New Feature List

[pipfromslitherine]

I understand your thinking. But rules like that can seem more arbitrary and are harder to explain to the player, as well as harder to implement. I think currently we penalise you heavily for being seen and that is part of the design.

Cheers

Pip

[enric]

What about a more logical LOS/LOF?

Scout can see on the slope of the other side by not on the slope adjacent

scout on top can't see to the adjacent

LOS.jpg (98.32 KiB) Viewed 6044 times

[Richcat]

How about friendly fire or blue on blue?

[pipfromslitherine]

Hill LOS is a different story . That's just broken! The rules that we wanted to implement in terms of how hills worked were just too complex to actually handle all the cases and so we will be throwing them away and simplifying hills drastically. On the plus side this may well allow us to have multiple height levels without needing a Cray to work out the sight lines...

And as for friendly fire - trying using a B-17 as close support and see how popular you are with your men .

Cheers

Pip

[Richcat]

And as for friendly fire - trying using a B-17 as close support and see how popular you are with your men

Cheers Pip, never noticed that before.

[Richcat]

Any chance we could have visible tracks left behind for tanks and vehicles, never mind troops, as in real life please

[enric]

When moving a vehicle there are several chances to be break, bogy..., when you choose a target tile the movement path is selected by BA, in some cases this is very dangerous, and you're obliged to fraction the movement.
So each fraction of movement get several chances to be break.

New feature: be able to choose the path, or just check for break in the first moved tile.

Note: In fact this should be easy to implement, I tried just modifying the move action, when checking for "bogChance", I added: only check if AP's are at maximum (so its the first move on a fraction).

[enric]

When you look at the info of a loaded unit, you get the morale it has but not the AP. This is important when you don't remember which infantry has been loaded this turns and which was loaded last turn.
When unload if the unit began the turn loaded has the capability to move an attack but not if it has been loaded in the same turn.

Just added this value when you check the unit will help a lot.

[k9mike]

When you look at the info of a loaded unit, you get the morale it has but not the AP. This is important when you don't remember which infantry has been loaded this turns and which was loaded last turn.
When unload if the unit began the turn loaded has the capability to move an attack but not if it has been loaded in the same turn.

Just added this value when you check the unit will help a lot.

+1 good one

[enric]

When a match finishes you get the message either "German or Allied Victory" or "Mission failed", etc. when you close this dialog the map vanishes.
While the dialog is present you can not move the map, so you only see the part of the map behind the dialog.

It will be nice feature to have the opportunity to inspect the map when the game is over, see all units left, friend and enemy. This will help to learn tactics, mistakes, etc.

[k9mike]

More good stuff enric. keep them coming...

[enric]

Don't worry about the post asking for more info for loaded unit, I found the way to display the AP (or any other info) for the loaded unit, I'll add to my scenarios.

modified tooltip

tooltip.jpg (62.78 KiB) Viewed 5829 times

[pipfromslitherine]

Any chance we could have visible tracks left behind for tanks and vehicles, never mind troops, as in real life please

We had a go at it as part of the original game design, but the scale of the maps, and the look of the game, didn't really fit it. Plus we didn't want to make them look ugly with lots of tank tracks .

We can revisit for sure, and see if it might work for an Eastern Front game.

Cheers

Pip

[pipfromslitherine]

Don't worry about the post asking for more info for loaded unit, I found the way to display the AP (or any other info) for the loaded unit, I'll add to my scenarios.

tooltip.jpg

Nice! I will get something like that into the next update.

Cheers

Pip

[jb431v2]

Can't wait for BA2, hope that during the wait there are more expansions for BA!

[pipfromslitherine]

Can't wait for BA2, hope that during the wait there are more expansions for BA!

Count on it!

Cheers

Pip

[tim1966]

Trenches, tunnels and foxholes would be great.

Trenches would be great.

[cptdavep]

Can I make the following suggestions -

Merge depleted infantry units - I'd like to be able to put those two squads with only one man left together!

Units start battles as green/veteran/elite rather than levelling up during each scenario. In scenario levelling up could be based on specific achievements, so if a unit kills a tiger tank it's much more likely to be successful the next time it trys to blow one up.

Firing on units has varied effects - i.e If I shoot an APC it might kill the infantry inside but still be able to move, or it might destroy the vehicle but the infantry escape.

Special units such as officers who boast or reduce morale, or heroes with special abilities. And snipers to kill them with!

Ability to drive tanks through obstacles such as hedges or walls.

[Interstate40]

Reposting this from the old forum at viewtopic.php?f=87&t=39219&start=40 (not sure anyone's home there!)...


Pip - I'd thought I'd add my two cents on this extension. Having read extensively on combat on the Eastern Front (like most folks here I guess) I think there are some potential major changes possible to reflect the terror, brutality and desperation of combat in the eastern theatre. It was quite different to the west in many respects.

Some things to consider:
* Many units would equate surrender with death after 1941. Russian prisoners taken in the first year of combat froze, starved or were murdered and this was used effectively as propaganda by political commissars to dissuade Russian troops from surrendering as well as kill many German prisoners. Upshot - certain units should never surrender. They will retreat if they can but not surrender.
* Some units should never break. SS and Russian political elite units would often fight to the death. These type of units would rarely surrender as SS units surrendering would usually be killed (their SS blood group tattoos gave them away too), and same for Russian commissars. In BA currently, Waffen SS units do not seem to have extra morale, but in real life they'd be used to attack and keep attacking until destroyed which was why they were so effective in counterattacks and 'fire brigade' actions. These units should be impervious to losing morale or should lose it much more slowly than other units.
* Punishment battalion troops would also be expected to advance until eliminated, as returning to their lines (certainly for the Russians) meant fire from their own side or execution by commissars. These type of units would easily break but they won't retreat.
* Wave attacks - there are many accounts of walls of Russian infantry falling upon German lines. Often plied with vodka or in fear from fire from their own commanders, these waves would keep attacking until completely destroyed. Some nice audio 'urrah' samples would be neat too when a large scale attack occurs.
* Tank riders - units should be able hitch rides on tanks as discussed previously. But this should expose them to brutal damage if the tank was fired upon and hit (similar to mortar damage maybe). If fired upon but not hit the riders should immediately dismount
* Poor C&C communication - it's easy in BA to overcome the poor comms of badly radio equipped tanks as we simply move them about as we please. Why not have some armour go "off reservation" for the non-AI side. Armour sometimes stops responding to non-AI orders as the crew is either out of contact or ignores order entirely. This would be similar to "Bogged down" or perhaps even better, the AI takes over the tank and for a period of time (1-2 turns) and you have no control of how it behaves. Waves of early Russian tanks, including T34's and KV's were destroyed through poor command and control, and the Germans often overcame terrible odds and inferior armour through excellent C&C.
* Entrenchments - Russians were experts in defense, able to turn the smallest bridgehead or position into a major problem through expert digging and hiding. In BA one of the biggest weaknesses is the inability to successfully entrench (which means say 6-12 inches deep - not a full trench but enough to not get killed as easily by direct fire when not firing). I'm not sure how many turns would be required to equate to more cover ratings, but if a unit stayed put for more than say 2 turns they should be given better cover. 5 turns should make them very difficult to see or hit. Experienced infantry got into the habit of immediately digging in wherever possible in open ground, and even in mid-winter would resort to dynamite to open holes in rock hard ice.
* Pre-prepared defensive positions (ie before the game starts) should make it much harder for direct arms fire to hit (and even see) troops in prepared positions if they are not shooting. Bunkers, trenches and so on kept troops safe from direct fire, something that BA ignores largely if troops have been identified which means armoured vehicles can blaze away to reduce units in good defences. Close assault should be required to dislodge infantry from prepared defenses, but if the entrenched troops fire back they can be hit in that turn only.
* Smoke - I think other folks have discussed. This was used extensively and was crucial for tanks withdrawing, and artillery should be able to deploy smoke with a 2 turn delay. Smoke would require the enemy to guess where units were as per suppression fire, but the smoke obviously provides no additional cover rating.
* Immobilisation - as above. This was a critical means of slowing down giants like the KV and KV2 by outgunned German AT units. Am not sure how the moral of the crew should be impacted, perhaps this could eventually be linked to whether any other friendly units are within LOS. If they aren't, the crew's moral would take a hit. If they are, the crew will fight on. Am not sure how long it would take to repair immobilised vehicles but I'd have thought repair crews would rarely come into a hot fire zone to fix an immobilised vehicle (they would come after the battle has passed or at night, taking back even knocked out tanks to repair and refit or salvage for parts). Perhaps if there are no enemy units in LOS tanks can be repaired after X turns (5?).
* Mud of course. Trucks should be useless in mud and all movement should be halved. Russian roads were mostly dirt so roads are also largely useless without additional preparation.
* Winter - houses were life or death objectives when it was -30 degrees. All houses should have much greater tactical value (some winter scenarios could make all houses key VP's), and AI should have infantry units go for houses at all times in winter scenarios. Oftentimes local actions raged around Russian villages simply because being in a house at nightfall meant units stood a decent chance of surviving the night. Being in open ground at night was a death sentence.
* Winter movement - Infantry movement over open ground was extremely slow without skis, and for armour often impossible. Ski/winter units would be cool, and in fact having some units 'winter equipped' versus not would mean they could move faster, fight better (with higher moral) and stay out in open ground. Those without would be reluctant to move or try and stay close to urban positions.
* Night fighting/flares. Units remain invisible unless flares are launched or are in an adjacent cell, or there's something burning close by.
* Burning buildings, tanks. Be good to see more realistic burning buildings. Buildings being hit by HE should have some chance of burning, which makes them impossible to enter for a number of turns. This would also impact visibility for night combat.

That's all I've got. Easiest to do I'd think would be morale/retreat mechanics changes for certain units (elite/SS, punishment battalion), add smoke (basically adds LOS barriers but no cover), immobilisation (same effect as bogged down for certain hits), and some tinkering with entrenchment/defenses rules. Winter and autumn mud would make for some interesting variations to unit choices too.

Really looking forward to this release, guys...

[Interstate40]

And how about Russian partisans? A type of unit that prefers to lurk in dense woods and appear to attack any German units who stray into or too close to large wooded areas. Short range fire effect, no heavy weapons but very hard to spot unless adjacent and they could see farther ahead than scouts. Would require German units pay close attention to clearing larger wooded areas before advancing too far ahead. Partisans should retreat quickly if broken but would not surrender as this almost certainly meant execution.