Hubert Cater

Thanks Brian and I can confirm that these bugs have all been corrected for the first patch. Hubert

I actually look forward to seeing this one as well, doesn't seem to be on the repository anymore though? Nupremal is definitely a great talent and as for the future there might be a few more surprises from him so I am glad those that have seen his map like his work Regarding his map size as mentioned before we needed something to release that was playable on most systems and while a larger map is great for multiplayer which is why I increased the maximum map size for mods such as these, there are still technical issues that wouldn't make for an optimal release if only very few systems could handle it. Either way, the nice thing about the Global release is that mods such as these are possible and in the end it is a best of both worlds is it not? Hubert Edit: I see the file now

Looks fantastic Al, very nice mod as this is the first I've seen of it as well

Gypsy, Glad to hear you are enjoying the game and for the Japanese units some of these are unfortunately tied into the AI, i.e. they were added to help AI plan their invasions and after testing we felt that their placements would help out the Japanese human player as well so we left them in. That being said as I said earlier I can see how some of these unannounced units might come as a surprise and I can try and add in a few popups to warn players of their arrivals. Hubert

Good points and we can certainly lower this

Thanks Brian, much appreciated

Thank you and regarding the free units it is unfortunately a little unpractical. Don't get me wrong I can understand the feeling but there are simply too many of these to have popups warning you of their future arrivals. This is really no different then what we had in previous releases, i.e. there are just more of them in this release but one thing I could possibly add are some notes in future releases in the manual describing these free units a bit more in detail. Even still this is a slippery slope as the same could be said for many of the other game events that only trigger depending on player action and so on. For example, in earlier releases we had the Siberian reserves for the USSR and again these only triggered if the Axis player advanced far enough into Russia and so on. My guess is that after a few games these will not be as surprising and more or less expected much like the Siberian reserves were in the older games. Actually I agree and that was my entire point. As it stands now, i.e. with the current setup those are exactly the risks you run if you decide as the British to aggressively move your naval units towards the Pacific in the early game. If on the other hand we simply gave the UK player all their naval units, as xwormwood suggested, whether it was on the map or on the P/Q (remember P/Q units arrive at the UK in the Atlantic) and let them decide where to send them, then you potentially have one of three situations. 1) They split their forces accordingly between the Atlantic and Pacific 2) They keep them all in the Atlantic throwing off the balance there 3) They send them all to the Pacific throwing off the balance in the Pacific True there are pros and cons to any of these decisions but like I mentioned numbers 2 and 3 just had too many exploitations because a player could easily dominate in the Atlantic and once Germany is dealt with shift their focus to the Pacific which is entirely possible because the UK is not at war in the Pacific until late 1941 in most cases. Then if you have active minors in the Pacific why not just DoW Japan as the UK in the early game because it is really easy to do so and then the game just doesn't play well at all at that point. It is essentially unbalanced and not historical anymore. Like I said we tried many of these setups and none of them worked which is why we settled with the current setup. I'd say you are not too far off at all with this assessment and keeping in mind game mechanics and what we can and cannot do, much of what you have outlined above is what we actually have in place. As it stands now and as mentioned previously, taking the DEI before Japan can take it REALLY hurts Japan and it is in most cases game over for Japan. Remember we are balancing the game for the AI and Multiplayer and by having Neutral Pacific minors for the UK it allows us to control their entry and penalize the UK for aggressive action in the Pacific prior to Japan waging all out war there. We also lower the US entry into the war as well as provide a longer oil trade from the US to Japan than what happened historically. These elements combined with the increased difficulty factor for the UK to take the DEI, i.e. if it doesn't have access to their additional minor units in the Pacific thus risking the Home Island and North Africa really balance it out. Now it is a gambit as otherwise it would not have been. We were just waiting for players to figure this one out but since the discussion started on the implementation of the Pacific we unfortunately felt the need to describe this fully (much of the design revolves around this gambit and any other a-historical strikes by the UK in this theater) and that is a bit too bad but it would have come to this eventually. Remember a part of the big problem is that while Japan is at war only with China the UK is at war with Germany and there is nothing rules wise from it pre-emptively attacking Japan because it has the option to do so. We really needed to make sure that if it did, there were true pros and cons and while that might not immediately be apparent in the initial setup, I suspect the more you look at the map and the potential strategies that would have existed if we set it up any differently you would soon enough come to the same conlcusion that active UK minors in the Pacific or the option to fully control your fleet simply wouldn't work balance wise. I guess I would just say that a single theater is much easier to balance but like I said above when you have active combatants that can declare war on each other at any time you really need to think about the pros and cons much more carefully. All this is saying is that just like Germany that can declare war on the USSR at any time, the UK in the Global game has the same power regarding Japan even if it never happened historically. Again, the problem with the Australian units is not so much as to remove control or to annoy Tojo, but more about not killing the game because with those additional units the UK can take the DEI risk free... now there is a risk and those Australian units only appear if Rommel presses hard enough etc.

Yes, if you can please send me the saved game file, thanks!

If it can be added to a script that is not a problem at all, I just need to know what item it is because like you've mentioned the other thread is a bit difficult to sift through. If you've seen my last post there I'm asking for a list of items as that would enable everyone to get on the same page and make any potential changes that much easier to identify.

Thanks Colin and I just want to reiterate that we are of course always open to suggestions and since this thread has many ideas and many proposals, what would be great is if anyone would like to list their main objections in order with suggested alternatives, I'd be willing to provide further context for our implementation and provide feedback on any of the new ideas. As it is now it is a little difficult to do so as the thread is a bit all over the place. PowerGmbH also makes a good point on the units such as the German Motorized Company and we can always add this to the higher difficulty levels as needed.

This might be an elicense issue, can you refer to the following to see if this helps? Elicense and DEP: http://www.battlefront.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=46&Itemid=30 Hubert

Yes, disc copies are possible and work just fine as the game is only licensed when you install, until then the installer that comes via the download, or CD, is just a file like any other file.

Very true SeaMonkey and I hope that some of our responses convey the idea that while it may feel that the design is hampering too much, for us overall game play was definitely the ultimate goal... well here's hoping Hubert

Right now the British can move their Fleet to the Pacific and there are no penalties so what you've described above is certainly possible, although granted not right to their ports that are still Neutral, but India, Australia and New Zealand are all options. I should add that if we did enable these minors, such as Singapore instead of leaving them Neutral there are also issues, beyond what Bill alluded to, such as losing play balance in the European Theater if the UK has access to these early MPPs and a few potential biggies such as the UK having the ability to pre-emptively attack Japan which we found to be a game killer. Once you figured out the formula it was a no brainer and we discussed this heavily without finding a better solution. Cat out of the bag is essentially the DEI and if the UK can take it before Japan can it is game over. It is still possible but it is very risky, very difficult and now comes at a cost of either the UK itself or Africa etc. and even then only if you can pull it off. Even if you penalize the UK it didn't make a difference and even if you seriously delayed the US arrival it made no difference. Once Japan loses the DEI and the US oil convoys and has little MPP there is not much for it to do as eventually the US will join and finish her off. Believe me we went through a lot of permutations before finalizing what we have now. Now on the other hand, if we are talking about giving the British the bulk of their naval OOB instead of breaking it up into arrivals for the Pacific or European Theaters as xwormwood suggests and then adding in penalties to compensate for unbalancing movement with pros and cons there are also quite a few issues. For arguments sake, let's say we do just this, the UK has a more significant fleet and can then decide where it wants to send their units, stay in the Pacific or go to the European Theater. Problem right off the bat is that if they stay in Europe then the European Theater is immediately imbalanced. No chance for a Battle of the Atlantic, no threat of Sea Lion etc. and immediately an entire naval theater is rendered inept. Again this is more than possible as Japan is not really in much of a position to do anything until 1941 so the UK has 2 years to harrass German coastlines and build up experience before sailing off to completely dominate Japan in the Pacific. By maintaining the current implementation, despite what might feel like a straight jacket, we have balance in both theaters and they both remain interesting, i.e. the UK can still send their Fleet off to the Pacific with the consequence of abandoning the Atlantic and the potential fallout that would go with that. Essentially we felt the current implementation, even though it might feel it is in stronger terms than in previous releases, would play closer to the historical context and ultimately player decisions would be closer to reflecting the tough reality the UK Navy needed to endure. There is a good point here in that we could have added an additional popup informing the Japanese player of the future unit arrivals for Op Z or simply added them to the P/Q, my mistake as this was added late in development to help Japan, but in many cases the scripted reinforcements are needed as they arrive in a specific location and again to maintain play balance as described in my earlier post.

As always we certainly appreciate feedback, and while I rarely take exception to a particular comment, I really couldn't let this one slide. Not for me mind you, but completely out of respect for the designers and testers that were involved in the development of this game. I can't even begin to tell you how many volunteer hours and discussions were put into this game and while I can understand and accept any disagreement with the design, in fairness to them what you have described as points of contention does not mean they did not do exactly what you've described above, rather we may have just come to different conclusions. Remember we had play tested this one quite heavily and much of what you have outlined in your posts was actually addressed many times as the game evolved, i.e. as Bill has already alluded to in his response post. I guess the major point here is that as mentioned we simply came to differing conclusions which I will attempt to describe further below. The problem with this is that from very near to the beginning of development these free units were never 'either or' in intention. All this means was that in order to maintain balance these units were never considered for any other theater except for the ones they are scripted to arrive. For example, you mention the Australian units showing up in Egypt and the fact of the matter is that these units were never included until play balance needed addressing, i.e. Australia already had her full complement of units but after finding in Multiplayer that Egypt was still too easy to take we decided to include these units in a similar manner as they were included in the original European Theater campaigns. Again, why not then include these units in Australia's OOB if we are just going to add them to Egypt? Why not let the player decide where they go etc.? Well the catch is in attempting to balance both theaters and maintain playability as well as somewhat of a historical context. All this means is that Australia was found to already be balanced in the Pacific Theater so if we add these extra units to Australia then we have one of two situations. 1) The human player sends them to Egypt and balance is maintained or 2) They use these new free units in the Pacific potentially throwing off the balance. Remember some of the free units that Egypt receives, including the Australian ones, only arrive if the situation warrants it so even here they will not necessarily arrive in every game and there is a lot of this throughout the campaign. For example, the US only receives some additional units if it is invaded directly and again we don't have these units otherwise arrive on the map in order to maintain play balance. In the Pacific portion of GC we found quite a few exploits if the Allied player does play in hindsight and they were game killers, much as Bill alluded to in his post, and while some may not like that we kept the Allied minors in the Pacific neutral it at least allowed us to keep this theater playable. This is again no different than what we found we had to do in earlier versions of SC and one example was in encouraging Allied players to maintain their North African Garrisons so as to not upset Italy and not throw off the balance in France and so on. Essentially we've had to do this many times over throughout the Global Campaign, and unfortunately sometimes in stronger terms. Some of the other items such as the automatically scripted Fall of Singapore were just AI helpers, this is really no different then how we handle Norway with Germany, and while we discussed it quite a bit the overall reaction in testing was much like how Robert described, shocking and as a result felt it was acceptable in terms of the historical context. But this, much like the free HQ and German Corps in Abyssinia are simply scripted and can easily be disabled as desired. As for the Amphibs sitting offshore, a part of this is the AI scripting as it was incredibly hard with the game mechanics to even get the Japanese AI to pull off all of the simultaneous invasions and attacks and sometimes the AI unfortunately drops an Amphib in a spotted location which of course a human player would never do. Again it is not perfect but considering that the scripts for the Pacific Theater release were much easier to implement as the Op Z campaign there starts with all the invasion units already in position, I can live with this one fault as the AI in Global not only has to ensure enough units are produced, but build up their Fleet and Transports and get into position in about 10 different places on the map and simultaneously launch an effective result. As good as I wanted it to be it just never handled Singapore to my satisfaction and as mentioned above the helper was added to simply move things along. I think most of the feedback pretty much falls into some of what I've described above and while it may not change anyone's mind I just felt that some background on the decisions might paint a better picture or at least provide some more context.

I knew someone would finally figure it out!

Good to hear and I think with the scale we selected it shouldn't be too bad and pretty playable. I think you'll find that after a few turns it is more than manageable and you'll be happy you have full control of each side for all the critical decisions. Happy gaming Hubert

Samichlaus, likely Japan was never at war with the USSR and as KvP suggests this can be accomplished using the War Map by selecting Japan and then declaring war on the USSR. The reason you were able to attack USSR units with Japan in other locations is simply a game mechanism we needed to put into place to prevent exploits. For example, you could have a situation where Japan is at war with China but Japan is not yet at war with the UK. If the UK moved units into China then Japan would need to be able to attack these units otherwise China can garrison critical locations and Japan would not be able to do anything about it.

Thanks Preusse, this was a bug and I've just made the correction on my end.

Some of these were already answered so I'll just quickly add a few comments on the remaining ones: 3. This was just a game play decision as often transports move in clusters and usually larger clusters than let's say a single destroyer here and there (or even any other capital ship type) and it just helps to speed things up on moving these units around the map as they are more point A to point B than the other naval unit types. This helps not only break down the tediousness for multiplayer games but also it helps the AI out a bit as well. That being said it has never really come up as a major issue and one that we are not married to and we might even increase the range of all naval unit types as some are leaning in that direction as well. 4b. This was just part of one of the new features for Global where minors can share the research of their parent but at a increased cost. We then leave the decision up to the player. 4c. Just another new option and again up to the player as there are pros and cons, i.e. would the German player rather have their own German units attached or Italian ones etc.

Thanks gentlemen, I will take a look this week to correct these and sorry about the errors.

Thanks U8led, I've just fixed this on my end as well. Hubert

Ironically enough... Masterclaude didn't fool me

Hi Gwgardner, Screenshots are of course allowed and hopefully some will be posted along with an AAR soon enough, but in the meantime I agree with Bo, feel free to take advantage of the DEMO found here: http://www.battlefront.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1585&Itemid=318

Hi Yolo, It might be better for you to tell us specifically which parts you don't understand but the general idea is that resource strengths will vary based on their positions on the map, i.e. a resource that is not cutoff and can trace a path of friendly tiles to a capital will be at full strength and those that are not will have lower values. Then if you multiply the resource strength shown on the map by the multiplier shown in chart on page 18, the sum of these will total the amount of MPP you collect per turn. Hope this helps, Hubert