Patch 1.1 requests

[ratprince]

10 days in March.....

[;)]

[Cinadel]

First off, I would just like to say that this is a fantastic game! Actually my friends and I have been waiting for this game for last 7 years since Axis and Allies was released without PBEM functionality, and I'm so glad it finally arrived!

Features I would like to see for the next Patch.

1. AI Automatically closes Combat Animation screen if it is turned on after a certain amount of time. (Unless I'm missing something, if this feature is turned on it always requires human interaction).

2. Option to only show Combat Animation screen if it occurs with a player controlled power. (i.e. I'm playing against 4 computer controlled opponents. I'm China and Japan attacks me, I would like to see the combat animation screen. However if Japan and US are fighting (both AI) I don't need to see it. And I always want to see it if I'm attacking someone.

Thanks again for this great game!

-Cinadel

[Espejo]

[:)] I like the game more and more. But there is always room for improvement.

a.) Is it possible to to toggle a default "strategic move " modus. Sometimes it is necessary to redeploy your units.
I don´t want to use tactical movement because I don´t want to use up my supply though I have to click unit click startegic movement over and over again a little bit tedious

b.) An option to turn of "take back move" (for competitive play

c.) Please make the "frozen" areas more vissible

d.) Change the OP fire rules please => The Malta thread

[Uncle_Joe]

Your 'a' can be accomplished by holding down the Ctrl key.

[Espejo]

ORIGINAL: Uncle_Joe

Your 'a' can be accomplished by holding down the Ctrl key.

[&o] Thanks Uncle Joe. It seems the interface is sometimes my biggest enemy.

[bmodified]

I'd like an auto end of turn report, something that could be outputted to another format, like a word or excel doc. If it would point out by region the unused resources for that turn, that would be great!

Also, being able to get a chance of surprise on first turn attacks that are allocated before the first one is executed.

Some sort of penalty for letting Berlin fall would be good.

[Espejo]

Some things I personally would like to see:

Can we be told were a unit retreats to: Liek infantrie retreats to London etc. ? I hate it to search for my damaged units.

PBEM: Right now it is not possible to have the combat animations only the report screen. Can this be changed easily?

[Vasili]

Please Please Please! [&o]
Allow us to choose how we want armies, navies, etc.. represented!!
Give us the option to have them as symbols (as in board game symbols) instead of the little man and tank and ship and airplane pictures!
Oh, and also, give us the ability to see their stats - maybe in a pop up window as a mouse over? Or by showing one or two stats per counter, and letting us choose which we want to see? [:D]

[willgamer]

It seems to me that the wrong expections were set by the names of the victory conditions. Who wants to win a Marginal Victory? Where's the thrill in a Auto Victory? Nobody and nowhere!

How about Historical Victory = MV and Crushing Victory = AV. [:D]

That would more accurately frame all the play balance discussions...[8|]

[dembe73]

When I am using the production screen and doing research balancing it is sometimes difficult. Do I want one more unit in 2 turns or research the breakthrough right now?

When I swap between those screens the production capacity of certain areas is used up at the production screen, even though it does not show what is being produced.

I mean 2 factories in a territory and only 1 graphic unit displaying on screen, and 0 capacity left.

Do I lose capacity if swapping between screens or is it just not displaying the graph properly?

[mavraamides]

Couple of exploits I'd like to see changed:

1) Japan and Germany both attacking Russia should get US in war IMHO. This should greatly reduce the effectiveness of the Russia double team strategy.

2) German invasion of England should get US in war. Otherwise, if island falls, the game is effectively over.

3) It appears something may need to be done about invasion of US by either Germany or Japan. Maybe Russia immediately gets into war if US invaded. That would make it a very dangerous move for either country.

[MrQuiet]

When I swap between those screens the production capacity of certain areas is used up at the production screen, even though it does not show what is being produced.

I mean 2 factories in a territory and only 1 graphic unit displaying on screen, and 0 capacity left.

Do I lose capacity if swapping between screens or is it just not displaying the graph properly?

dembe73 what I think is happening is you buy a beaker/s (research points) at a factory.
Then you switch to research screen.
Research screen shows how many production points have been applied to research (number next to beaker in uppper corner)
Now when you switch back to factory the beakers are gone and the factory/resource points have been deducted
But you still have the research points to use when you get back to the research screen.

So to answer your question you are not losing any factory capacity, its just that the beakers do not show up when you switch back.

Hope that helps.

[color]

ORIGINAL: Cinadel

1. AI Automatically closes Combat Animation screen if it is turned on after a certain amount of time. (Unless I'm missing something, if this feature is turned on it always requires human interaction).

There is an option in one of the options screen where you can turn this off. Can't remember which screen right now, but the option is to set the combat animation delay or something like that. Set it to zero and the combat animation popup will not appear.

Jorgen

[pyrhic]

I'd like to change the location of the floating mouse box...so many time's i've moused ovre a place, trying to see what's in the province, only to have the mouse box conceal it....grrrr

[PDiFolco]

ORIGINAL: GordianKnot

Couple of exploits I'd like to see changed:

1) Japan and Germany both attacking Russia should get US in war IMHO. This should greatly reduce the effectiveness of the Russia double team strategy.

2) German invasion of England should get US in war. Otherwise, if island falls, the game is effectively over.

3) It appears something may need to be done about invasion of US by either Germany or Japan. Maybe Russia immediately gets into war if US invaded. That would make it a very dangerous move for either country.

Yes, add to that that ANY Axis attack on land areas anywhere in the Atlantic west of Europe or on American (the continent!) mainland should trigger US activation . This will prevent the gamey "US attacked unprepared after taking Canada/Mexico" strategy [8|]

[marc420]

OK, I'm just trying to picture Roosevelt's speech to Congress when he tries to convince them that the US should enter WWII in order to save Communism.

--Why is there a Producttion Phase? Why can't I just set this stuff during my turn? Typically I'm looking somewhere, and decide for instance I need more transports. I'd rather go set that immediately in the Production. Instead I have to make a note somehow and wait for the next phase. So why not be able to set Production orders during the turn. They still wouldn't execute till later. From the outside looking in, I don't really see the need for a separate production phase.

--Why does it take four mouse clicks to Save a game? Very basic windows function .... give me one button to save the doc/file/game I'm currently in to the same name it already had.

--Some easy way to tell me WHERE the unlinked resources are located. Perhaps the Strategic Map could be updated for this and other purposes. A Resource mode where I can see what resources I'm controlling but not linked to. And also what Neutral resources I might have access to if I moved a transport or repaired a RR. And the unmoved-unit idea below could maybe be something that could be seen from this screen. I just get the feeling that something more beyond the colored squares could be shown here.

--Some sort of region info report I can bring up for 1 region. Data is scattered all over the place between four view modes, an annoying popup window and a all-region report. I'd like one screen/popup/area where I can see this all together for one region.

--Some sort of "go to next unmoved unit" button or hotkey. Or a way of indicating these on a world wide map I can see. A typical occurance for me in my first game as WA was to begin to move a naval unit south around Africa heading for either Egypt the Far East. Then I forget they are sitting in the sea zones south of Africa. A few turns later I'll finally realize, 'what happened to that Light Fleet I was moving?". Something that helps remind me to move those units would be nice.

--Some guess as to what the Op-Fire might be when asked whether you want to risk it. If nothing else, an indication as to what units are about to fire would help.

--On the production screen, some sort of clue as to how many resource and population points your production for each box of the production spiral will consume. An example is trying to deal with the UK's population limits. Give me a hint as to what how the population and resource points will combine with the production already in the boxes. Right now I find myself counting on my fingers and toes all the red units in the current quarter plus the units in next quarter then trying to get an idea as to whether I can build more infantry for next quarter. Some help here would be nice.

-- For research, give me one button for max research. Instead of having to hit that little plus button to see how many times I can click it, just put a 3rd button in there that says I want to research this as much as I can. And while you are added, make those plus and minus buttons bigger, there's lots of room.

-- And on the research screen, do something to let me know what items I'm already researching this turn. Maybe two different beaker icons. A bubbling beaker is an item I've already assigned points to this quarter. A beaker with no bubbles is research I've already started in a previous quarter, but where I've assigned no points this quarter.

-- I don't know why, but I have a very hard time pressing the Strategic Move button. Seems very tricky for my mouse to get that button to click. And I like the earlier idea of being able to lock the game into Strategic move mode. The Ctrl key is nice, but UI that constantly mixes keyboard input and mouse input is annoying. Frequently I'm leaning back in my chair

-- During movement, especially with fleets, some sort of indicator as to how much supplies you are about to use and from where you are going to use them would be nice.

-- I with the earlier poster where I'd love to see all the popup and unit hovers show up in a single area off the screen. I frequently start to pick a unit and hover over it, and suddenly the area I'm looking at is covered in popups. Slowing down the popups or turning them off doesn't help beyond a first step because there's key data in there I want to see .... slowing it down just increases the aggravation in trying to see that data.

--How about a combat comparison tool? Perhaps tied into that screen that lists the current ratings for all units. Something that lets me say "If my tank fires on his infantry, what's my chances of getting a hit ... and vice versa"? Currently, I find myself flipping between pages on that screen looking and saying "his defense is 3x4, and my attack is a 4, so what chance do I have to get a hit?" A screen that could combine this info, and get the player an idea of the odds of a matchup would help

-- Why do you guys hate printers?

-- If Fog of War is on, should I be able to see the total number of units for an enemy?


BTW -- I think its a high compliment to the programmers that almost all the things mentioned in this thread are improvements instead of bugs that need fixing.

[Grifman]

ORIGINAL: marc420

--How about a combat comparison tool? Perhaps tied into that screen that lists the current ratings for all units. Something that lets me say "If my tank fires on his infantry, what's my chances of getting a hit ... and vice versa"? Currently, I find myself flipping between pages on that screen looking and saying "his defense is 3x4, and my attack is a 4, so what chance do I have to get a hit?" A screen that could combine this info, and get the player an idea of the odds of a matchup would help

That already exists in some form. There's a box that appears that gives you an estimate of each sides losses and who will win.

[Grifman]

I'd like to see some differentiation on the production screen for units being repaired vs. those being built from scratch. A simple color code would allow me to tell the difference.

I also think ships should be repaired in ports without factories. Early British damage in the East Med seems to result in those ships being lost/sunk since they can't get to a factory, while historically they were repaired in port at Alexandria.

[MButtazoni]

data collected

I don't have the time to comment an ALL the suggestions here, but they have been noted and we are decideing on effort and imnpact of each. we have already coded in numerous of these.


one comment to:

If Fog of War is on, should I be able to see the total number of units for an enemy?

it was my STROING opinion to leave these numbers available to the enemy durign FoW games. This is a strategic game and strategic decisions are not made in a vaccum. Intelligience reports were available in the war, no commander made decisions with his eyes closed. yes, we've discussed all kinds of variations on this: +/- 20% on the numbers shown, show naval units in production, etc... but where/when do we stop?

[marc420]

ORIGINAL: Grifman
That already exists in some form. There's a box that appears that gives you an estimate of each sides losses and who will win.

Hi ... yes, I'm very aware of the always present popup with attack odds. But what I was picturing was something different. I was looking for something that just gives me some feedback on say what happens when my current infantry fights another powers infantry. I tend to be doing a lot of math in my head trying to get a feel for that ... and since the math is statistical based on say 6,7, or 8 die rolls, its hard to get more than an impression in your head. I can compare the avg of 3.5 per dice to the defence, but not much beyond that.

Right now I'm doing a lot of jumping around between different units in that unit stats screen trying to get that sort of feel. So, while I know its more of an enhancement, and one with a whole new screen of UI, it does seem like an area where, at least speaking for myself, I'd like to get some help.