Slitherine

Impressions after the first 15 minutes, please excuse my bad english I´m German:
1st mission briefing, text: the "Der Führer" - the D has to be a small type d, as articles not beginning a new sentence are generally written small type.

What I liked:
The music
The unit list, enlighting the unit selected, works fine, on big maps it might be helpful to centre on the unit
The comparison view in purchase mode and on the field (toggle stats panel)
The loss numbers turning up when in combat

Suggestions
-I´m so much used to seeing the stats of a unit (a window directly next to the unit) when clicking on it with the right mouse button
-The important because often used toggle buttons like land/air unit view are far too small and away, perhaps a command list which
is selectable by choice like the unit list (i)
Perhaps you should give the strategic cities a certain marking on the field view to make their importance visible without having to check on
the strategic map

So far everything worked well - and as a enthusiast having played the first Panzer General right after is apperarance and all other parts
even until now - I feel very excited!

Herbi

Thanks for the feedback

-I´m so much used to seeing the stats of a unit (a window directly next to the unit) when clicking on it with the right mouse button

Use Alt+click to open Unit Info.

-The important because often used toggle buttons like land/air unit view are far too small and away, perhaps a command list which
is selectable by choice like the unit list (i)

There are more hidden features check the Shortkey list in The Library.

Perhaps you should give the strategic cities a certain marking on the field view to make their importance visible without having to check on
the strategic map

Cities that are Victory Locations have a thick shiny golden border around the nation`s flag.

Hi there,

having finished (or better... having been finished off by) the Russian Campaign, I now can state some further impressions:
Difficulty Level Colonel - well I like the KI, the enemy acts quite clever and sees gaps in the defense or in an to rushy advance.
Most of the times it has been a marginal victory as I didn´t want to play with an endless save/load cklicking.

The game is a successor to Panzer General 1. Nice graphics and some newly added features which suit me very well.

I like the possibilty of troops to embark on rail. I would suggest the possibility also to embark in the field, not having to
move into a town - at least for the infantry.
I like the warning feature with the red dots for planes, indicating a shortage of fuel (That didn´t stop me from loosing two planes in
the heat of the fight)

It´s also very nice to refresh the troops completely even to overstrenght before the actual beginning
of the new campaing. I don´t like having to spend prestige for my core units to regain standard strenght of 10 in the beginning of a new campaign.
Sometimes I´m wondering, which algorithm is calculating the battle. When total superior troops hunt down an enemy unit not dug in - and it
escapes destruction several times....

I don´t know which monitor size the others are playing with . I have a 24 inch monitor and I´d prefer a bigger task list with bigger buttons as I see
huge parts of the battlefield I don´t neccesarily would need. That would be an improvement in usability imho.
I don´t want to learn any key-patterns.

I also have the impression that the dive bombers are not balanced well. At the later parts of the campaign my experienced altitude bombers
at overstrenght (13/14/15) were far more succesful (guaranteed kill of 2 - 4 unit strenght) while not having to fear damage.
Using a Stuka to finish of weak units with the strenght of 1 to 2 worked most of the time, but was no guarantee.
Weakening or severly damaging normal strength troops (10) never worked, most of the time the Stuka got hit while not
damaging or only slightly damaging the objective. The Stuka was a horrifying enemy for ground troops, especially the G-modell,
in this game it continlusly draws away prestige and generates anger.

Having played panzer general 3D for a while I often vainly waited for the possibility of a tank to attack a second time when having overrun an enemy unit before
moving. I miss that.

What I absolutely don´t like: I´m writing exams in the beginning of July and your game is drawing so much of my attention away from learning.
The flesh is weak.

That´s it for today.


Great game even if it doesn´t reinvent the wheel - but I think there are no great further possibilities to improve
this genre. You did very well and in my opinion met all the expectations a panzer general fan could have.

I forgot to mention that the function to start a mission comletely new over is missing.
Yes - every user has the possibility to save - but I still think that this function belongs into a game.

Back again to the algorithm calculating the battles.
First I will cite an example and then I will explain the thing which worries me:

The following scene in the Mission Seelion Invasion of England ´42:
In the southeastern corner there are a british destroyer, a light cruiser and a heavy cruiser
Between the light and heavy cruiser are two empty hex-fields.

1st Turn - 2 standard subs and a range of my core strategic bombers are within reach.
The bombers can attack every target, the subs both the light cruiser and only one the heavy cruiser.
I have one He 177A with strenght of 14 with which I plan to attack the heavy cruiser.

I tried the following out more than 20 times

My first movement has to be another unit than the He177 and I has to be an attack. Doesn´t matter whether it´s a naval attack closeby or a
Stuka attack far away. If I than attack the heavy cruiser with the He 177 it sinks the heavy cruiser instantly (10 damage).
If I don´t do that and hit the heavy cruiser first with the He 177 it´s always only 7 damage. It´s not the
reconaissance factor, I tried that out and moved another plane as reconnaisance next close to the heavy cruiser and than attacked
with the He. - again only 7 damage.

I than had a look if this happens in other cases as well. It seems to me as the outcome of battle is not a calculation between strength
of attacker/defender and a certain coincidence-factor. It really depends on finding the right sequence in your unit attack order and they
don´t have to be connected in any tactical way. If I attack a unit I have to try out the ideal combination of attacking. I can stupidly
load the same situation again and again, hitting the same target with the same attacker - the loss number stays the same.
But change the order of attack (of course not at the same unit), pick any other unit e.g. at the opposite end of the map and let it attack
something - than this attack affects the outcome of the initial planned attack on the other side of the map - and there is no real connection
because the distance between the incidents is far to big.

So it´s no fair chances regarding the strenght - save/load and try to find out the right order is the key to total superiority. Not very
flattering for a general who thinks that the choice of the right unit at the right time will influence the best outcome of the battle.

It still is important to find the right attack-unit for the individual target - no question to that. But you can alter the outcome of the battle by the way stated above. Sometimes very favourable and that´s what I meant what should not be, if the two different results aren´t explainable because there´s no real connection.[/code]

The game is desigend so that you cannot replay combats and get diffrent results. The random seed is built in so replaying the same scenario again and again will generate the same results. This is why you always saw 10 damage and 7 damage - the same actions will always generate those results.

This is to avoid cheating especially in multiplayer. The combat mechancis are actually quite complex and to get a feel for the resutls you ened to try lots of different combats. Any one copmbat can always go against the odds, sometimes significantly but thats war!

Had the pleasure to drive the imperialist allied invasors back into the atlantic

Again I have to say that the tactical bombers are defenitely far to weak balanced.
Again I found myself in front of the screen praying, that my strenght 13 Stuka D please please please do affilct at least one strength
damage to the tank/infantry/artillery before loosing two strength itself - and it went on and on like this with the whole dive bomber fleet.
As allied commander I would produce tanks for air protection. Quite effective and nearly invincible

I didn´t have the prestige to upgrade my tanks to panther or tiger as they´re so __cking expensive -
the prestige was invested to gain air superiority.

So I cheaply upgraded to the best Mark IV model - which also is a bit weak, comparing it to the standard sherman driving
around. The late model Mark IV had the same 75mm gun which was mounted to the Panther - and only the Sherman Firefly had an equal
gun. Yet my experienced IV´s at overstrength (even the SS Mark IV´s) were defenitely inferior to the standard strength
Sherman with significant less experience.

The Sherman was no match for a late model Mark IV.