Seasons in scenarios

[kIndal]

I think that an interesting event or option for long scenarios could be the introducing of seasons, changing terrains files to look as snow lands or changing some options in rules.txt which shows the stopings in the acient wars. But I think that could be a bit tired changing the files every 6 months, more or less, if you have make the scenario divided in months.
What do you think about this?

[Chris 62]

I've seen it done twice in world war two scenarios. As long as you have an event announcing when to change the file, it's not to much of a bother. It adds plenty from an historic point of view. as you well know, before the 20th century, winter shut down military operations. Winter quarters played an enormus part in strategy in the past, but is sadly lacking in civ scenarios. I think it's a good idea.

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All knowledge begins with the phrase: I don't know.

[Jay Bee]

Basically agree with cpoulos. it depends on the scen. for those like Red Front where seasons are truly important for the game is fine. If season changing is only done for 'cosmetic' reasons only, i.e. without a significant strategical reason, it's not worth the effort. And it'd be annoying too.

[Stefan Härtel]

If the Scenario is, like Red Front, concentrated on one small (or geographically equal) area, that is in general a good idea. In "Aufstieg" by John Petroski, it did not work so well because of the climatic differences within Europe: Northern Africa, Syria and Sicily, par example, turned into siberian landscapes.
In large-scale scenarios that unite more than one climatic area, a use of specific terrains or units is far more effectful. For example, if heavy snowfall had really deep impact, a missile-like "snowstorm" unit would be appropriate; in high mountain regions, a "high snow" terrain is more accurate.

[Henrik]

As you allready know I am for the season changing in your scenario.
I agree that it looks strange whit a snow filled africa, but the war (30 years war, right?) was centered in ermany, and this time is known as the "little ice age" for a reason, it was so cold that a few years after this war, the entire Swedish army went over the frozen sea and attacked Copenhagen.
I use winter/summer in my scenario don't I?
[This message has been edited by Henrik (edited February 26, 2001).]

[Shaka Naldur]

I think that it is a good idea

there are so many scenarios hanging around that the new ones need to be original and introduce some new features,
there is an scenario of the XVIII ( I believe ) about a Swedish invasion to Russia where they also change seasons, you can take a look at it and see if you like how it looks

make cities starving in winter and all that

[Hoek]

Plus, it opens up whole new options to the scenario creator. You can essentially make far greater reaching events this way. For instance, if you had a nuclear war scenario, it just wouldn't do to have just pollution everywhere. It would probably be significantly better to "change the season" to make it a more realistic aftermath.

[kIndal]

So, I am thinking of adding this effect for my 30 years war scenario, and I think that almost everybody agree with the adding of seasons, don´t you?
I think that in this centuries was important this fact because all campaigns start with the starting of the Spring and stopped in winter.
The unique really important problem that I found was that could be bad for the playbility the fact of saving and changing the terrain every certain turns.

[Kull]

You definitely need to automate the process with a batch file, ala Red Front. The last thing you want is people copying files and renaming them one by one. That would get VERY old! I do recommend the use of seasonal change, since it offers the possibility to make lots of OTHER alterations:

1) A 30 year scenario now offers the chance to have 60 Event files! (God help you!) Even if you don't use that many, it basically eliminates the files size problem.
2) You can also do cool thing with the units & rules files:
- Outmoded units can be upgraded automatically.
- The armies of particular nations could be strengthened or weakened, thus recreating the ebb and flow of power in a non-event based way. This could be done either by changing the unit stats in rules.txt (for example the Swedish Infantry suddenly changes from A6 to A8 during the Gustavus Adolphus era, and back to A6 or A5 after his death) or by creating large groups of Zero Move armies which suddenly gain movement points at the correct historical moment (thus eliminating the need to create vast armies one event at a time).
- Special General or King units could come and go at the proper time. Maybe the Gustavus Adolphus unit turns into zero move trigger right around the time he died. Done properly, the killing of this trigger would then generate a replacement unit (ie the next king). The possibilities here are pretty wild!

[Henrik]

You don't have to make it that controlled though, I would like being able to expand at my own pace, if you have multi events then you are able to place an invasion force whit events anyway (also, where would the army of 0 movement be waiting? The swedes hadn't got any german provinces before the thirty years war, and the army used where the veterans from the Swedish-Polish war).
A thirty years war scenariowhouldn't be as controlled as a WW2 scenario, you could still change unit stats from summer to winter and maybe between "different phases" of the war...