Azimuth's Trilogy - Official Teaser Trailer
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Hello folks!
I decided to take some time to present on this forum the project I'm currently working on.
Don't be too hasty in judging the title of this post and the little banners below: this is all for fun. Anyone who has ever tried to develop a game knows all too well that the main risk is to end up with a never-finished broken draft. So here is an attempt to move forward with a road map which I hope will help me finalize something tangible.
This being said, let's jump into it!
This is a "trilogy", because I keep maintaining three different variants to be played on the same map (a 'polar azimuthal equidistant projection' derivative of the AA anniversary map that I already presented to the AA forum).
Herkules - April '42
Herkules is the lightest version. It is basically AA50 rules on a modified map, with (optional) additional players:- The Commonwealth - UK's little helper, first in the turn order.
- France - starting as a Vichy Axis-oriented buffer zone, that can be liberated and join (back) the Allies.
- Neutral Powers - that can be invaded or join either side upon certain conditions.
The plan is to keep this variant simple and AI friendly - for players who would be interested in the graphics and modified experience of the game - but not keen to learn alternative rules.
It also maintains the link with the (real life) boardgame and my inital project of having an alternative printed map for it.
Ironclad - May '42
Ironclad goes a step further in modifying the units (cost and abilities - adding the tactical bomber and mechanized infantry) and some additional features.The cut line is not yet fully decided, but the plan is to put into it the most stable and reasonable stuff developped in the third variant. With the aim of keeping it playable and balanced.
Yes, in short, the ultimate variant
Fall Blau - June '42
Fall Blau is and will probably always be mostly experimental. It deeply changes the core game in using mechanics like an alternative economic system, additional and modified phases and alike. It went a bit too far - as it is playing with the limits of the engine. It is also quite heavy and slow (under 2.5) because of the length of the code, and definitely discards the AI.It is nevertheless a good example of what is possible to code in TripleA and it explores some new game mechanics that might interest other players/developpers.
Release date
Well, I don't know
Nor do I know if I should release it.
But it's good to keep having an objective, right?
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Nice, looking forward to this
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@azimuth Remember software isn't released, it escapes. Good luck with your project.
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So...
After hundreds and hundreds of hours (not exaggerating!) working on this project I reached something like a stable version. Then I started to playtest, but it is not an easy task: the AI is lost, so if playing against it, I win in a couple of turns. I have some ideas on how I could make it more AI friendly, but this is not something I want to do now (as every time I am changing anything, I create new bugs and weird situations).
The most painful part, as I expressed it here and there, is to handle the very complex set of interactions between sea units that is so hardcoded that any little change has huge consequences. But yesterday I finally found a solution to one of the recurrent bug I had with the transports, and I decided that this was the sign I reached some final achievement and that I could be ready for the next step.
So I created a GitHub account, followed all the steps from the tutorial and uploaded my map in a public repository. Everything went quite smooth until I took a very stupid fatal decision: because I had some private data displayed in the repository, I decided to delete it and restart the procedure from scratch with cleaned files. Then I got confused, don't exactly remember what I did, but I ended up with fully deleting the map folder on my computer
Thanks God, I had a backup for the map itself (graphics) and I still had the 3 scenarios open in my Notepad, so I managed to recover the most important files. I lost a couple of units I recently added, but it was not a big deal to re-create them. The main loss is all the "meta" I recently improved and especially the game notes with the rules...
Anyway, my mistake, I should be more cautious before starting things I have 0 expertise in. And I was not very satisfied by the way I presented the rules, so now I have a good reason to re-write them fully.
I created now a separate folder for the repository on my computer, so that it doesn't impact my working files if anything goes wrong. Here is the GitHub repository with recovered files: https://github.com/Azi-Muth/world_war_ii_v3_1942_azimuth_mod
Can you see it? Can people download the map directly from there?
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@thedog there are two branches, "main" and "master". The map is in the "master" folder.
But I don't understand what is the link between GitHub not being updated and me posting on the forums...
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@thedog Yes, OK, I understand. But the link remains valid, right?
You know, I am totally new to this - so my goal was not to make it instantly downloadable by any one
I am glad if you take a look. But as I said above, there are currently no explanations on the game mechanics (and some of the tooltips are outdated or incomplete). And it is for sure not balanced - still working on the initial setup. So don't be to judgmental
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The link and now files are valid, well done on your first public use of GitHub.
I still remember my early days of GitHub use and I am mental scarred
(Nah Im not, but it is a steep learning curve)No judgement hear, just happy that another map maker has joined our ranks.
It runs with FastAI, but with pop-ups, but I guess you knew that.
The map has some icons that are not allowed, they look a bit like this, Buddhist symbol
you should change them immediately. -
@thedog Thanks
Not allowed by whom? Are you referring to the swastikas? They mark the Kriegsmarine naval bases, as it is in many maps of the time I took inspiration from. Nothing political behind that, so I don't think I "should change them immediately".
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Not allowed by whom?
The guys that run TripleASee here
https://forums.triplea-game.org/topic/2636/historical-flags-swastikas/20Quoted below
Any map with a swastika present in it is not going to be allowed in the TripleA maps, nor any other hate symbol with the single exception to the CSA battle flag for US civil war maps. There will not be any other exceptions, no other hate symbols will be allowed, grandfathered in or otherwise. -
@thedog Oh, Ok. Quite hypocritical TMHO, but OK, I guess it's more about the emotional perception in th US.
If I reach once the point where I would consider requesting my map to be pulled into the game, I'll change those naval bases for something else.
Thank you for informing me.
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@azimuth how does one end up fully deleting those files? they aren't even in the "recycle bin"?
Anyway, excited to play Ironclad with its additions, gonna download it now.
I really ought to get back to work on my own fictional arheic-wars map once summer is in...
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@jkprince Well, this shows well how deep I had no idea at all of what I was doing
There is an optional game property "Danube Axis States Side With Italy" that I added especially for you, don't miss it
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@azimuth Nice! Yeah, players on Italy will want that extra bit of relevance so we can be helpful on the eastern front
I made a pull request on your github which replaces some of the unit portraits and also includes 3 new unit type ideas which could go in Fall Blau: Recon, Torpedo Boat and Mobile Artillery. (former two based around the Recon movement phase, latter one based around Mech Inf's "Assault Guns" ability)
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@jkprince Well, I personally dislike Italy to go to the eastern front, I appreciate the gap between major and minor powers as a core game component and I am more trying to make it relevant in the Mediterranean (I kicked out the Germans from there), with a key (perhaps ahistoric) role in the interactions with Vichy and Spain. But I added the option based on your previous comment, because it is always nice to try other ideas and strategies.
Thank you for your units icons! So now, I need to figure out: if I accept your request, it will update the folder in my computer as well?
Regarding new units, this was clearly a choice from my side since the beggining to stick to the original ones, but with more abilities and renewed interactions (I don't really like the OOB mech and tacs, feel like duplicates). I was mostly inspired by @BaronMunchhausen extensive work on revamped units rosters (but he might reject this paternity because I probably went to far from his ideas, because of engine limitations and personal tastes
)But in later developments or "extensions", why not.
I really like your idea to have the arty changed when boosted, but this is currently impossible, isn't it?
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I did not get the Fall Blau game (but it is listed in the selection).
The first thing which I noticed is that I don't understand why you have the typical TripleA maps distortion in a map whose projection makes them all the more obvious.
In particular, I'm talking about the fact that going from Japan to the Western United States by sea is faster by going through Midway than by going through the Aleutians, whereas it should be the other way around.
This is the shortest path between Tokyo and San Francisco:
TripleA has plenty of maps based on equirectangular or similar projections which have huge distortions (World At War comes to mind), lengthening distances closer to the poles, and I was assuming a map with this projection would be largely safe from that phenomenon.
Did you do it in order to keep it closer to the original World War II V3 (indeed having such huge distortions)? Is it worth it?
Anyway, I would suggest splitting SZ 57 in two parts, western and eastern, Midway being in the western part of course, also on the account that Midway is actually nearer to Japan than to the United States so at least avoiding the opposite seems due.
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@cernel Thank you for your interesting comment.
Sea zones are on of the thing I wasted a LOT of time with... This probably comes from the initial goal I had NOT to change anything about territories and connections. The original game is pretty much balanced in this regard, and to my personal opinion, it has the ideal scale to serve the fun of its mechanics. I am not a big fan of global for this reason (amongst others) and custom maps that add a lot of extra territories kind of loose the soul of the game (which is an abstract game after all). So I was very reluctant to change the sea zones, and was forced into it mostly because due to to the projection change, some connections were impossible without making very distorted and ugly zones, that also hampered the legibility of sea movements.
When I started to change the original sea zones I also forced myself to keep exactly the same number (66) and it is only recently that I gave up and added 3 extra ones - for graphic reasons mostly, because the Pacific is so huge - that would most probably never be used but make the map a bit more pleasant to look at.
I made very complex calculations to have them allowing (or not) some specific actions in the game and having more or less a comparable superficy (with some few exceptions).
I didn't really consider distance reality as a parameter in this equation. Because it is already so wrong in so many places. Except for few things I really disliked in the base game (like US able to reach Morocco or Guadalcanal from their coasts in one turn).
But in the end, your question (Is it worth it) is perfectly valid and perhaps I chose some sort of middle way that is worth than the original, and still unsatisfactory on many points.
If I had to restert it from scratch, I would definitely use another approach for defining the SZ.
And yes, I didn't include Fall Blau for now, still too experimental. Its mechanic is now working but it needs a lot of fine-tuning to make it really playable.
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@azimuth said in Azimuth's Trilogy - Official Teaser Trailer:
And yes, I didn't include Fall Blau for now, still too experimental. Its mechanic is now working but it needs a lot of fine-tuning to make it really playable.
Don't forget to remove it from the
map.ymltoo.I definitely assumed it was intentional and guessed something like you said. Anniversary is not even the worst in this regard. In particular, the German - Russian front is a lot more crazily distorted in Revised (and v4).
At the end, it seems like you ended up with something for Anniversary like Pact of Steel is for Revised, map wise.
I've not actually tried the game yet: just looked at it.
Why 1942 instead of 1941 as the basis? 1941 is much more popular (though I don't like the anachronism of having Barbarossa and Pearl Harbour on the same turn).
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@cernel what happens if it stays in the map.yml? Does it create some bugs?
Well, for this exact reason
Because if the game really wants to start with Barbarossa, then US and Japan should be neutrals, East Indies can hardly be considered as British territories and I don't like all the meta linked with politics (again, personal choice). Also I don't find it funny to replay Barbarossa and the Japanese conquest (with the mechanics of AA, I mean). The "what if" starts for me in 1942.
But more pragmatically I assume I never really played the 1941 scenario and discovered it was so popular only when I started reading these forums (after I started developping this map).
