Battlefield: Europe MOD v2.4

[jeffoot77]

hello McGuba

"I would rather suggest to give the same amount of money to a charity or a good cause of your choice instead. "

--> It is all in your honor ... i have make a little donation to Luis of "Open general" , u may know him :

http://luis-guzman.com/

[Großadmiral]

v2.0 is up.

More info + download link is on the first page of this topic.

Vielen Dank für deine jahrelangen Bemühungen!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[slowgtp]

Bit confused by this...are we not allowed upgrades on the first term? Still not sure what cities are allowed for upgrades.

[Andrea69]

Hello McGuba

how can you edit the big scenario to add some more cities able to buy and upgrade units? I like to play the realistic version, but I'd also like to have some more upgrade possibilities (eg Oslo, Munchen, Koenigsberg and maybe one city in eastern Europe). I did not find any way in the editor to do this change.

Thank you for any help.

[slowgtp]

Other questions:

Is there no more Hipper?
Why can't I upgrade Romanian troops in Romania?

[McGuba]

Hello McGuba

how can you edit the big scenario to add some more cities able to buy and upgrade units? I like to play the realistic version, but I'd also like to have some more upgrade possibilities (eg Oslo, Munchen, Koenigsberg and maybe one city in eastern Europe). I did not find any way in the editor to do this change.

Thank you for any help.

Hi,

In order to have two different cities (actually four, including the ports) in which upgrades and purchases are possible or not, I had to modify two existing hex types: jungle terrain and rough desert as can be seen here:



Basically jungle became the new port city (in this example Wilhelmshaven), which allows upgrades and purchases and rough desert became the new city (Bremen) which does the same. At the the same time original city and port hexes lost this functionality (like Arnhem and Amsterdam). Without going into technical details, I could only do it in this way and not the opposite, due to a strange game behaviour. (Also at first I attempted to add completely new city hex types to the game but then again, I ran into unexpected technical problems so I had to re-use existing ones.) Even then, when it comes to these new city types, I had to make sure that they do not have rivers going through them as in that case ground units would lose their ability to cross them due to another strange game behaviour. That's why the river ends next to Bremen in this example, even though visually it looks as if it goes through. And all such cities have to be the same.

So in the end, if you want to allocate more cities which allow upgrades and purchases you need to go to the editor, open the "Kursk.pzscn" file (which is used by the "realistic" version) and edit a city type hex (like Arnhem) to rough desert, but make sure you delete all rivers that would go through that city. And the same goes for ports, but this time they have to be jungle type.

You might also want to add them the upgrade marker, but that is only for visuals.

Bit confused by this...are we not allowed upgrades on the first term? Still not sure what cities are allowed for upgrades.

Victory objective cities and ports in Germany marked with the black cross:





And city and port hexes outside of Germany marked with the unit upgrade marker (double "^"):

Other questions:

Is there no more Hipper?
Why can't I upgrade Romanian troops in Romania?

In this mod a heavy cruiser unit represents two actual heavy cruisers and thus the unit named "Prinz Eugen" represents the ships Prinz Eugen and Admiral Hipper.

Romanian and any other units can only be upgraded in the above marked cities and ports. Due to game limitations I cannot restrict cities in Romania to only upgrade Romanian units. Therefore if I made for example Bucharest an upgrade city players would be able to upgrade German, Hungarian or any other Axis ground units there as well, which would be strange. On the other hand, on some occasions Hungarian or Romanian units were transfered to Germany for training for new (German) equipment, so it is more plausible in this way, even though not exactly perfect, I must admit. Also, historically German units were regularly rotated back to Germany for rest and refit and training, no German unit really spent the whole war in the frontline and this new game mechanic allows it to be better simulated.

[Andrea69]

Thank you McGuba for the detailed explanation

I have just edited the realistic scenario and it works fine

[Yrfin]

Grats with 2.0 !

Few things:
"- - Countryside terrain gets 1 base entrenchment so now it provides a bit more protection than clear terrain (originally these two terrains were in effect the same so now I try to make a difference between them)."

I think movements for Countryside terrain must be changed too.

Have you ever seen the rain ?
In a Russia countryside terrain ?

"- All air units move a bit slower over high mountain terrain."
- The hard attack value of most artillery units has been reduced by 30-40% so that now it is harder to fully suppress enemy armoured units and then force surrender them."

I'd like it

"I had to modify two existing hex types: jungle terrain and rough desert as can be seen here:"

I think better to ADD new terrain type instead CHANGE jungle terrain and rough desert.
Im add 2 new terrain type in my mod (Railroad station and Village) and think about add Wadi and Soft Sand for Rommel.
Nothing hard to do it. Trust me

[Keen]

I'm playing BE 2.0 multiplayer version, and I can't embark/disembark at Ufa. Upgrade is also impossible.
Other cities with special symbol works fine. Can somebody else to check it?

[McGuba]

I'm playing BE 2.0 multiplayer version, and I can't embark/disembark at Ufa. Upgrade is also impossible.
Other cities with special symbol works fine. Can somebody else to check it?

Ah, yes, sorry, it is because the problem that I described in my last post: I forgot to remove the river running through this "city" hex and that causes the problem. I only made this city an upgrade city in the last minute and did not check it. It looks like vanilla city hexes have some hard coded feature that makes it possible to cross them if a river is there and to embark/disembark trains. And I cannot give this hard coded ability to any other hex type if I just give them the normal "gndsup" (ground supply) or "railemb" (rail embarking), in the terrain file, which normally makes cities what they are. If there is a river running through them they lose this feature. Which also answers why I did not bother adding new hex types for cities.

Anyhow, in the current version Ufa does not work properly as a unit upgrade and rail embark city, but the other special Soviet cities do.

So for now I just removed the river but it will be only good in the next fixed version. Until now I only made like 2-3 small fixes to v2.0 but I may upload it soon anyway.

[Keen]

I played 30 turns multiplayer scenario vs Uhu.
Match is very interesting, but IMHO multiplayer version needs some changes.
Single version is good enough, its historically and so on.
But in multiplayer version there is no alternative for Allies side.
You only have to wait reinforcement and mostly just react for Axis attack. Thats boring.

1) The number of slots should be the same. 200 for both sides or something like that.
Axis have some alternative decisions here but Allies totally not.
30 turns passed, I have 6000 prestige points and i don't know what to do with it.

2) That's strange when Allies side haven't naval transport, specially England.
In our game all my fleet stay near the Malta but can not reoccupy it. Looks funny. ))
Paratroops also should be added.

3) About some freezing units. Leningrad, armies near the border at the beggining of war, England army in Africa thats ok.
Few turns ago my 120mm mortar unit was attacked and they start moving, but some turns later i move them to the same hex,
and they are now freezing again. I have to remember this hexes or what better to do in this situations?

In my opinion multiplayer version have to be more flexible and enjoyable. )

And the last question. How many reinforcement i will not receive if i lost Moscow?
10% maybe 20% What about other important cities? Maybe you have any guide?

Anyway thank you for MOD again. Great work!

[McGuba]

Thanks for your feedback

Playing the Allies is very different from the Axis. Like playing another game. Historically the Allies could only react to the Axis offensives until late 1942. The Axis had the initiative in the first half of the war. The Allies did not have enough resources as it took time until the Soviet and US war economy was fully heated. Then came the Torch landings, El Alamein and Stalingrad. Which is like turn 34-36 in this mod. After that the Allies get more and more reinforcements and can slowly gain the initiative. Unless the Axis makes enough gains before that thereby reducing the number of Allied reinforcements.

So initially the goal of the Allied side is to minimise Axis gains and Allied losses and maximise Axis losses.

As for the Allied prestige, it can be used for unit upgrades, but again it takes some time until better Allied units become available. At this stage I think it is best to use it for Spitfire IX upgrades (as soon as it shows up - but note that most Allied units become available for upgrade about 6 months later than historically, however they can appear as new replacement units at around the same time when they entered service). Or maybe for some better Soviet fighters or Allied bombers. Also Soviets can upgrade surviving BT tanks to T-34s, and T-26 light (recon) tanks to T-60 and T-70. And then of course Lee and Sherman upgrades for obsolete British tanks in the Middle East. Even later T-34/76 to T-34/85 and KV tanks to IS-2. But these latter are only from mid 1944. However at the same time there will be better and better Allied and Soviet air units as well. And of course model 1934 infantry.

Another good idea can be to use more elite unit replacements as most new Allied units turn up with little to no experience and then these can slowly build up experience for the later battles. Then they can also get overstrength making them even more effective.


I was thinking to add a few naval transports to the Allies but for the time being I did not. This would limit the Axis freedom of manoeuvre in the early stage considerably. Maybe I will do so later, though.

Soon the Torch landing fleet will show up and after that more and more Allied landing fleets will arrive, given that the Aliies control the seas and the landings go on as planned. Some of these units can be used unhistorically, for example to regain Malta, or to land in the Balkans as I did in our match with Intenso. There are of course other options as well.

The freezing of the Aliied units should stop at around turn 36, with some exceptions. For example Allied motorised units in the oil field hexes would freeze until the end of the war. But most others should “defrost” soon.

So in general, the Allied player needs to be a bit more patient in the beginning. It has to be like this to balance their higher numbers.

It is hard to say how many new units the Soviets lose after the loss of Moscow but I think something like that, 10-15, maybe even 20 percent, depending on the year or period. Losing the oil fields is more critical, but losing Leningrad or Stalingrad is less so. If all these are lost they get maybe just half of the maximum number from 1944, but probably a bit more in 1943.

[ahtf]

@ McGuba. Excellent work, congratulations.
A humble request, it could be possible to create a version to play grand campaign.
Thank you.

It is a recurring request and I might do it later, at some point. My main problem is I do not really see the point in playing an unhistorical campaing with a historical set of units. They might not be compatible with each other.

Thanks, I did reaload older saves but also got crash at the same point as before, so have had to stop playing this mod unfortunately.

I would really like to have one or more of these erroneous saves so that I can check if I can recreate this issue, with a possiblility to solve it somehow. I never really had this so I have no idea what causes it and why only for some players.

Thus it would be nice if you or Uhu could upload one or more of these saves to somewhere or send me via e-mail.

By the way, one can also start with the big 1941 Barbarossa scenario, skipping the earlier scenarios. That main scenario seems to be stable.

Hi dont know if you still want this, but i got the same error. I think it has to do with dunkerque, in my turn i forced a artillery unit to retreat there. In start of allies turn that unit disappeared and at the end of the turn it crashed every time with runtime error. Replayed my turn and when no unit was there the crash didnt occur next time.

I have a save if you still want it.

Great mod

[McGuba]

Hi, yes, I am interested in this savegame before the game crash as I could never replicate it and only a few players have reported it. Nevertheless I could have a look and maybe come up with a fix. I send you an e-mail address in a private message where you could send it. Please check your Private messages in this board.

[ahtf]

Send it, hope it helps.

[Großadmiral]

So, bin mitten in der Schlacht (Mittelmeer) und brauche eure Hilfe:
Ich kann keine Flugzeuge strategisch verlegen; das Umladen in Ju52 geht noch, aber dann stehen die nur fest auf den Flugplatz, lediglich ein Rückwandeln funktioniert.
Hiiiiiiiiiiilfe?!

[McGuba]

So, bin mitten in der Schlacht (Mittelmeer) und brauche eure Hilfe:
Ich kann keine Flugzeuge strategisch verlegen; das Umladen in Ju52 geht noch, aber dann stehen die nur fest auf den Flugplatz, lediglich ein Rückwandeln funktioniert.

Currently the strategic redeployment of the air units is only possible in the big "Barbarossa" scenario. In the Mediterranean and previous scenarios this function does not work: air units can change to Ju 52 but then cannot move. However, in the big 99 turn scenario it works fine with all Axis air units (with the exception of the Finns, if I remember well), but there is a limit as only 4 air units can be redeployed at the same time.

Maybe I will add this functionality to the earlier scenarios in the next version of the mod.

[JimmyC]

Hi McGuba,

Looking forward to trying the new version of the game. I only just finished my v1.08 game as I got distracted by many things and didn’t pick it up until about 1 year after starting. That game resulted in minor victory with me defeating the Russians.

This time round I think I will focus on defeating the British, although I previously found Sealion very frustrating with so many reloads required and annoyance of having to time it perfectly to land troops on the radar tower just as it is destroyed. Anyone have tips for making Sealion a little bit more bearable?

[Großadmiral]

Hi, McGuba!
Danke für die Antwort, ich dachte nur die strategische Luftverlegung funktioniert bei mir nicht, bin jetzt aber beruhigt.
Gestern das Hauptszenario Barbarossa erreicht und muss sagen: Wow!!!
Ich spiele auf Realistic+, kann man hier überhaupt noch eine <Landung in England schaffen? Ich glaube ich konzentriere mich nur auf Rußland.
Was meint ihr oder ist jemand schon soweit?
Kämpferische Grüße und Dank an McGubaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

[McGuba]

Hi McGuba,

Looking forward to trying the new version of the game. I only just finished my v1.08 game as I got distracted by many things and didn’t pick it up until about 1 year after starting. That game resulted in minor victory with me defeating the Russians.

This time round I think I will focus on defeating the British, although I previously found Sealion very frustrating with so many reloads required and annoyance of having to time it perfectly to land troops on the radar tower just as it is destroyed. Anyone have tips for making Sealion a little bit more bearable?

Hi, and welcome back to the frontline!

A lot of things have changed since v1.8 - and although I did not attempt a landing in Britain for a long time, it is still very much possible. PeteMitchell wrote a nice detailed AAR for v1.9 a year ago in which he achieved a total victory: viewtopic.php?f=145&t=86481

He made a "conventional" landing in south England, first clearing some naval minefields and coastal bunkers and I think that is the most obvious way to do so. But there was another interesting AAR in which the lightly defended Northern Ireland was used as a staging ground for the invasion, and of course North or East England and Scotland can also be options. Or maybe with a combined landing at different places. However, in v2.0 there are futher changes, for example the Royal Navy is supposedly more responsive, or "intelligent", and of course there are those new annoying coastal batteries (in artillery class, allowing them to get repairs) which can bombard the landing ships from a distance. So in general, I think now it is more difficult. But also more realistic, after all there was a reason why the Germans did not attempt to do so. Most likely it requires a higher investment and may result in higher losses, but if successful it will surely worth the effort.

Hi, McGuba!
Danke für die Antwort, ich dachte nur die strategische Luftverlegung funktioniert bei mir nicht, bin jetzt aber beruhigt.
Gestern das Hauptszenario Barbarossa erreicht und muss sagen: Wow!!!
Ich spiele auf Realistic+, kann man hier überhaupt noch eine <Landung in England schaffen? Ich glaube ich konzentriere mich nur auf Rußland.
Was meint ihr oder ist jemand schon soweit?
Kämpferische Grüße und Dank an McGubaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

Realistic + is the hardest version and it is only suggested to veteran players or to those who do not mind losing the war. Defeating the Soviet Union or the British is about equally difficult so it is hard to say which one is better, it depends on the playing style and personal preference. Obviously, fighting the Soviets is almost entirely a land war, and fighting the British requires more use of the navy. In "realistic +" the German and Italian navies suffer more from the historical fuel crisis from 1942, further limiting the maximum movement range of their capital ships, so maybe it is harder to defeat the British in this version. But the land forces also suffer a fuel penalty as they lose two units of fuel in each turn until at least two oil fields are captured and repaired. It also limits the mobility of the motorised units, especially those ones with low maximum fuel.

However, several players have also managed to defeat both the Soviets and the British in the same game and achieved a total victory in the earlier v1.9 version of the mod.

Since v2.0 is fairly new, nobody has published an AAR for the single player scenario, but hopefully some time later we will see some.