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Cossacks SeriesCossacks - quality of single missions(10 posts)(10 posts)
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Posted December 30, 2020
Hi all,

Being that I am interested in SP first and foremost, I got into Cossacks with the intention of playing through all the campaigns.

So far, I am still in Cossacks - European Wars, I've completed the Caribbean Pirates and Independence War campaigns, and have arrived at the 10th scenario of the French campaign.

Besides the campaigns, there are the "single missions": only 10 and 7 in European Wars and The Art of War expansion, respectively, but a whopping 101 missions in Back to War!

But I am skeptical: it is already clear with the campaigns that the scenario design in Cossacks is not stellar, and seeing as in the case of European Wars, only the last 4 scenarios in the single mission's list seem story-driven (the others have descriptions that are not even based on specific history, just random stuff like "two nations have fought over this land for ages, and are about to continue doing so"), I suspect most of the 101 single missions in Back to War are going to be little more than deathmatch material. A quick test did seem to show some story driven scenarios which may be sometimes based on actual history, but I also came across a scenario whose starting text-popup literally just said "remember you can use CTRL + D to switch between slow and fast modes" LOL

So my question is: what are the standout single missions in Back to War? Is my impression that this is a case of quantity over quality correct?

I am particularly interested in those missions that actually make you relive a specific historical event or context - like an actual real world battle or conflict, like in the campaigns. EDIT: I might also consider playing a mission that doesn't attempt to teach you any history IF it has particularly good level design (something on the level of Tatar Wars, for example, or Bermudan Pirates).

Thanks for any opinions and insights!
Post edited December 30, 2020 by Sat42
Posted December 30, 2020
How different people are. I love doing single missions and play maps people have made and care not whether they are based on a real historical event or not. Random maps are also in my favour but they tend to become samish.
Posted December 31, 2020
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Themken: How different people are. I love doing single missions and play maps people have made and care not whether they are based on a real historical event or not. Random maps are also in my favour but they tend to become samish.
For random map skirmish mode I prefer Age of Empires II, or better yet Empire Earth II, or Age of Mythology if I want to go into the fantasy realm.

(I also enjoy the skirmish mode in Battle Realms but there is no random map generation there, only a good number of hand-made maps.)

The thing is, Cossacks just doesn't have enough to keep me going in normal skirmish mode: the AI is mediocre at best and the pacing can feel really off. Good scenario design (usually with smart use of triggers or scripted sequences, but it doesn't have to be heavily reliant on those, for example I think Cuba in the English campaign has particularly good level design and it doesn't make heavy use of triggers) is what makes Cossacks interesting in SP (again I don't normally delve into MP).

Do you happen to remember some particular single missions in Back to War which you could recommend?

I welcome any thoughts/discussion on this!
Posted December 31, 2020
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Sat42:
I do not have the games installed where I am now :-( and my brain is not very good today so cannot remember details except a couple of custom made maps that were excellent. No clue where to find such after twenty years though. Also, I am not terribly good at real time tactical/strategical games and may like these more because of that. The campaigns are a bit too hard for me sooner or later.
Posted December 31, 2020
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Sat42:
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Themken: I do not have the games installed where I am now :-( and my brain is not very good today so cannot remember details except a couple of custom made maps that were excellent. No clue where to find such after twenty years though. Also, I am not terribly good at real time tactical/strategical games and may like these more because of that. The campaigns are a bit too hard for me sooner or later.
Understood, no worries, thanks for the reply! Maybe someone else will also chime in later and provide a list of specific missions of interest.
Posted January 25, 2021
So here are my impressions of the campaigns and single missions in Cossacks - European Wars:

- overall rating for the campaigns: good (for comparison, that's also my overall rating for the campaigns in Age of Empires, yes the original one)

- notable recurring problems: uneven narration, poor implementation of triggers leading to unbalanced gameplay (poor playtesting?), limited AI (mediocre at best)

- the Caribbean Pirates campaign is the best, and also the shortest (in terms of playtime, not number of scenarios) and easiest (=/= easy, as it can still be quite hard): somewhere between good and very good, with the highlights being Bermudan Pirates and Cuba; from a narrative standpoint, it succeeds in representing the progression from official imperial expeditionary force to pirate-like (privateer) force.

- the Independence War and Serving the Cardinal campaigns are both good: some truly hard missions now; Independence War has high contrasts with Tatar Wars being very good and Kodak Fortress being an actually below average scenario (the only one I'd rate below 50% in the whole game) due to a huge oversight allowing the player to win in a couple of minutes with the commander unit only (I figured this out on my first playthrough); Serving the Cardinal is more even, doesn't reach the heights of the Ukrainian campaign but doesn't reach the latter's lows either; both feature some anachronisms, with the Ukrainians inexplicably able to make a hot air balloon in the 17th century and the French campaign allowing for 18th century progression at times even though it is exclusively set in the 17th century.

- A Window to Europe is the longest, hardest and least enjoyable campaign: still above average (60%), so an overall mostly positive experience, but between some bullshit spawning of enemies (especially in the Crimean Campaign scenario, which is the first I encountered in this game which I'd call very hard) and unreasonable balance and design peaking with Karelia and Ingermanland (the only scenario I've played in an RTS which I'd qualify as extremely difficult, and for reference I've played through Starcraft - Broodwar), this campaign requires extreme dedication and patience and the payoff is basically limited to the knowledge that you beat the game (no nice ending cinematic here)... the last scenario is simply good, very hard but in a more or less legit way, and for the first time I managed to reach a population of over 1000 units there, so pretty epic...

As for the single missions, IMHO they're mostly uninteresting (they're mostly unrelated to a particular historical event) and pushovers after playing through the campaigns, but I did play four of them, when you look at the list of 10 missions I played from Ancient Abbey to Captured Coast (the latter features the awesome Portuguese shipyards with integrated defence towers), and only the latter provided some challenge. Certainly from a narrative perspective, they're not worth it.

So that's it for me, I am done with this game. I'd rate Cossacks - European Wars as falling just short of very good overall (so somewhere within ]7.5;8[ out of 10)

I have been playing Cossacks - The Art of War for a while now, and it is an improvement - definitely a very good game. I will share my detailed impressions on the campaigns once I am done!

EDIT: I always play on the Medium/Normal difficulty setting unless otherwise stated. Cossacks - European Wars does not allow you to choose a difficulty setting for the campaigns (similarly to Starcraft), unlike Cossacks - The Art of War.
Post edited January 27, 2021 by Sat42
Posted July 21, 2021
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Sat42: So here are my impressions of the campaigns and single missions in Cossacks - European Wars:

- overall rating for the campaigns: good (for comparison, that's also my overall rating for the campaigns in Age of Empires, yes the original one)

- notable recurring problems: uneven narration, poor implementation of triggers leading to unbalanced gameplay (poor playtesting?), limited AI (mediocre at best)

- the Caribbean Pirates campaign is the best, and also the shortest (in terms of playtime, not number of scenarios) and easiest (=/= easy, as it can still be quite hard): somewhere between good and very good, with the highlights being Bermudan Pirates and Cuba; from a narrative standpoint, it succeeds in representing the progression from official imperial expeditionary force to pirate-like (privateer) force.

- the Independence War and Serving the Cardinal campaigns are both good: some truly hard missions now; Independence War has high contrasts with Tatar Wars being very good and Kodak Fortress being an actually below average scenario (the only one I'd rate below 50% in the whole game) due to a huge oversight allowing the player to win in a couple of minutes with the commander unit only (I figured this out on my first playthrough); Serving the Cardinal is more even, doesn't reach the heights of the Ukrainian campaign but doesn't reach the latter's lows either; both feature some anachronisms, with the Ukrainians inexplicably able to make a hot air balloon in the 17th century and the French campaign allowing for 18th century progression at times even though it is exclusively set in the 17th century.

- A Window to Europe is the longest, hardest and least enjoyable campaign: still above average (60%), so an overall mostly positive experience, but between some bullshit spawning of enemies (especially in the Crimean Campaign scenario, which is the first I encountered in this game which I'd call very hard) and unreasonable balance and design peaking with Karelia and Ingermanland (the only scenario I've played in an RTS which I'd qualify as extremely difficult, and for reference I've played through Starcraft - Broodwar), this campaign requires extreme dedication and patience and the payoff is basically limited to the knowledge that you beat the game (no nice ending cinematic here)... the last scenario is simply good, very hard but in a more or less legit way, and for the first time I managed to reach a population of over 1000 units there, so pretty epic...

As for the single missions, IMHO they're mostly uninteresting (they're mostly unrelated to a particular historical event) and pushovers after playing through the campaigns, but I did play four of them, when you look at the list of 10 missions I played from Ancient Abbey to Captured Coast (the latter features the awesome Portuguese shipyards with integrated defence towers), and only the latter provided some challenge. Certainly from a narrative perspective, they're not worth it.

So that's it for me, I am done with this game. I'd rate Cossacks - European Wars as falling just short of very good overall (so somewhere within ]7.5;8[ out of 10)

I have been playing Cossacks - The Art of War for a while now, and it is an improvement - definitely a very good game. I will share my detailed impressions on the campaigns once I am done!

EDIT: I always play on the Medium/Normal difficulty setting unless otherwise stated. Cossacks - European Wars does not allow you to choose a difficulty setting for the campaigns (similarly to Starcraft), unlike Cossacks - The Art of War.
So what are your thoughts on the Art of War campaigns? I only ever played and finished the European Wars campaigns so I'm wondering if its worth trying out Art of War.
Posted July 23, 2021
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medkirtys: So what are your thoughts on the Art of War campaigns? I only ever played and finished the European Wars campaigns so I'm wondering if its worth trying out Art of War.
Hi medkirtys,

Funny your post arrives just as I am about to finish Cossacks - The Art of War!
I took a break from the game and only committed seriously to it a couple of months ago or so. I finished all the campaigns except the last one: Grand Bey, where I just arrived at the 3rd scenario (and I believe that the campaign has 5 scenarios in all, if the Wiki statement of there being a total of 63 campaign missions between the base game and the expansion is correct).

So the short answer is: in general, the expansion's campaigns are a bit better than those of the base game.

Mainly, that is because the game's systems/mechanics are improved, not because the mission design is better, however regarding the latter it must be said that the implementation is also better overall, with significantly fewer instances of haphazard trigger use / bullshit balance of spawning enemies. You will still see some occasionally WTF situations (on the Medium/Normal difficulty setting at least) and rarely some bugs (nothing game breaking).
I said the overall rating for the campaigns in Cossacks - European Wars is good; I'd say the overall rating for the campaigns in Cossacks - The Art of War is somewhere between good and very good, basically they are all on the level of the best campaign from the base game (Caribbean Pirates).

Importantly, the expansion improves the game's systems: from Quality of Life features like improved peasant AI such that peasants enter a mine automatically upon completing its construction, to the introduction of the much appreciated active pause (aka tactical pause) system (I definitely use it a lot in the campaigns).

As a result, while I said that I'd rate Cossacks - European Wars as falling just short of very good overall, I'd say that Cossacks - The Art of War is overall a solid 8/10.

So if you really enjoyed your time with the base game's campaigns, play the expansion's campaigns. As usual, expect a serious challenge (at least on the Normal difficulty setting). There are some easy missions in there, but the hardest missions are very hard (lots of reloads! on the level of the Russian campaign's Crimean Campaign and Baltic Campaign scenarios), however thankfully I have yet to encounter a completely unreasonable scenario like Karelia and Ingermanland.
However, the improvements aren't big, so if your experience with Cossacks - European Wars was so-so, you can safely skip Cossacks - The Art of War.

Final note: I should say that Cossacks - The Art of War is more welcoming to players who are new to the series than the original Cossacks - European Wars, primarily because of the ability to change the difficulty setting in the campaigns and the existence of the active pause feature.
Posted July 28, 2021
I finished the last campaign, Grand Bey, which is merely good overall actually, with its first scenario (Desert Warriors) being its best (and hardest). Not quite on the level of the other four campaigns, mainly because of a lack of inspiration.

Still, it doesn't change the general rating of the expansion's campaigns (i.e., overall they're a bit better than those of the base game).

I'd say the best scenarios in the expansion's campaigns are: Vienna (in the Champion of the Empire campaign) and Southern Province (Noble's Honour campaign), the best siege scenario and best role play scenario, respectively, both very good. This stuff is on a par with the base game's Bermudan Pirates, Cuba, and Tatar Wars, and is on the level of what you typically get in the campaigns of the original Age of Empires II.
The Siege of Berlin (Under the Banner of King Frederick campaign) is an example of a runners up scenario which I would have rated as being very good if the mission objectives had been better telegraphed on the Normal difficulty setting: defend the city they say, OK, but for how long and until what? The scenario is very hard (plenty of reloads) and you start second guessing yourself - maybe I should counter-attack, eliminate all forces in the periphery to stop the continuous stream of enemies crashing through my walls? The funny thing is, on the Easy difficulty setting, they clearly state to defend until reinforcements arrive! (I discovered that after testing the mission on Easy, then with that knowledge I eventually beat the mission on Normal which is the difficulty setting I always play on as stated in an earlier post.) Vienna - though challenging - is more fair in this regard, and also has a more interesting arc as if you succeed in defending the city, you then go on the offensive.

One more note on Cossacks - The Art of War's single missions: just like with the base game, the single missions are pushovers after playing through the campaigns.
Post edited July 28, 2021 by Sat42
Posted September 11, 2024
@Sat42, imo you should have played only Cossacks - Back to War, as it contains all the campaign and scenarios from the other two games (not sure if they come directly with the expansion, or you have to import them, but i'm pretty sure it's something simple if that is the case).

Back to War adds some interface, QoL and AI improvements over the first iterations of the game. It's pretty much the definitive version to play Cossacks 1 today.
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Cossacks SeriesCossacks - quality of single missions(10 posts)(10 posts)
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