Battle features

[Stechkin]

I am not sure if this is the correct forum to approach, but I am slightly confused about the plethora of variants of PanzerCorps and availability of battle features. Please inform me which package if any has the following features and obviously also instructions on how to use them:
- minefields
- capturing and reusing enemy equipment like tanks, artillery etc. This was an essential part of Wehrmacht strategy for example in France, Russia and Africa.
- fortification of defensive positions like digging in once you have captured a strategic point
- blowing up bridges. I think this requires an extra layer where you can construct and destroy non-movable objects and stack combat units in the same hex. See also my comment on fortifications.
- special guerilla units with reduced possibility of being seen by the enemy.

I think most of above features require changes in the PzC-engine. If such engine version is available and I install it, will the features be available also for older scenarios?

[ThvN]

I am not sure if this is the correct forum to approach

Hello Stechkin, don't worry, it's a good topic for the 'general' Panzer Corps forum (I sneakily moved it). The tech support is best used for posting about issues with sound/graphics, installation problems, etc. For more general questions, you'll get better feedback in this forum section, as more people read the topics here. Anyway:

I am slightly confused about the plethora of variants of PanzerCorps and availability of battle features. Please inform me which package if any has the following features and obviously also instructions on how to use them:

Well, to start, there is the 'base' game: Panzer Corps (PzC), and two stand-alone games: Afrika Korps (AK) and Allied Corps (AC), which can be bought, installed and played separately from each other.

To make things more complicated, there is also a series of Grand Campaigns (called GC or DLC for downloadable content), 10 in total, which can only be installed and played if you have one (or more) of those three games already installed.

- minefields

These were first introduced in AK, and are also featured in AC, but only on the opponents' side. So you can encounter them during some scenarios and clear them, but not purchase or place them yourself. They are also featured in some GC, notably in GC '44 West where you can be rewarded (during the Anzio scenario) with a handful of minefields to place in the next scenarios. But that is the only time you can actually use them yourself.

- capturing and reusing enemy equipment like tanks, artillery etc. This was an essential part of Wehrmacht strategy for example in France, Russia and Africa.

There is a whole thread what equipment can be captured during which scenario, but not to ruin the surprises, equipment can be captured during AK and the GC expansions. The base PzC game and AC do not feature this.

- fortification of defensive positions like digging in once you have captured a strategic point

You cannot build any fortifications/bunkers/trenches or anything, but there is a mechanism in the game called 'entrenchment'. This means a unit that remains in place during its turn can 'dig in' a little, making this entrenchment value higher and this will give some defensive bonuses. But not all units can do this equally well, and it depends on the terrain. Also, some units can provide protection to units placed next to them, like artillery or anti-aircraft guns, which will fire to defend a friendly unit next to them when it is attacked.

- blowing up bridges. I think this requires an extra layer where you can construct and destroy non-movable objects and stack combat units in the same hex. See also my comment on fortifications.

Unfortunately, this is not implemented, but it might be moddable. During the GC' 44 West, there are some campaign branches based on how well you defend the bridges during Market Garden, where follow-on scenarios feature a map without certain bridges, but that's all at the moment.

- special guerilla units with reduced possibility of being seen by the enemy.

There is actually a special setting to make units hard to spot, but this is not used by any standard game unit. But it can be used for modded equipment.

I think most of above features require changes in the PzC-engine. If such engine version is available and I install it, will the features be available also for older scenarios?

I've no idea, but I think any changes to the existing engine could break older content. It would make more sense for new features to make their way in an updated engine which could be used as a basis for something like a 'Panzer Corps 2'. But like I said, I don't know what is possible, and with each update little additions and new features are added, so who knows.

[Stechkin]

Many thanks. I'd very much like to have PzC evolve into a realistic battle simulation game. PzC engine should be revised and improved with better scenario, object and properties hierarchy. It should not be a problem to have an extra feature which converts the older scenarios into PzC-2 architecture. Various mods seem to have different features, but this makes the PzC-world very confusing if I need to download this and that from here and there. Some central coordination is needed to introduce the features to all other scenarios.

[fsx]

Some additional informations:

- fortification of defensive positions like digging in once you have captured a strategic point
Since 1.20 you could change the used map, like: if axis captures a city, trenches (as a type of map-terrain) around the city are "build". If you wish to add bunkers, you could use trigger (conditions for apperance) for units.

- blowing up bridges. I think this requires an extra layer where you can construct and destroy non-movable objects and stack combat units in the same hex. See also my comment on fortifications.
I searched log time for such a ability. Perhaps now with 1.20 it could be possible, because map-structures are destroyabel (removable). But the bridge is not a unit and can not be a direct attackable target. Its possible to make a trigger that destroyes the bridge, if a structure near the bridge is destroyed.

[IainMcNeil]

Features added in later iterations of the game are very unlikely to be added back to the old scenarios as it require rebalancing the entire game which is an enormous task and would take months each time you did it so is just not realistic.