FC: Cold War Beta - v3.0.3.10626

[LiamR]

Hello all, we have just released a minor update to the beta - v3.0.3.10626 - that fixes two small issues. The download for this update is available here.

1. We have made additional changes to the VCR Replay feature. Minor issues were corrected and the option to play the entire game is now implicit in the operation of the VCR buttons and does not need a separate checkbox to activate.

2. A last-minute bug was discovered while testing VCR replay. An issue with date formatting inconsistent with the rest of the game has been fixed.

These fixes are all backwards compatible with all existing saved games and multiplayer games.

The changelog and notes for v3.0.3.10625 are still pinned below and included in the beta.

Happy hunting everyone.

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Hello Cold War fans, Flashpoint Campaigns: Cold War Beta v3.0.3.10625 is out now and can be downloaded here.

This Beta offers balance changes and bug fixes to the game and all standalone and campaign scenarios have been refreshed to use the latest national data file updates.

This Beta is also available via Steam. A downloadable PDF has been attached to this post detailing all changes, while the changelog is also posted below.

Happy hunting everyone!

Data Corrections and Enhancements
- Corrected Effective and Maximum ranges of most ballistic-type weapons other than tank guns and artillery systems. Thanks to Jo van der Pluym for this.
- Accuracy value for AAA guns (AAA) set to 4, Aircraft Cannons (ACN) to 6, Aircraft MGs (AMG) to 5, Infantry Support Weapons (ISW) to 3, Machine Guns (MGN) to 4, and Vehicle Support Weapons (VSW) to 5 to improve them based on mounting/platform stability.
- Accuracy on Surface to Air Missiles (SAM) was reviewed, and many revisions were made based on better data. This should help some MANPAD systems be a bit better in a few cases.
- Adjustments for SA/AP/HEAT for Fast Rate of Fire weapons to better reflect the amount of ammo going down range during a combat action and this will make those weapons a bit more capable versus targets and should also with code adjustments, improve their use on soft targets.
- Corrected the Munition tables for the correct Type value for Base Bleed HE round (HEBB) and Rocket Assisted HE round (HERA) to the table.
- Replaced the Polish Surnames with the correct list. We also corrected Polish Rank Names.
- Added in missing high explosive (HE) versions of Warsaw Pact Surface to Surface Missiles. Also added a missing ICM version to the Soviet inventory.
- Corrections were made to the US Formations for incorrect Soldier squad counts for some H and J series units.
- Corrected the number and use of Dragon ATGMs in a number of US infantry formations.
- US Engineering units' names corrected.
- Added in a few missing Illumination rounds for various nations.
- Added missing ARMs to the Czech data file for the SEAD unit so it works properly.
- Added missing FFR codes to ISW and MGN weapons. Minor corrections for SA values on some small arms systems. Formation tag corrections for missing "/" markers and changes to aircraft tags for better understanding of the mission. Also, a few typo corrections."
- “SharedCharacteristics.xlsx” and .bin, “Air Unit FP and Size Ratings.xlsx”, "Data Validation Tool.xlsm", "CW Weapon MV Tables.xlsx" files all updated.
- New "Weapons Values Tools.xlsx" and "Ship Value Tools.xlsx" added.

Content
- All standalone and campaign scenarios have been refreshed to use the latest national data file updates listed above.
- The tutorials were not shown as sorted in the expected order in the scenario list. They have all now had their start dates adjusted to 1 to 4 July (i.e. prior to the 20 July start of hostilities) to put them naturally into the expected sort order.
- “Tutorial - Air Support Operations". The F4 SEAD aircraft had a 0 max rounds Napalm pod, causing problems, resolved by setting the Napalm pod to have 4 bombs.
- “Tutorial - Air Support Operations", "Tutorial - Artillery Operations”, “Tutorial - NBC Operations", and "Tutorial - Convoy Operations" have been updated to set the weather to generally clear weather on 28 June 2000.
- "Crossing the Waldnaab". Add missing bridges which the briefing refers
to, and refer to Warsaw Pact forces as "Czechoslovak" (not "Czech").
- "For Queen and Country". Fixed an error in its scenario blurb file that prevented it from being identified as UK when filtering scenarios to load using the national flag filter.
- "Meeting in Arolsen" changed to make Soviet battle plans hand off critical artillery to the computer player earlier, enabling better support of Soviet attacks with preventive barrages.
- “Schlacht bei Diemelstadt". Fixed a typo in Player 1 Mission Briefing: should be "Dortmund" instead of "Dortumund".
- "The Long Night” – In about 10% of cases, the visibility range was very reduced (50m) despite the weather conditions not being that bad. This has been fixed.
- "The Three Sisters" was updated to extend the Pact minefield the length of the West German/East German border to prevent players from using the area south of Blue's deployment area.
- UK1-SN4 “Battle of Braunschweig” was updated to flesh out the briefings.
- US1-SN1 "Fog of War" referenced Bundesstrate "25" in the player 1 Mission Briefing when it should have said "29". Now fixed.
- US1-SN4 “Percutio” updated where Soviet RAG-1 BP did not have the correct ammo set for all barrage missions.
- Fix Marburg map problems, and update CW scenarios using Marburg map (Eyes Ears and Teeth, USSR1-SN2).
- Fix three hex-side problems in Geseke map, and improve graphics for the Notlandeplatz III/4 / highway landing strip on the map (a historical Cold War feature)

PBEM++ / Multiplayer
- Fix some bugs in user message generation around Multiplayer errors, and recognize that HTTP 500+ errors just don't have anything we can do about them, and tell the user to try again later.
Add encryption to user passwords when writing them out to the debug log.
- Enable the new feature flag for tournament scoring to support the new tournament scoring, compatible with other Matrix tournaments.
- Fix: Fog of War settings get overridden somehow. Change the ‘save to server’ code during NATO setup to use the correct FoW settings instead of the incorrect Multiplayer Form values. This took a while to finally trace down and we are glad we finally found it.
- Sometimes the ‘Issue Challenge’ button was not showing on High DPI systems. It now shows under all circumstances.

VCR Replay
- New: A completely rewritten VCR Replay feature, which now allows replay of the entire scenario for games started with this release in effect. As before, Shift-F9 replays the previous turn.

Artillery and Fire Support
- FSCC: increase threshold to discard old fire support requests from 30 minutes to 45 minutes.
- Prevent HE barrages from being shifted to follow a fast-moving, low-flying target like a helicopter. Also, rule out high-flying targets.
- Support a wider set of artillery ammo for servicing FSCC requests now. Also, ensure there is an out-of-ammo message for all ammo types.
- Introduce missing radio log messages for new types of ammo.
- Reduce the default minimum steps for area fire to 10 from 40. This will result in fewer fire support requests being refused due to a lack of assets.
- Make the game more robust for Direct Support fires requests where the target is not a lost contact anymore.
- Improve the processing of barrages called in on 'now lost' contacts.
- Use the correct last known location when assessing hostile targets in potential target locations.
- Use the last spotting type to assess remaining steps for lost contact, not the actual unspotted type.
- Fix a problem in the direct supported unit calculation where an enemy HQ was ignored.
- Support enemy-oriented barrages resulting from fire support requests served by direct support artillery.
- Prevent artillery systems from using their cannons in direct fire unless the weapon system has a direct fire capability ('DFA').
- Fix artillery killing units not showing up a popup combat result hint.
- Forward observer - catch problem with observers having moved off-map.

Combat
- A validation sweep of air defense combat, especially direct fire guns against helicopters, was made, and the combat model was tweaked for better fidelity.
- Some combat popup hints were displayed in the wrong circumstances. This has been rewritten and now yields more predictable, expected results.
- Fixed issues with stand-off and surrender assessment by having them only consider Influence from units and not objectives. Also fixed an issue with the stand-off assessment that only checked whether potential threats had a spotting state.
- Air Defense guns should not be turned on to ground targets. Fixed with code and data corrections.
- The classic line of fire display did not work as intended. The settings to turn it on and off were not working correctly, but have been fixed now.
- Airstrikes: be robust against weapons with 0 max rounds ammo loads.

Victory Adjudication
- When Sudden Death was triggered, the wrong player icon would sometimes be shown. We think this has been fixed now.
- When the VP result is right on the border between victory levels, the game could bump the victory up a level too many. This has now been fixed.

Unit Dashboard and Orders Editing
- Prevent users from deleting Unit Dashboard orders while plotting orders. Also, ensure the next order is started when deleting the first order from the Unit Dashboard list.
- Remove Unit Dashboard ability to edit Counter-Battery orders; setting the fire mission for use in CB should be done via the unit's Fire Support Group settings.
- Fix 'auto-commit' on pressing Start turn resolution, where the current order has not yet been committed.
- Unit Dashboard Orders Tab. Enable/disable the button "Apply to Later Barrages" when the other edit controls are enabled/disabled.
- Fix Unit Dashboard orders delay to consistently reflect the High-HQ-to-unit command delay.
- Fixed an issue where order chain wasn't being killed when withdrawing due to SOP violations (stand-off, when taking fire, etc.).

Scenario Editing
- XLSX export/import. Be able to import an XLSX without resetting the custom ammo loadouts for various weapons back to their defaults. Custom SOPs are now protected too.
- Make "Key Ammo" designation settings from player and scenario designer stick.

Tactical Transport
- Improve rebuilding of transport allocations in the scenario editor. Also refine the allocations, including making sure we don't give free loading of organic passengers and transport units with organic passengers will always be able to carry stuff (assuming available capacity).
- Catch problem when a passenger unit included in transport plan is moved during setup to the pickup location.

Bridging
- Improve bridging logic, allowing short-span engineers to only bridge (or recover bridges from) hex side streams, and (not used) long-span engineers to bridge full water hexes (or recover bridges from there). Remove the ability for long-span engineers to bridge or recover bridges from hex side streams (as that would lead to trading short span bridges for long span bridges, removing control over the number of long span bridges available).
- Fix: Building a bridge caused a game crash in the released 3.0.2 game.
- Fix bridge recovery logic, so the AVLB can pick up its bridge again in the Tutorial.
- Fixed an issue on 2 hex side bridges where non-amphibious units thought they could path through.
- Don't show bridging radio buttons in the on-arrival Orders form when no bridging actions are possible.

Other
- Fixed a unit movement looping issue by upping the penalty for revisiting the previous location.
- When playing using Recruit FOW you could see and change enemy waypoints in some cases. Now fixed by hiding the enemy waypoints.
- Fix issue in unit Course-of-Action selection that downrated the utility of engaging ground units for all AD-capable units, not just AD-specialized units.
- Map Overlays: fully activate the last active overlays upon pausing turn resolution.
- Map Overlays: update Multi-Unit Chain-of-Command overlay to reflect all units exempt from command range such as recon, helo, air, and FARP.
- Subunit Inspector: don't list weapons twice in the Weapons tab (when the unit has multiple instances of the same weapon).
- Increase timer duration for warning message about impassable terrain.
- Subunit Inspector: fix calculations of min/effective/max range.
- VP markers didn't update properly in hotseat. Switching H2H players did NOT refresh and redraw the map marker list so that markers visible to only one side, of any type, did not change visibility as expected.
- Provide a better error message when clicking location trying to link a direct supported unit.
- In the TOC Ops SITREP report, show Readiness and Morale for reinforcing units now. It was hidden before.
- Menu underscore letters no longer function in-game for single-key-press items. The main menu choices have underlined characters that promise an Alt-shortcut key to the drop-down menu. This now works as expected, so that, e.g., Alt-G from the keyboard drops down the Game menu.
- The game's main theme music would stutter slightly on game launch. It was being started twice, and now starts only once. This sounds better!

[IronManBeta]

We are very happy to get this out and into the hands of our players. We watch your feedback very carefully and a number of these changes and fixes are a direct response to what we have been sent.

Thanks everyone, Rob C

On Target Simulations Ltd.

[bootlegger267]

Thanks for fixing the US Squad Size!

Bootlegger267