FC: Southern Storm - v.2.1.4.8794 Public Beta Now Available

[MaximKI]

Hello everyone,

There's a new public beta update installer available at the following download link: HERE

On Steam, you can switch to it by going to Flashpoint Campaigns: Southern Storm in your Steam Library, right-clicking on it, choosing Properties -> Betas -> then choosing the latest beta branch from the drop-down list and allowing Steam to update your game. If it updates correctly, you should see the latest beta version listed as your version in-game in the bottom left corner of the main menu.

What’s New in Version 2.1.4.8794:

Saved Game Version ID
Housekeeping: the saved game version ID was set to 420 previously, and with this version, it jumps to 423. The game is fully backward compatible, but players should know that for a player vs player game (for example, PBEM, PBEM++), or if saved game files are shared, both players need to have version 423 of the game. If one player does not then the saved scenario will be unable to load, and a message to update the game executable will be displayed. We should mention this every time we increment the saved game version ID, but often forget. Now we have put it front and center!

Organic Transport
“Organic Transport” is the ability of units that have a mix of transport subunits and passenger subunits to load up while moving and then assume a debarked state when done. A typical example would be an infantry platoon that has a mixture of infantry fighting vehicles and infantry squads. This has been part of the game since the start, but we have refined the load capacities and lift requirements significantly in the last few months and rolled them out here.

It should make no difference to ordinary play but is important for scenario creators to know about. Validation checks have been added to the scenario editor to flag when a unit lacks sufficient organic lift to use vehicle speed for movement. Again, this is a bit of a housekeeping item, but one we wanted to flag prominently as it will matter to content creators.

Improvements
• The unit Dashboard now shows Load and Lift values to support the organic transportation constraints.
• F11 ‘Full Screen Display Toggle’. The ability to play the game full screen without the title bar at the top and the Windows taskbar at the bottom can be toggled with the F11 key or the menu item ‘View Info > Toggle Full Screen.’ By design, this state is not saved when the game is exited. As a well-behaved Windows application, it must be turned on when the program is started if desired.
• Artillery units can now be put directly on Counter Battery orders at the end of a move.
• The Command Cycle Length has been reworked somewhat to reduce the base multipliers for formations of size brigade and above. The previous values created command cycles that were arguably too long for what was being represented. The impact of electronic warfare on command cycle length has not changed.
• Units caught within the blast radius of a nuclear event no longer have the chance of surviving in game terms. They are no longer mission-capable, and those not destroyed outright are marked as having fallen out.
• Helicopter flight pathing is now more intelligent regarding known enemy air defense positions.
• Amphibious units crossing rivers now do a better job picking paths as well.
• The TOC Intelligence Kills and Claims chart has some new columns added and some minor columns consolidated to focus better on the important subunit types.
• The campaign scenario transition report can now be printed.

• Quality of Life. To reduce screen clutter and information overload for players first installing the game, the following changes have been made:
o The Radio Log does not display by default on a brand-new install. It can be invoked with F7 in the usual way, and if the game is shut down with it hidden, then it will not show automatically when the game is restarted.
o User preference “Show detailed unit composition instead of basic in-game reports” is now unchecked by default. This means that a reference to an “M1A2” Abrams tank will simply show the word “tank” instead. Equipment lists will be much more readable to the beginner historian. This has a more muted effect than several years ago, as most places now show both forms, but it will still help at the margin.

• Quality of Life. For brand-new installs, we now start unit counters drawn with group-colored silhouettes turned on to make it easier to distinguish at a glance which units belong to which formations.

[IronManBeta]

Something that we did this time was adjust the drawing of unit icons the first time the game is installed, or in this case, when you load the new update and you have not already played with some of the different icon drawing settings already. What happens is that we are trying out the 'color unit icons by group' option instead of the previous 'black and white for everything' option. You can change it to what you like under the Options menu but we suggest you give the new look a try if you are not already familiar with it.

In board wargames, of course, the norm was that all counters on a side looked much the same. Sometimes they added a colored stripe or other indicator to show which units were grouped together under a common HQ, and this is fact was very helpful once you got used to it. We have offered something similar for a while as an option but think now that for brand new players, having it on by default is a lot more helpful than not. We are always looking for better ways to help people get started in Flashpoint and this is something we are trying now. We hope it helps.

If you are just as happy not to go this route, then just change it to what you would prefer instead under the Options game menu item. We offer a wide variety of different looks and trust that you will all find something you like!

Best, Rob C
Flashpoint Campaigns dev team

[Shadrach]

Thanks a lot for the update, I like the F11 full-screen option

Too bad there doesn't seem to be solution yet for the arrows in the Spotlight dialog when DPI scaling is used...

[CapnDarwin]

We would like to fix the OOB arrows, but it is in a third party skin engine tool by a Ukrainian dev, who is unfortunately occupied otherwise right now. It is on our fix when we can list.

[Shadrach]

A big QOL improvement would be to have key shortcuts for the popup context menu.
Especially when giving movement orders you need to go into this menu all the time.
If one could press for instance:
D - Move Deliberate
H - Move Hasty
S - Screen
D- Hold
R - Rest

This would save a lot of time.
Each submenu should have hotkeys, especially now the SOP menus require a lot of mouse dexterity to go into.

Clipboard_10-09-2024_01.jpg (28.24 KiB) Viewed 1106 times

[CapnDarwin]

Several folks have mentioned using a single-letter key press to do various things in the game, but the software limits us to how hotkeys can be coded. A number are using a third-party program to make macros to do various things when the game is running. If we reach a point where a new codebase version allows more freedom, we can entertain looking into this feature.

[Shadrach]

Several folks have mentioned using a single-letter key press to do various things in the game, but the software limits us to how hotkeys can be coded. A number are using a third-party program to make macros to do various things when the game is running. If we reach a point where a new codebase version allows more freedom, we can entertain looking into this feature.

Thanks for the info

I actually tried using AHK to map right-click to Shift+E. The result was that the menu hotkeys show up. So they are actually there - I'm assuming these shortcuts are auto-assigned from the Windows menu API, I believe it can do that without the dev actually doing anything:

Clipboard_10-11-2024_01.jpg (30.77 KiB) Viewed 1031 times

I belive the shortcuts can be set manually as well by the dev, otherwise Windows will just auto-assign them.
When using the dropdown menus from the top the key shortcuts actually show as well.

Another thing is that the game does not handle the menu/context key that are on most modern keyboards, so it can't be used either. If it handled that, I believe the menu shortcuts would automagically show, as the menu is detected as triggered by keyboard.

Of course, trying to play a game like this keyboard-only is pointless, but some things can be implemented to make giving commands faster by a combination of mouse+KB use.

Now I have to figure out how to make AHK pause hotkeys when a context menu is open...

[CharlesV]

Hi,
I've been playing the Big Red One - the first scenario is fine but the second has no valid setup locations defined so it can't be played.
Charles

[MaximKI]

Hi,
I've been playing the Big Red One - the first scenario is fine but the second has no valid setup locations defined so it can't be played.
Charles

Do you mind uploading a screenshot of what you're seeing?

[CharlesV]

Not sure how useful this will be.
Charles

Tall Order start.jpg (1019.31 KiB) Viewed 683 times

[MaximKI]

Are you able to move units around the map in deployment? What happens if you start the scenario? Do you get any error messages?

[CharlesV]

Moving a unit creates the message "You must stay within your setup boundaries". Start screen shot attached

[IronManBeta]

Rob here. There appears to be a flaw in that scenario as distributed that has removed the starting setup areas. This is indeed a fatal problem and I will post a fixed scenario as soon as I can.

I'm not quite sure what ate the setup areas here - sorry!

Rob C
On Target Simulations.

[IronManBeta]

OK, this version of the scenario will work but not have quite such nicely formatted Briefings. Unzip this file over top of your existing copy of that scenario and it will now work.

Finding the existing copy of the scenario is the trick. If you used the default installation location it will look something like this: c:\Documents\My Games\Flashpoint Campaigns Player Files\Modules\FCSS\Campaigns\US1-SN2 Tall Order\.

Overwrite the files in that folder with the contents of this zip file:

US1-SN2 Tall Order 8218.zip

(501.12 KiB) Downloaded 12 times

If you have trouble then please post again here!

My apologies for this error, Rob Crandall

[DeckelT]

When I saw this post, I played out scenario 1, Fog of War, and had the same issue with scenario 2, Tall Order. I followd your instructions and over wrote the files and was able to get a normal start up for Tall Order with the unit placement areas highlighted as usual and I was able to place units normally.

DeckelT

[CharlesV]

That's great and will keep me happy until Central Storm comes along!
Charles

[JohnOs]

It's been fixed for version 8794. Rob has it, and I assume that it will be pushed out.

[IronManBeta]

OK, as the illustrious JohnO has reported, he has redone that scenario to the version of the game you have. We have a lot of scenarios of various versions and one of the wrong ones got out. That is my fault and I am so sorry!

This is the official replacement scenario:

US1-SN2 Tall Order 8794 fixed.zip

(837.05 KiB) Downloaded 15 times

This zip file contains a "US1-SN2 Tall Order" folder which in turn contains the replacement files. Once again, the contents of this zip need to be copied to the correct target location on your computer. Depending on your familiarity with the Windows file structure this is either perfectly obvious or completely incomprehensible. I don't have a step-by-step guide for this, but the paths are just the same as in my post just above.

1. You want to find the 'writeable' versions of the Southern Storm files and these are located in your Windows "\Documents\My Games\Flashpoint Campaigns Player Files\" folder.
2. In that folder there is a "\Modules" folder and within that there is a "\FCSS" folder.
3. This folder in turn contains a "\Campaigns" folder, and deep breath, you are there. You will see a "US1-SN2 Tall Order" folder and there is where you want to put the files JohnO has provided. They will overwrite the files of the same name but older dates.
4. My big worry is that you will copy the replacement files in a folder too high or too low. I'm not sure how to guard against that except to urge you to visually check that the 8 files in that folder now have 22 November 2024 file dates.

Please post here again if there are still problems.

Thanks, Rob C