Panzer Command: Kharkov Updated!

[Alex Fiedler]

The first official update is on the way, with fixes, features and new units!

Matrix Games and Koios Works are pleased to announce that Panzer Command: Kharkov, a major new release in the Panzer Command series of 3D tactical wargames, has now been updated to v1.01. In Panzer Command: Kharkov, players step back to the early days of May, 1942 as both the German and Soviet armies prepare major offensives focused on the same place – Kharkov.

The v1.01 update is a major new version with over 40 fixes, ranging from two serious international region-related bugs to unit data typos and an issue that could prevent medals being awarded correctly in campaigns. New features include a Trees On/Off toggle, better path-finding and collision handling and more intelligent use of maps and platoon sizes in random battles. The showcase new unit for this release is the mighty KV-2, a formidable addition to the Soviet forces! In addition, the requirement for Internet Explorer 7 components to run the tools has been dropped. Tools like the Scenario Editor and Random Battle Generator will now work fine with Internet Explorer 6 components, which are included by default with Windows XP and later, requiring no additional installation of software.

Panzer Command: Kharkov is a 3D tactical game in which players control a core force of vehicles and squads while battling through individual scenarios and historical campaigns. In addition, Panzer Command: Kharkov includes a Random Battle Generator and a Random Campaign Generator that cover battles and campaigns across the Eastern Front of World War II

David Heath, Director of Operations at Matrix Games, said “Panzer Command: Kharkov has been very well received by tactical wargamers and critics alike, earning an 89% from Armchair General and a 7/8 score from Out of Eight. While the official release was stable and relatively bug-free, we moved quickly to track, investigate and resolve all reported issues as well as add in some new features and new units. International customers in particular will appreciate two nasty region-related bugs being resolved, which were the only critical issues on our list.”

Panzer Command: Kharkov is a 3D simultaneous turn based strategy game where you command either the Soviet or German forces during the punch and counter-punch of the 1942 battles around Kharkov in the Ukraine. Two new Kharkov campaigns as well as some additional short campaigns tie the scenarios together, allowing core units to progress from battle to battle, gaining experience, medals and special abilities. A point system allows players to “purchase” additional units for each mission in the campaign as well as replace losses, forcing decisions on management of resources. The new random battles system and the random campaign system allow for virtually infinite replayability with a variety of historical forces and settings.

The design for Panzer Command: Kharkov lets first time wargamers sit down and start playing, while allowing hard-core gamers to enjoy the realism and historical accuracy. All campaign battles can also be fought as individual scenarios and a new random battle generator as well as a random campaign generator make for almost infinite replayability! The AI can control either side in each battle and a full Play-by-Email system allows for head to head play.

Panzer Command: Kharkov includes a full set of scenario and campaign editing tools as well as excellent support for moddability, extending to the game data as well as the 3D models themselves.

Owners of Panzer Command: Winter Storm are able to use the additional Winter maps from Winter Storm in Panzer Command: Kharkov, which expands the winter map selection for random battles and campaigns significantly (only one winter map comes with Kharkov). In addition, if Kharkov is installed on a system which already has Winter Storm, it will install bonus Winter Storm campaigns that are updated to work with all the new features and improvements of Panzer Command: Kharkov.

Panzer Command: Kharkov is available now from the Matrix Games Online Store at $39.99 US for the digital download and $49.99 US for a boxed copy with a printed manual. Owners of Panzer Command: Winter Storm can register for a special upgrade coupon to purchase Panzer Command: Kharkov at a $15 discount. A bundle offer is also available for new customers to purchase both Winter Storm and Kharkov together for $15 off the combined price. Check the Panzer Command: Kharkov game page and forums for information on these special pricing offers.

Features of Panzer Command: Kharkov include:

[*] New Scenarios and Campaigns
German Kharkov, May 1942, 14th Panzer Division, (8 Battles)
[*] - Soviet Kharkov, May 1942, 169th Rifle Divison, (8 Battles)
[*] - German Mcensk, October 1941, 4th Panzer Division, (4 Battles)
[*] - German Kursk North, July 1943, (3 Battles)
[*] - Boot Camp Tutorial (6 Battles)
[*] - Plus additional individual battles and updated Winter Storm campaigns for Winter Storm owners (48 scenarios total if you own Winter Storm)
[*] New Random Battle Generator
[*] New Random Campaign Generator
[*] New Spring and Summer Maps
[*] - One Winter map is included with Kharkov. Winter Storm owners get access to all the additional Winter Storm Winter maps for the historical winter campaigns as well as random battles and campaigns.
[*] Trenches and Foxholes
[*] Minefields
[*] Detailed LOS and Terrain rules for historical realism
[*] Scenario Editor, Campaign Editor, Template Editor
[*] Improved Commands, Improved Interface Options
[*] Improved AI
[*] Improved Infantry Combat
[*] Reinforcements
[*] Surrender Option
[*] Smoke
[*] New Auto-Targeting
[*] Improved Graphics
[*] Improved Sounds
[*] Improved Performance
[*] New Units
[*] - New On-Map Mortars
[*] - New On-Map Infantry Guns
[*] - Greatly expanded list of German and Soviet Units from 1941 - 1944

Get more information on Panzer Command: Kharkov from its product page.

http://www.matrixgames.com/games/downloads.asp?gid=355

[e_barkmann]

any chance you could publish the change list?

cheers

[Erik Rutins]

Sure, here you go:

v1.01 - First Official Update, May 21, 2008

New Features:

1. The RBG, RCG, HQ Helper, Scenario Editor and Campaign Editor now all work fine with Internet Explorer 6.0. There is no longer any requirement to have Internet Explorer 7.0, though the tools will likely run faster with it than with 6.0. Since Internet Explorer 6.0 is installed by default with Windows XP, this means that these tools now work fine with an "out of the box" XP installation.
2. The Scenario Editor now enforces US date format strictly. If you do not use a US date format in your scenarios, it may cause the game to hang.
3. The Random Battle Generator now makes better use of template placements to increase density for larger point battles.
4. The Random Battle Generator now uses more historical default platoon sizes for each side and unit type and now supports "max=" for platoons listed in the preset files.
5. Medals that require a certain number of kills in a single battle are now more likely to be awarded to units that exceed that kill count. The more kills the unit gets, the more likely it is to be awarded the medal.
6. The F12 key will now toggle Trees On and Off. A few trees and tree shadows will remain so that the user can easily tell where the trees were.
7. We've incorporated one of the improved tracer sets created by "Mraah" as the new official tracers, with his permission. Thanks to "Mraah" for his work on these.
8. Collision handling between infantry and vehicles and terrain has been very significantly improved. If you experience any issues with this in the past, please give it another try.

New Units:

1. The KV-2 (two models) is now available for your gaming pleasure. This new fully modeled and animated unit done by Steve "Mobius" Lorenz, while rare, is a potential nightmare to face for early war German commanders. By default, it is now included in the random battle and campaign generation options as well.
2. The PaK 41 is now available, with a new data file and a new gun file, using the PaK 40 model. By default, it is now included in the random battle and campaign generation options as well.

Clarifications:

1. Spotting of moving infantry units is not correctly documented in the manual. An infantry unit moving at half speed (i.e. Defend -> Move) is only +5 to be spotted. An infantry unit moving at normal speed (i.e. Engage -> MOve, Advance or Bound) is a +10 to be spotted. An infantry unit moving at fast speed (i.e. Rush) is +15 to be spotted. Therefore, if you want your moving infantry units to be as stealthy as possible, use the slower movement orders.

Boot Camp:

1. Fixed problem with Boot Camp campaign that would cause some units in later scenarios to show up at zero strength and thus not be displayed if the player did not select them and click the "Replace Losses" button before playing the scenario.
2. Some minor balance adjustments to the Boot Camp campaign to make a few difficult missions slightly easier.
3. Fixed some typos in Boot Camp Campaign briefings

Data Issues:

1. Fixed issue with transparent silo on Kharkov Map L3B
2. Fixed issue with typo in Volksgrenadiers that could cause purchase screen crash in '45 Random Battles
3. Fixed issue with typo in Panther G Late that could cause purchase screen crash in late war Random Battles
4. Fixed issue with typo in media= field for 1/43 Winter Skirmish scenario that would cause it to crash
5. Fixed various typos in the Kharkov historical campaigns, a few of these could affect core unit experience. To take full advantage of them, start a Kharkov historical campaign from the beginning.
6. Corrected a typo in the penetration for 50mm mortars that could cause them to penetrate
7. Fixed missing gun files for 1943, 1944 and 1945 Soviet SMG squads that could cause an AI Planning freeze or a purchase screen crash
8. Fixed a missing gun file for 1941 SS SMG squad
9. Corrected firepower values for 1944-45 Fallschirmjaeger squads
10. Adjusted truck data to make them more vulnerable to small arms fire
11. Fixed a typo in the SU-100's gun file
12. Fixed an issue that could cause SS Rifle and SS PanzerGrenadier squads to show up wearing winter clothing in summer scenarios
13. Fixed an issue that could cause the KV-1 M1940 to show up in winter camo in summer scenarios
14. Made anti-tank guns slightly more vulnerable to small arms fire.
15. The entry dates for the SU-85 and SdKfz 234 Puma have been corrected. The Puma now uses the SdKfz 231 as its "generic" model until a unique model is available.
16. Added the missing Winterstorm Level scene files in the appropriate \Media\Level sub-folders.
17. Fixed two terrain map issues on Kharkov Maps L2B and L9B
18. Corrected some objective naming issues in the random battle map templates

Graphical Issues:

1. Some issues with the turret and wheel animations on the SdKfz 231 have been corrected.
2. Some issues with the turret and track animations on the T-70 have been corrected.
3. Some issues with the turret and track animations as well as the scale on the Panzer II have been corrected.

Code Issues:

1. Fixed a registry key error that would cause a "Loading Interface" freeze on non-US regional settings systems
2. Improved pathfinding collision handling to hopefuly eliminate units getting "stuck" on other units in situations where there was a rear collision and impeding terrain to the side preventing re-pathing.
3. Fixed an animation bug where crawling infantry did not always properly stand back up after recovering from suppression and trying to Run or Walk.
4. Fixed a bug that could cause a unit's Spot Indirect Fire menu to not refresh artillery status between turns unless the unit was reselected
5. Fixed a bug where in rare cases dead infantry did not properly dismount from buildings after being killed
6. Increased the opacity of the event list box and changed the bright red text to maroon to improve the readability of the text
7. Fixed a bug that could cause some units to be skipped for some medal/ability rewards at the end of a battle
8. Stepped through all the medals and abilities, corrected a few minor issues that could result in some rare double medals or medals being given to the wrong unit type.
9. The Withdraw Reaction order now only impacts the selected unit, even if that unit is the HQ unit for the platoon. This is to bring it in sync with the other Reaction orders, which are intended to only affect a single unit.
10. Fixed a bug that was not allowing artillery suppression to function at its full intended effect.
11. Fixed a bug with the Engage->Hold and Engage->Facing orders that would cause them to propagate to other sub-units that already had the same base order. This brings them in sync with the intended behavior, which is that sub-orders within the same base order do not propagate to other units in the platoon unless they have no specific sub-orders assigned.
12. Fixed a bug that allowed foxholes to be spotted more easily than they should have been.
13. Fixed a bug that allowed units to mount enemy vehicles.
14. Fixed a bug that caused "wheel" hits on wheeled vehicles to sometimes be reported as "track" hits.
15. An issue that could cause a unit to "bounce" off the map during collision handling has been fixed.
16. Collision handling calculation speed has been improved.
17. Fixed an internationalization issue that would prevent reinforcements arriving on systems that were running regional settings where a decimal point was replaced with a comma.

[Noypi53]

Hi Erik!

I've got some saved games from the 1.01h beta.  Will the game allow me to play these saves even when I install the official 1.01 version?

Thanks in advance.

Noypi53

[Erik Rutins]

Yes, they'll work fine.