Jump to content

How do you guys that mainly play single player enjoy the game?


Chaosduck7

Recommended Posts

Sorry for all the topics, but at 120 dollars I really wanna make sure this is worth the purchase for me so I wanna gather all the opinions i can. 

 

 

So im wondering, do you guys who play single player find there are enough user made scenarios for you to enjoy? There obviously is a finite number, and some of them are probably poorly made (no offence), so do you tend to replay some of them? Does it feel different when you replay them?  Do you ever get to the point where you wanna play some steel beats, but youve already played all the good ones out and you are just waiting for someone to make something unique?

 

Or do you guys find that most of your playtime comes from making your own scenarios and playing them?

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I play the scenarios and also build my own.  If you are not going to publish them, its easy to build a simple scenario with some variability.  I probably do about half and half.  I also spend a lot of time modifying existing scenarios as a kind of sandbox.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Chaosduck7 said:

Sorry for all the topics, but at 120 dollars I really wanna make sure this is worth the purchase for me so I wanna gather all the opinions i can. 

 

 

So im wondering, do you guys who play single player find there are enough user made scenarios for you to enjoy? There obviously is a finite number, and some of them are probably poorly made (no offence), so do you tend to replay some of them? Does it feel different when you replay them?  Do you ever get to the point where you wanna play some steel beats, but youve already played all the good ones out and you are just waiting for someone to make something unique?

 

Or do you guys find that most of your playtime comes from making your own scenarios and playing them?

 

 

 

The mission editor is a very powerful tool in SB

To alter the dynamic of a mission is very easy .

As an example I will often play a mission using say a CR-2 then try the mission in a leo-1 or even in a T-type

I can honestly say I have never run out of Missions in SB. and I have been playing it for ten years

The options for changing a mission are virtually endless you can add or subtract units change the map add more arty

And as stated you can do this very quickly literally a couple of clicks all depending on the complexity of the changes of course.

If your not in to editing. the SB community provides a steady supply of new missions

You will never run out of missions

 

Edited by Marko
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I play single and multi-player, although not as much multi-player as I'd like due to lack of time. I enjoy both equally, for different reasons.

 

Multi-player games tend to be much more dynamic, especially if there are humans controlling the opposition. And you get a more 'realistic' feel in terms of radio traffic and coordinating movements with other players, etc. MP games also tend to [generally] lessen the workload for each player. One can spend more time focusing on one's own platoon/company instead of trying to manage an entire force single-handed. And if there's no action where your units are, you can always jump around and check out what's going on elsewhere...or even jump in the gunner's seat of another player's wingman vehicle and help out [with permission, of course]. The downside is that it's not always easy to get everyone on the same page and sometimes things can go south because of a lack of clarity or a lack of communication altogether. Having said that, there's something very satisfying about working together to achieve the objectives. And the camaraderie that results can lead to some lasting friendships.

 

On the other hand, single-player missions allow one to have total control over what friendly forces do [usually]. The nice thing about the AI is that if you give them a route, they will follow it (to the best of their ability). The bad part is that if you give them a route, they will follow it. xD What I mean is: if you tell them to assault headlong into a superior force, they will do so without thinking twice...even if it means all of them will die in the process. In other words, you have to do a little bit more thinking for them than you'd have to do with a human player. But, if you're as OCD as I am, you might enjoy that kind of thing. It takes me a long time to get tired of playing the same mission. The way SB functions and the way most missions are designed allows for a lot of flexibility in terms of just how you execute your orders and achieve your objectives. You don't have to follow the same narrow route every time and see the same enemies from the same perspective. You can choose to deploy your forces in entirely different positions, at different paces, and try a virtually limitless number of alternate plans to see how successful they are. That's because this is what the sim was designed for: to test and evaluate different tactical approaches to a given scenario. And that's even if there's no randomness built-in. Many scenarios do have at least a little randomness, making re-plays even more enjoyable. With some missions, I spend more time in the planning phase than actually executing said plan in the action phase. But, how much time you want to spend in each phase is mostly up to you.

 

The other nice thing about single-player missions is the ability to pause whenever you feel like it. As an added bonus, you can use that time to take a step back and look at how things are going and even issue new orders before resuming. It's a welcome feature when things start to get overwhelmingly chaotic, but of course, you don't have to use it if you feel that it detracts from the immersion of playing the whole mission 'live'.

 

I do play a mix of missions that I and others create. Sometimes I also modify scenarios that others have created to mix things up a bit. (But, of course, I would never publish those modified scenarios without permission and full credit to the original author.) I find that if you make a mission challenging enough, it's still interesting even though you may know what's coming. And again, if you add in some randomness, you can even surprise yourself.

 

Anyway, that's just my fifty cents. ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

+1 @ marko!

Worth it?

Lets see .....with a couple of upgrades thru the years its cost me approx $200.00 usd

over the last DECADE.  Quick math  = 20 usd a year or one dollar and 60cents a month.

so for the price one 12 oz coffee at your local 7-11 per month you to can own sbpro. 

Marko's post is spot on, really the sim is limited only to your imagination!  Not every scenario

is a signal script, A lot of missions are dynamic, meaning they play differently every time-

FFS  that dam mission tanks or tanks again- I'm still tryin to beat that one, and Im not tellin ya how long thats

been either!

IMHO as a sp guy, If you have an interest in what sbpro offers, Its hands down the best

dollar per entertainment hour software I ever purchased!!!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, Marko said:

The mission editor is a very powerful tool in SB

To alter the dynamic of a mission is very easy .

As an example I will often play a mission using say a CR-2 then try the mission in a leo-1 or even in a T-type

I can honestly say I have never run out of Missions in SB. and I have been playing it for ten years

The options for changing a mission are virtually endless you can add or subtract units change the map add more arty

And as stated you can do this very quickly literally a couple of clicks all depending on the complexity of the changes of course.

If your not in to editing. the SB community provides a steady supply of new missions

You will never run out of missions

 

 

 

How fast do new quality missions generally get uploaded on here? 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 minutes ago, Chaosduck7 said:

How fast do new quality missions generally get uploaded on here? 

 

Well the process from lodging to publishing takes a couple of days.

 

If the question you are really asking is "How often do people create new missions?" then the answer is "it depends". No one is required to create missions, its up to them.

 

Also "quality" can be a very subjective term. There is a rating system but it tends to be not used very well (i.e. missions tend to score 0 or 5 stars - rarely in between).

 

Edited by Gibsonm
Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, Chaosduck7 said:

Sorry for all the topics, but at 120 dollars I really wanna make sure this is worth the purchase for me so I wanna gather all the opinions i can. 

 

 

So im wondering, do you guys who play single player find there are enough user made scenarios for you to enjoy? There obviously is a finite number, and some of them are probably poorly made (no offence), so do you tend to replay some of them? Does it feel different when you replay them?  Do you ever get to the point where you wanna play some steel beats, but youve already played all the good ones out and you are just waiting for someone to make something unique?

 

Or do you guys find that most of your playtime comes from making your own scenarios and playing them?

 

 

 

 

One of the forum members, Cobrabase, has a youtube channel:  Steelbeastscavalry.  He seems to play SB exclusively in single-player mode, and has posted numerous videos of his very, umm, enthusiastic sessions.  You can get an idea of the universe of SP missions and you might even be able to communicate with him for his thoughts on the matter.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

From a newbi prospective (have SB for a couple of months or so)...

 

- When buying a game I look for three things mostly, SP and MP modes, and included editor.

 

- Depending on the game I buy and specially a combat sim type, I tend to want a editor included, and if it´s a good editor as in SB the better. Why? well that gives you the flexability to creat your own mission, so you never run out of gameplay.  Some editors are a bit deep in the learning curve (not so much with SB, but it can get deepr if you so wish), but in the long run once you understand how it works it´s quite easy.  As stated above the SB editor is quite easy on the simple side, and as I said it can get a bit complex if needed.

 

- For gameplay, I like both but I tend to like a bit more the multiplayer side.  It´s alot of fun to play with other human players and a challange, be it co-op against the AI or head-to head.  If you like this type of game/sim, Steel Beast is awesome in every way you put it, the more I play, the more I enjoy it and I have been siming for some years now.

 

- Support is also something to take into account and SB support is the best that I have had to deal with in many years.

 

- Money wise, well some of us here are into flight siming with DCS and FSX/P3D.  If you compare a 3rd party add-on for these two sims (50<120$ with a quality plane) SB is in no way expensive taking into to account that you get a whole sim with editor and what would be the add-on´s (tanks, AFV´s, infantry etc.) for it, it´s spot on and on the affordable side for me.  If we look into a game that just came out for PC (50-60$) and that it might not even have to much replayability, and/or might be obsolete in a couple of years, your still in for a winner with SB, people have been playing it for years.  Also a security USB stick (I have other) will cost you around 20-30$ aside from the software that will be protected with it.  I remember playing Call of Duty (any title) and finish the games in a weekend, all you where left with was MP gameing. Nice to play but it was like going to the movies with the whole family. Once you see the movie, that´s it!  Not that there´s nothing wrong with that mind you, but you get the idea.

 

Beside, you can always buy a one month time limited licences and try it out. Can bet that :)

 

Just my humble oppinion.

 

Care,

 

Red

Edited by Red2112
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 10/13/2016 at 10:31 AM, MDF said:

 

One of the forum members, Cobrabase, has a youtube channel:  Steelbeastscavalry.  He seems to play SB exclusively in single-player mode, and has posted numerous videos of his very, umm, enthusiastic sessions.  You can get an idea of the universe of SP missions and you might even be able to communicate with him for his thoughts on the matter.

 

 

Wow his vids are pretty good. He definetly seems to enjoy the single player side.

 

 

5 hours ago, Red2112 said:

From a newbi prospective (have SB for a couple of months or so)...

 

- When buying a game I look for three things mostly, SP and MP modes, and included editor.

 

- Depending on the game I buy and specially a combat sim type, I tend to want a editor included, and if it´s a good editor as in SB the better. Why? well that gives you the flexability to creat your own mission, so you never run out of gameplay.  Some editors are a bit deep in the learning curve (not so much with SB, but it can get deepr if you so wish), but in the long run once you understand how it works it´s quite easy.  As stated above the SB editor is quite easy on the simple side, and as I said it can get a bit complex if needed.

 

- For gameplay, I like both but I tend to like a bit more the multiplayer side.  It´s alot of fun to play with other human players and a challange, be it co-op against the AI or head-to head.  If you like this type of game/sim, Steel Beast is awesome in every way you put it, the more I play, the more I enjoy it and I have been siming for some years now.

 

- Support is also something to take into account and SB support is the best that I have had to deal with in many years.

 

- Money wise, well some of us here are into flight siming with DCS and FSX/P3D.  If you compare a 3rd party add-on for these two sims (50<120$ with a quality plane) SB is in no way expensive taking into to account that you get a whole sim with editor and what would be the add-on´s (tanks, AFV´s, infantry etc.) for it, it´s spot on and on the affordable side for me.  If we look into a game that just came out for PC (50-60$) and that it might not even have to much replayability, and/or might be obsolete in a couple of years, your still in for a winner with SB, people have been playing it for years.  Also a security USB stick (I have other) will cost you around 20-30$ aside from the software that will be protected with it.  I remember playing Call of Duty (any title) and finish the games in a weekend, all you where left with was MP gameing. Nice to play but it was like going to the movies with the whole family. Once you see the movie, that´s it!  Not that there´s nothing wrong with that mind you, but you get the idea.

 

Beside, you can always buy a one month time limited licences and try it out. Can bet that :)

 

Just my humble oppinion.

 

Care,

 

Red

 

Way ahead of you lol. I got the month license and have been playing almost every day. The core game/sim is great, its just the lasting content im worried about. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Chaosduck7 said:

 

 

Wow his vids are pretty good. He definetly seems to enjoy the single player side.

 

 

 

Way ahead of you lol. I got the month license and have been playing almost every day. The core game/sim is great, its just the lasting content im worried about. 

 

Glad you did so and that you like it! 

 

My coment in general terms is also for anybody new who would have the same or similar doubts.

 

Lasting content, well people here been playing it for many years and still do, that sure convinced me. Like I and others stated, you can always make your own content with the editor.  There´s quite alot of missions in the download section. Here´s a nice SP one from Panzer_Leader:

http://www.steelbeasts.com/files/file/1998-area-reconnaissance-at-neustadt-am-rübenberge-1989-v20-40/

 

The AI is quite good in SB which is another + for SB, and same mission is never the same B|

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I'd call it "scenario maintenance" and I hope that the required changes are both relatively easy to identify and to fix. Of course that also depends a bit on the scenario documentation. Did the original author gave variables a descriptive name. Are there clear identifiers which event or condition triggers what action.

I mean, we try to be as backwards compatible as possible, and for the most part it seems to have worked (except for those two recent cock-ups with the scoring conversion and that other thing (I already forgot about the details). Memory may be failing me, but as far as I recall the biggest issue we ever had was that SB1 scenarios allowed non-amphibious vehicles to cross rivers that were up to two tiles wide (25m) which was no longer possible from SB2 on. And that was something we just HAD to break and it was reasonably easy to identify (and to adjust).

 

Do you know of a specific scenario that made years ago and which worked great in older versions but no longer does now?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Ssnake said:

Do you know of a specific scenario that made years ago and which worked great in older versions but no longer does now?

 

Well off hand - all the Brave Rifles scenarios since they were built on the previous Inf / APC model.

 

I suspect if run in 4.006 that the AI red will just dismount and stay in location and not move with their APCs during the assualts.

 

There may also be issues with the then Infantry sprites being represented more fully now - but I've not tested them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is not a criticism of you, Chaosduck7 because we are all different and enjoy different things, but any "lack of lasting content" in Steel Beasts would be subjective. It is really down to how much you enjoy the scope of what SB has to offer. It can be created, modernised, randomised etc. to the nth degree. However, ultimately you will either maintain an interest in the relatively finite, if evolving, technology and tactics involved and retain the desire to work toward a fairly predictable set of goals under varying circumstances, or you will not. It would not surprise me if you do not, simply because, even out of many friends who are either really hardcore gamers or equally passionate armour enthusiasts, I haven't convinced a single one to come here, whereas one of the less cerebral/realistic tank games out there was an easy sell to friends who were neither. All I can ask is that you try to explore the possibilities fully before making the decision to move on.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

I like single player scenarios a bit more than multiplayer.  No drama, no player conflicts, no connection problems, no time restrictions due to jobs, wives, etc.  I don't like trying to handle the large scale missions alone, prefer operating a reinforced platoon or a company sized unit.  I play whenever I wish, I can save the game and join in later.  I dislike creating missions for my own because when I know exactly what's happening, takes away the surprise element.  About the only time I enjoy multiplayer scenarios better is when I was unemployed and had way too much spare time on my hands in between job hunting. 

The sad part is that this game is really not intended for single player gaming.  It really is better for multiplayer.  Hence the reason there are far more multiplayer missions than single player.  Just how it is.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I gamed the first 4 years or so only in single player. Mostly because at that time, games tended to be mostly out of my tz. 

 

Someone above mentioned the time available as the reason not to play in mp. I agree and that's the reason our mp games focus on starting on time (when it works out). So we don't waste to much time on nothing. 

 

I must have played the PzG missions to death in single player and still enjoy them. Tons of good mission makers out there produced awesome missions. My quirk with the mission editing is that to get a good AI going it takes tons of time to make. In games with more than 1 plt that is. 

 

I have come to enjoy and appreciate everytime we have opfor or h2h in the mp games because they give something AI don't.  

 

If you want to do some minor mp games with a wingman or 2 give me a shout. 

 

Lastly I will also say that even if (and don't kill me yet...) it's not meant as a RTS I can still setup a game and run it by map only. 

 

My 2 cents.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I set up a few little simple scenarios - a heliborne invasion of Gotland and a reinforced Russian armoured battalion heading down a valley in 1983 and have played them over and over tweaking them as I go. Immense fun. There is infinite scope for variation even within the limits of what's in the simulator already and it's very exciting speculating what it will be like with various things that may or may not materialise in the future.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...