modified scripts for ammo production & units

[Robotron]

Attached to this post you'll find a zip-archive containing two modified scripts for testing purposes which adress the big gap of efficiency between artillery and aircraft reported by several players leading to unrealistic emphasis to build a historically unrealistic airforce to win the war.

For the PC version of the game (I have no clue where these will have to go for non-windows installs) these scripts will have to be copied to the following folders (make sure to backup or rename both original files so you can easily revert to the old stats!):

Unpack the the two scripts ("game.ammunition.lua" and "units.lua") from the archive.

game.ammunition.lua goes to

(folder where your program files are located)/Slitherine/Commander the Great War/data/scripts/game

units.lua goes to

(folder where your program files are located)/Slitherine/Commander the Great War/data/scripts


Changes made:

- ammo factory cost has been reduced from

5 * (faction.luaData.factories + 1) to 3 * (faction.luaData.factories + 1)
for example the first additional ammo factory for AustriaHungary would now cost only 15 instead of 25, the next one only 18 instead of 30, next one only 21 instead of 35 etc.

- artillery strength has been raised from a basic attack value of 3 to 5.

- fighters, zeppelins and bombers have been toned down to inflict almost no damage or efficiency loss to units at least without technology-upgrades. Bombers and zeppelins have been reduced in their ability to cause production loss while attacking citys, again this will improve with technology upgrades.

Please test and report back.

[nehi]

10 ammunition per shot is a plague

i wont put any penny in arts until they have such consumption

i dont understand all this madness about aircraft, so i want to point out, in ctgw there are not plenty kind of units, crippling aicrafts will make most of them completely useless or with very limited usefullness (i know, its eternal clash of historism and fun, sp vs mp, but ai is ill bad, it can be fixed just by gave it some huge advantage, which will completely break mp, so maybe first choice should be, it aims to have fun in sp or mp? it cant be both at same time and u mentioned u make it as one sided scenario, so its sp only?)

their ability to lower production is a crap, i hope we all can agree with that, it should be something like just a lucky shot, with 1/10 chance if its possible (or something like uncommon more than common effect)

personally i dont understand such effect of naval units too, when u shoot on ground unit, u can dmg it like it will cost 1pp to refill
when u shoot at city, it costs 1pp for many turns

[Robotron]

their ability to lower production is a crap, i hope we all can agree with that, it should be something like just a lucky shot, with 1/10 chance if its possible (or something like uncommon more than common effect)

Right now I can see by the number of downloads (1, a test-download by myself) you haven't even tried the scripts I uploaded or else you would see the impact of zeps and bombers on damaging production is vastly reduced to the point where even investing in further bombing tech would probably be a waste of ressources.

In my opinion the whole effect of aircraft in WW1 was almost negligible as they were mostly used for reconnaissance (fighters and zeps). That is what i'm trying to reflect with my choice of stats for aircraft.

Please tell me what you think would be better suited to have a fun game. Reducing ammo consumption for artillery to 5 points? or even 1? Fine, but then we could scrap ammo-factory production BUT ammo-crisises WERE a factor in the early war. The file I uploaded already reduces the cost of ammo-factories by almost half.

And consider that a great campaigns took months of building up ammo-stocks to be consumed in days or weeks.

It's always easy to come up with what is NOT working. So let's all please take part in a more productive kind of discussion of what MIGHT be working.

[nehi]

as i said, first question to be solved should be, the goal is to to have a challenge vs ai or have some fun vs humans?

i think ai is ill bad and cant be cured else than with huge advantage, which will break it for multiplayer

for example, ai ratherly replace weakened units by fresh ones, so u can just attack em until destroyed, in extreme, u can throw away rifles and fight hand to hand

humans are smart, when it looks some unit could be destroyed, they replace it, when weakened unit is refilled and back at 10 efficiency, they can use it as replacement etc. we can call it live circle

vs humans u need real firepower to break trenched line of infatries, usually when u dont destroy unit in one turn, it means great
delay, which means one step closer to lose whole war as cp

so just imagine, useless aircraft, arts in ammo crisis, what the hell should cp do then? yes, they can surrender anytime, not much more real options

with consumption of 10 ammo, it will cost many production to have ammo at least for 2 arts, but u cant even put all production to it, cp need ground units to fight both fronts, so first months or whole year, u cant use more than one art at time = u cant break trenched infatries = the war is over for cp

vanilla is working quite good all together, with exceptions of small garrisons upkeep and that like any unit can hit production...
after all its all about production, which is that core i was talking about, rebalancing of other factors would be better on playground with allready basic rules set

test in 1914: fighters expensive and useless, fighting value absolute zero, when cavalry can do same job for free, the best thing any commander can do is just to disband all fighters

any blimps attack reduced production of paris by 1, fighting value absolute zero

arts are better, but shock is just 1, so without air support overall ability to strike trenches is significally lesser than in vanilla

test in 1914: it feels much more suitable than in previous test, with all that tech behind and lower ammo cost

but i discovered one weirdness, german fighters just sux in dogfight, even richthoffen with 10 planes has forecast vs guynemer with 5 planes 1:2? really? (10 vs 10 its 1:3)

[Robotron]

but i discovered one weirdness, german fighters just sux in dogfight, even richthoffen with 10 planes has forecast vs guynemer with 5 planes 1:2? really? (10 vs 10 its 1:3)

This is a consequence of reducing the fighters ground-attack ability to zero as fighters attacking other fighters on the ground use their ground attack stat vs. the defending fighters ground defence stats (interception combat works differently).

To be blunt: I guess this game is really too much of a train-wreck to be rescued anytime soon if ever, considering it's also quite old by now and the orignal coder has taken to hills long ago.

Sad but probably true.

[nehi]

i like it in mp almost as it is, so far i see just that 2 noticable flaws (sg upkeep and that any unit can lower production)

it works as it should i guess, cp can win just when play perfect game and entente do some mistakes (when opponents are at similar level)

ai is kinda bad in any game i ever played, the more complex game is the more complicated is to make it effective