Glabro

That is interesting, however, the official campaign with decision events etc. is hard to give up on. I'll have to take a look. In my mind, ground recon is essential to have. Therefore, the old corps-style units should signify light reconnaissance units with 5 AP and spotting 3, and capable of taking and controlling undefended locations, but even less able to hold positions compared to garrisons. These are needed so that the actual corps units don't have to perform "menial" tasks like scouting and taking of undefended villages.

Well, studying the editor I at least have some grasp of what there is to be done to "downscale" the SoE campaign to all corps: besides changing the actual units on the map at the start (and researching to find out which units served under what corps in Poland, if for nothing else than for the sake of naming), I'd have to edit all the unit entry scripts. Of course, corps would have to be the "standard" combat unit with the stats of army-sized units to bring things into line with the strength of Panzerkorps. This would probably de-emphasize tanks, which based on the AAR might not be a bad thing. But would there then be none of the old "korps"-sized units? Would one have to change the old Korps-sized units into divisions instead (by multiplying them). Then, do we need to add more HQs because the current ones aren't enough to cover all the new units... I assume one can't change the name of units either, so then "corps" would be armies and corps would be divisions. So in that light sacrificing the "small but fast" unit type might be required. This is a lot to think about, maybe it warrants a separate thread.

Yes, having the "big" units be corps and the smaller ones divisions might indeed work best if one wants a closer simulation, it would be pretty epic as well. It's probably quite a bit of work to mod, so I'll see about it - but would be best if someone who actually knows the editor does it.

The problem keeps recurring, and it seems it happens only when I get really many completions / breakthroughs in research - like 3 at once. Or then it's my luck again! Maybe it's just my PC though, just thought I'd throw it out there.

Nah, the Bulgarians decided not to advance for 5 more rounds (just needed that one more success) and then I made a brainfart of cataclysmic proportions and operated the Constantinople garrison away to secure another less important port city, and promptly on the next turn the Soviets landed on Constantinople. D'oh. So, I lost the whole thing partly because I didn't have those Bulgarian troops to secure my borders, but more because of that. We might continue from before I made that stupid brainfart, though, just to see how the game would've ended otherwise.

The odds are so low (We're talking tens of turns here) that I find it more likely that there is an unknown factor at play rather than just bad luck. But I suppose if you say so, Bill, nothing can be done about it. I will make an experiment though: I will load a turn and press end turn twenty times if I have to see if I get a diplomatic success (unless the end turn results are pre-determined, which I don't think they are based on my earlier "crash" and redoing of a turn). Edit: I got a hit on the 6th try, apparently with 20% opposition from the Entente (so if it outright reduces chances, it's with a 40% chance). Probably I'm just having consistently bad luck then with Bulgaria as you said...hard though it may be to believe since the odds are something like one in ten thousand...(for failing ten turns in a row with 60% chance). I did manage to beat back the Entente in a bloody way from Hungary with German assistance just like you said, Bill. I can do this thing with or without the cowardly (no offense intended in real life) Bulgarians! Perhaps the reluctance of the Bulgars is what made the Entente attack there, enabling me to defeat them, so it may have even played to my favor somewhat. Now though, it's past time!

Well, good to know it's happening with others too. I'm actually on the defensive in Serbia due to Entente landings in Albania, so if they won't join with normal diplomacy, I'm going to be very pissed.

Ever since I noticed that Bulgaria had 70% readiness on its own at the turn of the year (1914-1915) I invested all the chits the Central Powers have on Bulgaria. I have had exactly one diplomacy hit, and now it's August 28 1915, and this is with 65% chance per turn. This is beyond bad luck, and before you say it, my opponent tells me he hasn't invested anything in Bulgaria, so unless he flat-out lied to my face for no reason, something's up with the scripts, for this game, at least. Has anyone had similar experiences? Am I not supposed to invest in Bulgaria and let it enter the war on its own terms? If so, I've wasted my diplomacy efforts big time, there was no documentation for this.

Hmmm...well, it was a one-off, so probably a freak accident. I'm running a normalized build Call to Arms with 1.02. Well, will just have to bear with the losses incurred from this.

Ah, sorry. I'm running Windows 7. Here's the report: [08/20/2011 1:32:07; 6.1.7600; 1680x1050x32(1); v1.02] DIRECTX FAILED(draw_map_to_screen): dderr_generic [08/21/2011 11:40:55; 6.1.7600; 1680x1050x32(1); v1.02] DIRECTX FAILED(draw_map_to_screen): dderr_generic [08/29/2011 4:40:06; 6.1.7600; 1680x1050x32(1); v1.02] FAILED(make): 0x80004001 Not implemented So it looks like it's some sort of a java graphics error. I'm running a middle of the line ATI GPU.

Hi, I just had an....interesting experience, when right at the end of an excellent turn while saving, the game crashes with an error message. Any idea what might cause this to prevent it from happening EVER again? Now I will have to replay the turn n times for hours to get the same breakthroughs I got at the end, and with the foreknowledge of enemy deployments affecting my decisions. It's quite, quite annoying in PBEM.

Well, in my mind, making the Infrastructure tech more worth it by limiting the rail transports would be a good idea.

My opponent was apparently on the ball even before I asked him to! In any case, it's good to have a direct line to the developers - makes you really feel involved with the game. Thanks for fixing it.

I'll send you a turn and ask my oppponent to e-mail you his password. Thanks.

We'll see, but the benefits of the defensive line might outweigh all that. Depending on how well the Austrians can hold the Italians at bay, Italy might become the next battlefield instead of France, and it can provide another access route to the Industrially rich French south. Another option is to try and get the Swiss on your side. But time will tell, I'm not the most experienced player of this game with just one campaign victory under my belt, haven't tried it against the AI yet. Next time I'll be sure to try the all-out Schlieffen plan. In history it might have been the dumbest move possible because of the UK entry into the war because of it, but in this game it understandably doesn't matter if Belgium is invaded or not - wouldn't be much of a game without the UK in it.

Hi, In my latest e-mail game, I was surprised to discover that Innsbruck had been captured by a French unit via Italy, and apparently the unit was only able to move and enter into Italy via using the Forced March feature - not by normal movement. This seems like a clear bug to me, and would be a game-ender if my opponent hadn't agreed to redo the last turn (where he captures Innsbruch). I have a low tolerance for bug abuse, and thus would have forfeited the game unless this would be done (not that I pressured him into it - he suggested it himself.) I've still lost the border towns, of course, but I might be able to build a new detachment to capture them before Italy joins. That's funds I can't afford right now, though - we'll see if the game is spoiled. I suppose we can make a gentleman's agreement that he won't advance on the towns illegally captured when Italy joins until I've got my guys in there (because I can't use rail transport to get there instantly).

You misunderstand. Obviously you have to leave a defensive line from Belgium to the Black Forest, capturing Luxembourg. Whether the Entente is effectively able to assault that straight line (East-West lines are so much easier to defend in this game) until heavy equipment is brought in is an altogether different matter; I think the main effect is that it will ensure the British will ship everything to Egypt.

So even with a Russian defeat / armistice in say 1915 or 1916, the CP will find it hard to win? I find that hard to believe, but we'll see. The point is to balance the fronts: currently it does not even make sense to go west, but instead shift everything east because there are no downsides to knocking Russia out of the war; it doesn't tie down any of your resources. It's quite hard to crack France, on the other hand. Maybe these two fronts need to be balanced as options to attack? Make it more taxing to hold Russia away after Brest-Litovsk, but make it slightly easier to win in the West perhaps? I bears thinking about.

There is still a lot of seemingly unnecessary slowness. For example, why is there a long delay between event messages? It seems to me the scripts are somehow really slow, but I guess it comes with the territory when you are a small dev team compared to something like Paradox, the code might not be so "tight". The thing I'm missing, though, is the single player turn replay feature (show AI moves). I had to alt-tab away between single player turns because it took 15-20 mins, and when I got back, I had no way of seeing the replay. That basically made me decide that I would stick with multiplayer. But the replay would be nice - then I wouldn't mind if the AI took an hour, as long as it was really good.

Well, I got two friends interested, one more playing. Now that we're getting greedy, what would be cool would be a 1944 D-Day scenario with the whole ETO map, and based around trying to survive as Germany, with national morale playing a huge part for the Allies (possible US/UK scaling back or even withdrawal if the invasion fails completely with huge losses, and with the Soviets starting to be stretched to the limit). It would make for a great scenario to really test the axis player, making it ideal where there is a skill mismatch as well.

Well, when you get down to it, what would be the elements we'd be willing to give up for simplicity's sake? I find it a bit hard to start making a list, but what I do know is that I want the next game to be smooth. SC2's engine seems to be quite cumbersome. What about a global Cold War going hot scenario? There are few of those around. Of course, strategic weapons would have to be limited due to MAD, I just wonder if was really possible both sides would be scared into playing fair, even on the losing side? Maybe it'd make for an interesting human experiment, since the focus is on multiplayer. The best period would then be before ICBMs, when Europe, the Pacific and even the Soviet Far East and Alaska would become battlegrounds. Maybe it could all start from the late 1948 splitting of Korea going wrong. I hear you on the fantasy front, I just don't think that's something Battlefront will consider for their audience.

I could go for that. I liked SC1, but it had big balance problems and we had big fights on the forum about stuff like air power (for the longest time people adamantly defended the game and how it was entirely realistic that air power alone would blast entire armies into oblivion, but I've learned that's how it is on every forum dedicated to a certain subject in the Net - people are loyal to a fault), a problem compounded by the fact that the same unit served as both fighters and tac air (a reasonable proposition for this scale, but the problem is that units gathered experience from ground attacks for air combat purposes and vice versa, making them unstoppable for both purposes). Anyway. The smoothness of SC1 (with an improved map and balance) as well as the best additions of SC2 could make for a nice and approachable game.

Well, I just bought the game because of support like this. In addition to a great WWI game, you've basically given out the definitive version of SC2 WW2 as well. Good job.