Ozyman's recent post about a delayed abandon feature got me to thinking..

Seeing as PerTerritoryAbandon or TerritoryMinimums is not going to be an option anytime in the near future, it would probably be nice if players had a "Total - 1" or "Advance all but 1" button.  Really, it would only need to be on boards with Abandon ON.  It's a player feature and not a designer feature, but when I design boards and I'm considering Abandon ON, I always think that the board is unlikely to be played because players will be frustrated when they hit that T button by accident.

I don't think I've *ever* cared about what the player would think of my board if they made a mistake on how to roll. And after careful thought provoked by your post (shame on you for making me think!), I think I'll continue that way. Tho I'm not opposed to the T/A-1 button (other than clutter effect), is it just one more thing for people to want to change when they mess up? 

I like the idea of a T-1 button for abandon boards.  I also like the idea for non-abandon.  In some cases, you want to leave a trail of 2s behind to make cleanup more difficult.  Of course that means for abandon boards, you'd need a T-2 button...

Even more than either of these, I'd love to see a 'W' (weaken) button.  The idea is that it would stop attacks just before the territory might be taken.

If the concern is too much clutter, there could be an active area on the right edge of the attack box.  You click it, and the box extends and has a few more buttons.  That way it doesn't clutter the interface in normal views.  Or maybe just a option in the user profile.  I wouldn't mind a few more buttons, but it might be confusing for newbs.

These could all be premium perks.

good ideas Ozy. i especially like the expanding attack box. i know we've discussed a weakening option as well as a T-X button.

I know we currently have a pull-down, but never been able to figure out which it is: attack with up to X losses, or until X units remain (and I can't find in the forums where i know we'd discussed it)

When I first read T-1 I had actually assumed it meant the weaken concept that Ozy just wrote about whereas attacks would stop (-1) attack from completing the T and leaving the opposition with 1 or 2 troops there.  It just makes a lot more sense having a single button that gives the player control over however they want to complete the attack (or not) and however much they want to leave behind as they move forward. Much simpler then creating any clutter of buttons or a pull down menu. 

Such a weaken feature would even be useful in regular (abandon off) games.  For instance, sometimes in border skirmishes with light fog on a player might want to bring opposition territories down to having only 1 or 2 troops remaining but not take it so as to not give anyone else playing a clue as to who's more powerful on that border.  Or just to send that other player a message that you will not allow him/her to build up, but, not breaking each other's bonuses is also necessary for both to remain competitive in the game.

Also could be very useful in team games whereby perhaps one player might want to weaken a bottleneck prior to their ally passing through it.  So, they'd like to stop short of actually capturing the bottleneck territory.

I like the W button idea. I know I would use that also for times when you want to use one territory to weaken and another to take. If you are talking large troop stacks you have to tap 3 a number of times until the target has the desired 1-2  for your other stack to storm through. 

I also like very much the W button. T-1 and T-2 would be nice. 

I would also like a D for desperate button. It's a T thta would not stop the attack even if you have only 2 armies left. You want to attack all out, even with 2 or 1 dice.

You'd never touch that one Toto. ;)

ratsy wrote:

You'd never touch that one Toto. ;)

Yes i would, very often. Say I am attacking with 5 armies a territory defended by 1, and I really want to get the kill, I would go till the final 1 vs 1 fight.

I like the weaken button also.

In the interests of satisfying all (impossible of course), what if there was a customizable button?

So the buttons could be 1 2 3 A T and C (custom).  The C button wouldn't work unless the player opens up a menu with the advanced ">" sign right on the button menu.

Custom Button Options are 

T-x   

Weaken   (select threshold)

Fight to the Death

Fight to the death would be certainly be nice on boards where you have limited attacks :)

M57 wrote:

In the interests of satisfying all (impossible of course), what if there was a customizable button?

So the buttons could be 1 2 3 A T and C (custom).  The C button wouldn't work unless the player opens up a menu with the advanced ">" sign right on the button menu.

Custom Button Options are 

T-x   

Weaken   (select threshold)

Fight to the Death

if there's going to be an expanded attack window, why not have all three - it would essentially double what's there with the 3 buttons and a pull-down threshold

weathertop wrote:

M57 wrote:

In the interests of satisfying all (impossible of course), what if there was a customizable button?

So the buttons could be 1 2 3 A T and C (custom).  The C button wouldn't work unless the player opens up a menu with the advanced ">" sign right on the button menu.

Custom Button Options are 

T-x   

Weaken   (select threshold)

Fight to the Death

if there's going to be an expanded attack window, why not have all three - it would essentially double what's there with the 3 buttons and a pull-down threshold

+1

M57 wrote:

weathertop wrote:

M57 wrote:

In the interests of satisfying all (impossible of course), what if there was a customizable button?

So the buttons could be 1 2 3 A T and C (custom).  The C button wouldn't work unless the player opens up a menu with the advanced ">" sign right on the button menu.

Custom Button Options are 

T-x   

Weaken   (select threshold)

Fight to the Death

if there's going to be an expanded attack window, why not have all three - it would essentially double what's there with the 3 buttons and a pull-down threshold

+1

+1