17-09-2019 Forty-Third Field Report: Artillery Progress Update

[Fancy Sweetroll]

Field Report 43: Artillery Progress Update posted 17-9-2019 CLICK TO VIEW (https://warofrights.com/Fieldreport43)

[RhettVito]

This is badass!

[James Morgan]

This is so needed right now thank you

[Lord Drax]

Many thanks for keeping us in the loop! Full steam ahead!!!

[aurell]

So when can you expect to get your hands on the initial artillery release? We do not know yet but great advances are currently being made each day in order to ensure that the release isn’t too far off
What does not too far off mean? Can you give at least a rough estimation, like within days, weeks or months?

Sorry but i am getting really eager...

[Saris]

What does not too far off mean? Can you give at least a rough estimation, like within days, weeks or months?

Sorry but i am getting really eager...

Soon™

[TrustyJam]

What does not too far off mean? Can you give at least a rough estimation, like within days, weeks or months?

Sorry but i am getting really eager...

Sorry! We would have done so if possible. :)

What "not too far off" means is that we're seeing some pretty big advances being made almost daily currently.

- Trusty

[Dman979]

Asking this so Leifr doesn't have to.

Rifle pits on Burnside's Bridge when? ;D

Best,
Dman979

[TrustyJam]

Asking this so Leifr doesn't have to.

Rifle pits on Burnside's Bridge when? ;D

Best,
Dman979

Don't know. :D

- Trusty

[Leifr]

Asking this so Leifr doesn't have to.

Rifle pits on Burnside's Bridge when? ;D

Best,
Dman979

Hah! My thanks Dman.

Excellent work, I’m sure the time taken to implement artillery will be worth the wait. I assume also that it will open up more development time for some of the existing core systems.

[RhettVito]

How long will it take to load the cannon?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPRoCAqvs6o

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAwvUsC_Pvg&t=17s

[Kyle422]

Looks awesome cant wait!!

[TRaider]

Field Report 43: Artillery Progress Update posted 17-9-2019 CLICK TO VIEW (https://warofrights.com/Fieldreport43)

Looks amazing, great job CG team! Will the map boundaries open up at all with the addition of artillery?

[Dman979]

How will supression and formation systems work with artillery fire?

To me, this seems like a perfect opportunity to increase the suppression for being out of line and for skirmishers. When you're taking artillery fire, it's a terrifying experience, and you'll naturally want to be with your comrades. Unfortunately, there's a tendency among commanders to spread their troops out. If skirmishing and out of line penalties are increased (potentially dramatically), that might help leaders decide to keep their men in a formation, instead of in a skirmish line or spread out in a field.

I can predict that some people might say that increasing the penalties to skirmishers is unfair, and will punish them for playing the way their historical regiment did. That may be so, but I'm hard-pressed to come up with examples of unsupported skirmishers assaulting artillery during the Maryland campaign. If someone is able to give an example that's fine, but I don't think that skirmish lines should be encouraged to assault cannons. It doesn't make sense from a gameplay perspective, and would be more appropriate to a late war campaign.

Best,
Dman979

[Sox]

At this juncture I realise that I'm wasting my breath, but I BEG you to re-consider turning on friendly fire with artillery, trolls are bad enough with muskets, I shudder to think what they'll do with cannons.

[STOTS]

"I can predict that some people might say that increasing the penalties to skirmishers is unfair, and will punish them for playing the way their historical regiment did. That may be so, but I'm hard-pressed to come up with examples of unsupported skirmishers assaulting artillery during the Maryland campaign. If someone is able to give an example that's fine, but I don't think that skirmish lines should be encouraged to assault cannons. It doesn't make sense from a gameplay perspective, and would be more appropriate to a late war campaign."


Why would skirmishers assault artillery positions? It will be easy enough to shoot them down from long range.

[TrustyJam]

At this juncture I realise that I'm wasting my breath, but I BEG you to re-consider turning on friendly fire with artillery, trolls are bad enough with muskets, I shudder to think what they'll do with cannons.

As stated in th field report: The initial implementation of artillery will be with friendly fire turned off. Later on we will look into creating a dedicated team damage punishment system for it and will enable friendly fire from it when this is in place. :)

- Trusty

[Saris]

With the implementation of artillery into the game, i say it would be fair for infantry to be able to go prone but with the downside of not being able to fire, only be able to fire once but having to crouch or stand to reload, or a timer on how long they can be in the prone position. You could count whoever in prone as out of line or skirmishing.

[Dman979]

Why would skirmishers assault artillery positions? It will be easy enough to shoot them down from long range.

For that matter, why should regular infantry formations make suicidal bayonet charge all the time? It doesn't make sense, since you're able to hit targets at 300 yards or more. It would stand to reason that a team would take fewer casualties and have a more cohesive formation if they engaged at distance to significantly weaken the enemy before following up with a decisive charge, but we rarely see that happen in-game (be that public play or organized events).

I can think of plenty of reasons to assault a cannon- to stop its fire, because it's on a piece of the objective, if it's simply being a nuisance, etc.- but the default way to attack a position in the meta now is with a few seconds of fire, followed by a bayonet charge, so you spend as little time under enemy fire as possible. This mindset will inevitably find its way into attacking artillery: spread out to avoid shelling, fire for a bit, and then charge when the cannon is reloading. I don't think that's what the meta should be.

Assuming that we're looking to encourage Civil War tactics, my point is that you should be in a close formation when assaulting artillery. This is counterintuitive to modern thinking (why should we clump up when it makes us an easy target?), so there should be incentives for sticking together and punishment for spreading out. Ideally, players will try to stick together during a charge instead of spreading out, and I think the best way to do that is to reduce some effects of artillery when you're in formation and to magnify them significantly when you're skirmishing. Due to the limitations of the current formation system, that might mean some collateral affects when a skirmish line comes under artillery fire, but I think it's an acceptable tradeoff. If there's no penalties for taking artillery fire when skirmishing (or if the punishments aren't significant enough), then players will default to spreading out under a barrage or when assaulting a cannon.

I'm assuming that we're in agreement that most of the time, infantry should fight in a close formation. If you disagree with that, it's OK, but I didn't have the time to expand on why I think they should fight in close formations, and it's probably a subject for a different thread anyway. :)

Best,
Dman979

[SilverStaples]

Nice preview. :cool: Looking forward to the new features.

[STOTS]

Mcadams, this is Sexy, don't have my new signature done. I am talking about small groups of skirmishers attacking artillery positions. Also Zouave doctrine called for open order formations though not all Zouaves followed the doctrine in the war.

[Dman979]

Mcadams, this is Sexy, don't have my new signature done. I am talking about small groups of skirmishers attacking artillery positions.

Ah, fair enough. I think we're in agreement that skirmishers shouldn't attack artillery.


Also Zouave doctrine called for open order formations though not all Zouaves followed the doctrine in the war.

That's exactly the point. If you follow Zouave doctrine as a Zouave regiment, the game will still think that you're acting as skirmishers, and will deal out bonuses and punishments accordingly. If you want to get the best bonuses and avoid the penalties, you'd need to adopt a closer formation than your historical regiment's doctrine calls for. I'd argue that's an acceptable limitation, since the majority of the units during the Maryland Campaign were not Zouaves. If it was possible to code in exceptions for every historical reference, that would be incredible, but the developers have a limited bandwidth and should focus on code that works for the majority of situations before focusing on the exceptions.

Best,
Dman979

[Cairnsy44]

As a sharpshooter, though, these often WERE our targets. These penalties you suggest would probably render us a little useless. I know, I know...I just opened myself up for a slam....

[Saxon21]

Looks awesome can't wait.

[Poorlaggedman]

It looks pretty but there's so many questions when it comes to artillery which will effect the way they work in game.

Will they be able to melee? Will they have any ranged defense ability or sidearms other than the pieces themselves? I see the officer has a pistol and the other redlegs appear to have handspikes or bayonets. If they can defend themselves will they be able to physically leave their batteries? Are we going to have artillery officers running around with sidearms with the infantry? If they can't defend themselves well and they can't run, what's to stop lone enemy from chasing them down?

I foresee a lot of gunners loading, falling back to hide from musket fire, then running forward to pull the lanyard; assuming the process can be interrupted. You might have one crew load a whole bunch of guns, face them around, then sit low and wait, denying the enemy of even having a fair target until the artilleryists show themselves. Unless the number of guns on the field was reduced or changed from what the prop guns amount to, any reasonable artillery guys would do exactly that, load all the pieces and run from one to another. Whereas in real life those guns are hugely valuable and a humiliation to lose, in the game are they going to matter much to lose? Will counter battery fire ever be able to disable enemy pieces or shatter equipment?

The potential invulnerability of an unattended artillery battery (aside from the members being shot) seems quite unfair from an infantry perspective bearing no horses to kill. An artillery battery would seldom let the enemy overrun it. The damage to the horses and equipment should count into the victory conditions IMO. That further complicates the action if unused artillery batteries were still present and could take losses in any of that. So perhaps any penalties against the team morale system would be against artillery members getting killed? Which would only make them more favorable of a target and a potential liability and distraction for teams trying to have an infantry battle but getting punished for their gunners shoddy performance.

I don't like to see expansion of desertion penalties and I haven't taken the time to really think on this until I see what comes out first. I'd gladly trade whatever artillery brings to get rid of those random artillery barrages though. Or let us turn them off like the weather.

The hit detection around current artillery and the associated caissons can be quite wonky. Just last night I was standing behind a 3-inch gun on Piper Farm standing and reloading with a small group of skirmishers against a solid enemy line. I was the only one standing and I got off 4 shots before getting killed when probably half the enemy firepower was directed at me and the guys kneeling around the gun with me. That's not a unique experience as others might attest.

As far as I'm aware this is the first instance of props which can block a bullet being able to move (aside from a door). What about other props, buildings, walls, etc? Will a bolt or a shell be able to bash through a building or a fence?

Also skirmishers were definitely the method of assaulting artillery batteries unless an enemy infantry formation was present. If the battery is alone there's tons of examples of them being targeted and assaulted by skirmishers. If it didn't happen at Antietam that's because there were many times the number of soldiers as we have players in the same sized-area. With the size of frontage the ~75 player teams can present you could never simulate that infantry screen.

[A. P. Hill]

Always a ray of sunshine with you.

Again, this is a work in progress. It's still Alpha.

Of course everything has not been addressed at this time, be sure. But all your worries are for nothing.

[TRaider]

Awesome addition for sure! The maps are already too restricted without artillery and with the addition of artillery that will have an estimated range between 1,500 to 2,800 yards if it's going to be historically accurate it will turn the map into a kill box. Would it be possible just to allow both sides to have the same boundaries so at least we can introduce new tactics and have some more freedom of movement. Thanks for your consideration!

[Dutchconfederate]

Looking forward to turn the map into a kill box

[TRaider]

Looking forward to turn the map into a kill box

Hahaha! I'm sure you are but fear not Wolcott's Battery will return your favor in kind.

[Dutchconfederate]

Hahaha! I'm sure you are but fear not Wolcott's Battery will return your favor in kind.

Looking forward to some fierce artillery battles with you all

[Poorlaggedman]

Again, this is a work in progress. It's still Alpha.
The rate of development being slow and steady strongly compels me to bring concerns out up front when it comes to fundamental issues. I see a real danger of 'out of line' becoming 'you are about to desert' for infantry as a quick fix to artillery being constantly harassed by lone enemy players or to other problems arising.

With trolls, yikes. So much they can do as someone pointed out already with artillery. As soon as friendly fire is turned on again post-artillery (as it should be) you have an easy #1 way to troll: standing in front of the barrel of your own side's guns. How is that going to be stopped? I don't have an answer but I'm willing to bet it'd be worth some thought to prevent it and if I don't bring it up it seems everyone takes a 'wait and see' approach for everything.

Perhaps give a way for artillery crew to voice command yell at infantry (or other crew) to GTFO the way and then the infantry nearby who are in the path of the barrel or just in the immediate proximity are given a warning on their screen and if they don't move after a couple seconds the gunners are not held liable for the TK. Just an idea.

[Oleander]

https://i.redd.it/vmuly1vdjeb01.jpg

[Sally]

Awesome, love the breakdown of the different mechanics too!

[Mark L. E. E. Smith]

Perhaps give a way for artillery crew to voice command yell at infantry (or other crew) to GTFO the way and then the infantry nearby who are in the path of the barrel or just in the immediate proximity are given a warning on their screen and if they don't move after a couple seconds the gunners are not held liable for the TK. Just an idea.

Good idea. Give each piece a radius where tk's don't count and are written off as infantry error/death by misadventure.

Another idea is to make each gun cause suppression to non-artillerymen from either side within a certain distance. A bit like the circle of fear from the melee improvement thread. Designed to make the arty guns terrifying to standard infantry. Neither idea would stop idiots approaching, but it would make it a ball-ache for them to try it.

[TrustyJam]

Good idea. Give each piece a radius where tk's don't count and are written off as infantry error/death by misadventure.



It is an interesting idea - I can see it being potentially exploitable, however. If you push back a cannon to the main spawn of the infantry and load it up with canister you'll be able to kill a lot of teammates without triggering any friendly fire punishment action as they will not count towards this, being in close proximity to the cannon.

Another (somewhat more gamey solution, I'll give you that) is to allow the shell to always pass through friendlies in close proximity to the cannon. Super heavy suppression will of course still be happening.

- Trusty

[Oleander]

Let's not nerf the stuff before it even makes it into game. There needs to be some sense of danger associated with this, it will require coordination between arty and infantry as far as attacks. It shouldn't be batteries firing away at random targets, you know team work in a game that requires team work.

One feature that may be useful is the ability for server admins to lock out the artillery class, that way if you want to have an infantry only match you can or if you have trolls hogging the guns you can just make it where they can't respawn.

[Mark L. E. E. Smith]

It is an interesting idea - I can see it being potentially exploitable, however. If you push back a cannon to the main spawn of the infantry and load it up with canister you'll be able to kill a lot of teammates without triggering any friendly fire punishment action as they will not count towards this, being in close proximity to the cannon.
- Trusty

Yeah that would be unfortunate. Would it be possible to paint areas of the map where the guns can't be moved to, or areas they can't target? For example, the areas which are out of bounds to the opposition in theory wouldn't need to be fired into - thereby stopping the player also firing into the friendly infantry main spawn. Or perhaps only activating the tk penalties if the cannon is in or facing towards such areas?

[Poorlaggedman]

It's not in yet but I think it's a good idea to contemplate the problems before they arise. The easier it is for the game to function without admins the better. It really isn't that far-fetched to imagine friendly players wanting to stand in front of the barrel to intentionally be TK'd whether specifically malicious trolling or not. Without an admin present to stop that a single troll could severely frustrate all the artillery players. It's also not a stretch to imagine an artillery player targeting friendlies intentionally and you don't want to make that any easier to do without at least an autoban.



One feature that may be useful is the ability for server admins to lock out the artillery class, that way if you want to have an infantry only match you can or if you have trolls hogging the guns you can just make it where they can't respawn.Yes, definitely. I'd like to see the ability to remove the artillery roles from the server as well, in similar fashion to how you can monkey with the regiments which spawn in for each scenario.

Also an option to turn off the random artillery, like we can turn off the weather

[[1st Cav] Shifty]

Very sorry if this question has already been answered but will there be a certain amount of ammunition for artillery, possibly making people or officers think when and when not to use artillery so not to waste it so it doesn't get spammed.

Regards,

Shifty

[A. P. Hill]

Artillery is modeled with the exact loadout of ammunition in the ammo chests for the particular gun.

In this case : 6lb and 3 inch varity, 50 rounds, 12 Pdr 32. Etc.

[A. P. Hill]

The information for artillery is freely offered online - All one has to do is look and read. :)

[Spud]

I'm assuming that the different artillery pieces will have different ballistics and projectiles, so say the rifles won’t be as effective with cannister as the smoothbores (or even very limited use of cannister to avoid messing up the rifling)? Probably didn’t need to ask this since you guys have done a very detailed job with the other elements of the game! But as an artillery re-enactor I’m looking forward to this update.

[Oleander]

Will artillery be in game before the end of this year?

[McMuffin]

Will artillery be in game before the end of this year?

In addition, will it be a notable priority in fixing/maintaning/updating or will other things come before it?

[TrustyJam]

I'm assuming that the different artillery pieces will have different ballistics and projectiles, so say the rifles won’t be as effective with cannister as the smoothbores (or even very limited use of cannister to avoid messing up the rifling)? Probably didn’t need to ask this since you guys have done a very detailed job with the other elements of the game! But as an artillery re-enactor I’m looking forward to this update.

Yes there will be different ballistics and projectiles based on what kind of cannon you're using. Currently, however we're focusing on getting the 3-inch ordinance game ready. :)


Will artillery be in game before the end of this year?

We hope so but no guarantees!


In addition, will it be a notable priority in fixing/maintaning/updating or will other things come before it?

I'd be extremely surprised if the initial implementation of artillery didn't require quite a bit of fixes. :)

- Trusty

[Spud]

Yes there will be different ballistics and projectiles based on what kind of cannon you're using. Currently, however we're focusing on getting the 3-inch ordinance game ready. :)

- Trusty

Thank you, I'll keep my thumb stall ready...

[Oleander]

11509

[Dutchconfederate]

december is almost upon us any view on the artillery progress will we see that before the year ends?

[TrustyJam]

december is almost upon us any view on the artillery progress will we see that before the year ends?

We don't know yet. This week we've been seeing a major programming related blocker related to the proxy of the cannon when pushed resolved so progress is being made.

We might end up releasing a more detailed status report to you all if the initial artillery release is not ready at the end of the year. :)

- Trusty

[Dutchconfederate]

Good to know you have solved a large issue and thanks for your reply, hope we can try out the Artillery this year but yes a detailed status, if a release is not reachable, is also welcomed.

[LeFuret]

It sure would be a very nice Christmas gift :)

[A. P. Hill]

You don't rush perfection! ;)

(not saying the release of artillery will be perfect … all new stuff has kinks to work out … )

[LaBelle]

We don't know yet. This week we've been seeing a major programming related blocker related to the proxy of the cannon when pushed resolved so progress is being made.

We might end up releasing a more detailed status report to you all if the initial artillery release is not ready at the end of the year. :)

- Trusty

Ah, so you're prepping us for the inevitable announcement that it's not coming out this year? ;)

[TrustyJam]

Ah, so you're prepping us for the inevitable announcement that it's not coming out this year? ;)

Not really. :) We understand the hype for the arty release and thus we think a status update at the end of the year if it isn’t out then should be considered.

Mike, our programmer is now down to the last of the release blocking issues related to the programming aspect of the initial implementation of artillery which we found during the first internal tests by the way. That of course doesn’t mean that more issues can’t come to light in later tests.

- Trusty

[LeFuret]

thx for the update Trusty!! Just a shame we always have to "draw it out" from you guys xD! Go Mike, go! You can do it!!!

[SwingKid148]

We will certainly assist in a test case for artillery and 200 player servers. ;)

[Warboy]

We will certainly assist in a test case for artillery and 200 player servers. ;)

I think everyone would Emerson :p

[SwingKid148]

I think everyone would Emerson :p

Hey, we got some time over this Thanksgiving break here, so thought I would offer our services. :cool:

https://i.imgflip.com/3hr52d.jpg (https://imgflip.com/i/3hr52d)

[LaBelle]

Hey, we got some time over this Thanksgiving break here, so thought I would offer our services. :cool:

https://i.imgflip.com/3hr52d.jpg (https://imgflip.com/i/3hr52d)

Seconded!

[RhettVito]

Hey, we got some time over this Thanksgiving break here, so thought I would offer our services. :cool:

https://i.imgflip.com/3hr52d.jpg (https://imgflip.com/i/3hr52d)

yes please

[Oleander]

Any update?

[McMuffin]

Any update?

Yeah at this point, it'd be nice to just have a report of the state of the game, the state of artillery, where you want to go with the game. Do we have to keep guessing and speculating with the little information given?

Come to think of it, why has it been so hard over the years to get information?

[TrustyJam]

We don't know yet. This week we've been seeing a major programming related blocker related to the proxy of the cannon when pushed resolved so progress is being made.

We might end up releasing a more detailed status report to you all if the initial artillery release is not ready at the end of the year. :)

- Trusty

As I stated a few weeks ago, progress is being made. We’re probably at a point now where there’ll be no more updates until the initial release of artillery.

We’ll give a more detailed status report by the end of the year if its not out by then.


Yeah at this point, it'd be nice to just have a report of the state of the game, the state of artillery, where you want to go with the game. Do we have to keep guessing and speculating with the little information given?

Come to think of it, why has it been so hard over the years to get information?

Because we are very careful with what information we put out there. We don’t want to hype everybody up about early prototypes (or even just early talks/designs) that might never make it into the game. It’s also why we’ve never mentioned a player cap number as being our target or given hard release dates for features well in advance.

Lastly, it is also partially because we don’t have a community manager/PR manager as we’re a small studio and would rather spend the money on developing the game.

- Trusty

[McMuffin]

As I stated a few weeks ago, progress is being made. We’re probably at a point now where there’ll be no more updates until the initial release of artillery.

We’ll give a more detailed status report by the end of the year if its not out by then.



Because we are very careful with what information we put out there. We don’t want to hype everybody up about early prototypes (or even just early talks/designs) that might never make it into the game. It’s also why we’ve never mentioned a player cap number as being our target or given hard release dates for features well in advance.

Lastly, it is also partially because we don’t have a community manager/PR manager as we’re a small studio and would rather spend the money on developing the game.

- Trusty

I think most people will understand if you very explicitly say something is a prototype or early design or concept, it's subject to change. Plus, if it's a prototype/early design/concept, why not ask 'Hey we're working on this, what do you all think?', granted not everything has to be posted. Things are just kinda added without even bothering to really pitch it to anybody, even when before Early Access when we were supposedly testers who's results were often ignored or 10000 reasons were given why to ignore what the entire community says. Hard release dates are understandably not given out, I don't like those being given either as they are seldom met by most people anywhere in life.

I hope a new year ushers better communication.

[TrustyJam]

I think most people will understand if you very explicitly say something is a prototype or early design or concept, it's subject to change. Plus, if it's a prototype/early design/concept, why not ask 'Hey we're working on this, what do you all think?', granted not everything has to be posted. Things are just kinda added without even bothering to really pitch it to anybody, even when before Early Access when we were supposedly testers who's results were often ignored or 10000 reasons were given why to ignore what the entire community says. Hard release dates are understandably not given out, I don't like those being given either as they are seldom met by most people anywhere in life.

I hope a new year ushers better communication.

Thanks for the feedback.

I’m sorry to hear that you feel your feedback has been ignored throughout the development of the game.

I don’t think there’s a single of the 165 alpha updates that does not include fixes of either highlighted or directly reported issues by the community - feedback is everything when developing a publically available alpha - it’s practically impossible to make any kind of progress without it so we’re thankful for the help of everyone spending time testing or simply playing the alpha as it does help out. :)

- Trusty

[Poorlaggedman]

I think there's a balance between a community that can only wildly speculate and one that's disappointed with things falling through. I do recall a post that said we'd have 200 person server upgrades within a few weeks last Spring. In that case it obviously both fell through (waiting to coincide with artillery) and left people to wildly thrash about in the dark speculating when changes will occur and what they'll be like. Perhaps if the game has generated enough income to continue development for years, as has been said previously, then some more folks should be hired. I'm not saying the rate of development is anything uniquely slow among crowd-funded games but that it is definitely slow and I would think continued success would pay dividends.

Also everyone is pretty much in the dark about how artillery will function just in principle. Obviously the shooty end fires. How the game will endeavor to keep gunners at their post, how they'll be able to defend themselves, how much freedom of movement they'll get, how the game will try and make the teamwork required to operate them work? (Can a player run off with a ramrod or is it fixed with the gun?). It's not like there's a parallel dev team working on another intriguing project at the moment although if the pace continues for five more years like this then there will be. We know the projectiles won't harm friendlies, the guns move and can be aimed, and 3 inch ordinance guns will be the first out. That's about it.

[McMuffin]

Thanks for the feedback.

I’m sorry to hear that you feel your feedback has been ignored throughout the development of the game.

I don’t think there’s a single of the 165 alpha updates that does not include fixes of either highlighted or directly reported issues by the community - feedback is everything when developing a publically available alpha - it’s practically impossible to make any kind of progress without it so we’re thankful for the help of everyone spending time testing or simply playing the alpha as it does help out. :)

- Trusty

I never said that bugs went unfixed, I was talking about the fact that mechanics are never hinted at, never pitched to the community for any feedback, in fact, feedback is very rarely asked for when it comes to things that make the game a game. What feedback we do provide, from what I remember when I was far more active on the forums some months ago, was mostly for naught save for 'Thanks for feedback, we'll think about it.'

Why did sound options take an eternity? Excellent question that was asked for years, did we ever really get an answer? Nope, instead it became a meme when we saw new game mechanics and code rewrites come before sound options. Maybe you all had a reason for it that was very valid, but we would never know that because you never tell us anything. Instead, we have to speculate, we constantly have to speculate.

I feel like it's strange to just add things to the game that could potentially change the game a lot but not even tell the community how you're thinking it may work? I'm not even talking about just artillery, this could be applied to any game mechanic you all may add. Do we seriously have to go through this silly dance and forum argument to try and convince you that what the entire community wants, like I am doing right now and what countless people have asked for, should maybe get some consideration?

Come on man, we're not asking for Star Citizen's PR and community management. Would it be too hard to maybe once every 2-3 weeks take maybe 30 minutes at max and say 'Hey, here's where things are going, here's what issues we have, etc'. If things are status quo and not much has changed, great, tell us, we'll get it, easy post for you. You have a devoted community who deserves to know more about a project that many of us have stayed with for years.

[Dane Karlsen]

I too would like more updates and information. At the same time I do understand why the devs are taking the aproach they do. And would argue that they clearly listens to the community, Picket patrol, last stand vs final push . And now the updated version. Clearly inspired from the many debates in the community - Just not allways in direct interaction with the community. Why I have no doubt that arty will be in our spirit. But as I said, I too would like more info.

Campfire games are situated in DK(<3), so have you guys thought about getting a trainee. I am sure there a alot outthere that would rather learn at your company, and this community, than with BT or Ekstrabladet. I think those poor sods come more or less for free, or taxpayer funded as it where.

[Bravescot]

I have always been a strong supporter of the Dev team since I joined. Even with out disagreements, I've defended your choices. Now....I would put myself strongly in the anti-Dev camp. I'm glad I can't play War of Rights right now due to being in Japan. I lost any joy I had in the game knowing no matter what was said the Devs didn't care. What joy is there to be had when you have no clue what's to come next and what you currently have stinks.

McMuffin is correct. If feed back is not heard and appropriatly acted upon. People are crashing out hard and it's going to take Arty to bring them back. If Arty is poorly thought through and the game player is no fun, then it might be GG. You need to give the community more news and spike more interest. You can't just hide behind a locked door claiming shadows will steel your ideas and people will be pitchforks and torches 24/7. A week or even monthly update of any form would go SO far.

You guys don't have a community manager anymore after the loss of Hinkel? Then get create in thinking of how to find a new one. Most people in this community would be your community manager for free if asked I'm sure of it. People are that pationate about War of Rights as a community. You guys have the "Fighting Men of War of Rights" once, that vanished. George's Battefield Tours feel through! There were great little things to just keep people knowing there was still something going on. Utter silence for ages then "Boom we go this and we don't care what you think we like it so therefor it's good" has worn thin on so many people. Reach out to the community for someone! You've done it before why not do it again?

[brentcarter]

When did you ever had a community manager?

[Bravescot]

When did you ever had a community manager?

It was Hinkel.

[LeFuret]

I agree with you all. I mean, it's way easier to be told to wait (years) when you know what is coming on. A little sneak peak or summary every week or two would be great. And for ONCE I must agree with PLM. If you have the kind of money to develop the game for many more years, why not try hiring more people in your team and speeding-up the process? If you can't afford to hire more people, just tell us.

This game is unique, it's a niche game and therefore your community is very loyal and passionate about it. We are not bots either: we understand that this is alpha state, that is why we would not mind any problem in early builds. Don't be scared to show us new things and to let us try them. One day, most of us will grow tired of waiting. The more we wait without real pieces of news, the more we speculate. The more we speculate, the more disappointed we could get after a new release.

Anyway, another rock thrown into the ocean.

Don't get me wrong, i'm not crapping on your boots here. I'm just trying to express myself (and english is not my mother tongue)

[TrustyJam]

Thank you all for your feedback.

We will try to do better (we always are trying to).

Yes, Hinkel held the Community Manager in title, not as an actual job. It was a leftover special forum title from the the very early days when he joined the crew back in like 2013 or 2014 where he took a good part of his mod comunity with him and thus thought it was a good idea to also act as the official community manager of the game. We've never had a hired, full time (or part time) community manager.

This is from the field reporting regarding what sort of artillery features we're currently working on as well as what features we would like to work on in the future:

The very first artillery implementation which we’re quickly headed towards will be a work in progress (as most if not all things in an alpha are) and will thus feature both limited game mechanics as well as a lot of new exciting bugs for you to enjoy.
That being said, it will feature the core mechanics of functional artillery:
Different artillery classes with different tools and weaponry.
Unlimited artillery crew slots - if a team wishes to use all available battery pieces (or none) they can do so.
Pushable cannons (by wheels) by two players at once.
Ammunition and powder pickups from limbers.
Different types of loads (such as explosive shell and canister shot).
Horizontal aiming adjustments by lifting the tailspike of the cannon.
Vertical aiming adjustments by turning the elevation screw of the cannon.
Firing by fixing a lanyard to a primer and pulling it.
Recoil from firing will require the cannon to be pushed back to its initial position in order to maintain accurate fire.
Pushable limbers in order to make sure that the supply for the cannon can be moved with it should it be deemed a good idea to relocate the gun.
Here’s a short list of some of the things we’ll be looking to bring to the artillery system in later released iterations:
Artillery specific team damage punishment system (the first release of artillery will have friendly fire turned off).
Chance of normal and catastrophical misfires without proper maintenance of the cannon.
Dry sponge & worm tools for properly clearing stuck embers after firing.
Chance of explosion when hitting the limbers.
Chance of explosion when hitting the shell while it is being carried over to the gun for loading.
Vent hole plugging step while loading.
Fence destruction.
Horse drawn artillery.



Here's me going into details about the counter-attack mechanic design, the latest major addition to the gamemode several months before it was ready to be released, giving you direct access to our design doc which was thought up and created largely because of your feedback - as was the picket patrol mode earlier: https://www.warofrightsforum.com/showthread.php?6318-Dear-developers-A-collection-of-community-suggestions&p=97691&viewfull=1#post97691

We do try to inform you of what we are working on - and I see several of you that feel the development is going too slow (as well as those that feel we should communicate more with you).

The question is if you would rather have more communication but less actual content (the money spent on a community manager's full time position can only be spent once). This will also mean that the communication that is indeed put forward will be largely filler based (one can only say "we're developing artillery" in so many interesting ways).

I see some of you ask for George videos and The Fighting Men of War of Rights ones too. While they did contain historical information, they were more PR videos than anything else (containing little to no game development related content).

We're not witholding any information from you that is super awesome and just about to drop or anything of the sort and we're most certainly not afraid of people stealing our ideas (or we wouldn't put out design docs months in advance even of their implementation).

As I feel like the two posts as of late I have made in relation to the status of artillery isn't what you're looking for I would like to ask you what kind of updates you would like to get from us.

I'm sorry to see there's now being spoken of an "Anti-dev camp". That is not a good starting point for dialogue at all I think.

- Trusty

[TrustyJam]

Here's a bit of an experiment.

Would you like screenshots such as this posted?

The screenshots below are directly from two of our dev branches showing the commits we've made since the last alpha update two weeks ago. The overall asset branch (Assets) and the overall code branch (WarofRights):

https://www.warofrightsforum.com/images/Code.jpg (https://www.warofrightsforum.com/images/Code.jpg)

https://www.warofrightsforum.com/images/Assets.jpg (https://www.warofrightsforum.com/images/Assets.jpg)

I don't think it's possible to get a more unfiltered look into what we're doing.

- Trusty

[TRaider]

Would it be possible just to throw up a test server up that has all the W.I.P. buggy stuff on it so we can still get our hands on new stuff even if we will experience issues? If you make it clear what it is I don't think people will have a problem with it and it will give your dedicated community something to get their hands on while they wait for progress. Just a thought or maybe just give us that open drill camp map with both Union and Rebs so we can have at it on an open map (Sandbox Mode). We need something to keep us coming back while we wait for what is understandably a very slow process. Thank you!

[TrustyJam]

Would it be possible just to throw up a test server up that has all the W.I.P. buggy stuff on it so we can still get our hands on new stuff even if we will experience issues? If you make it clear what it is I don't think people will have a problem with it and it will give your dedicated community something to get their hands on while they wait for progress. Just a thought or maybe just give us that open drill camp map with both Union and Rebs so we can have at it on an open map (Sandbox Mode). We need something to keep us coming back while we wait for what is understandably a very slow process. Thank you!

Thank you for the suggestion. :)

We don't think it's a good idea to have, effectively, two alpha branches running at the same time. Not only can this cause a lot of developmental issues issues down the line (merging the branches) it will also drastically increase the amount of time we spend on replying to reports about broken features which we're already aware of (hence it not being release ready in the first place) it will also split the community in two: those who play on the WIP branch and those who play on the live branch. We don't think our community is big enough for that to be a wise thing to do.

That being said, such secondary branches work very well for time limited, focused tests (which we expect to be running on the artillery implementation when it is test ready prior to a live build release).

I realize that many of you want to get your hands on the WIP features before they are ready for a broader public release - the days of us adding something that is extremely early in its development cycle to the actual live build of the game are over, however (if we can avoid it that is).

Many early access users expect to get fully working (and also very polished) game updates to what they often consider finished games, not alphas ( their train of thought being something like: publically available via steam = released game = if not finished, then at the very least extremely well developed game).

We will of course consider doing more focused tests (the guy who mentioned that we promised 200 players is wrong by the way - the 200 player tests were just that - focused tests) depending on how well the WIP arty test branch turns out in terms of feedback and bug catching. :)

- Trusty

[McMuffin]

Here's a bit of an experiment.

Would you like screenshots such as this posted?

The screenshots below are directly from two of our dev branches showing the commits we've made since the last alpha update two weeks ago. The overall asset branch (Assets) and the overall code branch (WarofRights):

https://www.warofrightsforum.com/images/Code.jpg (https://www.warofrightsforum.com/images/Code.jpg)

https://www.warofrightsforum.com/images/Assets.jpg (https://www.warofrightsforum.com/images/Assets.jpg)

I don't think it's possible to get a more unfiltered look into what we're doing.

- Trusty

Having that is far better, but I think plenty of people would still be wondering “Well does this mean, is progress is good, slow, do they have issues, etc” so you could have a very brief post giving a status update of the major stuff as well as that.

[TrustyJam]

Having that is far better, but I think plenty of people would still be wondering “Well does this mean, is progress is good, slow, do they have issues, etc” so you could have a very brief post giving a status update of the major stuff as well as that.

Thanks for the feedback.

If the progress is good or bad is a bit of an interpretation thing so kind of hard to give such an answer.

Progress is good if one considers daily improvements to be good progress. Progress is not good if one considers good progress to mean "we're ready to release arty within a few days". Issues is a tough one to pinpoint objectively as well. Most if not all commits will have run into one issue or another, some very minor ones, some very large ones as game development is hugely based on issue solving. These are overcome/worked around of before the commit is pushed to the branch.

We obviously have several major alpha-related issues (such as servers mass booting players), some of which we have spent close to a year's worth of full time working on (rewritten how the server is handling connections), but there's more often than not no major stopping issues when developing new features and so we can't list them. There will be annoying ones for a few hours or possibly days or in extreme cases weeks (those are rare). The major issues of new features tend to show themselves during broader testing (where you'll all become aware of them as you'll be the ones primarily triggering them for us to see and fix).

The above screenshots give you an unfiltered insight of what goes into each patch (but not the actual challenges/issues faced before being able to push a single commit to the branch - this is impossible as we'd have to ask each employee to write a short essay of their entire process from design to implementation to internal testing to revisions which would require a huge amount of time). Whether or not the time required to get the patch out to you is worth it is something you will have to decide when the patch is released for testing.

- Trusty

[Oleander]

Those screenshots are good insight since we can at least see what progress has been made. Just from what I can see, artillery is in the final phase before release and it looks like there are some more terrain texture improvements in the works.

As for additional info, the short list of things I think most of us have pertaining to artillery are:

-Bare minimum numbers to man a gun
-Are implements position specific or can anyone in artillery class use them
-Are implements tied to a specific gun
-Are you only able to pull ammo from the limber attached to your gun
-Are you only able to use a gun tied to your specific unit
-What maps will have playable artillery ( I know the screenshot shows all maps on Harper's and SM will have arty positions, but what about Antietam)
-Are the cannon locations in game where they will be on release
-Since we will only be able to use 3 inch rifles upon initial release, will there only be one or two available for use based on current cannons in game per map
-Can any arty class role work any position on the gun, i.e. a cannoneer working as a gunner, and can you swap implements at will

I know it takes time to sit down and answer questions, and that time can be dedicated to development. We are just a little in the dark in terms of what we should be anticipating. I think I speak for most people in saying we are trying to plan for the release so we can utilize the time spent in testing more efficiently. Most units will be using their line grunts as artillery so having an understanding of how this will work and how many they should plan to dedicate to it is pretty crucial.

As far as updates, I don't think anyone is asking for an essay on what was done. Just quick notes on what has been accomplished, similar to what you've shown in the screenshots. It doesn't have to be a major list, just quick points saying we're close to an update or we've hit a snag and it will be a bit longer.

[TrustyJam]

The information below is all subject to change.


-Bare minimum numbers to man a gun

1

-Are implements position specific or can anyone in artillery class use them

Anyone that is an artillery crew can use them.

-Are implements tied to a specific gun

No.

-Are you only able to pull ammo from the limber attached to your gun

No.

-Are you only able to use a gun tied to your specific unit

No.

-What maps will have playable artillery ( I know the screenshot shows all maps on Harper's and SM will have arty positions, but what about Antietam)

The skirmish areas where there was artillery engaged or at the very least close to, if not inside the current skirmish area bounds will feature artillery at their historical positions: not only area specific but also time specific (a certain battery may be at one position during the dunker church skirmish and later nowhere to be found on cooke's countercharge which takes place on the same ground but at a later point in time for instance). Not all skirmish areas of Harpers Ferry or South Mountain (the "all" in the commit refers to all skirmish areas actually to feature artillery) or Antietam will feature artillery.

The more loosly histocially based skirmish areas will feature artillery where it makes sense from a level perspective.

-Are the cannon locations in game where they will be on release

Some are but a lot aren't.

-Since we will only be able to use 3 inch rifles upon initial release, will there only be one or two available for use based on current cannons in game per map

No, the game will feature as many cannons as if we had all versions in-game. The 3 inch'ers which we're starting with will be replaced as more and more cannons are introduced.

-Can any arty class role work any position on the gun, i.e. a cannoneer working as a gunner, and can you swap implements at will

Yes.

- Trusty

[Oleander]

Awesome, thanks!

One other thing I forgot to ask is if limbers can be moved as well.

[Hinkel]

Awesome, thanks!

One other thing I forgot to ask is if limbers can be moved as well.

Yes, you can move them :)

[McMuffin]

See, look at that, it’s stuff like that post you had above and the unfiltered look in that we appreciate immense amounts. We’ve been asking those questions about artillery for a while and it’s good to finally get them and I hope this continues.

Also for that bare minimum number, I’m assuming that one person means, if someone wanted to, they could eventually get all the tasks done, like in real life. However, for the average gun at normal operations what is the number?

[Maximus Decimus Meridius]

Thank you all for your feedback.

We will try to do better (we always are trying to).

Yes, Hinkel held the Community Manager in title, not as an actual job. It was a leftover special forum title from the the very early days when he joined the crew back in like 2013 or 2014 where he took a good part of his mod comunity with him and thus thought it was a good idea to also act as the official community manager of the game. We've never had a hired, full time (or part time) community manager.

This is from the field reporting regarding what sort of artillery features we're currently working on as well as what features we would like to work on in the future:

The very first artillery implementation which we’re quickly headed towards will be a work in progress (as most if not all things in an alpha are) and will thus feature both limited game mechanics as well as a lot of new exciting bugs for you to enjoy.
That being said, it will feature the core mechanics of functional artillery:
Different artillery classes with different tools and weaponry.
Unlimited artillery crew slots - if a team wishes to use all available battery pieces (or none) they can do so.
Pushable cannons (by wheels) by two players at once.
Ammunition and powder pickups from limbers.
Different types of loads (such as explosive shell and canister shot).
Horizontal aiming adjustments by lifting the tailspike of the cannon.
Vertical aiming adjustments by turning the elevation screw of the cannon.
Firing by fixing a lanyard to a primer and pulling it.
Recoil from firing will require the cannon to be pushed back to its initial position in order to maintain accurate fire.
Pushable limbers in order to make sure that the supply for the cannon can be moved with it should it be deemed a good idea to relocate the gun.
Here’s a short list of some of the things we’ll be looking to bring to the artillery system in later released iterations:
Artillery specific team damage punishment system (the first release of artillery will have friendly fire turned off).
Chance of normal and catastrophical misfires without proper maintenance of the cannon.
Dry sponge & worm tools for properly clearing stuck embers after firing.
Chance of explosion when hitting the limbers.
Chance of explosion when hitting the shell while it is being carried over to the gun for loading.
Vent hole plugging step while loading.
Fence destruction.
Horse drawn artillery.



Here's me going into details about the counter-attack mechanic design, the latest major addition to the gamemode several months before it was ready to be released, giving you direct access to our design doc which was thought up and created largely because of your feedback - as was the picket patrol mode earlier: https://www.warofrightsforum.com/showthread.php?6318-Dear-developers-A-collection-of-community-suggestions&p=97691&viewfull=1#post97691

We do try to inform you of what we are working on - and I see several of you that feel the development is going too slow (as well as those that feel we should communicate more with you).

The question is if you would rather have more communication but less actual content (the money spent on a community manager's full time position can only be spent once). This will also mean that the communication that is indeed put forward will be largely filler based (one can only say "we're developing artillery" in so many interesting ways).

I see some of you ask for George videos and The Fighting Men of War of Rights ones too. While they did contain historical information, they were more PR videos than anything else (containing little to no game development related content).

We're not witholding any information from you that is super awesome and just about to drop or anything of the sort and we're most certainly not afraid of people stealing our ideas (or we wouldn't put out design docs months in advance even of their implementation).

As I feel like the two posts as of late I have made in relation to the status of artillery isn't what you're looking for I would like to ask you what kind of updates you would like to get from us.

I'm sorry to see there's now being spoken of an "Anti-dev camp". That is not a good starting point for dialogue at all I think.

- Trusty

First of all i would like to thank Trusty for sharing your screenshots (from sourcetree?) there are some very interesting changes there. can you tell me which colors are which branch and what is the trunk? just to get a feeling about your progress. (SVN looks a bit different ^^)
From my point of view you could share such screens more often. I will "translate" them and can tell our Community "TGV" whats going on. that will make a lot guys happy.

second i cant support the thesis that the dev team isnt listening to our feedback. This Thread (https://www.warofrightsforum.com/showthread.php?6318-Dear-developers-A-collection-of-community-suggestions&p=97691&viewfull=1#post97691) shows that the dev team listen to feedback and some points of our list made it to the game. Thats great and it animates our guys to do such feedback rounds again. maybe after Artillery release, but we will see.


But i would like the idea of small update video maybe every 2 weeks? just show your versioning software, highlight some of your more interesting commits and tell us 2 or 3 sentences about it. If you have a screenshot you could show it. Just a small headsup. no need to be longer than 5 minutes.

We also like the Videos from Fancy :D


Another Idea, maybe nothing for you guys, since you all tend to be a bit quiet ( :D ) and I may suggested it once:

A 3rd Party Dev from DCS: World made 2 livestreams where he did some live debugging. Code was blurred due to an NDA but it was interesting to listen how you debug a fly sim. Thats something you could do also with your modellers when they build or rework some models.

Nobody expects a "good streamer performance" if you keep quiet for minutes, thats fine. just watch your working and see how game dev looks, could build some understanding.


sorry for my english. I am a bit tired :/

[TrustyJam]

See, look at that, it’s stuff like that post you had above and the unfiltered look in that we appreciate immense amounts. We’ve been asking those questions about artillery for a while and it’s good to finally get them and I hope this continues.

Also for that bare minimum number, I’m assuming that one person means, if someone wanted to, they could eventually get all the tasks done, like in real life. However, for the average gun at normal operations what is the number?

I can't answer your question regarding normal operations as we have yet to do a complete and proper multiplayer test as key aspects are not yet implemented. It also hugely depends on the situation I think. Are we talking continous fire at the same exact position? Does the barrel need to be elevated or depressed often between shots due to the targets getting closer/further away? Does the trailspike need to be lifted often in order to adjust horizontally as the targets are moving in front of the cannon rather than towards it? How far away is the limber of the particular battery? Is the battery in a hotly contested area resulting in crew members getting killed, meaning more players being needed per gun if delaying the loading procedure is to be avoided? etc.

I'm sure you'll all be helping us out finding the optimal number of crew members per gun in most if not all of the different possible situations listed above. :)

- Trusty

[Poorlaggedman]

You don't need to pay a community manager. Just have General Cody sign a non-disclosure agreement and give him sneak peaks every 2-3 months and let him monetize it. It's not so much the lack of communication it's just the pace of progress. From the player perspective updates are coming painstakingly slow. That's what drives people up the wall. Not everybody is in it for the long haul. For some people 2 1/2 years is 10-20% of their life they've been playing Alpha to get from A to B.


Fence destruction.

11522



Horse drawn artillery.

I like the ambition of this dev team.

I'm mostly concerned with artillery that it's going to be something trolls join for maximum effect on top of a serious distraction from well-populated infantry combat. Someone could take a critical item and run away with it or go AFK. What's to stop someone from pushing a cassion to an area and using it as a booby trap to be targeted by a battery? Standing in front of a cannon barrel? Give a bunch of strangers a cannon and see what happens without controls already existing beyond just admins playing whack-a-mole. I'm not worried about it in the short term.

[McMuffin]

I can't answer your question regarding normal operations as we have yet to do a complete and proper multiplayer test as key aspects are not yet implemented. It also hugely depends on the situation I think. Are we talking continous fire at the same exact position? Does the barrel need to be elevated or depressed often between shots due to the targets getting closer/further away? Does the trailspike need to be lifted often in order to adjust horizontally as the targets are moving in front of the cannon rather than towards it? How far away is the limber of the particular battery? Is the battery in a hotly contested area resulting in crew members getting killed, meaning more players being needed per gun if delaying the loading procedure is to be avoided? etc.

I'm sure you'll all be helping us out finding the optimal number of crew members per gun in most if not all of the different possible situations listed above. :)

- Trusty

We'll be too busy figuring out the absolute maximum limits we can push the gun to before failure occurs.

[calmmyst]

Im just curious as to what Penalty Playing will be imposed upon gun crews lol, as you have placed upon the game as a whole. I may just have to play as a gun crew all the time, instead of being an update player Ive become, and only if worthy to even play the update, after reading about the update.

[Warboy]

Im just curious as to what Penalty Playing will be imposed upon gun crews lol, as you have placed upon the game as a whole. I may just have to play as a gun crew all the time, instead of being an update player Ive become, and only if worthy to even play the update, after reading about the update.

Always negativity with you Calmmyst, maybe just look past that for now and not worry about the little things until it actually comes out. It's all speculation right now what it will look like and just look on the bright side of things life is better that way overall. ;)

[Lord Drax]

Im just curious as to what Penalty Playing will be imposed upon gun crews lol, as you have placed upon the game as a whole. I may just have to play as a gun crew all the time, instead of being an update player Ive become, and only if worthy to even play the update, after reading about the update.

They already stated in a previous update that artillery will be rolling out with friendly fire turned off... When it is turned on eventually they described a system of restricting gunners from temporarily playing as artillery class if they rack up too much team damage.

[Xbwalker]

I had a conversation with a pretty reliable source the other day who mentioned that TKs may be turned off in the early days of artillery so that players can get used to it. As for penalties, the devs were working on a proper solution to that.

[Oleander]

I had a conversation with a pretty reliable source the other day who mentioned that TKs may be turned off in the early days of artillery so that players can get used to it. As for penalties, the devs were working on a proper solution to that.

The devs have previously confirmed this.

[Poorlaggedman]

I think Calmmyst meant penalties as in gameplay. In the past he was pretty sore on the suppression mechanics and out of line penalties. What I'm curious is whether artillery crews going to be restricted to playing near their guns with desertion zones or timers, etc..


I had a conversation with a pretty reliable source the other day who mentioned that TKs may be turned off in the early days of artillery so that players can get used to it.Get used to what? Being reckless with cannon fire?


When it is turned on eventually they described a system of restricting gunners from temporarily playing as artillery class if they rack up too much team damage.So a player later on can go artillery, land some pretty nasty TK hits and then just get booted from the artillery branch?

Keep in mind a single player could potentially load and work his own gun. And there are quite a few guns laying around Antietam-more guns than there are infantry regiments in skirmish areas. Who gets the credit for the TK btw? The guy who sets the fuze? The one who aims? The one who pulls the lanyard? Beyond that the potential for trolling is monumental and the requirements of servers to police this are terrifying. Sometimes I feel like the only person who really takes the time to exercise the thought process of a troll around here. By all accounts it sounds like there's going to be a lot of ways to interfere with and hijack the operations of cannon crews in manners that a single foot soldier is just unable to do at present. If all else fails they can just stand in front of the barrel. Goading players to TK is a far more effective way of trolling than TKing itself. I wouldn't be worried if I didn't see this game increasingly being packaged for closed server operations. In society, a laissez-faire approach doesn't mean we abolish the courts and declare anarchy. Not having any structure with player feedback is anarchy and only the iron fist of a closed server environment can solve anarchy in that case.


Artillery, with all it's requirements for teamwork, would be a great opportunity to work on a squad system where players consent to work and appoint each other during gameplay. That way you could at least choose who to work a gun with. It's not an expressed goal of mine to make enemies yet the ultra-cartoonish reality of people demanding exclusivity from public gameplay for the sake of their own cohesion while simultaneously insisting that zero accommodations are made to make public gameplay stand a realistic chance at cohesion ... come'on.


I don't have any solutions and am just waiting like everyone else. But there's so many levels of new problems being introduced and meanwhile the team morale system hasn't been altered since they made kneeling downgrade you from in formation to skirmishing if you can remember back that far. I admire the vision but at present artillery is purely a looming impediment to WoR's gameplay.

[Oleander]

Need I remind everyone that everything in this thread, outside of what Trusty has confirmed, is speculation. We don't know how the TK penalties will work, we don't know what effect it is going to have on gameplay and we don't know all the restrictions, if any, are going to be placed on artillery crews. We had trolls that would take the officer class in the beginning if you will remember, and a group of them would get together and TK entire lines then run off. Its going to be a work in progress and we won't know the full extent of the issues until its implemented. We can guess player behavior until the cows come home, but until its in the game there's no way to know for sure.

And as far as the morale system goes, the devs have said, in a couple threads now, that it wouldn't be wise to work on it until artillery is in place.

[calmmyst]

Thank YOU Poorlaggedman That is exactly what I was implying, Ex, how far away from the gun before you desert, Not aloud to have your side arm, or rifle for close quarter battles, not have enough Men to fire the main gun, unable as a last ditch effort, for one man to swab, load, aim and fire, yes This would take time for one man to do all the steps required to fire a cannon, but its been done. WOR made me feel negative About this game, Warboy, with all the penalties imposed, I do not like last stand, where one is made to feel you have just had all 4 limbs STAKED down like a rabbit for the slaughter, when just out of the desertion point, is a perfectly defincible spot, you cant take cover behind. while the enemy can take full advantage of cover, and slaughter all the staked rabbits. I never attack on last stand, I dont like shooting staked rabbits. Let us have full control of a server where we can get rid of all those penalties, and watch it be the only one always filled, and have many waiting to get in. it would be like a Trump Rally, everyone shows up but only a few can get in, lol

[TrustyJam]

Thank YOU Poorlaggedman That is exactly what I was implying, Ex, how far away from the gun before you desert, Not aloud to have your side arm, or rifle for close quarter battles, not have enough Men to fire the main gun, unable as a last ditch effort, for one man to swab, load, aim and fire, yes This would take time for one man to do all the steps required to fire a cannon, but its been done. WOR made me feel negative About this game, Warboy, with all the penalties imposed, I do not like last stand, where one is made to feel you have just had all 4 limbs STAKED down like a rabbit for the slaughter, when just out of the desertion point, is a perfectly defincible spot, you cant take cover behind. while the enemy can take full advantage of cover, and slaughter all the staked rabbits. I never attack on last stand, I dont like shooting staked rabbits. Let us have full control of a server where we can get rid of all those penalties, and watch it be the only one always filled, and have many waiting to get in. it would be like a Trump Rally, everyone shows up but only a few can get in, lol

Hello,

There is no longer a desertion timer when leaving the point of contention as a defender during last stand.

Merry Christmas! :)

- Trusty

[Lord Drax]

Hello,

There is no longer a desertion timer when leaving the point of contention as a defender during last stand.

Merry Christmas! :)

- Trusty

He might have realized that Trusty if he had recently played the game in the last month and half... ;)

[Oleander]

So, am I correct in guessing we won't have artillery before the end of the year?

[Soulfly]

It's practically impossible to say. We hope to have it out as soon as possible - there's one super nasty programming issue where all placed cannon entities have to get deleted and replaced in order for the build to work again if but a tiny bit of the artillery code has been updated.

Until that is fixed there's no way I'm going to start placing cannon entities on the different skirmish areas. :P

We're also not quite sure what timeframe we're looking at in regards to getting the limbers workable.

- Trusty

A quote from yesterday, so yes its pretty safe to say that arty won’t be released within the next 3 days...

[LeFuret]

This is a real bummer...

[calmmyst]

well Drax, your absolutely right, Its been over 2 months since I played, till the other day, I Hated playing with Timers, saw no since in trying again to play something with the same BS timer. Now the game is going back to the good margin, meter will jump high, when the timer is removed from officer class, where he doesn't have to rely upon enough men to get him back into action. I dont care about how rambos play. get rid of Timers, LOL

[Poorlaggedman]

I'll admit that I'm thus far mostly wrong that trolls would become a serious problem for this game. They aren't that bad yet, unless you just consider bad leaders trolls (a few are). I suspect with new waves of players we'll see more trolls but so far it hasn't been a catastrophe that it was a year ago before admin controls even existed.

Boom. Here comes the artillery.

What I see is a somewhat complicated device that requires teamwork to operate efficiently. Individual crew can (and should be able to) move about and activate or mount parts of the gun and make adjustments. Theoretically players could be working a gun in loading and such and then just have any old crew member come up and start performing tasks such as aiming or taking the lanyard. It's not hard to envision conflicts between players in these areas. You and your buddies are loading the piece and some jackass comes up and seizes the lanyard or takes the sights or starts moving a wheel.

What non-admin recourse does the artilleryman have to the actions of trolls or malignant players? Unlike an infantry formation, a lone artillery crew member player looks like he can be a real problem.

It's easy to envision a group of players operating efficiently and a fool is going to just say "Well, smart teams will work together" but at some point the developers are going to have to decide if they're making a video game for a few groups of friends or are they making a video game for the public. Don't stake the community's existence entirely towards the facilitation of organizations that will one day pack up and leave for the next best thing. BTW that will come a lot sooner if the size of the community is diminished by poor public gameplay.

You need systems in place to allow strangers to come into a server and play together. Without that, it's just an event-based game that covers a few hours of quality playtime each day. Nobody playing outside of set time windows is going to be happy for that long.

Whereas if you had a game where a group of players could create a gun crew, rank up with followers, and maintain exclusive control over a gun or a section of guns at a time ... what a difference that would make.

You want to work with us on these guns we're posted at, you have to join us. If you're an asshole, our leader boots you and you can't rejoin and can't work our gun(s). If your officer is a jackass you leave his section and make another and suddenly he's a private with no authority. It helps shut out trolls and helps guide player motivations to be aligned with their teammates.

[McMuffin]

I'll admit that I'm thus far mostly wrong that trolls would become a serious problem for this game. They aren't that bad yet, unless you just consider bad leaders trolls (a few are). I suspect with new waves of players we'll see more trolls but so far it hasn't been a catastrophe that it was a year ago before admin controls even existed.

Boom. Here comes the artillery.

What I see is a somewhat complicated device that requires teamwork to operate efficiently. Individual crew can (and should be able to) move about and activate or mount parts of the gun and make adjustments. Theoretically players could be working a gun in loading and such and then just have any old crew member come up and start performing tasks such as aiming or taking the lanyard. It's not hard to envision conflicts between players in these areas. You and your buddies are loading the piece and some jackass comes up and seizes the lanyard or takes the sights or starts moving a wheel.

What non-admin recourse does the artilleryman have to the actions of trolls or malignant players? Unlike an infantry formation, a lone artillery crew member player looks like he can be a real problem.

It's easy to envision a group of players operating efficiently and a fool is going to just say "Well, smart teams will work together" but at some point the developers are going to have to decide if they're making a video game for a few groups of friends or are they making a video game for the public. Don't stake the community's existence entirely towards the facilitation of organizations that will one day pack up and leave for the next best thing. BTW that will come a lot sooner if the size of the community is diminished by poor public gameplay.

You need systems in place to allow strangers to come into a server and play together. Without that, it's just an event-based game that covers a few hours of quality playtime each day. Nobody playing outside of set time windows is going to be happy for that long.

Whereas if you had a game where a group of players could create a gun crew, rank up with followers, and maintain exclusive control over a gun or a section of guns at a time ... what a difference that would make.

You want to work with us on these guns we're posted at, you have to join us. If you're an asshole, our leader boots you and you can't rejoin and can't work our gun(s). If your officer is a jackass you leave his section and make another and suddenly he's a private with no authority. It helps shut out trolls and helps guide player motivations to be aligned with their teammates.

If the developers are creating a game for a group of people to play in an organized fashion, that's developing the appeal of the game and that's what public players want. An organization is just a group of players that have agreed to play together consistently, but at the core of it, them and public players want the same thing, use the same mechanics, and there's little to nothing that's been added to the game that's been purely for groups aside from passworded servers (which hasn't killed the game).

I do agree though that any old jackass could walk up and fuck with an artillery crew, but that's just one of the things that will happen in unrestricted public gameplay. The best we can do is just have admins on those servers to kick people, like we have right now. That's part of the reason we wanted passworded servers, so we weren't spending all our time messing about with kicking people that were trolling.

[calmmyst]

Well thats what caused all the penalties to be imposed, due to rambos, because people cried about 2 or 3 guys with pistols running in taking out 8 or 12 men. and the solution to stop rambos, led to all the penalties to be imposed, That I for 1 was totally against. I didnt care how rambos played. The cannons havent come out yet, so I woudnt worry about something till then, and then dont complain, to see another absurd penalty play imposed, that will effect those complaining just as bad, as it will to stop someone from doing something that people will surely complain about. On a Side note Thank you Trusty for removing some of the penalties. I am no longer feel like a staked rabbit. not so sure I like overtime though.

[Иван]

го играть товарищи

[Oleander]

I don't know that it will be the big of an issue. Sure, put something in place to prevent it, but like Calmmyst has said don't impose more penalties. At some point we have to let admins do their job and not have some umbrella solution that handicaps everyone. The officer deal is probably too strict at this point, but it was absolutely needed at the time.

[Grudge Bringer]

Is there any update on the Anti-Cheat? Are Gatling Gun's for real?

Check out this War of Rights Stream...
https://youtu.be/PMGFIO5-aZE

[TrustyJam]

Is there any update on the Anti-Cheat? Are Gatling Gun's for real?

Check out this War of Rights Stream...
https://youtu.be/PMGFIO5-aZE

Hello,

We're investigating this currently.


- Trusty

[calmmyst]

Pretty Pathetic to CHEAT! get mad about Penalties, BUT DONT CHEAT! go PLAY MOH if you need to cheat! I would say for everyone who sees this cheater, SHOOT HIM, no mater what side hes on. He will never get a shot off, and get tired of dying, and get himself banned for TKs, then its what 6 hours before people do it again, if he rejoins game. as it is everyone can take a shot at this cheater, then tell the other side to come TK this cheater, 149 Players to 1 LOL.

[Grudge Bringer]

Hello,

We're investigating this currently.


- Trusty

Wow ty dev! Funny thing is the community is so wholesome people from last night swear it was a gatling gun. Even though the guy admits it in rebel chat.

Great game. Really excited for for this to go huge.

[Sgt.Nightfire]

What about the troll Zoorik who is tking in the servers with multiple accounts Trusty? https://steamcommunity.com/app/424030/discussions/6/2659872073617775454/

[TrustyJam]

What about the troll Zoorik who is tking in the servers with multiple accounts Trusty? https://steamcommunity.com/app/424030/discussions/6/2659872073617775454/

We’re fixing that exploit as well - Thanks for the reports. :)

- Trusty

[Draco8x25]

I am sorry if this has already been asked but what weapons will the artillery crew be receiving. I would imagine the officer gets a pistol but what about the enlisted and the NCO class.

[RhettVito]

I am sorry if this has already been asked but what weapons will the artillery crew be receiving. I would imagine the officer gets a pistol but what about the enlisted and the NCO class.
Artillery class should not really have any weapons besides their implements that I'm sure will be able to be used as a weapon in worst case scenario.

[SwingKid148]

Historically they had short swords and NCOs would have a saber version.

[Poorlaggedman]

Artillery class should not really have any weapons besides their implements that I'm sure will be able to be used as a weapon in worst case scenario.
Those were more for killing the horses or finishing them off rather than fighting off enemy. If they get close enough to use those things then the crew usually already made a mistake by staying there - all their horses are probably dead and they'd be dead in the water.

It's another problem with representing artillery. How do you represent the urgent need to not lose or sacrifice your guns in the game? That should certainly factor into the score. I'm pretty positive a significant use of artillery will be crews loading a whole bunch of pieces and then hiding back to come forward to fire canister shots at ideal times instead of operating like an artillery section and being highly concerned about their pieces being lost. Crews held losing cannons as worse than infantry regiments held losing flags, hence the need to be able to displace their guns and move them around.

[Oleander]

I'm pretty positive a significant use of artillery will be crews loading a whole bunch of pieces and then hiding back to come forward to fire canister shots at ideal times instead of operating like an artillery section and being highly concerned about their pieces being lost.
Quit reading my playbook!!

[Draco8x25]

Artillery class should not really have any weapons besides their implements that I'm sure will be able to be used as a weapon in worst case scenario.
If the artillery crew do not have any weapons one or two enemies could kill all of them. In my opinion they should at least get a musket or sword. All this does is make it so they aren't easy pickings and can defend themselves if a few rambos get to them.

[Soulfly]

How do you represent the urgent need to not lose or sacrifice your guns in the game?

If the ability is given to disable them after capture, that would be an urgent need


If the artillery crew do not have any weapons one or two enemies could kill all of them

Not if the infantry is guarding them with some guys, I guess that will be needed on some maps

[RhettVito]

It would be really nice if the artillery could actually be destroyed. Hopefully that would be one feature that might be added one day.

[Cairnsy44]

If ammo from caissons is available to artillery crews, could ammo crates exist for infantry? I have run out of ammo a few times lately and hate having to wait for a charge to die gloriously and not out of line....F9 is too wasteful. Would be great to refill the cartridge box.

[Cairnsy44]

that might actually be a fun role. Like McKinley's. Make sure your boys have rounds....

[A. P. Hill]

We need mules for that.

Yep, mules connected to quartermaster wagons. :)

[Dane Karlsen]

And here I am, a simple man only longing for an optional mustache and a field brothel. (could be a place to re-generate when injured)