Any OOB 2.0 news?

[Gters]

As per title

[ncc1701e]

Interested too.

[Wiedrock]

What's OBB? Sounds like a Rapper.

[Wiedrock]

We discussed in the past the possibility of making the Panzer Aufklarungs Battalions as SUs attached to their parent panzer divisions. The PzAufklarungs Battalions have a wide variety of equipment that would free up enough slots for the remainder of the division. Its an idea that would take a lot of work as every scenario would require every panzer division to be rebuilt. My focus right now is implementing the new OB 2.0 file which is already going to take months to get ready already.

Maybe this answers your question.

[MarkShot]

Thanks for your new planning map!

Would such a large scale project such as this make more sense when the game has stabilized like WITW? It would seem harder to do with patches regularly coming out.

But in any case, your work and that of others to improve things is much appreciated.

[Joel Billings]

Good news. Earlier this week, Trey completed his new 2.0 OB file and the conversion list of old to new OBs. The next step is for Pavel to write a program that coverts all the scenarios to the new OBs. This could be done within the next week. At that point, Trey has a lot of work to do, checking the conversions, double checking his OBs, and then beginning a process of rebuilding units in each scenario. I can't tell you how long that process will take. Assuming the conversion script goes smoothly and we don't have too many typos in the Ob file, the time depends on how much time Trey has to put into working on the rebuilds each week. Maybe Trey will be willing to give an estimate once he get the script code and starts the process, but that's up to him.

So the bottom line is the process is moving forward. Perhaps we'll be able to share the new OB file in the near future for those of you that are interested and willing to swap back and forth between the old and the new file manually. It would certainly help us to have some community members checking over Trey's work. Trey's done an amazing job researching and maintaining the OB files (and dealing with the game's limitations), but everyone can make a typo, and it's also good to get the widest possible sources of information.

[ncc1701e]

Thanks for the update.

[Joel Billings]

In even better news, Pavel completed the migration function, and Trey used it to migrate the Obs in Campaign 1941 and then to fix some errors he found in his new file. After working on it for a full day, he says the process is going easier than he had expected. Of course, every scenario must be updated, so Trey still has a lot of work to be done. But it is happening and we have every reason to believe it can be completed in the next several months.

One thing to note is that modders using the editor will need to lock generic data in their modded scenarios before they start using the new OB file. Either that, or they have to provide an older OB file to go with their modded scenarios, and players would need to switch out the OB files depending on what scenario they were going to start. There's no getting around this, and it's the cost of radically changing a generic file after release. We think it's a price worth paying. We will warn modders before we release the new OB 2.0 update.

[Joel Billings]

I don't have a complete list of changed OBs, but it only has to do with Axis OBs. I think the Italian OBs are changed quite a bit, while there are a number of changes to German units as well. Trey started using some of the new German OBs in the Steel Inferno scenarios, so those will require less updating, but the campaigns did not use these newer OBs that were added after release.

[AlbertN]

Will that function of updating scenarios automatically be included in the Editor?
So that if someone wants to alter the OOBs then it can be used to updated the relevant / interested scenarios / campaigns with the modded OOBs?

[Joel Billings]

We weren't planning on releasing it publicly. If there's enough interest, we might do it. The scenario designer still has to rebuild his units that have changed Obs, and knowing which units changed OBs would not be easy. Trey knows since he has been working on all the OBs and probably has the list memorized by now.

[AlbertN]

While it may take time, isn't just better to do something that 'updates' everything in a scenario?
That way virtually what is unchanged updates into the same self, and what is changed simply updates. I believe it's easier than to have to input in all what requires an update.

[Joel Billings]

There's no easy way to automate the rebuilding of the new TOEs, especially if some units were hand build (i.e. not the same percent TOE for all elements). We created a routine that automates the shifting from an old OB to a new one, but the impact of that change on the elements in the unit have to be adjusted manually.

[MarkShot]

Sounds like Axis and USSR balance debates are going to persist into 2024. Oh, well ...

[Joel Billings]

They will persist forever.

[ncc1701e]

They will persist forever.

So true.

[Nikel]

Indeed.

Though it will probably fade away when Federation-Klingon Empire balance become more relevant

[ncc1701e]

Though it will probably fade away when Federation-Klingon Empire balance become more relevant

[Gters]

I don't have a complete list of changed OBs, but it only has to do with Axis OBs. I think the Italian OBs are changed quite a bit, while there are a number of changes to German units as well. Trey started using some of the new German OBs in the Steel Inferno scenarios, so those will require less updating, but the campaigns did not use these newer OBs that were added after release.

Really interesting... I hope to see the divisions of the axis allies with greater adherence to history and their number of men, vehicles, guns and weapons

[oldMarinePanzer]

Just a thought here, but how about varying levels of "modified OOBs". This could be possible if we have the ".csv" download feature enabled for ALL the data fields. For example, a user like myself could load and start up the game, download and then save away the originals. Or maybe there could be a "revert to original feature" button to do the same thing. Then I as the user could upload a modified OOB to play scenarios. At first glance this seams to me it would work, the scenarios content values would change but unit locations to start each scenario would NOT. The custom OOBs could have any number of modified parameters contained within them. e.g. a strong German but weak Russian OOB, or vice versa, the possibilities are endless. Each modified OOB could almost be a entirely NEW game. Once a user gets tired of playing one they can move to another. I imagine there could be entire tournaments played with pre-determined OOBs. Thoughts?