Slitherine

deducter wrote:

Rudankort wrote:I have a vague feeling that the concept of rarity will solve the problem which other existing mechanisms are supposed to solve already, but they do not work well. In this particular case, adding rarity limit to the game will result in player getting Tigers, Panthers etc. one at a time. So you have one Tiger in your core first, then two, then three etc. Prestige limitation is supposed to give the same result. Tigers and Panthers are expensive, and you pay full price for upgrades. So normally, you would only get a few in one go. Why this does not work? Because of the fundamental problem of people "swimming in prestige in late campaign". So, I would suggest to fix this first, and then see if any new limitations (which will be unpopular at least with some people anyway) will be needed at all. The problem with abundant prestige has a lot of implications - not only "best units in the core", but also "always elite replacements" and "always maximum over-strength". A whole dimension of complexity is removed from the game - you do not make choices, you can just have it all. In my opinion, this is the issue which we need to discuss in the first place.

Yes, if you set prestige limits to be tight and make heavy tanks suitably expensive, then there's no issue at all. But if you lay the grand campaigns, prestige is never an issue even after GC39, and heavy tanks actually end up saving prestige. However, many players struggle enough with prestige, and lowering it on the default difficulties is not a good idea either. Perhaps more official difficulty levels could be implemented, with more a difference between Colonel -> General -> FM.

Exactly what Deducter wrote is the problem. In theory prestige is meant to do that but due tot the vastly different skill levels of the players one end with millions of prestige and other is struggling to keep the core running. Additionally as you already mentioned having a lot of prestige not only gives you best units but as well trigger the whole more experience, more oversrtrength, less losses, more prestige spiral. I still think that my "weighted core costs" idea i described here would be a good way to ensure units variety without enforcing any restrictions on the player. Obviously it can't really be integrated into the current game mechanics but could be something to kept in mind for later.

I know very well why the problem with prestige exists, how it depends on player's skill and snowballs from there, and that we cannot decrease prestige levels in existing campaigns without making most players struggle. It is the base game mechanics which are in error, it must be changed completely in the area of how you earn and spend prestige. But since we are discussing deep changes here, this is what needs to change. Maybe not in this game, but in a sequel, anyway.

The weighted core idea sounds interesting and could be something that would encourage more unit diversity. I'd probably think twice about buying a heavy tank if it took up a few slots and would use them sparingly.

Of course I've modded my DLC campaign to be harder and have been a bit squeezed for cash since Stalingrad so too much prestige and a core of Tiger tanks isn't my problem. My force still has quite a few older units in it and I'm more worried about how the balance will look in 44

soldier wrote:The weighted core idea sounds interesting and could be something that would encourage more unit diversity. I'd probably think twice about buying a heavy tank if it took up a few slots and would use them sparingly.

Weighted core slots are great for balance, but I'm afraid that this might be a bit untrue to PG spirit. In PG buying a cool shiny Tiger for your core is a reward for playing well. With weighted slots it is no longer a reward, but a routine. You can have two ordinary tanks or one Tiger, both ways have their advantages and disadvantages, but it is all averaged out, there is nothing cool about buying more powerful equipment.

Rudankort wrote:

soldier wrote:The weighted core idea sounds interesting and could be something that would encourage more unit diversity. I'd probably think twice about buying a heavy tank if it took up a few slots and would use them sparingly.

Weighted core slots are great for balance, but I'm afraid that this might be a bit untrue to PG spirit. In PG buying a cool shiny Tiger for your core is a reward for playing well. With weighted slots it is no longer a reward, but a routine. You can have two ordinary tanks or one Tiger, both ways have their advantages and disadvantages, but it is all averaged out, there is nothing cool about buying more powerful equipment.

If weighted and balanced correctly the Tiger could be a bit stronger then then the equal amount of lower tanks. It would have the advantage of being more powerful and still shiny and powerful but the disadvantage of jut being able to cover so much ground.

Perhaps a stupid idea, but wouldn't it be possible to have a changing purchase cost 'scale', where the more you buy of a certain unit, the more expensive the next one you buy gets?

An example: your first Tiger I could still be 703 prestige, but a modifier in the eqp file would make the next unit bought to be, say, 10% more expensive, 773 prestige. Third one would cost, dending or wether you would add 10% to the previous price or just add up the percentages on the 'base' price, 850 or 843 prestige. This setting could be fixed differently depending on how 'rare' you want the unit to be. It could be implemented as an adjustable setting in the equipment file so you can model different kinds of increases in cost. It could be no extra cost, it can be expressed in percentages, through linear or non-linear progressive increases, or even exponential, for very rare units.

This would increase the cost of 'popular' units, while less wanted units get relatively cheaper, so they become a better deal. And it would take massive prestige levels to buy a disproportionally large amount of a certain unit.

I see big problems/balancing issues however:

First, how expensive are the reinforcements for units which have cost more than the base unit? Will those costs have the same growth rate, so reinforcement would have the same price adjustement? Otherwise it might be too cheap to strengthen an existing unit. But it might be strange if you have two Tigers on a map, both strength level 5, both needing urgent reinforcement. One reinforcement purchase would be much more expensive than the next, which might confuse players, because logically, the 'first' reinforcement should be the cheapest, independant of which unit, and the next one more expensive because you are exhausting the supply of new tanks and thus the price should go up. But I think you can come up with a decent alternative, like for example averaging the reinforcent cost based on the average price the player paid for the units?

Secondly, a big gameplay issue: what happens if your first-bought unit gets wiped out and you want to buy a new one? Keep the price high, because you can't get your units killed and expect them to get cheaper? Or go back one level in pricing, because you don't want the player to be penalized too much? Depends on opinion, really. If you already have two units, will the second one (which has cost more), become cheaper to reinforce once the first, cheaper one, has been killed?

Third: how narrow will the definition of this 'unit' be? Will only buying identical units trigger the cost increase (PzIV G), or a unit family (PzIV) ? Unit class would be going too far, obviously, but making a unit family 'as a whole' more expensive might not have the desired effect. Although cheaper models (Pz IV F instead of G) would increase relatively less in price, so would over time become more cost-effective.

Fourth: what happens when a new upgrade becomes available? Will having already bought a number of similar units cause the upgrade cost to increase as well? Otherwise you might get the idiotic problem that the upgrade will be free or disproportionally expensive, altough it would only be a minor improvement in performance.

Fifth: older and obsolete equipment would be too expensive after a while. As an answer, might have the cost increase stop or even reverse after a certain date, like the current 'Available Till' date will cause the unit to become unable to be bought, a third date column could be added ('Availability Peak'?) to end the price increases and/or start lowering them with again.

It might work just work, and it could be scaled with the difficulty settings. With moddability of such a function both the more historical modders and the all-you-can-shoot Jagdtiger crowd could be satisfied?

EDIT: As an afterthought, you could add yet another eqp column date entry to increase the cost of buying a very recently introduced unit for the first weeks of it being available, after a certain date it will have the 'normal' price. This would account for the player expending prestige to get his hands on the latest equipment.

I wouldn't call it a stupid idea ThvN. It actually sounds quite interesting imho. As you said yourself there are some problems with the idea that needs to be solved but generally i think the idea got potential.

Tarrak, I've just had another idea. I like your proposal for a weighted core, but I struggled to think of some 'rules' to determine the weight factors, because it might be too simple to assign a fixed number of core slots to certain classes. It might lead to 'gamey' 'maximizing' strategies, especially in multiplayer. But the principle behind your idea is very good.

But, what if you combine your proposal for a weighted core with this sliding price scale? Keep the unit prices reasonable, but make extra core slots cost prestige? Very simple example: the player gets a certain amount of base core slots. But in addition the player can buy extra core slots with each extra slot increasing in price, as in my system. This way the player can fill a few slots with expensive units or have more slots but will have to settle to fill them with cheaper units. This just popped into my head, so I needed to throw it out as I'm going to get some sleep soon and tomorrow I will have forgotten it.

Of course, it will be very difficult to balance.

EDIT: sleeping seems difficult, so I reread my posts and fixed some grammar/clarity. But my idea seems less stupid when I read it again.

A lot of these ideas are good, especially idea about scaling unit costs. That could be an interesting parameter in the equipment file. However, none of these measures are going to be popular with the "shoot everything with a JagdTiger crowd," as ThvN puts it. Also, not all of these measures are even necessary at the moment to properly balance the game.

The fact is, using just prestige and the correct equipment/gamerules files, you can achieve almost all the changes talked about. I have already made such a file which I think works very well for the GCs. The point of my file is that using a Bf 109G or a Panzer IVG should not feel like punishment or tying your hands behind your back or whatnot. It should feel like a real, viable choice for a commander with limited prestige. The Panzer IVG is not going to perform as well as a Tiger, of course. But it can perform well enough against the various T-34s, conscripts, T-60s, and all sorts of other Russian units for a small fraction of the cost of a Tiger. As a consequence of such a file, however, the game is by necessity significantly harder, since as Kerensky once put it, if you use a historical core you can expect a historical result. By playing well, during GC43 I've achieved ahistorical results in the Kursk scenarios, although that was by the skin of my teeth.

I guess what we're really discussing is the idea of more varied difficulty levels for an expansion. On the higher difficulties, certain new rules activate, like weighted core slots or scaling new unit costs. That I think is a fantastic idea. For now, such features are unnecessary to actually achieve their desired goals. But for the next expansion or a sequel, they are strongly worth considering.

deducter wrote:
The fact is, using just prestige and the correct equipment/gamerules files, you can achieve almost all the changes talked about.

I am certainly inclined to agree with this.

I'm playing now through the GC on Rommel (I did the last AK beta in it, too). I'm up to Kursk and it's added much more constraints. Mixed forces of 190s/109s, only a few Tigers or Stuka's, majority IV's, and also two of the best KV captures and still one IIIM. I'm never scared of loosing a scenario, though DV is getting a little riskier since you can't just flog the core and rebuild it each time.

To me, this feels like what "FM" should be - tough choices; victory possible though not always DV if you value your continued fighting ability. I'm sure once I get better then I'll experiment with a rule pack like deducter's for more challenge.

I suggest if there is limited availability level, you could call it "Speer."

One thing I noticed, and I here others say, is that there isn't a big difference between general and Field Marshall. Maybe make future general = current FM, and FM = current "rommel." Then, you can have "Speer" as a difficulty setting (like supply/fog of war), or perhaps another level.

Tarrak wrote:If weighted and balanced correctly the Tiger could be a bit stronger then then the equal amount of lower tanks. It would have the advantage of being more powerful and still shiny and powerful but the disadvantage of jut being able to cover so much ground.

Maybe. Another question. By the time Tiger appears in my upgrade lists, I have 20 core panzers, with experience, awards, heroes and all that stuff on them. I want to upgrade, but of course, I can only have 10 Tigers, not 20. What do I do with the other 10 of my tanks? Disband them?

ThvN wrote:Perhaps a stupid idea, but wouldn't it be possible to have a changing purchase cost 'scale', where the more you buy of a certain unit, the more expensive the next one you buy gets?

Exact implementation which works would need to be figured out, but the base idea of unit prices changing over time does have a lot of potential. I was thinking about it in a bit different way: as new equipment becomes available, old one gets discounted. PzIV should be pretty expensive while it is the high end tank in your army, but after Tigers and Panthers arrive, it is no longer a high end tank, and deserves price reduction. This way we could avoid exponential growth of costs throughout the game, and still get the benefits provided by it.

Rudankort wrote:

ThvN wrote:Perhaps a stupid idea, but wouldn't it be possible to have a changing purchase cost 'scale', where the more you buy of a certain unit, the more expensive the next one you buy gets?

Exact implementation which works would need to be figured out, but the base idea of unit prices changing over time does have a lot of potential. I was thinking about it in a bit different way: as new equipment becomes available, old one gets discounted. PzIV should be pretty expensive while it is the high end tank in your army, but after Tigers and Panthers arrive, it is no longer a high end tank, and deserves price reduction. This way we could avoid exponential growth of costs throughout the game, and still get the benefits provided by it.

I am in favor of older equipment getting cheaper as time goes by. I don't like the ideas of making advanced weaponry more rare or expensive though. Players should not be deprived of the choice of building cores with advanced weaponry out of a misguided sense of game balance. For a lot of players, including myself, using the advanced weaponry (Tigers, Panthers, ME 242s, etc.) adds a lot of enjoyment to the game. The advanced equipment also has, in most instances, greater survivability which helps to conserve with prestige costs in the late-war scenarios.

Rudankort wrote:

Tarrak wrote:If weighted and balanced correctly the Tiger could be a bit stronger then then the equal amount of lower tanks. It would have the advantage of being more powerful and still shiny and powerful but the disadvantage of jut being able to cover so much ground.

Maybe. Another question. By the time Tiger appears in my upgrade lists, I have 20 core panzers, with experience, awards, heroes and all that stuff on them. I want to upgrade, but of course, I can only have 10 Tigers, not 20. What do I do with the other 10 of my tanks? Disband them?

Ok this is a very good question. Haven't thought about this case. I think part of the problem can be offset by the natural growth of the core when during the progress of the campaign but obviously not all of it. I personally would have no problem in putting a big part of my tanks into reserve to give me more flexibility in deployment and have some replacements but i can see how that idea is not popular with everyone.

Rudankort wrote: Maybe. Another question. By the time Tiger appears in my upgrade lists, I have 20 core panzers, with experience, awards, heroes and all that stuff on them. I want to upgrade, but of course, I can only have 10 Tigers, not 20. What do I do with the other 10 of my tanks? Disband them?

You made an argument in another post about how players in PG always just upgraded all their Bf 109s to Fw 190 immediately once the latter model was available, but you don't have a problem with players doing this for Tigers? While it is a good idea to look at this from both sides of the argument, you cannot simultaneously hold both of these positions. It is not possible to both allow the player to upgrade all his units to the best possible at all times and to try discourage him from doing so.

The choice atm for 20 tanks in SP is 20 Tigers, or anything with fewer Tigers. That's an extremely boring choice, since 20 Tigers is always better from a powergaming standpoint. No one is disputing this fact. What I'm disputing is that from a powergaming standpoint, there should be more choice. This is actually true for MP, where there is tons of choice (see below). A weighted core concept isn't even necessary if you limit prestige and if you tweak the stats of the units such that Panzer IVs/StuG IIIGs end up being more prestige-efficient in SP.

Zhivago wrote: I am in favor of older equipment getting cheaper as time goes by. I don't like the ideas of making advanced weaponry more rare or expensive though. Players should not be deprived of the choice of building cores with advanced weaponry out of a misguided sense of game balance. For a lot of players, including myself, using the advanced weaponry (Tigers, Panthers, ME 242s, etc.) adds a lot of enjoyment to the game.

Most players, including myself, enjoy using advanced equipment. Despite any misconceptions, I would never run around GC43 and win every battle with Panzer IIIs and Panzer IIs. That is not only nearly impossible to do, it is also very boring for me. I enjoy using some Tigers and Panthers in conjunction with other tanks. The Tigers and Panthers can take on the Soviet heavy tanks while my StuG IIIG/Panzer IV take on the "junk" but numerous T-34 and Soviet infantry.

The advanced equipment also has, in most instances, greater survivability which helps to conserve with prestige costs in the late-war scenarios.

This is an unintended quirk of the very long nature of the Grand Campaigns, that advanced, expensive equipment counter intuitively ends up saving prestige. In the Grand Campaigns, reinforcement costs, not upgrades, consume the majority of your prestige. This is not the case during the stock campaign, where Tigers/Fw 190A are available for about 5 scenarios and King Tigers/Me-262 for about 3. The high purchase cost actually mattered a lot more than the reinforcement costs. In MP, the prestige costs also function as they should. King Tigers do not end up saving prestige there, because unlike the AI, a crafty player is capable of destroying/neutralizing it. If you lose a King Tiger in MP, that's irreplaceable, but if you lose a StuG IIIG, that's no big deal. This does not mean the King Tiger is useless, rather, I find having 1 or 2 quite useful in forcing a breakthrough at a critical point. Lots of the "junk" units like the Wespe or the Panzer IIIN or StuG IIIG become very useful in MP precisely because they are cheap.

You read complaints all the time about how heavy tanks are the only way to go in MP. I see many players buy nothing but heavy tanks, nothing but Me 262. Yet I routinely win games against those players using "inferior" equipment, not because I'm such an amazing tactician, but because my equipment is cheaper and I can afford replacements. There is also this misconception that I can destroy a IS-2 with a StuG IIIG. That is impossible. Instead, I will use the StuG to go fight something weaker (like a SU-122, which is often used as artillery). The StuG is also useful at finishing off weakened enemies, like a IS-2 with 2 strength left. It can even be used to delay the IS-2 (assuming it is isolated with no support units nearby) by reinforcing after each attack; it may take the IS-2 quite a few turns to destroy the StuG if I keep doing it. When I run across players who buy a more balanced force, I am always in for a tough fight, and I've lost plenty of games to such players.

I had to decide for such a problem only by testing HGM from DMP.

Because prestige bwas short, I had to decide:
Should I use all my slots
Should I use normal or elie replacements
Should I upgrade some units
Should I use overstrength

The possibility is included in PanzerCorps, but it is very difficult (not posssible) to adjust the prestige for each player right.

If I think about "separation" of prestige after reading some of the posts again, it could be possible to add a new (3th) type of "prestige".
This 3th type should be a "number" for the strength of the cores. Given by reaching scenario objectives or additional missions. It is a measurement for the strenght of the cores. Now, we have slots and prestige. With the new one we could use:
10 points for having a normal infanery unit in cores, 20 for a Panzer IV, 27 for a Tiger... for example. Overstrength is a part of it (1 overstrenght for a tiger costs 2.7, Pz IV 2.0..).

My $0.02: An elegant and "realistic" solution would be changing purchase/reinforcements costs over time. As purchase costs change, so too do reinforcements and any "money back" for disbanding the unit or upgrading it within its class. So reinforcing that first really, really expensive Tiger gets cheaper over time as Tigers become more common. This is intuitive from the player's perspective--especially for anyone who has ever bought a new car or motorcycle and then watched it instantly depreciate--but I realize that it would be complicated from the developers' perspective.

deducter wrote:You made an argument in another post about how players in PG always just upgraded all their Bf 109s to Fw 190 immediately once the latter model was available, but you don't have a problem with players doing this for Tigers? While it is a good idea to look at this from both sides of the argument, you cannot simultaneously hold both of these positions. It is not possible to both allow the player to upgrade all his units to the best possible at all times and to try discourage him from doing so.

I did not say that upgrade to all Tigers would happen instantly for all units, or that it would be easy and any player could get enough prestige for that. But to rule this possibility out completely is something I'm not sure about.

deducter wrote:The choice atm for 20 tanks in SP is 20 Tigers, or anything with fewer Tigers. That's an extremely boring choice, since 20 Tigers is always better from a powergaming standpoint. No one is disputing this fact. What I'm disputing is that from a powergaming standpoint, there should be more choice. This is actually true for MP, where there is tons of choice (see below). A weighted core concept isn't even necessary if you limit prestige and if you tweak the stats of the units such that Panzer IVs/StuG IIIGs end up being more prestige-efficient in SP.

Bingo. I also think that the problem could be solved within existing ruleset, just we need to tweak it somehow. It already works in MP, we need to figure out how to make it work in long campaigns with tons of prestige flying around.

Rudankort wrote:

deducter wrote:You made an argument in another post about how players in PG always just upgraded all their Bf 109s to Fw 190 immediately once the latter model was available, but you don't have a problem with players doing this for Tigers? While it is a good idea to look at this from both sides of the argument, you cannot simultaneously hold both of these positions. It is not possible to both allow the player to upgrade all his units to the best possible at all times and to try discourage him from doing so.

I did not say that upgrade to all Tigers would happen instantly for all units, or that it would be easy and any player could get enough prestige for that. But to rule this possibility out completely is something I'm not sure about.

deducter wrote:The choice atm for 20 tanks in SP is 20 Tigers, or anything with fewer Tigers. That's an extremely boring choice, since 20 Tigers is always better from a powergaming standpoint. No one is disputing this fact. What I'm disputing is that from a powergaming standpoint, there should be more choice. This is actually true for MP, where there is tons of choice (see below). A weighted core concept isn't even necessary if you limit prestige and if you tweak the stats of the units such that Panzer IVs/StuG IIIGs end up being more prestige-efficient in SP.

Bingo. I also think that the problem could be solved within existing ruleset, just we need to tweak it somehow. It already works in MP, we need to figure out how to make it work in long campaigns with tons of prestige flying around.

Don't pick on the Tiger. And by the way, any experienced player would not buy all Tigers because of their movement and fuel restrictions. I try to eventually get half Tigers, and half Panthers, and several ATs, like StugIIIG's and jadgpanthers. I don't think there is a shush fund of prestige around in the scenarios that needs to be tightened. If you were a WW2 panzer commander and had your choice to pick any equipment you wanted to accomplish your mission (preferably with the least amount of casualties), you would likely pick a core with a mixture like I play with. Tweak up the AI more. It already has been greatly enhanced in the last few upgrades and made the game even better.

Also, given that there are somewhere around 85-90 scenarios that a player can play through in the DLC 39-45 campaign as it currently exists, you quickly see that because of the drawn-out time frames for each year, opportunities to upgrade to new equipment don't come around very often anyway. Everything is, in my opinion, nicely incremental. The Tiger isn't even available until the very end of 1942, and in 1943, if you don't have some serious heavy metal in your core by the summer of 1943, you are going to get a butt-kicking from the Russians in the Kursk and post-Kursk scenarios. The debate goes on and on and on. That is why I tossed out the idea of more random factors for the equipment to create diversity/variety.

I also think it would be challenging if in each scenario, the AI could place its equipment in a choice of several different positions and/or make-ups. One of the things about the original PG that became boring was that the re-playability factor was hampered by the fact that after playing each scenario a million times, you knew where every AI unit was going to be at the start of the game, and what kind of units you would be facing. It might be beyond the ability of the current game's engine to randomize the AI's placement and use of equipment in each scenario (within certain perameters), but again, this is food for thought for future development.

As fsx hinted at, trying to balance this in the existing model is a futile exercise.
Players are far too different. Some are very skilled or willing to replay scenarios constantly, willing to save/reload constantly or even just plain old lucky, others probably less so.
If you try to prevent the player using every trick in the book to maximise his prestige so he's swimming in it at some point from being able to do that, you're going to make the game unplayable or at the very least extremely frustrating to the player that's already struggling with prestige under the current model.

In multiplayer, this works better because usually those tackling MP are more skilled from the get go and - much more importantly - it's normally just about this one single battle at hand. There's no core to cater for, no unexpected loss of dear units from three battles ago is going to effect either side.

I personally was rather fond of the late PG games' approach to limiting access to units, but of course these games played out drastically different to the first PG.

In any event, since it's already been ruled out that anything like this could be implemented into PzC, the whole discussion is probably a bit pointless in the first place...
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rezaf