Iron War - Official Thread

[redrum]

@black_elk Yeah, one other thing I thought might be useful is having a 'max fuel consumed' that would show in order to move all my existing units their maximum movement how much fuel would that consume. So that I can as a player compare that to my income to determine if I want to buy more fuel consuming units or even consider taking some as casualties.

[Black_Elk]

@wc_sumpton said in Iron War - Official Thread:

Most of the major powers (Germany, USSR, Britain, Japan, USA and Italy) could use a 50% increase in their start reserves. This IMOA would help move the game to the mid stages before Fuel became vital for these nations. Right now it feel like fuel is to important at the start of the game. Also I would increase the '1 Fuel-Barrel' to 2 or 3 in some places in Asia and Africa. It this was done then 10+ areas could be decreased a little. (Romania at 15 barrels represent half of Germanys production, and makes that area feel as if its more important the Berlin, and I feel like I need to reinforce there instead of expanding elsewhere.)

Yeah I feel the same, more of the existing fuel could be pushed out from the core to the periphery so that it is in contention. But I still think the current fuel production totals are too low for the number of starting units, the scale of the economy overall, and the expected attrition levels for fuel consuming units in the early rounds.

I feel like currently the fuel production design is such that most nations will only be able to move their starting fuel units 1 space per turn, when they really need to be moving 2 spaces per turn. This is particularly the case for powers with navies (even smaller navies like British India or ANZAC.) Most nations have barely enough fuel to move their starting forces, let alone enough oil production to justify purchasing new fuel units.

If 1 fuel= 1 movement, then I think the baseline should be oil drums that are worth 2. In other words, if you take a territory with an oil drum, then you can buy a tank and move it 2 spaces every turn off that drum. Just seems simpler to read and understand at a glance.

Upping the starting fuel would definitely help, but I worry that without upping fuel production too that might just create added frustration in the midgame, when there are suddenly way more units on the board than can be moved, but players can't actually reach each other to start destroying stuff hehe.

I also like that last idea floated by redrum about the max fuel consumed thing. Basically whatever that number is for the starting units in play, then that's the amount of oil production the nation should probably have. Either that or the starting fuel reserves need to be really huge to cover the gap. Otherwise the purchasing game is kinda shot, and it becomes just about managing the starting units and less about what to buy for next round.

My feeling is that each nation should have enough fuel production such that, if they lost no fuel units in combat and bought no new fuel units, then they should be able to move their starting stuff around without worrying overmuch. That way the pacing around fuel is driven more by the new unit purchases rather than the starting units, so players can learn to manage their totals as they go, instead of starting out in the red. I think it will serve the gameplay, and help with the learning curve, especially since all the fuel stuff is kind of new. To frame it another way, a new player should experience running dry as like "damn I guess I can't really afford to move that new cruiser I just bought" instead of "oh fuck, how come half of my navy is suddenly stuck in the middle of the ocean!?!" Or again, a decision like "which should I move, that new heavy tank or that new fighter?" instead of having to choose on a mass scale between moving the entire air force or the entire mobile ground force in a given turn. Basically something more incremental and forgiving that you can learn as you go, instead of being all front loaded.

[Frostion]

I have updated the fuel testing version of Iron War:
• Some nations starting fuel income is increased.
• Some additional drums of fuel placed around the map.

New version can be downloaded here: 0_1522782395771_Iron-War-Test-XML-2.zip

Download, unzip and place inside the Iron War zip file’s “games” directory. You can now use the latest TripleA release to play this map: http://triplea-game.org/download/

Changes:
I have given some nations more fuel, especially Japan (who was in most fuel need) and USA, but also others. Personally I think they have a bit too much now, but I will give this new amount a chance.

Before, I was able to play up to 3 rounds with no critical fuel shortage as I conserved fuel from start. Additional to that, when I play the major nations I send PUs to minor nations and that helps me in regards to the PU/Fuel ratio. I am also willing to casualty-select the fuel using Mech-Inf instead of inf when at the front. I suspect that people who experience huge fuel needs don’t spend PUs on supporting minor nation, but I don’t know. But as the Hard/Fast AI players act similarly, and end up in critical situations, exposed unmoved units and huge fuel needs, most nations now have a bit of extra fuel. Hard AI can now mostly play round 1-3 with a tiny surplus of fuel.

There is no way that the income will be increased by x2 from previous, as that would totally undermine the idea behind the fuel: Manage your fuel so you don’t end up in shitty fuel situations. It is the idea that you have to think about fuel. The fuel needs SHOULD impact movement choices and thereby be a dimension of the game, just like Iron is a dimension (although iron is a little more simple dimension).

One more thing related to fuel needs, that I think also supports the gameplay, is that it favors the underdog. If a player grows or keeps being huge in unit numbers, he probably runs into fuel needs. But if a player loses a big battle, then he probably has more than enough fuel to move his remaining and new purchased units.

I think I will keep Denmark and Norway un-invaded at start. The German fleet can from start always be saved by moving it or reinforcing it by just a single cruiser or more. Germany is in no way in danger from being overrun by anyone in the first many rounds, so there is nothing preventing Germany from building fleet units in round 1+. If players want to focus only on building land units and just rolling east, the penalty is probably the loss of their fleet. And then Germany just has to build up more European defending units to compensate against D-Day.

@Black_Elk said “Strangely the Germans always go really light into France, taking just the bare minimum to attack Paris at advantage, but not really enough to press very hard the following rounds.”
I have also noticed this. It seems that the AI can only think 1 turn ahead when it comes to the danger from enemy attacks, but it cannot predict how much a factory could potentially reinforce a territory. If the AI could do this, then maybe it would bring more units into the first attack into france? @redrum ?

@Black_Elk said ”Sacrificing expensive units to free up fuel for movement during future turns is pretty counter intuitive, and in some cases might not be possible even if you wanted to, because here's no kill button to scrap units. I guess you can always crash aircraft into the sea, but if you want to get rid of mech or ships etc. it still requires a way to battle, and there might be no enemy units in range for that.”
I cannot see this problem. No player needs to purposely kill of own units to get fuel as the fuel maintainance thing is gone, and units don’t use fuel if they don’t move. This might be a problem in the old Iron War version, but not in this new one.

@wc_sumpton said “Anti-Air Gun: Allowing it to move during CM as changed the unit from a defensive orientated weapon to offensive fodder. So I can see the problem in costing it out. Maybe removing its CM capabilities while retaining its defense of 1“
I am thinking about this. I will just wait a bit for now, but perhaps I will remove the offensive CM ability.

[wc_sumpton]

@frostion
I like the way you are going. These additions IMOA will go a long way. I also like the reasoning that you explained. I am going to have to try some of those strategies.

Cheers...

[redrum]

Seems like a step in the right direction. I agree with @wc_sumpton on the AA guns still but will try to give this a spin to see how it plays now.

[Black_Elk]

Yeah I guess I was conflating the maintenance system with the new scheme. I suppose the thing to do now is just think of those starting units as fixed defenses in some cases and leave them in place when a shortfall occurs, since there's no penalty that way.

Maybe x2 was pushing too hard? I didn't know how experimental it still was at this point, or how settled you were on the initial fuel production totals. I might have been trying to throw too much gas on the fire hehe.

I can see the desire to be cautious and conservative with the fuel amounts. It encourages a somewhat different playstyle where you have to prognosticate further in advance, and be more selective with your heavy hitters esp. during the opener.

That said I still think the oil production totals can be pretty high before the fuel scheme is undermined. Fighters and Bombers especially seem to be gas guzzlers, and its possible to burn through oil pretty quickly if you've got a big fleet.

To me the ceiling on fuel production really informs the kind of purchasing strategy I'd adopt. Like the lower the fuel the greater the emphasis on infantry/artillery push becomes. But as long as the purchasing keeps pace its more a matter of how many new fuel units you want to see in play during the midgame, how quickly the midgame itself arrives, whether the play is shaped more by purchasing (with a lot of unit replacement), or more by utilizing the starting units (with less unit replacement). I was imagining a pretty sizable influx of new fuel units owing to the relatively large economy, but it's true I don't really send that many PU's to the minors. Usually I like to have the power projection with the big dogs where I can concentrate it, rather than going to the minors, but I can see how that would work to reduce the available PUs to Fuel ratio if aid is sent every round.

My general impression from just a few games under the new scheme is that, the tighter the restrictions on fuel/movement, the more deliberate the pacing becomes, such that most player-nations will probably have to pick a clear movement focus early on and really stick to it, even if it means some starting units stay home. Building up a reserve of fuel so you can make rapid moves in the endgame will doubtless be the real key to success. I think it will also make safe havens around the production core more significant (esp coastal sea zones), because you'll want to have those locations really secure for stacking, if moving a large force away at the last minute isn't always an option.

Anyhow, here was my first quickie attempt with Germany, (also took Iraq and Iran for kicks). Tried to break out of my comfort zone a little and do some stuff I don't usually do. Went all in on the naval attacks right out the gate, and let the transports sink to the bottom of the sea. Then did a little aid to middle east. I figured I'd try sending them the 10 spot every round for a change. Was able to hold the Persian gulf region and snap up the Caucasus, but then floundered during the main event on the Eastern Front. We broke through in the south initially, but then overextended ourselves, and the Reds are now clapping back! Bastards

Just lost the battle of Stalingrad. Our Balkan buddies decided it wasn't worth the effort to stay and fight to the last man, ten thousand curses hehe! It's been pretty fun so far. Basically I started running dry in round 5, which felt about right, since it was at just the time when the tanks started pulling up to Moscow.

0_1522824814343_Elk vs Fast AI Allies round 7.tsvg

Look forward to checking it out more! Definitely want to try my hand at Japan again. I'll give it a go tomorrow when I get off work. Glad to see the fuel thing coming into its own -exciting to check out the latest.

Great work man!

[Frostion]

@Black_Elk - I hope that your Japan experience can be compared up against your German experience. It would be nice if the two could feel a similar fuel pressure. Personally I see Japan as more complex to play than Germany. With all their ships, islands and enemies, it is hard to keep the overview. Happy gaming!

[Black_Elk]

Just wrapped my first solo run as the Japanese. I went with a pretty traditional India crush, and then tried to crash in on the Middle East. My plan was to leave the Truk fleet in place for as long as possible and just try to move the bare minimum each round with the IJN to stockpile fuel. Was very conservative with the island hopping. Basically I just concentrated on the transports, shucking infantry and leaving the warships in place whenever I could. Its seemed to work reasonably well, and I was even able to comfortably expand the airforce a bit after a few rounds. The Americans attempted an end-around and parked their pacific fleet in the sea of Japan for several turns. Fortunately I was able to trap and destroy them in early 45, before they could maneuver any transports in range. So far so good, I think the Empire is on the road to world domination hehe.

One cool thing that happened this game was a truly command performance by the South African Fast AI, which took Italian Somalia and then made it all the way to Iraq before the Japanese arrived to spank them hehe! Fun stuff!

Here it is at the start of round 12...
0_1522870534015_Elk vs Fast AI Allies Japan round 12.tsvg

I think now that I got a feel for it, the next one I will try a full Axis press vs Hard AI and take control of the whole side, since HardAI games can be a little slower. Fast AI is enjoyable for the solos since the rounds don't take too long, but hard AI it's nice to break up the round a bit. I'm thinking start off with a 10% boost to the Allies and see how they hold up. Then maybe increase to like 25% to see how that feels by comparison.

[Black_Elk]

Ok started my first full game against the HardAI Allies. Took control of all the Axis nations and set the AI allies at 110% income. It felt pretty solid. The Hard AI Soviets did a much better job managing their front with Japan early on, opting for strategic withdrawal rather than a blowout. Using the same plan as last time, I kept the Truk fleet in place and focused on crushing India ASAP. Here is the save just before the dawn of the nuclear era...

0_1522942858784_Elk vs Hard AI Allies 110 Japan round 10.tsvg

This time I also sent aid more consistently. In early rounds I pushed money from Germany and Italy over to Japan to get the ball rolling faster in the Pacific. Then once established in the Far East, I reversed the aid flow and started sending cash from Japan to Germany. It worked out pretty well, though we did burn through a lot more oil on the march. For some impulsive reason I decided to go a little dive bomber crazy and they like to chug that fuel hehe. Germany and Italy felt the thirst at about round 5. Japan stayed on target with fuel a little longer by conserving in the early rounds and by heavy shucking into French Indochina and the Dutch islands. Then I went strait for the jugular on India, which seemed to shore up a nice steady supply until rounds 7-8 when a major naval re-positioning consumed most of the reserves.

I think the 110% percent boost to income produced a moderately challenging game against the AI and I enjoyed the pace. The machine had me breaking a sweat a few times, but overall still fell prey to some of the usual weaknesses like canal control, spooked fleets, not using mech to the fullest etc. I'd say the level of difficulty at 110% was fun though, you're under some definite pressure to knock off enemy factories before the AI amasses too many units at their production cores. It takes a bit longer to crack in, but not so crazy that you can't find inroads if you keep pushing. Of course once you make a break through things get a lot easier pretty quickly, but on the whole I liked it.

Given the hard AIs performance here at 110%, I think 120% should be pretty fun, so I'll try that one next time I have a free day to game.

But yeah so far so good. I dig the latest alterations. For me fuel needs start to come into focus right around 1942-43, which feels cool for the historical timeline. Like you get to expand during the first 3rd of the game, then shit hits the fan during the second 3rd when the fuel headaches come into play, and how you manage determines what happens during the final 3rd of the game.

One suggestion I have would be to give all the minor powers an Aid phase and the option to send 10 or 20 PUs to one of the major nations. During the endgame it can be tedious to find ways to utilize the minors when the team is ascendant. I mean like once a region has been handled, you end up with a lot of minor units that get spawned, but which can't really get into the fight. I used to just buy aircraft or ships, but its not really an option now with the fuel limitations. Would be nice if we could just skip past the purchase phase in those cases, and send some of those minor PUs to the larger nations in the block, where they can be of more use.

[Black_Elk]

Ps. Also I think I might have found an image bug. When I went to round 11, I got an error about a missing convoy image for South Africa. Maybe because a lot of the minors were killed off, but SA still had a patrol boat afloat? Not sure, first time I've seen it happen. Anyway figured I'd grab the log when it fired off.

TripleA engine version 1.9.0.0.9853
Loading map: iron_war, from: C:\Users\jason\triplea\downloadedMaps\iron_war-master.zip
Loading resources from the following paths: [C:\Users\jason\triplea\downloadedMaps\iron_war-master.zip, C:\Program Files\TripleA\assets]
Loading map: iron_war, from: C:\Users\jason\triplea\downloadedMaps\iron_war-master.zip
Loading resources from the following paths: [C:\Users\jason\triplea\downloadedMaps\iron_war-master.zip, C:\Program Files\TripleA\assets]
Error: Image Not Found:flags/South-Africa_convoy.png
java.lang.IllegalStateException: Image Not Found:flags/South-Africa_convoy.png
at games.strategy.triplea.image.ImageFactory.getImage(ImageFactory.java:34)
at games.strategy.triplea.image.ImageFactory.getImage(ImageFactory.java:27)
at games.strategy.triplea.image.FlagIconImageFactory.getConvoyFlag(FlagIconImageFactory.java:39)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.screen.drawable.ConvoyZoneDrawable.draw(ConvoyZoneDrawable.java:33)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.screen.Tile.draw(Tile.java:128)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.screen.Tile.getImage(Tile.java:86)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.MapPanel$BackgroundDrawer.run(MapPanel.java:848)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Unknown Source)

Here is a save that shows the map having issues loading. Happened right before the Italian turn...

0_1522942951072_Elk vs Hard AI Allies 110 Italy round 11.tsvg

[Black_Elk]

Started the game vs HardAI Allies at 120%. I figure they will spam harder the longer their factories are up and running so I went with a more aggressive opener to sweep Egypt. Still tried to keep the fuel reserves up, but went I little harder out the gate with the big dogs. Will see how things hold up after a couple hours burning the midnight oil hehe. Catch you in a few

0_1522946626666_Elk vs Hard AI Allies 120 Germany round 2.tsvg

Went another 10 rounds. Hard AI Russia was beast this game! Every time I thought I'd put them to bed for good, they'd stand back up to take another beating hehe. I could tell it would take forever to break Leningrad so I redirected to the periphery and tried to mop there while waiting for an opening on the Eastern Front. This time I went thirsty by round 4 for sure with everyone, owing mainly to the battle of the Atlantic and a lot of escapades with the IJN and Regia Marina. Its late 1945 now, but I think I might go all the way, just to see how long it takes at 120%. Good times! The war is basically over, but I find myself with a strong desire to put the hurt on the AI Australians for a victory lap, just because hehe.

0_1522984850722_Elk vs Hard AI Allies 120 Germany round 12.tsvg

[Frostion]

I have decided to release the new fuel version of Iron War for download via the game engine. The new version works with the newest TripleA releases. Here are the changes:

v0.2.2 to v 0.2.3:
• Corrected a typing error in the notes (Kamikaze pilots are obtainable from round 9, not round 6).
• Fixed a graphical error that could occur when South Africa captured a convoy zone.
• British Colonies Colonial-Infantry now looks different and is now more distinguishable from the normal British Colonies Infantry.
• Tank-Destroyers are now listed in purchase screen before the Light, Medium and Heavy Tanks, not after.
• The Anti-Air unit now costs 8 PUs, not 7.
• Japan now gets 1 Kamikaze recruitment poster in round 9, 10 and 11, not only 1 in round 9. This means that Japan can recruit 3 pilots per round from round 11 / early 1945.
• Aklavik (in North West Canada) renamed to Fort Norman
• The map uses the resource option “isDisplayedFor” to keep nation specific resources only visible to certain players.
• Fuel system has been changed. Now ships and land vehicles use 1 fuel to move one territory, and planes pay half of their full potential movement in fuel when moved.
• Other minor changes.

Old Colonial-Infantry: New Colonial-Infantry: Normal Infantry:

This release is not closing down work on the new fuel balance, and more changes will be made. But I have decided to let this new version have some play time, and in the mean time I can work a bit on the Iron War Europe version and copy over the fuel changes to this map also.

@Black_Elk said “One suggestion I have would be to give all the minor powers an Aid phase and the option to send 10 or 20 PUs to one of the major nations.” I can see what you mean and that it would be nice for the colonies to be able to send resources back. It is something that might be worked on in the future. Maybe also resources like oil and iron. And thanks for the bug report. The problem was a wrongly named convoy picture file. I guess it was first noticed now, as South Africa hardly ever conquers any convoy zones, so the error never showed before.

@Black_Elk what is you impression on the Kamikaze planes? Do you use them? Do you see forward to them as they unlock? I think they are like long range lucky strike missiles.

[zlefin]

is there a way to set bonus resources by resource type? I didn't see one that was obvious, didn't look that hard though. I wanna give the ai players extra fuel (sinc ethe ai doesn't know how to handle fuel), but not extra PUs.

[Frostion]

@zlefin Unfortunately the bonuses you can give the AI and players during game setup only applies to PUs. It would be nice if it could apply to other resources also, but this is not supported at the moment. Maybe @redrum can tell us when/if this will ever be possible

[prastle]

@frostion updating bots it should be there now shortly good stuff

[redrum]

@frostion I believe that's incorrect. The resource bonus % should apply to all resources: https://github.com/triplea-game/triplea/pull/1791. But flat bonus is only available for PUs.

@zlefin There is not currently away to set different % per resource. I considered doing that but didn't know if it would be useful for enough maps and enough players would use it to make it worth it. Given that the AI doesn't really understand fuel yet, it might make more sense to consider it now that fuel has been revamped.

[Frostion]

@redrum Nice! I would say that the option to give extra percentage to all kinds of resources covers most needs, for most maps.

Maybe an option to give flat rate of certain special resources would also benefit some maps. But then, as maps may have a lot different resources, an option like that should come with the ability for mapmakers to enable/disable certain resources from showing in the start menu. Maybe some resources do not fit as resources that ought to be "increasable".

How about XML options for the resource list like:
ShownAndAffectedByFlatRateBonus
ShownAndAffectedByPercentageBonus
or something shorter and simpler?

[redrum]

@frostion I think the better approach is actually to allow map makers to just define difficulty levels with specific percentages/flat bonuses for each map in addition to the basic bonuses we already have. So on Iron War, for example, since the AI doesn't really understand fuel maybe you have the following:
"standard" - "25% fuel bonus"
"hard" - "50% fuel bonus and the rest 10% bonus"
"very hard" - "100% fuel bonus and the rest 50% bonus"

I think that probably makes it easier for the average player to understand and keep the game setup UI simpler. Otherwise you could end up with a lot of input boxes on the screen.

[Frostion]

@redrum Would your described way then replace the percentage and flat rate totally? If so, then an easy, medium and hard should maybe be supplemented by a "custom"? I agree on keeping the menu options simple, and letting mapmakers preset values.

[Black_Elk]

Just went a dozen rounds vs Hard AI Allies at 125% and it felt pretty good. In every game I've played vs the AI there invariably comes a point when you break away, and then it doesn't really matter how much of a bonus the AI has received, because they can't recover, but up until that point the extra PUs and Resources make a pretty big difference in the feel of the difficulty level.

I also like the idea of default difficulty settings of the sort redrum just mentioned, mainly because I think the average player is more likely to click a simple difficulty setting, than they are to pop the hood and start tweaking a bunch of complex values at launch. I think they are more likely to say, "ok, last time NORMAL was too easy, so I will click VERY HARD this time and see how that feels" as opposed to going in and assigning bonuses nation by nation. It would also give us a chance to really cater the bonuses to the AI's current ability. So for example, I've just been picking a universal number like 110% or 125% etc and giving each AI nation that same bonus, mainly because it felt clean and easy to replicate. But maybe some nations need more? Perhaps some need less? With a default setting you could get more nuanced with it.

That said, I still think its important that the player be able to adjust this stuff on the fly, via a CUSTOM difficulty or whatever. And its definitely important that they be able to see it all charted out somewhere (so that the difficulty tweaks for the standard levels aren't invisible.) Until then though, I'll just keep trying to tease out a number that I feel works alright for the AI Allies until I hit one that kicks my ass consistently hehe. Next I'll try like 130% or thereabouts.

Oh also this last time I did try buying a couple Kamikazes at the end there, but I only used them in one attack so far. I haven't made much use of those or the V rockets or nukes, somehow I felt like it was probably a cheapshot on the AI. But as the difficulty of the AI bonus levels increases, then I feel less sporting and less likely to cut the computer as much slack. Probably at the 130% bonus level, stuff like strat bombing will be necessary to maintain parity with the machine? Will have to see

Anyhow, here is the last one...
0_1523315918556_Elk vs Hard AI Allies 125 Germany round 13.tsvg