Hubert Cater

5% each 'allied' turn, so you are looking at around 600 MPP Edit: This value also changes depending on the level you decide to play at. Two new levels have been introduced and 5% reflects beginner level so it could then go up or down depending on which level you choose. The levels are: Green Novice Beginner (Default) Intermediate Expert [ May 08, 2002, 12:25 PM: Message edited by: Hubert Cater ]

Ok let me clarify, by geography the three Allied powers are separated and this is what I meant by spheres of influence. Now you're right that the UK and Russia can both have interests in the mideast and well so can the US, but this is entirely up to you and how you decide to play since you control all three sides at once. They may also have vested interests together in other areas and as vonManstein alluded to, you can play them independantly or collectively, it's up to you. What I meant by "should" is that if for example you have all three sides knocking on Germany's front door it may be to your advantage to coordinate your attacks, but if you choose not to, again that's up to you. Hope that helps, Hubert

There are a couple of spots on the map where I picked one flag just because the size of the territories, sorry about that

Yes and no, since the russians are not active in the game until they enter the war, they do not collect regular income each turn. So what happens is that the russians collect about 5% of their income each allied turn until they get involved, so the idea is to try and balance out your strategies with when you think they might get involved, i.e. the longer you wait the more money they will have and so on. On top of this the number of units they start with will depend on when they get involved, again more the longer you wait. Then once involved they collect their full income

Riga does become a regular city and the port at Sevastapol has a fortification which does not give MPP as income. And one of the reasons the Germans were so interested...

480 MPP

Bold attacks by the Allies are possible and would be a part of the "what-if", but it's not to say that it would be easy. The current design considers that really nobody was prepared for war and really only the Germans wanted war, so to reflect the slight dissarray in the Allied camps, they do not start with HQ's (which has been alluded to can be very important to any offensive) and the Allies will require a bit of building up to get their house in order. The things that the Brits, French and Poles do have going for them is a combined air force comparable to the Luftwaffe, (but it is separated and difficult to coordinate like the German air units) and the French and Royal Navy are formidable. Also consider the political consequences of aggressive actions by the Allies early on in the war and how that will affect the mostly pacifict movement that existed in the US at that time. Nonetheless, like I have said before, there can be some interesting results with an aggressive and bold move by the Allies early on. Hubert

Although unit prices are of the same standard they do vary depending upon research and development, so there will be a variation during game play for different countries as well as for each campaign. To answer some of the other questions, MPP's are not only used for purchases, transport and operational movement, but also for research as well as for reinforcing/upgrading weakened units. So that 660 Battleship might start to look a little less attractive and more expensive once you really get into the thick of things. As an example it could be purchased early on (by the German player) to duke it out in the Battle of the Atlantic, but it might leave you short of some material for future offensives/defensives down the road. Careful strategic planning and balancing will be required when considering the future possibilities/options Cities return 1 MPP * operational efficiency/strength Capitals 2 MPP Ports 1 MPP Mines 2 MPP Oil 3 MPP Supply and strength of cities/resources depend on a number of factors and most have to do with drawing a direct line to your capital. Strengths of resources also depend on whether or not it is occupied or a friendly resource and it's too much detail to spill out here (i've given some basis previously in other threads), but it's intuitive and will be included in a table in the user manual. The US resources are just like any other resources but should be considered as an abstraction of half of their total considering their own two front war including the Pacific. [ May 07, 2002, 05:53 PM: Message edited by: Hubert Cater ]

Essentially you're correct, but for this game it was just a design decision and for the most part I would say that they do play as separate powers with a common goal in mind kind of thing. They each have their own sphere of influence and thus their own problems dealing with the Axis powers. Now purely dependant on the type of game you decide to play, but in most cases it really won't be until the end of the war (if they've got the Axis on the run) that their strategies become more coordinated as they probably should be.

Thanks guys!

Good points, the commitment percentages only applies to majors and for all modes of play were kept in there. But as I am in the process of cleaning up the FoW messages (kept in there until the end just to make sure the AI was playing properly) this will most likely be hidden for this mode of play.

Okay now I am really ashamed of myself considering my Slovenian/Yugoslavian roots Anybody know what the Yugoslavian flag looked like in 1939, or perhaps a link? Thanks, Hubert

Agreed I think the idea would be fantastic! No problems linking to the forum, but if you use the screenshots all you've got to do is give credit to Battlefront.com and Fury Software. Again this sounds really good

Each major country will have it's own icons, so the option already exists for someone if they would like to change these. All subsequent minors have their own set as well, i.e. one for allied minors and one set for axis minors The three icons that change over time and that are dependant on research are the "tank", "airfleet" and "strategic bombers" icons. These change as you develop 'heavy tanks', 'jet aircraft' and 'heavy bombers' research

Too funny! Sometimes things will make perfect sense to me as I write them but after rereading it I can see how it might start to feel like your back in highschool taking Calculus all over again As far as game play goes I think you are right, I tried to make it as intuitive as possible so it should not really be a huge problem, but for the mathematical diehards I will be including all the formulas used just in case...

I'm actually Canadian, does this make it worse

Not exactly, what an HQ can give out is also dependant on it's supply value, i.e. it drops as it's own supply value drops but remains at a level that still makes it attractive to keep them around As you've pointed out chaining HQ's can help or just strategically placing them in the right supply spot/distance can be of a great benefit. The readiness formula is based on supply, strength and leadership rating, so supply alone will not necessarily reduce a unit to 50% readiness Letting a unit sit still will not increase it's readiness, but reinforcing to the max value, or moving in the right HQ will have it's readiness benefits when not in combat or preparing for an upcoming assault. Also letting a unit sit can be beneficial for defence purposes as the unit will automatically entrench itself each turn it is not used, up to the maximum entrenchment value for that particular hex.

Disbanding a unit does not return any bonuses from the experiences that unit gained since it only returns MPP's to purchase new units... which btw thinking about it now is maybe a good thing so as to pay a small penalty if you decide to disband and discourage wholesale disbanding which could be close to a form of cheating on some occasions during game play. To answer the second post, maximum reinforcement value is partially dependant on current supply, so if playing as Germany in the USSR and the Soviets are using the scorced earth strategy, driving deep too quick could be costly if in need of reinforcement as you could be in low supply. In your home countries for the most part your cities will be running at 100% efficiency and thus your units will be in good supply and have a good max reinforcement value.

Great points on weather and some of the production irregularities, and in many ways I agree. Honest answer is again that I had to limit a few things and deal with them as best as I could in trying to get this game done in a reasonable manner. This is not to say that any of these issues will detract from great game, which btw none of these have ever come up in beta testing which I think is a very good sign No points are being discounted and I am keeping track of everything, some will make it in for the final release and most will see the light of day in some form or another down the road.

Cool

Fair enough and I apologize if I seemed curt I do understand the concerns and I would like to make it as accurate as possible (I'll change Frankfurt to Cologne ), it's just that some things are done for a reason that may not be immediately apparent until the game is actually played or because of design limitations. And honestly, for some of these, in a way I don't want to get into the habit of defending each one because then otherwise the game will never get finished as I would spend more time here than actually coding :eek: So just to let you know the exact answer to another question "why there are two cities along the Rhine as opposed to the inclusion of Vienna?", the basic idea here is that each city represents a portion of a countries income, that said, each one of these resources can be damaged by strategic bombing of some sort, so since much of Germany's industrial hearland was in the Ruhr/Rhine area it makes more sense from a gameplay standpoint to make these targets available to the Allied player i.e. US/UK bombers (from England) to target and damage in order to hinder the German income rather than swap for a city that may never get touched kind of thing. So then it was just a toss up between including either Prague or Vienna, so I went with Prague. Btw this also made sense to move the mine icon up into the Ruhr area as you've suggested so I did this Suggestions are always welcome, and I think that since I have incorporated many of them it shows that I am very flexible, but by the same token you've just got to trust me on the few of them that I do turn down Hubert

Honestly the game offers much more than the exact locations of a few cities, and this is not something that I really think is all that important, but if giving you a few more details will close this subject I am more than willing to do so. In general map hexes cannot contain both a river and a city hex (either or only), so by moving Essen down a hex, the river will have to be redrawn and you will not get the nice elbow that's in there. Besides if moved down 1 hex it will be lower than Brussels which would definitly not be geographically correct. So like I said, imagine that it is in the lower left corner of the hex. As for Frankfurt I don't think it's really that big a deal, but if renaming it Cologne will help then I can do that. Believe me that there are many, many, many such inacuracies in the game and like I said I've dealt with them as best as I could given the system I was working with. You can take a look at Ted's screenshot of the big map (don't remember the exact thread it was in) and you will notice things like the eastern edge of Sicily starting roughly below Brussels when it should be started somwhere below Munich, or that Athens is located west of Sophia when it should be east and so on. As far as the map goes right now I am more than satisfied and strongly feel that it gives you the main idea. Like I said before sorry but you are just going to have to live with it

Sorry Straha that's as good as it's going to get Like I said there is a limitation to the hex based system and how things have been implemented. What you are going to have to do is imagine that the city is located in that hex but not necessarily right in the center of the hex. So for Essen imagine that it is located at the bottom left corner of the hex, for Frankfurt it's located near the bottom of the hex and Prague would be actually located in the top portion of the hex or something like that. Looking at it this way you might agree that it's close enough

I agree that I'd like to think that most people are trustworthy so I'll leave the current implementation as is and see what everyone thinks before considering any more draconian measures Hubert

Thanks, disbanding takes into consideration current supply of the unit and it's current strength