Any plans for a new WW1-II version using the BoA II / AJE engine ?

[Jolly Roger]

Hi folks,

most recently I purchased WW1-( not gold) for low budget on Ebay. Have to say it´s definetely one of the best games I´ve ever seen.
What I really miss, is a feature for PBEM gaming. My first approach to this gaming system was Pax Romana, which I loved to play in spite of all the bugs resulting from untimely release.
Now I´d like to see WW 1 adjusted to the fantastic AJE engine.

Keep on the good work.

Cheers,

Klaus

[Random]

No idea but my guess would be that Matrix/Slitherine, having released Commander-The Great War not so very long ago is unlikely to revisit WW1 any time soon. While I think that CTGW is inferior to WW1G in every meaningful way that opinion is certainly not universal and the former seems to have a following.

All that said, as much as I enjoy the AGE Engine 2.0 or 3.0 (PON) I do not think that it makes a particularly good game system to replicate combat in WW1. Two of the great strengths of the WW1G combat system are:

Obstination; where the Player is forced by the rating of the Army Commander to fight repeated combat rounds often with few prospects for success and often long after common sense says to break off the attack. I can see no way to incorporate this into the AGE Engine because of the methodology behind the land combat routines; and

Employing Reserves; where interacting with the combat as it happens allows the Player to control which units are switched from the reserves to the front lines and vice-versa. With the AGE Engine this sort of action is handled automatically and almost invisibly as the combat plays out. It lies within the level of control that the real commanders had so the WW1G model works really well in this regard.

The AGE Engine does a superb job recreating situations with open flanks and smallish forces covering large areas and is demonstrably ideal for situations like the Seven-Years War, Russian and Spanish Civil Wars and ancient campaigns. It also does an excellent job recreating many of the problems with asymmetrical warfare as seen in PON but I do not think that it would do so well with World War One complete. It would however, be perfect for the entire 30-Years War, hint, hint...

Too bad you did not buy the Gold edition as by most accounts it is superior to the original in many respects plus there are some fixes and tweaks for the Gold version that are unlikely to work in the original game.

-C

[Jolly Roger]

Thanks, Random ! You are right, warfare in WW 1 is much different from other conflicts and AGEOD WW 1 is definetely an outstanding simulation.
Does anybody play WW 1 online games ? If yes, do they play on Gameranger, Hamachi, etc..?
The Gold version is already on my list, will get it sooner or later on Ebay.
Thanks again for your detailed comment.

Cheers, Klaus

[Shri]

Aside from OBSTITATION and RESERVES UTILISATION-

One extra thing provided by this game is unit distribution i.e. even GERMANY the strongest has weak units like MOBILISED and RESERVE and CAVALRY (it cannot disband them and gain manpower like HOI3 etc and make ELITE UNITS ONLY)

Also RUSSIA/BULGARIA/RUMANIA/OTTOMAN have a few strong units