Locarnus Addon 2025-08, for Battlefield Europe, Afrika Korps and Grand Campaign East

[uzbek2012]

the player should start with 740 prestige in case of a decisive victory in the Mediterranean scenario, or 640 prestige in case of a marginal victory in the Mediterranean scenario. Regardless of prestige accumulated before Barbarossa. It is imho simply impossible to balance a Barbarossa start with 640 prestige vs one with 5000+ prestige.

Interesting idea. But it may be controversial: a lot of players have already questioned the need for playing the pre-Barbarossa scenarios, I guess mainly as many of them are anxious to play the big scenario as soon as possible without "wasting" their time playing the early war scenarios, which are more "conventional" by nature. And so the extra prestige that can be collected during these mainly serve as a "hook". Otherwise only the extra experience and kills may not be compelling enough to make the people play them.

Nevertheless, the main reason of playing the early war scenarios should not be any of these, but to learn the new and modified game mechanics, unit stats changes and to get used to the map scale step-by-step. And of course to experience the whole course of the war and to better realize the scale difference between the early war campaigns (which lasted only a few weeks each) and Barbarossa (which eventually lasted for several years and at a much larger area). So if the possibility to gain more prestige is removed I guess even less players would be willing to play the early war scenarios and these players would miss a lot of the content and the chance to be better prepared for the big scenario. What I could do though, is to further reduce the difference between the prestige that can be gained during these a bit.

Interesting idea. But it may be controversial: a lot of players have already questioned the need for playing the pre-Barbarossa scenarios, I guess mainly as many of them are anxious to play the big scenario as soon as possible without "wasting" their time playing the early war scenarios, which are more "conventional" by nature. And so the extra prestige that can be collected during these mainly serve as a "hook". Otherwise only the extra experience and kills may not be compelling enough to make the people play them.

In vain do you think I like small wars on big maps, it 's even more interesting ) for one workout

Nevertheless, the main reason of playing the early war scenarios should not be any of these, but to learn the new and modified game mechanics, unit stats changes and to get used to the map scale step-by-step. And of course to experience the whole course of the war and to better realize the scale difference between the early war campaigns (which lasted only a few weeks each) and Barbarossa (which eventually lasted for several years and at a much larger area). So if the possibility to gain more prestige is removed I guess even less players would be willing to play the early war scenarios and these players would miss a lot of the content and the chance to be better prepared for the big scenario. What I could do though, is to further reduce the difference between the prestige that can be gained during these a bit.

You 're right , it will do )

[Locarnus]

the player should start with 740 prestige in case of a decisive victory in the Mediterranean scenario, or 640 prestige in case of a marginal victory in the Mediterranean scenario. Regardless of prestige accumulated before Barbarossa. It is imho simply impossible to balance a Barbarossa start with 640 prestige vs one with 5000+ prestige.

Interesting idea. But it may be controversial: a lot of players have already questioned the need for playing the pre-Barbarossa scenarios, I guess mainly as many of them are anxious to play the big scenario as soon as possible without "wasting" their time playing the early war scenarios, which are more "conventional" by nature. And so the extra prestige that can be collected during these mainly serve as a "hook". Otherwise only the extra experience and kills may not be compelling enough to make the people play them.

Nevertheless, the main reason of playing the early war scenarios should not be any of these, but to learn the new and modified game mechanics, unit stats changes and to get used to the map scale step-by-step. And of course to experience the whole course of the war and to better realize the scale difference between the early war campaigns (which lasted only a few weeks each) and Barbarossa (which eventually lasted for several years and at a much larger area). So if the possibility to gain more prestige is removed I guess even less players would be willing to play the early war scenarios and these players would miss a lot of the content and the chance to be better prepared for the big scenario. What I could do though, is to further reduce the difference between the prestige that can be gained during these a bit.

I just read a comment from PeteMitchell on the final goose-2 youtube playthrough of BE 2.0:

[...]
- For the planes, some people sell the bomber and buy another fighter instead, the bomber is helpful but two fighters might be better for Russia I think
- Not sure if possible anymore but in the past you could also enter Barbarossa with only two tanks and three planes/fighters

So maybe another option could be to allow a larger core to transition between the scenarios. The "sell tank, buy fighter" was recommended before, eg in the Tipps thread for BE 2.2?

Would perhaps be easier to balance than the prestige. Since the larger core would somewhat compete for the same experience/kills anyway (due to starting in the same area, opposite of the same enemies). While even a thousand more prestige would be a balancing issue (especially if the player is allowed to buy units early on, something that I really want to keep due to the added strategic considerations).

[Locarnus]

From the Battlefield Europe 2.3 thread:

Ok so daddy finally finished his playthrough of the epic 1st go around on Battlefield Europe. 2.0

It is now on 2.3 that everything is played on. If McGuba could send me the screen shot of the start screen so I can use that for my next playthrough I would greatly appreciate it.

Here is the start of my thoughts on this awesome mod.

The frustrations are minor as these pain points are part of what make the game so awesome.

The frustrations are as follows:
1) Mines: So many stinking sea mines that frustrate the assaults and progress of anything dealing with the sea.
a) They are so strong. 10 str. that take years of play to destroy a single mine layout.
b) Often Destroyers will miss or Bombers will miss so frustrating lost turns doing nothing.
c) Nothing destroys more than a single mine at a time. (Couldn't there be something that destroys 2 every time at least.)

2) Inability to buy units.
a) Early on I would like to be able to purchase some units in order to create the army I want to fight with rather than the army the designer wants me to fight with.
b) By the time you can buy units in the game you are often limited on anything that you can afford.

3) I was surprised that I was able to take out the Soviets. I was expecting that to be impossible, especially my first time, but I did it, and even well. You can see the final result on my channel. Do not get me wrong it was not easy, not at all, in fact I needed help from several followers to get me through some real rough patches and encourage different strategies, but I was not expecting to win my first time. I really enjoyed the challenge and am looking forward to what I can garner staring with an entire campaign at Field Marshall.

4) The Oil problem. (I think the problem of suffering for 24 turns without oil relief was way too long and should be relieved quicker the more oil fields you seize.) In fact if you take it all the allies should start suffering the same penalty you were suffering.

Ok Those are the pain points that come immediately to mind, some others were their aa and arty hit almost everytime, and mine miss more than hit.

I will try and take some time and detail all the things I loved about the mod, which were numerous.

I love this game and am super excited to get the chance to keep this game fresh and new for the rest of my life.

Blessings to you all, and I am on pins and needles awaiting the next birth of our 10th child. Exciting times!

My reply here is focused on the "Locarnus addon":

ad 1) The mine situation has been mentioned all the time when feedback on BE was given. On one hand, mines are nessecary due to the AIs inability to properly react to naval invasions. On the other hand, I share the frustrations when a mineweeping effort fails for the n-th time due to "evasion". Perhaps an expensive to buy minesweeping unit would be possible? At the moment, preparing an invasion costs no prestige at all, just time. If the player could spend prestige to speed up the process (of clearing mines), there would be an historically justifiable cost to those preparations.

What should such a minesweeping unit look like? What movement should it use? Making it a "plane" would limit the number of minesweeping units that can work on a specific minefield to 2 per turn. It would also render the units ineffective in bad weather. Which might be frustrating, but would perhaps also add to the realism. Of course such a "plane" would perhaps look strange and could be bought on any airfield near the coast. Range and transfer range should be considered as well, having such a plane work Med, Black Sea and then Atlantic would perhaps make it overpowered? A "ship" minesweeper on the other hand would be more limited in range, but more of those could be concentrated on a given minefield. They could work in bad weather (maybe unrealistic but less frustrating), but they would be more vulnerable to the enemy fleet (imho more realistic), and they would be limited to a theater (imho also more realistic).

ad 2) The possibility of significant changes of the starting situation (army composition and prestige amount) are very hard to balance. In this addon I attempted a compromise, allowing the player to buy additional units in turn 2 of Barbarossa, while limiting the prestige. Imho it works well with the setting of the player becoming the new leader of Germany. Thus early on the player faces the strategic decision regarding prestige spending. How much to spend for repairing the navies, or buying new units (eg fighters), or upgrading existing units and so on.

ad 3) The Soviet front (and Africa) afaik was already changed between BE 2.0 and BE 2.3. I made some additional changes in this addon (eg more victory hexes to take and guard). No feedback on those changes so far.

ad 4) The time to repair the oil field afaik was also changed to 12 turns sometime after BE 2.0. I kept it at those 12 turns for this addon.

AA was unnerfed a bit in this addon, from rof 7 to rof 8 for the heavy AA, compared to BE 2.3.


About my proposal for expanding the core size:
Of course it would not be easy to balance an expanded core. Since prestige is not carried over anymore, the player would have an even bigger incentive to make the core consist entirely of elite unit types. Eg Grenadiers and Gebirgsjäger instead of standard Wehrmacht Inf. So I'm open to suggestions for things to try.

As a start, perhaps just one more core slot, eg for a Bf 110, which was a good and significant fighter/bomber in the early war. Could then be upgraded eg to a Fw 190 during Barbarossa? Since players recommend switching out a tank for a fighter anyway.

[Locarnus]

Having used some of the time between the years, this is a significant update:

2022-01-01 Download: https://bit.ly/3FMv3bq
- Major, somewhat experimental land unit stat rebalancing, especially concerning units with armor and/or tank/anti-tank guns
- Pre-Barbarossa: 6 core units from Poland onwards (additional Bf 110 core unit), 2 air units deployable in Norway (1x Bf 109 and 1x Bf 110 recommended)
- No reserves (undeployed core units) after Norway, fixes logic gap due to prestige not transitioning to Barbarossa since version 2021-10-31
- No expensive railway arty and Karl Gerät available before Barbarossa, but earlier Kradschützen
- Panther F version (thx to flakfernrohr), more as a roleplay/immersion event than an actual fighting unit due to very late availability (turn 96)


The major stat rebalancing will take some more work, but imho this version is already better balanced than the previous versions.
- Some vanilla issues were partially addressed, like the total disregard of ergonomic and C3 issues of certain vehicles in favor of "hard" stats, leading to ahistorically overpowered units
- Minor BE issues were partially addressed, like the comparison between eg 3.7mm AT guns and 3.7mm Flak guns in AT mode
- Some issues of my own making were partially addressed, like tank destroyer stats compared to tank stats (especially considering initiative values)

The pre-Barbarossa campaign was experimentally adjusted for 6 core units instead of 5, giving the player the Bf 110s. Hopefully this leads to more diversity regarding the core makeup, after the clear 2 fighters + 2 tanks + 1 Stuka or something else recommendation for the 5 unit core of BE 2.3. Eg one of the Panzer Is can easily be upgraded to a Panzerjäger I for France, or a Sturmpanzer, without losing experience.

Prestige rebalancing for the pre-Barbarossa campaign was not attempted, since it is imho not worth the effort before attempting a general prestige rebalancing based on the direction of the experimental September branch.

[PeteMitchell]

I would love to see the Spanish Civil War prior to the Poland scenario

It could serve as another training scenario!

[guille1434]

Hello Locarnus:

Congratulations for developing a "mod add-on" over such a great mod as Battlefield Europe... It looks like it adds a lot of interesting concepts to the base mod.
For the ones (like me) which are getting ready (learning as much as I can about the mod by means of reading all that I can find about the mod) to play Battlefield Europe for the first time, it would be nice from you to edit a brief readme document about what are the most important modifications and concepts thought by you. This way, any would be player would find easier to choose between between playing the "official" mod or applying your additions.

By the way, I saw in the equipment file you added a movement switch stance (separated fron the firing switch) to siege artilery units like Karl Gerat and the 28 cm and 80 cm Kanone (E). This is a very interesting idea, one that I would like to test in my "personal" equipment file. Also, I would make a separate unit class for that kind of very heavy artillery units, with the intention of making them unable to provide artillery support fire to adjacent friendly units. I think those very specialized units should be only able to be used for what they were designed for: attacking heavy fortifications, not providing defensive support fire. In fact, I think the player should commit resources to keep those valuable units protected (by "regular" artillery to defend them against enemy attacks, and AA against air raids), instead of using them to protect other less important units. May be you like this idea.

In the meantime, here you have two variations of the "move" type icon for the Karl Gerat (one with its barrel lowered to zero elevation, and the other with also the barrel in horizontal position, but with a protective canves cover over it), which I noticed, are missing from your unit roster... May be you can use them.

Greetings a I wish you a good new year!

[Vano2004]

I would love to see the Spanish Civil War prior to the Poland scenario

It could serve as another training scenario!

So far , only here about Spain )
viewtopic.php?f=147&t=86786&start=80#p766808

And then
soviet-balance_v3.1.
https://disk.yandex.ru/d/meZUDC9_fnI5fQ

[Locarnus]

I would love to see the Spanish Civil War prior to the Poland scenario

It could serve as another training scenario!

The Spanish Civil War would indeed be interesting in this context.
Unfortunately there is little overlap between such a scenario and the changes/additions I made so far (upgrade groups, multi-role aircraft, and so on).
And thus I am already occupied with my current agenda, especially since I want to rebalance the prestige usage as well, based on the experimental September branch.

[Locarnus]

Hello Locarnus:

Congratulations for developing a "mod add-on" over such a great mod as Battlefield Europe... It looks like it adds a lot of interesting concepts to the base mod.
For the ones (like me) which are getting ready (learning as much as I can about the mod by means of reading all that I can find about the mod) to play Battlefield Europe for the first time, it would be nice from you to edit a brief readme document about what are the most important modifications and concepts thought by you. This way, any would be player would find easier to choose between between playing the "official" mod or applying your additions.

Since McGuba mentioned that players tend to not read the library anyway, I opted to summarize the concepts behind my changes/additions in the form of screenshot annotations in the first post of this thread. As well as listing my preferred house rules to accomodate the shortcomings of the PanzerCorps engine without sacrificing gameplay variety.
This is imho one of the fundamental differences between 2.3 itself and my addon.

2.3 itself sacrifices gameplay (and especially unit) variety in order to curb exploitable aspects of game engine limitations. Eg no buyable paratroopers, long range and siege artillery, and so on. This design aspect of 2.3 is the foundation for a balanced and fair multiplayer experience.

The addon provides more historical gameplay and unit variety, but in turn requires some house rules to address exploits (like shooting at England with long range artillery or dropping masses of paratroopers far behind enemy lines). Which in turn makes a balanced, competitive multiplayer experience near impossible.

Imho both approaches have merit and it depends on personal preference, which one is better suited for singleplayer.

Upgrade groups with this addon are listed in the in-game library and the discontinued succession AAR attempt here: https://www.slitherine.com/forum/viewto ... 5&t=106799

By the way, I saw in the equipment file you added a movement switch stance (separated fron the firing switch) to siege artilery units like Karl Gerat and the 28 cm and 80 cm Kanone (E). This is a very interesting idea, one that I would like to test in my "personal" equipment file. Also, I would make a separate unit class for that kind of very heavy artillery units, with the intention of making them unable to provide artillery support fire to adjacent friendly units. I think those very specialized units should be only able to be used for what they were designed for: attacking heavy fortifications, not providing defensive support fire. In fact, I think the player should commit resources to keep those valuable units protected (by "regular" artillery to defend them against enemy attacks, and AA against air raids), instead of using them to protect other less important units. May be you like this idea.

The switch uses the same mechanic, just for different purposes. It was somewhat of a by-product of me messing around with the unit classes. I agree that auto-defensive fire is a bit odd for the siege artilleries, however in practive I found it to be not much of an issue. Especially due to the very limited ammunition supply, sometimes it may even be a detriment for the player. I even remember stationing a K5 one hex further back for the siege of Moscow to avoid it wasting ammuntion for defensive fire. It imho added an interesting tactical dilemma not unlike other specialized units in WW2, which were often "misused" by local commanders simply because they were readily available (eg US tank destroyers, German Brandenburgers and so on). I'm currently considering the addition of the Sturmtiger as a unit, which also uses an oversized caliber. So I'm not yet decided on the best way to balance those special units, still trying out different methods.

I'm also still in the process of learning how to properly make custom classes (looking at those purchasable ship classes from PAK mod!).

In the meantime, here you have two variations of the "move" type icon for the Karl Gerat (one with its barrel lowered to zero elevation, and the other with also the barrel in horizontal position, but with a protective canves cover over it), which I noticed, are missing from your unit roster... May be you can use them.

Greetings a I wish you a good new year!

Thank you very much!
I was looking all over the place for a Karl-Gerät transport icon, before eventually giving up and settling on an unsatisfactory stand-in. I especially like the second one with the differently colored cover, it is a very nice level of detail that also makes it easily distinguishable from the "firing-mode" icon.
Will definitely add it in the next update.

[guille1434]

Hello again Locarnus:

Thanks for the link to the AAR, I will read it carefully, like any other text about Battlefield Europe mod that I happen to find.

About siege artillery units added as a separate unit class, I think it is a good idea... In my case I would absolutely hate that having positioned a vert heavy artillery unit in order to attack a tough enemy fort, to lose the opportunity to attack it, because said unit "wasted" its limited ammo firing against a crappy infantry unit who happened to attack one of my units adjacent to the heavy arty unit...

To add those units to a separate case you can make a new unit class which can be seen in the purchase screen (I could make that for my personal mod looking how another forum member called Puma made a small mod to make structures and other units classes normally not able to be purchased visible in the purchase screen), OR...

You can just put those siege units in the regular artillery class, but using as "primary" switch units the moving unit (i.e. the non firing unit switch) and to define a new separate unit class for the firing unit switch and giving them the "nopurchase" trait which will make them not to be shown in the purchase screen no matter what unit class those units belong to. I would prefer the first solution (the new, separate unit class visible in the purchase menu) because is more "organized" (bbeing able to see the units in a separate class in the purchase screen), but the second option, in my opinion, would be easier to implement.

About the Sturmtiger, it would be a nice idea to add it to the unit roster... but I would like to think a bit about giving it (or not) the support fire ability, because such weapon system in my opinion was not designed as siege artillery, but as a kind of "giant wurfrahmen" used to demolish field fortifications at short range in the immediate front lines... I tend to think that the Sturmtiger was too short ranged to be considered as "siege artillery".

Another ideas about units that could be added to the mod which may find a useful function niche in it:

- Flak Trains: Historically, the Germans mounted flak batteries on railcars and changed them from position to position to augment the fixed defenses of the cities that were being targeted by Allied bombing raids. So, railway mobile units with flak guns (also with a "move" and "fire" switch) would be useful to defend German target cities against Allied bombers in a more efficient way than fixed defenses and also thay would be more mobile than gun units with transport trucks attached.

- Light Flak guns mounted on (unarmored) trucks: a cheap version of the Sdkfz 7/1 and 7/2 units, useful for defending targets positioned far behind front lines where attack from enemy land units is not expected.

Also, I am happy to know that you find some use for the "move" version of the Karl Gerat unit. By the way, I made the same style of "move switch" icon for the Karl Gerat 041 (the longer barrelled version) and will upload it in my thread, just in case you also want to add the 54 cm version (with longer range).

Greetings and thank you for all your efforts!

[Locarnus]

I thought a bit about the siege artillery in general and the Karl-Gerät in particular.
My concern is, that taking away the artillery classification from the "firing stance" would cause balancing issues for weaker players.
Since most of us are more experienced players, we tend to think about the (player) axis as being on the offensive unit the player achieves some form of victory.
However that might not be the case. Either because of a less experienced player or because of higher difficulty.
For those situations, taking away the ability to respond to adjecent units being attacked would further decrease the total rate of fire (initiating 1 attack per turn if not reloading + potentially multiple defensive barrages per turn) and thus usefulness of siege artillery.

The rather short ranged Karl-Gerät would be particularly affected. Since the 600mm version really should only have a range of 2, instead of the 3 it has at the moment. Which would only later be increased to 3 for the 540mm version. I would need to compensate them somehow to prevent them from becoming useless white elefants (higher rof?, more ammo?).

About additional flak units:
I would love to have some flak train for historical unit variety! And another version for the 2cm flak sounds great!
The balancing is what I'm unsure about.

Even with the current mobile flak units (those which do not have to switch to transport mode), we have the peculiar game engine situation of land based flak units actively hunting aircraft. Essentially behaving like very range limited fighters that do not even have to deal with defensive fire from the attacked aircraft. But without that, flak units probably become even less useful. I have not yet seen a viable solution to this problem.

Now if the Flak train has a movement switch, then it could not even respond to an attack on a neighboring unit, until switched back in the next turn. It would also be limited to train tracks. And would probably need a 3rd stance to be able to somewhat respond to ground units. For balancing, should this Flak train then cost more than the Flak itself, which can already be rail transported at no prestige cost from each city?

Light Flak gun on truck: Realistically it should cost the same as the Flak gun + the truck. However the game engine does not allow cheap upgrades from Flak gun + transport to Flak gun on the very same transport. The pricing would also have to account for the possibility of many relatively cheap Flak guns on trucks chasing after enemy bombers each turn. Perhaps only really intended as an upgrade for the existing 2cm Flak guns, which are of limited use against later aircraft anyway?

[guille1434]

Hello Locarnus:

You expressed some very well thought comments in your previous posting. I will further comment of those topics, but those will be just my ideas, not even will I call them suggestions, because, after all, this is your mod...

About siege arty in general and Karl Gerat in particular:
What you say about making things more difficult for the less experienced players is undoubtely true, but considering that you (if I am not mistaken) are modding over the "realistic+" scenario from the Battlefield Europe mod (the most diffcult option), I think that your mod, in case of it being used for any player, will be mainly the option chosen by the veteran ones, and less so by the newbies, which will prefer to start by playing the easier options.

Besides, making that very specialized units like "white elephants" should not be much of a concern. After all, historically that was what exactly were: very expensive units to manufacture, which put a high stress on the logistics network, and really only useful for a very limited battlefield use: demolishing heavy structures, which were not vey abundant in the front lines.

Also, by just changing the "unit class" value to 4 (artillery class) for the Karl's unit firing switch you can make two paralell versions of the equipment file: a version for new players (with defensive firing heavy arty units) and the other (with no defensive fire ability for siege artillery) reserved for the veteran players willing to try the more difficult scenario option.

Including the Karl-Gerat 041: definitely yes! This one should have range = 3 instead of the 2 hexes range of the 60 cm short barrelled version, also it should have somewhat lower attack values, and may be just one more ammo point.

Mobile Flak units: I really HATE the "AA land vehicles chasing aircraft" effect... To avoid this, I (again) made use of a switch for mobile AA (besides the switch to allow that kind of units to attack land targets): I give them one "move" switch giving them just negative (pasive) Air Attack values, so they will have full movement ability but they will only fire in self defense or to cover adjacent friendly units against air attack, and a "sentry" switch with movement limited to one hex (mainly to allow them to retreat if attacked by enemy land units) but with full Air attack values, they will provide defensive fire and will also be able to "actively" fire on enemy air units in range.

The same could be implemented to rail-mobile flak units: a move switch with passive air attack values only (may be reducing those values a bit) which will allow them only to fire in response to an enemy air attack, and a "sentry" (Or "guard") mode with full Air Attack values (simulating the situation that after arriving to its destination the unit was able to deploy all the rangefinders, fire control, comms, and all other equipment to allow the guns to work at peak efficiancy.

As I said before, they are just some loose ideas, but may be you can make something out of them...

Greetings!

[Locarnus]

Wait, negative values allow a unit to provide defensive support fire for adjacent units?
For some reason I thought that negative values only allowed a unit to defend itself.
Never really thought about it, but that is great! If it works for artillery as well, it might allow for alot more variety in terms of unit stances and tactics!

Will have to do some extensive balancing tests. So it might take quite a while for me to find a good way to implement such a mechanic, since it might open so many opportunities.

About siege artillery and less experienced players:
Imho the multiple versions (moderate, realistic, realistic+ and multiplayer) offer some variety, but in turn also stifle development. I shudder at the thought of having to remake my extensive topography changes for 4! scenarios. It would certainly keep me away from making any changes at all. Same goes for multiple versions of the equipment file or any other necessity for duplicates. Making changes/additions it enough work for me.

Imho vanilla PzC has a serious game design defect, which makes it near impossible to properly balance scenarios/prestige for players of very different strengths. The core of the problem is the extreme difference in costs of reinforcements for damaged units compared to buying new units. This means that every lost (core) unit is a tremendous blow to the player. Not only in terms of experience and heroes, but even in terms of prestige.
I tried to mitigate that issue with the experimental September branch, but then chickened out and mostly went back to the traditional (imho broken) vanilla PzC prestige handling.
Thus at the moment (and due to the very limited feedback), I only make smaller changes to units and such. Perhaps I will revisit this fundamental design flaw one day, but so far there seems to be little interest in anything "experimental", even if the existing system is broken.

[guille1434]

Wait, negative values allow a unit to provide defensive support fire for adjacent units?
For some reason I thought that negative values only allowed a unit to defend itself.
Never really thought about it, but that is great! If it works for artillery as well, it might allow for alot more variety in terms of unit stances and tactics!

Will have to do some extensive balancing tests. So it might take quite a while for me to find a good way to implement such a mechanic, since it might open so many opportunities.

I think I saw in some of my "experiments" AA units with negative Air Attack values providing defensive fire for adjacent friendly units. It was long time ago since I made my testing, so it can be different now. I don´t know about artillery, but it would be rather simple to make some new tests. What I am positively sure is that enemy air units do not attack friendly units when escorted by a mobile AA with negative Air Atk value... At least, that was when I had a good computer and was able to play Panzer Corps.

About siege artillery and less experienced players:
Imho the multiple versions (moderate, realistic, realistic+ and multiplayer) offer some variety, but in turn also stifle development. I shudder at the thought of having to remake my extensive topography changes for 4! scenarios. It would certainly keep me away from making any changes at all. Same goes for multiple versions of the equipment file or any other necessity for duplicates. Making changes/additions it enough work for me.

Imho vanilla PzC has a serious game design defect, which makes it near impossible to properly balance scenarios/prestige for players of very different strengths. The core of the problem is the extreme difference in costs of reinforcements for damaged units compared to buying new units. This means that every lost (core) unit is a tremendous blow to the player. Not only in terms of experience and heroes, but even in terms of prestige.
I tried to mitigate that issue with the experimental September branch, but then chickened out and mostly went back to the traditional (imho broken) vanilla PzC prestige handling.
Thus at the moment (and due to the very limited feedback), I only make smaller changes to units and such. Perhaps I will revisit this fundamental design flaw one day, but so far there seems to be little interest in anything "experimental", even if the existing system is broken.

Maintaining four "parallel" versions of the mod is out of the question... I, personally, would never do that, nor pretend that someone else take such a burden on his shoulders. What I was thinking is to just make a different version of the equipment file where all siege artillery units are classed in the "4" unit class value to give them defensive fire ability, and each player would have the option to use this "easier" equipment file in any of the mod versions just by replacing the equipment file for the scenario he chooses to play, without making further changes to maps, scripts, etc...

[Locarnus]

I think I saw in some of my "experiments" AA units with negative Air Attack values providing defensive fire for adjacent friendly units. It was long time ago since I made my testing, so it can be different now. I don´t know about artillery, but it would be rather simple to make some new tests. What I am positively sure is that enemy air units do not attack friendly units when escorted by a mobile AA with negative Air Atk value... At least, that was when I had a good computer and was able to play Panzer Corps.

Maintaining four "parallel" versions of the mod is out of the question... I, personally, would never do that, nor pretend that someone else take such a burden on his shoulders. What I was thinking is to just make a different version of the equipment file where all siege artillery units are classed in the "4" unit class value to give them defensive fire ability, and each player would have the option to use this "easier" equipment file in any of the mod versions just by replacing the equipment file for the scenario he chooses to play, without making further changes to maps, scripts, etc...

The negative values work for protection of adjacent units, both arty and aa. That opens so many possibilities. Thank you very much!
I will have to do some more testing how to use that. I'm very hesitant about many more switches for common units, it kinda slows the flow of the game. But on the other hand the opportunities are too great to ignore. And then I'll also have to test how the AI reacts and if it can handle those switches. Not to mention the balancing. It seems to be more of a longer term project. Also requiring more icons and/or signs and such.

I will see what I can do about the equipment file.


Goose_2 also provided some valuable initial feedback for the addon.

So for the next version I think I found a partial solution to the harshness of the balancing restrictions imposed by the addon (which prevents lots of prestige, and reserves, to spill over from the early campaign to the main scenario). This partial solution will focus on the Poland scenario. It will support a better start for more "exotic" 6 unit cores (eg containing non self-propelled arty, wheeled recon, infantry and so on), but will not make any difference for traditional 1 Bf 109, 1 Bf 110, 1 Stuka, 3 "tanks" cores.
I'll also adjust some briefing hints and pop-ups for the early campaign, smoothing out some rough edges and overlooked messages (eg Norway in-scenario message stating only 1 deployable unit).
Plus some rebalancing for the Bf 110 line, which is more important now, since it is multi-role and part of the 6 unit early campaign core.
And of course the Karl Gerät 040 and 041 split in addition to the desert SdKfz_10-4, with the icons provided by guille1434, thank you so much!

Not sure when I'll be able to finish that update, still working on some infantry aspects which I wanted to implement for quite some time now.

[Locarnus]

Played first 4 scenarios on FM with 2.3 + addon, not to get an optimal core in terms of experience and kills, but to try out different compositions.

Poland (campaign starting core):
1 Pz I A (A2D1 hero)
1 Pz I B
1 Pz II C r11
1 Bf 109 E-1
1 Bf 110 C multirole tac bomber/fighter
1 Ju 87 B Stuka

Norway (only 2 core units deployable):
1 Bf 109 E-3, upgraded from Bf 109 E-1
1 Bf 110 D multirole tac bomber/fighter, upgraded from Bf 110 C (for longer range)
other reserve units untouched

France:
1 Pz III F (A2D1 hero), costly upgraded from Pz I A (not in same upgrade group, only same class)
1 Bison I (Sturmpanzer I) multirole tank/artillery, upgraded from Pz I B
1 Pz II Flamm r11, upgraded from Pz II C r11
1 Bf 109 E-3
1 Bf 110 C multirole tac bomber/fighter, downgraded again from Bf 110 D (for better initiative, especially in fighter mode)
1 Ju 87 B Stuka

Mediterranean:
1 Stug III B (A2D1 hero) multirole tank/artillery, upgraded from Pz III F
1 Bison I (Sturmpanzer I) multirole tank/artillery
1 Pz II G r11, multirole tank/recon, upgraded from Pz II Flamm r11
1 Bf 109 F-2, upgraded from Bf 109 E-3?
1 Bf 110 E multirole tac bomber/fighter, upgraded again from Bf 110 C
1 Ju 88 A multirole strat/tac bomber, costly upgraded from Ju 87 B Stuka (not in same upgrade group, only same class)

Thoughts on those core units:
The experienced Stug III B + Bison I multirole tank/arty combination is quite something. Should have tried that in France already, with one of them in arty mode and the other in direct fire mode.
Will need some more testing, but if I expect a counterattack from the front, I start with the Bison I in arty mode in the back and use the Stug III B in direct fire mode in the front.
Or if I really want to hurt a more heavily armored target and don't expect a counterattack, I start with the Stug III B in arty mode (even with range 1) and then blast the suppressed, armored enemy with the Bison I in direct fire mode. With the 15cm sIG, the Bison I is basically a thinly armored, limping, half-blind SU-152 in 1940. But a direct hit from a 15 cm shell is still devastating for armored targets and tanks even in the later stages of the war...
Third option would be both in arty mode, either to cover each other or to cover more friendly units.

The Pz II G is pretty versatile, due to being a pretty fast, tracked unit with recon movement, even though it only has a vision range of 2.
On the other hand the Flammpanzer II is quite something as well, making short work of entrenched infantry. Especially when supported by arty. The combination Stug III B, Bison I and Flammpanzer II might be well worth a try sometime in the future.

Anyway, imho a lot more interesting variety of viable options, compared to different ratios of the latest Panzer IIIs and Panzer IVs.

The multirole aspect of the Bf 110 is pretty useful and makes this often overlooked backbone of the early Luftwaffe really good. First the supporting fighter duty against the enemy airforce, then the ground support later on. The changing role of these aircraft imho also adds to the immersion. Plans and planned uses of equipment have to adjust to the situation.

The Ju 88 A multirole has some nice suppression options, but I still prefer the Ju 87 B to rack up the kill count in the early campaign. Just for the hero alone, but also because Barbarossa provides a lot of strat bombers, don't really need another one.

Thoughts on Barbarossa:
Any prestige spent before the last turn of the Mediterranean scenario would use old, "tactical" prestige, before it is wiped due to your promotion and prestige becomes a strategic resource.
So costly upgrades (eg from Pz I to Pz IV chassis) should be done before the Mediterranean scenario ends, even if that costs some minimal experience or kills.

If I would continue with this core into Barbarossa, I would probably try to adjust a few things:
Costly upgrade the Ju 88 A back to a Ju 87 B before Mediterranean scenario ends due to the prestige reasons stated above.
Then at the start of Barbarossa upgrade the Ju 87 B to a Ju 87 R for the longer range.
The Bf 110 E can stay, while the Bf 109 F-2 is upgraded to a Bf 109 F-4.

Not so sure about the ground units. Maybe the Stug III B + Bison I + Flammpanzer II is worth a shot. On the other hand, there are already Panzer Is and Panzer IIs in Barbarossa, waiting for cheap upgrades. So after the experiments in the early campaign, one or two Panzer IVs are probably more helpful, given the existing units of Barbarossa. And the expensive upgrades from Bison I and Flammpanzer II don't even cost "strategic" prestige when they are already done before the Mediterranean scenario ends.

For the next addon update, I have to find a way to make that "upgrade before Mediterranean scenario ends" less annoying.
And also have another look at the primary mode of the multirole ground units. Even though there is imho little reason to change back from a Stug III B to a Panzer III H.

[Locarnus]

With version 2022-02 of this addon nearly completed, I just started a second attempt at a succession game.

If you are interested in such a succession game, please reply in this thread in the AAR forum:
https://www.slitherine.com/forum/viewto ... 5&p=961121

What rules would you recommend for such a succession game?

What difficulty settings would you choose?

What would be you preference for participation? Taking on an early scenario to learn about the mechanics or plunge directly into the cold water and take over at the start of Barbarossa?




I also dropped the "day" in the version numbers, since the last update cycles were about 2 months long.

Among other aspects, the coming 2022-02 version reintroduces "understrength" heavy units for the Germans. The Elefant was already understrength in BE 2.3, but not in the addon.
Many German heavy tanks are available relatively early, but only as understrength units (1st row on screenshot).
When their teething problems are dealt with and production ramps up, understrength will stay an option (2nd row) in addition to full strength (3rd row except Maus).
This should increase historical accuracy in their usage as well as giving players more choices for prestige spending.
An early 7 strength Tiger unit can turn the tide of a battle in early 1943, but is rarely purchased by players, in part due to the enormous up front costs.
I'm also working on a Sturmtiger upgrade option, to keep those hulls useful until the end of the war.

[goose_2]

I am having real trouble picturing this even after the discussion today on my broadcast

[Locarnus]

I am having real trouble picturing this even after the discussion today on my broadcast

This is an example for such a succession game in Rule the Waves 2.

In that case the succession game had an organization thread:
https://nws-online.proboards.com/thread ... ssion-game

As well as an actual AAR thread:
https://nws-online.proboards.com/thread ... succession

To be able to see the smaller thumbnail pictures in those threads you just need to make a forum account.
It gives you a good idea how such a succession game works.


Of course not everything goes as planned, so there needs to be some flexibility.
But imho it is quite an interesting experience.
Except for the first player, everyone takes over a somewhat unfamiliar situation.
Troops are not where you would have put them at that stage, upgrades were done for units that you would not have upgraded, prestige was spent on stuff you do not usually need...
But somehow you got to make the best of it.
And everyone but the last player hands over the savegame to someone else and thus has to take that into account as well.
Readers of the AAR thread can analyze that new situation (even by downloading the savegame and looking at it in detail), providing recommendations and discussions for the next successor.

With limited players, someone might play turns 1-6, and later on play turn 31-36. But turn 31 looks totally different from what he would expect in his own playthrough at that time.
A really new challenge for Panzer Corps veterans!

[PeteMitchell]

This sounds like a lot of fun!