作者：Michel Mony

尽管并非强制要求，但我还是建议你们在阅读本文前先看看这系列文章的第一部分。

上下文

在上篇文章中，我描写了《沙丘2》作为RTS游戏类型的先驱，并提到了它引起了Westwood Studios（已经不在了，之前是属于艺电）和暴雪娱乐在1992年至1998年期间的“冲突”。

正因为这几年的激烈竞争才塑造出了我们所看到的现代RTS。我们可以着眼于暴雪对于Westwood的回应并观察事情的发展趋势。

需要注意的是，如果没有Patrick Wyatt那价值连城的回忆，也就没有本文了。

《魔兽争霸：人类与兽人》

《魔兽争霸》是一款非常优秀的游戏，获得了许多积极的评论并引出了人们对于过去的回忆。从本质上来看，它与《沙丘2》略有不同。它的突出之处在于通过执行而非功能简化了类型。在许多方面，它的突出之处也是促使RTS成为主流游戏的主要原因。

多人游戏

《魔兽争霸》的主要创造性在于多人游戏概念。在暴雪最初关于RTS的想法中，这是一种突出竞争性的游戏。迫于当时的技术限制，它只能想办法呈现一种基于调制解调器的多人游戏系统。这甚至能在不同平台上（PC vs MAC）交叉进行多人游戏。

因为这是首次涉足RTS多人游戏体验，所以他们缺少足够的支持。也不存在特定的游戏玩法功能。

为了为多人游戏创造空间，暴雪还定义了单人游戏体验与多人游戏体验之间的核心区别。

单人游戏

–拥有吸引人的故事线（比《沙丘2》具有更多描述和上下文设定）。

–拥有各种威胁和遭遇，（人类vs人类的比赛，非玩家角色，如蝎子，食人魔等等）。

–拥有各种目标（重建一座城镇，在特定时间内复苏，有限的兵力等等）。

多人游戏

–这是拥有同等获胜机会的双方之间的肉搏战。

–在玩家试图打败对手并假设所面对的是势均力敌的对手方面添加乐趣。

显然，多人游戏仍然需要走很长的一段路才有可能接近平衡。《魔兽争霸：人类与兽人》之中的多人游戏比赛通常都是片面的，即更理解游戏机制的玩家总是能够占上风。这里不存在“联盟”系统或任何规则。

尽管《魔兽争霸：人类与兽人》可能是第一款真正涉足多人RTS领域的游戏，但是其游戏模式是因为之后的内容才真正开始发光的，特别是《魔兽争霸2：黑潮》，《星际争霸》和《星际争霸2：自由之翼》。

经济

《魔兽争霸》中的资源出现了很大的变化。它们进化成两种不同的来源：树（森林）和金子（矿藏）。然而经济中的最大变化还是复杂的经济单位的出现：农民（雇农）。

农民是“复杂的”，因为他们会提供给玩家有意义的决策选择（以及选择的成本）。他们既能够创造架构（使用资源）也能够收获资源（获取资源）。他们会积极/消极地影响资源流。选择指定一个农民去创建一个架构拥有多种含义：

这能将农民从任务中移除：这是一种选择成本，即等同于玩家接受了不间断的劳作不再获得资源的结果。因为在特定期间单位是固定的，所以如此的作用将会很明显。

这是基于架构成本消耗资源。这是另一种选择成本，即这些资源将不能再被用于其它地方了。

这提供给玩家一种全新的架构（当建造完成后）。基于不同架构，它能够从经济上或军事上带给玩家帮助，但通常情况下它总是需要进一步的投资。一般情况下建造会提供进一步的选择成本（如创造一个步兵？需要多少成本？）。

这些单位的复杂性及其相对低效的收集率（与《沙丘2》相比较）将确保玩家的军队拥有大部分“平民”（农民/雇农），这反过来也呈现出了较高的脆弱性。

与基本经济单位是全副武装的《沙丘2》不同的是，在这里农民是非常脆弱且无处不在的（经常需要分散开来）。损失一个农民不像收割机损失那样具有威胁性，这是更常见的情况。《沙丘2》的收割机是由大枪所护送，而农民却不能单独护送，，在这里我们需要将农民当成“补给线”，这在下面会进一步讨论。

在《魔兽争霸：人类与兽人》中，资源是实体一样的存在，如此也为游戏添加了战略深度。例如树同样也是作为碰撞对象，这意味着玩家需要在获得木头的时候格外谨慎。在获得适当兵力的时候打开它们的侧面可能会引出烦人的遭遇战。

因此木头是作为自然保护屏障，它将随着基地的壮大而变少，但它也仍然需要适当的管理以避免一些明显的陷阱。

同样地，在敌人基地周围收获木头也揭示了一个可以进攻的“薄弱点”，所以我们可以派遣农民在敌人基地附近砍伐木材以提供更多进攻机会。

另一方面，矿藏是非常集中的。它们代表的是地图上一个下载的目标，即需要不惜代价将其控制住。随着自然中的矿藏变得越加稀少，获得遥远的矿藏就变成了主要目标：不管是什么矿藏，只要你的敌人找到了，也就等于你失去了这部分资源。此外，矿藏需要农民去收获并且不受任何“代理”的干预带回家。这会创造出更长的补给线并需要你花费更多精力去防止敌人的进攻。一般情况下，矿藏越远，我们便越难守护，玩家的伤亡情况也会越惨重。

一些游戏系列有效使用了复杂的资源。例如《帝国时代》便将“树”作为最大的资源空间。金子系统同样也得到了完善，就像在《星际争霸》中集中的资源需要玩家进行专门的投资（游戏邦注：为了更好地控制，精炼厂需要建在Vespene Geysers）。

后勤：道路

《魔兽争霸：人类与兽人》中最容易被遗忘同时也未出现在任何续集中的一个机制便是“道路”。这是强制要求你建造建筑并扩展基地。在某种程度上，它们扮演着与能量相同的角色，但却不具有脆弱性。玩家需要为此花钱去建造道路。这强调了保持基地金币的需求性（考虑到成功应该使用尽量少的道路）。

在《沙丘2》中，道路就像混凝土板的孩子。混凝土板最初是用于确保建筑保持稳定，但最终它却成为廉价建造代理基地的方式（未使用MCV）。

不幸的是，道路根本无法与混凝土板相比较，从游戏玩法来看也未能添加什么好处。它能做的只是提供一种社区感和强大的传说：玩家正在建造营地，不只是在这里和那里进行建造。尽管这一执行相对简陋，但是在之后的游戏却仍能看到它的身影。

许多更专注于城市建造的RTS游戏便更有效地使用了道路，即在评估了UX之后。为了通过每3次点击创建更多道路而拥有拖曳能力能够有效降低道路建造所伴随的消极性，并为沿着道路行走的单位添加速度推进器以给它一个游戏目标。

这也是为何《魔兽争霸：人类与兽人》会添加这一机制的原因，尽管它的执行不是很完美，但它却保留了RTS中利用率最低的机制。大多数使用了这一机制的游戏都与罗马传说具有直接联系（游戏包注：道路对他们的战斗非常关键），我也始终对后勤未能在现代RTS中扮演更重要的角色感到困惑。据说它最初的潜能是受到糟糕的UX执行以及缺少切实目的的影响：建造道路是一种烦恼，并且不能提供除外观以外的更多优势。

食物

虽然《沙丘2》限制了建筑建造，但是《魔兽争霸：人类与兽人》却决定着重于单位。《沙丘2》通过一条不准确的文本信息去明确整款游戏最大的单位数量，而这也等于将所有游戏内部单位整合到零和游戏中：如果你想要创造更多单位的话便要消灭它们。

这一过时的处理游戏内部单位能力的方式存在了很长时间。例如基于回合制的策略游戏《VGA Planets》最初便使用了同样的方法：游戏中最多单位是500个，不管是什么。一旦到达了这个最高值，游戏便会基于不同方式去处理它（例如在《VGA Planets》中，它便使用了受到你所破坏的单位数量影响的点数系统去决定谁将在位置被掏空时创造单位）。《沙丘2》则较为简单：不管何时当单位遭到破坏，任何当前“已经准备好部署”的单位都将填满那个位置，但是会使用哪种算法则是随机的。

《魔兽争霸》通过执行了“派别”上限而解决了这一设计问题。假设任何游戏所拥有的最高数量单位是100个，那么这些单位将被分成两种派别（半兽人50个，人类50个）。在《魔兽争霸：人类与半兽人》中，每次建造“农场”都能提供给玩家一些食物单位（如果我记得没错的话应该是4个），这意味着你能够从每个农场中获得4个单位。同样的，你的军队不能超过你所拥有的农场数量的4倍，或者大于你最终拥有的派别数（一般是游戏单位的一半）。你可以从技术上创造比你的实际上限更多的农场，但是为了防止其它农场遭遇摧毁，这些额外的农场只能作为冗余部分。

《魔兽争霸》意识到了《沙丘2》的设计中的一个缺陷（同时也是那时候许多游戏所带有的缺陷）：因为基地建设受到局限，但是单位建设却没有，这可能导致大量的堆积。因为《魔兽争霸》坚持竞争性游戏，所以它们不会允许这种情况的发生，农场也是主张防御的一种方式：假设两个派别总是拥有同等数量的农场，带有更快增援部队的派别在战斗中占上风，也就是成为防卫者。这能够保证，即使早前的侵略者数量再多也不能在游戏早期将敌方彻底消灭（这与《星际争霸》中的“4pool”是不同的）。

同时，因为所有单位都会消耗一个“食物”，游戏将推动玩家去创造他们自己的技术树并获得“最佳单位”以尽快填满这些位置。如果你正与一些侵入者（半兽人骑士）战争时，步兵数量登顶将不是一种乐观的情况。

然而食物系统将导致基地快速发展。尽管受到道路建设的限制，基地还是能够无限制地自由扩展。

在与能量相比较时，食物同样也非常抽象。这“只是一个数字”，同时也是一种静态资源。它能够独立存在，但却不能提供足够的深度。

在很多情况下食物并非最佳解决方法，但它却是最简单的。它能够处理最初的《沙丘》所面临的一些设计缺陷，即不能有效处理单位容量，并阻止因为太过高效而出现的早前策略太过集中的情况。

这里关于功能的旁白是“几乎是”：农场最初是作为单位开发的更复杂方法的一部分，即随着时间的发展农场将创造出农民，并在兵营里培训他们将其变成军事单位或经济单位。在他所谓的“设计妙招”中，概念被简化成这一抽象的概念。有人肯定会好奇如果执行的是最初的系统的话会出现什么情况。

《星际争霸》，《魔兽争霸》和《战锤》系列都广泛使用了“食物系统”。它代表的是一种实现增长限制与调节军队规模的抽象方式。尽管多少可以称为今天的主流元素，但是我们需要注意的是它也是简化现有设计的一种方式。它似乎已经成为了RTS游戏类型的特性，尽管这一状态还有待验证。

不对称性

《魔兽争霸：人类和半兽人》的不对称设计就像镜中迷雾一般的存在。所有半兽人单位看起来都不同于他们所相对的人类，但是从机制上来看他们却是扮演着同样的角色。尽管有些单位略有出入，但是从根本上看来他们也是一样的。

唯一的机制区别是以咒语的形式表现出来，尽管如此，它们都是一样的（只是看起来不同罢了）。例如：

双方都能施展小型召唤咒语，即召唤非常相似的生物（蜘蛛的破坏性通常都是随机的）

双方都能够施展咒语去破坏1X1区域（如毒雾vs火雨）

书房都能够施展大型召唤咒语，即召唤强大的暴徒（在混战中恶魔是非常强大的，而Water Elemental是远程的招式）

真正不同的咒语是：

半兽人可以（暂时）起死回生而添加一些骷髅到自己的军队中从而在附近出现新鲜尸体的时候提高破坏性。

半兽人可以牺牲单位一半的生命使他们暂时变成天下无敌。

人类可以使用“治愈”功能而最大化“生存单位”的使用并在战斗中起到推动作用。

人类可以使用“隐形”能力在单位不能发动攻击时将其隐藏起来。

考虑到所有的这些内容，半兽人和人类比《沙丘2》中的不同派别更相似，但是因为他们的外观是不同的，所以很容易成为这种计策的牺牲者。暴雪之所以会这么设置是因为确保派别身份与传说和外观相一致同样重要。这是他们在之后几年里设计《星际争霸》系列时始终坚持的理念。

单位升级

《沙丘2》拥有一个升级系统让玩家能够在技术树中进一步打开单位，但它却并未真正利用这一系统。而《魔兽争霸：人类和半兽人》却添加了能够直接影响单位的升级系统。它们让建筑只能用于从整体上完善单位（基于《沙丘2》中的IX机构建造）。

因为升级能够完善单位的防御和攻击能力，所以这些升级能够帮助玩家轻松地走向胜利，但如果理解错误的话也会轻易被打败。

它们往游戏中添加了一个经济层面，即明确何时创造更强大的单位vs创造全新单位是必要的。因为根据目标单位数量能够衡量升级价值，所以在评估升级成本的时候可以最小化/最大化这一策略，并且有许多玩家开始认为这是非常先进的策略基础。

随机地图生成器

源自《文明》系列的“小规模战斗”模式拥有随机地图生成器能够创造出无限的重玩价值。

随着时间的发展，这一随机地图生成器的价值将因为不能生成“平衡的”场景而受限。所以之后的升级中将使用经过严格的关卡设计的“递进式地图”。

UX

作为游戏首席程序员兼制作人的Patrick Wyatt认为自己最自豪的功能就是《魔兽争霸：人类和半兽人》中的多个单位选择。他创造了之前的RTS从未出现过的功能。《沙丘2》很难控制，所以需要进行分组。尽管最初的功能开发不受任何限制，但是有些设计限制最终导致多种选择只影响到4种单位，因此导致这一功能不是那么有用，虽然如此它也是很棒的。这一功能的主要成就便是成为了RTS的主题之一。

他同时也创造了成为另外一个主题的控制组（使用控制+数字键），让玩家能够指挥特定单位群组在游戏中提高他们的控制能力。

就像Patrick所解释的那样，玩家的注意力是RTS的稀少资源，这些添加内容能够减少玩家的负担让他们更好地融入游戏中。有人可能会说，除了多人游戏，《魔兽争霸：人类和半兽人》的伟大遗产在于它完全专注于用户体验，这真的是很棒的决定。

流线型化

《魔兽争霸：半兽人和人类》开启了其它RTS游戏将进一步完善的一个过程，也就是所谓的“流线型化”。

流线型化的优点在于它能够让内容变得更好使用与理解，它能够降低准入障碍并最小化玩家在玩游戏时需要掌握的知识。大多数情况下，这是一种多快好省的有效方式。

而流线型化的缺点则在于它有时候会破坏深度。这通常出现在功能未能得到有效执行时。基于升级内容，设计师将着眼于什么是可行的什么是不可行的，并且不会多加思考不可行的原因并将其删掉。尽管这能够提高每个升级内容的质量，但同时也有可能扼杀掉能够真正完善游戏的一些理念。

《魔兽争霸：人类和半兽人》删除了《沙丘2》所呈现的雇佣兵单位理念。

它删除了沙虫。

它删除了能量（尽管这是Westwood不会轻易放弃的系统）。

它放弃了许多地形元素。

它简化了派别不对称性。

它简化了战役地图。

它呈现出了小地图（不需要特定的建造）。

它将每个派别单位从13减少到7至8。

它将建筑数量从18减少到8。

许多这些决定能够减少一些不必要的复杂性并创造出更棒的“深度”管理，但也有些决定导致一些本来能够进一步扩展的机制的损失。其中有些内容，如对于不对称性的需求在几年后又重新获得了成功（如《星际争霸》中）。

评估

我希望《魔兽争霸：人类和半兽人》能够为RTS类型的发展带去帮助。它的贡献是双重的：一方面，它将推动RTS类型去发展多人游戏场景，并永远地将RTS与PvP竞争维系在一起，执行用户界面工具去支持这一体验。另一方面，它线性化了最初的RTS设计，专注于核心游戏玩法的特定元素去降低这类型的准入障碍，使其使用变得更加民主化。它也有可能具体化一些核心游戏机制（有时候会遮盖了一些全新的理念）。

《魔兽争霸：人类与兽人》并不是独创性实践，这应该是一种执行案例。考虑到创造PvP所伴随的风险，开发者选择使用更简单的设计去创造新次元：具有竞争性的游戏玩法。

在很多情况下，这种线性体验其实是为了创造作为一种游戏类型的RTS。如果让游戏探索许多全新的功能，玩家可能会因此错过核心机制。但是《魔兽争霸：人类与半兽人》却有能力让Westwood和暴雪（或其它公司）能够为谁可以创造出最棒的这类型游戏而继续争斗。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转发，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Retro Mortis: RTS (Part 2) – Then a Blizzard came…

By Michel Mony

Greetings,

While not mandatory, it would be advisable to have read the first part of this article before proceeding.

Context

During my last article, I’ve entertained that Dune II was the original precursor of the RTS genre, and have argued that it had led to a “conflict” that opposed Westwood Studios (Now defunct, formerly under EA leadership) and Blizzard Entertainment (now part of Activision Blizzard) from 1992 to 1998.

The fierce competition during these years helped shape what would become of the modern RTS. I thought it only fitting to take a look at Blizzard’s response to Westood and see where things went from there.

Please note that without Patrick Wyatt’s invaluable recollection, this article would not have been made possible.

Warcraft: Orcs and Humans

Warcraft was a great game that received positive reviews and generated a lot of traction back in the days. When broken down to its essence however, it differs slightly from Dune II. It shines by its ability to condense and simplify the genre, through execution, not feature-creep. In many ways, what makes it great is also a big part of the reason why RTS became streamlined (for better and for worse)

Multiplayer

Warcraft’s primary innovation is the concept of multi-player. In Blizzard’s original vision of the RTS, it was a game that was meant to be played competitively. Limited by the technology of its time, it still managed to boast a modem-bound multiplayer system. It even allowed crossover multiplayer on different platforms (PC vs MAC).

Since this was the first foray into the RTS multiplayer experience, it was provided “as is” with limited support. There were no specific gameplay features attached (ladders would only come with future installments).

To make room for its multiplayer, Blizzard also helped define the core differences between the Single and Multi player experiences.

Single Player…

…has an engaging storyline (much more characterization and context than Dune II).

…has a variety of threats and encounters (mirror matches (human vs human), npcs (scorpions, ogres), etc.)

…has a variety of objectives (rebuild a town, survive for a given duration, limited forces (no base), etc.)

Multi Player…

…is a head-to-head match-up where both forces have an equal chance of winning.

…places the burden of “fun” on how players seek to defeat one another and assumes balanced opponents are facing off.

Obviously, multi-player would still need to come a long way before it became anywhere close to balanced. Multi-player match-ups in Warcraft: Orcs and Humans were generally one-sided where the player that better understood the game mechanics would quickly come on top. There were no “league” systems or any regulation of any kind.

Though Warcraft: Orcs and Humans was possibly the first serious foray in multiplayer RTS games, this game mode would be honed by future installments, especially Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness, Starcraft and Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty. (Warcraft III being left out intentionally)

Economy

Resources changed a lot with Warcraft. From mere “spice laying on the ground” they’ve evolved into two distinct sources: Trees (Forest) and Gold (Mine). Yet, the biggest change in the economy is the introduction of the complex economic units: Peasants (Peons).

Peasants are “complex” because they provide the player with meaningful decision-making (and cost of option). They’re both able to build structures (using resources) and harvest resources (acquiring resources). They affect the resource flow positively AND negatively. Choosing to order a peasant to build a structure has several implications:

It removes the peasant from the task it was performing: this is a cost of option as the player is accepting that the ongoing labor will no longer result in resources being acquired. Since the unit is immobilized for a certain duration, the effect can be quite dire.

It consumes resources based on the structure cost. This is another cost of option as these resources cannot be used elsewhere from here on.

It provides the player with a new structure (when construction is completed). Depending on what that structure is, it can help the player economically or militarily, but generally will require further investments. The building generally provides further cost of option (building a footman? at what cost?).

The complexity of these units, and their relatively inefficient collection rate (compared to Dune 2) insured that players’ armies would now have a significant portion of “civilians” (peasants/peons), which in turn introduced a higher level of vulnerability but also some redundancy.

Unlike Dune II, where the base economic unit was armored, and focused, peasants are extremely frail and can be everywhere (and often need to be scattered). The loss of a peasant, though not as threatening as an harvester, was much more common. While the Dune II harvester could be escorted by big guns, the peasants cannot be escorted individually, instead, peasants need to be thought of as “supply lines” which we’ll discuss below.

The concept of complex economic units was upheld and refined through various Blizzard games but also many others going so far as to put a lot more emphasis on these units in games like Supreme Commander.

***

In Warcraft: Orcs and Humans, resources are a physical entity which adds tactical depth. For example, trees also act as collisions which means that players need to be particularly careful about where they get their wood. Opening their flank in the early game before proper forces are made can lead to unwanted encounters.

Wood thus acts as a natural protection barrier which thins out as one’s base grows, but it still requires proper management to avoid a few obvious pitfalls.

Likewise, proper harvesting of wood around an enemy base may reveal a particularly “weak spot” to invade from, so it is not uncommon to employ peasants to cut lumbers nearby the enemy base to provide more opportunities.

Mines, on the other hand, are extremely focused. They represent a narrow object on the map that needs to be controlled at all costs. Securing a distant mine becomes a critical objective as the mines are finite in nature: whatever gold your opponent gets you won’t be able to get.
Furthermore, mines require peasants to harvest and return home without any “proxy” base to gather from. This results in rather long supply lines that need to be defended from enemy incursions. As a general rule of thumb, the further the mine, the harder it is to defend that supply train, and the more casualties the player will register.

Several series have made good use of complex resources. For example, the Age of Empire series retained the “trees” aspect as most resources occupy physical space. The gold mine system was also refined in various ways, namely by Starcraft which added the concept that a focused resource should require a dedicated investment (refineries need to be built upon Vespene Geysers in order to be controlled).

Logistics: Roads

An often forgotten mechanic from Warcraft: Orcs and Humans that was not present in either sequels was the inclusion of “roads”. These were mandatory to construct buildings and expand the base. In a way, they played the same role as energy, minus its vulnerability. One would have to pay good money to have roads established. This emphasized the need to keep a closed base (use as few roads a possible given the cost).

In a way, roads are the children of the concrete slab in Dune II. The slabs were initially established to insure buildings would be sturdy, but ultimately, it was a means to build proxy bases cheaply (without the use of a MCV).

Unfortunately, the roads pale in comparison to the slabs, and did not add much in terms of gameplay. What it did however is provide a sense of community and strong lore: the players are building encampments, not just buildings here and there. Though the implementation was relatively poor, it was found to be lacking in later installments.

A number of RTS games with a bit more focus on city building have used the roads to great effect afterwards by merely assessing the UX aspect. Having the ability to drag in order to build more than one road every 3 clicks turned out to greatly diminish the negative frustrations associated with road building, and adding a speed boost on units that walked over roads gave it a gameplay purpose.

It is unclear why this was truly added to Warcraft: Orcs and Humans (perhaps playtesting revealed the dangers of “proxy barracks”?) but though its implementation suffered, it remains one of the most under-utilized mechanic in common RTS. Most games that have employed them had a direct link with Roman lore (roads were critical to their multiple campaigns) and I remain perplexed that logistics are not playing a more important role in modern RTS. That being said, its original potential was probably overshadowed by poor UX implementation and lack of tangible purpose: the roads were, essentially, a pain to build, and did not provide much advantage beyond cosmetics.

Food

While Dune II sported a flamboyant limit on building construction, Warcraft: Orcs and Humans decided to put emphasis on units. Dune II had a loose text message to determine that the max unit count for the entire game had been reached which basically pooled all in-game units into a zero-sum game: you would have to kill units if you were to build more of them.

This archaic form of handling unit capacity in games was around for a fair bit of time. For example, the turn-based strategy VGA Planets originally had the same approach: there is a maximum of 500 units in the game, no matter what. There comes a point where the max is reached, and the game handles it in a different way (in VGA Planets, it uses a system of points, which is mostly influenced by the amount of units you destroy, to determine who gets to build units when a “slot” frees up). Dune II was simplistic: whenever a unit would get destroyed, any unit currently “ready to deploy” could fill that slot, but the algorithm that determined which was arbitrary.

Warcraft fixed this design issue by implementing a “by faction” cap. Assuming the maximum amount of units any game could have was, say, 100, this was split across both factions (50 for orcs, 50 for humans). In Warcraft: Orcs and Humans, each “farm” building provides a few units of food (4 if I remember correctly) which means you can create 4 units for each farm. Likewise, your army can never be larger than 4 times the amount of farms you have, or larger than your ultimate faction capacity (half of the game’s units). You can, technically, construct more farms than your actual cap, but they will only serve as redundancy in case other farms get destroyed.

What Warcraft recognized is a flaw in Dune II’s (and many other games of its time) design: because base construction was limited, but not unit construction, it could lead to very aggressive build-ups. Since Warcraft insisted on competitive play, they couldn’t allow it, and farms were a means to favor the defender: Assuming both factions always have the same amount of farms, the faction with the fastest reinforcements will be the one closest to the fight, de facto: the defender. This ensured that no amount of early aggressiveness could fully annihilate an opponent in the early game (unlike the “4pool” in Starcraft for example).

Also, since all units consumed exactly one “food”, players were encouraged to build their tech tree and get the “best units” to fill these slots as quickly as possible. Having a fully capped army of footmen was not desirable when facing off against several raiders (orc knights).

The food system, however, left base growth rampant. Though limited by the construction of roads, a base could freely expand limitlessly.

Food was also very abstract when compared to energy. It was “just a number” and a very static resource. It worked well in its own right, but did not provide much depth.

In many ways, food was not necessarily the best solution, but it was certainly the simplest. It allowed to handle several of the design flaws of the original Dune which simply had no means to handle unit capacity properly, and prevented early rush tactics from being too efficient.

A quick aside here on the feature that “almost was” (as was recently revealed through Patrick Wyatt’s blog): farms were originally meant to be part of a drastically more complex approach to unit development which would’ve resulted in peasants being “spawned” from farms over time, and then trained at the barracks into military units or used as is as economic units. In what he calls a “design coup”, the concept was drastically simplified into this abstract concept. One can’t help but wonder what might have happened should the original system had been implemented.

This barebone “Food System” has been used extensively by the Warcraft and Starcraft franchises, but also in other games such as the Warhammer series. It represents a very abstract means to achieve growth limitation and regulate army sizes. Though somewhat mainstream nowadays, it is important to note that it was found accidentally as a means to simplify an existing design that was deemed too complex at the time. It feels it has become the defacto common denominator of the RTS genre, though that may be a questionable status.

Asymmetry

Warcraft: Orcs and Humans’ assymetrical design is much more smoke and mirrors than gameplay. All orc units look drastically different than their human counterparts, but they serve mechanically the same roles. Though some units vary slightly (archers have a slightly longer range but lower damage output than spearmen, and magic units have a slightly varying range) they are fundamentally the same.

The only real mechanical differences comes in the form of spells, and despite this, most are actually the same (they only look different). For example:

Both sides have a spell that allows them to reveal portions of the map (Dark Vision vs Far Fight)

Both sides have a minor summon spells which summons creatures that are fairly similar (the spiders’ damage is a bit more random)

Both of them have a spell that can deal damage to a 1X1 area (over time dmg of 10) (Poison Cloud vs Rain of Fire)

Both of them have a major summon spell which summons a powerful mob (The Demon is strong in melee and random, whereas the Water Elemental is ranged and has flat dmg)

The only spells that trully differ are these:

The Orcs can raise the dead (temporarily) to add a few skeletons to their army and increase their damage output when there are fresh corpses nearby

The Orcs can sacrifice half the life of a unit to make them temporarily invincible (tanks).

The Humans can use “healing” which is particularly helpful economically as it allows to maximize the use of “surviving units” and give an extra boost to forwards in the fray.

The Humans can use “invisibility” which allows them to hide units so long as they don’t attack and allow them deep into enemy lines.

All things considered, orcs and humans play much more alike than the different factions in Dune II, but because they are aesthetically different, it is easy to fall prey to this ruse and choose sides. What Blizzard brought forth with this installment is that it was equally important to support faction identity with pieces of lore and cosmetic overhaul. This is a thought they would build upon when designing their highly-acclaimed Starcraft a few years later.

Unit Upgrades

Dune II had a system for upgrades which allowed players to unlock further units in the tech tree, but it never really capitalized on this system. Warcraft: Orcs and Humans built upon it by adding upgrades that would affect units directly. They went so far as to having buildings that would only be used to improve units as a whole (loosely based on the House of IX building in Dune II).

From upgrades that would improve units’ defenses and attacks up to outright new spells unlocked for spellcasters, these upgrades could easily lead to victory and defeat when misunderstood.

They added an economic layer to the game where knowing when to make units more powerful vs creating a new unit was necessary. Because an upgrade’s value could be measured by the amount of units it would be applied to, it was possible to min/max this strategy when weighting the upgrade’s cost, and a number of players started to understand that it was fertile grounds for very advanced strategies.

Random Map Generator

Borrowing from the Civilization series, the “Skirmish” mode had a random map generator which could potentially result in unlimited replayability.

As time would prove however, the value of this random map generator was limited in that it did not necessarily generate “fair and balanced” scenarios. Later installments would use “ladder maps” instead which had undergone serious level design efforts.

UX

Patrick Wyatt himself, lead programmer and producer of the game, would say that the feature he’s ever been the most proud of was the multi-unit selection created for Warcraft: Orcs and Humans. He could very well be coined with the invention of that feature altogether, which no RTS has shunned ever since. Dune II was simply cumbersome to control, and it called for grouping. Though initially the feature was developed without limitations, some design constraints eventually led to multi-selection affecting only 4 units, thus making the feature much less useful, but nonetheless stellar. Suffice to say this one achievement was to become a staple of the genre.

Yet he also created the control groups (using control + numbered key) which would also become yet another staple, allowing players to command specific groups of units to improve the player’s grip on the game.

As Patrick puts it, the player’s attention is the rarest resource in a RTS, and these additions came a long way to minimize the burden put on their shoulders and allowed them to better interface with the game. One could argue that, aside from multiplayer, Warcraft: Orcs and Humans’ greatest legacy was its sheer focus on User Experience, which given the case, was no small feat.

Streamlining

Warcraft: Orcs and Humans started a process that several other RTS would refine which I like to call “streamlining”.

The good about streamlining is that it makes things easier to use and understand, it lowers the barrier to entry and minimizes the amount of fore-knowledge one has to have in order to learn and play the game. In most cases, this is desirable as it effectively allows to do more with less.

The con with streamlining is that it sometimes eliminate depth. This often occurs when features were not implemented properly. With new installments, designers look at what worked and what didn’t work and they axe features that didn’t work without stopping at “why” they did not work. While this undeniably improves the quality of each subsequent installment it can also kill under-developed ideas that might have truly improved the game significantly.

Warcraft: Orcs and Humans removed the concept of mercenary units which was present in Dune II’s starport (and would later be re-discovered by Ground Control).

It removed the sandworm.

It removed energy (though that’s one system Westwood would not let rot).

It gave up on a lot of the subtleties of landscaping.

It simplified (and almost removed) faction assymetry.

It greatly simplified the campaign map.

It made the minimap visible de-facto (without the need of a specific building).

It reduced the amount of units per faction from 13 to 7-8.

It reduced the amount of buildings from 18 to 8.

Many of these decisions were for the best as it reduced unecessary complexity and resulted in a better management of “depth”, but a few inevitably resulted in the loss of mechanics that could’ve been expanded instead. (I’ve put an asterisk next to the ones I humbly believe would’ve been worth revisiting). Some of these, such as the need for more assymetry, resurfaced years later with resouding success (Starcraft, for example).

Assessment

I postulate that Warcraft: Orcs and Humans was instrumental to the evolution of the RTS genre. Its legacy is twofold:
On the one hand, it brought the RTS genre to the then rising multiplayer scene, forever associating RTS with PvP competition, and implementing the user interface tools to support that experience (multi-selection, control groups).
On the other hand, it streamlined the original RTS design, focusing on very specific elements of the core gameplay to lower the barrier of entry to the genre, democratizing its use. However, it may have inadvertantly crystallized the core gameplay mechanics for titles to come along the way (sometimes relegating fresh ideas to the oubliette as a result)

Warcraft: Orcs and Humans is not an exercise of originality, it’s an example of execution. Given the risk associated with making this game PvP, the developers chose to stick with simpler designs to create a new dimension: competitive gameplay.

In many ways, this streamlined experience is also largely responsible for establishing the RTS as a genre. Had the game explored many new features, people might have missed how “alike” the core mechanics were and never made any subsequent installments, but Warcraft: Orcs and Humans insured that Westood, Blizzard (and others) would duke it out to figure out who could come up with the best game in this vein.(source:gamedev)