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AOC and AOD New Features


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First of all, a BIG THANK YOU to Hubert and Bill as well as all the playtesters for the new AOC and AOD! I'm really looking forward to both games and I'll pre-order both as soon as I can.

I was checking my list of new features in the game compared to previous SC games. I believe all the new features in Breakthough are incorporated into AOC andd AOD. The only one I didn't find was the "armistice" feature.

Hubert or Bill: are all the new features in Breakthrough put into AOC/AOD?

Thanks!

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Thanks Jodl and we are very glad to hear that you are looking forward to these packages as much as we are :)

Just one quick correction here that the primary campaign designer for these packages is Al Sousa, or Big Al, who has previously worked on campaign releases such as GOLD and the Brute Force campaigns. I need to mention that as the work is fantastic for these packages and a recognition of that for him is well deserved and I think everyone will be pleasantly surprised just how much fun these campaigns will be to play :)

For the new features, yes everything that is in Breakthrough will be in AoC and AoD but that being said off the top of my head I don't believe we've set any campaigns to use the Armistice feature even though it certainly is possible.

On top of having everything Breakthrough has the new AoD/AoC packages will also have the 10 new unit types and these play a significant role in enhancing the campaigns and especially so for the AoC package that includes the East Front campaigns.

For example, having units such as Divisions, Mechanized, Light Tanks and Medium Bombers helped us to model the campaign much more accurately and then having dedicated units such regular Artillery and now the new Rocket Artillery just adds to the atmosphere of the campaign.

As I've already said, I think players will be pleasantly surprised and the Official Walkthroughs and AARs will definitely paint a better picture as we near final release.

Hubert

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I am hoping everyone will find the A.I. for AoC very enjoyable. We tweaked the engine and I worked on several new script models for the huge map. The largest fun of the AoC is the PvP.

Hubert and I really came up with something good and all the Beta testers gave excellent suggestions and just simply an overall improvement for the package.

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Hi Al

Just a small hobbyhorse of mine - even if the scale is 5 times the previous Strategic Command map Midway should still be a single tile in AOD!

That gives some problems in what you can base there but I have experimented with a fighter bomber unit that has anti-ship attributes of a bomber but is actually a fighter in terms of intercepts. My intention is to simulate an airbase that includes both true fighters and bombers but of course Fighter Bombers were an important later war capability.

In current SC I had to play around with using minor country Fighter units to create a Fighter Bomber whilst still having specialist fighters for the major countries. I guess a true Fighter Bomber unit might have been an alternative to the new Medium Bomber but would possibly be more relevant to the Western Allies than the Eastern campaign.

Regards

Mike

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Hi Al

Just a small hobbyhorse of mine - even if the scale is 5 times the previous Strategic Command map Midway should still be a single tile in AOD!

That gives some problems in what you can base there but I have experimented with a fighter bomber unit that has anti-ship attributes of a bomber but is actually a fighter in terms of intercepts. My intention is to simulate an airbase that includes both true fighters and bombers but of course Fighter Bombers were an important later war capability.

In current SC I had to play around with using minor country Fighter units to create a Fighter Bomber whilst still having specialist fighters for the major countries. I guess a true Fighter Bomber unit might have been an alternative to the new Medium Bomber but would possibly be more relevant to the Western Allies than the Eastern campaign.

Regards

Mike

That is correct. It is always a pain in the butt to write these kind of scenarios because you either lose the naval scale or the land scale. I thought simply fighting the either or wouldnt be too fun so I made both viable. The ranges are different than the standard scenario for this map. Ships can fire further than 1 square and CVs can attack further out too.

I played many test games of Wake Island and it was a good comprimise to include both naval and land combat for an exciting scenario, as is Malta.

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My apologies for not thanking Big Al for his work! I really enjoy SCGC and SCGCG and I'm looking forward to playing (and modding) AOC and AOD! Bill, Hubert, and all the testers: you're great too!

Thanks Jodl and we are very glad to hear that you are looking forward to these packages as much as we are :)

Just one quick correction here that the primary campaign designer for these packages is Al Sousa, or Big Al, who has previously worked on campaign releases such as GOLD and the Brute Force campaigns. I need to mention that as the work is fantastic for these packages and a recognition of that for him is well deserved and I think everyone will be pleasantly surprised just how much fun these campaigns will be to play :)

For the new features, yes everything that is in Breakthrough will be in AoC and AoD but that being said off the top of my head I don't believe we've set any campaigns to use the Armistice feature even though it certainly is possible.

On top of having everything Breakthrough has the new AoD/AoC packages will also have the 10 new unit types and these play a significant role in enhancing the campaigns and especially so for the AoC package that includes the East Front campaigns.

For example, having units such as Divisions, Mechanized, Light Tanks and Medium Bombers helped us to model the campaign much more accurately and then having dedicated units such regular Artillery and now the new Rocket Artillery just adds to the atmosphere of the campaign.

As I've already said, I think players will be pleasantly surprised and the Official Walkthroughs and AARs will definitely paint a better picture as we near final release.

Hubert

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I assume that when these are released they will come with new versions of the editor and game engine to handle the extra unit types. I also assume that these new versions will not work with any existing standard or modded scenarios.

Can we therefore expect any further bug clearance releases of SC Gold to tidy up various minor problems that have been reported?

Regards

Mike

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I assume that when these are released they will come with new versions of the editor and game engine to handle the extra unit types. I also assume that these new versions will not work with any existing standard or modded scenarios.

Can we therefore expect any further bug clearance releases of SC Gold to tidy up various minor problems that have been reported?

Regards

Mike

Yes the new Editor will of course be included and the existing standard or modded scenarios will unfortunately not work but some elements may be importable such as the maps and other data so it will not be a complete loss if you want to upgrade your campaigns to the latest engine.

I'm working on a GOLD patch as well and if there are any specific items you want to remind me of now is a good time :)

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Considering units I'd like to say that the list is almost complete now. To be able to have seperate cavalry instead of using the anti tank unit feels like a huge leap for me lol :D Also the idea of introducing different bombers opens up a new scale. Instead of using tech advances to simulate for instance heavy bombers there are now different units. Maybe it would have been a great idea to do that also for tanks, adding heavy tanks as a slot. That way a divisional game of barbarossa could simulate KV-1:s and light tanks at the same time. Also the same case could be made with cavalry(light/heavy), artillery(light/heavy), cruisers(light & heavy) to open up the tactical scale.

one thing though that is still missing is mountain troops. Most armies had them, germans had seperate mountain corps as some other countries as well. A-bomb should be introduced. And last but perhaps most important: Mines are also missing. Though mostly a tactical feat in ww2 it played a strategic role too, sea mines bottled up the soviet baltic fleet.

I hope it's possible to introduce these units. If not here but for sc3. Another suggestion for SC3 is unit icons. Regardless if we have counters or 2D-units, topdown view or isometric I hope Hubert and his crew would add some different unit sets. Imagine adding unit sets for ww2, ww1, us civil war, napoleon warfare etc. That would be awesome as it is a true pain in the ass to do that kind of stuff.

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Considering unit types I would have liked to see 2 or 3 more naval types as naval aspects seem to have missed out. The first of these would be to represent the older BBs that many navies had and which could not realistically be upgraded to be equivalent to the new modern battleships. The second would be a unit to represent a deployable minefield as mines were used extensively in WW2. I have experimented with a zero AP minor country DD unit that seems to work OK but the AI does tend to block up its own harbours with these so they would need some extra intelligence routines for the AI to tell it not to do that except in desperate circumstances such as a port being about to fall into enemy hands. If it is too difficult to code the AI to understand how to handle minefields and ports then perhaps the unloading routine for transports could be modified so they could unload when adjacent to rather than actually in a port location in the same way as happens for loading. The third category of new naval unit would be a lower strength and much cheaper and quicker to build CV to represent a CVL or CVE - perhaps this could be like a garrison unit that could not have its strength increased beyond 6 but which could still provide air capability for defence against subs (e.g. on convoy routes) or for weakening land targets as done by the IJN in its early conquests and the USN during its island hopping campaign.

Regards

Mike

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Considering unit types I would have liked to see 2 or 3 more naval types as naval aspects seem to have missed out. The first of these would be to represent the older BBs that many navies had and which could not realistically be upgraded to be equivalent to the new modern battleships. The second would be a unit to represent a deployable minefield as mines were used extensively in WW2. I have experimented with a zero AP minor country DD unit that seems to work OK but the AI does tend to block up its own harbours with these so they would need some extra intelligence routines for the AI to tell it not to do that except in desperate circumstances such as a port being about to fall into enemy hands. If it is too difficult to code the AI to understand how to handle minefields and ports then perhaps the unloading routine for transports could be modified so they could unload when adjacent to rather than actually in a port location in the same way as happens for loading. The third category of new naval unit would be a lower strength and much cheaper and quicker to build CV to represent a CVL or CVE - perhaps this could be like a garrison unit that could not have its strength increased beyond 6 but which could still provide air capability for defence against subs (e.g. on convoy routes) or for weakening land targets as done by the IJN in its early conquests and the USN during its island hopping campaign.

Regards

Mike

Mike,

I believe we are on terms here. More different unit-types increase the tactical options of the game as well as simulate certain aspects of the war. Mountain units is something I miss, heavy and light cavalry would be nice for napoleon warfare and cruisers in two sizes(heavy/pocket battle ship and regular size) would be awesome. Your suggestions to include dreadnoughts is perfectly fine with me.

To sum things up thinking a bit more about it, Hubert please read:

ADDITIONAL UNITS:

Dreadnoughts(older battleships)

Heavy cruiser

Mountain infantry unit

Light cavalry

Possible escort carrier

Heavy armour(so we have light, medium, heavy)

Light/heavy artillery

ADDITIONAL FEATURES:

Land mines

Sea mines(perhaps minesweeper unit?)

Bridges - very important even on strategic scale

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You can replicate what you want in the editor. This all started because I used a minor country's CV unit to simulate a CVL for the Solomons campaign.

In BF1939 I simulated ASW specialized aircraft in a similar fashion using a minors STR bombers.

You just have to be creative enough and just about anything is possible in the editor.

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