Big Al's historical Mod v1.2 is in CMODs

[Big Al]

yes with AI and a fat readme file

Big Al's historical Mod v1.2 is in CMODs

[Big Al]

1 mistake Japan's infantry weapons should be 0 and 0 points invested.

[Big Al]

It is 12:20 am EST october 30. I am now reloading the mod.

I fixed a critical error that involved the new production system and operational movement and added some convoy defense scripts. So please download after this update.

[Big Al]

I have a new new NEW corrected version now 1.21.

I will upload it as soon as CMODs comes back. I am correcting problems as I playtest.

[Samichlaus]

I have a new new NEW corrected version now 1.21.

Great. Since you wrote that you implemented allied AI, I will start playtesting it today!

Sami

[Big Al]

I have one more upload Sami I have to put up. More bugs I found early in the war.

Late war I have not tested yet.

[Samichlaus]

Playing your scenario I found something that REALLY needs correction: there are no jungle hexes in your game. In Asia most jungle hexes are actually mountain hexes. It also seems you (as Nupremal did) dropped the Molotov-Ribbentrop decision event (something I can live with, but wanted to mention it). I like, btw, your world map. I think that leaving out some areas (like southern africa) as a trade in for a bigger european map is fine. The same is true for the reduced US map. IMHO the best way to overcome the map size restrictions.

And: why don't you use the smaller resource graphics (introduced by Honch as far as I remember)? This is also true for Nupremal's world map. I find that the smaller town and resource icons fit more into the big world scale.

[Big Al]

I'll take a look at the smaller graphics. Didn't know they were there.

The pacific does have lots of jungles its just some hexes I couldnt fit them because even though they were land looking they are sea hexes. India, and indonesia are mostly jungle.

Also I have been having trouble making France surrender. I have to actually reduce the # of units for france to fit the 6% x # of units remaining.

Also there was a mess up in production AGAIN. The AI keep buy the cheapest unit AA guns. instead of what it should.

I am fixing it this weekend.

[John DiFool the 2nd]

I assume this is for Waw (nowhere in any of the threads or the readme is the game version mentioned, tho with most of the threads being in the WaW forum I'd assume that is what runs it). Anyway it won't run for me (is not visible in the game) in patched WaW-attempting to load it in the editor gives me an error relating to a missing naval loop script file.

[Big Al]

Its for PDE

If there is a way to dumb it down to WaW I will gladly do it.

[John DiFool the 2nd]

OIC, so why are the threads in the WaW forum?

Guess I'll spring for PDE then...

[Big Al]

I dunno bro

[John DiFool the 2nd]

Alright, took a quick look at it (haven't played any turns yet), doesn't look too bad, with the notable exception of the fractured US. I am glad you managed to keep the Euro map the same size while still putting in a viable Pacific theatre, but North America just looks bizarre, if workable. My second quibble might be with the relative lack of Ural and/or Siberian mines/oil wells-in the original world scenario the USSR was almost bare. Here it does have 3 oil wells in the Caucasus, but the Urals contain much less than they do in vanilla, and there's only one Siberian mine. Perhaps all the Siberian towns will compensate, but I'll reserve final judgement for my playtest (a gaming buddy has been bugging me to play a WW2 global scenario for eons now-he'll be Germany/Italy and I'll take Japan). I'll keep a special eye on the Allied Pacific AI, which was AWOL in the original scenario.

[Big Al]

The AI past Jan 1942 is untested BTW. Also the split in the USA was needed due to the limitations of the map and how the real world was shaped. If I didnt do that the USA would be accurate but Aisa would be at the bottom of the map and Europe at the top. Also I couldnt fit in the USA as a whole I couldnt even squeeze it in there. I suggest you wait till I upload tonight's version.

As for Russia. Between the Urals and Siberia (Im putting in a convoy tonight) its 100 MPPs. In total the USSR has 280 MPPs. Yes they had factories in the Urals and a lot of them. But there were a lot of important industries around Moscow and the Baku oil fields were much more important that you realize. Some key parts were made near the moscow area like optics for variance scopes. Oil was not only part of fuel but also part of machinery. Without it trucks couldnt bring raw material to the factories and factories can't run without oil. So I thought the USSR could move 2/3 of their industry to the urals effectively but if the oil fields were taken they would lose 40% of that ~80 MPPs production. If the Soviets are driven to the urals they are done for as is. Most of the population to make armiess live in main land eastern europe not the Urals. So there were a lot of factors to take into consideration. Also since the system really doesnt allow for the movement of factories its kinda hard to do. In a historical game the USSR is only losing 50 MPPs of production due to German occupation which leaves 230 MPPs left. Its not unreasonable. Also I balance the production with conscripted units that come into play at the start of Barbarosa. I did a lot of research for this game. Now I am balancing it.

The new version has free french colonies if Germans say no to Vichy and the US prewar production was cut in 1/2. I found they build waaaaay to much stuff before coming in. almost as much as Germany and in reality it was about 1/2 (according to my calculations)

It should be up by 10pm EST.

[John DiFool the 2nd]

Constructive criticism, played to late '42 as Axis:

Very ambitious scenario, and obviously a lot of thought has been put into it. The "split" USA may very well work out okay; the fact that the two parts of the map operate on different scales may not work out so well, but probably isn't fatal.

I'm not sure that the split USSR is workable tho. I had Japan attack Vladivostok right before the Germans commenced Barbarossa (historical start date) in the hope that it would prevent the Siberian transfers. Nope. You are certainly on the thorns of a dilemma here, as the game mechanics won't allow Russia to stay neutral vs. Japan while fighting Germany; do the Siberian SSR MPPs go into Russia's pool?

I am still convinced that Russia needs more mines: here's what she had in May '42, right before the summer offensives started up and after an almost perfectly historical '41 (BTW I managed to surround and destroy permanently about 5 armies and a couple of corps during Barbarossa):

15 Corps

5 Armies

2 Tanks (part of the Siberians I'd guess)

1 HQ

5 Fighters

This force is woefully inadequate to stop any German offensive, as in fact I had taken almost everything in the south by Sept. 42 with virtually no opposition (the AI piled most of its armies in front of Moscow, the ONE place I didn't attack that summer). Now perhaps the Japanese had something to do with that, but I only took Vladivostok and that other city N of Manchuria, and then the offensive foundered as I needed the MPPs to build up my fleet.

There probably should be an arrow or three linking the Middle East to India. China shares the same weather zone with central Europe, and overall new weather zones certainly could be put in, so that they are more independent of each other. The 0 MPP island towns (and islands with just a port, no town) have a problem; land units can check in but they can't check out, lacking the supply to re-embark. Yes I know you want to limit how many MPPs nations get from these podunk towns, but perhaps there is a better solution.

Japan needs to spend close to 2,000 MPPs to build its navy up to fighting strength (including elite reinforcements), which puts something of a crimp in what else they can purchase. I bought 2 more CVs, a tank and a mobile infantry, a tac air, some more corps, and 800 worth of tech and forsaked any offensives at all against the Chinese, and I only managed to attack the Allies in June '42, with the Yamato still stuck at 4 strength. Perhaps that is historical, maybe not; maybe I was too greedy. .

The biggest bug is this silly message I got each time I declared war on someone: "China switches sides", for example. Well that isn't so bad, but the effect of China "switching sides" (when Japan is already at war with her) was to have every single Japanese-controlled Chinese square flip to Chinese control! And even worse the little bastard was able to OPERATE units behind my lines, and even beefed up the AA of several of my cities!! Needless to say this completely porked the Japanese position, hosing down to zero the port of a crucial army I was going to use to help take the Netherlands East Indies, and allowing the bugger to operate two of his units into cities behind my lines before I could react.

There was no Yugo coup, which IMHO isn't a flaw because history shouldn't be as deterministic as it is in vanilla (something I argued about with Hubert long ago). They in fact went over to my control by June '42. Iraq was stuck on 76% Axis despite a rampaging Italian army which had just taken Saudi Arabia; perhaps there should be an additional trigger towards the Axis once they cross the Suez or something.

I read your designer notes about CVs and how you made them weak against land-based air and ground units, but there is a problem; with no marine-type unit able to assault units on small islands, that makes it very hard to root the garrisons out, requiring BBs/CAs and land based air to damage them (and remember that ships damage the city first then maybe the unit if they are lucky). I'd rethink that for playability purposes.

I know you said that the post-41 AI wasn't working yet, so I'll limit my comments about the AI. Here's US on-map forces as of Sept. 42:

6 HQ

4 corps

2 armies

1 armor

3 CV

2 BB (sunk 3 of them with Japanese CVs during a quasi Pearl Harbor)

2 CA

1 SS

14 fighters (!) most operated onto islands in the Pacific

1 tac bomber

1 strat bomber

They had just launched about 8 units on an amphib mission somewhere (North Africa I think), but without an escort.

The British had tons of air and land units crowded on their shores as of this time, with about 1500 MPPs unspent in reserve. Given that I only saw one corps sent down to Egypt (which fell after about 18 months of attrition vs. an Italian-only force), perhaps some scripts are in order there.

I am looking forward to seeing this scenario polished up and improved even more. You have a lot of work ahead but it should be worth it.

[Big Al]

Constructive criticism, played to late '42 as Axis:

Very ambitious scenario, and obviously a lot of thought has been put into it. The "split" USA may very well work out okay; the fact that the two parts of the map operate on different scales may not work out so well, but probably isn't fatal.

I'm not sure that the split USSR is workable tho. I had Japan attack Vladivostok right before the Germans commenced Barbarossa (historical start date) in the hope that it would prevent the Siberian transfers. Nope. You are certainly on the thorns of a dilemma here, as the game mechanics won't allow Russia to stay neutral vs. Japan while fighting Germany; do the Siberian SSR MPPs go into Russia's pool?

The Siberian Transfer is a bug that you made me realize as I read this. I am trying to find ways around it for the game. Its based on decision 4. "No" means Siberia keeps its units, "yes" means they dont and USSR gets them BUT if Siberia is DOWed on before Siberian transfer decision comes then both come in. And yes Siberia's MPPs go right into Russia. I played the scenario myself. I was thinking of a single soviet nation and that could work except then the soviets would just send their air over to Manchuria for Target practice even with scripts in the game I cant stop that.

UNITS: The Soviets were short on units when invaded. So I recalculated the MPPs and found them ~1000 MPPs short. So I made an early conscription script that pops up after USSR is @ 100% allied. 7 depleted armies for the soviets appear to deploy.

Also the AI was building too much crap and tech early, thus less units. If you only build armies you should be able to buy out the army force pool and have MPPs left over. I corrected purchasing for the AI also. If you focus on buying units the soviets should have a nice army by 1941.

I am still convinced that Russia needs more mines: here's what she had in May '42, right before the summer offensives started up and after an almost perfectly historical '41 (BTW I managed to surround and destroy permanently about 5 armies and a couple of corps during Barbarossa):

15 Corps

5 Armies

2 Tanks (part of the Siberians I'd guess)

1 HQ

5 Fighters

This force is woefully inadequate to stop any German offensive, as in fact I had taken almost everything in the south by Sept. 42 with virtually no opposition (the AI piled most of its armies in front of Moscow, the ONE place I didn't attack that summer). Now perhaps the Japanese had something to do with that, but I only took Vladivostok and that other city N of Manchuria, and then the offensive foundered as I needed the MPPs to build up my fleet.

See above answer. Their purchasing was off and they were short of MPPs which I both corrected. They should provide a much better defense now. I am currently testing a game myself before I place up the new version.

There probably should be an arrow or three linking the Middle East to India. China shares the same weather zone with central Europe, and overall new weather zones certainly could be put in, so that they are more independent of each other. The 0 MPP island towns (and islands with just a port, no town) have a problem; land units can check in but they can't check out, lacking the supply to re-embark. Yes I know you want to limit how many MPPs nations get from these podunk towns, but perhaps there is a better solution.

Hmm, I'll have to check that. I thought ports provided supply and units could leave. As for linking arrows... realistically there was no way you could move from Kuwait through the mountain deserts of Iran and Pakistan and the jungles of India. It would have to be by boat which can be done. If I could I would actually include all of asia linked but map size limitations were a problem. Weather zones I took off of World in Flames. I am not a meteorologist. Since they have a weather system that works (games been out for at least 10 years) I thought it would be prudent to use that instead of trying to figure out weather patterns for moonsoon season.

Japan needs to spend close to 2,000 MPPs to build its navy up to fighting strength (including elite reinforcements), which puts something of a crimp in what else they can purchase. I bought 2 more CVs, a tank and a mobile infantry, a tac air, some more corps, and 800 worth of tech and forsaked any offensives at all against the Chinese, and I only managed to attack the Allies in June '42, with the Yamato still stuck at 4 strength. Perhaps that is historical, maybe not; maybe I was too greedy. .

Japanese production was quite crappy. Building 2x CVs before end of 1941 is like Japan having 6 more carriers for Dec 1941 than they should have... thus something must suffer. My Japan build land based air power and land units. I did compensate for late in the war and convoy sinkings to give them more production then they actually made in 43, 44, 45. US subs can cripple this just like historical. Thats why so many convoys.

The biggest bug is this silly message I got each time I declared war on someone: "China switches sides", for example. Well that isn't so bad, but the effect of China "switching sides" (when Japan is already at war with her) was to have every single Japanese-controlled Chinese square flip to Chinese control! And even worse the little bastard was able to OPERATE units behind my lines, and even beefed up the AA of several of my cities!! Needless to say this completely porked the Japanese position, hosing down to zero the port of a crucial army I was going to use to help take the Netherlands East Indies, and allowing the bugger to operate two of his units into cities behind my lines before I could react.

That is a game system bug that will be fixed the next patch. It is out of my hands. Usually when I know Im going to attack US I pull all units from cities the turn before. Then after DOW on US I move them back. Dont know if a script can correct that while the bug is fixed by Battlefront.

There was no Yugo coup, which IMHO isn't a flaw because history shouldn't be as deterministic as it is in vanilla (something I argued about with Hubert long ago). They in fact went over to my control by June '42. Iraq was stuck on 76% Axis despite a rampaging Italian army which had just taken Saudi Arabia; perhaps there should be an additional trigger towards the Axis once they cross the Suez or something.

I accidentally had a double Yugo script in the txt files so they were getting double activation shifts toward axis. I corrected that. Now Yugo comes close to becoming axis and each turn there is a 2% chance the coup occurs. So with a little successful pressure (dip points) from Germany or some really good ground gained Yugo should come on to the axis side. But normally the coup should eventually occur before they become fully Axis.

As for Iraq I planned to put that in, I just simply forgot to. Thanks for the reminder.

I read your designer notes about CVs and how you made them weak against land-based air and ground units, but there is a problem; with no marine-type unit able to assault units on small islands, that makes it very hard to root the garrisons out, requiring BBs/CAs and land based air to damage them (and remember that ships damage the city first then maybe the unit if they are lucky). I'd rethink that for playability purposes.

Work in progress so yes it is always being "rethunk". Its very difficult to scale and balance 3 CVs with 200-300 planes vs land based air units with 600. Each land based air is operational planes which means that really it has anywhere from 800-1200 planes in that air army. That's my 1st attempt at seeing how the system works. I will investigate better modifications.

I know you said that the post-41 AI wasn't working yet, so I'll limit my comments about the AI. Here's US on-map forces as of Sept. 42:

6 HQ

4 corps

2 armies

1 armor

3 CV

2 BB (sunk 3 of them with Japanese CVs during a quasi Pearl Harbor)

2 CA

1 SS

14 fighters (!) most operated onto islands in the Pacific

1 tac bomber

1 strat bomber

They had just launched about 8 units on an amphib mission somewhere (North Africa I think), but without an escort.

The British had tons of air and land units crowded on their shores as of this time, with about 1500 MPPs unspent in reserve. Given that I only saw one corps sent down to Egypt (which fell after about 18 months of attrition vs. an Italian-only force), perhaps some scripts are in order there.

I am looking forward to seeing this scenario polished up and improved even more. You have a lot of work ahead but it should be worth it.

Hmm UK should be constantly sending units to Africa as long as they have too many in UK. And I'll have to ask Hubert how to script in fleet escorts.

As for 1500 points, well this is a new production system and the kinks have to be worked out. I increased tech in my new update, I might have to do it with cost too. I also might have to level out production some for better playbility. For me I saw I always needed more MPPs to do what I wanted early in the game, which I liked. It simulated the problems warring nations have. But I was worried late in the war I'd be like "MPPs ** YAWN ** no problem heres 2000" I bumped up tech levels too from 3 to 5 for many things so units get killed quicker and thus players spend more MPPs late in the war to go with the better production.

As for the US super air power I miscalculated their production and it was 2x what it was suppose to be, oops. Its hard to calculate when their activation keeps going up. I had to actually play both sides to 1/42 to realize USSR was short and USA was way over. Also I increased lend lease to Russia and UK from US. The AI for post 1941 for allies is working, its just UNTESTED.

Originally I started learning Java to make a game like this then I saw the map maker and the editor can make bigger maps. I like, SC2 its a good system so I decided to make this scenario instead of learning Java, and I am glad I did.

My goal right now is to get it working on a decent level of AI play, fix the bugs, and balance the game play. The production is really historical BTW as close as I could calculate it doing hours of research and figures. But it too could be readjusted. The scripting methods are very nice and easy to implement and manipulate. The problem is getting the AI to do them right. That will take lots of time.

My ultimate goal when the basic scenario is working is really put in more decisions and AI scripting. I am working on an idea to make the axis AI randomly pick a strategy thus each new game you play vs them you dont know what they will do.

1941 all out Barb, no subs

1940-41 Med strategy through spain take Gibralter, take Iraq, 1942 Barb

1940 Med strategy (No Gib) 1941 invade UK build lots of subs

1940 Sealion

Not sure if the scripts will allow so much but I can figure it out. I have excellent problem solving skills.

[John DiFool the 2nd]

Thanks for the response Al. One last thing I wanted to point out was that the Fins were able to walk into both Murmansk and Archangel unopposed,so you probably want to put in a couple of garrison scripts (at least).

How moddable is the weather in PDE? I'll go take a look at the scenario again in the editor-I just wanted to avoid the 'raining in every temperate zone in Eurasia' syndrome, tho that's more of an aesthetic objection than anything else.

[Big Al]

weather is very moddable. I can make 50 zones. Remember though that there is a lot of rain in that part of the world at certain times.

Oh as for Siberian transfer here how it works.

If the axis get too close to Stalingrad, Moscow, or Leningrad the decision activates. If you say "GIMME" then units pop up for USSR. If you say "nope Im kicking Germany's ass as is" then units pop up for Siberia when they are at 100% activation. The AI always takes yes on that option. So Siberia should have 1 HQ, 3 corp, 1 tank, 1 army, 1 ftr if Siberia YES. If no then add 6 more units. So there shouldnt be extra units in Siberia.

It took me a while to find answers on what they had and how much of it. Surprisingly they kept a hell of a lot vs Japan.

As for Fins those areas should have a garrison script. Every time I tried to walk in their Poof a unit was railed in. It could be the scripts are messing up due to lack of units in your case. I fixed how AI handles USSR so Im hoping this test game Im doing takes care of some of the issues.

The USSR AI is pretty basic... fall back to defensive positions, if you get outflanked, fall back. When you have enough crap on the board, ATTACK!

---

Correction: Tula is a reinforcing city not Stalingrad for the extra armies.

[Big Al]

Im going to upload the new version tonight.

[John DiFool the 2nd]

CM Mods has been down for two days now. RRRRRR.

[Samichlaus]

CM Mods has been down for two days now. RRRRRR.

Yes a RRRR from me too. But why don't you upload it to the sc2 yahoo group? The link is

http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/strategiccommand2/

You can join for free and upload the file.

By the way: playtesting your scenario as axis I am in Dec 1944 now but the game crashed due to a segmentation violation.

Observations/comments:

-It's raining a lot! It's not funny having your planes in middle europe down half of the year

-Yugoslavia joined axis even before romania did (which in fact did very late)

-Italian fleets cannot use naval loops to atlantic (is that on purpose?)

-Trying to capture Novosibirsk (where Stalin fled to) was difficult, since most of my units were immediately sent back to Sverdlovsk because there was no space they could go due to russian troops...and when I captured it finally nothing happened (except that the game crashed the following turn)

-Minor countries should definitely be allowed to upgrade their units. It should be up to the player whether he wishes to spend extra money for upgrading those

-Why can japan not research kamikaze?

-Why is german airforce research limited to level 4 (so I really can never get those cool jet planes the germans developed in the end of war?) and tanks to level 3 (no king tiger?)

Okay so much for the moment. I hope you can upload your next version somewhere.

Sami

[Big Al]

Rain: Yea Ive been reducing the rain down so the game plays better.

Yugo: I had a double activation entry by accident, fixed

Italian fleets and Atlantic Naval: They didnt have the range in real life.

Novo: Good to know. I was considering a surrender script since AI doesnt use arrows and I was worried a clog up was going to happen.

Minor Upgrades: I see things different. The cost to upgrade is too cheap. In real life most minors under axis control did NOT get much equipment. I use them for garrison duty mostly. Only way I can see it done is to make upgrades expensive. But you can always go to the editor and change it yourself. Its rather easy.

Kamakazi: Because the research for Kamakazi is only strat bombing which is kinda useless if you are targeting a ship.

Research Levels: I put back all to level 5. With the escalating production there needs to be costlier units and more casualties to make sure countries dont stock up on MPPs.

Thanks for the input. ALL input is looked at for the game and I thank everyone play testing it.

On a side note I will really have to beef up the USSR's units and give them free ones. I see the AI make really dumb re-strengthening of units that are simply going to die where they are next turn. Its a waste of production.

I did bump up the air again BTW vs soft and hard targets. Just not enough death and on a MPP mechanics side they were not worth buying since they took more damage than dealt on average.

[Samichlaus]

Rain: Yea Ive been reducing the rain down so the game plays better.

Great, but the monsoon in asia is okay

Italian fleets and Atlantic Naval: They didnt have the range in real life.

But they can naval loop to the pacific...and what is the point in getting the suez channel then?

Novo: Good to know. I was considering a surrender script since AI doesnt use arrows and I was worried a clog up was going to happen.

I reloaded the game via autosave, then all went okay. About two turns after I captured Novo the russians gave up...

Minor Upgrades: I see things different. The cost to upgrade is too cheap. In real life most minors under axis control did NOT get much equipment. I use them for garrison duty mostly. Only way I can see it done is to make upgrades expensive. But you can always go to the editor and change it yourself. Its rather easy.

Yeah I know (I did a global conflict scenario already, remember?) and I certainly will if you don't implement it. I feel that one should use all the freedom the game offers. This means that if the Führer decides that for example Spain gets all the new german equipment and knowhow it need to produce jets, then it should be made possible (for a certain cost of course)

I did bump up the air again BTW vs soft and hard targets. Just not enough death and on a MPP mechanics side they were not worth buying since they took more damage than dealt on average.

Great and very reasonable.

So when and where do we get a next update from you?

Sami

[Samichlaus]

Oh yes and CMMODs is up again!

[Big Al]

I'm going to look things over and pop it up tonight. I will update the readme file with new information, but its basically what we talked about here and some other bugs/fixes/work arounds I came up with.

To answer about Italians going to India and the Pacific but not around Africa is simple.

Their range was short and while taking Cairo means the axis can send fuel and supplies rather easily to Egypt, not to mention taking Iraq. Going around the horn of Africa is another matter.

The distance from the Cairo to the bottom tip of India is the same length of the Med. That same distance covers only 1/4 the route around Africa going west from Gibralter. There are no refueling stations down there to support the axis and that theatre is not important for the axis effort. If someone did spend the effort to take West and South Africa just to go around the horn... well they are losing the war because its much harder to do that and keep it than snag Egypt by an exponential amount.

Now as for Italians in the Pacific. If historically it came to the Italian navy in the Pacifc to assist the Japanese I am sure they would find the oil to supply those extra navies vs the US machine of naval power.

Now true there were German subs that went to the India ocean via the horn, but these were few in number not a large fleet of 25+ ships and there were smaller vessels supported by milch cows. It is different to send 1-2 ships to the Indian ocean that 25 and support them all.