Anglo-Zulu Wars in AT?

[spelk]

Yes, I created a modified version of the SMG SFT for a Warrior SFT to represent the Zulu's. I did set their supply requirement to 0. Making the assumption that they will forage from the land, and they are fighting in their lands - so its not a big stretch. I think the native population dreaded having the Impi's roll by because they lost a lotof their food/crops.

Thanks for the river crossing adaptation. It took me a while to find it all, but essentially you create an extra Movetype, and then for each of the land types you adjust the Movement Costs, compared to the normal Infantry Foot movement type.

I've been tweaking the starting positions and VP's.

I want it to represent the Invasion of the Zululand from the start, but I'd like to allow the opportunity for Chelmsford and Glyn to fight defensively at Rorke's Drift and Isandlwana. Coupled with Pearson's push into Eshowe and then onto Ulundi. I've got Wood and Rolands in the north west, around Utrecht and Luneberg - they will become the reserves for the push onto Ulundi (they fight battles at Khambula and on the Ntombe river, but I don't think I'll be able to include them in the overall picture). So it will be ahistorical in the sense that all the British will focus on holding the main VP points and then with luck push to take Ulundi. However, I'm hoping I can capture some of the historical experience around the famous sites of Rorke's Drift and Isandlwana.

I'm trying to fathom out events now, and tweaking the AIVP Values. I take it I can't get the same Regime to support both defensive and offensive behaviours?

I want the Zulu's around Ulundi and Eschowe to be staunchly defensive. But the Zulu's approaching Isandlwana to be feircly aggressive and take the Camp at Isandlwana, and attack Rorke's Drift.

It seems I can change the Regime's overall defensive nature with the Conservative variable. Coupled with altering the AIVP values for the main Zulu objectives upping the VP's by 20 or so points. In the hope that those Zulu's nearby will attack Isandlwana and Rorke's Drift.

The scenario will have no production as such, and will be played from the British point of view against the Zulu's.

Any ideas or comments that may add flavour to the scenario would be most appreciated.

I've got a lot of the stuff in place, just the winning conditions and the events need fiddling with. Then it needs some extensive play to see if its actually fun and challenging. I'm not sure at what point I should release it, do scenario designers release fresh scenarios out and then update them, or do you wait till its more or less watertight and exactly how I want it  before releasing it?

[Grymme]

Personally i dont think you should script the AI to much.
 
I do not know how to modify both offensive and defensive general behaviour in the same round. But you can have the AI conservatory and AIVP change in different rounds depending on different things so in that way you can set the AI to be both defensive and offensive.
 
As for when to upload the scenairo. I dont think there is a generally accepted practice. My advice is better to upload to soon than to late. There are several great scenarios that looked fantastic but were never uploaded and then the designer got tired of it and stopped playing AT, thats horrible. I think that things like balance and finetuning has to be done by the general community but its always nice to have all major events done and to have done a couple of playtests before uploading the scenario. Remember that you can always delete the uploaded scenario and replace it with a new version (something people dont do enough in my opinion).
 
What kind of events are you thinking of doing?
 
Also, have you read the tutorials in the mod section, they give a lot of insight and inspiration?

[spelk]

ORIGINAL: Grymme
Personally i dont think you should script the AI to much.

I do not know how to modify both offensive and defensive general behaviour in the same round. But you can have the AI conservatory and AIVP change in different rounds depending on different things so in that way you can set the AI to be both defensive and offensive.

I tried creating two sets of people in the Zulu side, and searched for a way to attach different Conservative scores to them, but I think its limited to Regimes. Would be tricky to make them fight as one if they're different regimes. So I've sort of settled for just tweaking it enough to get them slightly defensive and then pump the AIVP scores high for the main British VP zones.

I didn't know you could alter the Conservative and AIVP scores alter based on rounds. DO you think I could attach value alterations based on circumstances?

Heres my logic.

Zulu's want to overrun Isandlwana, and Rorke's Drift.
Brits want to hold those areas, and push on to Eshowe.

If Isandlwana falls to the Zulu's, really bump up Rorke's Drift AIVP so that they push on to that.

If Eshowe falls to the British, then Zulu's Conservative Defense bumped up and AIVP's for Ulundi are boosted to get them back to their King's Kraal in defense.

ORIGINAL: Grymme
As for when to upload the scenairo. I dont think there is a generally accepted practice. My advice is better to upload to soon than to late. There are several great scenarios that looked fantastic but were never uploaded and then the designer got tired of it and stopped playing AT, thats horrible. I think that things like balance and finetuning has to be done by the general community but its always nice to have all major events done and to have done a couple of playtests before uploading the scenario. Remember that you can always delete the uploaded scenario and replace it with a new version (something people dont do enough in my opinion).

I played through the scenario last night, and the British have a tough old time, to hold Isandlwana. I managed to take Eshowe, and I pulled the reserves from the North West Southwards, Wood come down to help defend Rorke's Drift, Roland made an epic journey across towards Ulundi, but was encircled and ran out of supplies before he made it. Pearson and Durnford both tried to push up to Ulundi, but were also swamped. When Chelmsford was killed outside of Rorke's Drift they all went into supply starvation.

I'll fiddle a bit more, and see if I can get it playing so that at least the British have a fighting chance. Perhaps I need to balance the combat a bit, it seems the riflemen can't take much punishment from the Zulu's in numbers. Unless they have extraordinarily high entrenchment values (like at Rorke's Drift). I'm keen to get it up, so that a few people can try it out and point out the glaringly obvious mistakes or balancing issues. But I don't want something half baked to be my first introduction to the world of my scenarios. If I was in a position of giving up on it, I'd upload what there was anyway. But I can't see that happening just yet.

ORIGINAL: Grymme
What kind of events are you thinking of doing?

At the moment I only have a couple, the start event that sets the scene and sets the Conservative/AIVP values. Then I have the following:

Defeat at Isandlwana (where the Zulu's take over the Camp) - [Only this one is in the scenario at the moment] 20VP

Defeat at Rorke's Drift (if Zulu's get in to the Drift) 20VP

Fall of Eshowe (if the Brit's make it in to the Mission there) 10VP

Overrun of Helpmekaar (if the Zulu's overrun the British/Natal back line) 10VP

Fall of Ulundi (if the Brit's defeat the Zulu Nation) 40VP

I've set the VP Victory condition to be 100, but you'd need to hold all VP places to win. Seems a bit extreme to be honest. Not sure either side can do it, well maybe the Zulu's could. SO might have to adjust that.

ORIGINAL: Grymme
Also, have you read the tutorials in the mod section, they give a lot of insight and inspiration?

Yeah, I've been through most of them. Much of the Event/AI fiddling has been directly lifted off the Netherlands scenario Vic was going through.

[spelk]

Heres a screenshot of the scenario mid play, with the Zulu's at Camp Isandlwana.

[spelk]

Thought I'd throw up a couple of images of a round of the combat, just to see if there are any comments on the balance between the two combatants.

The Visuals


The Numbers


Any glaring errors or inconsistencies, let me know..

[spelk]

I think I'm almost at the point where I want to playtest it, perhaps with an interested few who wouldn't mind trying it out and sharing their thoughts and critiscisms/improvements. Anyone who wants a go at this early build, and who wants to help craft it into perhaps something a bit better? Shout up here, or PM me if you want.

Also, while I'm here with my begging cap out, how do you determine which unit the map is focussed on when your turn starts. Since I've added Port Natal, every turn of the British seems to start with that site selected - and initially most of the action takes place around Rorke's Drift and Isandlwana some way up on the map.

[spelk]

Got another quick question for anyone, I've set up several Zulu HQ's with a few Warrior units attached to them, and all these HQ's have their main HQ with Ntingshwayo at Ulundi. But as soon as the AI takes their first move, they re-shuffle my Unit heirarchy and reassign men and HQ's around. Is there a RuleVar setting to stop this? Or some other mechanism by which the AI preserves the current OOB and HQ setup?

[spelk]

Ok, I've managed a workaround for the HQ shuffling the AI was doing. Since Zulu supply isn't an issue, I made the sub-HQ's, non-HQ's. Simply Chief units.

I've tidied it up a bit, as best I could, I've played it a couple of times. I've had the Zulu's win once. I've very nearly won as the British, but the Zulu defense of Ulundi was just too strong, and most of my units had ran out of supply or were being cut out of the supply chain, and it ended in failure to secure Ulundi itself.

I've uploaded the scenario onto the AT Scenariobank as it stands, version 0.5 - still needs some refinement I'm sure. Would be good if interested AT players have a crack at it, and tell me what I've done wrong.

Thanks to all those who have helped me so far, especially Grymme - without whom I wouldn't have made it to this stage.

[CSO_Talorgan]

ORIGINAL: spelk

Thanks for the river crossing adaptation. It took me a while to find it all, but essentially you create an extra Movetype, and then for each of the land types you adjust the Movement Costs, compared to the normal Infantry Foot movement type.

Sorry for taking this thread off on a tangent, but this technique could be used to give Gebirgsjäger a distinct advantage on mountains.