Slitherine

bru888 wrote: ↑Sat Jun 13, 2020 2:26 pm

Anduril wrote: ↑Sat Jun 13, 2020 11:07 am Why do I have to evacuate 10 units instead of 7 as in the briefing?
Scenario 15 Petsamo, Winter War1939.

Erik raised the bar in the official version of the campaign/scenario from 7 exits to 10. He needs to revise the briefing and the objective text to match.

And Erik has added this to the WW '39 list.

bru888 wrote: ↑Sat Jun 13, 2020 2:32 pm

ColonelY wrote: ↑Sat Jun 13, 2020 2:30 pm Yes, good idea, some "talkative prisoner(s)" for once... Otherwise, most players risk "missing" this info (not existential, it's true, but immersive, so worth noticing).

Yes, that is what I will do. When that redoubt falls, I'll have a popup message in which the captured soldier mentions the name of the redoubt and the army translator, who knows a bit about Japanese history as well as the language, realizes that it refers to a Japanese castle. Thanks for the suggestion.

Excellent! What, this damn officer is yawning when he hears about this?!

Yes, such details are part of good storytelling...

This stuff is what I have come to expect from The Bruce. Carry on, soldier!

A final bit of whimsy before wrapping up Jacquinot Bay and the New Britain 1943-45 campaign: A "hidden" POW camp. I love the way the walls blended in with the jungle - I was concerned that they would look too finished and "Chinese" (as in the Great Wall) - but this looks great:


As far as "hidden" goes, it really isn't; with the FOW restored, the player can see something on the map in that location and may be able to figure it out:


The only question that I have is whether I can depend on the player to go take a look out of curiosity or must I call his attention to it and tell him that it's a POW camp (with prisoners to be freed)?

VERDICT: Call the player's attention to it, rather than having him stumble upon it as the trigger to a new objective appearing. In FOW, the walls blend a bit too much into the jungle, especially zoomed out, and it looks like just a hilltop with a road leading up to it. Easily overlooked as a prison. So instead, somewhere along the line, a unit of AIB commandos will "discover" it and send word. Or, if the player does come near it on his own, then the objective will pop up anyway. Best of both worlds.

bru888 wrote: ↑Sun Jun 14, 2020 11:00 pm A "hidden" POW camp. I love the way the walls blended in with the jungle - I was concerned that they would look too finished and "Chinese" (as in the Great Wall) - but this looks great

Oh yes, looks really nice. Also agree with your verdict, it's better not to "assume" what players might do (or not)...

Simply awesome!

And I totally agree: Better calling the player's attention to it, especially since the player doesn't have all the time in the world, 'cause this scenario will indeed have some time limit...

Contrary to popular belief ("popular" in this case meaning "widespread" which is quite a presumptuous presumption), I have not fallen off the face of the earth. Jacquinot Bay has taken much more time than I anticipated because it is jam-packed with stuff. I am looking to finish it and New Britain 1943-45 today.

When Bru goes into silent mode I know he's working even harder.

Sometimes things take much, much longer to finish.
I've been playtesting the first scenario of a Korea mini-campaign at least 8 times now. It is a bear to play-balance.

New Britain (1943-45)
by BrucErik CSD Studio

Description: Operation Cartwheel will neutralise and bypass the Japanese base at Rabaul. Dominating the strategic Vitiaz Strait between New Britain and New Guinea is part of that plan. That in turn requires control of western New Britain.

Theatre of War: Pacific

Side: US/Australian vs Japan AI

Scenario List:
Arawe
Cape Gloucester
Talasea
Jacquinot Bay

Forum Discussion and Download Link: viewtopic.php?f=374&t=94345

[This ended up being a duplicate post - the other one is now the second post in the Custom Campaigns thread - so I parked this one here. - Bru]

New Britain 1943-45 has been officially released. (It is version 3.0 in recognition of the fact that it is an expansion and enhancement of Erik's original campaign). In the words of one beta reviewer, "This is a very well designed campaign, full of movement, surprises, unexpected situations and the player needs to balance many options in order to achieve its goals. On a whole, its superbly created and you deserve every congratulation for this accomplishment." The link is in the first post.

bru888 wrote: ↑Thu Jul 02, 2020 6:02 pm New Britain 1943-45 has been officially released. (It is version 3.0 in recognition of the fact that it is an expansion and enhancement of Erik's original campaign). In the words of one beta reviewer, "This is a very well designed campaign, full of movement, surprises, unexpected situations and the player needs to balance many options in order to achieve its goals. On a whole, its superbly created and you deserve every congratulation for this accomplishment." The link is in the first post.

Agree with review although I didn't play the last scenario. The first 3 are very good and the campaign is well worth anyone's time to play. I have no doubt the 4th is the same. Going to d/l the 3.0 and probably play it again soon. GREAT JOB GUYS

Navman, thanks for the encouragement!

Mascarenhas, thank you for the messages about the endings of Jacquinot Bay and the campaign. I just walked through the campaign and I find that it's working as designed.

First, these are the campaign messages that appear before Jacquinot Bay, the first to ease the transition from U.S. to Australian forces, the second for historical interest. I assume you are seeing those okay:


Then, when the Jacquinot Bay itself ends, some version of this popup message appears. They all have the same photo and the text varies only by whether the man subsequently dies happily or disappointed by what happened; victory, draw, or defeat in the scenario:


From your last message, however, it's the campaign ending message that is giving you pause, "which looks like you're beginning, not you've finished":


What I was trying to do there was to "fill in the gap" in that, once the U.S. and Australia cordoned off the Gazelle Peninsula (the northern neck of New Britain which included the Japanese base at Rabaul), nothing else happened! On land, that is. Rabaul continued to be isolated, and pounded by air bombardment, until the war in the Pacific ended in August 1945.

Still, I now get what you are saying. Perhaps that message could use rewording; it does sound like the introduction, as a matter of fact!

Erik, if you agree, perhaps in version 3.1 you could swap out the victory message text with this:

The New Britain campaign is a success! It has played a major role in Operation Cartwheel, neutralizing and bypassing the major Japanese base at Rabaul. By isolating Rabaul, its large garrison are now prisoners of war without having to fight them. The land action is over but Allied air attacks will continue to pound Rabaul until August 1945.

That last sentence goes well with the image, which looks like a B-24 Liberator on a bombing run over Rabaul.

Yeah, this reads better and the text fits into the message box for cretins like me who are still clinging to version 8.3.0 (a message scroll bar was introduced in 8.4.4 for overly long text; hmm, it might be a good thing for talkative me to stick with 8.3.0 and be forced to "keep it short"):


So Erik, if you agree with this and if you have made no other changes yet, you could just copy this campaign text file over the previous one in a future version 3.1 of New Britain 1943-45:

I probably was playing some prior version, because the text I saw was quite different from this one, perfectly appropriate for the beginning of this great campaign. Since I'm playing it again under GKM, I'll see what happens and let you know, Thanks for caring.

New Britain 1943-45 3.1
Link updated in first post.

Changed victory txt.

The pic needs resizing?


On the other hand, the pic of the Continuation War looks okay.

I have resized it for the next update.

All's well if there's nothing else to report but minor cosmetic stuff...nice...