Locarnus Addon 2026-01, for Battlefield Europe, OC, AK, SC and Grand Campaign East

[eskuche]

FWIW, I've only played through vanilla BE 2.4 once, 3-4 years ago. I've never played add-on BE before. I'm partially worried that I won't be able to assess any changes made meaningfully if I'm hyperfocused on not actually playing a PzC-style game. For example, would not the most optimal play be to actually skip the first winter entirely after Smolensk/Kiev? One would save about 2-3000 prestige in repairs and 15% (ish) experience on all units. Of course, then that is meta-gaming quite heavily.

There is of course a small aspect of sour grapes here as I've lost significant naval assets to unknown spotters. However, I do think there is something to be said about quite literally not being able to use the experience system whatsoever in FM Rommel. At some point it'd almost be more effective just buying new units straight up if units never have a star of experience. It's also a bummer that the penalty hits EVERY single German unit, which kind of blows up the historical premise of at least some very experienced units having an impact on the front.

I will think about it some more though...!

[Locarnus]

FWIW, I've only played through vanilla BE 2.4 once, 3-4 years ago. I've never played add-on BE before. I'm partially worried that I won't be able to assess any changes made meaningfully if I'm hyperfocused on not actually playing a PzC-style game. For example, would not the most optimal play be to actually skip the first winter entirely after Smolensk/Kiev? One would save about 2-3000 prestige in repairs and 15% (ish) experience on all units. Of course, then that is meta-gaming quite heavily.

There is of course a small aspect of sour grapes here as I've lost significant naval assets to unknown spotters. However, I do think there is something to be said about quite literally not being able to use the experience system whatsoever in FM Rommel. At some point it'd almost be more effective just buying new units straight up if units never have a star of experience. It's also a bummer that the penalty hits EVERY single German unit, which kind of blows up the historical premise of at least some very experienced units having an impact on the front.

I will think about it some more though...!

Will fix the heavy arty strength loss issue for the next update, but I can not make that work for player purchased units (since I need to reference specific unit names). So it will only apply to the aux 28cm K5, the aux Karl and the normal core 21cm Mrs 18 that is already on the map.


I remember an old BE youtube attempt where the players tried to avoid the first winter casualties. Did not end well.
You need time to cover distance. And while the first winter brings casualties, it also marks the end of the very static enemy forces. And static enemies are a lot less annyoing than moving ones.

If you only played BE 2.4 once, then another frustration might come into play, which I had to get used to as well.
In normal PzC, we experienced players do not lose units (except disposable aux units). It took some time for me to get accustomed to all those unit losses in BE. Especially irreplaceable ones like ships or hero fighters that dared to much with too little remaining strength and so on.

It is still possible to have experienced units, but it is mainly dependent on their usage. Eg if you use 2-3 specific tank units only when the enemy is fully suppressed, and always have them guarded by arty and an aircraft above, then they will retain experience since they won't get damaged. And then spend your prestige on elite replacements for that handful of units, if they take 1-2 damage from time to time, rather than spending it on any new units at all.

Though it is imho much more important to keep experience on fighters than on any other unit class, since those still get the +2 attack bonus per experience level.


My overall focus is usually Baku, and thus Rostov crossing of the Don in the first winter, instead of Moscow. But also starting Leningrad siege asap, to whittle down those massive strength numbers.
In Africa I usually leave the vulnerable and expensive Italian fleet at home and use mainly aircraft against allied ships. While focusing on Tobruk early on, with help from the units that start out on Crete (Fallschirmjäger have fortkiller trait against those bunkers).

However that only works if I can actually take Baku and hold it until repaired...

[eskuche]

Interesting thoughts! However, keep in mind that in FM, a tank with high attack hitting a unit with medium-low defense may get only 1-3 experience per shot. Hence if you start with only 1 star or drop to mid-1 star range, you will barely keep one star over the entire 99 turns based on number of turns available to attack. Elite replacing that is still at 100% cost; I think it will almost ALWAYS be better worth just buying a fresh PaK 43 or something with that money instead.

Separately, I think if we are getting so much into the strategic and operational layers I'd rather play a game that's dedicated to that. I just booted up War in the East 2 and started reading through the manual. It may be that time in my game cycle where I have an operational itch. I think that was the niggling feeling here -- that PzC cannot possibly appropriately satisfy that gameplay itch. I was going to suggest, for example, adding a "wintering" trigger to cities, such that WitE has (+ 1 strength to specific sheltering cities during the winter on top of the -1 blanket decrease from the Tula trigger), but I think I have to accept BE + addon for what it actually is.

[Locarnus]

Interesting thoughts! However, keep in mind that in FM, a tank with high attack hitting a unit with medium-low defense may get only 1-3 experience per shot. Hence if you start with only 1 star or drop to mid-1 star range, you will barely keep one star over the entire 99 turns based on number of turns available to attack. Elite replacing that is still at 100% cost; I think it will almost ALWAYS be better worth just buying a fresh PaK 43 or something with that money instead.

Separately, I think if we are getting so much into the strategic and operational layers I'd rather play a game that's dedicated to that. I just booted up War in the East 2 and started reading through the manual. It may be that time in my game cycle where I have an operational itch. I think that was the niggling feeling here -- that PzC cannot possibly appropriately satisfy that gameplay itch. I was going to suggest, for example, adding a "wintering" trigger to cities, such that WitE has (+ 1 strength to specific sheltering cities during the winter on top of the -1 blanket decrease from the Tula trigger), but I think I have to accept BE + addon for what it actually is.

Yeah, WitE 2 is certainly focused much more on that operational level and key elements like supply and rail lines are included, but it gives up a lot for that as well.

No decisions which theater to prioritize, which units to purchase and so on.
While you basically have only 3(6) unit types: Infantry, motorized infantry/cavalry and tanks, plus the same for your minor axis nations. Though those minors are basically only good for map painting and digging, where only numbers count and not combat power.
And when you dial up the difficulty level, the AI becomes too mobile for its own good. Making it harder to fight the individual enemy units, but easier to trick the enemy into doing stupid stuff...

[Locarnus]

When you return from WitE 2 for a 2nd attempt at BE + Locarnus Addon, let me know.
Then I'll publish the update I'm working on, to incorporate all the feedback from your first attempt.

[eskuche]

When you return from WitE 2 for a 2nd attempt at BE + Locarnus Addon, let me know.
Then I'll publish the update I'm working on, to incorporate all the feedback from your first attempt.

I think I'll still play here in some capacity, just taking a break for a few days

[goose_2]

When you return from WitE 2 for a 2nd attempt at BE + Locarnus Addon, let me know.
Then I'll publish the update I'm working on, to incorporate all the feedback from your first attempt.

I think I'll still play here in some capacity, just taking a break for a few days

Eskuche,

I am sorry I have not been able to find time to play BE, I will endeavor to get another play in soon.

Locarnus,

I was able to record the 1st broadcast of Vilna and the key was using extra infantry. It is rough but going well. I look forward to discussing with you on broadcast tom.

Blessings

[Locarnus]

Locarnus,

I was able to record the 1st broadcast of Vilna and the key was using extra infantry. It is rough but going well. I look forward to discussing with you on broadcast tom.

Blessings

Aside from RichardMartin, Goose could also be an option for quick change to infantry?
4 stars, movement + def 2, frees up the Wespe for Rimski...
Wespe arty mode ^^ 12 GrWerfer arty mode >> 12 GrWerfer inf mode ^^ Wehrmacht Inf

Upgrades/purchases/repairs: 5 strength fighters with ~1 star get normal replacements. 1 airborne 7.5 leG by Konigsberg to be flown to the Finns. 1 Sdkfz 7/1 at Konigsberg to support the advance. 1 x 8.8 cm at Athens bound for Rommel. 1 x Wurfrahmen to support AGN penetration into forests.
Prestige: With all the surrenders, 75% prestige, and purchases, we still have 553 prestige leftover.
Balance: After ending turn, I was surprised to find the Minsk pocket still existing with 1 strength. Perhaps the trigger could be changed to accommodate for +SP difficulties.

Thats a lot of prestige left after all those purchases and upgrades. Great surrenders help, especially with 75% instead of 50% prestige setting.

Ah, Minsk pocket strength issue. Another relic from the Panzer Corps 1.30 era, where McGuba had to make do with 32 AI zones only. Thank you for reminding me, I will fix that.

Will also be an issue for Tobruk sea mines, which I implemented, I will fix that as well.
After capturing Tobruk, you can use the cheat code "uber units" to wipe those sea mines (enter just like "fog of war"). That cheat code makes your units wipe out enemy units, but does not prevent them damaging you, so use with aircraft or so against those sea mines. Don't forget to toggle it off again after using it against those 3 sea mines in front of Tobruk!

[eskuche]

Yep, I'm very versed in kosher use of cheat codes (e.g., I gave my Sturmpanzer 2 ammo after action in the Minsk pocket ). Are there many more zones left? I would be happy to suggest some changes to spice up the game a bit...

[Locarnus]

Yep, I'm very versed in kosher use of cheat codes (e.g., I gave my Sturmpanzer 2 ammo after action in the Minsk pocket ). Are there many more zones left? I would be happy to suggest some changes to spice up the game a bit...

PzC 1.32 supports ~255 zones, while PzC 1.30 and thus BE 2.3 had to make do with ~32 zones.
I have been very liberal in spreading it out a bit, but I guess only 70-80 zones total are in use at the moment.

Sure, any suggestions are welcome, though can't promise implementation. Due to limited time as well as editor limitations.

Imho the limited targeting of units is a major issue for a lot that I would like to do.
Eg can't target units by unit type ID, only unit name. Which is a problem if I want to exclude 28cm Kanone 5 railway arty from the winter strength loss. Since I can only control the unit name for the one I place on the map, not the one a player purchases...

[Locarnus]

An idea to encourage the player to take part in the Battle of the Atlantic:

How about all US & UK ground, air and naval units get 2 experience per turn, if no german naval unit is on a convoy route.
No experience change, if one german naval unit is on the convoy routes.
And -2 (-4/-6) experience, if 2 (3/4) german naval units are on the convoy routes.

It would only affect existing units, but it is a little incentive to not just save up your subs for an eventual Sealion.

[eskuche]

An idea to encourage the player to take part in the Battle of the Atlantic:

How about all US & UK ground, air and naval units get 2 experience per turn, if no german naval unit is on a convoy route.
No experience change, if one german naval unit is on the convoy routes.
And -2 (-4/-6) experience, if 2 (3/4) german naval units are on the convoy routes.

It would only affect existing units, but it is a little incentive to not just save up your subs for an eventual Sealion.

That would be interesting, but would it hit undeployed units too? Also if it's so granular, nothing matters until a critical star is hit.

[Locarnus]

An idea to encourage the player to take part in the Battle of the Atlantic:

How about all US & UK ground, air and naval units get 2 experience per turn, if no german naval unit is on a convoy route.
No experience change, if one german naval unit is on the convoy routes.
And -2 (-4/-6) experience, if 2 (3/4) german naval units are on the convoy routes.

It would only affect existing units, but it is a little incentive to not just save up your subs for an eventual Sealion.

That would be interesting, but would it hit undeployed units too? Also if it's so granular, nothing matters until a critical star is hit.

Undeployed units unfortunately can not be affected.
So far, many players considering a Sealion operation later on save up their subs for that invasion, rather than risk them on the convoy routes.
Thus shifting the risk/reward consideration for those players is the focus.
I would give many ground and naval units in and around Britain base experience between x50 and x90, with x being their current stars.
So with the player historically engaging the convoy routes, not much would change. But players not fighting that Battle of the Atlantic would lead to those defenders gaining another star.

I do not want to overdo it, especially at first. So perhaps +2 UK/US experience for no German naval unit on convoy routes, 0xp for 1 naval unit, but only -1xp for 2 naval units and so on up to -3xp for 4 German naval units on convoy routes.

Turn 5
Surrenders: Odessa artillery, AGS pocket KV-2 and BT, Ukraine BT-7, AGN KV hero
Refit/redeploy/Heroes: Defense +1 on a core Ju 88 C-4, Attack +1 on core JG 53
Upgrades/purchases/repairs:
Prestige: 2288

Lots of surrenders and thus prestige. Unlucky heroes, especially on that Ju 88 C-4.

Turn 6
Refit/redeploy/Heroes: Misc. GebJ to training spots in preparation for 1942.
Upgrades/purchases/repairs: New PzI to Bison. Massive splurge on two 8.8s and another Condor for the Atlantic war with the surrendered material. Probably should not buy too much more. That’s a lie. Last minute purchase of one more Bf110 to hunt down heavy bombers across the mainland.
Prestige: 714

Lots of investment into the Western theaters!
Imho the heavy two engine fighters are decent for conversions of existing airframes, but less cost efficient for purchase. Especially since their fuel is the main advantage compared to the German single engine fighters of that time, and that is not an issue over Germany itself. With PanzerCorps mechanics, another advantage is the training as strat bombers for experience and then converting to heavy fighters later on, making them much more effective.

Without that strat training, the Fw 190 is the better multi-purpose aircraft in the near future, combining hitting power against bombers, decent ini against fighters and ground attack conversions later on.
Especially compared to upcoming Fw 190.

Turn 7
Surrenders/Casualties (underlined < 50% str): T26/BT-7 Lvov pocket, odessa infantry, T-34 north of Kiev
Atlantic/Western: One three-star fighter dispatched with 7 attacks (!). Finally our core Condor is starting to do some work. It should be able to clear out ~2 full strength escorts per re-arm.
Prestige: 1566
Balance: Western Allies fighters at 3 stars (at 150% AI experience) are really really scary prestige-wise. Even fighter traps aren’t great because the second unit of the turn will happily fire at you.

Surrenders are really making all the difference for prestige.
And yeah, that 150% AI experience was a good call. Making those 2 star fighters much scarier while still keeping the experience mini game for your own units.

Turn 8
Atlantic/Western: Condors paying dividends. For a cost analysis, 800 prestige for a unit that enables say 50 prestige per turn from unprotected convoys and 25-50 extra prestige per turn for harassed U-boats on sealanes is likely a good investment longterm.
Balance: Railguns still haven’t taken out a single strength point. Perhaps they were better spent elsewhere. Oops.

I'm considering making the convoys a bit more resilient, while also providing more prestige reward.
So that sitting on the convoy routes is more for single subs, while the convoy units are more for wolfpacks and/or combined arms air attacks.

Railgun balancing is a problem, I agree. Buffing their hard attack values makes them shred tanks as well, but keeping their current levels makes them a bit impotent against those fortified structures. Considering their very low rate of fire, perhaps and increase of 1 soft attack and 2 hard attack would be ok.

[Locarnus]

Turn 9
Surrenders/Casualties (underlined < 50% str): Below, I dislike when the AI makes nonsensical attacks that have miraculous results. I wonder if there is a preview of the random roll sometimes. Two units broke free in Kiev and destroyed one of the encircling italian infantry.
Atlantic/Western: One fighter trap, and one sub destroys the 3-star Canadian destroyer attacking it! I am tempted to block low fuel enemy planes but feel maybe that’s even more exploitative than fighter traps..

Yeah, rng can be painful. Don't know about such a preview existing.
Did you still manage to close the Kiev pocket in time with that Italian inf destroyed?
Yeah, blocking enemy aircraft is imho a bit cheesy. Enemy AI is bad enough, can't even reliably reach airfields for refuel.

Happy to see the Tobruk message, means I a least tried to give a warning.
Also shows how important it is to have someone else play the scenario. If I plan to go to the Suez canal, I always take Tobruk first for reinforcements and upgrade options. And if not going to Suez, then I retreat towards Tripoli early, making that spotting unit irrelevant. That was probably my thought process for putting that warning within the Tobruk message.
Glad you reminded me of different strategies and tactics, so that it now shows up at the end of first turn for everyone.

Turn 10
This turn crashed like 4 times on turn start, so I did the turn skip trick about 95% into the enemy turn. Some results were more favorable, like the infantry not dying in Tobruk. Have to spend some effort this turn de-mining Tobruk with cheats, since the script didn’t work.

Crash is quite concerning. I did not have one in a long time. Wonder what caused it.
Do you start the game using a /nocache shortcut? If not and you played a long continuous session all at once, that might cause it.
Otherwise it is some issue within the scenario or other modded gamefiles, which notoriously could be near impossible to track down...

The mines did not lose ANY strength, which I think is not what the script wants. So I left one destroyer at 16 strength from cheats for just this one turn, since normally it wouldn’t be there.

Will be fixed, thank you!

Turn 11
Enemy Turn/Surrenders/Casualties (underlined < 50% str): Ouch. 2 infantry destroyed in the desert, in part due to SAS spotters. T-34 caused more trouble, but not for long. It has 17 attack (!) and chunked the StuG. The Finnish forces finally got a rugged defense and can take petrozavodsk
AGN is similarly uncomfortable. We have a very precarious setup to start the siege. I do believe the central artillery doesn’t automatically fire but I could be (disastrously) wrong.

That T-34 near Moscow is missing its halo/aura (indicating a named hero), which significantly pushes the combat ability, together with the experience boost.

Leningrad siege is different than in BE. No fixed turns where it checks the siege status, instead every surrounded turn makes it tick up, even if non-consecutive. And after 5 siege turns it rolls the dice (90%) for a strength reduction.

After getting the enemies down to 11 strength (with your +1 enemy strength setting), the enemy is probably able to reinforce further strength losses from the siege. Which is a prestige sink for the enemy, but only a small one.
So to actually take Leningrad in the current version, getting the enemy down to their normal strength (here: 11) and then attacking when they lose another strength point is probably the best option.

Perhaps the reinforce ability should go down further. So that the siege can more meaningfully continue more than a year or so. Or perhaps a combination between becoming a prestige sink for the enemy while also permanently whittling down the strength numbers?

[Locarnus]

Turn 12 & 13

North Africa looks like a proper fight and quite a bit of investment.
Are you going for Suez and beyond or will your Africa force head back towards Tunisia in 42?

Eastern front seems stable winter positions.
With Finnish support crossing the Svir river, to dismantle those positions on the eastern shore of lake Ladoga.

Turn 14?

That was some monster rng against your sub. With those dice the DD would have wiped it even at full strength.

North Africa still very contested, especially with your airforce being grounded by the global weather.
At least your navy can help a bit.


Thank you for all the turns in that second attempt already and all the feedback.
Helps a lot!


<< Ongoing BE + Locarnus Addon playthrough by eskuche >>
It is a classic picture and text AAR on Field Marshal Rommel difficulty (player gets only half experience, half prestige):
https://tinyurl.com/y8euym2r


.

[eskuche]

I do not want to overdo it, especially at first. So perhaps +2 UK/US experience for no German naval unit on convoy routes, 0xp for 1 naval unit, but only -1xp for 2 naval units and so on up to -3xp for 4 German naval units on convoy routes.

Lots of investment into the Western theaters!

Yeah, not quite sure what I was thinking (may have been too tired to play effectively), as that Bf-110 has not had any battle action yet. I think on non-FM, training regimens could actually be considered for the longer 99 turn term.

Overall changes for the Western front I think removing any sort of AI prestige changes would actually be a plus. Since it can't buy any more units, I don't think it really matters. The levers that really matter for the player are player prestige and additional units (or fewer enemy units). But it also has to be noticeable to really be a meaningful player decision. For example, moscow/leningrad-tied unit spawns aren't really clearly demonstrated to the player in a way they can track.

Railgun balancing is a problem, I agree. Buffing their hard attack values makes them shred tanks as well, but keeping their current levels makes them a bit impotent against those fortified structures. Considering their very low rate of fire, perhaps and increase of 1 soft attack and 2 hard attack would be ok.

I think the expense is good enough to warrant these changes. Also consider revisiting the Gerat morser. It cannot hit any enemy fortifications safely. What if it had camo in one of the forms. I know that even railguns had camo in the war when transported; perhaps their transport forms could have this as well? There are sprites for this in PAK-MOD.

Did you still manage to close the Kiev pocket in time with that Italian inf destroyed?

Yes, no issues there, just unfortunate that a GAZ and a tank both unfroze. By the way, three units near Kiev and Chernigov were NOT cleaned up with the trigger. Had to cheat a bit there too. One was on the river, one on the airfield. Perhaps revisit the zone there.

Leningrad siege is different than in BE. No fixed turns where it checks the siege status, instead every surrounded turn makes it tick up, even if non-consecutive. And after 5 siege turns it rolls the dice (90%) for a strength reduction.

After getting the enemies down to 11 strength (with your +1 enemy strength setting), the enemy is probably able to reinforce further strength losses from the siege. Which is a prestige sink for the enemy, but only a small one.
So to actually take Leningrad in the current version, getting the enemy down to their normal strength (here: 11) and then attacking when they lose another strength point is probably the best option.

Oh, that would've been good to know. So there is no emergent need for expediting the surround. My balance here would be to set max strength at something like 7-8 and starting strength at 15-16. Thus, there is still a need to siege, but storming is viable without hitting 10 strength elite units on fortifications.

I would like if these mechanics were described in the encyclopedia. Similar to unit upgrade times. I know that that would be quite a bit of work. Perhaps it could be a text file that LLM creates from the Excel instead of the graphic that exists otherwise.

Other thoughts for scripts for increased replayability. I am thinking the Soviet deployments aren't particularly historically accurate down to the formation like the Axis, so more artistic leeway could be taken here:
1. More random enemy deployments with slightly increased heroes. The random spawn zone could actually be in different theatres, e.g., a Valentine with hero (and several accompanying units) in EITHER Africa, Stalingrad area, or Moscow area. This can be done with random trigger.
2. I assume since you said there was a Leningrad counter that there is a way to store variables in the game. My idea was to use a unit with strength points increased/decreased by conditions if that's not what you're using already.
3. Since we have more zones to work with, I would really like to suggest sanctuary cities where attrition does not take place. In exchange, the harsh first winter could be increased to 4-5 turns while maintaining historical verisimilitude.
4....will think more

[Locarnus]

I do not want to overdo it, especially at first. So perhaps +2 UK/US experience for no German naval unit on convoy routes, 0xp for 1 naval unit, but only -1xp for 2 naval units and so on up to -3xp for 4 German naval units on convoy routes.

Lots of investment into the Western theaters!

Yeah, not quite sure what I was thinking (may have been too tired to play effectively), as that Bf-110 has not had any battle action yet. I think on non-FM, training regimens could actually be considered for the longer 99 turn term.

Overall changes for the Western front I think removing any sort of AI prestige changes would actually be a plus. Since it can't buy any more units, I don't think it really matters. The levers that really matter for the player are player prestige and additional units (or fewer enemy units). But it also has to be noticeable to really be a meaningful player decision. For example, moscow/leningrad-tied unit spawns aren't really clearly demonstrated to the player in a way they can track.

AI prestige is the worst to balance, I agree. I still want to add a little bit of those modifiers here and there. Just in case I find the time in the future to take a closer look at it or someone manages to stack those effects (eg playing differently than I usually do).
Moscow/Leningrad unit spawns hard for me to track as well.
Prestige bonus to the player is much easier to handle, perhaps Moscow capture should yield a bit more.

Railgun balancing is a problem, I agree. Buffing their hard attack values makes them shred tanks as well, but keeping their current levels makes them a bit impotent against those fortified structures. Considering their very low rate of fire, perhaps and increase of 1 soft attack and 2 hard attack would be ok.

I think the expense is good enough to warrant these changes. Also consider revisiting the Gerat morser. It cannot hit any enemy fortifications safely. What if it had camo in one of the forms. I know that even railguns had camo in the war when transported; perhaps their transport forms could have this as well? There are sprites for this in PAK-MOD.

The Karl-Gerät is rather special.
It seems that the relative prestige value compared to the high ground defense makes enemy artillery rather reluctant to target it. Especially when other, softer targets are around, like cheap infantry with low ground defense values.
But last time I tried was a while back and the AI did not have the 50% experience bonus.

Perhaps you could try using Karl against those fortifications in front of Leningrad, with eg with and without cheap decoy infantry? Worst case you use a cheat code to bring it up to strength.
Kinda like compensation for all those other instances when something did not work as it should have (Minsk pocket, Tobruk mines).
But due to low ammo and low rate of fire, there are not many other efficient use-cases for Karl anyway.

Did you still manage to close the Kiev pocket in time with that Italian inf destroyed?

Yes, no issues there, just unfortunate that a GAZ and a tank both unfroze. By the way, three units near Kiev and Chernigov were NOT cleaned up with the trigger. Had to cheat a bit there too. One was on the river, one on the airfield. Perhaps revisit the zone there.

Leningrad siege is different than in BE. No fixed turns where it checks the siege status, instead every surrounded turn makes it tick up, even if non-consecutive. And after 5 siege turns it rolls the dice (90%) for a strength reduction.

After getting the enemies down to 11 strength (with your +1 enemy strength setting), the enemy is probably able to reinforce further strength losses from the siege. Which is a prestige sink for the enemy, but only a small one.
So to actually take Leningrad in the current version, getting the enemy down to their normal strength (here: 11) and then attacking when they lose another strength point is probably the best option.

Oh, that would've been good to know. So there is no emergent need for expediting the surround. My balance here would be to set max strength at something like 7-8 and starting strength at 15-16. Thus, there is still a need to siege, but storming is viable without hitting 10 strength elite units on fortifications.

I would like if these mechanics were described in the encyclopedia. Similar to unit upgrade times. I know that that would be quite a bit of work. Perhaps it could be a text file that LLM creates from the Excel instead of the graphic that exists otherwise.

Yeah, while I think that the date independent siege ticks are a considerable improvement for the early siege, there is still some work to do concerning the balancing of the late siege.

Great idea, the library has a section for the bonus SE/Std units for original and grand campaigns.
Time to work a on the Battlefield Europe + Addon documentation!

Other thoughts for scripts for increased replayability. I am thinking the Soviet deployments aren't particularly historically accurate down to the formation like the Axis, so more artistic leeway could be taken here:
1. More random enemy deployments with slightly increased heroes. The random spawn zone could actually be in different theatres, e.g., a Valentine with hero (and several accompanying units) in EITHER Africa, Stalingrad area, or Moscow area. This can be done with random trigger.
2. I assume since you said there was a Leningrad counter that there is a way to store variables in the game. My idea was to use a unit with strength points increased/decreased by conditions if that's not what you're using already.
3. Since we have more zones to work with, I would really like to suggest sanctuary cities where attrition does not take place. In exchange, the harsh first winter could be increased to 4-5 turns while maintaining historical verisimilitude.
4....will think more

ad 1: Yep, fully agree. A bit more randomness with the initial placements of some units would already help much with the replay value. Will look into it.

ad 2: Unfortunately there are no actual counters in the editor. One of the many aspects I have to use pretty annoying workarounds for.
The editor can not even check unit strength. It can alter most unit conditions, but unfortunately can check none of them. It can practically only check if a unit of particular nation, class or general type and so on exists within a zone or hex.
The only particular unit aspect it can check, is the unit name. Which thus only works for units the scenario designer places, but not for units a player upgrades from something else (since upgrades do not change the unit name).


My workaround to get a basic COUNTER:
The scripts are executed in chronological order of first making them (but I can edit older entries to do something completely different, if I really really need that spot in the list to do something before another script...)
And tags (strings) can be created, deleted and their existence can be checked as a condition for running a script.

So I have to implement counters backwards and use those tags, eg for Leningrad siege. Script numbers do not exist, they are just an example that those scripts are somewhere in the big list, roughly beteween 30% and 40% of the total scripts, no idea how many there are in total:

[...]
-> script 370, run ONLY ONCE: IF turn 2, THEN add tag "812" AND show message to Axis player
-> script 371, run 18*: IF tag "817" exists AND IF 6 axis ground units are in zone 181, THEN reduce strength of allied ground units in zone 182 by 1 AND add tag "812" AND remove tag "817"
-> script 372, run 18*: IF tag "816" exists AND IF 6 axis ground units are in zone 181, THEN add tag "817" AND remove tag "816"
-> script 373, run 18*: IF tag "815" exists AND IF 6 axis ground units are in zone 181, THEN add tag "816" AND remove tag "815"
-> script 374, run 18*: IF tag "814" exists AND IF 6 axis ground units are in zone 181, THEN add tag "815" AND remove tag "814"
-> script 375, run 18*: IF tag "813" exists AND IF 6 axis ground units are in zone 181, THEN add tag "814" AND remove tag "813"
-> script 376, run 18*: IF tag "812" exists AND IF 6 axis ground units are in zone 181, THEN add tag "813" AND remove tag "812"
[...]

So when the condition
IF turn 2 is first met, then script 370 fires and adds tag "812", initializing the event chain, but running only once.

If in the same or a later turn the condition
IF 6 axis ground units are in zone 181 is first met, then only script 376 runs (since tag "812" was already created by script 370) and counts one up by exchanging tag "812" for tag "813".

Script 375 can only run in the next turn, since it sits before script 376 in the list and the PzC engine strictly goes from first in the list to last in the list (when selecting all those scripts to be checked only at the very start of the Axis player turn).

That goes on until eventually script 371 does the actual strength reduction for the Allied units and restarts the counter.
Note that after script 371 runs, then script 376 also runs in the same turn, since it is lower in the list and tag "812" is already recreated at that point.

Pretty tedious implementation to get a simple counter that only goes to 6 (5 after the first cycle)...


ad 3: Sanctuary cites could be something like Minsk, Kiev and the whole Crimea?

[eskuche]

ad 3: Sanctuary cites could be something like Minsk, Kiev and the whole Crimea?

I would consider like the major Russian cities Novgorod, Pskov, Smolensk, Mogilev, Bryansk, etc. Perhaps all major victory hexes. Simply add a +1 strength trigger before the -1 strength trigger. Or honestly I would just redesign it with some zone painting, excluding those cities. If you changed winter attrition to be more geographically realistic, it could be like 4 turns Pripyat marshes and north, then every other turn for two turns south of that.

Edit: Heavily suggest not deploying Africa SAS until guaranteed winter turns are over. Having super vision into the snowstorm is a bit nonsensical

[goose_2]

Locarnus,

I was able to record the 1st broadcast of Vilna and the key was using extra infantry. It is rough but going well. I look forward to discussing with you on broadcast tom.

Blessings

Aside from RichardMartin, Goose could also be an option for quick change to infantry?
4 stars, movement + def 2, frees up the Wespe for Rimski...
Wespe arty mode ^^ 12 GrWerfer arty mode >> 12 GrWerfer inf mode ^^ Wehrmacht Inf

I finished a 2nd Broadcast this weekend, but the problem with the first is it has no voice sound. My problems with my voice recording is highly irritating, but not really sure what to do about it. I have tried a little tweaking and hopefully it gets better, but not sure.

Rimski is going to reach 4 stars in Vilna.

I was also wrong about Warsaw. You can bring 36 units like Vilna and is a huge focus on arty blasting. I will not be looking to update any artys until after that battle, and plan on bringing every single one of them to get exercise. I am realizing that getting to 5th star experience is going to be harder than I hoped, where as 4th stars is very attainable.

Not sure what else I can do to try and get units to 5 stars except with arty training, so since my infantry are at 4 stars continue to work with them to get the 3rd hero allocation then switch them to arty for final 5th star training, while other arty's trade up for infantry kill training, and just switch back and forth between them.

Something similar may need to be considered with my air force, as it scares me how willing they are to attack my 4 starred fighters.

At least more and more units are getting almost or over 1000 kills for 3rd hero reaping in 45.

I will post the final Moscow 41 for Friday, but will not be on chat as will be in office.

[bondjamesbond]

The main thing is not to let the player get bored !


Allied raid on Dieppe, Normandy, France
Allied casualties Canadians: 3,367 killed, wounded, and captured (68% of the unit). Total landing force casualties: 3,623. Navy: 1 destroyer, 33 landing craft. Air force: 106 aircraft.
German casualties Approximately 600 killed and wounded, 48 aircraft.




Pearl Harbor after the Japanese air raid. Hawaiian Islands. December 1941.


And I really hope that someday there will be an Asia Battlefield add-on, because from 1937 to 1945, events there were no less significant and bloody than in Europe.