Der Weltkrieg

[ojsdad]

This was posted over at consimworld

dave schroeder - Sep 14, 2019 11:27 am (#12953 Total: 13039) BookmarkEmail to Friend

SPW Website

I am in the process of closing down the spwgame.com website. I have sent the rules files to Decision Games, and they will shortly take over the distribution of those files. I will keep the website up until DG is fully set up.

The videos on the game mechanics are available on youtube, so they will still be available for people to view.

Until I fully retire (maybe 3 years from now), I just do not have the time and energy that is needed for further developments. And I cannot justify what I am paying to maintain the website.

So, if you want to get something off of the website, please do so quickly.

[bob48]

 

[72z]

Don't expect much to make sense - the East Front game literally redid the countersheets, verbatim from the 3 titles it all combined (neverminding the fact that when republished it had become a singular title).

Why this might have been important?  In the previous expansion title: Gorlice-Tarnow/Brusilov  - the set up for (and I forgot which one it was) -required users to substitute HQ units with one designation for something else as outlined in the set up instructions.

Now the mind-fornicating aspect of this, is that this little detail was never outlined in the rules --- so a user could spend a long time searching for HQ units in your countermixes, that literally did not exist.

How or why do I know this?  Well, aside from the fact that it never got documented - when these things were re-published back in 2012 I had done all of the counter-proofing and sorting out all of the different titles to make sure that with all of the various layers of 'Duration games' that existed (what this means is that every time a new title was released it included layered on rules to combine everything that existed at that time .... of course the problem was, was that prior to 2012 there did not appear to have been much of a plan to do this outside of simply slapping together another Duration game set of rules ... so that there were a multitude of slightly different entry schedules ... all for the same thing.

B)

[ojsdad]

Looks like all of the rules are downloadable from here.

http://decisiongames.com/wpsite/e-rules/

[72z]

Nice find - glad DG saw fit to get rid of the password needed for rules download thing. 

I mentioned about about some units being missing (I think in Gorlice-Tarnow/Brusilov) - and by extension the eastern front continuation games. I probably have the proof files for the countersets - which means I would be in a position to create the missing counters -but you'd have to then make them up ala print on demand.

I would just need a list of what you need.    That and work out how to use .ai files (am not sure if I have the exact font set either ... so that might be an aesthetic issue). 

Edited:  Ojsdad and I were discussing this;  I do have some space on my own site  (Scenario Design Center  -which mainly has John Tiller Software content) set aside for Der Weltkrieg.  I didn't have the link handy at the time - and this is really only intended as a placeholder site (and it has been in this state for a number of years).   

I understand that the SPW official site is now gone (I knew Mr Schroeder had said that he would drop support of it) - I was in charge of the SPW website (such as it were) for several years.   The point in posting this link is not that I am saying this is done - but rather more that there is the potential to do this.  I thought that I could do better than the site that was published (a lot better actually), so this is basically a blank canvass - but also one with a disclaimer-  I have a project with Tiller that takes precedence to everything.  I am not at all saying that I can do this immediately.

http://hist-sdc.com/spw/

Useless trivia -- that FT-17? It's the one from Western Front, which I worked into a favicon for my own site - I think I probably did something similar for the other tanks in the game as well.
 

[72z]

All the links on that side were never added - I did have an alternate index site however:  http://hist-sdc.com/spw/index2.php

[bayonetbrant]

https://twitter.com/chanceofgaming/status/1280674478872240134

[bob48]

I've got the second one from the top :-)

[ojsdad]

Bob, your idea about getting the strength values to change on the counter.  I've got that to work.  Next time I see you on line, I'll show you. 

[bob48]

Well done, Mike - I'll be interested to see that - it will save a lot of work and reduce stack size 

[mirth]

https://twitter.com/chanceofgaming/status/1280674478872240134

What every gamer thinks

[tuna]

Well done, Mike - I'll be interested to see that - it will save a lot of work and reduce stack size 

Awesome interactive counters Bob!!.. But beware, those mountain ranges will make your eyes scream!! 

[bob48]

The maps are a little hard work.

[72z]

https://twitter.com/chanceofgaming/status/1280674478872240134

I can do better than that-- David Mitchell in an episode of Peep Show is in a Hobby Shop - he's standing in front of a shelf- and there behind him -with their nice spectral convergence of yellow to orange to red and back again (or is it vice versa) - is a about 5 of these titles.

Mind you I swear the episode where Mitchell's character self-publishes a self help book: Business Secrets of the Pharaohs is also a parody of Business in the Trenches... seems too coincidental..

-Switching Gears:  OJsDad and I were talking - and while I was aware that the SPW website was going away soon, I hadn't realised that this had actually happened - which it has now.   I had done the official SPW website for several years- and while I saved all of what I had - frankly it wasn't all that great of a site - I wanted to use digital images - as they were going to be clearer than photos and all that - and to that end, I am open to adding this on to a section of hist-sdc.com.   

I haven't played the series since about 2008 ... spatial considerations ... I'd done the first few turns of Schlieffen Plan several times- and the entire Liege-Namur area is a bit of an interesting puzzle as it also involves timetables. 

I thought the then version of Tannenberg was too scripted and therefore not conducive to replaying.... and was nearly to the point of starting Galicia when I had to pack things up - that one looked like it had a lot of possibilities - but I need to someday get back to that one.

Yes the maps thing has been an issue that I have read about numerous times, but the thing with this series is - effectively aside from some city hexes, effectively all terrain is via hexside.   I don't actually know how else you do it - although I imagine there might be a way - at the time these were initially published (late 90's) - it was a time when graphics programs were not like something you just fire up a pc, laptop, or tablet and just go for it.  I read a long time ago that Dave said something about Joe Youst- however, I mean if you go back far enough you can read all sorts of interesting things about the series- like the whopper that all of it was done, but just needed money to be published.

Well if that is so, then how is it that several years later (and by this I mean like 2001 - or so - on Consimworld) he's brainstorming techniques for a Panzers in France, and talking about playtesting, and actual development talk?  Since that time nothing much changed- there's a WWII folder for the series on CSW- but - I mean, let's be honest, it's under development - maybe. WWI as a series out - well that's an accomplishment to be sure  -it is something that Europa never achieved ... so I mean to be fair to Dave - it has been a big project.

Anyways- I might open up an area to this on Scenario Design Center... am happy to work with others who might want that - although as I got some other things in mind, it won't be a personal priority unless I get seriously back into WW I gaming -- who knows... I guess it could happen.

[ojsdad]

Finally got the turncoat Italians and their British and French masters loaded.  Took some time as I was having to figure out what to do with fortresses and supply markers.  Now to get the Austrian-Hungarians and their allies the from the German Empire loaded.