Erm what about vietnam then? America.. super power... big industrial might... but all green and young. Had resources and where well supplied in battlefields by their armour and hueys but i guess those evil "tactics" and "strategy" that you hate so much worked in the end then right?

also my subject title isn't me trying to sound hard like i was in vietnam or anything but its just what lotsa americans seem to say..

This comment was edited on Sep 19, 19:17.

You're all wrong. Real war is about logistics and attrition. Sure you can win a battle or 2 using tactics and strategy, but the overall war is won by resources and the delivery of the those resources(logistics). The reason for this is that opposing armies quickly adapt and learn from the strategies used and relatively quickly, both sides end up using the same tactics and strategy.

In WW2, the Americans were at first surprised by German blitzkrieg but soon adapted. Rommel himself said that they couldn't win against American industrial might(resources/logistics). Immediately after Pearl Harbor, the Japanese admiral feared "waking a sleeping giant", obviously referring to American industrial power, whose military strategy was green at first(hence the "sleeping" part)

Take the civil war. The South had superior tactics and strategy and sure they were winning battles at first. But they could not match the industrial strength of the North. It was a matter of time before the North was pumping out more soldiers, more cannon, more ships, more guns and slowly crushing the South.

And no, chess has nothing to do with real war, morons. And no, you have no evidence that generals or even a majority of them play chess - you've been watching too many movies.

Actually, "combat strategy" is probably more properly described as tactics...

lol

If you don't want to debate, than don't. no one is forcing you to say anything stupid.

Resources, shmesources. You aren't making any sense.

were not talking about military strategy, or football strategy, or car race strategy. were talking about combat strategy. which has to do with resources. so bite my bum.

and every "strategy" you mentioned in chess is a tactic. and i agree with the other guy, this conversation is starting to make my head buzz.

You can't state or even assume that 'advantageous conditions' has anything to do with resources. An advantageous condition could be as simple as placing your armies on higher ground, or positioning you ships to guard a harbor so no enemy boats can escape.

Strategy is the dictation of combat at a higher level, while tactics is the dictation of combat at a lower level. I think that is pretty obvious.

Strategy can also take place in a political compaign, in a football game, in a car race, in a tennis match. To say that strategy is limited to dealing with resources is limiting a very powerful word.

Also, there is definately strategy in chess. You may go into a game with a strategy of letting your opponent take the center squares in the hopes of making him over-confident. When you play your strategy out, it may be tactics, but it's still following a strategy that you made based on your opponent, the time on the clock and the color of pieces you're playing.

The truth is, I can make the word strategy fit exactly what I am saying, but you can't make it fit ONLY what you are saying. Strategy can have a lot to do with resources, but it can also have absolutely NOTHING to do with resources. It is a very large word that covers multiple instances, not just one.

You guys need to cut this shit out. It's all fun and games until some hot chick comes in and sees you arguing over battle tactics and chess.

two things:

my chess square argument is flawed, but only slightly. in fact, i guess their might be better squares from a tactical standpoint (i.e.- offers more attack options.)

the science and art of employing the political, economic, psychological, and military forces of a nation or group of nations to afford the maximum support to adopted policies in peace or war (2) : the science and art of military command exercised to meet the enemy in combat under advantageous conditions

both of those highlighted words suggest resources. and, in none of those strategy definitions does it mention actual combat. thats because (say it with me now)
THERE IS NO COMBAT IN STRATEGY!

all combat takes place at the tactical level. chess is a game of tactics. learn it, live it, love it.

Ok, I'm changing my stance on this debate and now disagreeing with you, draft.

First of all, there are squares in chess that are more important than others. It is generally regarded that the middle squares are the most valuable because that gives you better position for attacking the entire board. Also, the a1-h8 and a8-h1 diagonals are considered very good places to put your black square and white square bishops because this is where they'll be able to cover the most squares. Same goes for rooks on the d1-d8 and e1-e8 squares. By placing your rooks on any of these squares you'll be able to cover the center of the board, which, again, is where you can launch the most attacks from.

Also, while resources are an important part of strategy, strategy does not cover resources alone. I now understand the difference between tactics and strategy, but I don't know where the heck you're getting your definition of strategy from.

Also, moving one of your pawns all the way across the board can convert it to another piece. So pawns are fuel for new Queens, Rooks, Knights or Bishops. In other words, pawns are resources.

EvilJebus, you're an idiot. Of course real soldiers aren't limited to moving straight or diagonally. But if you can find a situation or game that requires more tactics than chess, then please let us know what it is. Maybe in a real world scenario you wouldn't depend on a piece that can only move diagonally, but the same basic rules apply. You still have pins, forks, pieces that are more powerful than others. You can still use tactics to make your enemy move his units to someplace else so you can take an objective. Why do you think so many Generals love and play chess? Do you really think they don't see a similarity there?

Just read in computer games magazine(Oct 02) in an interview with Bill Roper of Blizzard:

CG: So when is Starcraft II coming out?
BR:(Laughs) We're not working on StarCraft II. So who knows when it's going to come out? We do love StarCraft and want to go back to (it) and I'm sure we'll do another one some day. Everyone asks this question and it's hard to say no. But the answer is that we're just not working on it right now.

I think the problem is that you're basing the defence of your argument on a flawed definition of strategy. Hopefully, a dictionary definition will help:

1(1) : the science and art of employing the political, economic, psychological, and military forces of a nation or group of nations to afford the maximum support to adopted policies in peace or war (2) : the science and art of military command exercised to meet the enemy in combat under advantageous conditions

2 a : a careful plan or method : a clever stratagem b : the art of devising or employing plans or stratagems toward a goal

3 : an adaptation or complex of adaptations (as of behavior, metabolism, or structure) that serves or appears to serve an important function in achieving evolutionary success
(all from the miriam-websters dictionary at http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary )

Notice that nowhere does it mention 'resources'.

They're already working on a SC2 in 3D. I heard it's in the alpha stage, but that could be wrong.

http://www.starcraft-2.com

first of all, chess is supposed to be a representation of war. but regardless, answer me this? do any squares in chess have more value than others? for instance, is there any bonus for taking control of the upper left corner? no, unless your opponents pieces are arranged around that square in such a way that is beneficial to you. hence, that corner has no strategic value. there is nothing special about it that makes having it useful for the players.
however, lets change the rules of chess for a second. lets say the two middle squares, if you place your king on either one, grant you an extra pawn every turn. if that was the case, the square would have strategic value.
i mean, even games agree with me. warcraft 3, starcraft, red alert and AOE are all considered strategy games. what do they all have in common? mining and spending resources to fuel your war machine. now, lets look at Final Fantasy Tactics, or Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel. both of those games are similar to the above strategy fare, but missing one crucial element: RESOURCES. neither game requires you to manage an economy, just dictate where your troops go and what they do. so, again, i repeat:

strategy: overall plan of attack, involves moving units in such a way as to claim resources necessary to war, as well as destroying enemies resources.
tactics: specific troop movements. no resources entre the equation. an example would be if you move your knight to check my king, id move my queen to kill your knight.

so, for (hopefully) the last time, THERE ARE NO RESOURCES IN CHESS, THEREFORE THERE IS NO STRATEGY. this is not a bad thing. strategy is not better than tactics, and vice versa. theyre both equally important parts of real war. as a matter of fact, tactics are more interesting, because they focus solely on combat (the fun stuff

I totally see your point. But I still dont see how soldier's tactics are anything like chess. You cant compare chess to real war, its nothing similar at all. Do some soldiers only move forward while others can go diagnal? Imagine your chess pieces as groups of soldiers instead of individual soldiers, and the board as an entire country, and then you see that chess is much closer to your definition of "strategy" than it is "tactics".

This comment was edited on Sep 16, 16:34.

finally, someone with a brain. people, im not trying to invalidate the game of chess. its a fine game, requires a keen mind to play well and years of practice to master. but, IT HAS NO STRATEGY!!! aarrgghhh!
once again, ill try to break it down, real simple like. in the grand scope of war, there is strategy. a plan to take Japan by leap frogging from island to island is a STRATEGY. once you land on an island, the manuevers soldiers perform against each other are TACTICS.
getting back on topic, id also like to see a FPS game from bizzard, but i dont think itll happen. i remember some interview roper gave where he said he'd like to, but only if blizzard could come up with some genius new play mechanic that no one else has. i doubt theyre going to revolutionize the FPS genre while working on WOW and the inevitable WC3 expansion.

finally, someone with a brain. people, im not trying to invalidate the game of chess. its a fine game, requires a keen mind to play well and years of practice to master. but, IT HAS NO STRATEGY!!! aarrgghhh!
getting back on topic, id also like to see a FPS game from bizzard, but i dont think itll happen. i remember some interview roper gave where he said he'd like to, but only if blizzard could come up with some genius new play mechanic that no one else has. i doubt theyre going to revolutionize the FPS genre while working on WOW and the inevitable WC3 expansion.

Jimmy gots the vapors.


This comment was edited on Oct 17, 01:48.

Why hasn't anyone really talked about Diablo3. Come on peoples it's going to be another RPG. Obvious as

Is the same team that worked on Diablo working on World of Warcraft? It would seem to be the case, as both games are more RPG'ish. Whouldn't it therefore have to be another RTS?

#62, that was the third definition on the list. The first one confirmed what draft has been saying. Also, the definition you gave didn't really back up what you're saying, so hush-a-roo.

The definition for Tactics: (used with a sing. verb) The military science that deals with securing objectives set by STRATEGY, especially the technique of deploying and directing troops, ships, and aircraft in effective maneuvers against an enemy.

I am now in agreement with draft.

Perhaps then, what RTS games really lack is good tactical combat. I also think that the pace of the game is way too quick. It's like playing a 1 minute game of Speed Chess where you don't have time to really think or develop good tactics. It's all attack attack attack.

Granted, I've played some fun Age of Empires games, and I even bought WC3 (looking for the ultimate strategy game). But I just have a problem with the Do Everything Fast gameplay that's common among most RTS games. I want slow paced, thinking strategy games where I have the time to create something a little more complex than "grab all the gold mines." If the games last 8 or 9 hours instead of 2-4, that's fine with me, as long as I get to develop a complex strategy using good military tactics. A game with larger maps, more units (not more variety, but a larger unit count, i.e. 500 to 1000 units instead of a max of 100), and more interesting ways to complete an objective.

Also, I think map design in RTS games is highly under-rated. Most of the maps out there (that I've seen) are pretty much a re-hasing of all the other maps.

I still stand by my statement that there's no more strategy in WC3 than there is in BF 1942.

I do not have a beef with WC3. I'm just a picky gamer