Dev Diary #1: Call of War 1.5

I hear you man, but consider this:

A: they are not your parents and throwing a temper tandrum will not make it more likely to get what you want

B: they are just human people that have a job and I suspect are doing the best they can for the most part.

C: if we are nicer and more encouraging they might be more motivated to fix stuff we point out

D: we on the forum are a relatively small fraction of total players and are biased toward more high level play

I can assure you that we will do more than that. First off we will fix more things than you listed because there were more issues pointed out by the players, and we will work on solutions. This includes rebalancing of more things and will also include providing missing functionality (like unit upgrading). Secondly we will add more features to the game which are not yet in the Event. And yes we will also have new features which will be exclusive to CoW. All of this has been announced in the Dev Diaries already btw, we said from the beginning the first Event will be a rough test with alot of things still missing and still being tweaked.

So please stick with us and keep giving feedback and I am sure in some months we will end up with a version that the majority will like

Also a big yes to what DxC writes in his last post. In general we take constructive and polite critisism much more serious.

From what I gather, the most important issue on the minds of the players is: Will COW 1.0 still be available to play in the future or is COW 1.5 going to replace COW 1.0? Can and will they co-exist like Supremacy 1, Supremacy 1914 and COW 1.0 did?

Secondly, in (the likely) case COW 1.5 is replacing COW 1.0:

- Is the simplification of the game a goal in itself (for mobile?) or just a side effect of COW 1.5 not yet being fully ready?
- Will the now very predictable rock-paper-scissor battle mechanic be deepened and open the way for more approaches?
- Will managing your country ever be as much of a challenge as it was in COW 1.0, or is this game aspect purposely reduced in importance?
- Will unrealistic aspects be addressed and changed? As there were mentioned for instance: the drastic Pokemon-style evolutions in unit levels, having to build IC's in otherwise empty provinces for the sake of manpower production; or building barracks and tank factories for moral improvement which will never produce a unit; or tanks having to pull out of defensive positions?
- Is the single function of buildings and units a fixed feature or can this still evolve into a more interesting scheme?

Personally I am not at all worried about resource shortages, detailed unit characteristics, the tech tree etc. in COW 1.5.
These will all be tweaked, fixed and balanced out, given sufficient feed-back and data-monitoring from games.

What I don't like, are certain characteristics, which might be (unchangeable) root-features at the core of the game.
Most of what feels 'off', boils down to COW 1.5 being a simpler and less interesting game, which on the other hand is equally more complicated in an uninteresting way (for instance country management was a challenge and now it has become a chore).
Same goes for army development and battle resolution.
Or strategy.

Honestly, without knowing what COW 1.5 is supposed to fix, I have yet to discover an added value for strategy game players, when comparing COW 1.5 with COW 1.0 and Supremacy 1.

Please convince me otherwise...

Lots of people wanted 1.5 to be made into another game. I personally think it should and the CoW 1.0 MUST be kept here because that will be too much of a changed to Call of War if you change all games to 1.5. I have a feeling that 1.5 is going to change tremendously because of the protest against lots of things that are not as "liked". I understand that freezy might have spent a lot of time on it and I appreciate it. On top of a lot of other issues, I do not like the units not auto upgrade... Maybe they can auto upgrade over time. That will result in a lot of unbalanced unit.

This being the Dev Diary, it can address many different points that do not fit in Balancing or other threads.

I understand a need for innovation or renewal of a product.
But I still do not understand how 1.5 could achieve that or how it supplies any other fix or added value.
All I see is a simplified version of COW 1.0, which might work for the mobile market.

Actually, from my rather long experience in gaming as well as business, if player (= customer) retention and revenue improvement are the goals, a completely different issue would have to be addressed first.

An obvious defect I noticed over an again:

All the various Bytro games I know (S1914, COW 1.0, NWE, S-1, COW.15), all have the same handicap of a no-good tutorial, after which you are thrown in the deep.

For a fact, seasoned strategy gamers immediately have a huge advantage over new players; let alone strategy buffs that play or have played the great strategy board games of yonder.

When nobody teaches the new players the fundamental steps or the crucial strategic aspects or tactical priorities, it is no wonder that so many go inactive. There simply ois no hope for them to ever feel like they can achieve something (= reason to play).
Newbies start without a clue and they now quit without a clue, calling it a 'shitty game'.

COW 1.5 is not fixing anything in that respect and only repeats the same mistake.

On the other hand, every successful game I know, has new players progress through multiple tutorials, with various layers of difficulty, building their knowledge and skills.
Only once these have attained a certain level, these new players are thrown in with the rabble of war waging maniacs like us.

To fulfill their purpose, these tutorial maps should:
- start relatively small, (= more instant gratification)
- possibly have fewer units, unlocking (= incentive) new units with progress
- have no moral penalty in the 1st few levels (= remove challenging complications during tutorial)
- possibly run at 6x speed on the 1st starting level and then go 4x speed and then 2x to keep a newbie 'in' (= action).
- have plenty of stuff to do and discover (= incentives to log back in)
- have worthwhile and educational missions., e.g. 'Raise your Goods output with 10% to get X-amount of gold', (= incentives)
- have incentives which show not 'how to do something', but teach 'why to do something' , teaching the importance in the right context (= instead of 'advisers' talking some 'gibberish', lacking any actual baring on the game situation you find yourself in as a newbie; e.g. "We should build fighter planes in Warschau (because we can)", but your army doesn't even have a good basic set of units yet nor a network of air fields to make those fighters useful).


Besides fixing what there are not for issues, a good set of progressively difficult tutorial maps, would most likely solve a number of other issues 'on the go', as there are:

- an incentive to play for progress w/o being hammered by seasoned players in your 2nd game
- (with that) increased player retention
- (and with that) drastically lower inactivity rates, as players reach a higher level
- (all the above adding up to) more and frequently active players in the pool and attracting more new players into the pool,
- (all of which in turn is) leading to more income from more players who will spend money.

Actually, one only has to look at successful games to see what a good tutorial phase means.
Take World Of Tanks for an example.

Newbies start with a basic tutorial on how to move, aim, shoot. Then they go to the 'girly' maps, which can only be played by low level players in low level tanks, which in turn do not contribute to your ranking and score in any way significant: the newbies are simply playing in a different League.

And by the nature of progress, they unlock new tech for their tanks and completely new tanks in higher tiers. And with that they progress into a wider range of maps, until they have unlocked all required to play all maps.

What does all that do for WOT?
They excel at at retaining players.
They also make a train-load of money, but not from selling victory! They make that money from e.g. selling Premium Tanks which are no better(battle wise often even worse) than regular tanks, but offer different advantages (more XP, more silver earned = more rest) and they even make money from loyalty (!!), selling WoT-ware.
And they increased their customer base by releasing similar games with a different theme: World Of Warships, World Of War-planes and their mobile customers can play WoT-Blitz (= a separate, simpler game on the same basis)

Nonetheless, there is nothing WOT can do, that Bytro can't.

A good start for making more money would be: investing in player retention, which will lead automatically to more income.
In my opinion, that investment would be well aimed at creating a system of progressive tutorial maps as suggested.

And there is nothing against a separate mobile game, as War Gaming has proven with WOT-Blitz, to tap into the mobile market.

This is such a great post vonlettowvorbeck.

Thank you for putting this subject out there and then offering solutions to what is such an apparent hindrance to gaining player retention.

Being a newbie (joined in the late Spring of this year, but also being very logic-oriented and fastidious (ok, other ppl call ii AR), I can attest first hand that if I had not watched all of the online videos that were available before starting the tutorial game, I would have been partially wiped out in the first four hours of playing and most likely eliminated in the first 24 hours of having opened up my first tutorial game. And yes, I probably would have maybe attempted one more time to play (because I really dislike not being able to figure things out - lol) before quitting forever, as this is the first and only electronic game I've ever played in my life and I (still to this day) am constantly reminded of how much time this game takes away from living an actual vibrant / productive life - lol.

As it turned out - the other players quit on the west side of the Pond and so I then had the next 30 days to play alone and figure most everything out. How to build units, how to do the research, how to find all the little bits of detailed information required to make logical / strategic / orderly decisions.

And then to get to watch / figure out the results of those decisions - good and bad. But learning all the time.

Then I discovered the Help Chat Room and how the moderators were so willing to put up with my questions and take the time to provide me with answers. Even telling me how wrong I was in my thinking process and to go read this link or another. Always helpful to say the least.

I printed out a ream (well not quite but a lot) of hard paper copies of all the wonderful informational subject matter discovered on the forum (so many brilliant contributors - I must say) and poured thorough it all. Of course absorbing only about 50% of it, but filled with this information, playing (even when alone on the first tutorial which I am still referring to within this post) became even more interesting, more enjoyable, more inquisitive about how this or that worked, etc.

By the end of the game I had figured out how to make stacks, build a navy, sail it across the ocean and do battle on both sea and land. I got to produce an air force, but was not able to put into practice (operate) the air force because when I went overseas, the AI didn't really use their air forces.

As I was nearing the end of the tutorial, I met someone in the Help Chat Room who offered to play a game with me and be my ally.

Being able to watch how he utilized arty, produced the various units in an organized manner, and fight successfully with so few units was so enlightening.

I still didn't get to use the planes I built in combat until near the very end of the second game and so even while I had read all the various informational postings in the forum on how best to use an air force, I still didn't have any practical experience with implementing the recommendations on how best to use them.

It wasn't until my third game that I was able to use an air force in combat and then of course experience most of the various situations everyone had mentioned in the forum postings - lol.

So in closing, I highly endorse your thorough recommendations to the Devs for their consideration. However, I also clearly recognize how complex and difficult, implementation of this subject / topic would be for Bytro to undertake and successfully complete.

Most likely a specialized staff within Bytro would be necessary in order for to successfully implement your recommendations.

Or a qualified detail oriented project manager with an editorial/writing skillset or experience managing those types of people along with an existing support staff of volunteer moderators, etc. who would in this particular case get paid for their services and work efforts.

So much information is already out there, but it would take a concerted effort by a staff/team to compile and organize it all so that it could be readily used by new (and old) players.

And then of course, taking all that existing information (so much of it will become obsolete quickly what with Version 1.5 coming online sooner rather than later) and adjusting, revising and in some cases rewriting and/or writing for the first time, in order to make it applicable to Version 1.5.

The key is retention. The way to achieving that is (as you so well stated) providing an enjoyable first and second time (and beyond) experience with playing the game (or even learning the game in increments as you also so cleverly suggested).

I hope sharing my own first and second time experiences (in general terms) helps the Devs to deeply consider your proposals / recommendations.

Respectfully

Just noticed that the capital of Iceland has been neutered in Version 1.5 and is no longer an urban city.

Which results in taking away a strategy for moving from North America to Europe (Scandinavian countries in particular along with the UK).

Should be able to produce units in the capital as before which Iceland did.

Bigger picture strategy should be to upgrade capital of Iceland and produce units (such as rockets) which can hit Norway and England or even a nuke.

Or ship rockets to Iceland via Greenland or via convoys all without any interference from other countries (players) if one can take control of the ocean between New Foundland and Greenland and Greenland to Iceland.

Losing this ability now takes one of the major military support techniques when attempting to make a landing in the UK or Norway.

Not sure if this is correct place to post. Let me know and I will remove it if so.

I like the new music and sound effects added in the new update. I hope Bytro updates the models for every unit

You should share some suggestions in the update posted in the forum just for that.

Thanks for reporting, this is not intended. Will be changed to urban again in the next Event.
Yes we will.

Weird, but once you upgraded Ordnance Foundries to level 5 and maxed your research on SPA, it is impossible to build SPA.

I fear am too dumb for 1.5

Edit 1-12: the situation is even weirder.
- I can't produce any Elite SPA in any of the level 5 foundries, but I can produce level 4 SPAA (though also researched to Elite level).
I have, however, 1 level 4 foundry which can still produce SPA.

- I can't produce Tacs anymore since I upgraded my airplane factory to level 4.

Last game has some 60 points to go and everyone alive is bored out of his skull.

Really hard to differentiate between a tank destroyer and a tank imho

Especially in certain views / angles / positions of each.

Mobile or PC?

Well, it generally looks the same. Also, artillery (France) looks like anti tanks.

Artillery for all nations has the 'nose' upward.
AT has its 'nose' straight forward.

I agree it could be a bit more differentiated, i.e. by having arty put its nose higher up maybe, or by using a heavier type of arty

Hope you notice that it changed a lot during the new update. (I am so off topic)

A strategy game (like CoW is... or let me render this more precisely: like CoW1.0 is) should be easy to play and understand - that much is true.
But at the same time, becoming a good player shouldn't be easy at all. You should have to use your gray matter very much in order to make the right decisions. Because that's the appeal of a strategy game, that it makes you think.

Making principles more simple and unit & building attributes more even-shaped makes the game easier to play indeed, but comes at the price of losing strategical challenge and realism; thus makes the game less interesting.


Giving some examples of changes that could make the game easier to understand or play without negative side-effects:
* Display SBDE in mobile version, it's missing there (how is a mobile player supposed to understand SBDE if it's not even displayed to him??).
* Display in the unit detail screen how many units of that type can go in one stack at 100% SBDE.
* Explain SBDE somewhere. For example in tutorial. Or add an "i"-button next to the percentage in the unit detail screen. Or explain it in the manual one can reach when clicking on the "i"-button on upper left corner of the screen (which overall is very sparse and might be elaborated). The SBDE system in CoW1.0 isn't complicated, but some players feel like it was, because it's explained nowhere.
* Make air mechanics realistic and thus intuitive by removing the attack timer for patroling stacks containing bombers (rename "patrol" to "recon" for such stacks). Only fighters should fire on hostile units while patroling.
* For buildings with resource consumption, change "off" to "off while not producing" (and make that the default setting). Players would then still be able to place production orders if building in that setting and as soon as the unit is produced, the building stops consuming resources again - without the hassle for the player to have to remember turning the building off again.
* Reduce food costs of infantry (--> link <--), because building infantry in CoW1.0 is a newbie trap. Some newbies build infantry, because they think what a real leader would do can't be all that wrong... and then lose, because recruiting infantry in CoW1.0 is suicide.
* ...


Now some examples of changes that do make the game simpler, but at the same time sacrifice either strategy or realism or both:
* Removal of morale malus while being at war: You now have to think less about consequences before attacking. Makes the game easier to play, yes, but also means one very good and realistic strategy element removed.
* Removal of the resource consumption some buildings had: Makes the game easier to play, yes, but only because it makes decisions on what to build where easier. In CoW1.0 you sometimes had to think hard what to build where, because you had to weigh up different effects against one another. In CoW1.5, building effects are one-dimensional - you don't need thinking, calculating or estimating to know what to build when and where. Just build much, build build build, don't think.
* Removal of buildings having several effects: Same as above.
* Removal of terrain maluses. Sure: Not everyone is comfortable with a -25% calculation. But what this change mainly does is to reduce the effect of terrain (correct me if I'm wrong - I missed the 1.5 test event). Which half-way removes also this strategy element.
* Removal of province upkeep: Makes the game easier to play, yes, but also means one strategic aspect less. Goal in 1.5 is to just conquer much, as quickly as possible - no need to consider your actions carefully.
* Removal of some unit values having a steeper progression than others: Makes the game much easier to play, yes. But simply said, also just horribly boring. And unrealistic. And reduces strategy, because it makes units easier to compare to each other and thus makes it easier to always hit the right build/research decision.
* Inventing fantasy rock/paper/scissors roles for units: Makes the game easier to understand, because units now fit into a clear schema. But is unrealistic.
* SBDE counting for entire stack and no longer for specific unit: Makes game a bit easier to understand, yes. But at the same time - if compared to CoW1.0-SBDE-system with lowered limits - promotes focussing on few unit types. Which reduces diversity, fun and realism. Or in other words, makes fantasy unit roles required in order to achieve diversity in army compositions.


I certainly forget something, but the above should be enough to make my point clear: 1.5 sacrifices strategy and realism for the sake of becoming a very simple, tap-and-swipe-don't-think game for the mobile market.

... Which is very sad. I mean nobody wants to keep you (Bytro) from throwing another trivial tap-and-swipe-don't-think game on the market. Use CoN or Supremacy1 for that or create a new one, OK. But why cannibalize the - as far as I know - most demanding, well-balanced and realistic online strategy game ever for that??
CoW1.0 is so very good and you plan to replace it with a cheap trash game that could be easily programmed by some noobs?

OK, if it's your intention to target more young, impatient smartphone-focused players, then we all can understand the changes you introduced with 1.5 and we would have to respect your decision. If you argue with the smartphone argument, then we (I mean players looking for strategic challenge, player interaction / diplomacy and realism) will leave silently, bowing to the power of the market.
But instead you argue like "we do this to give players more meaningful strategic decisions and to improve realism", which is so plainly ironic. Do you really not see that 1.5 achieves the opposite? Or do you want to dumb down the game?
Since you're not stupid, we have to assume the latter. So let me write a more appropriate description of the update for you:

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"With CoW1.5 we want to make the game more attractive for mobile players, mainly from the younger generations.
When playing casually for just a few minutes while waiting at the bus stop or while sitting on the toilet, you don't want to be breeding over strategic decisions for a long time. Also you cannot, because your small smartphone screen doesn't give you the overview for that.
We therefore reduce the strategic depth of the game drastically. It will now always be very easy to make a decision on which structure to build when and where and which unit to research. You get 4 urban provinces at the start, in each of which you will always build one production facility at any time to the highest unit level you've researched from the respective tech tree. And that's that. No more complications involved. That's great, isn't it? Donald Trump gives his thumbs up for that .
We also remove the morale malus from being at war and province upkeep, so you don't have to waste any thoughts any more on how to position your country politically in relation to the other powers on the map. You can now blindly attack every neighbour that's weaker than yourself, without giving it a second thought. Then just tap and swipe, tap and swipe. Drag your stacks across the map, hardly care about terrain, just drag them towards the enemy, yawn once or twice.
Tap and swipe a lot on your smartphone - be online more often than the others - and you'll win for sure. Or, alternatively, spend a lot of gold . At least we reduced the risk of being beaten by some over-intelligent smartass with a better strategy, because you can now find a sufficient strategy also without thinking... secondly those intelligent players now leave the game anyway, because they'll be bored to death.
And - last but not least - yow won't have to study any unit values any more. Just look into the research tree once and thanks to the steady progression of all values, you already know the whole story after 10 minutes.
Please also participate in our naming contest, because since CoW no longer is a strategy game, we're thinking of renaming it. Our favourites so far are "CoW for cows", "Pokemon CoW" or "Paper/rock/scissors online simulator deluxe", but feel free to add own proposals."
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Maybe I now also get banned from the forum for using irony, suggestive questions and other nasty rhetorical instruments. Honestly I couldn't care less. My days here are counted anyways if you don't do a drastic turnaround in the direction that 1.5 takes.
Sorry for the negativity. Hope I could wake you up, Bytro team! Wake up! Keep CoW as a strategy game!

Hans is right. The current version 1.5 feature split military into many parts. It can be a good idea. But like I said before, devs drive it to the wrong way again. This is the screenshot from World Conquerer 3 I download from web.

Look at the picture, what's come from your mind(*Not general feature)?

The general icons just represent the players of CoW. It should be small but specific, rather then split nation into 4 urban areas. The CoW 1.5 should split players to different positions. Shanghai legion, Bangkok legion, New Delhi legion...etc. Each player should have their role. Like, Bangkok has navy factory. They owned more navy; New Delhi has tank factory and they owned more tanks. Something like this. It will become a team up game.

When you take a special role. It will forced you focus on your own mission. Then you will think twice before you attacked.

Call of War has more potential can be dig out. There still has plenty improve space, it also can add more features to earn money. But focus on the use of gold and expect it can briing profits. I think it is worse.

To know CoW 1.5 better. I decided to play Conflict of Nations. After enter the game, I was shocked. In fact, most of CoN beat CoW as well. Can understand why Bytro try to import the features to CoW. But CoW is Call of War, CoN is Conflict of Nations. They are designed for different purposes.

Why don't just absorb the benefits from CoN?

Conflict of Nation has better social function than CoW. When you enter the game, first you will see:


A connection with Discord. You may said we live in the era people read newspaper. It's OK. Then how about......


This "In Game" chat, as far I know, many players want it on eager.

Then the terrain grapic is better than CoW, even supermacy 1914 is better than CoW.

CoW has music and sound now. This is some of few benefits to beat other Bytro games. And CoW own better 2D model skin than others too.

CoN own more terrains and more kind of resources. And it doesn't have population upkeep. Upkeep is a special feature of CoW. If devs takes out all CoW features. How does CoW compare with other Bytro games?

Demolish building, this is the feature I suggested on the forum before. I did't know it's a key feature of CoN.


Special event, I very like this feature and I also suggested it long time ago. Did CoN devs view Call of War Steam forum before? I don't know. CoW didn't have any "too special" event. But CoN has!

The amount of CoN resource produce rate is pretty low. I'm still studying it balance or not. But after I start the game. Russia own more provinces and resource than me.