Steampunk Advanced: Available for download now.
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Hi Folks,
I spent the past couple months developing a new mod of "Steampunk 1915" called "Steampunk Advanced"
It is essentially the same map as the original, but I have created many new, interesting units and fixed some of the glitches in the original. See below for the list of changes and upgrades.
I am hoping people will download this and send feedback on potential future improvements. I am worried about balance issues, as well as general feedback on the new units. I have done many playthroughs and find it more interesting and challenging than the original. Lucky hits on the tech tree... can move a game in new direction (or unbalance it). Interested to see what the community thinks.- New Units:
I went nuts adding a bunch of new units. Sometimes I reused icons (in the unit folder) the original creator never used.. tried to imagine what he was envision here and put it in action.
France: I added landship, land Leviathan and "heat ray tripod" to this country
"Heat ray tripod is a massively expensive unit I created here... 4 hitpoints, 6 offense/Defence" and artillery support for 6 other units.. looks cool and costs 35 points
USA: I added landship, land leviathan, guerilla
(a new conscript like cavalry) and dreadnaught (swiped from England)
Alliance: I added a two hit "mecha" unit (the original author had this in the units folder but did not use it)
also land leviathan and gave them battleship purchasing rights
Austria: added land leviathan
Turkey: added "bombard" unit.. basically a big, two hit siege gun
Britain: Added "heat ray tripod"
Russia: Added landship and land leviathan units.. also added a cheap suicide unit (Penal battalion) simiar to gas.. but cheaper and not as powerful
Germany: Added a two hit "steam walker" unit
as well as a new relatively cheap and powerful two hit submarine (deutchland)
and of course "heat ray tripod" (all major powers should have this!)
Communists: The commies succeeded in stealing the Frankenstein tech from Austria and made their own army of zombie-fied Trotsky soldierssimilar to the undead qualities of Frankenstein
Lastly I made sure every country had light, "regular" and heavy tanks. - Error Correction:
Scotia and Goa were both "0" production, despite having factories. I made these both "2"
Aviatrix unit could not land on carriers, despite manual indicating so.. corrected this.
Alliance could not purchase assassin units (despite being in initial placement).. corrected this.
The "Nautilus-hit" icon did not match the undamaged one (two different unit icons!)... and other two hit units did not have a "hit" unit counterpart.. which I corrected. I spent a good deal of time airbrushing little smoking fires on these using Paint.net.
I fixed the Propaganda tech bug, where units keep being produced even though the capital has fallen (by fixed, I mean I stole the code from the correction to Domination 1914, as this map inherited the problem) - Debatable Enhancements and/or error correction:
Colonial and Sniper units now upgrade to two movement with Mobile Warfare. I think it is kind of pointless if a support unit (sniper) cant keep up with their main unit. Shouldn't a colonial (as elite) be able to upgrade? I think so. However an early lucky hit on this tech could really unbalance the game perhaps?
Upgraded "Tesla" cannon to movement 2 with railway gun tech (see above).
I did a bunch of anal retentive cosmetic corrections like making sure the units for all the nations point in the same direction (left or right). I also tried to correct the "hue" of each of these units so the colors are as close as possible. I am not an artist here.. it is better than before but still not perfect. I also fixed and added a ton of unit icons (mostly lifted and recolorized from other Triplea maps). Some of the icons were exactly the same for each nation.. I tried to add a flag or otherwise differentiate.
Also made sub, dreadnaught, and carrier upgrade to +4 movement with merchant marine tech.. otherwise you leave half your fleet behind. (again and early lucky hit on this tech could really unbalance perhaps. - Controversial Changes (maybe):
Okay, I love the concept of the original Steampunk 1915.. fantastic! However, I hate the overuse of cartoonish unit icons for the standard units (i.e. infantry, etc). I tried to strike a balance by using "standard" icons for "regular units" and more decorative ones for special units. I don't want to destroy the "steampunk" feel.. but sometimes "less is more" - Future upgrades planned:
Bug fix: There is something odd with the "Guadalcanal" territory as it doesnt seem to reliably change color on capture. I think there is a fix for this in Steampunk 1915, which I will port over
Manual upgrade: I would love to get my hands on the non-pdf version of the game manual so I can modify it to reflect my changes.
- New Units:
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The map looks good, no feedback from playing it yet, I'll try to fit in some vs AI games soon and report back.
@Swampy said in Steampunk Advanced: Available for download now.:
Manual upgrade: I would love to get my hands on the non-pdf version of the game manual so I can modify it to reflect my changes.
FWIW: https://github.com/triplea-game/triplea-game.github.io/blob/master/user-guide/rule-book/rule-book.md, you can use the pencil icon to suggest edits & changes. The rule-book is quite dated, it very much could use work.
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All the techs are not clearly stated out, so its hard to play
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@Lord-Bevan The PDF Manual in the Map folder has the techs listed out. I pretty much left the tech tree alone with the exceptions of the slight changes I mention in the original post. I see someone has responded with the location of the original manual, so will work on getting this updated.
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@LaFayette I was actually talking about the very specific manual that the original author made for Steampunk 1915 (the base game I modded). It is in the Map folder. You can tell there was a lot of work put into this! I converted this PDF to Word with an online tool, and will start to chip away at updating it. It is still useful as it explains the background of the game, the tech tree (as per Lord Bevans query) and some of the units. It definitely needs to be update with the new units I inserted. I am hoping to get some feedback on the general game, make any needed tweaks or suggestions, update the manual, and then release a "SteamPunk Advanced" 2.0.
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@Swampy one point of suggestion, getting the manual as much as possible added to the game notes should go the furthest. It's pretty rare for anyone to view map assets outside of the game, such assets also add to unnecessary download size as well.
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@LaFayette said in Steampunk Advanced: Available for download now.:
@Swampy one point of suggestion, getting the manual as much as possible added to the game notes should go the furthest. It's pretty rare for anyone to view map assets outside of the game, such assets also add to unnecessary download size as well.
TWW did (and still does) it by converting the PDF to image files, then having them in notes in sequence. This really doesn't seem the right way to do it, as you are displaying as images what was really supposed to be primarily text (and still need keeping the PDF too, for any future need of making changes, duplicating everything).
In this case, I believe @Swampy doesn't want to operate on PDF at all, so what I understand he would need is something to convert the PDF to a html that can be displayed in Notes (sort of the same you did with the TripleA rulebook, I assume) and changed.
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@Cernel I meant, in theory. In practice, under what I understand are the current limitations and issues, if I would have a rulebook in PDF, I would display it the TWW way, as well (I'm not sure if it would be possible to display something looking exactly as the TWW manual in the Notes as html, but I guess that would at least imply hacking it using tables everywhere).
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Hmm. that is a good point. The original PDF manual is pretty cool, and was a lot of work. However, it is pretty annoying to have a stand alone companion manual that you need to play the game. I think I can move most of this over to the game notes as you suggest. I will put this on the list for version 2.0.
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@Cernel there are pdf to html converters out there. Having image files for PDF still has the drawback you can't edit, but at least it is in the game and not just on the file system.
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the 1 PU unit for Russia is a bug right?
Alsace is Germany or France? i know my history but this is a fiction story.Alliance can easily crush Austria not just because its has a higher PU but because it start the round first. Talking Trisetie in the first round is a major blow for Austria since it only has 3 factories. Austria has a lot of high PU territories that Alliance steal PU from.
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Regarding 1 PU unit (assume you are talking about Penal battalions). This is a 0 defense suicide unit similar to gas (can't gain or hold territory), but attacks much weaker (only 3). Due to low production values of Russian territory and overall weaker attack, I think the risk of "penal battalion spam" is low.
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Regarding the weakness of Austria. I tend to agree that this is a problem (but it was inherited from the original game as I didn't change any territory values or unit dispositions). Do you think if I built up a "Maginot line"-like ring of bunkers around the Austrian border.. this would give them time to build up forces against the French and Alliance? Another option might be give Austria another factory further East and bump up a couple territory values. Yet another option might be to give Austria a single "Land Leviathan" multi-hit point unit at start... (must still roll tech to build more). This could give them more of a fighting chance.
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or you can let Austria start first
edit: Penal have 1 HP so they are not gas, but more like conscripts, ridiculously cheap and can move 2.
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@Lord-Bevan Hi, I'm not sure what you are talking about to be honest. My statements about Penal battalions are correct. These are a 0 hit point, Gas unit(see below). Normal "Gas" has 5/0/2 stat and costs 3, this unit (meant to give Russia a unique boost) is a 3/0/2 stat and costs 1. Yes that is cheap.. but the attack is much weaker and Russia has limited factory output and must defend on two fronts. A "spam Penal" strategy is risky because of the weaker attack here, and the fact it would steal production needed for troops. Have you actually done a play through of this game and found my logic unsound?
<attachment name="unitAttachment" attachTo="penal" javaClass="games.strategy.triplea.attachments.UnitAttachment" type="unitType">
<option name="movement" value="2"/>
<option name="transportCost" value="1"/>
<option name="attack" value="3"/>
<option name="defense" value="0"/>
<option name="isSuicide" value="true"/> -
Okay i stand corrected, penals work just as gas, But it is the battle calculator that says it has 1 HP.
Edit: it seems penals can attack by itself, (take territory?) but gas cannot?
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@Lord-Bevan Penal battalions cannot take territory but can attack by themselves. This is the same as "Assassin unit" but different than gas (gas must have support)
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Apart from Alliance opening move against Austria being too game changing, the other one is Nemo trying to take Sidney. It has a 10% chance of success ( with France help being factored in) but pirate ships being 2 hits you can just hit and run.
Australia + NZ is just 7 PU, maybe not worth saving. If Nemo is only meant to be played by AI, then I guess its not a problem.
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Hi Folks,
Unfortunately I will no longer be able to be a contributor to this community. I want to thank all the many members who helped me along the way. Along with all the code I "borrowed" from them! I am still working on updates to this map and have a new stable version correcting many of the errors that still exist. Please email me if interested as I would be happy to share the latest version. Have fun folks!
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@lord-bevan The reason you would want Australia/New Zealand safe is to prevent two VC's for Nemo Pirates
