Potzblitz V26.01 OCT 26th 2025

[trulster]

Sounds like a brilliant change. No more free dreadnoughts and a more realistic approach.

[Unwichtig]

Up to now Entente would get 1 british pre-dreadnought, 1 french pre-dreadnought and 1 british armoured cruiser each with a unit strength of 7.

This will be removed and instead the event will be unlocked by assembling a large Entente fleet within 3 hexes of Anzak Koyu. The larger the fleet the sooner the landing takes place.

Ah okay Thanks for correcting me I thought it was 3 armoured cruisers. Anyway...The change sounds great.
Fantastic solution. Looking forward to that it sounds realistic I agree.

[Robotron]

More new stuff:

1. after being called out several times by Trulster about obsolete stuff in the manual I thoroughly updated the manual and all ingame choice-event descriptions to reflect the actual effects as set up in the game scripts. Been about time too.

2. added the French city of Lille, just south of Ypres with a PP value of 12, representing a major area of French heavy industry.
PP were deducted from all other French cities to compensate.
Because Lille is right on the Franco-Belgian border and is guarded by a Reserve Corps, effectively blocking German advance into France, to compensate all French units will automatically suffer from loss of movement on turn 3 in case of a successful German "surprise" attack through Belgium.
Before this change, the chance for loss of movement per French unit was 66%.
As a consequence this will remove any chance of a French Reserve Corps getting moved into Namur.
I wonder if upgrading the Belgian "Home Guard" (new name for Small Garrison) in Namur to a Reserve Corps is justified.

3. to encourage Russian units to move onto CP hexes, the chance for diplo point bonus for each Russian unit on German/Austrian hexes was raised from 33% to 50%.
Cavalry units will always generate bonus diplo.
Also all Russian units in East Prussia will contribute to swing Italy toward joining Entente.
There's also a new "Panic in East Prussia" event that triggers if Germany is unable for several turns to manage "Victory at Tannenberg" with the danger for Germany of suffering 1 collapse point.

4. After the "Moltke sacked" event, the impassable Belgian coastal hexes will be unlocked. The "Race to the Sea" event will only be triggered if units actually move on either the unlocked hexes on the Belgian coast. Moving first onto one of the possibly unlocked hexes will result in the enemy losing all diplomatic points for that turn.

5. made Armoured Trains slightly tougher and cheaper but also set a unit-per-tech-limit on them just like with Zeppelins, Bombers and Tanks.

6. thinking about also limiting artillery units in the same way like Zeps, Bombers etc., but not sure about that - comments?

7. Submarines ambushes will not automatically happen if an enemy naval unit moves into a hex occupied by a submarine: the enemy unit must fail a test against its experience value first

8. unit commanders may not be removed if that unit has already performed an attack on the current turn

9. Battlecruisers cost 35 PP (was 50) and take 6 turns to build (was 10).

10. Dreadnoughts cost 40 PP (was 75) and take 12 turns to build (no change)


Phew...sometimes I wonder if all this is starting to become too esoteric as long as V12 is not yet available for testing...but anyway: comments are welcome.

[operating]

Over at the Matrix general discussions site there is a fairly new thread from someone looking for WWI game recommendations. I as well as Berto (iirc) recommended Potzblitz...

[Robotron]

Thanks for spreading the word, master sergeant operating!

[Unwichtig]

9. Battlecruisers cost 35 PP (was 50) and take 6 turns to build (was 10).

10. Dreadnoughts cost 40 PP (was 75) and take 12 turns to build (no change)

Comment: I will test it. Sounds very game changing too me. Much cheaper dreadnoughts and battlecruiser, what is the reason for this?
Doesn't this degrade the light cruisers as they are not that much cheaper anymore?
Previously the question was: 3 light cruisers (75pp) or one dreadnought (75pp).
That was a hard decision I think it was balanced.
In the future it's 4 LCs (100pp) vs 2 dreadnoughts (90pp). I d rather have 2 dreads then, especially as entente don't have subs to sink them. I can imagine the northsea will be full of them but I might be wrong. Question: still 1 collapse point when Sinking a dread? Game could be over after a few major seabattles because of morale loss and naval collapse points only.

Maybe getting collapse points for naval actions should not be linked to 'loosing a dread' but more to a 'loosing a seabattle' event. (Jutland, colonel, Falkland, dogger bank, successful battlecruiser raid etc.)? But that would be difficult to integrate.
Every seabattle would have to be linked to specially designed tripwires to be triggered.
It would be nice... But I think hell of work for you.
I. E. (suggest):
1. If german navy destroys 10 PP on the British coastal cities all together, the "successful battlecruiser raid event" appears giving uk 1 collapse point. This would force the CP player to continously try to bombard uk with navalgunfire.
And force royal Navy to have ships ivo coastal cities to prevent it. More seabattles would be likely. I like the idea.
2. Even the automatic battles colonel and Falklands cound be linked to tripwires. I. E. If Germany sends the Goeben and Breslau to strentghen the Asian squadron and UK does not hunt down Graf Spee and focus on northsea blockade instead, I see a high chance that the events don't happen at all. In this case Germany does not have a catastrophic defeat at the Falklands and does not suffer a collapse point.
If the royal Navy successfully hunts down Graf Spee and sinks his ship... Germany does get a collapse point.
3. Germany breaks the north sea blockade. This is an obvious event showing that the royal Navy is not strong in the northsea and unable to block the sea lines of communication. For me, this should be a collapse point for uk Everytime it happens.

But you said you will change the collapse point system anyway right?
Whatever the new system looks like, please don't add one collapse point for every dreadn sunk. With the new cheap dreads this will be too game changing.

[Robotron]

I propose to make BBs and BCs cheaper because I think their high cost is prohibitive as you need to spend most of your production on land units and then upkeep for the stuff you built.
And if you don't build land units you'll soon have a problem. Big ships are a luxury that's not really affordable at 50 or 70PP while at 35 or 45PP they might just fit in.

You are right about saying that 35PP for a BC and 25 for a CL (Light Cruiser) is a bit weird but you'll have to consider that they serve different purposes as one is for establishing naval superiority and one for sub-hunting and good luck hunting subs with a BC.

How about reducing LOS for BCs from 3 to 2 and raise upkeep from 3 to 5 to compensate?

Also: if you are afraid about suffering collapse points from getting your big ships sunk then just don't build any, right?

[Unwichtig]

Yes true. You could say that's the risk...
A cheaper stronger navy, but if you loose it you are totally doomed. Half the collapse points just by loosing dreads. I am just little worried that the new focus will be a massive naval clash in the northsea with UK and german dreads facing each other to establish or break the blockade. And in the end both get +5 collapse points because if this. Maybe I am wrong.
Could also be great fun so just keep it as it is I will try it.

LOS of dreads could be reduced by 1. Yes, why not.
That's realistic. They really had no clue where they were going at all. Most of the seabattles were more based on surprise and luck instead of fantastic military planning.

Not sure about increasing the upkeep.
If it's from 3 up to 5 per turn.. That's 50 extra pp for one dread in only 25 turns. Due to the cheap dreads I assume players will build 3 or 4 more than usual.
That's easily 150+pp extra upkeep for ships in a game.
That's the same pp value as the combined price of the old expensive dreads with their low upkeep. So it would be about the same.
I will think about it. I think u have an idea.
Initially I think changing dread upkeep to 4 is okay.

[Robotron]

Half the collapse points just by loosing dreads.

You are exaggerating. Such a situation would only be possible if you spent an absurd amount of PP on expanding your number of BBs+BCs and then manage to get all of them sunk by an enemy that has built even more, which brings me to:

I am just little worried that the new focus will be a massive naval clash in the northsea with UK and german dreads facing each other to establish or break the blockade. And in the end both get +5 collapse points because if this. Maybe I am wrong.

Well, there's also a land war to be fought. The only situation when Germany would be able to build anything coming even close to such a mega- fleet would be after the defeat of Russia or France by disbanding all unneeded units.
If France is down then Entente is quite doomed anyway. If Russia is kicked out of the game then the game has proceeded probably well into 1916 and the building of enough BCs would take at least half a year. Also these new units would have no experience in contrast to those of the Royal Navy.

As for Entente, meaning mostly Britain: if there is no German mega-fleet the there's no need to counter it.

LOS of dreads could be reduced by 1. Yes, why not.

To clarifiy: BBs (= Battleships) already have a LOS of 1. I meant reducing the LOS of BCs (Battlecruisers) from 3 to 2.

Not sure about increasing the upkeep.

But increasing upkeep to 5 would actually help avoiding the "mega-fleet" scenario that you are so worried about, see above.

[Unwichtig]

Yes ok let's just try it.

Dread and BC upkeep 5.
BC LOS minus 1.
Cheaper Warships instead.

We ll see what happens.

And I am also happy with artillery limitations linked to tech levels. The higher the teck, the more arty can be build. Like with all other stuff. That sounds good.

[trulster]

Am with Unwicthig here, making BC and BBs so cheap seems problematic. Would go for 45 and 60 at the lowest.

And increasing upkeep just makes for more passive play as you cannot afford to actually use the ships. Will be a whole lot of sitting around in port.

[Unwichtig]

I thought about some naval ideas as I really love the naval aspects about the game or actually any game.
I know I have too many ideas to be included into the mod and that the focus will always lie on the land campaigns, especially as you are just working on the massive Russian Civil War mod.

But anyway, it's a hobby to create some ideas just like doing this even though it's not my mod.
That does not matter.

I know that the naval arms race between imperial germany and the royal Navy took place prior to ww1. Tirpitz, the risk theory, the flottengesetze, the flottenverein etc were all key elements in late 1890s until 1910s. And they basically failed meeting their objectives from a german perspective.

But anyway... It's a game, and a stubborn Kaiser and many indoctrinated high ranked german naval officers searching for global recognition, trying to establish a global Germany could have pushed even harder by investing even more into the navy and actually fight the "entscheidungsschlacht" when ordered instead of starting a mutiny in Kiel or leaving the fleet in port most of the time.
It's insane, I know. But I like what if scenarios so I thought about some german navy events (that would change the game massively though).

1. "Continue the Tirpitz Plan"
Event available 1914.
- Unlocks Tirpitz as Admiral (Return from the political theater to the frontline, small effect but large range, a naval version of Hindenburg)
- One random German General protests against new naval focus by refusing to continue command. (=removed and out of play!)
- 1 additional, free Battlecruiser
- Construction time for Dread and BC reduced by 2 turns, subs and LC by 1.
- construction time for trains, artillery and tanks increased by 1 instead. (=industrial focus: navy, not army)
- Unlocks the next 'Naval Focus' events below:

2. "Order the Entscheidingsschlacht"
Event available 1917/1918
- Every Royal Navy or US Unit sunk = - 3 UK / US Morale and +3 German Morale.
- Every German naval unit sunk increases the chance of Kiel mutiny event by 5%. Kiel mutiny is checked every month and if it happens, the effect is discarded and the Harbour of Kiel becomes unusable and Kiel PP is reduced to zero.

3. "Advanced Torpedo Boat Tactics"
- Dreadnought and BC are escorted by Torpedoboat Squadrons. (a unit type that I miss a lot, even the army have 'small cars' moving on the frontline. If any unit type is missing, it's the torpedoboats from my opinion. That's why I added this event)
- Naval Defence for major warships increased by 2
- Naval Attack against major warships increased by 2
- Production Cost of DD and BC plus 10 each.
- Production takes + 1 Turn
- Unlocks Andreas Michelsen (Torpedo boat Commander)

4. "Strike the Empire"
An offensive, almost suicidal Naval Attack on British shipping lines.
Available from 1915. Requires 4 Submarines.
- 4 Submarines will be automatically forward deployed in the southern atlantik. In the next 8-10 turns zero French/uk convoys will arrive from the southern atlantik. After 8-10 turns, all 4 submarines are exhausted and will be scuttled and disappear automatically.
- Basically the CP player buys some time by sacrificing 4 subs but blocking entente convoys instead for a few turns. I think this is okay as entente has a significant overall PP advantage anyway.
- Significantly angers USA joining entente early

5. Mine the Black Sea.
- 1915 and 1 LC.
Removes one german LC from the Game which is tasked to automatically mine the Black Sea.
- If played, +50% Chance that Entente units get hit by a mine in the Baltics for rest of the game.
This prevents the Entente Submarine flood in the Baltics. (they then could have the subs back instead)

6. Prepare Amphib Assault on Baltic States
(Background: Taking of the Island Osel which does not exist in the game so I made it Baltic states)
- Consumes 25 PP
- Spawns 1 Elite Reserve Corps in Kiel ready for deployment
- Increase Naval Transport of Germany by 1.

Dozens of more ideas. Easily enough for a huge Naval MOD expension. (which will never happen).

Have a great evening.

[trulster]

There is a very annoying chat bug, that happens when you write a message that is longer than a line I think, crashes the game. When just about to finish a turn, quite the pain in the ass.

[Robotron]

Yes, it crashes when a line of text goes beyond the border of the chat panel.
Unfortunately this does not produce a bug report in the logfile so it's impossible to discern what's actually going wrong.
Also the chatbox uses callbacks to the main engine (ctgw.exe) which, unlike the rest of the lua scripts, are "unmoddable".
I'm stumped how to fix this issue.

@unwichtig: some nice ideas, #2, #5 and #6 look like good candidates.
Note that once the game is started production cost and production time can't be changed any longer and combat stat enhancements can only come in via technologies.

I'd very much appreciate ideas for 2 new events for the CP event pool at the start of the game and 1 for Entente so both alliances start with 8 events. These events should be compatible with the standard scenario "modified Schlieffen".

[trulster]

Some good ideas, I like the Tirpitz plan.

Have another idea, historically quite some German subs made use of Spanish ports for supplies and information. There could be a late 1915 or 1916 CP event to allow one German sub per turn to be in a Spanish port, if that can be programmed.

Then, in 1917 an Entente event of US, British, French and Italian pressure on Spain for internment of all German vessels in Spanish port, causing a reverting to normal rules (ie not possible to enter port for German uboats).

This would also open up some action in the Mid-South Atlantic, where nothing happens in 99% of games.

[Robotron]

Port hex affiliations are tied to the corresponding city's alliance status so your proposal would require to have those Spanish cities switch to CP control, which would be quite weird but a smallish Port like La Coruna would probably be acceptable.

@"Tirpitz plan": could be a good candidate for one of the two additional CP starting events I'm looking for. Play before Germany joins the war for 1 free BC. Seems like a no-brainer though, so maybe needs some twist to it. As I mentioned above, raising costs for other stuff is not an option.

[trulster]

New event ideas:

November 1915 CP event:

Germany offers Åland Islands to Sweden in return for entering the war. +4d6 influence in Sweden, +6d6 if Soviet Revolution has occurred.

(the islands are on the map, but a change in control would have no practical in-game effects as there is no port IIRC. Or it can be coded that any Entente naval units passing north of the islands will have a higher chance of hitting mines (narrower sea area if Russia loses the islands).

1917 Entente event:

Food shipments to Sweden. Entente arranges help against starvation. +20 influence in Sweden. This event will only be available if starvation has occurred in Germany due to blockade.

[trulster]

Port hex affiliations are tied to the corresponding city's alliance status so your proposal would require to have those Spanish cities switch to CP control, which would be quite weird but a smallish Port like La Coruna would probably be acceptable.

Cadiz was historically the port, but La Coruna could work as well.. Though, I guess the Entente could just invade it if the city hex switches to CP control. That should be possible, but cause a huge pro-CP shift in Spain.

or if it comes with a garrison then invading will be practically impossible without landing in Spain proper (ie DoW).

[trulster]

@"Tirpitz plan": could be a good candidate for one of the two additional CP starting events I'm looking for. Play before Germany joins the war for 1 free BC. Seems like a no-brainer though, so maybe needs some twist to it. As I mentioned above, raising costs for other stuff is not an option.

Can an event add to the production queue (ie a battleship to arrive in 10 turns etc? And, can units in the queue be "damaged" or at less than full health?

[Robotron]

No to both, at least I don't know how. But the BC could spawn via a normal scripted trigger maybe at the start of game turn 10.
Also a choice event would be possible: pay nothing and get a BC or pay 15 and get a BB. Or pay nothing and get a BC on turn 10 or pay 15 and get it NOW!.