Potzblitz V25.0 OCT 18th 2024

[Zombo]

Race to the Sea/Antwerp issue:

The two impassable hexes revert to passable at the beginning of the Allied turn, and they connect Calais to Antwerp by rail. So, because Calais will usually be defended by an Army, the Allies have an opportunity to slide that Army into Antwerp ( which was at that point encircled) via rail and there's nothing the Germans can do about it. Of course, they can try and take Antwerp before ( well before the historical time) but the diversion of resources will seriously jeopardize their advance nach Paris.
Would it be possible to revert only the southernmost hex during the Allied turn, and the northernmost hex at the beginning of the German turn? that would fix the issue, and conform the front to the historical line ( barring any unusual developments)

[Robotron]

I've come to the conclusion that the replay crashes are caused by bugs in V4s modified retreat code (units performing double retreats, confusing the internal unit array) , so I decided to reintroduce the Race to the Sea event to be able to happen during either player's turn when moving units around in Belgium or France after the Moltke event has triggered.

[Zombo]

- managed to implement the "recon adjacent hexes" after a fighter attack on enemy unit.

Great! Haven't you just found the way to get rid of the "360 °recon range" altogether, to the profit of a mission-based recon? It gives players more role in where the recon is directed to, and makes recon interceptable, which is cool too. One hex plus all surrounding hexes is well enough as an area for one air unit/one turn. I would even favour some sort of success% (weather could be a significant factor)

[Robotron]

Well, I could always reduce fighter LOS to 1 but problem is that one cannot attack an empty hex or a hex within FOW and therefore those recon missions you're proposing are just impossible to implement.

I'll take that weather suggestion though.

[jkehoe]

thank you so much!

[Zombo]

one cannot attack an empty hex or a hex within FOW

true. Pity. No way around this?

[Robotron]

one cannot attack an empty hex or a hex within FOW

true. Pity. No way around this?

I'm afraid not. But I'll have those parts of the scripts re-examined at the test lab.

[Zombo]

Regarding Race to the Sea, the fact of having the event possibly trigger at the beginning of either player's turn may not solve the above-mentioned problem (although admittedly not a game-breaking problem). If the event fires at the start of the Allied turn, the problem with Antwerp remains the same. If it fires at the beginning of the German turn, it may well give the Germans the coastal hex adjacent to Calais for free. If the one-hex one-turn,southern hex-allied turn/northen hex-German turn solution is not implementable, I think it is is by far preferable to make the event fire ta the start of the German turn automatically, because making Antwerp impregnable without the Germans being able to do much about it has severe consequences on the physiognomy of the Western Front, while some extra room for the Germans to press against Calais, while not desirable, is less critical.
If there is a 50% chance of the event firing at the beginning of the Allied turn, the German player may have to try and take down Antwerp straight away, which will completely derail his progression into France timetable, or face the possibility of a permanent thorn on the side, that will divert forces and cost him PPs otherwise rightfully his.

[Robotron]

the fact of having the event possibly trigger at the beginning of either player's turn

The event will be checked during each player's turn and both hexes will be checked individually until both hexes have been activated (for either alliance) after any one of the following conditions has been met:

Moltke's advance was stopped
or Brussels and Ypres have been taken by CP
or Brussels and Namur have been taken by CP
or Antwerp has been taken by CP
or Belgium has surrendered

The checks will take place during movement for every alliance's land unit that is moving in Belgium or France and is not a small garrison.

For Entente the southernmost hex will be checked first (under the condition that Calais or Ypres is held by Entente) and if that has been activated the northernmost hex will be checked (condition: southernmost hex still under Entente control and Ypres and Antwerp not fallen to CP).

For CP the northernmost hex will be checked first (under the condition that Ypres or Antwerp are held by CP) and if that has been activated the southernmost hex will be checked (condition: northernmost hex still under CP control and Ypres or Calais fallen to CP).

The chance in % to unlock either hex is:

up to number of current game turn

+ up to number of current game turn if Brussels has been captured
+ up to number of current game turn if Namur has been captured
+ up to number of current game turn if Ypres has been captured
+ up to number of current game turn if Antwerp has been captured

the sum is doubled if one of the following cases applies or quadrupled if both apply:

- Moltke was stopped
- Belgium has surrendered


The new "All East" warplan:
- German attack on Russia in turn 3
- Germany loses 1 whole Army Corps from the West caused by the struggle to redeploy to the East but which is "cannibalised" instead to keep all the new units in the East at proper unit strength and efficiency.
- Kluck's Army Corps and a further Cavalry Corps will be placed northeast of Lotzen
- Bulow's Army Corps will be placed northeast of Thorn reinforced by one artillery originally from the Western front
- Hausen's Corps and a further Army Corps will be placed southeast of Posen and the Fighter Corps from the Western Front near Danzig to go either way.
- Prittwitz will be retired.
- Moltke will be positioned at HQ Koenigsberg commanding a Reserve Corps (if he can't take Warsaw by winter he will suffer dismissal and be replaced by Falkenhayn)
- Crown Prince Wilhelm will command two Army Corps at Metz and Strasbourg reinforced by the other artillery and all the other Reserve Corps in Alsace-Lorraince except the one in the salient in front of Nancy
- a single Reserve Corps will guard the Belgium border
- all other German units in the West will be disbanded without compensation
- Germany suffers 1 collapse point from extreme difficulties to regroup to the east and public opinion going sour by not trying to repeat the long-awaited 1870 knock-out blow against the French first
- Germany suffers 15 morale loss for the same reason
- CP loses the "Waves of patriotism event" for the same reason
- Britain war entry delayed as per "Rupprecht plan" if Belgium left uninvaded (no German naval bombarding of French ports allowed)
- Russia gains 10 morale and immunity from collapse points in 1914.
- acceleration of Russian war effort ("Defend mother Russia!")
- Russia Supply Crisis will be delayed until 1916


The following events will be discarded:

- Cossacks
- Tannenberg (and therefore no Hindenburg)
- Max Hoffmann (no Hindenburg: no Ludendorff: no Hoffmann)
- Russian Code Broken event (since German redeployment would have not gone unnoticed, special care was taken to keep discipline on wireless transmissions)
- Marne Taxis, Gallieni, Kluck's Folly,
- AH Defense Planning (since AH is going to join the all-out offensive)
- Austrian Siege Howitzers (since the Russian forts are deemed not tough enough)

Suggestions?

[Zombo]

Looks fine to me!

[Zombo]

Im Westen nichts neues?

[Robotron]

Still trying to get fighter recons on empty or FOW hexes working.

[Robotron]

I gave up on the recon on FOW and empty hexes feature, it just won't work.


New features:

- chance for the player with lower total INTEL to not see what events were played by the enemy, instead he only gets to see this:

event_secret.png (122.79 KiB) Viewed 5643 times

- choosing "none" on the events choice screen now will also generate INTEL on random enemy nations

- new "Aufmarsch Ost" setup:

Clipboard02.jpg (222.66 KiB) Viewed 5643 times

[Robotron]

V5.0

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B0N7V ... ldhMG9WaUk

CHANGES:

- removed bug where Trento was suddenly ceded to Italy without CP player having been given a choice
- strangely overblown Danish army reduced to Reserve Corps only. It somehow felt wrong to see 2 Danish Army Corps appearing on the Western front when during test play the Royal Navy tried to break through into the Baltic by attacking Denmark.
- same for Switzerland, but enough PP given to build an Army Corps, at least as long as the capital is held (probably by the French if Germany chooses war plan Rupprecht). Skt Maurice now held by small garrison to further need of French assistance
- "French doctrine changed", "Austrian defense plans" and "War plan Rupprecht" will cause 5-10 morale loss and deny that alliance the "Waves of Patriotism" choice event.
- "Marne Taxis" and "Gallieni to defend Paris" will only spawn Reserve Corps and will use up French PP
- ceding Tsingtao to Japan will cost Germany 1D6 morale and 1D6 diplo points (next turn only), else this always was a no-brainer
- Reversed the consequences for occupying Tabriz by the Russians: early Russian invasion into Persia will bring Persia closer to Entente and will gain diplo points. Before the event just clogged the event choice list.
- "Bring Hindenburg" event will no longer reduce range of Hindenburg (proved to be unreliable and might cause instability) but now the "Max Hoffmann" event will be discarded instead
- fighters are now LOS 3 (because of the survey results) but tech research times got shortened to compensate and fighter attacks have a chance to recon enemy hexes adjacent to the target, zeps will do so likewise but may recon at radius 2 of target
- Berber Revolts are stopped once a Berber attack meets a French Reserve (33% chance) or Army Corps (100% chance)
- Fritz Haber event unlocks the next pending gas tech, not only chlorine gas
- commander kill chance is directly related to their commanding range, so the higher the range the less likely they are going to die
- naval commanders will ALWAYS die, heroically going down with their flagships
- Air aces have a chance to get wounded and therefore have a chance to die during every single attack, the chance being modified by their experience (intercepts now gain experience too) and unit upgrades in comparison to the enemy fighters encountered
- chances to get hit by sea mines reduced and damage taken also reduced
- new buttons showing whether alliances are suffering from food shortages.
- 5 new marches for the title screen for variability: one each for France, Britain, Russia, AH and Italy.
- chance for the player with lower total INTEL to not see what events were played by the enemy, instead he only gets to see a "?" event
- choosing "none" on the events choice screen now will also generate INTEL (instead of only INFLUENCE) on random enemy nations
- miscellaneous bugfixes

New German "AUFMARSCH OST" war plan:
- must be chosen during first game turn or will be discarded
- German attack on Russia in turn 3
- Germany loses 1 whole Army Corps from the West caused by the struggle to redeploy to the East but which is "cannibalised" instead to keep all the new units in the East at proper unit strength and efficiency.
- Kluck's Army Corps and a further Cavalry Corps will be placed northeast of Lotzen
- Bulow's Army Corps will be placed northeast of Thorn reinforced by one artillery originally from the Western front
- Hausen's Corps and a further Army Corps will be placed southeast of Posen and the Fighter Corps from the Western Front near Danzig to go either way.
- Prittwitz will be retired.
- Moltke will be positioned at HQ Koenigsberg commanding a Reserve Corps (if he can't take Warsaw and either Riga or Kiev by winter he will suffer dismissal and be replaced by Falkenhayn)
- Crown Prince Wilhelm will command two Army Corps at Metz and Strasbourg reinforced by the other artillery and all the other Reserve Corps in Alsace-Lorraince except the one in the salient in front of Nancy
- a single Reserve Corps will guard the Belgium border
- all other German units in the West will be disbanded without compensation
- Germany suffers 10 morale loss from public opinion going sour by not trying to repeat the long-awaited 1870 knock-out blow against the French first
- CP loses the "Waves of patriotism event" for the same reason
- Britain war entry delayed as per "Rupprecht plan" if Belgium left uninvaded (no German naval bombarding of French ports allowed)
- Russia gains 10 morale and immunity from collapse points in 1914.
- acceleration of Russian war effort ("Defend mother Russia!")
- Russia Supply Crisis will be delayed until 1916
- there will be no squabbling between German and Austrian commanders leading to temporary removal of commanders

The following events will be discarded if AUFMARSCH OST was chosen:

- all other German war plans...duh!
- Cossacks
- Tannenberg (and therefore no Hindenburg)
- Max Hoffmann (no Hindenburg: no Ludendorff: no Hoffmann)
- Russian Code Broken event (since German redeployment would have not gone unnoticed, special care was taken to keep discipline on wireless transmissions)
- Marne Taxis, Gallieni, Kluck's Folly and any other event linked to the German advance in France
- AH Defense Planning (since AH is going to join the all-out offensive)
- Austrian Siege Howitzers (since the Russian forts are deemed not modern enough)

Enjoy!

[GPT55]

I just discovered PotsBlitz and tried playing for the first time (V5). It is very impressive! I have enjoyed CTGW occasionally for a few years, but this seems to make it much more interesting. I have a question about the AI. I played as CP with privileged AI, and for the first time ever got my ass kicked by the AI. The Russians attacked early with a huge army--it was like Barbarossa in reverse. I was a bad sport and quit in early October. So my question is: is the AI more "privileged" in this mod compared to the vanilla version, or are there other AI improvements, or did I just play lousy?

[Robotron]

@petertodd: the initial resources available for each faction differ from the original game to varying degrees. Also there are a lot of additional commanders and units now have experience ratings. Russian AI enjoys a short time combat bonus during the initial attack on Central Powers. Overall the AI was mostly left unchanged except for some crucial scripted opening moves and enhanced aggressiveness in certain cases. You'll probably need a few more games until you get the hang of what will work in this mod including choosing events and using diplo.

[KOB001]

I'm REALLY enjoying this mod!

I'm currently playing in SP & have had a few crashes as the CP.

I've attached (or hope I have) the logs & save game of the current game...it crashes whenever I press end turn.

I've also had problems with the game crashing when I sank a British Battlecruiser (in port)... I'll try & dig that one out.

Other than bug ironing I was also wondering on your opinion for a few "realism" improvements...

-Getting rid of the armored train & armored car units (which are ridiculous at this level). Probably also the Rail Cannons. Special events could be used to spawn a few here & there (Armored cars were used primarily on the Eastern front). New technologies (like improvements to your transport can increase the speed of units or decrease the efficiency loss associated with movement) will be opened up by getting rid of these things.

-Allowing the production of tiny garrisons & allowing them some freedom of movement (these could build fall back lines or defend 'quiet fronts').

-Infantry Assaults consume ammo, they can be launched without ammo but with attack penalties (like warships now & similar to Armored trains now)

-Rename flamethrowers to infantry support arms or something similar & give it a new picture... this could account for the LMG's, SMG's, rifle grenades & small mortars that were also developed (and of far more importance).

-Barbed wire was nearly unbreachable during the early war period... make it +3 entrenchment at least, probably more like +4 (it was at least as troublesome as machine guns & probably more effective at stopping attacks).

-Artillery tech improvements should not only effect your heavy/specialized artillery units. Some of them should start to effect the field artillery units of the Infantry formations themselves (this would help counter the improved barbed wire in the mid/late war).

-Could WW1 aircraft be better represented with air commanders that could be attached to land units & give small recon boosts? This would certainly work for 1914 & 1915 when the air fleets were tiny. Perhaps purchasing of separate aircraft units can then begin in 1916?


EDIT

I found the Battlecruiser bug. Attached is my save & the log. There are two German Dreadnoughts within striking range of a badly damaged (strength 4) British Battlecruiser. Sinking the British ship leads to an immediate CTD.

[Robotron]

@KOB001: Thanks for reporting the bugs and providing the logfiles and savegames as they were of great help. The bugs you mentioned got already fixed and will be included in the next scriptfix coming up soon.
Regarding your comments:

Getting rid of the armored train & armored car units (which are ridiculous at this level). Probably also the Rail Cannons.

I'll raise Armoured Cars to 15 PPs then but apart from this neither of these units are too effective nor too over-represented in the game in my opinion. Short story: don't build them if you don't like them.

New technologies (like improvements to your transport can increase the speed of units or decrease the efficiency loss associated with movement) will be opened up by getting rid of these things.

The movement stat is not changeable via tech improvements. In fact it cannot be changed at all during a running game.

-Allowing the production of tiny garrisons & allowing them some freedom of movement (these could build fall back lines or defend 'quiet fronts').

Smallgarrisons are unpopular enough among the community. There's no need to get more of them by allowing them to be produced, players would just spam them like there's no tomorrow.

Infantry Assaults consume ammo, they can be launched without ammo but with attack penalties (like warships now & similar to Armored trains now)

This would severely handicap the AI and it is already having enough troubles on its own.

Rename flamethrowers to infantry support arms or something similar & give it a new picture... this could account for the LMG's, SMG's, rifle grenades & small mortars that were also developed (and of far more importance).

SMGs have their own tech, the rest is included in "Assault tactics" or "Flamers". I might just rename Flamers but coming up with a new picture for the tech will be difficult without help from the original GFXs team, so the pic fits into the look of the rest of the game.

Barbed wire was nearly unbreachable during the early war period... make it +3 entrenchment at least, probably more like +4 (it was at least as troublesome as machine guns & probably more effective at stopping attacks).

I'm okay with +3 to entrenchment.

-Artillery tech improvements should not only effect your heavy/specialized artillery units. Some of them should start to effect the field artillery units of the Infantry formations themselves (this would help counter the improved barbed wire in the mid/late war).

Not feasible without major code rewrites but since the development of this mod is nearing its end, I'm not going to try to take on anything of that complexity.

Could WW1 aircraft be better represented with air commanders that could be attached to land units & give small recon boosts? This would certainly work for 1914 & 1915 when the air fleets were tiny. Perhaps purchasing of separate aircraft units can then begin in 1916?

We had the issue of fighter recon a few weeks ago and the current system with fighters/zeps having a chance to scout adjacent enemy hexes around the target is going to stay.

@everyone: I've come to the decision that V5 is going to be the final version of this mod as I believe I've done my share of improving the game. I doubt I'll add any new features from now on but will of course keep on fixing bugs where reported and change existing features where deemed appropriate.

[KOB001]

@KOB001: Thanks for reporting the bugs and providing the logfiles and savegames as they were of great help. The bugs you mentioned got already fixed and will be included in the next scriptfix coming up soon.
...

@everyone: I've come to the decision that V5 is going to be the final version of this mod as I believe I've done my share of improving the game. I doubt I'll add any new features from now on but will of course keep on fixing bugs where reported and change existing features where deemed appropriate.

No problem... I'll report any more bugs I find. I'm sure I'll be playing your mod a lot & trying to break it (Hmmm I wonder if it's possible to get Spain to join the CP?)!

Thanks for your replies & explanations & I'm up for playing multiplayer with anyone to help iron out the replay bugs.

[KOB001]

After a half dozen quick defeats I finally managed to get a win as the CP in August 1918.

I came across no bugs (a few crashes caused by Airship attacks... but I think that's a base game issue & none repeated after reloading).

Just a few missing descriptions/images for "unusual events" (at the end Denmark joined for me & the Berbers surrendered, both had descriptors like "Event_DOWdenmark").

I was surprised by how cheap & quick capital ships were to build (8-12 months).

In the real war, few were built during it because of the immense cost & long build times (more like 24 months if you including working up & commissioning times), as such I could very quickly build a German fleet to challenge the blockade once I was confident about the Eastern front.

I managed to get Italy & Romania to join the CP! Spain not so much .

Oh, one oddity... throughout 1917 & 1918 I was repeatedly given the option of Choosing War plan Ost as an event... even though the war had been going on for years & Russia had surrendered.