Discussions about 2194 Gigamap v0.95

Pap1723 · February 11, 2003, 07:40

Here are the proposed changes I was thinking for the new version of the scenario, so many things are changing that it should be called version 1.0, but that would be a release version, and I'm just not ready for that yet!

Please comment on what you think about all of these ideas, etc...

1. I am going to get rid of the ability to communicate with all countries. In various tests, people have been able to get nuclear weapons way too fast and also been able to gift money to completely overpower the opposition. I would rather force the countries to use Freight to Lend-Lease units (money and trade) across the Atlantic, or wherever they want to.

2. I am going to give all units the ability to attack air units again. I took this out because I didn't like how it played out, but after testing by others, it played out much worse with the fighter flags turned off.

3. I am trying to find a good value to re-work the T-34 in the early part of the war. Yes they dominated German tanks at the beginning of the war, but I think they may still be a little too strong, any ideas on possible values?

4. I am getting rid of the AA Batteries units. Since all units now have the ability to attack air units, we will just assume that they are all covered by their own AA Batteries, which, since the units are probably division size, they most likely would have anyway.

5. I am going to make a new unit in the AA slot called Minor City. It is going to be a unit with a city graphic and it is going to be placed on an airbase so that units and planes can be stationed and paradrop from and to there. These will be placed in spots that would normally have cities, but because of the Civ 2 limits, that is not possible. They will be garrisoned like real cities and have units in them for defense. The actual units will be very weak so that they will never defend from an attack ahead of other units.

6. I am removing the ability for the generic Bomber and all of the Axis bombers to see subs. After reading some comments from people, they were not very good at detecting subs anyway.

7. Should I make all of the Ocean squares stackable so that units can actually defend other units in a true convoy style? I understand that units will then be left asleep on the squares if the transport they were in was destroyed, but we can make it a house rule that all sleeping units in water must be disbanded immediately.

8. I am also going to increase the ability of bombers and fighters by giving them a higher firepower so that they can destroy tanks and ships moving without proper cover. Are cruisers the ones that are primarily designed as anti-air? I am going to make Cruisers defense x2 vs air units if they are the right ones, and lower their attack, so they are primarily used as naval air cover. So that the Americans cannot send a fleet made up of Battleships and Cruisers without any fighter cover to Germany in the first few months. I was also thinking about making the Submarines have a better attack, otherwise Germany has no fighting chance, but that was the case Naval wise. So I'm torn, any ideas?

That's about it I think, let me know what you think of the proposed changes and if you have any other ideas of your own.

Thanks,
Pap

Cifer Almasy · February 11, 2003, 10:32

Good ideas!
with german U-Boots you are right! in the first time of war almoust every allied ship was destroyed though with the end of the enigma they were useless... perhaps there could be a change per event!?

I would also like to see some more other citys then just those which were important in the war. You could make Brest and Cherbourg to strong Bunker units with a minor city unit - that could do it I guess!

And pleeeeeease dont leave out the Ruhrgebiet again - you should take Köln (Cologne) or Essen as one representing city.

In fact there should be more German than french cities on the Axis side. (I guess...) cause main production was there as well as the biggest cities.

Pap1723 · February 11, 2003, 10:38

Cifer, very good ideas, more German cities would make the most sense as that is where all of their production came from...

When was the Enigma found and when was the German code cracked? That way I can change the abilities of the Submarines by changing the Germans to using only the U-Boat's and have the Submarines for everyone else.

Pap

Chris 62 · February 11, 2003, 12:56

Quote:

Originally posted by Pap1723
1. I am going to get rid of the ability to communicate with all countries. In various tests, people have been able to get nuclear weapons way too fast and also been able to gift money to completely overpower the opposition. I would rather force the countries to use Freight to Lend-Lease units (money and trade) across the Atlantic, or wherever they want to.

I agree, it's better this way for WWII.

Quote:

2. I am going to give all units the ability to attack air units again. I took this out because I didn't like how it played out, but after testing by others, it played out much worse with the fighter flags turned off.

I would limit it a bit, mainly infantry would have attached anti-air ability, it would also give incentive to build them.
I see no reason for tanks to have it.

Quote:

3. I am trying to find a good value to re-work the T-34 in the early part of the war. Yes they dominated German tanks at the beginning of the war, but I think they may still be a little too strong, any ideas on possible values?

Even though they had 76mm guns, they lacked proper optics and many lacked radios.
The attack value should be the same as the PzKwIII (with the 50mm gun) untill late 1942.

Quote:

4. I am getting rid of the AA Batteries units. Since all units now have the ability to attack air units, we will just assume that they are all covered by their own AA Batteries, which, since the units are probably division size, they most likely would have anyway.

I agree, it frees up a useless unit.

Quote:

5. I am going to make a new unit in the AA slot called Minor City. It is going to be a unit with a city graphic and it is going to be placed on an airbase so that units and planes can be stationed and paradrop from and to there. These will be placed in spots that would normally have cities, but because of the Civ 2 limits, that is not possible. They will be garrisoned like real cities and have units in them for defense. The actual units will be very weak so that they will never defend from an attack ahead of other units.

Hmm, I would have to see how this works in action.

Quote:

6. I am removing the ability for the generic Bomber and all of the Axis bombers to see subs. After reading some comments from people, they were not very good at detecting subs anyway.

I agree completely.

Quote:

7. Should I make all of the Ocean squares stackable so that units can actually defend other units in a true convoy style? I understand that units will then be left asleep on the squares if the transport they were in was destroyed, but we can make it a house rule that all sleeping units in water must be disbanded immediately.

Maybe you could make convoy "lanes", areas of the ocean with stackable terrain, instaed of all, then it would be up to the players to take the chance.
Convoys didn't sail all over, they usually were confined to a narrow area of ocean.

Quote:

8. I am also going to increase the ability of bombers and fighters by giving them a higher firepower so that they can destroy tanks and ships moving without proper cover. Are cruisers the ones that are primarily designed as anti-air? I am going to make Cruisers defense x2 vs air units if they are the right ones, and lower their attack, so they are primarily used as naval air cover. So that the Americans cannot send a fleet made up of Battleships and Cruisers without any fighter cover to Germany in the first few months. I was also thinking about making the Submarines have a better attack, otherwise Germany has no fighting chance, but that was the case Naval wise. So I'm torn, any ideas?

As the war progressed, AA improved, maybe you could improve cruisers and BBs as the war progresses.

fairline · February 11, 2003, 16:20

Pap, I like your scenario, but there are a few things about the choice of tanks and their relative strengths that bother me. I suppose my question would be did you assign offensive/defensive strengths based on the real abilities of the tanks or did you want to include a 'playability' factor to even things up?

Darius871 · February 11, 2003, 22:52

D'oh, didn't know there was a thread here and at HB. Well, same response.

3) I suppose just lower the combat stats slightly and/or make them more costly to build. Then make them stronger and/or cheaper later in the game when the Germans have tanks that can match them.

7) Yes, definitely! One unit kills one unit, why extend this accuracy only to land and not to the sea?

8a) Excellent, I was always annoyed that even B-17's couldn't beat high-end tanks. I'd raise the hit points as well, since it's the tanks' high hit points that kill the bombers.

8b) The reason battleships need fighter flags is they are the only units which can defeat a fighter-battleship stack. IMO the four ship types should have the flags, and not have the 2x defense against air. Cruisers did provide some flak against planes on their way to carriers, but they also were instrumental in conventional fleet actions. If you weaken them there will be nothing but pathetically weak destroyers and prohibitively expensive battleships to carry out the real ship on ship combat. If people want air defense for their fleets, they should build carriers and fighters, period.

8c) I would increase the u-boat's attack a little more, but not too much. Remember that their main purpose was to take out freighters and badly damaged capital ships. As Exile pointed out explaining why he excluded submarines from Age of War entirely, submarines rarely sank capital ships. As the subs in this scenario stand, they can sink destroyers, cruisers, and transports, while only denting battleships. This sounds about right, but a slight increase couldn't hurt so that perhaps they could sink a battleship that'd damaged to red.

On everything else I agree.

Cifer Almasy · February 12, 2003, 07:01

i dont know too mucha bout units and warfare so perhaps darius is right in what he says about about the U-boots.

Perhaps Battleships should not be able to attack citys anymore...

About the enigma: Yet I was to lazy to search for information in the internet but my brother said the crack could have been about the early 1942s!?
But he was absolutely not sure!

About citys:
I could give you an example how I would place German citys on the map, if you like. You are right - main production came from germany perhaps a bit from France but less from conquered regions.

Goingonit · February 12, 2003, 07:54

Battleship shore bombardment was most definitely around in World War 2.

And the first break into Enigma was in January 1940. (according to the Bletchley Park website).

Cifer Almasy · February 12, 2003, 09:24

jep the first!

but soon they had another code till early 1942s...

yes they bombed cities but in many scens you just need a batlleship to destroy all units in one city. its the same prob as with bombers I guess. what i mean is: they did not attack the defending units but buildings anf factorys in reality.

Darius871 · February 12, 2003, 14:28

But rather than make it impossible for them to bombard, why not just make them weaker? This is actually already in place as even a superbattleship can't beat a fortified Tiger or Panther division.

Pap1723 · February 12, 2003, 17:06

I have been doing a lot of editing to city placement and other things in Europe and a few other parts of the world. I've added, moved, and removed a lot of cities, but mostly German cities.

Added - Cologne, Leipzig, Liverpool(UK), Stuttgart, Nuremburg, Vichy, Danzig, Taranto

Moved - Prague, Berlin, Cherbourg, Glasgow(UK), Edinburgh(UK), Birmingham(UK), Brest, Paris, Bordeaux, Alexandria(UK), Koenigsberg, Pyongyang(JAP), Darien(JAP)

Removed - Le Mans, Toulouse, Strasbourg, Tirana, Naples, Crete, Lyon, Rio Gallegos(NEU)

Renamed - Marseille to Marseilles, Mukden(JAP) to Shenyang

Pap1723 · February 12, 2003, 17:09

This is what Europe looks like now, but at the same time, all of the city sizes haven't changed and I didn't add farmaland or industry where I want to yet. I want to get your opinion about the changes I made before I start.

Pap1723 · February 12, 2003, 17:15

And the old Europe...

Pap1723 · February 12, 2003, 17:23

New look of Britain...

Pap1723 · February 12, 2003, 17:24

Old Britain

Michael Daumen · February 12, 2003, 18:08

IMO you need to change some terrain types around for a more realistic map.

Pap1723 · February 12, 2003, 18:29

Any ideas on which ones Michael?

Pap

Darius871 · February 12, 2003, 18:52

Quote:

Originally posted by Michael Daumen
IMO you need to change some terrain types around for a more realistic map.

Why go for realistic terrain when the units and cities are Nemo style?

Cifer Almasy · February 13, 2003, 09:07

yes thats really better tan before.

perhaps remove hamburg that it is between "northern Sea" and "Eastern Sea" (thats how its called in german translated into english).
You should give cologne a HUGE production representing the "ruhrgebiet" with those coal mines and factories as well as the other cities.

Michael Daumen · February 13, 2003, 10:32

Quote:

Originally posted by Pap1723
Any ideas on which ones Michael?

Pap

Switch fertile terrain and rice paddies and put the former around the world. Or switch tundra and rice paddies, and get a new special resource to replace water.

No cities are on defended terrain, and anti-tank terrain seems to be randomly distributed around the map.