Grand Campaign Unit Revisions - Update for GC42-43West

[4kEY]

Finished The Hague. This time around it was more challenging, and therefore fun, whearas before I steamrolled right up to the Queen's doorstep (I guess I had fun then too.... )

I had to make my first tactical retreat since Piatek, which occurred on the eastern area of the map. Another interesting thing was that it seemed that without the five paratroops from the 22nd Luftlande I may not have been able to keep from being overrun by 100,000 angry Dutchmen. There was one turn where I simply sat, thought, and looked at the map for maybe 5 minutes before making a move, figuring all the different combinations of maneuver. This is what I like most

[deducter]

Finished The Hague. This time around it was more challenging, and therefore fun, whearas before I steamrolled right up to the Queen's doorstep (I guess I had fun then too.... )

I had to make my first tactical retreat since Piatek, which occurred on the eastern area of the map. Another interesting thing was that it seemed that without the five paratroops from the 22nd Luftlande I may not have been able to keep from being overrun by 100,000 angry Dutchmen. There was one turn where I simply sat, thought, and looked at the map for maybe 5 minutes before making a move, figuring all the different combinations of maneuver. This is what I like most

I sometimes spend 30 min before making a move during the late war. When I do this, I usually execute a nearly flawless move, but often I'm too impatient and finish my move quickly, which often results in the Russians inflicting more damage on me than I'd like. The game is certainly plenty playable without having to take forever to think, but if you do, it rewards you.

I just finished a playthrough of Prokhorovka using one Tiger, one Panther, and a Hornisse, along with an overstrength Panzer IIIM and an overstrength Panzer IVG (I had various other tanks too, but these were the workhorses, so to speak). Interestingly, because I was most worried about the fragility of the Hornisse, it ended up taking the least damage. Somehow I squeaked out DV on the very last turn... I honestly didn't think it was possible.

[4kEY]

I played DLC '43 with my eqp file (close enough to vanilla) with the AI general exp setting to 250 (300 seemed too much), and with a pre-set core. I thought it was a good primer to knock loose a couple bad habits before playing your mod, but by the time I got to Prochorowka, my units were too strong and the game slipped back into.. Deutches Crocodile Panic My core was not unreasonable imo, two Tigers, one of them SS, no panthers, and one Hornisse among a core that was pretty modest, yet overstrengthed. (edit: I had a railgun named Peter The Great, which chopped off the heads of my most feared enemies. [280mm K5, ROF 12] Otherwise modest)

How did you concentrate your forces in this scenario, deducter? What do you think of the 5th Guards trigger?

I attempted to modify this a while ago by setting the trigger as the capture of the airfield just below the position of the 5th Guards. I was not satisfied with the results.

Is this 5th Guards army supposed to be the group sent south to deal with the III Pz. Korps/6. Pz. Div's crossing the northern Donets, or is this group supposed to model the attack against the eastern flank of II. SS-Pz. Korps?

[ThvN]

Given the number of new units to research and a relatively busy schedule, it might be until next weekend that I have a completed version out. I welcome any historical commentary on the state of the American/British tanks/planes.

Hello deducter, I currently have a busy schedule as well, but that will only last until monday. So next week I can help you if you need input on any units, especially as I have already been busy with gathering information for churchlakecity, who also requested info on Allied units.

A couple of questions before I dive back into my books/bookmarks, to give some food for thought:

Do you need info only on the models used during the DLC scenarios or all Allied units in the eqpuiment file? In case you are making an AK file later. For now I'll keep my research limited to the DLC time period.

Are you going to re-tweak any existing Western Allied units from your current version? I assume you are not, since you already have adjusted/modded the stats for the earlier British tanks and the M4 Sherman (lend-lease), so can I use those existing figures as benchmarks for comparison purposes? A lot of info (esp. about airplanes and tank guns) about Allied units always gets 'measured' against the equivalent German hardware. But I don't think comparing them only to German units is very useful to you, since this will probably upset the balance in your system. So I will try to to 'rank' any info relatively to other Allied units for now, leading to my next question:

Do you intend to 'standardize' any Allied guns? (for example, tanks: 37mm, 2-pdr, 6-pdr/57mm, 75mm, 76mm, 77mm HV, 17-pdr)

I'll start of in a few days with info on British tanks and their doctrine/effectiveness.

BTW, I'm not very good with planes, but they are very difficult to model in this 2d-environment with any accuracy anyway, and you already stated your objective of modelling Allied air superiority, so I have no doubt you'll manage to make them suitably challenging. I like a bit of self-imposed realism, during the later beta versions, I never bought additional fighters and never deployed without my trusty mobile AAA, which was very useful. And still I managed to mangle and/or almost wipe out the Allied airforce each time. So I think a decent player with an imported core will manage to achieve air supremacy easily with the stock eqp file. So you'll going to have to buff those Allied planes a bit I think.

[deducter]

I played DLC '43 with my eqp file (close enough to vanilla) with the AI general exp setting to 250 (300 seemed too much), and with a pre-set core. I thought it was a good primer to knock loose a couple bad habits before playing your mod, but by the time I got to Prochorowka, my units were too strong and the game slipped back into.. Deutches Crocodile Panic My core was not unreasonable imo, two Tigers, one of them SS, no panthers, and one Hornisse among a core that was pretty modest, yet overstrengthed. (edit: I had a railgun named Peter The Great, which chopped off the heads of my most feared enemies. [280mm K5, ROF 12] Otherwise modest)

How did you concentrate your forces in this scenario, deducter? What do you think of the 5th Guards trigger?

I attempted to modify this a while ago by setting the trigger as the capture of the airfield just below the position of the 5th Guards. I was not satisfied with the results.

Is this 5th Guards army supposed to be the group sent south to deal with the III Pz. Korps/6. Pz. Div's crossing the northern Donets, or is this group supposed to model the attack against the eastern flank of II. SS-Pz. Korps?

Prohkorovka is a very challenging scenario with my mod, but doable. I try to avoid fighting the 5th Guards Tank Army as much as possible. I'm not 100% sure what the trigger is, I never checked it in the scenario editor, but it seems to be either capturing one of the Prohkorovka hexes or capturing all but 1 VH. I tend not to engage the Soviet tanks, but instead concentrate my forces on capturing the VH and ending the scenario that way.

I split my forces into three parts: north, center, and south. Northern force is small but has a bit more infantry. Central force gets priority on almost all heavy armor and overstrength tanks. Southern force has a bridge engineer so I can move my forces at will across the river. Also important is to overstrength at least 2 fighters to shoot down the hordes of Red Air Force planes. I picked a Bf 109G with attack/INI heroes and a Fw 190A at 4 stars. I also use some of the extra core slots to deploy some more SPAAG, and I will disband them in the next scenario.

The way I would make this scenario more historical with triggers is to make the 5th Guards Tank Army attack in two waves, one at turn 12 and one at turn 17. That should make DV almost impossible for a historical core. You should end up with the historical result: hundreds of Soviet tanks destroyed and the Soviets tank army crippled, but the Germans too exhausted to advance further.

[deducter]

Given the number of new units to research and a relatively busy schedule, it might be until next weekend that I have a completed version out. I welcome any historical commentary on the state of the American/British tanks/planes.

Hello deducter, I currently have a busy schedule as well, but that will only last until monday. So next week I can help you if you need input on any units, especially as I have already been busy with gathering information for churchlakecity, who also requested info on Allied units.

A couple of questions before I dive back into my books/bookmarks, to give some food for thought:

Do you need info only on the models used during the DLC scenarios or all Allied units in the eqpuiment file? In case you are making an AK file later. For now I'll keep my research limited to the DLC time period.

Are you going to re-tweak any existing Western Allied units from your current version? I assume you are not, since you already have adjusted/modded the stats for the earlier British tanks and the M4 Sherman (lend-lease), so can I use those existing figures as benchmarks for comparison purposes? A lot of info (esp. about airplanes and tank guns) about Allied units always gets 'measured' against the equivalent German hardware. But I don't think comparing them only to German units is very useful to you, since this will probably upset the balance in your system. So I will try to to 'rank' any info relatively to other Allied units for now, leading to my next question:

Do you intend to 'standardize' any Allied guns? (for example, tanks: 37mm, 2-pdr, 6-pdr/57mm, 75mm, 76mm, 77mm HV, 17-pdr)

I'll start of in a few days with info on British tanks and their doctrine/effectiveness.

BTW, I'm not very good with planes, but they are very difficult to model in this 2d-environment with any accuracy anyway, and you already stated your objective of modelling Allied air superiority, so I have no doubt you'll manage to make them suitably challenging. I like a bit of self-imposed realism, during the later beta versions, I never bought additional fighters and never deployed without my trusty mobile AAA, which was very useful. And still I managed to mangle and/or almost wipe out the Allied airforce each time. So I think a decent player with an imported core will manage to achieve air supremacy easily with the stock eqp file. So you'll going to have to buff those Allied planes a bit I think.

I try to standardize guns as much as possible, with a few exceptions for balance reasons. For instance, the Hornisse has INI = 12, when it should have INI = 11 because of its Pak 43/41 gun, but I gave it an additional INI to make it more useful. Same thing with the Marders.

Since there will be additional Western GCs, it'd be good to have information for all Western Allies units. For this GC, the priority is of course on the units for 1942-1943.

I look forward to hearing your advice.

[monkspider]

Well, I have completed the first three scenarios in '45. So far so good, thus far they have been easier than some of the later '44 scenarios like Minsk and Budapest. I really like how you modeled the Volksturm to basically be the equivalent of German Conscripts. I purchased one for my core, but choosing the offensive path (to be able experience some new scenarios, I chose the defensive path the first time), the scenarios thus far have strongly favored armored units.

[deducter]

Well, I have completed the first three scenarios in '45. So far so good, thus far they have been easier than some of the later '44 scenarios like Minsk and Budapest. I really like how you modeled the Volksturm to basically be the equivalent of German Conscripts. I purchased one for my core, but choosing the offensive path (to be able experience some new scenarios, I chose the defensive path the first time), the scenarios thus far have strongly favored armored units.

I trust you found the Bagration scenarios + Budapest to be sufficiently hard? The result isn't quite the historical annihilation of AGC, but it should still be pretty brutal.

If you have time, I'd be interested to hear about the range of MV vs DV, your core composition, prestige levels, and any opinions on specific units.

[orlinos]

I found a tiny mistake in the equipment file. There are unnecessary spaces in few.png file names. They are leftovers of the mistakes in the original files, fixed by the developers in the last patch.

The spaces are in the following names:
SdKfz _10-4.png (it's in two places)
SdKfz _251-1.png
SS_SdKfz _251-1.png
PZL_ P.23B_Karas.png
155_C_ mle_1917.png (it's in two places)
Italian_L 40_47-32.png (space between L and 40 changes into an underscore)

Two of the above shouldn't be changed:
155_C_ mle_1917.png
PZL_ P.23B_Karas.png

because the spaces are still left in the efx.pzdat, even after the 1.11 patch.

I found it by total accident. Since old graphic files remain in the proper folders (they were not deleted), only the sounds disappeared.

[Razz1]

Spaces make no difference. The game works with them.

The sound file should have the same space, which they do have in the stock game.

Space or underbar _ works.

Both files need to be the same.

This mad needs the data to be the same in each file.

[orlinos]

Spaces make no difference. The game works with them.
The sound file should have the same space, which they do have in the stock game.
Space or underbar _ works.
Both files need to be the same.
This mad needs the data to be the same in each file.

I know this. Patch 1.11 corrected few typos - deleted mentioned spaces or turned them into underscores etc. - copied new .png files and overwritten efx.pzdat. It wasn't obligatory on the developers, I guess it was mostly "house-keeping".

Deducter's patch wasn't changed to reflect that, but player's folders still have .png files with old name patterns. Otherwise, we wouldn't even be able to see the icons of these units. Right now the efx.pzdat and custom e-file do not correspond in few selected places, not allowing unit's like Sdkfz 251 to have sounds or attack animations.

[4kEY]

I've finished Amiens and the French path, going back to the end of Sedan to face the British. I've learned to fear the Somua more than the Char because of its operational range, but the Char can still pull a boogey-man-maneuver. Without my bombers, especiallly the Stuka with an A3 and the Ju88, and other things that fall from the sky, it'd be far more difficult for me to get past these armored creatures. I don't do much overstrength..my policy seems to be Artillery, Stukas, SS, AT. Everything else rarely, if ever, receives overstrength points.

My Dad has been playing along at about the same pace, about a map or two behind. I'm surprised I was able to fool him into playing your mod. I had mimicked some of your stat changes, like fuel and prices, and some other things I picked up from reading your thread, in my custom eqp file we'd been using. When I started '39 over using your mod, I realized and was able to convey what you have actually been able to do, which is create a balanced system. Creating a balanced system requires knowledge, talent, and the ability to think things through (this is NOT intended to mean the Panzer Corps developers did not). He was highly resistant, even hostile, to the idea of experience penalties (he had 17 Tiger tanks the first time he played through '43 - '45 East another time he had 17 railguns ) Playing on General seems to be the reason why this, and using green relacements does not hurt so bad. Long stroy short, after playing through the first year he is no longer wanting to be "softcore" when he hits Russia I highly anticipate his reaction, and my own, when we hit '43 East. We have different philosophies on overstrengthening our units. He spends himself broke doing it. I do not know how much this will hurt later on, if at all...I know that I really regretted not overstrengthening my fighters for Amiens. He's is by no means a bad player; he was playing Panzer General when I was playing Final Fantasy 7. He was playing wargames with counters before I was born. It took me 17 turns to beat The Hangue, whereas his blitzkrieg kept the AI from breeding units, granting DV in half the time.

It's pretty cool to be able to talk about the game and strategy with him, especially now that we're on the same campaign, trying a new mod.

Does anyone know what the bandwidth usage is with PZCorps multiplayer games?

[Rudankort]

Does anyone know what the bandwidth usage is with PZCorps multiplayer games?

Ah you asked before, but I forgot to answer - sorry. Before you can make your turn, the game downloads game instance (saved game) from Internet. And when you are done with your move, updated saved game is uploaded to server. So, you spend 2x(size of a saved game) per turn, unless you make a single turn in several goes.

Size of a saved game differs from scenario to scenario of course, but average size is about 500KB. Which means you spend about 1MB of traffic per turn.

[Chris10]

He was highly resistant, even hostile, to the idea of experience penalties (he had 17 Tiger tanks the first time he played through '43 - '45 East another time he had 17 railguns )

......................jajajajajajajajajajajajajaja...
this is funny as hell...

[deducter]

Spaces make no difference. The game works with them.
The sound file should have the same space, which they do have in the stock game.
Space or underbar _ works.
Both files need to be the same.
This mad needs the data to be the same in each file.

I know this. Patch 1.11 corrected few typos - deleted mentioned spaces or turned them into underscores etc. - copied new .png files and overwritten efx.pzdat. It wasn't obligatory on the developers, I guess it was mostly "house-keeping".

Deducter's patch wasn't changed to reflect that, but player's folders still have .png files with old name patterns. Otherwise, we wouldn't even be able to see the icons of these units. Right now the efx.pzdat and custom e-file do not correspond in few selected places, not allowing unit's like Sdkfz 251 to have sounds or attack animations.

Regarding this issue, I have updated to v1.11 and played with my e-files, but I have not noticed that the graphics for these units are corrupted. Rather, the Sdkfz 251/1 halftrack doesn't make a sound sometimes, but that is an issue that players who have not have played with these efiles also has. I'm not 100% sure what exactly you are suggesting here. If it's not broken, I don't see any need to change it.

[deducter]

I've finished Amiens and the French path, going back to the end of Sedan to face the British. I've learned to fear the Somua more than the Char because of its operational range, but the Char can still pull a boogey-man-maneuver. Without my bombers, especiallly the Stuka with an A3 and the Ju88, and other things that fall from the sky, it'd be far more difficult for me to get past these armored creatures. I don't do much overstrength..my policy seems to be Artillery, Stukas, SS, AT. Everything else rarely, if ever, receives overstrength points.

Don't forget the 88 gun, it is highly effective against French and British armor.

Overstrength is an interesting choice now. Overstrengthing fighters, for instance, can end up saving you prestige if done correctly. A super fighter or two with enough INI/mass attack bonuses can often hit an AI fighter and completely kill/suppress it, so it can't fight back. Sometimes, I send in another to attack and weaken the enemy fighter a bit, then I send in my overstrength fighter to finish off the weakened unit with no step losses.

Playing on General seems to be the reason why this, and using green relacements does not hurt so bad. Long stroy short, after playing through the first year he is no longer wanting to be "softcore" when he hits Russia I highly anticipate his reaction, and my own, when we hit '43 East. We have different philosophies on overstrengthening our units. He spends himself broke doing it. I do not know how much this will hurt later on, if at all...I know that I really regretted not overstrengthening my fighters for Amiens. He's is by no means a bad player; he was playing Panzer General when I was playing Final Fantasy 7. He was playing wargames with counters before I was born. It took me 17 turns to beat The Hangue, whereas his blitzkrieg kept the AI from breeding units, granting DV in half the time.

It's pretty cool to be able to talk about the game and strategy with him, especially now that we're on the same campaign, trying a new mod.

There's little need to overstrength for much of 1939-1941. But by 1942, it can be helpful, although still not necessary. By 1943 though, if you want DV, overstrength is almost certainly needed. The choice of what unit to overstrength is interesting too. For instance, I had a 14-strength Panzer IVG that took part in Prohkorovka and it ended the scenario with 12 strength, because it was often able to attack Russian tanks before they could attack back. I thought it was a very good investment. Generally, units with high INI and attack are the best choice to overstrength. Overstrength all artillery/bombers is not necessarily the best way to go in the late war, since the AI has a variety of options for whittling down your overstrength points, and the cost to reinforce them back up is prohibitive. This means you need to keep track of your heroes if you want to maximize your effectiveness.

A good choice for a core is to go along historical lines, but feel free to experiment somewhat. Something like 17 Tigers is actually doable if you save up about 20k prestige by 1943, but you'd not only have 0 prestige left for anything else, the reinforcement/overstrength costs are prohibitive, and also the Tigers have inherent shortcomings of their own: low ammo, low fuel.

I recommend though that you try to get somewhere around 10-15k prestige or more by the start of GC43. You will need it. And remember, I think a MV in 1943-1945 is harder than a DV in the stock game.

[orlinos]

Regarding this issue, I have updated to v1.11 and played with my e-files, but I have not noticed that the graphics for these units are corrupted. Rather, the Sdkfz 251/1 halftrack doesn't make a sound sometimes, but that is an issue that players who have not have played with these efiles also has. I'm not 100% sure what exactly you are suggesting here. If it's not broken, I don't see any need to change it.

Graphics won't be corrupted - unless we someday have a pure 1.11 installation available from the get-go. If you check your Panzer Corps\Graphics\Units folder, you will find pairs of certain files there like:
SS_SdKfz _251-1.png
SS_SdKfz_251-1.png

The first one is a leftover from older Panzer Corps version, the second one was copied by the patch and it is now the proper one. There is no graphic corruption because the e-file makes the game use an older .png (otherwise obsolete but still available in the folder), but the sound won't play because the game cannot find an entry for the .png in the efx.pzdat.

Myself, I have eliminated the unnecessary spaces from the e-file (except two units: 155_C_ mle_1917.png and PZL_ P.23B_Karas.png) and the sound for affected units now plays with no problems. Of course, it only works after starting new scenario, when the game rereads the e-file.

If you want, I can PM you the corrected versions of the files, after I update all years (I have only done it for the year 1942, since I am playing it now).

[4kEY]

Are you guys familiar with the Soviet counterattack at Hill 252.2 during the Battle at Prochorowka? Throngs of Soviet T-34s careening into their own tank ditch, my reaction was much like this graphic Chris provided

......................jajajajajajajajajajajajajaja...
this is funny as hell...[/quote]

[monkspider]

Well, I have completed the first three scenarios in '45. So far so good, thus far they have been easier than some of the later '44 scenarios like Minsk and Budapest. I really like how you modeled the Volksturm to basically be the equivalent of German Conscripts. I purchased one for my core, but choosing the offensive path (to be able experience some new scenarios, I chose the defensive path the first time), the scenarios thus far have strongly favored armored units.

I trust you found the Bagration scenarios + Budapest to be sufficiently hard? The result isn't quite the historical annihilation of AGC, but it should still be pretty brutal.

If you have time, I'd be interested to hear about the range of MV vs DV, your core composition, prestige levels, and any opinions on specific units.

It was indeed very brutal! I can't remember the exact number, but I think the scenarios were probably 2//3 MV and 1/3 DV. Shockingly, I have been able to keep up my experience levels for the most part and still do mostly elite replacements. This was largely due to being very cautious as to limit my losses, but most of my units are 4-5 stars. Keep in mind that I am only playing at General level. I plan to finally make the jump to Rommel on my next playthrough.

Let me see what my core composiion is as of the fourth scenario of the '45 campaign. Of course, with the deployment limits, I only deploy three out of my four divisions in any given scenario and alternate between which of my bombers I deploy. This is off the top of my head, so forgive any omissions.

9th Panzer Division
1x T-34 41
1x Panzer IVG
1x Panther G
1x STuG IIIG
2x Wehrmacht Infantry
1x 10.5 artillery
1x 3.7 FLAK

40th Infantry Division
2x Wehrmacht Infantry
1x Volksturm
1x JagdPanzer IV/70
1x PAK 8.8
1x 10.5 Artillery
1x 15 Artillery
1x 2cm Flak vierling


1st SS Panzer Division
2x SE Panzer IVG
1x Tiger I
1x Tiger II
1x Panther G
1x Jagdpanther
2x SE Grenadier
1x Grille H
1x Neberwerfer 15
1x FLAK 88

27th Panzer Division
1x KV-1c
1x KV-85
1x Panther G
1x STuG IIIG
2x Wehrmacht Infantry
1x SU-122
1x Nebelwerfer 21
1x Ostwind

1x Hornisse (which I use as an independent unit)

Luftwaffe
3x ME-109k
4X FW-190-D
1x ME-262

2x JU87G
1x HS-129
1x ME-110G
1x FW-190F

1x DO-217
1x HE-177

I have come to have a much greater appreciation of the FW-190F/ I am not sure if it is the buffs or simply training it up to a higher level, but it has proven quite handy. I really like the overall balancing a great deal, the Panzer IVs/StuGs/captured Soviet equipment are actually prestige savers. The Jagdpanzer is much more handy too. My investment in training up the Jagdpanzer/48 definitely paid off when the 70 became available. I hope that in the future the default EQ file takes more cues from your balancing decisions.

[4kEY]

Impressive core, monkspider. I am wondering if you ever find yourself wanting in artillery.

edit: I too have a softspot for the Jgd.Pz IV (70). I modeled mine in my custom eqp file very similar to how deducter did, just with and INI of 10 or 11.