Iron War - Official Thread

[Black_Elk]

Hey there, been a little while, but I finally had a chance to play some full games vs the hard AI with the new changes in place... sub pens, resource tweaking etc.

My initial impression is that I really enjoy the game when playing as the Axis. I like the re-balance with Siberia, which makes Russia a bit more reliable at the center. The sub pens are fun, and seem to encourage more naval builds on the European side of the board, while also giving Japan a bit more breathing room to spend for ground in Asia, since they can use the sub pens to help support their Pacific naval defense. For the minor Axis powers, Iraq and Iran feel a lot more relevant to the overall game, because of the oil exchange. Even if they aren't expanding overland, or producing much in the way of units, just keeping them alive feels important for the war effort, because they can send critical oil to the 3 major Axis powers.

I wish the Balkans, Finland and Thailand had the same thing going on. Right now their role for the team is sort of an inversion of Iraq/Iran's role. Balkans, Finland and Thailand are more of a drain on German/Italian/Japanese resources and they have to expand quite a bit before they have enough oil and steel to really function on their own. They also tend to checkerboard the map and move pretty far afield from their starting core, once Germany/Japan do all the can-opening. Personally I think it would be cooler if their role was more resource support oriented, where they send stuff to the big 3 on the Axis team via the exchange phase, rather than going on the march. The ability to trade steel in particular would be cool, since steel much more than oil, really puts the hard limit on what you can build in a given round. If Finland could send 1 steel to Germany, Balkans 1 steel to Germany or Italy, and Thailand send 1 steel to Japan, that would provide a lot more flexibility in a given round, especially when it comes to purchasing necessary transports, or the big ticket items like Carriers and Heavy Tanks.

Anyhow, that's my only real suggestion for the Axis side, to get Balkans, Finland, and Thailand into the resource exchange, with support for the big 3.

On the Allied side, I think the resource exchange for the minor powers is somewhat less engaging than it is for the Axis. The Big 5 for the Allies (UK, Russia, British-Colonies, British-India, and USA) are pretty fun to play on their own, but the others are a bit of a toss up. I'd say British-Colonies and British India are now enjoyable, since they have enough going on in the neighborhood to keep them busy, and with aid from the UK they can be even more effective.

For France it basically comes down to whether you are willing to sacrifice critical early PU's/resources from USA to give the French something to work with, and whether you want to try and prop up Normandy out the gate. I guess China is similar, its up to the USA whether they have a chance to make an impact in central Asia. In both cases though, it's kinda hard to see the PU's being used there over Russia (where they can stack up more) or just keeping it for USA builds or for production expansion in places like Morocco, Norway, Truk etc. China is a bit of a special case, since it's still pretty tough to prop them up, even if sending max aid. Not sure, but they might use a buff. For the most part though it seems to work fairly well as is with the USA aid. I think the other minor Allies are set up kind of backwards though.

What I mean is that, if you want to utilize the aid phase, the resources/PUs are flowing from where they are more useful to where they are less useful. So for example, to me it would make more sense that KNIL resources might go to ANZAC (or India maybe). Or ANZAC resources go to the British (or British-Colonies). Or Brazil's resources going to USA etc... rather than the other way round. Ideally each of these minors should have like 2 possible ways to send aid, so they'd have a more compelling gameplay choice to make each round. Again the ability to trade even 1 steel would be particularly interesting, since the resource is so scarce. But basically that's what I'd do to make all those minor Allies feel more significant to the team. There's really only so much that you can do with your units when playing as South Africa, or the Dutch, Anzac or Brazil and can feel a little repetitive, but if you could send some aid (even a small amount) up to the big dogs on the Allied side, then those extra few PU's/Resources might make a real difference in the over-all fight vs the Axis.

The only other thought I have right now for the Allies, is that it might be cool if they had something similar to what the Axis have received with those sub-pens, some kind of specialized production feature that continuously spams units of a given type. Except rather than subs I'd maybe consider something like transports for the USA/UK, so that their North America production is more relevant as the game goes on. Or maybe you could try it with light Tanks, for something that Russia could make use of. I guess for simplicity it would probably make sense to just choose one unit type to highlight the way the Axis have subs. Probably Tanks would be the most fun, since the Western Allies kind of have the opposite problem as the Axis, they usually invest a lot in naval power, and somewhat less on heavy ground. I don't know, maybe its not necessary. Seemed like it was worth bringing up though just for parity by sides, since those sub pens can be pretty powerful after some time has elapsed. If the Allies are trying to match them round for round with destroyers, that's a lot of steel not being spent on tanks hehe.

Anyhow that's what I got for the moment. Will post some saves when I get home from work a little later. Still my favorite game for the AI I think

Best, always
Elk

[Frostion]

@Black_Elk Good feedback! It is nice that you still feel like playing a few games of Iron War once in a while It is a good idea, to have the minor nations be able to send at least one 1 iron to their bigger allies. Then if humans take control of minors, the humans can decide if it is a good idea to "milk" the minors and take their iron. Maybe this could symbolize if in real life the large nations more or less forced certain resources out of their smaller "friends". I am also confident that the minors access to resources is now pretty balanced, so if the big nations do not milk the smaller, the small can make good use of their own resources.

In regards to a special unit for the allies, what about the air-transport? This is a unit that would not tilt the balance of power, and also a unit that US and UK is pretty unlikely to build a lot of. It could further motivate for an European invasion build-up. I doubt that the AI, as it is now, could make good use of them. In my mind marking good use of them would mean building up for a good deal of rounds and use them all at once as part of a bigger invasion. The AI would probably use them as attack fodder or something. I don't think the AI can even load onto air transports? Anyway, I still see it as a potential spawn unit.

[Black_Elk]

For sure! I also think the balance on total resources across the board is pretty solid, so just having the ability to shift around a few oil points or esp. steel points from the little dudes to the big guys on the team should provide a lot of dynamism. I dig the idea about air transports. Thematically its a pretty good fit for any of the Allies really, and even if the AI doesn't currently make use of the transport ability itself, we know that they will use the unit in regular combat, so at least it can serve as padding fodder. For the human player it will give some logistical flare and highlight a unit at the same cost as the Axis sub, but that otherwise might get ignored in favor of fighters or 2 inf or whatever.
Conveniently British air transports built in Halifax can reach Europe in two turns via Southern Greenland, so I think it may help activate that north American production hub a bit, without putting a drain on the critical slot at England. Or perhaps air transports placed at Victoria can help the Russians control the back field with a few more hitpoints in the Soviet Far East vs Japan. For the US the unit would certainly be fun. Probably takes a couple rounds to get them into position, but I can imagine the airborne being an effective way to move some hitpoints around once you get a couple air-transport shucks set up.

Another reason I dig the air transport is that I think it will work pretty well for Russia too, practically I mean, like with the gameplay dynamics. The unit also has a historical basis, since the USSR certainly made use of them, especially early in the war. It's an unlikely purchase under regular circumstances (compared to fighters and the like), but I think if they were spawning every round, it would really help the Russians to bounce their defensive hitpoints to and fro, maybe punching some holes in the Axis forward lines when the Russians invariably starting getting rolled up by Axis tanks in the midgame hehe. I like it.

0_1540849549756_elk vs hardAI Allies full side Germany round 13.tsvg

0_1540849569289_elk vs hardAI Axis full side Russia round 7.tsvg

Here's another as Allies with a 120% bonus to the Axis AI. The 1/5th bonus is pretty fun. Axis caught me with my pants down a few times early on, though we still nabbed a TKO just before they sacked the Russia capital hehe.
0_1540866127568_elk vs hardAI Axis full side 120 Russia round 6.tsvg

[redrum]

@black_elk @Frostion Starting to feel like the 2 of you are trying to convince me to have the AI support air transports

[Frostion]

@redrum Whenever you feel like it Whenever you have the time We are ready to test any AI air-transporting abilliy you devs might conjure up

[Frostion]

I have now added “Airfields” and Iron resource shipping from minor powers to major powers.

v0.2.5 to v 0.2.6:
• Added “Airfield” unit, a new counterpart to the Axis Submarine-Pen. Airfields spawn 1 free Air-Transport every turn, give all air units +1 move, are destroyed upon capture, and only 3 exists and are placed in USSR Siberia, UK Halifax and USA North Atlantic.

• Added the option for some minor powers to ship 1 iron each to major powers. The exporter-importer relations are as follows:
Balkan -> Germany
Finland -> Germany
British-Colonies -> Britain
British-India -> Britain
South-Africa -> Britain
French-Colonies -> France
KNIL -> ANZAC
Thailand -> Japan
China -> USA
Brazil -> USA

[Black_Elk]

Sounds good. I was just typing when I saw that update come in haha. The airfield looks rad! And of course I love the steel deal

Here is a save game from the previous build vs the HardAI Allies that I think really illustrates what I meant about the minor powers during the endgame. I went 18 rounds here setting up for "Invasion USA" (which is clearly playing well beyond the point the victory hehe, but it helps to show the issue over many rounds.)

0_1541374876307_elk vs hardAI Allies full side 120 Germany round 18.tsvg

Basically, at a certain point the minor powers will start producing more PU's than they can use effectively. Either because their production centers are too far from the front, or because they lack the resources to move high value units like ships or aircraft in an effective way. So you end up spamming low value units and kind of tediously shuffling across the board to no real purpose.

Ideally this is where the Aid/exchange phase would come into play. I think each minor should have the ability to send like 10 or maybe 20 PUs a couple different directions, and some smaller amount of Oil or Steel depending on what makes sense for the nation. That way, when the game advances into the final stages, you can just "strip" the minors for cash/oil/steel and send it to the major powers, where it can actually be used.

So for example, you can see in that savegame that after Russia has fallen, there's really nothing much to be done with the Balkans or Finland, sure you can spam ships with the the Finns or fighters with Balkans, but invariably they run out of petrol before they can move to where they might contribute to the fight. Sending fuel away from Germany to try and get those Finnish/Balkans unit moving doesn't make sense, because at that point its really Germany that needs the gas, since they have the cash and production capacity to make the best use of it.

Same deal on the other side of the map with Thailand, here I mainly spammed cruisers, went on a little escapade to New Guinea, and then bought a couple bombers, cause I couldn't think of much else to do. But really it would be better if I could just strip Thailand and send all their stuff to Japan, with a couple quick clicks.That way the pacing during the endgame would be faster, as you could just skip past the turns for the minors, and send their cash along to the big dogs.

I think something like the following, where each minor has a few different options for the aid phase...

Balkans:
*Send 20 PUs to Germany
*Send 5 Oil to Germany
*Send 20 PUs to Italy
*Send 5 Oil to Italy

Finland:
*Send 20 PUs to Germany
*Send 5 Oil to Germany

Iraq:
*Send 20 PU's to Germany
*Send 20 PU's to Italy
*Send 20 PU's to Japan
*Send 5 Oil to Germany
*Send 5 Oil to Italy
*Send 5 Oil to Japan

Iran
*Send 20 PU's to Germany
*Send 20 PU's to Italy
*Send 20 PU's to Japan
*Send 5 Oil to Germany
*Send 5 Oil to Italy
*Send 5 Oil to Japan

Thailand:
*Send 20 PU's to Japan
*Send 5 Oil to Japan

plus whatever you already have going with the steel of course hehe. And something similar for the minor Allies.

I think by having the PU values slightly larger like this, most of the minors would likely have to skip a turn between utilizing the Aid phases for cash (so its not just a constant steady trickle, but when the stuff arrives the influx of cash/resources will have a greater impact.) It also makes the pacing somewhat faster in the endgame, since it will allow you to blow past the purchase when the minors come up, and save up to send Aid next time. Basically gives you a way to offload the excess every other round, instead of doing a ton of micromanaging with units, once you get deep into the endgame.

Or alternatively, it gives players a reason to try and expand the minor powers, so they can get to a point where they have enough cashflow/resources to use the aid phase every turn once they accomplish their main strategic objectives. So for example, maybe Finland can afford to send 20 PU's and 5 oil every round, if they take over enough of Russia, Thailand can afford to send aid each round if they take a decent bite out of India etc. So having the Aid amounts be somewhat larger than their starting point would work towards that purpose, while you exploit the turn order advantage, but then later (after it becomes tedious and there's nowhere left to go) you can streamline things by just giving the cash directly to a major power on your team who can use it to produce fleets and such.

[Black_Elk]

First game with the new build, went 12 rounds vs the HardAI Axis at 120% to see how things shaped up. I like the airbases, they definitely seem to make the fight for Europe more engaging. The steel exchange is also cool, finally feel like the Allies have enough to support the requisite transport and warship builds. I still think it would be cool if the minors had an option to send cash to the majors (since they often end up with a lot of loot/units at the end.) But otherwise I dig the feel of this latest iteration.

I did notice an air movement glitch just now though... not sure of the cause.

For some reason I can't bring my dive bombers into this final nuclear attack to spank the last Japanese hold-outs at truck hehe. Tried a few different ways of getting them into the fight, but keep getting denied with the little red X.

I think it may have happened once or twice during the game at various points. I assumed initially that it was a fuel thing and didn't pay it much attention, but that doesn't seem to be the case here, since the USA has more oil than they know what to do with. Anyhow, thought I'd bring it up just in case a bug needs squashing.

But yeah, nice work so far man! Keep it rolling

0_1541452672421_elk vs hardAI Axis 120 USA round 12.tsvg

[redrum]

@black_elk I believe the reason you can't move the 2 dive bombers to Truk is that the engine doesn't think they'd have any where to land based on believing that the space on your 2 carriers (6 capacity) is filled by the Nuclear Bomb (2 cost) and 4 Fighters (4 cost). So it appears that carrier landing calculations don't properly consider that suicide units wouldn't need to land. If you undo moving the nuclear bomb to Truk then you could move the 2 dive bombers instead. So yeah, this is a bug I believe.

[redrum]

@black_elk Here is the potential fix: https://github.com/triplea-game/triplea/pull/4322

I tested it with your save game and seems to work.

[redrum]

@black_elk I also glanced over your save game and the obvious major error was losing West Germany on turn 2. The issue is that the AI calculates amphib assault potential by trying to strongest units rather than the units with the least transport cost first. So it assumes UK can only transport 4 units (2 tanks, 1 inf, 1 art) rather than 6 units (5 inf, 1 art) which changes the odds of attacking pretty significantly.

[Black_Elk]

Makes sense. That's interesting, esp. the amphibious thing. I was wondering why the AI tends to leave W. Germany a little light, but it would make sense if it's thinking about tanks instead of mass hitpoints. In the standard A&A games it probably wouldn't make as much difference for the calc, since there its only 2 hitpoints per transport regardless, whereas in Iron War you can load up to 3 hitpoints if you go only inf/art/aagun, but only 2 if you bring a tank type along for the ride.

I fired up another game vs the HardAI Allies to see how they make use of the air transports. They were actually pretty effective at smoking my Atlantic fleet early on, and the Russians used them to squeeze out the middle east in fairly short order. I decided to see how it might look if the European Axis went after West Africa instead of the usual center crush. We managed to knock off France and the African minors, but Russia was a total beast at the end. Even with Japan getting busy in the backfield, they've still pushed a stack like 100 deep right up to the German border. We just snaked the TKO, but I'm pretty sure that red bear is about to drop the hammer and sickle on me hehe.

It's definitely dangerous to let Leningrad survive into the midgame. Russians stacking to the ceiling by the 10th round. Egypt can also get pretty massive if the Italians don't drive hard against them right away. Usually I try to knock out the British Colonies med fleet on the 50/50 shot with the German bomber and subs, but in this one British Colonies went overland to double team the middle east with Russia and put the serious hurt on Iraq/Iran. Japan had to step up in the region, since Italy was all distracted. Tried to pull an end-around and destroy that Siberian airbase with Japanese tanks by racing across China, but got stalled up before we could seal the deal.

I think Russia could definitely break Europe if they'd cannonball into G full force, but fortunately for us they've been it cautious the past couple rounds lol.

0_1541525562435_elk vs hardAI Allies 120 Germany round 10.tsvg

[redrum]

@black_elk Really seems like Japan wins that game for the Axis. Looking at the save, it seems kind of too easy for them to take India and then push into the Middle East. Almost feels like there should be another sea zone in between Gulf of Thailand and India. Otherwise Japan just takes out Sumutra and French IndoChina then immediately invades India.

[Frostion]

@Black_Elk
I see in the save that the Russians have mustered a stak of 90 infantry ready to invade Germany! Have you just focused on only sea and African and then let the German homeland defenceless?

@redrum
In Iron War there seems to be an AI behavioural tendency that leads India to ignore the Thai/Japan threat and instead focus on taking out Iran/Iraq. The same goes for USSR that seems to not be able to defend the many 1 PU far eastern territories, I guess because USSR is so focused on Europe. It seems pretty fatal strategies to me. The Chinese always fight the Japanese like if their lives depended on it (and it does), but not India and USSR.

I think that the few times Japan does badly, it is because USA decides to focus a lot on Japan.

I dont know what could be done, but it seems to me that the AI is a bit blind in regards to "backdoors". I don't know if it could be called related, but the AI also has a hard time figuring out and planning amphibious invasions, like ANZAC and USA should focus on against Japan. @Black_Elk what do you see in this regard?

[redrum]

@frostion Well at least the most recent save @Black_Elk had, India fell like turn 3 I think. So they didn't really have much chance to do anything. I think the challenge is that Japan starts with 6 transports and can move turn 1 towards Sumatra, turn 2 invade Sumatra and Southeast Asia, and then turn 3 invade India with potentially like 15+ units. I haven't played enough to know if there are viable ways a human would defend India or not.

From what I've seen, USSR focuses mostly on Europe and Middle East which honestly is probably a good strategy as there are a lot more PU value there and if it doesn't then it could get wiped out by Germany. Probably better to over focus Europe than over focus Siberia.

I tend to agree that USA/ANZAC need to slow down Japan but the first few turns they can't really do anything quite yet.

The AI definitely struggles with both planning and foreseeing amphib assaults. That happens to be one of the most complex things to code as it involves both transporting units (which is hard because you have to coordinate land/navy) and planning out multiple turns (which is hard because computers are too slow to deal with the large number of possibilities).

PS. I think I finally realized that I don't really mind the darker blue water but its that I wish the sea zone lines where white/gray instead of black to have more contrast

Also, if anyone wants to start up a PBF game of Iron War, I'd be interested.

[Black_Elk]

Yeah, part of me thinks the solution might actually be to give Anzac a buff. The situation with India is kind of tight. Like if you don't hammer Sumatra in round 2, or take a lot of losses in the process then India can stack pretty deep. Japan's dilemma is getting out quickly with their starting ground, since they don't have a ton of cash or production capacity to replace them until they start knocking off a few minors. Russia is also pretty heavy in the far east now which I like. Sometimes they can steam roll into manchuria and such if Japan ignores them or if the Brits or Americans send fighter support. But Australia isn't a big factor in my experience. Sometimes they can do air strikes vs a Japanese fleet or maybe liberate Sumatra with a sneaky transport if you let your guard down, but overall there's not much incentive for Japan to deal with them.

Usually Anzac ends up with a lot of landlocked ground. So its hard to mount an effective landing there as Japan. There isn't much threat from leaving them, so Japan isn't punished much if they ignore Anzac.

China and KNIL are the first priorities, since Japan kinda has to deal with them early or risk them getting pretty annoying later on hehe. But I think as far as India goes, if it was framed more as a choice between India and Anzac, that might help.

Right now if Japan goes after Anzac then they can really be punished by India, but the reverse isn't really true. So anyhow that's my thought, make it harder to ingore Australia by giving them some kind of buff.

[beelee]

@redrum said in Iron War - Official Thread:

Also, if anyone wants to start up a PBF game of Iron War, I'd be interested.

C'mon Elk Rise to the occasion : )

[Black_Elk]

Yeah I'd be down for PBF. Hard for me to get a decent block of time uninterrupted, on account of the kid/lady hehe, but I could probably swing a an hour or so after dark to post a save. Because of the scale and the number of players, I think the game works really well for solos vs AI. It stays pretty engaging, even after the point when you might otherwise close the laptop, just because its fun to try different expansion patterns, or set little mini-goals for yourself to spank the machine hehe. I really dig that tripleA has a map that works for this purpose. The standard A&A games can be a little dry, since there's only so much going, even in something like global, to be fun vs the AI.
So that's where my balance recommendations (like with Australia and such) are coming from, but that said, there is no doubt that it will play much much differently PvP.

Just as a quick example, when we were talking about hitting French Indo-China immediately with Japanese transports and then taking Sumatra on round 2 (India on round 3 etc), that only happens because the machine doesn't consider blocking maneuvers with their ships. It would be fairly easy for the Allies to stall that play by at least another round, simply by sending a French-Colonies patrol boat, or KNIL destroyer to block the Japanese in the East China Sea Zone. That would restrict Japan to non-combat movements in the critical South China Sea Zone. Similarly the Allies could send a French-Colonies destroyer or cruiser to block at Wake Island Sea Zone, and KNIL a cruiser to block at Pacific 4 Sea Zone which would prevent the Japanese player from taking Philippines.

I imagine that most competent human players would do stuff like that, sacrificing some starting TUV for naval blockers to buy more time, and thereby prevent a bunch of cascading amphibious assaults that might otherwise threaten production centers right out the gate.

You'd still see the Sumatra/India crush taking place, since it makes sense to hit the weaker Allies sooner rather than later, but at least there'd be a few more hitpoints in place before the Japanese arrived. Getting control of Sumatra/Malaya is still really important for Japan, since you can block naval movement from the Indian Ocean once you have it on lockdown. Once you smoke the Dutch it makes sense to leave at least some transports in the Gulf of Thailand Sea Zone so you can threaten amphibious vs India, but I imagine it'd be more about the drive overland in PvP (through Burma/Bengal), shucking units to Hanoi or some such and then pushing across towards Bengal, rather than an instant transport swoop across the south with all the dudes, like you saw me do when I was snaking the AI hehe.

[redrum]

@black_elk Yeah, I agree about the naval blockers and that's something the AI doesn't understand yet.

Cool. Let me know what side/settings you want and we can look to get a game started.

[redrum]

Here is the improvement for the AI loading transports more effectively: https://github.com/triplea-game/triplea/pull/4326. This should help avoid the situation where it leaves factories like West Germany under defended.