Operations DLCs - Turn off AI Heroes?

[Nimlthaule]

Hello y'all,

I'm looking for some help on the best way to remove the heroes form the AI units in the Operations DLC's. Basically what I enjoy about PC2 over PC1 is the cool game engine stuff: AA has defensive coverage now, AT and AP are split, the ability to surround enemies. What i don't enjoy much is the heroes or general skill system. I appreciate the vanilla aspects of the game and the strategic ideas that with thousands of men and hundreds of tanks, for the most part the qualities of one individual person on the battlefield don't mean much.

To that end I have been doing a play through with a vanilla commander, I generally don't use wonder weapons or foreign untis (yet), and I turned off heroes in the advanced options. However I am still running into AI heroes. Example, In Warsaw I was shocked to find an enemy tank charged out of encirlement to attack my infantry hunkered in a forest they dealt some moderate damage and then my infantry did nothing in return. Checking the tank battalion I saw they had a 'no retaliation hero'. At this point in the campaign this was more an annoyance, breaking my immersion, than a threat. But in Eben Emael the 25 man Belgian division(?) made short work of my paratroopers, but after several restarts I was able to overcome.

Now, however, I have reached Hannut. Historically I think the Germans did not do well here, something about Rommel desperately calling in 8.8's to defend himself? Fair enough. But I am finding that I am struggling with French tanks that have +5 attack or 2 attack actions just absolutely battering open my tanks backed by AT. So now it's not only immersion being shattered, but literally my lines as well. I've got Belgian infantry in my rear and Panzer 4's and 38(t)'s surrendering up front. Some heroes feel fair: no surrender, no supply loss in Warsaw. Or extra retreat, or even oversized Belgian units. No retaliation or 2x attack, or super good attacks again full size units break the immersion FOR ME


All this is to ask... What are my options for removing these heroes? I checked steam workshop but couldn't find anything. Is there an option I'm missing in the menu, a cheat code, or do I have to edit the scenarios by hand? And if the latter, what would be the best way to do that, but leave the existing campaign intact.

Thanks Kindly,
Nimlothaule

[VirgilInTheSKY]

There is no such thing to "turn off AI heroes" for what you are talking about. Part of the new things the AO DLCs introduced is scripted heroes for non-player units. If you don't what to face them, the only way is to edit the scenarios, one by one, remove the lines about attaching heroes for ENEMY units (friendly AI units CAN also get attached heroes in some scenarios) in the related .lua files.

[Grondel]

All this is to ask... What are my options for removing these heroes? I checked steam workshop but couldn't find anything. Is there an option I'm missing in the menu, a cheat code, or do I have to edit the scenarios by hand? And if the latter, what would be the best way to do that, but leave the existing campaign intact.

The heroes that annoy u are added via the LUA of the scenario. Find the scenario in the game files, open the LUA with any text editor and remove the heroes.
Stay away from the friendly heroes. removing those can potentially break objectives.

sers,
Thomas

[Nimlthaule]

Thanks for the replies, especially the heads up about deleting friendly heros and objectives. I'll try to post hear if I run into any other issues, so others can know about any pitfalls. First thing to note, "restart scenario" does not reload the scripts, so you will have to go back to a save prior to the scenario you are on to get it to load.

[ErissN6]

Same, it becomes a world war fantasy game.
PC3 will be in D&D5 rules.

[Nimlthaule]

It seems pretty clear that most players of PC 2 very much enjoy the Hero system and trying out different bonuses and drawbacks from the Generals, as well as collecting or unlocking huge amounts of foreign/proto equipment. Which is very likely why Slytherine leaned into it. I'd very much like to keep this thread upbeat and positive about adapting the game to how I would PREFER to play. As evidence of how much of the community perfers the heroes: I downloaded and tried out steam workshop mod for the "PC1 Campaign" Thinking that this would largely give me a better less hero centric AO in PC2. I was wrong. This clearly the very meticulously crafted mod not only heavily changed the equipment file, it also made copious use of heroes on both the player and NPC side. And I don't think the creator could be in any way accused of being a 'fantasy ww2' lover.

Back to the topic.
I haven't tested it yet, but I'm considering whether a better idea might be to keep the heroes in the files, but just remove their bonuses and traits. I haven't tested it yet, but I think this might be cleaner and leave more of the events and messages in tact.

Also generically if you are got going to do a playthrough like this, just know that it's going to be a bit more of a slog then you are used to with a 'normal' PC2 playthrough, or even a PC1 campaign. I am in no way an expert PC1 or PC2 player. I am playing my through as "Hanz von Vanilla" right now on generallissmus, but I'm thinking of dropping it to just the Prestige loss, instead of giving the AI a bonus to accuracy.

• Because you can't stack lots of bonuses, other than over strength, its very hard to destroy multiple enemies a turn. PC2 compared to PC1 has some kind of damage scaling effect where as unit is destroyed or suppressed it becomes much harder to deal that last point of damage. Especially if you are playing with no randomization on your dice rolls, you will frequently find your going to need one more attack then you would.

• This somewhat compounds with losses on your infantry, it's extremely hard to fully suppress an enemy before sending in your infantry to clear close terrain. I think in this game more than PC1 you have to accept you are going to need to replenish infantry mid-battle. I also think that if you are going to play with limited stock turned on you will very much need to consider one of the work around mods to give you much more basic Wehr Infantry

• This is purely speculation, but I think the scenario designers assumed you would be killier then you are capable of. With a 'historical' core, or using the Collector trait, You might find yourself (as I did in Abbeville) absolutely swimming in enemy units you can't kill fast enough

• Enemies generally avoid suicidal attacks compared to your 'surprise' artillery in PC1. Because you can't rely on them damaging themselves in their own turn unless you setup ambushes, which, like surrounds is much more difficult when the map is flooded.

It's very possible I just haven't figured out the combat well enough to play this hero less vanilla style of PC2. The old tricks from PC1 just don't work as well when the AI isn't willing to spear itself on your artillery/AT/AA.

Two positive traits I might recommend to make the playthrough less of a slog:

• The free split trait (I think splitting units into ad hoc 'Kampfgruppe' was a specialty of the early Wehr, and was adopted by all combined arms capable nations by the end of the war. I think this spliiting will offset the numerical advantage by allowing for slightly easier surrounds. I think this also gives that "Bewegungskrieg/Blitzkrieg" feeling of piercing and then surrounding enemies to destroy them. Personally I would not use trophies of war or the faster supply drain. I feel the germans underestimated how long the pockets would take to be liquidated and the slow drain in the base game reflects that well.

• The "AA gets kills" trait. Really helps a lot with getting air superiority when you have less Air Craft than the enemy. Would really make early war Collector much easier when you can only field a single fighter and a single fighter bomber. Also gives that cozy PC1 feeling. But maybe I am letting myself off easy.