Total World War (TWW) 2.7.7.2

[Hepps]

Starting Unit set up changes.

Since everybody will know where the missing Advanced Prototype units have been removed from I shall not list them. Instead any unit that has been placed due to the removal of one such unit shall be followed by the caption (Adv. Unit). Furthermore, a unit that has been removed due to the addition of trains shall be followed by (Trains). And lastly any unit changes that have been done for balance shall be followed by (Balance).

[Jean-Pat]

I feel the AA changes (AA, AT) will bring more balance against air heavy opponents (e.g., russia defending against germany). It will no longer be possible to mass air to take leningrad witouth taking substancial losses, as battles in urban territories usually last for a couple rounds at least !

I think AT now are a unit worth buying. They have less regular defence, but they can hit prior to a combat round which is better.

For sub I agree totally. Sub AA was always to high, rendering DD all but useless.

Cruiser are now worth buying en masse. We now have the option to go with a ship heavy fleet (instead of planes doing all the job).

For bombing, i am ont the fence. I need to see it in play.

[Hepps]

@jean-pat Yes what you are saying is really what these changes mean... and how they are meant to change the game.

Bombing changes kind of work in tandem with the reduced effectiveness of the AA Guns.
So they (A.A. Guns) are less effective early on vs bombing runs (since firing every round in combat does nothing to effect bombing runs). This means that while there is the chance Bombers can be less effective it also means that you are less likely to loose them.

The idea of course being that players might be more inclined to get more bombers as a viable strategy to cripple an opponent. And the opponent is going to have to invest more in a defensive strategy to counter increased bombing.

At the end of the day the changes to bombing represent the first stage of an experiment in a dynamic we have never had before. So we have to keep an open mind and experiment.

[redrum]

The unit changes look pretty good and agree with @Jean-Pat analysis. Bombing changes should be interesting and hard to comment on their balance until we play it some.

The only 1 that I don't really like the feel of is:
Mobile Artillery A.A. defense now fires during ALL ROUNDS of combat. Cost is now 8 PU. (+2).

I think that makes M.Artillery too expensive to really be used much. Most of the games I've played I really haven't seen any of them built so I wonder if other experienced players thought they were balanced in 2.7? I think giving them AA defense fires all rounds probably isn't worth the 2 PU increase.

[ghostronin]

@Jean-Pat Agree with analysis as well.

@Hepps I am most intrigued by the train unit. Train basic movement is 6, it's transport capacity is determined by the # of rail units in a province? Based on the maximum of 6 rail units per territory with 6 provinces in line, a train could theoretically transport 6 infantry units 6 provinces in a single turn. Is my understanding correct?

Would capitals and strategic cities with higher infrastructure would start with 2 rail units to allow both starting trains of the major belligerents to pass-thru in round 1 , whereas the rest of the country would be limited to 1 or 0 rail units.

Where there are bottlenecks I'm assuming the train would only be able to carry the capacity of the lowest rail infrastructure province? For example, if provinces were in line and every province had 3 rail units, but a province in the middle only had 1 rail unit, the train would only be able to carry a single unit thru the full length of the line due to the bottleneck.

[Hepps]

@ghostronin No

Currently trains are the same as trucks.... they have a capacity of 1. But a train can move 6 and pick up and drop off multiple times in the same turn.

I have given the area with developed infrastructure 2 rail lines each. IE. lots of Europe... Interior of Russia....

And a long term goal is to have land transport units capacity settable like sea thransports.

[redrum]

@hepps Yeah need to make an adjustment so the engine loads the dice image for 0. After I did that then I get this beauty:

[Hepps]

@redrum Little bit of over kill don't you think?

[Jean-Pat]

I think the starting tech for japan should be changed to something else than improved dd. As much as I like it when I play japan, and japan is my favourite country to play, it is simply too good compared to the other starting tech. Removing it would make things more dynamic in the pacific too in my opinion.

I think replacing it with improved gun laying would be reasonable.

[redrum]

@hepps I'm not seeing the technology tab panel appear on the right side in the latest TWW 2.8.

[Hepps]

@redrum Weird. Cause all the same files are in the folder.

I think it's just a naming issue since I renamed 2.8

[Hepps]

@jean-pat I hadn't looked at Techs. But part of me does agree that Improved Destroyers gives the Japs a certain edge. Was trying to limit the changes to get a handle on how the inclusion of Trains and the alterations to the units would affect balance. But definitely something to consider.

[Hepps]

@hepps Just a quick follow up.

First,

I got the tech Tab back up and running. Was just a naming issue. Will include with a new update.

Second,

Though I don't intend to make any changes immediately until more games have been tested into further rounds. I have been considering the changes to the A.A. Guns and weighing it against some of the new input and some long standing input.

Based on that I have come up with an idea to find a good medium for the unit...

Just putting the idea out there to get some feedback.

[Jean-Pat]

I like this idea, with 2 tech, the aa gun will stay around a little longer in combats.

[redrum]

Yeah, definitely a step in the right direction. I think some really good player did mention AA guns were a bit under powered

[Hepps]

@redrum Really? I remember it being mentioned by a mediocre player recently.

[prastle]

@hepps Looks good! Testing will prove how nasty they are now that they fire every round.

[Hepps]

First complete game.

0_1512795440164_WirkandRed2point8finished.tsvg

[beelee]

@prastle I assume when you were talking about updating 2.8 that you want the new map to show up when you start triplea or the map update window pops up ?

I checked into it a little and it won't mess anything up if a person is on .7621 it just throws a error and the new map won't play. Everything else will so I don't think that should be a problem, but Idk for sure if one is allowed to update a map that runs on a pre release.

Noticed there were some unit changes as well as xml changes. The major powers had a new BBhit, AC and Heavy tank hit. When I checked the smaller countries that showed changes I couldn't find any new ones so Idk if they use the British hit unit somehow and that's why they didn't show up or ?

Anyway, if we know what was added for sure in the units folder, we can do the poor man click and drag method to upload files as long as there are fewer than 100 total changes. Which it looked as if that might be the case.

Otherwise I need to do it from a termial or switch to windows and use their git desktop I think it's called. Both will take me a while to get up to speed on.

So If @Hepps wants to post the individual unit changes and they're less than 100, we can go the poor man route. Also i guess we need to check if those are the only changes and I didn't miss any others.

[prastle]

@beelee What I was actually meaning is more than an update. @Hepps new version contains both the old and new TWW. We need to upload the file I gave you to the GitHub repo and replace the old TWW. That way people can play either and download it directly over using the sendspace link I gave you. The other reason for this is that many people unfortunately find manual install a pia.