WAR V2.0
========
REQUIREMENTS
------------
War requires a 1Mb ST/STe and is mouse controlled. It should work on most
TOS versions, including the Mega STe at 16MHz. Theoretically it should also
work on the TT (I haven't been able to test this, but if you run it from ST
Low it should be okay).
The program will run quite happily from hard disk. Note that the files
TITLE.PI1, TERRAIN.PI1 and UNITS.PI1 are all necessary.
CREDITS
-------
Many thanks to Dom Morris and Dave Gamlin for playtesting and suggestions.
Thanks also to Billy Allan and Colin Watt for MISTY and THE MISSING LINK,
without which this program would have been SLOW!
SHAREWARE!
----------
WAR is shareware. The registration fee is œ5, for which you will receive a
disk containing:
- The latest version of WAR (probably the same as this one but you never
know...)
- New scenarios
- A fully interactive scenario editor
- Full instructions and example files for the editor
The DEMO folder on this disk contains a small slideshow of screen dumps from
the editor program.
Send to:
Ross McNaughton
29a Vachel Road
Reading
Berkshire
RG1 1NY
All rights reserved. This version of the program may be freely distributed
provided that all files in this archive are included.
LOADING A SCENARIO
------------------
When the game has loaded, the title screen will be replaced by a file
selector listing the scenarios available (in the demo version, they're all
in the folder SCENARIO). Choose one, then go and make a cup of tea or
something, the program has all kinds of things to set up during the loading
process.
OPTIONS
-------
When the scenario has loaded, a status screen will appear showing the name
of the scenario, the name of each army, and which options have been set for
this scenario. The options are:
PALETTE. There are three palettes, Normal, Desert and Winter. They do not
affect the gameplay, only the screen colours.
VISIBILITY. With FULL visibility, all units are visible to the enemy at all
times. With LIMITED visibility, all units start the game invisible. With
PARTIAL visibility, units are hidden if they start the game in cover, and
only stay invisible if they stay in cover. In all cases, any unit which
fires, is hit by enemy fire, or is next to an enemy unit will become
visible. Under PARTIAL or LIMITED visibility, visible units can hide again
by moving into heavy cover (normally deep woods or buildings).
FIRING. With SIMPLE firing, the only difference between direct and indirect
fire is that direct requires line of sight. With COMPLEX firing, short and
long ranges are determined for each weapon (roughly the first and last
quarter of the range). Direct fire has increased armour penetration at short
range and decreased AP at long range. Indirect fire cannot target units
within short range, and suffers an accuracy penalty at long range.
TERRAIN DAMAGE. When this is active, shots that do more than 60 damage have
a chance of affecting the terrain. Buildings can be ruined, bridges broken
and flat land turned into craters.
GAME PHASES
-----------
Each round of the game is divided into a number of phases which follow the
order:
PLAYER 1 ORDERS PHASE (1st round only)
PLAYER 2 ORDERS PHASE
PLAYER 1 FIRE PHASE
PLAYER 1 MOVEMENT PHASE
PLAYER 2 FIRE PHASE
PLAYER 1 FIRE PHASE
PLAYER 1 ORDERS PHASE
PLAYER 2 FIRE PHASE
PLAYER 2 MOVEMENT PHASE
PLAYER 1 FIRE PHASE
PLAYER 2 FIRE PHASE
REPORT PHASE
The extra orders phase in the first round is just to make sure that player
1's units don't get into combat without any orders.
ORDERS PHASE
------------
The orders phase starts with an overview of the battlefield. The overview
map shows your units, your objectives (if any), all enemy units which are
visible and any visible mines. Units and objects (objectives and mines) can
be turned off to show the terrain underneath.
When you exit the overview, you will step through each of your units in turn
with the opportunity to change its orders. This is the first time you will
see the main game screen. On the right is the close-up map, centred on the
unit and showing 5 squares in each direction. All visible units are shown,
with a small red arrow indicating which way they are facing. Top left are
some of the unit's statistics, and bottom left are the controls. In this
phase, the controls are buttons for the five types of orders. The other
phases have similar displays but with different stats and controls.
The orders for a unit determine which actions it can perform during the
turn, and how effective it will be in close combat. Some units can only be
given certain orders. The orders are:
MANOEUVRE: Units on manoeuvre get their full movement and can fire normally
but have no combat bonuses.
ADVANCE: Units on advance have their movement reduced by a third but have a
small combat bonus.
DEFEND: Defending units cannot move, although they can fire normally. They
get a large combat bonus.
RESERVE: Units in reserve will recover strength and morale. They cannot move
or fire, and have no combat bonus.
SNAP FIRE: Units on snap fire get extra shots during the enemy movement
phase. They will automatically fire at any unit which assaults them, and
will also fire at one other enemy unit if it moves. The target unit is
chosen by the computer according to its position and cover, the idea being
to pin units so that they are fired upon if they emerge from cover. Units on
snap fire cannot move and have no combat bonus.
Units with BROKEN morale are restricted to manoeuvre or reserve orders. When
a unit's morale changes to BROKEN, it will automatically be placed on
manoeuvre.
When you've selected the orders you want, click on NEXT to step to the next
unit. If you've given all the orders you want to before reaching the last
unit, click on EXIT.
FIRE PHASE
----------
During the fire phase, the game will step through each of the units which
can fire. Different units have different rates of fire, so they won't all be
available in the same phase. Those with a ROF of 1 fire in the phase before
your movement phase, those with ROF 2 fire in the other two phases, and
those with ROF 3 fire in all three.
Click on the direction arrows to scroll the map. The unit which is firing is
marked with a red frame, so that if you scroll too far and get lost you can
find it again.
When you move the pointer over the map, it will turn into a crosshair. Move
it over the unit you want to shoot and press the left mouse button. WARNING:
Friendly fire is possible! If you target one of your own units, the computer
won't stop you. The message line at the bottom of the map will report the
success of your shot: hit, miss or deflected by armour. If you hit, a second
message will appear if the unit is destroyed.
Firing accuracy is affected by terrain; it is increased if your unit is on
high elevation, and decreased if the target unit is in cover.
When the unit has fired, the game will automatically step to the next unit.
If you want to skip a unit, click on the NEXT button. If you want to end the
phase before all your units have fired, click on EXIT.
MOVEMENT PHASE
--------------
The movement phase control panel is similar to that for the fire phase, but
with a few additions. Under the statistics list is a line which shows
whether a unit is a transporter or transportable. If it is a transporter and
is carrying another unit, the icon for that unit is also shown.
Similar to the fire phase, there are 8 direction arrows, but for the
movement phase there are three other icons next to them. These are explained
below. Also, a copy of the unit icon and its facing arrow are shown in the
centre of the direction buttons.
The three icons on the left select the MODE: Observation (eye symbol),
Change Facing (8 small arrows, like a chaos symbol) and Move (large arrow).
The mode determines the effect of the direction buttons. Whenever you change
mode, the map will be re-centred on the current unit. The mode setting
remains as last set when you change to a new unit.
In Observation mode, the direction arrows scroll the map freely, without
affecting the current unit. You can plan your route, check on the positions
of supporting units and look for the enemy.
In Change Facing mode, clicking on a direction arrow will turn the unit to
face in that direction. This costs points (one point for turning up to 90
degrees and two points for more than 90 degress), and should only be used
after the unit has finished moving, since facing changes automatically when
a unit moves.
In Move mode, the direction arrows move the unit. Movement is points based
and the number of points remaining is one of the stats shown in the top
left. Provided the unit is able to move onto the target terrain type, and
has enough points, the unit will move, otherwise a message will appear
telling you why movement is impossible.
If the target square contains mines, they will react depending on the type
of unit. Normal units set off the mines, taking damage and making the mines
visible to both sides. Airborne units will spot the mines, making them
visible only to the side which owns the unit. Engineers will remove the
mines. Engineers will also repair damaged bridges or roads if moved onto
them, but all of these actions require extra movement points.
You cannot move on top of one of your own units except to load a
transportable unit into a transport. This will end its move, but it will
appear in the next movement phase. Move the unit if you wish to unload it,
leave it alone if you wish to leave it in the transport. Units in transport
cannot fire, and do not appear in the orders phase; they are automatically
on manoeuvre orders.
If you attempt to move onto an enemy unit, an assault will take place. If
your unit loses, it will stay where it is. If it wins, the enemy unit will
retreat and your unit will take its place. A unit that cannot retreat (all
directions are blocked by units or impassable terrain) will be overrun and
destroyed.
As well as the assault values of the two units, the following stats have an
effect on assault: Morale, relative elevation (eg attacking from hillside to
flat ground), and facing (rear attacks are most effective, frontal attacks
least effective). A unit on less than 50% of its original strength will also
have its assault reduced.
As well as both sides taking the appropriate damage, the winning unit will
increase in morale and the losing unit will decrease in morale. One
exception to this is that a unit on less than a quarter of its original
strength cannot increase its morale, either by winning assaults or
reserving. For the unit to increase in morale, it must be left in reserve
until it is back above a quarter strength.
A NOTE ABOUT DIAGONAL MOVEMENT: If a wargame map has to be divided, most
people prefer hexes to squares. Hexes offer six directions of equal distance
whereas squares either give four equal directions, or eight directions with
longer diagonals, which is more difficult to work with. However, the
combination of points-based movement and the computer to do the calculations
makes the latter option quite easy. A simple bit of trig shows that for a
square with sides of 1, the diagonal is SQRT(2), about 1.42. So, for
diagonal movement, the computer uses 1.5 times the movement cost, rounded
down. This isn't perfect but it's close enough and tends to average out over
a whole movement phase. Firing distances are calculated similarly, so if a
unit fires at an enemy five squares up and five squares to the left, it
needs a range of 7.
The movement phase will step through all units which still have movement
points available. Unlike the other phases, the movement phase will 'wrap
around', going back to the first unit after you click NEXT on the last unit.
It will only exit automatically if all your units have used all their
movement. Otherwise, it will keep going until you click on EXIT.
REPORT PHASE
------------
The report phase presents a screen of statistics on the two armies. The
initial and current army sizes are given both in terms of number of units
and total strength. If objectives are used, the number of objectives held by
each side is also shown. The last column of each row gives the current value
of each of these statistics as a percenage of the initial values.
The report phase is there to help the players decide whether victory
conditions have been achieved. Victory conditions are not handled by the
computer, but are left to the players to decide; the game itself will not
stop even if both armies are totally destroyed.
There are three options along the bottom of the screen. SAVE saves the
current position as a standard .WAR file, which can then be loaded into the
program like any other scenario. Orders are not saved, but as when starting
a new game, each player will have an orders phase at the beginning. CONTINUE
begins the next round. Finally, QUIT terminates the game. There is no
confirmation in the current version, as soon as you click on QUIT you will
return to the desktop, so be careful not to click on it accidentally.
Ross McNaughton, July 1994