PowerGmbH

I think the forced march mode is quite interisting as it prevents move and attack, while permitting to come quite fast onto a theatre of Operation. Now my question would be: how to explain tha AI when to use forced march and when not? Actually an AI Plan doesn't care of readiness factors, which would mean if Naval Units would be below a certain readiness, a Plan would never be executed ( which may be a good Thing ). but if the AI brings a lot of DD via Forced march, it may be not a so good idea, as the Sub simply goes away on the next turn. On the other side an idea of giving a Naval unit an Attack Range of 4-5 tiles ( only on Seatiles ) while ALL other moves would have as consequences to have no attack left could also do the trick of preventing "Long-range-move + Attack" . Ther the AI would not do "dumb Errors". It would also help to increase the Movement range to up to 25 ( i.e. 12 days of cruise Speed ) while at the end there would be no Attack Point left. on the next turn the Unit would have a "partol and Act" range of 4-5 tiles which could be still realistic. Aditionally this would be a movement wuite similar to Airfleets: opertating or moving doesnt Permit Action any more ant so it would be with Naval Fleets: first take Position then atrack.

Hi Ludi, good Point here. I think this can be adressed quite simple by the help of Decision Events. I.e. A Mayor Nation can be "asked" or if AI it would be automated to supply one or more possibly thread Minors. In the Case of Finland, Germany couldbe Asked on the Winter War time if it would help out Mannerheim by Arms Trades. So on the case of Attack by RUS, Finland would dispose the Decision Event Units planned. Similarly to Iceland, Hungary, (Yougoslavia allready made) Spain Portugal Greece and other Countries. I think US could receive some DE of this type so that GB doesnt have to pay for the Upgrading of all Minors. the only Thing that is not possible is to set the entrenchment Consider this done for other future Scenarios. Thanks.

imho thoughts reqarding Divisionas and different Unit types in diferent nations: Isn't it the most simple approach to compare the quantity of man? let's say in SC2-3 a Corps has 30K man and an Army 60K. how much Divisions is this in Russian Units? 2,5? and in US Units 3,9 Divisions? If a possible SC3 has Manpower as "resource" wouldn't it be more logic to leave the final and total amount of man in the Unit as base and not how much divisions or whatever sub-fractions are "inside" this unit? One could say ok, recruiting man in URSS is easier than in USA, but this could be solved with a factor. i think the simplest strategic approach keeps beeing the total amount of men regardless subfrations. Must admit that it is a little more difficlut to give a correpondent Name to the Unit if in fact it would be the equivalent of i.e. 2,76 divisions, but this is in my eyes the only handycap.

Hi mcaryf1, i allways read with interest your Posts, as they are well thought before writing and helpful. I personally think Loops in a future would be obsolete, if the global map Scrolling would be in place. first the AI is not so Loopo-phile and mostly it is a dificult thing to explain the AI proper Looping. second i think that the travelling distance capabilities of Naval Units may be upgraded. I.e. if a Naval Unit travels "normal Speed" with 8 Tiles there would be "no" or not much "cost" (MPP, Oil or whatever Energy) while each more tile with higher Speed would exponentially increase the Bunker Added Fuel Surcharge. (i.e. 9 tiles + 2, 10 tiles +4, 11 tiles, +8, 12tiles +16, 13 tiles + 32 etc). In this way it would be a simple manner of spending, while Units could reach in a 10 Days Turn almost any Position of 6000Miles. Actually a part of this i think that Loops for Axis would be like a Little bit justice, as normally Axis Player is not really able to move out into the Atlantic, and AI Axis Player mostly better not even attempt...

Well the issues posted here would guide the game into NO-GO Areas, killing a lot of What if's. On the other side: would it really be soo far that the Allied side "protects" Ireland from Axis Invasion? It's mostly a an Issue of "who has the best Propaganda" at least. i.e. Axis Invaded DK, NL and BE definiteley with a "defense against Allied Agression" propaganda (which obviously didn't work). Allied Side was far better describing any actions as "humanitary" or on behalf of "Freedom". In a possible SC3 one could think of a "Technology" Called "Propaganda Eficiencity" which would reduce the effects of Political decisions and for shure US would receive Tech level 4, while Germany would have to start researching on level 0.... But as for the toppic: I think the reactions are quite strong, and i am 100% shure the UK would (in a What if Case ) have done it's best to declare the Occupation as a "protection" or liberation against Axis or Irish Rebels dangers... May be not the same for China, but they may have declared this as an "liberation campaign" for "Free Indochina", which sterangely gets an Gouvernment that is China Friendly. btw the things didn't change up to our 21 century...

David12345: dis you put the settings on the AI as very experienced? this may significantly change the situation. I must say i played Axis and must admit that with the profound scenario knowledge i manage to win, but it was never a walkthrough even knowing all AI Plans. I almost never get even Smolensk in 41 not to speak about Moscow. i soemtimes got "surprised" by retards in the African campaign with tanks needed for Russia and stuck in El Alamein... In Japan i never got China fallen, but almost allways India. I guess you are not an average Player but rather an Expert, where you can expect to win the game. Average Players ask question like : how the heck do i get Nanning in less than 2 years or Chunking but to get Turkey and fight in the Urals is to me more like an absolute Expert with Years of SC1 + 2 experience... Maybe some more AI responses should be figured out for Expert level Players?

You give me to think! this seems to me like an exploit and a "non-historic" behaviur that gives more sucsess.. I found it always "important" to have a Rail-Link up to Singapore in order to have Supply Level 8. I think this advantage would be important enough, no? Any thoughts? should there be more reasons than the above in order to take Nanning?

Here is what normally helps ( at least against the AI ) for Nanning: 0) forget about other Goal Positions. Go on defense mode for all(!) other Fronts. possibly retreat to more secure positions ( also Around Peking) 1) Use at least your 2 Special Forces. 2) Use 2 Armys (one of them preferably the Wuhan,Level 11-12 Army) better 3 and optional Corps. 3) As you have done, the Position of the HQ is ok. 4) Wait for good Weather, May - Aug. 5) Use your 3 Carriers (full strength) and position them in a way they can reach Nanning. 6)Place your fighter in range as well. 7) Check to have also "liberated" the Position 1 NEast of Nanning, here it could be good to put the "Bumper" Corps, this one shal absorb the Attacks from the North. If not you may need an aditional HQ and free this tile before. 3-4 Turns before Attack: Prepare a Army for Amphibious Landing. Place Units around Nanning Specially the two SpecForces. Dont Attack 2-1 Turns before Attack: bring the "Left behind" HQ to the Position, depending on how you move it may take 2 Turns more. As soon as the HQ is "on place" you wait one more Turn so the Units have the necessary Morale and Supply. Amphibious Landing 1 Tile SW of Nanning AFTER the Tile is your colour by advancing units Air Attac over nanning by 1) Airfleet 2) 3x Carriers ( Soften up the Units by 3 de-entrench + Morale down ) Attack Turn: in this Order: Again, Airfleet + 3 x Carrier and then the 2x Spec Units Attack and move away. Now Check which Army may Move Inside (before!) then the 2 Armys move on their places and Also Attack. Normally the ennemy unit is downed, at least if it is a Corps. your one Moves finally "in" if not it may be done with the HQ. If it didnt work, you may better wait the next season: Reinfore your Carriers, and bring back to >5 Supply the Units to get to 10. And prepare again the Army that is 1 SW of Nanning to get Supply >10. this is also possible by advancing the HQ, in worst case. Hope this was the Right Order. Anyway the Goals in China are mostly Nanning and Chansha, so dont panic, you have 5 Years for two Cities....

Seamonkey: I agree, i also tried to think how reflect the Supply on islands. An allready working approach could be to reduce supply with the simple presence of ennemy units in a preset range. This could be helpful for Malta or the Pacific. mcaryf1: yes, sorry i forgot the cheaper "naval resurection" inside Ports. I have no idea how this could be adressed without real programing. actually the cheap rebuild works for Supply >5, but this doesn't work for Naval units. i think it must come down to a new Idea. In this Respect one should also consider what is a Port? I would i.e. see a recovery for a sunk BB Richelieu in the Ancorage place of Dakar differently to Taranto or Hawaii. Ports would be only the Main Harbours of developed countries, while the rest would declassified as a sort of Ancorage Places with minor developement. to the other issue it would be nice to have a sort of aditional function for several Techs to "prohibit upgrade". i tried the "expensive Upgrade" as described by you as well but this doesnt reflect 100% the desired result, as you have observed. Also the Secondary countries are not "realisitc" A player with "prohibit Upgrade" for Naval Tech, would probably observe carefully his Naval Tech and wait until the next level is reached before buying his next BB. The AI could be forced to do the same, i.e. based on the developement of the new tech: i.e. if the developement of the next naval tech is below 55% then buy-old, and if above 56% then Not-Buy. This could also be an idea for Tank units, but this is very controversial: shall it be possible to Upgrade a Tank yes or no? How would the AI handle this issue? a Human would possibly "consume" his old Tank in battle and rebuild the Next generation cheaper. but would the AI have the same intelligence and not try to reinforce eternally the Tank Level 1?

mcaryf1: so if i amalgame the entire Tread i hold following idea: -a Speed Value is given to each naval Unit, and helps as follows: in Patrol Mode it may help to engage and win a Naval encounter, and in "Silent" Mode it helps to move on the map with less probability of beeing intercepted. -a Bomber becomes more expensive but features aditional functions i.e. Spotting, providing Supply for units in Range or heavy Bombing, or more. -Carrier Units shall be divided in at least 2 diferent Types: Light, and Heavy, (optionally Escort Carriers) -Attac and Spotting Range of Airfleets must be reduced over Sea (maybe halved as well over Ennemy Tiles) , but not over friendly Land Tiles, to reflect the value of Carriers. So far so good. is there sth more that could help to close the gap in realism for Naval encounters?

mcaryf1: Well i would come back to the Naval System. If the cost of Bombers where really as you describe compared to Naval Units, how would you represent this in the Game? If you come down to a simple game: Imagine a BB would cost 190 MPP while a BmbrCmd would cost 600 MPP... Who the heck would buy a BmbrCmd? If this Airfleets where as expensive as you said, then the whoole Allied Bombing Strategy shouold be regarded as a full failure regardless they won the war... I had often advocated an idea of "effectivenes" Factor in this Game, where a Player ( and the AI ) is rated by the most effective way off winning, and not only by the simple Mass of production. but that's another theme. How much would you let coste a BB? and respectiveley the other units and which Price differences could be affordable to a player? Which Units would be the "Base-Price" ? And most of all: would you have an idea besides the "no stop if ennemy pops up" to prevent the ugly thing that All Hawks form North atlantic Attac one Simple ship after having met the ennemey the thurn before?

The "Speed" factor as a simple value could be an idea in regards to the question: What is an encounter between Naval Units? Actually the ennemy Units pop up if your naval unit meets them in Range. Now if i make a mix between "Speed-Factor" , "Sid Meier's Pirates" and SC it could be defined as follows: -If the engine marks up a standart "meeting" on the Sea, then a window would pop up and tell: "Sir we have spot a "Naval Unit-Type" our Escape Chances are "Friendly-Speed-Factor / Ennemy Speed Factor" in %. Adtitionally our intelligence reports "Random-NavalUnits-Check of 1-2 Tiles around the Naval Unit Tile". A battle would have "Possible Result" Shall we engage? or shall we try to esacpe?" A yes would stop your Naval Unit, while a No would use the Speed Factor difference to escape. Naturally this mode could become a Nightmere, if. i.e. an Axis Ship tries to make a Camouflage Transit through the Channel or through the North Atlantic filled up with DD's, and if then every 2 Tiles would come a Popup asking Yes or No. Maybe this could be adressed with a sort or "Cruise-Mode" ( general Escape ) or a "Patrol Mode" ( general engage ) Anyway, it could help to prevent this Ugly thing that one pops up in the middle of the Atlantic with a Ennemy Ship, ant next turn Arrives the Entire Allied Atlatic Fleet to Battle down a Simple Ship on "special-mission"...

mcaryf1: I have read and re-read your posts on the Naval Issues, and i wonder following: how would you adress the problem that a player can reassemble almost all ships of the north atlantic to bog down an ennemy ship. isn't the main idea that Battle groups where meeting ennemy battle groups in their set formation and that there where no way in a given Time of the Battle, of joining in other Groups? I thought of a possibility where there would be a sort of "same-level-chance-encounter" and after that BOTH units would be randomly replaced on other tiles ( range 1-4 ) in order to make it impossible ( or less possible ) for the player who is owner of the turn to bog down a single ship. This is not a 100% feature, but i wanted to ask if you have thought of the above mentionned problem of assembling the Whoole North Atlantic Fleets in one single turn and how this problem could be minimized... The Speed Factor would clearly be accounted in the calculations of a Same-Level-Chance-Encounter.

WoW! you got a big Chance there! This probably can occur only on the tile 100,28 AND has the chance of 1:11 (9%). If you add that the Diving chance is 50% then you had a 4,5% Chance... Slightly better chance than to win a Roulette bet...Congratulations:rolleyes: i think it is an rather improbable issue, and i hope you took advantage of this singular event!

For all folks interested in details of the Pacific war: yesterday i find some infos about a Japanese Submarine(!) Aircraft :eek: Carrier, that was actually built and used. Info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I-400_class_submarine Somebody herad of this one? Quite interisting Historic detail

pzgndr: did you simply set de Destination Port (i.e. Aquaba) and the Engine sends the Units via Loop instead of passing by the Med? or was this with the help of Map-Positions?

I havn't ever seen a AI-Transport or a AI-NavalUnit using Loop Positions. If the AI Blockades a Port it is normally told to do so ( under certain Circumstances ) by a "Plan". Regarding Naval and Transports or Units on Sea, this is controlled by the AI Transport/Minor Transport Plans. i.e. if Axis Tanks sucessfully take Egypt, they would probably receive some "generic" Plans to attac Timbuktu or Capetown, but normally would stand around in Cairo and dring Beer until War's end. Therefore there are "plans" that control i.e.: IF Cairo and other Positions become "friendly" Positions ( means Egypt conquered and nothing more to do there ) THEN starts a Transport Plan which removes the Units via a Friendly Port towards a previously Planned destiantion i.e. Athens. If Athens is Allied in this moment, the AI has a problem, because it is not clever enough to look for i.e. to another Active Axis port in the Med... Therefore a Scenario design would i.e. make 2 or 3 plans: a plan to withdraw to Napoli and another one to Athens or one more to Marseille, in order to have less chance to fail the "escape" from Africa. Anyway the AI is so clever that nonavtive Units no matter where they are sometimes generically "plan" themselves some Adventure-Offensives, a thing that is quite impressive sometimes, if an Allied Human Player suddenly finds a German Tank Group popup in undefended Karthoum...

Afaik the AI has depending on the difficulty level a slightly wider Visibility Range. Most AI activities are controlled by "Plans", some are carefully programmed, and others are "generic" or randomly planned. The AI does NOT know if it is advantage to block a specific port. An Example of a Plans as follow: Allied AI checks how much Units are on the British Islands. Once this Number reaches a specific quantity, AND a specific Minimum date (and other conditions) the AI activates a preset "plan" with a Goal Position (i.e. an Amphibious Plan) to Paris. Then the Engine boards the planned Unit quantity (With ot Without HQ) on Amphibs (hopefully has engough MPP) and after waiting the consignment to be complete ( preset number of turns to build up ) all the Units launch and try to get on a specific Shore Position (or near to it) with the final Goal Position Paris. More generic are the Airsrikes, while Naval Activity is as well a "Naval Plan" prepared by the Scenario Design. So i.e. it is wise to have the AI Naval Plan in the same Period (or sightly before) so that they can clean the seas for the Amphibs. Would be ugly if the Invasion Navy comes 1 year later than the Amphibs... In regard to Unit characteristics: afaik the units choosen by the AI to combat a certain spotted Unit are "preset" in a specific order/rank. This yourself can observe in Naval Battles: If a Sup is spotted by the Ennemy the AI sends a lot of destroyers to chase it. If the Sub is "Protected" by BB surface Vessels, the Engine doesn't change it's attac, while a Human would probably first try to get rid of the more dangrerous BB.... If no destroyers are available the Engine chooses also Cruiseres for attac, but only as second option. So if you change the specification of a Sub to "Naval Attac/Denfense" Value 16 the Destroyer would probably still Attac the Sub instead of the BB.

i tink a simple solution for this "Mpp-Loss" for UK would be as follows: a DE01 (owner UK) "Replace Lost Ships" If the Player says yes comes an type 2 DE based on DE01 = 1 with #POPUP= "Leave empty" so it goes automatic and put #AI_RESPONSE= 100 without text. This event should then fire every turin IF: ; One or more raiders in XXX Ocean #CONDITION_POSITION= XX,XX [3,2] [1,1] [1] [0] this means if you said NO, notzhing happens, Ennemy raiders have NO effect. If you say Yes: then the MPP List shows you every turn a Loss on MPP, if there are Axis Ships in this specific Area. Obviously you als Allied Player Penalize yourself, so you should put a balance Event for saying yes..

Thanks for this info. i just read in Wiki. Interisting in this Article about Actic Missions is also the fear of UK that an hypotetic attac by Axis on the Falklands could "activate" Argentina if Axis would "gift" these islands to Arg. "President" Péron. Quite Fascinating What If Idea! Regarding Antarctica i also read about Axis placing manned "Weather"-Stations in Greenland in 42. The Problem on these abnroad "Missions" is always how to get them reasonably into a scenario. Deinitifeley the "Argentina - Bring - in - idea" is fascinating!

right. The approach of this event is anyway based on a problem that in fact this Carrier Group would belong naturally to Vichy France and never to Germany. I think a correct event would be in a way that VICHY-FRANCE with help of Axis "bribes" or "pression" would get "independently" active against UK, a thing that is far closer to history, and use it's limited resources in the Caribbean as a sort of Independent Co-Beligrent Nation VS UK only. That is what happended in fact (Aditional Infos: Battle of Dakar 40, Battle of Syria in 41, Battle of Madagascar, and later even the Vichy DOW on URSS, see wiki. ) If then in such an event UK won't "blockade" these regions the Vichy Carrier might "pop-up" and make a little noise around in the Caribbean until UK gets it chased like Bismark. I think this could be fun as well. Anyway a thing of limited rewards for specific "missions" in form of Morale or Units or even Tech could be fun.

Xwromwood: Yes i heard that the Buccaneer Mission was not allways welcome. But anyway a focus point in these Month of June 40. Clear is that Historically none attempts where made to access this Vichy Belongings from the Axis Side. Yet the Allied Side was not so shy and got the Plunder Here is a related article of Daily Times Jan 10 '41 ( i have several "outcuts" of historic Newspapers avlbl , even in German, if you want pm. ) i think some things like this in a Global-Map spice up the "dead regions". Also available this fascinating 300 Pages Book: "War, cooperation and Conflict" The EUropean Posessions in the Caribbean 1939-45 by Fritz Andre Babptiste. you can Google Read this partly in Google Books.

Glad that you liked this "Mission":D Hopefully others did as well, althoug it's a little complicate to "explain" the AI how to react to a human Mission... confused: Did you hear about "Operation Mincemeat" or "Operation Oak" or "Operation Siverfox", or even this one for Japan: "Golden Lily"(!) , ? i was allways a fan of Indiana Jones and the "Raiders of the Lost Ark" If you know any more "Missions" where not much peaple heard of, just let me know. I'm Allways keen on these ideas

37 and started with SC1. Cheers Hubert , Same age! and Hats off for all the more aged Experts from C64 times