World War II v3 update to master?

[Cernel]

@black_elk said in World War II v3 update to master?:

@cernel Yeah I just yanked the biggest meaning looking tanks for impact there lol. I think the custom mod also uses a Panther model?

What mod?

Both the current TripleA assets and the Iron War based skin you have shown have the Tiger I as the German tank. The Tiger I is bad too for a game starting in 1941 (and generally anyway, since only a very small fraction of German tanks were Tigers), but at least it saw combat in numbers a few months before the @Panther did. When @redrum and me updated World At War, I substituted the Tiger I (quite ridiculous for a game starting in 1939 and especially for a game featuring the Tiger II for the heavy tank unit) with the Panzer IV (still a touch anachronistic), for the Germans (I'm not sure if anybody noticed).

[Black_Elk]

@cernel Yeah it looked like a beast for G, that sounds about right. I think it might have said that in the lead post in the notes but I glanced past, WOPR just called it a custom mod on aaorg, since it had some unit and soundwork as well there. Frostion's units that I borrowed had the tanks staged into light, medium and heavy also with the little insignia, the heavies only coming in after 43 I think. I almost used the black one just cause it reminded me of playing on the board lol

[Cernel]

@black_elk said in World War II v3 update to master?:

@cernel Yeah it looked like a beast for G, that sounds about right. I think it might have said that in the lead post in the notes but I glanced past, WOPR just called it a custom mod on aaorg, since it had some unit and soundwork as well there. Frostion's units that I borrowed had the tanks staged into light, medium and heavy also with the little insignia, the heavies only coming in after 43 I think. I almost used the black one just cause it reminded me of playing on the board lol

The American level 3 tank is the Pershing, which fought only in 1945 and in small numbers. I would pick the level 2 tank for the Germans, which is a Panzer IV, even though that is not much better than a Panther, since I see that that model of Panzer IV is at least an "H", which began production in June 1943 (the most glaring feature being the Schürzen skirts, which were used only starting in 1943). The level 1 German tank is a Panzer I (though it looks like it only has the right-side machine-gun), which is not really a tank if we consider a tank has to mount an artillery piece.

[Cernel]

Also the details of the proposed new skin somewhat reduce clarity, in this case on territory ownership, but, as long as the current skin is kept downloadable as a map-skin, I still suggest adopting the details herein proposed in substitution of those of the current original skin for the map.

[Black_Elk]

@cernel I'd definitely be game for even cooler looking tanks of any sort hehe. Sometimes it's hard for me to make out the detail, but I imagine maybe they're taken from illustrations or actual images of models and then just shrunk way down? Like losing some detail in the process there, but basically going from something like this (randomly off the web just now), to something that ends up more like this once it goes into the blender.... but spruced up with a dropshadow and a little national hokey puck heheh.

So maybe they get clipped when shrinking and losing some bits or something I'd guess hehe. Like it's almost more about just nabbing a good orientation probably, so it shrinks down decently without turning to fuzz. Or maybe punch up the contrast and other tricks till it reads alright in the ultra tiny.

Obviously Frostion did a better job than I could on a quicky, so I just used his that were ready to go, but it would be fun to have it thematically more 41/42 for a board with that startdate.

I agree that territory ownership can be a little muddled with the colors more muted from the reliefs, but sort of a trade off I'm willing to make there I think.

I've gone back and forth in preference, but one advantage of national styled units that aren't just default TT/Faction colors is that it allows the end user to edit the hex color of the faction in a game and still have it look alright, without really needing a new unit set. Or having to tint an existing color unit set to match, which can be involved. So that's kinda nice. Just in case someone like brown or green for a faction, whereas others might prefer blue and purple TTs, it's little easier to switch on the fly if the units have their own thing going on.

[beelee]

@black_elk heh heh me and my brother would be putting model glue on it about now to light it on fire lol maybe a firecracker to blow it up, we got in big trouble for that though

[Black_Elk]

@beelee Haha the good old days! with a kaboom

Here's a quick screen of the same, but with a tank switcheroo. Little rough but gives an impression for what we might go for.

I think a little spit and polish we could get something that looked pretty nice. It would be cool though to have the units themed more towards the early side, I agree, so it fits more for 41/42.

Also cause it'd be cool to get a unit set that could be 'backloaded' for Global which is even a year earlier in the timeline 1940 than v3's 41/42 . Or at least have the starting stuff reflect that, and maybe have some alt unit images themed for later dates. Just to have a set was consistent or could be used for either v3 or Global would be nice. Early hardware vibe. That'd be cool

[Black_Elk]

Oh also here's the big list from Krieghund about the various sculpts we saw on the physical board... I think the trend was more towards anachronism and the iconic over period specific. But also with the mix and max going on for the various releases. Like Japanese Panthers sometimes I guess if one was willing to spring for 41 hehe. I don't think we ever got a tank that wasn't a Tiger or Panther for G though. He must have really liked the look or something lol. Anyhow there may be others floating around, but this is what we've gotten cardboard and plastic style...

https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/33671/list-of-sculpts

Might be a nice way to set the thing apart in another way by using the 40-41 equipment, for like fighters bombers and armour. Or it'd be badass if they could change as the game progressed too, but least for the outset having the 41 well covered would be cool. I liked Frostion's take on the naval game, where the images were sort of more generic but clearly denoted by type with the little symbol for destroyer, cruiser, battleship, or carrier to add clarity. I thought that stuff was a nice touch. His transports are nice and chunky so pretty easy for me to tell apart for the most part hehe.

[beelee]

@black_elk said in World War II v3 update to master?:

His transports are nice and chunky so pretty easy for me to tell apart for the most part hehe.

yea kinda look like cruise ships lol. Nah i like his stuff. Trprts seem a bit big to me though.

You can switch units purchase wise depending on game rd/date. Be harder and basically limited if you wanted to switch existing. Probably wouldn't want to do that anyway.

FNGs can drive the old stuff till it dies. lol

yea sorry : ) NFGs

[Black_Elk]

@beelee for sure. I've been playing with them as an expedient, since they looked cool. WOPRs set works for both scenarios with the tech advances. Frostion's set had enough 'painted sculpts' to handle G40 as well though, so I got a test set working with those as the basis for now. Mainly just needs a couple tech advance icons and a sign off if he's game. Or there might be some unit images in the WOPR style for the TacBs and Mech for a more vintage pc game look that could expand to Global? Both art styles have a certain appeal to me, so might be cool to do one base set and an alt set. There are a lot of other units in the default folder, presumably for game variants that I wouldn't want to upend, so probably good to do as an add on or skin toggle type thing. But I like the vibe it creates. I enjoy the larger units. There is some trade off in the overlap to switch to larger sized sculpts, but for the most part I think it looks pretty good. Those units still seem nice and clean to me at 75% which I think is the important threshold. Does feel like a rather different game somehow. Was tooling around with 42 just to get some bombers going hahah.

At 100%

At 75%

Would also be cool to change the gamenotes to an image file rather than text to display some of that info more graphically. Right now the tech is listed first then objectives though the reverse might be better, since objectives come up more often. Stuff like that would be fun just to spruce it up a bit.

For his game Frostion had these little flags to reinforce territory ownership, changing the flags based on the owner of the TT. I thought that was a cool concept. Maybe do something like that for a visual if it's not clear enough from the changing relief colors?

His unit roundels are smaller versions of these... They were drawn onto the unit images there, which does look a little clearer to me than the usual roundel unit flags set to on/small or large. I think they may have been intended for capitals though not really used on the board for Iron War that I can recall. I like how they add a bit of depth and dimensionality to the units, though I dig the relief kinda subtle with just the banners fading at the capitals so I don't think second capital markers would really be necessary. Still they look cool too hehe. Anyhow he did some nice work all around I thought. Pretty top drawer stuff

Just keeping with the 42 flare there heheh

[LaFayette]

What exactly are we trying to achieve here?

• (1) Do we want to simply update WWIIv3 unit images?
• (2) Are we talking about updating the default unit images?
• (3) Are we talking about a new skin?

Overall the screenshots look a lot better than what we have. It's hard to not see these unit images as an overall improvement despite any other issues. Like, it's better than what we have in just about every way.

I'd suggest we do go with (2) on this and update the default unit images provided by the game engine.

[Black_Elk]

@lafayette

(2) Would be my strong preference as well, but I wasn't sure how much traction there'd be for the idea. I was pushing a v3 update concept, mainly because it was the one World War II map that I actually had a hand in making, but I think the other standard games would probably benefit from some flare as well.

v3 was initially put together to coincide with the release of the physical board in 2008, and it seemed like a timely project back then, but of course tripleA went dark for a few years and it was basically abandoned until Veq and co put together a functional version of Global, revisiting the v3-v6 maps to be consistent with the overall look established for Global. I think in general the idea at the time was to distance tripleA in all respects from the physical boards, for a presentation that was somewhat more generic and less 'A&A centric', for lack of a better word. Though there are still some artifacts left over from the earlier iterations that carried through, most notably the familiar air service roundels for each player Nation. In that sense, a visual overhaul might help to differentiate the World War II games further. I didn't create the unit and flag images above though. They were taken from Frostion's Iron War game. I assume the artwork was created specifically for tripleA and that game, thus original, so I used them to give a visual impression showing what I think a really cool World War II map might look like hehe.

I like the v3 file that WOPR put together, as it's a full package and basically ready to go, but for the units it's missing some stuff to complete a full roster for Global. That's why I was tooling around with Frostions, since there were enough in there to get the larger spread with mech and tacs and such. I also liked the look of the factory unit. He used more pixels for his units, so instead of everything in a 54 pixel square, the tanks and aircraft are larger and the ships are just shy of 100 pixels. This creates some occasional foregrounding issues in the display just cause of how the centers were drawn initially probably, but with more room in the larger rectangle for units with more detail, I think it just creates a better overall look. The reliefs I think also give the map itself a sense of space or depth. Even though it's flat it takes on more of a 3d-ish physical character that I like, mainly cause it reminds me more of cardboard and painted plastic lol.

[Black_Elk]

Couple other thoughts related to v3. First, it's out of print again, so anyone interested in playing this one is sort of out of luck, short of swooping something second hand from collectors I guess. That's kind of a bummer, cause there's really no intermediate board to scale up the gameplay or play pace between v5 and Global. I think v3 was a good go-between since it introduces most of the new rules and larger roster that was later adopted for global, still has tech advances too, but sadly the 2017 reissue didn't really update the rules. The AAguns or the cost for tanks and such, so there's a few throwback aspects there. Still it did introduce the concept of Objectives, and Italy, and China (which was itself pretty complicated, just judging from how many questions were addressed to it in the 2009 errata lol) new transports and production rules, so it's kinda nice to have something between v5 and Global, which is just way more complex and more rules intensive in pretty much every regard. Also just thinking of the errata, it did include the optional rules to close sz16, along with the escort intercept stuff, which would probably be nice to have highlighted as standard game options from the launch screen. I don't know how popular closing sz16 ever was, but the escort/intercept was clutch just cause bombers get so nutso hehe. It has the raids preceded by battles tickbox currently so that's cool, but not the sz16 one I don't think. Not sure how popular the map remains compared to the other World War IIs, but I like that the AI can sort of handle itself on this one. Like sure it doesn't track objectives or VCs, or always do the best with the push, but at least it raids and makes some moves. Still better than nothing for a trainer hehe

[Schulz]

I would like to vote in favor of keeping the current relief and unit arts as default.

1. The national colours are just too dark for my taste. I even think it would be better if the current national colours were based on pastel tones.

2. I like the idea of nations using their historical war posessions but not coloring the units is just reduce the clarity. Yes, the flag icons help but they are just unneeded distractions for me when coloured units are more simpler and easier to distinguish.

3. I would prefer unit images that points their gun to a clear direction.

4. I would also prefer the Japanese color as either brownish yellow or a darker yellow and the Rising Sun as a national flag. For example;

[Black_Elk]

@schulz Yeah I see an advantage to retaining the default units as well. I'm less partial to the relief, though there is a charm and simplicity to the color coordinated aesthetic, which is why it was adopted originally I'm sure. It's relatively simple to alter the national colors by changing the associated Hex color in the map files, though getting the units to match can be more involved. Using the default relief for v3 it is also possible to get a more pastel vibe by selecting "view" tab, then "show map blends" which knocks the saturation way back. It's pretty extreme with the default though, and you can't isolate it to just one nation say Japan, since it's sorta universal. My preference would be to have a default set that includes both options, for reliefs and the units. One map that is more topographical and one map like the current, then a unit set to match for each. That way all the preferences are covered. It'd be nice if one could switch on the fly from the view tab. I suppose I don't care much which is the actual default, so long as the material is all in there, but I definitely like the idea of showing off something that looks cool for v3, since it hasn't been updated in ages hehe.

ps. here's a quick example of a national set based off Frostion's units. There's more stuff here than would be necessary for v3, but it could work I think for a scale up to global or to support some variant rules that it'd be cool to have imagery for in the back catalog. I tried a quick hack to do some tech advances just to show how it might look. My thought would be to keep with the traditional, like using a pair of bombs for HB, or radar on an aaGun. Or could do stuff like switch to a rocket if the tech is rolled, or from regular artillery to self propelled art or something like that for the ground advance, maybe cruiser gets a BB clib or whatever. Super subs and LR could do like a color change, or a wing stripe. Or here maybe just add in a long range mustang in this case lol. Maybe do a p38 just to have one? stuff like that. Anyhow, just to give a quick impression. I think it would be rad to have something like a next level Cyanight Magneto board done up to the nines hehe, but I like the old school look too. It'd be nice to have both on offer.

Similar example using his set for Germany. Again more stuff than would really be needed for v3, but just to give a sense of the larger spread that might go for the global scale. Still working through the labelling, but almost done. I tossed in a few tech advance types just to have something there. Most would rarely be seen I'd figure, but I liked the idea of a visual change to accompany a breakthrough where it makes sense. Anyhow gives a gist for a quickie. I'll work up a folder for each to see how far I can get, but should be enough in there to get the job done for anyone who likes that sort of look for World War II.

pps. Also before I get too far along, here is a copy of WOPR's master from that 2017 post, just in case the mediafire link goes down or something.... That one is pretty self contained, so one could load it up as is to get things going for a topographical relief vibe. The units there are mostly in the 54x pixel size boxes. To me the art style definitely evokes Iron Blitz and a mid 90s pc game, which is something I kinda dig on its own merits cause I love the era.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/etcmt3ulo65xzzb/world_war_ii_v3-master (WOPR).zip?dl=0

My thought was to do that again with the Iron War units since Frostion was game, for an art vibe that's sorta more painted sculpt/cartoon realism. Something that harkens to a physical gameboard type look I guess. Then just expand the unit roster where needed to cover the tech and a scale up to global. I know there are a few variants that use stuff like marines or alt units even some added nations like Vichy so I was trying to dig up some extra stuff where it made sense. I'll tool around for a few and put together a unit folder to see if it gets the nod hehe.

quick example of a Soviet set... For artillery advance could do like Katyushas or something. I think for tech a different paint job could work well like for super subs, or to fill in the gaps with a couple different planes for lr and the like just to add a little more drama when that happens lol. Anyhow, gives an idea...

Catch ya in a few

[LaFayette]

I'm thinking more broadly than just v3, as v3 is using almost entirely default units that apply to all maps.

@schulz Good point about the national colors. If the unit images were blanched out, we could colorize them automatically to fit the nation colors. I agree that the ownership of a unit is ideally determined by more than a flag roundel

[Panther]

I hope that the default units will be preserved. Not everybody is a fan of whatever details and different looks of specific units, that often are hard to distinguish or to identify (at least for non-weapon/unit-experts).

For gameplay reasons and clarity the default units come in handy.

However I admit all of this looks awesome! But - at least IMHO - it distracts from the game itself.

[Black_Elk]

@panther I agree and would not want to remove the current default units for that reason. The idea of using National units as the default imagery was debated probably a dozen times in the past and on the various tripleA boards that preceded this one, and each time I was definitely in the tinted units camp. In part for clarity, in part just cause the national art wasn't really there in my view.

When v2 was created, there was a question of whether tripleA might be made to look more like Iron Blitz and I wasn't really into it at all back then. There was always somebody in favor of national units, but it was never me lol. I argued against a topographical look for the map as the default for similar reasons. Then latter with v3, and pretty much every time it came up, I always argued in favor of tinted units. So I take some responsibility for the existence of blue Italians and whatnot to begin with regrettably hehe. I don't paint my physical sculpts either, for similar reasons of uniformity and ease of recognition on the actual board, and also because I'm not a weapons expert I often find that details get lost in the crowd too.

I felt at the time and still do, that having National units for ships is particularly confusing, which may be part of the reason that any national flare for the default tinted units was usually confined to just aircraft or ground like say the infantry unit. I also thought it was important that the tinted units have a clear orientation too, which is why we typically have 'Sinister' (left facing units) for the Axis, and 'Dexter' (right facing units) for Allies. At one point we had that stuff all consistent by faction, Axis vs Allies, though someone probably flipped some stuff around to make certain nations appear to be facing each other on the map. On the physical gameboard people will just turn their tanks around so one doesn't appear to be running away from the enemy, though on the digital map that's harder to make consistent at all times hehe. That could be a reason to go with the 3/4 view when possible rather than a side profile view, so the facing issue is somewhat less pronounced.

I think all those things enhance general playability and make the units simpler to parse at a glance.

That said, I have warmed to the idea of having at least some kind of national unit set available for people who like that look, especially since I think Frostion executed the concept pretty well. It just creates a rather different all around visual vibe. In my view tinted units create an overall look that is rather video gamey, with some pros and cons to that, but generally more pros than cons hehe. People who like the tinted look are pretty well served by the current defaults, which are graphically bold and easy to tell apart, without recourse to roundels or whatnot. I think people do tend to have pretty strong preferences when it comes to colors, but changing the exact hue of a tinted set is also relatively straightforward.

Just as a very crude example, here is that same set of soviet units above, desaturated and then adjusted for hue. I don't know that much is really gained from backtinting Frostion's set over the current defaults, since you end up with a visual effect that is largely similar to what we have right now (unless one just wants slightly larger units?), but just to demonstrate that it's fairly simple to remove color information and change the tint once you have a national unit set going, but much harder to national-ify the blanched out generic stuff when that's the starting point.

You can sort of see what I mean when comparing the stripped and tinted unit art above, to something like this taken from the current defaults.... A lot of the detailing just becomes less necessary/useful at that point, since color tends to override the visual impression.

Also when the color 'hue' is made uniform, then color 'value' and the amount of saturation becomes the most important aspect, basically how bright or dark the image is. You can see quite a bit of variation there, even within the default unit set, as subtle differences in color 'value' contribute to certain unit types having slightly different tints despite sharing the same base hue. Different design elements become more important, shape is more important, and simple blocking of values, like a white stripe on a super sub or things that are easy to spot. I think often people prefer smaller units (like scale down to 75-80% or whatnot). Though for people who do enjoy the larger scale it and vibe on that sort of impression, it would be fun to have something available that could service that look. Or could just do a tinted and painted scheme both for a matching set. Like something that could toggle on the fly? I like the default set though, it has it's own charm and the basis for a lot of variants so gotta keep all that stuff probably just for compatibility anyway

Or this is a random idea, that might require some tweaks on the engine that I wouldn't know how to make but what if the player could flip units on the map, in game? You know, so that they would "face" the opponent, with graphics for a left or right facing orientation? That might be cool, I can kinda picture visually how it might work, though executing it would be another thing haha. Drawn on roundels with the perspective built in are a little harder to flip. Basically they have to be stripped of the roundel and then add the roundel back in after the flip. Not too hard, just kinda tedious. Anyhow, I'm sure left or right can be dialed once it's all assembled. I'm working through it at sort of a rambling pace

ps. here are the national style AA50 units and as far as I got for G40/tech
https://www.dropbox.com/s/3mk54gjgvua1rba/Units for G40.7z?dl=0

[LaFayette]

Having a nicer set of default units seems like a win. Having a toggle to go back to the 'old' units seemingly is a good move for those nostalgic users who do not want any change (though, honestly it's probably better to have nicer units and no toggle, than to leave the current units - the look of the screenshots is far better. Though that is not to say there shouldn't be a reasonable effort to allow for a toggle to use legacy units).

Having generic units as part of the engine default would be a goal, ideally with a neutral color that can be colorized and there is already code to flip units east/west orientation automatically based on faction.

Very few maps truly use the engine defaults and most unnecessarily duplicate the default unit images as part of the maps. It is a small project therefore to remove these unnecessary images so that the engine defaults would be used. There is pay-off to do that exercise alone as it would reduce download size would and reduce the number of unique (but duplicated) unit images, helping reduce unit image maintenance costs & complexity.

[LaFayette]

That is all to say, if updating the default images with the engine, it's likely better to avoid faction specific unit images so we have one set that are colorized and east/west flipped automatically.