Such a shame

[artisticdude]

And time is money, and I haven't got much of either. I guess we should have known better... but I was really hoping this time would be different. Shucks, I think I'll stick to art and campaign design, and leave the

"This game is really good but it has this minor flaw** that I would like fixed" category

to figure it all out amongst themselves.

[Caphriel]

I'm not sure if this could really be called enjoyable, though. Or if that's generally good game design.

Max2008 conveniently provided a good example of why it is good game design. It's designed for people like him, not for people like you and me There's nothing wrong with this, there's no reason campaigns couldn't be made that it wasn't true for, and it certainly doesn't affect multiplayer. It's simply a matter of taste. I used to enjoy the Wesnoth campaigns when I had more time to play them, but these days I'd be lucky to get through a couple scenarios a week. Heir to the Throne would probably take me about three months.

I think the scale of the time investment is probably what creates these reactions. There's no way to learn the principles of Wesnoth campaigns (expendable units, good army composition, using cannon fodder, etc.) without putting a good many hours into the game, during which time the player will feel that he is learning, because his tactics and single-scenario strategies are improving. Discovering that you've been winning a series of Pyrrhic victories can be an unpleasant shock. And then after discovering the mistake, it takes an almost equal amount of time to attempt a better method, which the player, feeling that the game doesn't make sense, may be unwilling to invest.

[Sapient]

If you look at bronopolis' profile, he has not visited since he posted the original post on this topic. As Gambit already pointed out, we're probably all wasting our time.

Who cares if bronopolis reads this? Maybe I just like honing my skills of critical analysis and reflecting on what merit (if any) his words may have possessed?

After all, it is a topic which other lurking people might be interested in knowing the answers.

[King_Elendil]

If you look at bronopolis' profile, he has not visited since he posted the original post on this topic. As Gambit already pointed out, we're probably all wasting our time.

Who cares if bronopolis reads this? Maybe I just like honing my skills of critical analysis and reflecting on what merit (if any) his words may have possessed?

After all, it is a topic which other lurking people might be interested in knowing the answers.

Then I respect you

[Zarel]

Do not feed the troll

I see a few posts in this thread pointing out that the OP is not actually a troll, but none have given a detailed explanation. So, here you are:

It's important to know 1. what a troll is, and 2. why it should not be fed.

Someone legitimately interested in improving the game is not a troll.

The reason why people say "do not feed the troll" is because a troll is posting solely to cause the reader to react in a certain way (usually by inciting an argument) for his/her own amusement. Posting a reply ('feeding the troll') is discouraged because the troll does not actually believe what he/she is writing, since the troll is only posting to, say, anger a reader.

Brunopolis seems like a sincere player dissatisfied with the campaign. Regardless of whether or not his criticisms have merit, it is clear that his feedback is sincere, and that he should not be ignored, as a troll would be.

[Gambit]

And I've held back defending my positon that the OP is lightly trolling in the hopes of not derailing/scaring him off to bad. But you want to quote me many many many posts later and bring the topic back to that so fine here goes.

Trolling: Posting with the primary intent of provoking other users into an emotional response.

Okay so we start with the title. Such a shame. Could mean anything, let's click on it. Oh my he's talking about Wesnoth. Well I don't think there's much shame in Wesnoth. Let's keep reading. Campaign mode is a poor experience. Well that seems rather generalized. So you hate the whole single player experience? That makes me rather upset.

Absolutely ruins the game... removes all elements of strategy... what the heck are you talking about. Have to save load? No you don't have to save load. Stop blaming the game for your own inadequacy. If you want help ask for it! Well anyway let's see what else is here. Okay three changes he think could fix the game. Why does it need fixed? Wait wait, let's not jump on him yet. Maybe they're good ideas. Units only get experience for attacking... Okay so you complain about "no strategy" and then remove any strategy in deciding who kills what unit just so you won't be as tempted to save load? Yeah that makes sense. Next! Heh and now you want to remove all value in keeping your units alive? I thought that was part of strategy... Wow you don't make any sense at all mate. Last idea... Make it so every scenario is winnable no matter how awful you did last round. What?! This is a campaign! If you want what you're asking go play multiplayer. Terrible ideas.

Alright let's look at his conclusion. Remain calm. Please make this game more like... What the hell? Wesnoth is wesnoth. If you want Advance Was then play Advance Wars.

User makes contradictory first post full of insults to the game. The only way he could possibly not expect a emotional negative response is if he's never had any human internet contact before.

Besides I made him a cute troll.
Yes he didn't mean to tick anyone off, but he clearly wanted to ruffle some feathers.

Besides we don't need to cook enough to feed an army for one disgruntled user. He's not come back to eat any of our posts yet anyway.

[friar tuck]

I'm not sure if this could really be called enjoyable, though. Or if that's generally good game design.

Depends on perspective, I think.

First of all, in the light of your experience I think EI should really be classified as an expert campaign and not intermediary as it currently is, exactly because there are some scenarioes (like the one with the bridge, but also the swamp and the one where you have to free the knights) which are really hard. I don't think it's much easier than UTBS, for instance.

But considering this, how do you become an expert in wesnoth campaigns? As soon as you are, you certainly are on the shallow part of the learning curve, and this in itself means you have to do a lot of "work" (i.e., playing) to get even a little better.

How can one provide a challenge to an expert? Look at what they are doing with the easy campaigns: Play HttT with only shamans, or without losses, or without recalls (sic). This certainly means a lot of replaying scenarios until it works out.

For me, it is certainly enjoyable, because it is rewarding to have overcome the challenge in the end. (At least to a degree. Having to go back all the way to the underground scenario in FtF because I had too little gold in THE VERY LAST scenario and every single scenario inbetween was a gold drainer was NOT fun...)

Cosidering "play as work", we still have it good in BfW. Think of people having to memorize whole books of openings and endgames to get better in playing chess

[Rya]

Well I guess if you see a campaign as a single "challenge" which can go over several months and you consider "challenge" as enjoyable, then you could still admit that the Wesnoth style is enjoyable.
But I doubt that the majority of the people can enjoy such long term challenges.

Even a chess game is considerably shorter. If you look at a whole "tournament" as one challenge it will be comparable length-wise but still completely different, because if you win a chess match it always means you can still get 1st place, no matter how 'bad' you've won. Because of this independence the actual challenge lies within a single match.

Also as someone highly involved in game journalism I see "Game is fun for people" and "Good game design" as two different things.

Another comparison would for example be an MMORPG. In an MMORPG the challenge is pretty long term because it lies in getting the highest levels and the strongest equipment and the best playing skill which can take years (or is impossible altogether, just that the player doesn't know it before -> similar to Wesnoth's unbeatable scenario situation). This challenge is indeed enjoyable by many MMORPG players as PVP is one of the most used features in an MMORPG. But generally I wouldn't call it good game design. Because fighting monsters again and again for hours itself isn't enjoyable and could have been shortened strongly and focus only on playing skill instead ("remove grinding" -> similar to Wesnoth: removing recall lists and carryover gold).

I see this comparison especially in regards of the forum threads:
- in MMORPG forums there are repeatedly threads that complain about the exp rate being too low and that the drops are too rare
- in the Wesnoth forum there are repeatedly threads that complain about the RNG and the "losing units in campaigns problem"

The fact that those threads keep appearing doesn't mean they need to be changed at all (developers individuality), but it is a "sign" that there is some kind of flaw in the game design, a flaw big enough to ruin the experience of at least some players so much that they actually feel like posting a thread about this (keep in mind that only people who actually have some liking to the game will even bother to do such a thing, at least if they aren't just trolling, which is certainly not the case in most threads made about this).

I would never demand that the developers change anything, since it's completely their choice. But they should at least accept that the criticism made repeatedly is actually valid (instead of this general "not another thread about this" feeling).

I'm personally at a point where I love and hate Wesnoth at the same time. If I miss again 10 times in row or when I lose an important unit which I couldn't have saved even with the best tactic if I wanted to win that scenario, it makes me so angry I want to throw my computer out of the window and it usually results in me closing Wesnoth instantly and feeling bad for the next 2 hours until I calmed down. I don't think a game really should invoke such feelings. How can it be good game design if a similar good game could be created with different methods that create less hate.

And this scenario repeating isn't liked by anyone. Even those that say they like it, actually don't like it, but rather like the long term challenge itself. People don't like losing. People don't like repeating. What people like is the feeling they get when actually having solved such a challenge.
If it's possible to make a game that gives this success feeling at the same power while on the other hand reducing the overall frustration, then the original game certainly had game design flaws.

So the next step would be too look if it was possible. And alone if I look at the "complain" threads that usually get replied with "won't be changed, because this is how the developers want it to be" and imagine a game that has all these ideas implemented, I would end up with a game, with somewhat different gameplay to the original Wesnoth but whose forums will certainly have way less 'complain' threads and which could still represent a similar level and challenge and success feeling.

And for me this shows that it can't be good game design to do it like Wesnoth does it. It's simply a developers choice in the end, not a game design choice. Just how the bad exp rate in MMORPGs is pretty much a developers choice, just that in MMORPGs this choice is made for money reasons whereas in Wesnoth it's more of a developer's message.

[friar tuck]

And this scenario repeating isn't liked by anyone. Even those that say they like it, actually don't like it, but rather like the long term challenge itself. People don't like losing. People don't like repeating. What people like is the feeling they get when actually having solved such a challenge.

I think you're having an overly negative attitude here. Repeating things, and more often than not repeating the very same thing all over for a long time, is the way people learn.

Quite often the subject being learned has a purpose in itself (like learning to play a music instrument), but very often there is no inherent purpose at all (like learning to throw darts or dice stacking). The reward comes from the achievement of having learned and getting better at the subject at hand.

Of course, having to repeat some scenario just because I want to be able to finish a completely different scenario further on in the campaign might feel annoying at first. But in the end, I often find I can do so much better than when originally playing the scenario that this experience is quite rewarding in itself.

If it's possible to make a game that gives this success feeling at the same power while on the other hand reducing the overall frustration, then the original game certainly had game design flaws.

So far we only know there would be certain people who feel less frustrated. Maybe there would be much more people who feel less challenged?

As has been said before, it would be quite easy to design a campaign having the excact properties you demand (no recalling [or automatic resurrection at end of scenario], no gold carryover). The fact that only few campaigns of this kind exist (if at all?) might be a first sign that at least the other campaign designers do not quite share your likings.

But this doesn't mean at all that you can't design your own campaigns to provide exactly the experience you would desire from a game of wesnoth.

[Rya]

I think you're having an overly negative attitude here. Repeating things, and more often than not repeating the very same thing all over for a long time, is the way people learn.

I didn't disagree to this. My point is simply that not the "learning" is enjoyable but rather the "having learned".

So far we only know there would be certain people who feel less frustrated. Maybe there would be much more people who feel less challenged?

If other people would feel less challenge then this is again a flaw in the game design. Then you didn't actually manage to make the game better but you only replaced one flaw by another flaw.

[Caphriel]

I didn't disagree to this. My point is simply that not the "learning" is enjoyable but rather the "having learned"

Motivations for why people play games are interesting and complex. You might be interested in reading this as a starting point for discussion. I strongly disagree with you that there's a flaw in the game design; the campaigns simply are designed to your taste. Every game gets complaints like these, from people who thought the game was what they wanted, and discovered it was not.

@friar tuck: Most of the complaints about Wesnoth campaigns seem to come from beginners who have run face first into a very punishing learning curve, with very harsh penalties for failure. In games, the only real penalty for failure is in terms of player time. In Wesnoth, especially for new players, the cost per learning experience in time is generally high. Even if you consider learning to be fun, it's a very low return on investment.

For experienced players, reasons can vary. In my case, I no longer find playing against the AI interesting, so there's no more hard-fun appeal. Note that I didn't say it's not challenging, because with sufficient advantages, it can be. I just feel that there's nothing interesting left for me to learn about Wesnoth campaigns. When I play them, I generally either lose to bad luck, or what I feel is insufficient information (surprise enemy reinforcements, an ambush that has no tells, etc.) Furthermore, I derive no sense of accomplishment from defeating the AI. In short, the only thing to draw me to campaigns is easy-fun appeal: the stories. In this case, again, the reward isn't worth the time investment.

[Rya]

Every game gets complaints like these, from people who thought the game was what they wanted, and discovered it was not.

Most of the complaints about Wesnoth campaigns seem to come from beginners who have run face first into a very punishing learning curve, with very harsh penalties for failure.

You sound as if you blame this on the persons rather than on the game.
I think this is the main difference in our view point.

Especially referring to the first quote I'd counter with:
"A game with good game design will make the players think they got what they wanted even if they didn't."

[Icarusvogel]

If you saveload depends totally on how you want to play Wesnoth, I think. Sometimes, I mean usually, it is more fun just not to saveload.
Also, when a unit's dead, it's dead, in my opinion. Recall the dead? Of course, undead could theoetically do that (necromancy!), but THAT would make the game unbalanced.

[Rya]

You can simply let it make more sense if you call it "unconcious" instead of "dead" or you rename "recall" to "recall / revive". This certainly isn't a good reason not to do something. If a game isn't fun and makes perfect sense it still isn't a good game.

If you saveload depends totally on how you want to play Wesnoth, I think. Sometimes, I mean usually, it is more fun just not to saveload.

Well if you are a bad player and want to complete the campaigns you need to revert turns quite often, even if you don't enjoy it at all. Your only other options is to not play campaigns or search for user-made campaigns that are easier.

[Icarusvogel]

My personal opinion is that when you are hit 10 times by a general's sword, you are dead.
And also that wesnoth would not be enhanced by the "unconcious" thing.
Wesnoth is fun, AND it makes sense.