💥 1941 Global Command Decision - Official Thread

[wc_sumpton]

@TheDog, @Black_Elk

Another thought; "isDestroyer" for HQ-Army, it would nullify apposing artillery/anti-tank first strike capabilities. I would not add to HQ-Air, as they also fight in water territories, and it would affect subs.

Cheers...

[wc_sumpton]

@TheDog, @Black_Elk

A few comments on game play.

The USA receives:

<attachment name="triggerAttachment_NationalTheme_USA_Dest" attachTo="USA" javaClass="TriggerAttachment" type="player">
	<option name="conditions" value="conditionAttachment_NationalTheme_USA_Dest"/>
	<option name="purchase" value="Destroyer" count="2"/>
	<option name="resource" value="PUs"/>
	<option name="resourceCount" value="-10"/>
	<option name="when" value="before:USAPurchase"/>
</attachment>

<attachment name="triggerAttachment_NationalTheme_USA_Fleet" attachTo="USA" javaClass="TriggerAttachment" type="player">
	<option name="conditions" value="conditionAttachment_NationalTheme_USA_Fleet"/>
	<option name="purchase" value="Fighter" count="3"/>
	<option name="purchase" value="Carrier-Fleet" count="1"/>
	<option name="purchase" value="Cruiser" count="1"/>
	<option name="purchase" value="Destroyer" count="2"/>
	<option name="resource" value="PUs"/>
	<option name="resourceCount" value="-60"/>	<!-- 8+8+8 +18 +8 +5+5  -->
	<option name="when" value="before:USAPurchase"/>
</attachment>

So on turns 4, 8, etc... USA get 4 destroyers and a whole fleet. VS who? Germany may get some subs, and Japan only receives 2 destroyers. I think it would be better to remove the 2 destroyers during turns 4, 8, etc.. and give Japan some counters units during the odd turns 3, 7, etc...

Also I have this to help simulate Bomber-Tac as a Torpedo-Bomber:

<!-- Bomber-Tac vs All Sea -->
<attachment foreach="$All-Sea$" name="supportAttachmentBomber-Tac_@All-Sea@" attachTo="@All-Sea@" javaClass="UnitSupportAttachment" type="unitType">
	<option name="faction" value="enemy"/>
	<option name="unitType" value="Bomber-Tac"/>
	<option name="side" value="defence"/>
	<option name="dice" value="strength"/>
	<option name="bonus" value="1"/>
	<option name="number" value="1"/>
	<option name="bonusType" value="OffensiveSupport"/>
	<option name="players" value="$All-Players$"/>
	<option name="impArtTech" value="false"/>
</attachment>

To help counter some of this I have for both Cruiser and HQ-Fleet:

<!-- Cruiser v Bomber-Tac -->
<attachment name="supportAttachmentCruiser_Bomber-Tac" attachTo="Cruiser" javaClass="UnitSupportAttachment" type="unitType">
	<option name="faction" value="enemy"/>						<!-- reduces enemy strength -->
	<option name="unitType" value="Bomber-Tac"/>
	<option name="side" value="defence"/>
	<option name="dice" value="strength"/>
	<option name="bonus" value="-1"/>
	<option name="number" value="1"/>
	<option name="bonusType" value="DefensiveSupport"/>
	<option name="players" value="$All-Players$"/>
	<option name="impArtTech" value="false"/>
</attachment>

I bring this up because I see Pacific-Allies using their Tac's very effectively against Japan. So I still think moving then to after USA is a gook idea.

Thoughts and observations---

Cheers...

[Black_Elk]

somehow I just edited over my previous entry with a control+v. That's annoying. I'll try to dig back up the images. Thought I was typing in a new post, but it edited over the previous one instead. Alas I can't really remember all the points I had just made... Jotting down what I recall, so the idea was to stage-in the national bonuses every other round instead of 4-8-12 which I think doesn't have quite enough impact. I think more frequent bonuses, basically to guide the playpattern with a steady drip instead of the big shot. Like WC was talking about, I think we should try it alternating by sides, odd rounds vs even.

So Axis aggressor might get their themed bonus units in rounds
3-5-7-9-11-13-15-17-19

Allies would get their themed bonus units in rounds
4-6-8-10-12-14-16-18-20

Both teams get 9 rounds with bonuses, but they're staggered that way. Axis team getting the initiative as aggressors, Allies with the follow up.

Also the idea that that the player might influence what sort of bonus units are received by a branch choice in the preceding round. So in the off round they could choose say fleet/air/army improvement and then the bonus received gives units of those types the following round. Similarly for Industry, that these would be given as an automatic, but that the player might choose the location using normal placement. I like the idea of upgrading Industry-Meds to Industry-Hvy as the game progresses. With only a few core spots as Hvy's to start, that way the player can feel like they are making the command decisions there.

I agree with the Army HQ suggestion. I think that will be better for game balance, and make the battle calc more reliable.

I like bombardment for battleships and cruisers, I think it will make the battleship especially a better buy, but I was worried that Germany/USSR etc will suffer from not having that class of unit available. Especially with the caps at x10.

Cruiser bombardment at 2 I think will be swingy, but could work. Provided there is costal production I think DDs will be used to block/nix bombardment. For coastal bunkers I'm not sure what the interplay would be, but this might recommend allowing a +1 to bunkers that are on coastal tiles to compensate. The way bombardment works in v3, it is pegged 1:1 with ground units amphibiously assaulting, so there is that overall limit, but it will still have a pretty large effect, so it might make sense that bunkers can counter it a bit. In v3 units hit by bombardment also return fire before being removed, so it's not as dramatic as earlier versions of A&A where you could peel off a bunch of units only risking 1 of your own. Not sure which version you like but I think v3 style works better on balance probably.

I was trying to add a German battleship graphic rescaled as an example for their purchase roster. Basically to the bombardments point, I was thinking you could add a German ship type at atk/def 3, with the cruiser's bombardment level but which functions mechanically more like the battleship, called a heavy cruiser. Just so that each nation could have a purchase unit of the 2-hit type in their roster (even if at slightly different atk/def values), so there'd be overall parity with the total number of unit types by sides. Here's the graphic I was thinking for a German heavy cruiser 2-hit unit type, if you wanted to give them something between the big Battleship (fleet battleship?) and the cruiser. I just used the battleship graphic rescaled from 54px tall to 50px and with 1 shell removed from the bombardment icon.

Compared to the more powerful atk/def 4 version, which would be like the standard battleships everyone else gets. Just so you could keep the 2 those starting battleships to be like the movies not available for purchase. Might get a gold star.

Here's a Russian battleship/heavy cruiser done the same way, slightly reduced in scale and with 1 less shell in the bombard icon. In case you wanted to try that idea.

Another similar option might be something like an escort carrier, that holds only a single fighter. Though that seems like another allied ship type, which doesn't really solve the problem of team Axis having fewer unit types in total than team Allies. Frostion had that PT boat. Something like that might work for Axis, if just trying to give Axis something to compensate. In Iron War it was an M1 ship, not sure if it works here though. I think the important thing isn't so much which units exactly are available, but that each nation/team have the same total number of types, so they can bring similar numbers of hitpoints or hit-absorptions into a given battle at the stack limits.

This is perhaps overthinking it a bit, as other players might not fixate on the cap limits the way I am right now, but I'm just anticipating exploits at the stack limits, cause these could probably be reached with a few rounds of consolidation and magnified builds. Right now there is also a bit of downward pressure from the air. So for example if Britain has say x10 carrier decks, then x10 Fighters and x10 Tactical bombers they are right at the limit, but with fleet carriers instead you'd still hit that same limit in fighters but sooner and with fewer decks than 10, unless you also used x10 Fighter-Early since the caps are by individual unit type. You could get 10 more slots by bringing the older equipment, which seems a little odd, but mechanically that would be a sound strategy to ride the cap limit ceiling there.

Axis could probably do something similar on attack if bringing old subs together with the newer super subs or something, but that can be a bit strange right, getting that much mileage out of older equipment. On defense it's harder for Axis since only fighters will scramble in from the coast right? So their air nerf is pretty extreme there sans carriers. Probably all fighter types (including the tactical bombers) need to scramble into adjacent sea zones, to manage what the attacker can bring to bear. Since the Allied attacker is likely to bring bombers as well. At the stack limits advantage goes to Allies on attack at sea, pretty much across the board right now, least on the Atlantic side, since they can bring more total unit types into an engagement than the German defender could. I think the only way Axis could really compete on an even footing there would be for Japan to send carriers to the Atlantic to coordinate the Axis naval stacks, but that seems gamey.

It'd be cooler if each nation could bring roughly the same total number of hitpoints to bear, even if the exact composition of forces nation by nation is a bit different or themed to what they had on offer historically. I just mean for the general gameplay, that we'd have the same number of types overall by nation, so it doesn't go too lopsided at the cap limits. Not sure how an overall cap in total units per tile would effect this, it might make it too hard for joint operations with 2 or more teammates, so I like the 10 per idea or +10 per nation if allowing the teams to overstack together. This is probably pretty critical to get right though, because if teammates can coordinate over the normal x10 limit, that is a very strong gameplay driver. Players would have every incentive to converge fleets with their teammates as soon as possible, to try and blow past the attacker's stack limits.

An example would be 10 USA battleships and then 10 British battleships in the same tile. Even with a full naval roster like Japan's, Axis couldn't hope to drop a stack like that once all those naval units are converged together on defense, since the Axis attacker can't over stack into a battle the same way during the combat move phase. Probably the way to overcome this as a player would be to use all the air types available including stuff like air-transports, just to match the hitpoints of a multi-nation defender, but I'm not sure if they'd actually be able to once you get the hit-absorptions figured in as well. Why I'm thinking all nations need some form of battleship, and parity on the 2-hit units there. We just need to make sure that each nation can get enough x10s of the various types to match what they're facing down so it's not a blowout. Might be more of a PvP consideration here honestly, but even for just beating up the computer, if there's a stack that can't be realistically challenged at the limit, the computer will always back away right? Currently the Allies can stack a lot deeper on defense with their carriers than Axis can on the water. How deep you can stack at the limit depends on how many different unit types you have available in your roster, since you could have x10 air/naval or x20 ground of each type.

If allowing teammates to overstack into the same sz tile, then I think you need to consider different stack limits for the attacker vs the defender. In simple terms if USA and Britain can both stack +10 ships of the same type in the same spot, then Italy as attacker should be able to somehow stack in +20 at the limit to match them on an even footing, otherwise it's a coordinated defender's game the whole time. Same thing if you're say USA, trying to attack a tile that has both Japanese and Italian ships stacking together at +10 each type. We might be able to pair this down with the aircraft that the attacker can bring into the engagement, or factor in the possibility that the opponent can coordinate a double whammy attack against the same force in a single round, but that first wave attack is going to be brutal. I still think you'd need some way for the attacker to answer that sort of multi-nation joint defense. Cause even if all the national rosters were identical, with the same number of unit types available (which isn't currently the case), you'd still have that issue I think, since there is joint defense here, but no joint attack. The attacker would need more power, or greater numbers I'd think to keep it working once the defender starts hitting those ceilings. The same thing would likely happen on the ground I think, at least for the nations on the team that can co-locate. But I'm not sure how that works, with ground or naval units, because what if someone duds, or more attacking units than the defender cap limit would allow end up surviving?

I think the solution is probably air power, because unlike ships or ground, air units don't have to occupy the tile they're attacking into. In that case you could perhaps allow attacking air to go over the cap limit normally imposed on the defender, provided they don't all land in the tile when the battle concludes. So something like cap = x10 fighters per nation defending, but x20 fighters per nation attacking? Not sure if that would work with way it's set up, but something along those lines. Thinking especially of the dogfighting, if the attacker is facing down twice as many units of the same type owing to the multi-national defense thing. Ultimately I think players will play to the stack limits once they're imposed, which I'm still not so sure about. Everyone can work together at sea on non combat, so you can kinda imagine it there where both teams are trying to converge to get an insurmountable leg up. I'm worried the defender's stack of doom will outpace the attacker's by a pretty wide margin once you scale to that level. Anywhere that 2 players on the same team can coordinate a defense vs one opponent the same thing would go down. On the ground as well. So like Germany/Italy vs USSR attack, China and Britain vs Japan, USA and Pacific Allies vs Japan. Germany/Italy can sorta work together vs USA/Britain on an even footing in Europe, but once you got 2 or more nations stacking together with a joint defense, it becomes that much harder for the lone attacker to match them. Just something to keep in mind.

Oh also here are the graphics for the German armor with hits. For the panzer II I softened the edges so it would look more consistent with the others.

Panzer II

Panzer III

Also the Med with a hit too in case you wanted them.

Not sure if you wanted all armor as a 2-hit type? If so I can just go through the unit folders and make a hit version for all of them. Hit absorption is a very powerful ability. The tow is also very powerful. Taken together an entry level unit that does both those thing could be somewhat underpowered in the attack values.

Current Armor-Lgt is 2/2/2 (Panzer III)
Current Armor-Med is 3/3/2 (Panzer IV)
Current Armor-Hvy is 4/4/2 (Tiger/Panther)

Might try something like...

Panzer II is 2/2/2

Panzer III is 3/2/2

Panzer IV is 3/3/2

Tiger is 3/4/2

Panther is 4/3/2

I know the last 2 are a bit vague hehe, perhaps they could be inverted. In Frostion's set the black version of the unit just gave an extra bonus in power to another unit I think and they're both Tiger IIs I'm pretty sure. But I kinda liked the whole alternating tint/shade vibe he had going there. Anyhow main idea being to use the 2-hit and Tow as the defining characteristic of the armor unit type and just tweak the power as you go up in levels, but with a little asymmetry in atk/def at each tier. Perhaps an armor adv type would boost to the 4/4 with a star or whatever. I think even the entry level tanks could be pretty pricey, since it'd be the most versatile ground unit for sure with the tow and hit-absorption.

For the Russian KV-1, as an M1 unit, it suffers no movement malus from terrain off the rail, and it hits at 3/3 so it's pretty badass without that terrain downside. I figure those camp on Moscow or whatever and maybe just make a few big moves out at M3, but then get sorta marooned. Anyhow not sure how many types you want or which graphics are best. But figured to put em all up somewhere.

Catch ya next round

[wc_sumpton]

@black_elk

WOW!! You have a lot of good things here. To bad I can double my up vote, so, how's this .

First, "Stacking Limits". Base-Camp has a production of 1, Industry-Lgt 2, Industry-Med 3 and Industry-Hvy is 4. Adding a "placementLimit" seem to further restrict an already restricted production, and counter the Railroad ability of Industries to move stacks of units from the rear. If a stack of 10 infantry are moved onto a Base-Camp to later move it to combat position, then the Base-Camp cannot produce any infantry. With production of 1,2,3 it takes time to build proper stacks. Removing "placementLimit" would seem to help gameplay.

"movementLimit", I really hate this. The game engine already allows for "moving through", but "movementLimit" halts this ability (seems like lazy programming). So if you have "movementLimit" set to "10" for Inf-Tranied, Armor-Med, Artillery, Fighter, etc... Them a combined "Stack" of just ground units of "70" and a different stack for air of "30" then lastly a combined ground/air of about "120" to try and give movement room through stacks.

"attackingLimit" could also be done the same way, but with values increased, individually set between "20 - 30" with total combined set to "250 - 300". The idea here is to allow the attacking play the option to combine units from different territories, and hopefully have some left over to hold the territory.

"Free" units, "Lend-Lease" and give units every other turn.
One of USA biggest should be its ability to out produce and earn capital from mid to late game. To help simulate this Industries territory requirements could be reduced, 3, 5, 7 while maintaining their 5, 7, 9 PUs generation. Capitals, in general would still be in the 9-13 PUs, with a hvy. Victory Cities would be 7-9, some with med, and some with without production. And the areas around Capitals/Victory Cities would also be 7. Most occupied island at 5, along with some unoccupied island. Panama also. Brizal at 7 and some surrounding territories at 5.

More Later RL.

Cheers...

[Black_Elk]

I think we share similar concerns about the movement limit/move through.

One that I forgot to mention is the transport at x10. So mechanically this would make it significantly easier to attack into any coastal territory that can be approached along 2 or 3 amphibious assault vectors vs just the one. An example would be a TT like Brittany vs a TT like Normandy. Say Allies are attempting to invade France, with the current limits Brittany could be attacked with 10 transports from sz110A, and then another 10 transports from sz 105, whereas Normandy could only by attacked from the single sea zone 110A. Even though x10 per tile for everything feels clean, at the limit this changes which tiles are more attractive to capture/likely to see action during course of play, because some TTs would be much harder to defend under those conditions. In this case Germany would be able to stack defense more effectively in Normandy than Brittany cause the transport movementLimits means the same force as defender, might have to face down twice as many amphib hitpoints during the opponent's turn. Same deal trying to manage enemy units that can bombard along multiple vectors. It's pretty extreme, we're talking about double the number of units of a given type, or 3 times that, if the TT can be attacked from 3 directions. This not counting the piggy back from the turn order, like the double hit from UK/USA before Axis is back up. For the limit numbers themselves, probably x12 would make more sense than x10, just since its cleanly divisible by more numbers, but I think you'd still have the same issue at the limits, so not really sure what approach is best for that. I think a higher attackingLimit would definitely make sense for certain unit types though, transports and aircraft especially might be worth considering a higher ceiling.

I also have the same thought on USA, that they'd scale up with their main advantage being a higher production capacity as the game progresses. Kinda the same deal as USSR, where they pick up the pace on production as the game goes on.

[TheDog]

@wc_sumpton you have v110 with owner/player of stacking 10/20 (AIr & Sea=10 / Land=20)
@Black_Elk has v114 with with owner of stacking 10/20 & allied 15/30

NB. We have tried total and its a non starter as the player has to do to much shuffling of units when the max is reached.

Black Elk version allows movement through an allied stack, 5 at a time, not ideal but a good compromise.

The AI plays a much better game and is forced to de-stack, but this is opposite to the player who wants freedom of movement & attack.

So do we bother with stacking?
If so then where is the sweet spot for the player and a de-stacked AI?

.
USA production
Just finished coding the placement of 10x Industry-Med for the USA AI on turn 1, this gives an additional 70pu per turn but costs 210pu, so ROI is 3 turns, thereafter USA is in the money/PU. The US is now at full production.

[Black_Elk]

Oh yeah I should have mentioned that, since I was using the 114 where friendly units can overstack into the same tile to get the move through.

I think it's a bind, on the one hand the AI is playing a much stronger game when forced to de-stack and fan out. They play more forward generally and seem to position better along their main warfronts. But then the AI also fails to exploit the cap limits in the ways that a player almost certainly would.

Using the example from the previous post of Normandy compared to Brittany. As Axis what the player would do is immediately stack these forward coastal tiles with both German and Italian units for a joint defense at whatever limit. USA and Britain would do the same thing in reverse if they managed to take the beach somewhere. Mechanically this is much a stronger play than trading the TTs back and forth piecemeal. Right now the AI is still behaving as if income were being collected during the final phase of the turn, but here income is collected at the beginning of the turn. This is a pretty huge difference from say v3, where the goal is to trade TTs (and double dip as it were.) As the player we understand what has changed, and grasp that trading a territory which you or a teammate can't hold is less important here than destroying that initial enemy TUV, or eliminating the opponent's production while preserving your own. But the AI behavior is still keying off that earlier form of A&A style income collection at the end of the turn. So what the AI will do is basically trade TUV at a loss. Sometimes it stumbles into prime position and manages to stack into a tile effectively with a multinational force, but often it will casually trade the same tiles over and over to minimal gain. A player would try to just stack in at the limit the first time, or do blocking/SBR maneuvers to try and control how many Hitpoints the opponent can bring on the counter attack, to push the odds out of range.

I'm also trying to think of ways that the cap limits could be exploited, by bringing units in different combinations. Example might be something like Elite/Paratroopers. Say these reach the cap limit at 20 (ground unit)... When deciding how best to get them in position, 10 air-transports would be more effective than 10 fleet-transports at the cap limit. Since they could move all 20 elites at a go, and then the fleet transports can bring in Inf-trained+ ground units of another type to try and push the unit cap ceiling by type. Similarly the player would have an incentive to try and max any unit that supports other units of another type, or which can tow/transport/house more units of a given type in tandem. Like the fleet carrier with 3 air, compared to the reg carrier with 2 air. Basically any way that the player can come up with to bring more hitpoints at the stack limit to edge out what the opponent has defending, or can muster in the same tile from scrambles and such. I think there is potentially some gameplay interest there, in sort of privileging the player/team that takes the time to figure out how all that works at the extremes, but I don't know that the AI would ever be playing at that level. Perhaps whatever stack limit is imposed on the player, the AI might get to go a bit higher than the player, as a way to compensate for it's deficiencies? Basically still forcing them to de-stack but at a higher threshold than the player is subject too. But I'm not sure exactly what level that would be to pair off for vs the machine, or whether it would be hard for the player to parse. I guess nice round numbers there would help, so the player can shorthand it. Like 'oh I see, if can bring 10, then AI can bring 15' or whatever. Might work, but not sure how that would code up hehe.

[Black_Elk]

Idea for a naval bunker unit, fixed sea zone fortification.

Unit Name: Coast Guard
Theme: coastal defenses, smaller vessels, corvettes PT boats, mines, merchant marine etc.
Function: as an immobile blocker, hit absorption, buffer or interrupt type unit identical to the land bunker, just at sea. Disrupts bombardment until destroyed, something along those lines.

I think subs should be able to pass through them, but subject to some sort of AA fire depth charge perhaps, but otherwise treated sorta like a cruiser fixed-in place that doesn't move around. Again, sea bunker type concept.

Could be placed in any sz worth 2 or more PUs say. Then we just determine the likely spots for the desired play pattern. Use them to help model things like straits, or just to manage the approaches and maybe get the AI to position their ships for defense a bit more solidly.

Example spots might be...

Germany
Sz 112 Jutland
Sz 113B Kiel
Sz 114 Konigsberg
Sz 105 Lorient/BETASOM

USSR
Sz 115 Baltic fleet
Sz 100C Black Sea fleet
Sz 127A Murmansk

Pacific-Allies
Sz 54 Brisbane
Sz 62 Syndey
Sz 46 New Guinea

Italy
Sz 95A Leghorn Genoa etc
Sz 97A Taranto
sz 97B the Venetia/Istria fall back

Britain
Sz 110 B theme North Sea blockade of Germany, mine fields
Sz 119 or 111A theme Scapa Flow
Sz 106 Halifax
Sz 92 Gibraltar
Sz 98 Suez
Sz 37 Singapore

Japan
Sz 6A Tokyo
Sz 6B Hokkaido Sakhalin
Sz 6C Kyoto Kyushu
Sz 19A Ryuku Mukden
Sz 33A Truk

USA
Sz 26B Pearl
Sz 10A Los Angeles, San Diego
Sz 10B San Francisco, Seattle
Sz 101A New York Atlantic Seaboard
Sz 101B Gulf Coast

Harbor graphic could work for this maybe, since I got the battle damaged one already. Or for a placeholder till we make something cooler looking, in case you think the idea might have promise hehe. I'd float it out in the sea zone to make clear how it's functioning, basically as a combat/infrastructure type unit within the sea zone itself.

Maybe something like that but with an actual PT boat or whatever next to the buoy so it fits the part, or we could use the mini naval banners, not sure what looks good. Just trying to brainstorm hehe

Perhaps it might just look like a ship? The PT boat graphic already exists so might slap a hit graphic on that. Or do some kind of frigate/corvette, but there's something kinda iconic and charming about the little guy getting the highlight too, so I'll use him as an example. In Iron war it was an M1 unit, but might just as easily be fixed in place as an immobile sz infrastructure type unit. Like a mini battleship that can't move and doesn't hit as hard hehe, and you can have up to x2. Same deal as the bunker on land, just the naval version of that. Provided the sz tile meets the requirements of being worth 2 PUs or more. Then you got that parity between how stuff works on land and at sea, which might be kinda cool.

[Black_Elk]

We don't really need him here, since elites serve both the marine and paratrooper function, but I made a paratrooper guy just to have one...

Made the parachute icon from an old book cover... Thought it might be good to have an icon handy for the 54px set.

[TheDog]

@black_elk
The Coast Guard is in game, using the PT Boat icon. Sadly the AI does not seem to want to buy them or sea units in general. So only players will buy it, making it PvP only.

Check these out, if you have not seen them before.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maunsell_Forts

[Black_Elk]

Those look boss! I'll see if I can get a graphic for that too. I think it'd be cool to start working up some unit graphics at like 100px in case we ever get to go larger. I have a few tanks and fighters saved out at that scale. We could make tripleA look pretty cool with a few more pixels.

Secret Agents hehe

Tiny tinted

ps. naval style fort

Here is another version of the Panzer III. Same image as the current just with a different tint.

Panzer II in the same sort of tint range.

[TheDog]

Latest version 115 ready for download from 1st page 1st post

If using faster 2.6 remember to minimize the error box to the taskbar, to stop it it reappearing (this is only a warning error please ignore it)

.
MAJOR CHANGES

• To help the AI, each 'owned' Air & Sea unit type limited to 10 per TT/SZ. Each Land unit type limited to 20 per per TT
• To help the Player 'allied' Air & Sea unit type limited to 15 per TT/SZ. Each 'allied' Land unit type limited to 30 per per TT. This is to allow the Player to move through an allied stack
• Fixed ship to shore Bombardment for HQ-Fleet, Cruiser & Battleship, now a bit easier for an amphibious assault
• Removed Neutral Bunkers with tuv=1 as does not work
• Removed Carrier from Japan & USA Purchase panel as AI will only buy cheapest
• Fixed Lend-Lease-Depot isInfrastructure again (its non combat)
  .
• New icons Armor-Hvy_hit (thanks Black Elk & WC Sumpton)
• Britain shading for Fighter-LongR (thanks Black Elk)
• Neutral Fighter-Early remove roundel & shadow (thanks Black Elk)
• New USSR Armor-Inf (KV-1) Icon & _hit (thanks Black Elk)

.
WEST

• Blitzkrieg tech for Britain, Germany, Italy & USA, Fighters & Bomber-Tac, Armor & Bomber-Tac, Bomber-Tac & Infantry
• USSR get an extra free Inf-Trained & Artillery each turn as dont have Blitzkrieg
• Germany Provence-Marseille gets Industry-Med, so can build Transport to reinforce Tunis-Tunisia
• Germany Vichy-Rhone gets Industry-Lgt
• USA get lots of small PU increases & Industry-Lgt in Dakota & Kansas to simulate rail netork accross US
• USA AI get 11x Industry-Med built on turn 1, to simulate increased war production. Gives an additional 77pu per turn, costs 231pu, so ROI is 3 turns
• Neutral Sweden, Shahara & Himalayas given more defences

.
EAST

• Fixed connection 045A & 045B Sea Zone to Hollandia-Dutch New Guinea

.
TODO - The Dog
Balance

.
Link to 1st post that has the download link
https://forums.triplea-game.org/topic/3326/1941-global-command-decision-official-thread

[Black_Elk]

Here are some options for battleship/cruiser bombard where the clip icon matches the attack. Also a transport that has the ASW sonar icon, in case you want to have advances for the transport to indicate an improvement for the convoy thing you mentioned vs subs, or to a weaker default version of the transport for earlier timelines or whatever.

I also fixed the canvas sizes for some ships, which for some nations was at 62px tall. They should all be 54 now so it won't clip at the top of the battle screen like for the little stars. I attached the relevant graphics here for each nation.

[TheDog]

@black_elk
Oh yeah, looking clean, sweet and petite!!!

[Black_Elk]

No prob

Here are the German Armor-Hvys retinted like the others to a blue-ish gray. I like Frostions black tanks as well, but these are more consistent with the rest of the set. Probably black types could be used for specials or tech advances, like if you wanted a duo tint there. I did hits too just in case, though they might not be needed for the lighter types. But anyway, just to have em all in the thread somewhere.

[Black_Elk]

I would suggest we add transport capacity x1 elite to cruisers and battleships. The idea was floated a while back in a few posts, but this would have 2 big benefits I think...

First there would be a natural incentive for the player to hold a detachment of elites on board, which means that more TUV is likely to be contested on the water. Rather than seeing Cruiser vs Cruiser TUV 8 in contention, it'd be more likely TUV 13 (since the ships would likely have an elite on board worth 5 TUV.) This is similar to what the AI is already doing anyway with it's transports where it will leave them stacked and floating, but if the capacity was extended to the larger ships (cruisers/battleships) you'd probably see more trading between the warships. With a better chance for the floating units to hold out.

Second the transport capacity being restricted to x1 elite would limit the overall impact per unit/stack to a level that's not too extreme, while still allowing a sufficient number of attacking hitpoints for the really large scale amphibious assaults. Like say a D-Day or Invading Italy.

x10 cruisers could bring x10 elites in extra hp over say 20-30 hp with just regular transports. At scale and given the way the AI kinda behaves, I think you'd be more likely to see smaller forces say a couple cruisers carrying a couple dudes around, but if they stack together, the overall limit would be in about the same range as the defenders likely ground stack limits. Meaning that if a player used the transports and cruisers together, you could bring a force to bear that's more like x20-30 hp. So in a PvP game where the player is more likely to stack towards to the ceiling, you'd still have a way to bring a sufficient number of hitpoints per coastal tile. Using cruisers, naval transports and air transports in conjunction the player could conceivably bring 20 elites and 20 other ground units, which is more like a D-Day in scale. If the x1 elite capacity is also given to battleships the tile limit for an attacker would be 40-50 ground units, per adjacent coastal sea zone.

That's assuming the current stack caps, but that is closer to what would be needed I think in a pvp type game where the defender is more likely to stack at the limit of the tile. I think the caps are high enough that it wouldn't affect most players, so only the AI is really de-stacking in that way. But anyhow, if extending transport capacity to cruisers and battleships the hope would be that the AI will purchase these, similar to the way it purchases regular transports for nations like Britain, Japan and USA, while also giving Germany and Italy a way to get their units out across the water too.

If that seems too extreme, then perhaps a Cruiser Adv, Fleet HQ, Battleship and Fleet Carrier might have a transport capacity of x1 elite. That would give each nation a few units to work with at least that functioned in this way. I'd be most curious though to see if it changes the AI purchasing behavior at all? Like whether the AI would then purchase more cruisers and battleships and such. Might be worth giving a shot just see.

Also I'd ditch the naval bunker idea. If the AI won't buy em, I don't think they're worth including.

I'd rather try something that gets the AI buying the cruisers and such hehe.

[TheDog]

Transport & Convoy
Past few days I have been testing the following and noticed;

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Transport 0 0 2 for 7pu

• AI is slow to buidup an amphibious assualt, can be turn 8ish
• AI most times escort Transport
• AI buys a lot of Transport, almost never buys Destroyer, Cruiser etc (possibly the design of the map, Sea Zones with PUs)

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Convoy 0 1 2 isDestroyer/Anti-Sub for 10pu

• AI quicker to mount an amphibious assualt, can be turn 4ish
• AI sometimes escort Transport (well it does have anti-sub built in)
• AI buys a lot of Transport, almost never buys Destroyer, Cruiser etc (possibly the design of the map, Sea Zones with PUs)

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Adding Cruiser & Battleship with 'transportCapacity'

• Having Cruiser & Battleship with 'transportCapacity' does increase probability of purchasing Cruisers, especially for USA

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Next release will have;

• Transport renamed to Convoy, this will allow an earlier version of the game to start in 1939 with Transport as 0 0 2 and a 'tech' upgrade to Convoy
• Cruiser & Battleship with 'transportCapacity' as the AI is buying Cruiser but for the wrong reason, that is for transport

[Black_Elk]

Sounds good to me

I was thinking about transports as well, or more specifically about the maximum force that a player could bring, given the current cap limits.

Right now the transport cost of the Armor-Lgt unit (transport cost 3) will allow a player to bring more hitpoints/unit types into a given amphibious fight, than a player/nation that doesn't have access to that unit type.

Armor-Hvy has a transport cost of 6, and HQ-Army has a transport cost of 7. The transport capacity of the naval transport is 7, which makes these units very unattractive to transport across the water. The player has few incentives to purchase these units in locations which will require that they be transported, and a very strong to spawn Armor-Hvy and HQ-Army in-place at frontline factory. I would consider lowering the transport cost down to 4 there, and treating basically all heavy equipment the same way. So no difference between say an Armor-Lgt, Armor-Med or Armor-Hvy or an HQ-Army in terms of their transport capacity cost.

Thinking about how to max the force and using the earlier example x10 transports, x10 air transport, x10 cruiser (with transport capacity) you can imagine something like...

x10 cruiser =10 Elite
x5 air transport =10 elites (since they can each carry 2)

Now we're already at the the cap for elites per tile, so maybe...

x5 air transport =5 trained infantry

And then you figure out what you want to put into 10 regular transports. With Armor-Lgt at transport cost 3, you can slot two of these into a single transport. This is a bit unfamiliar still to me.

For context the vanilla v3/G40 transport has a transport capacity of 5.
Infantry have a transport cost of 2, and all other ground units have a transport cost of 3.

What this means is you can shorthand it to "Transports can carry 1 inf + 1 other ground unit."

This is basically how the rules are framed OOB, so either x2 infantry, or x1 Infantry + 1 of something else. Assigning a number to the transport cost/capacity I believe was a tripleA innovation just to get that rule to work, so I'm not really used to thinking about it as a number/ratio really, but anyway, here the transport has a capacity of 7.

Currently you get a pretty strong malus if transporting Elites with anything other than more Elites or Elites and Trained infantry. x3 Elites (total transport cost 6), 2x Elites +1 Inf-Trained (total transport cost 7), or 2x Elites + 1 Armor-lgt (total transport cost also 7).

Since ground units are currently capped at 20 per tile by unit type, that last option becomes very powerful. But basically we'd have the elite coming out ahead in just about every combination there, and at the cap limit you might not be able to make use of every transport slot available before maxing out your elites per tile. An example of where it could go awry, transporting 1 elite or 1 artillery, since the transport cost numbers there are 2 and 4 =6 total. Bringing an Elite instead of Trained Inf in combination with Artillery and you gain nothing from the Elite's capacity bonus. Similarly bringing x2 Armor-Lgt together on the same transport, in order to free up room for an Inf-Trained/artillery combo etc. That sort of thing.

Also right now when the transport is automatically loaded, ie clicking the Tile and then 'move all' into the sz with transports, the way that UI selects the units to be loaded first doesn't seem to prioritize capacity. Meaning you might have a 3 elites that could load into a transport, but the machine will fill up those slots with Inf-Trained and Artillery first, fewer total hitpoints than if the player were to manually select transports 1 by 1, to make sure the Elites got loaded. This is a bit of a time sink, and adds somewhat to the tedium of managing transports here, since which specific units are loaded first can be consequential if the machine isn't picking up the capacity thing. I think this can become problematic when loading from multiple land territories into a single SZ, where units like Elites, Armor-Hvys and Army-HQs are involved, just because the capacities are different, and click all will load the heaviest stuff with the highest attack power first. Probably because it was designed around the vanilla transport scheme that only had like two options there, Infantry and Other hehe.

Not sure which solution is best, but if the capacity of the transport is 7, I probably would not exceed a transport cost of 4 for any unit. That way you can always bring 1 inf + 1 other unit for a total of 2 hitpoints, unless you're fielding Elites which can get you up to 3 hitpoints per transport, but where that's only mechanically useful in smaller engagements. Since at the scale of the caps, it starts becoming a trade off. One option might be just extending the transport capacity of those warships mentioned to 3, that way they could carry either x1 elite or x1 Inf-Trained. Probably most would prefer to use Elites, for the attack of opportunity amphib bonus, but if you're trying to work against the cap limits per tile in a large engagement, it might make sense to use the Trained-Inf instead. Also for the AI, which tends to spawn Inf or Elites sorta unpredictably, least that way they could still get both types out and to the front. Conscripts are sort of a wild card in all this, since they can't be transported via Air-transport. The same might hold for transporting on a Cruiser. Conscripts could become more advantageous in combination with the other units like Tanks or Artillery on the naval transports, allowing the elites and trained inf to slot in from the Air-transports or Cruisers and such.

Anyhow, just some thoughts

[TheDog]

Latest version 120 ready for download from 1st page 1st post

If using faster 2.6 remember to minimize the error box to the taskbar, to stop it it reappearing (this is only a warning error please ignore it)

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MAJOR CHANGES

• HQ-Army has isDestroyer - nullify apposing artillery/anti-tank first strike capabilities (thanks WC Sumpton)
• Pacific-Allies moved to after USA (thanks WC Sumpton)
• Industry-Med can produce all Fighter types (thanks Black Elk & WC Sumpton)
• Technology research requires that a nation has at least 1 Industry-Hvy unit. (thanks WC Sumpton)
• Map Blends for a lighter map, Activate by ticking "View> Show Map Blends
• Removed Coast-Guard as the AI will not buy it
• Transport renamed to Convoy, so we can use the name Transport (without isDestroyer/Sonar) for 1939-41
• All nations have a few Bombers at the start (thanks Black Elk)
• All fleet units refreshed (thanks Black Elk)
• Cruiser transportCapacity 2 only 1x Inf-Elite
• Battleship transportCapacity 3 only 1x Inf-Elite or 1x Inf-Trained, both in an attempt to reduce AI buying too many Convoy/Transports
• Renamed Neutrals to Neutral (reduces extra units in the Unit Help panel)

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WEST

• Germany can build Battleship and research Carrier-Fleet from T10+
• USA removed 2x Destroyers from the AI on turns 4,8,12,16,20 as they get them on turns 1-20 anyway. (thanks WC Sumpton)
• USA AI gets on Turn 5, 3x HQ-Fleet
• USSR can build Battleship
• German Armor-Hvy retinted (thanks Black Elk)
• Italy AI purchase 3x Destroyer in 100 C Sea Zone to clear the Black Sea
• Fixed link British Guiana to Dutch Guiana (thanks Black Elk)

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EAST

• Truk now Industry-Med & 7pu simulate the massive miltary base of history and create conflict in the area (thanks Black Elk)
• Honolulu-Pearl Harbor & 7pu, Hawaii 2pu, simulate the massive miltary base of history and create conflict in the area (thanks Black Elk).

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TODO

• Balance

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Link to 1st post that has the download link
https://forums.triplea-game.org/topic/3326/1941-global-command-decision-official-thread

[Black_Elk]

I'm enjoying this. Feels pretty solid to me. The production spread seems like it's getting the job done for the AI here and the flow for the timeline/start date seems pretty good for the WW2 story beats. Like WC I think it might be a bit on the heavy side in terms of overall production capacity distributed across the board at the start, but it's still a lot fun to tease out. I could easily imagine a 1939 scenario like prequel/sequel using a similar set up where the NAP is reversed and it's Germany and USSR that have the non-aggression treaty, while Japan might skirmish in the opening round or something. Just remove like half the factories and backload some of the earlier tech equipment etc. Might be fun.

For this one 1941 I like it. Probably would just let it ride and then focus on the playbalance. Only thing I might look into is that capacity thing I mentioned for the heavier armor types, just to make sure they don't get left in the lurch. Otherwise I'd just tinker around the edges, like for minor starting unit additions or starting cash, or any extra difficulty/challenge levels for the AI and such. Self imposed handicaps or higher VC wins etc. I think is pretty good for most factions to resolve in a timely fashion at 21 VCs for the TKO. A VC win at 24 is also pretty fun in the solo for doing endgame techs and sorta painting the whole globe your teams color, but I think about a dozen rounds or more to hit 21 so that's not bad. First round can take a bit for the AI to get cooking, but seems to pick up the pace after that.

I think probably for a new player coming from A&A the m3 stuff and terrain, order of battle with the targeting and bunkers probably takes some getting used to, but I think it feels a bit easier now to kinda ease into what's going on and parsing the how the units work/interact on the map. Last few games I was just controlling a single nation from the big 6, which was a bit more challenging than controlling the whole team. I had fun with both styles of play though. Controlling the whole team I think is pretty entertaining, but for a challenge rating there probably a higher VC win, or an income bonus to the AI on top of what they get for their themed reinforcements would probably make sense. Income is pretty high generally so even going up like 110% can get the AI pretty formidable there.

Anyhow, feels pretty good to me! Nice work!

Let me know if we need any other graphics stuff. Meantimes I'm just blasting as USA hehe
Catch you next round