I did notice a few Panama Canal scripts, but they were only assigned for CV's & HQ's, but not any other type of ship. I have no idea if they can be tweaked if things start getting sunk in the Pacific, or not.
Both the research and build scripts apparently work differently than I had assumed: I had thought that it simply rolled the dice for every purchase in each script field, for all units/tech simultaneously, and the "lucky" one got bought. Reading the docs in the files tho makes it clear that that is NOT how it works; instead each tech/unit is rolled for individually, based on the percentage chance in question. But, if the scripts are simply read from top to bottom, then there indeed may not be any MPPs left by the time it gets to the bottom, where all of the ships are, natch.
The research scripts tho contained some "forced" buy ones, a few techs w/ 100%, ensuring that they are kept "topped off" no matter what. It may simply require something similar for ship buys.
I just edited the US AI build scripts; at the start of each war year, for a period of several months, the west coast will buy only ships, with fleet CV's guaranteed--if all funds aren't gone by the time the program reads the relevant line.....
1942 Feb to June [this presumes they will be at war by the former month]
1943 Jan to May
1944 Jan to March
1941: I may put in one for prewar as well.
I'm also going to beef up the fleet scripts by raising both the minimums and maximums.
If you want these Crispy I'll find some site [Dropbox is fine I guess] for them.
Found another issue: a script ["#NAME= USA Build Up Fleet - Med -> Pacific (Malaya) (1)"] is set to move a number of ships from the Med to the Indian Ocean. Except that if the Italians defeat or defer a Torch/Italy invasion, the script apparently won't fire.
If you come up with any new AI scripts that improve the game I would welcome them, especially in the Pacific Theater. I've spent most my energy in the event side.
Just one question: the dates on each build (or research) script: the help portion of the file says this:
; Purchase Plan identity is determined by #COUNTRY_ID. A country can only have a single plan based on this
; criteria and will be assigned the first valid plan regardless of duplicate script entries (even if the
; remaining control '#' values are different).
; Note: This will also allow you to set up a variety of plans with the same identity but different
; control '#' parameters where the first 'event' satisfied will be the fist plan assigned (for added variability).
The 1st two sentences would appear to mean that each country can only have one active plan script at any given time, but the two sets of notes here seem to fully contradict each other. The issue is that the US has both West and East Coast scripts, and for them the dates are not sequential, but overlap, which would imply that they can both fire simultaneously (during the same turn).
My USN build plans are working; he's put 2 CV's into the queue in the space of 3 turns (tho note I made the build %'s 100 for carriers, which means he didn't have funds left over in one turn), + an Alaska super cruiser. [and 2 MTB that I enabled in the scripts just for the heck of it, will likely take them back out] Still didn't buy diddly before that, nor anything else in said 3 turns, but, it's a start.
But had a weird diplo bug/feature come out of literally nowhere. In Feb a decision came up offering me friendship with Turkey. They had gotten 1 diplo hit towards the Allies, were at +9 Allies at that moment, so figured I would be swinging it back to zero...
Very next turn my spy network reports a fighter in the middle of Turkey. Confused as heck, examined the war map, and noticed that during the following AI turn they had declared war on me! Note Rommel was moving into Palestine at that moment, Syria had become Allied, Iraq had done its coup then surrendered.
I think the turn lengths need to be reconjiggled for operational & research as well as economic reasons. Just tested T1 for both the Euro & World scenarios (using your new 30% IM for the Reich in Euro, World kept at the default 50%), and noticed that the native MPP income for World is only 15% more than Euro-for 13 turns a year, vs. 18 in Euro, where Euro income will be 40% greater. I couldn't figure out why I was always running out of funds, couldn't buy what I usually bought in Euro (where, of course I have some extras available such as divisions).
Operationally, in World I get, if I start Barbarossa/future Eastern offensives in May, 4-5 clear weather turns. In Euro I can get, early June start, 7-8 clear turns. OK, distances are shorter in World, but I still have to attack the same towns to reach my objectives (World: 5 each on the roads to Leningrad & Moscow, while Euro has 6). In the offseasons I found that I simply don't have the time nor MPPs to rebuild before May comes along, and in the meantime both my sub fleet and my research suffer.
I also don't have quite enough time to ensure tech hits in the vital areas before Barbarossa, given that the chits in both scenarios give you +5%. Got Tanks 2 at the end of April '41, so postpone one turn...then get Inf 2 a turn later, now I gotta wait until July. Note: I actually prefer the slower tech pace in general, dislike getting L4's by early '43...
Yes, this may indeed be by design, and also historical, but I am simply comparing what is available in both scenarios. I'd peg turn lengths at 12 (24 thus being the effective interval), giving you 15 per year.
Welp, mostly bad news on the AI front. Note I am still learning the in's and out's here...
The AI built one CV before the end of '42 (recall I made the relevant scripts have a 100% chance-if it has the cash on hand). As was the case before tho it typically only bought ships once everything else was bought, so most of his builds will be coming on starting in early '44. I now strongly suspect that it was a mistake to have put ships for the US at the bottom of the script list, if the program indeed reads the lines one at a time. Which means I have a question for the devs, if they are lurking: can I switch the order of the units in the script, put carriers 1st, and thus ensure a build right off the bat? Does the AI buy units first, or technology?
As for operational movements, there wasn't any, at least as far as fleet units were concerned. Note all I did was bump the minimum unit requirements up c. 20-40% (so that they will sail in a task force to wherever the script directs them). Even tho by the end of '43 it had 20 ships on the West Coast only a handful moved towards Australia (a minor script not one of the major ones). For the rest it was a sitzkrieg; even after I invaded Hawaii at the end of '43, they didn't do anything.
Welp, mostly bad news on the AI front. Note I am still learning the in's and out's here...
The AI built one CV before the end of '42 (recall I made the relevant scripts have a 100% chance-if it has the cash on hand). As was the case before tho it typically only bought ships once everything else was bought, so most of his builds will be coming on starting in early '44. I now strongly suspect that it was a mistake to have put ships for the US at the bottom of the script list, if the program indeed reads the lines one at a time. Which means I have a question for the devs, if they are lurking: can I switch the order of the units in the script, put carriers 1st, and thus ensure a build right off the bat? Does the AI buy units first, or technology?
As for operational movements, there wasn't any, at least as far as fleet units were concerned. Note all I did was bump the minimum unit requirements up c. 20-40% (so that they will sail in a task force to wherever the script directs them). Even tho by the end of '43 it had 20 ships on the West Coast only a handful moved towards Australia (a minor script not one of the major ones). For the rest it was a sitzkrieg; even after I invaded Hawaii at the end of '43, they didn't do anything.
I still appreciate you trying! It's tricky to do things with the AI at this scale, something I think is best suited for those paid to do so. I still think this is a great PBEM scenario, although I've yet to test run it with anyone.
It was buying ships during the periods where that was all it could buy, not quite as many as historical tho. I may experiment with rearranging the units in the scripts by priority, thus putting CV's at the top, BB's one below that, assuming I don't get an error when I do...
The endgame was rather sad. It did eventually start following my scripts, first trying to retake Hawaii, which I stomped to pieces, and then sent like 3 waves straight to the Japanese home islands. But the fleet sizes were still far too skimpy, and Kido Butai cleaned house. By Halloween '45, I had sunk the following, in exchange for the loss of Musashi, 2 DD's and 1 CA:
23 BB
1 BC
10 CA
7 CL
20 DD
8 CVE
15 CV [yep, all that he had, all gone. I still had all 12 of mine.]
4 SS
35 total transports too; I didn't lose a single one.
I surrender. Despite putting all ship builds at the top of the script, fleet carriers 1st, it appears that the only ships the AI got [other than those already in the build queue at start] were ones from Expert AI Unit scripts. Not a single carrier to be seen.
Quick question [which kind of snuck up on me, tho it apparently was a feature from Hubert/Bill's original scenario]: why don't the Russians get discounts on their infantry builds like they do in the Euro scenario? I overdid my tech builds, and only started building up the USSR's army too late, and only then noticed that I was paying the full prices for them. Even if I had eschewed said ~2000 MPPs of tech, that's only going to give me 7-13 additional ground units, which wouldn't have much of a prayer of standing up to the Axis tsunami of 140 ground units.
[Meant to add] I guess the only alternative is your idea about scripting the carriers-with sufficient randomization it likely could be simulated rather straightforwardly.
Scripting the AI is the toughest part best left to those getting paid lol I think some purchases via DE is best way to go.
As for the Soviets, I’ve kept all of the units as they are in vanilla. The idea with this campaign was more to expand the sandbox rather than tinker with everything as I did in WiE.
Small update, just tidying things up for a PBEM match.
- Added Belligerence scripts so that UK/India units can enter occupied Burma prior to war with Japan
- Fixed a French NM event after the fall of Paris
- Added a Japanese NM boost if USA declares war on Japan
I have only played it once as the Allies, and am about to begin my first PBEM. Keep in mind the game was designed with PBEM in mind, I did make some tweaks to the AI to handle the different scenarios that could come about, but in the vanilla match I played I found the Allied AI to be weak in the pacific and that has not been improved on my end so if you do play solo I would recommend playing Allies vs Axis AI. The match I played against Axis AI was very enjoyable and I purposely went "off script" to test.
As for changes, this was much less adventurous than my WiE mod which dramatically changed research, combat stats etc. This was fully about creating a sandbox with additional events, strategies and political outcomes.
I'll highlight a few important ones;
- Economic warfare against Germany. Germany throughout the game receives imports from Hungary, Romania, Yugoslavia, USSR,Greece, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Vichy France, Norway, Sweden, Argentina and Turkey. The latter of which you will have the ability to counter throughout the game.
- USA can declare war on the Axis prior to Pearl Harbor
- UK can mobilize the entire Commonwealth including Pacific nations
- Japan and USSR will have to each agree to neutrality pact or will be bound to war by the Tripartite Pact (it's automatic if Axis declare war in 1940 prior to the negotiation however)
- Some minor nations can receive military imports from Majors to grow stronger prior to joining the war, this can either be a defensive deterrent or prelude to an Alliance
- There are many other events and some have been re-written (such as Italy DOW Greece decision) some events are purely what-if such as the UK evoking the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance at the beginning of the war, or if USSR occupied the Baltic Straits.
Give it a go and go off script (evoke the Anglo Portuguese Alliance, Occupy the straits as USSR, Declare war on Japan as USA, activate the entire Commonwealth) it will be a refreshing change if nothing else! I did these four in my match and it was a blast.
I have only played it once as the Allies, and am about to begin my first PBEM. Keep in mind the game was designed with PBEM in mind, I did make some tweaks to the AI to handle the different scenarios that could come about, but in the vanilla match I played I found the Allied AI to be weak in the pacific and that has not been improved on my end so if you do play solo I would recommend playing Allies vs Axis AI. The match I played against Axis AI was very enjoyable and I purposely went "off script" to test.
As for changes, this was much less adventurous than my WiE mod which dramatically changed research, combat stats etc. This was fully about creating a sandbox with additional events, strategies and political outcomes.
I'll highlight a few important ones;
- Economic warfare against Germany. Germany throughout the game receives imports from Hungary, Romania, Yugoslavia, USSR,Greece, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Vichy France, Norway, Sweden, Argentina and Turkey. The latter of which you will have the ability to counter throughout the game.
- USA can declare war on the Axis prior to Pearl Harbor
- UK can mobilize the entire Commonwealth including Pacific nations
- Japan and USSR will have to each agree to neutrality pact or will be bound to war by the Tripartite Pact (it's automatic if Axis declare war in 1940 prior to the negotiation however)
- Some minor nations can receive military imports from Majors to grow stronger prior to joining the war, this can either be a defensive deterrent or prelude to an Alliance
- There are many other events and some have been re-written (such as Italy DOW Greece decision) some events are purely what-if such as the UK evoking the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance at the beginning of the war, or if USSR occupied the Baltic Straits.
Give it a go and go off script (evoke the Anglo Portuguese Alliance, Occupy the straits as USSR, Declare war on Japan as USA, activate the entire Commonwealth) it will be a refreshing change if nothing else! I did these four in my match and it was a blast.
Thanks. All very interesting stuff.
Anything done on the game balancing side of things? I see the victory conditions are not changed.
Most of the what if events are balanced with consequences as for victory conditions no changes yet at this time, perhaps if the mod gains transaction I’ll keep updating it. It’s been pretty quiet and still only about to start my first human march.
The biggest change this mod offers is variability. Quickly looking at the scripts I pinpoint roughly;
150 Decision Events
125 Unit Script Events
100 Mobilization_3 Events
Various other types of scripts, none that approach the above numbers.
This is a list of the Yes/No decision events (copied from a much older thread), as you can see many of the decision events are dummy as this is much shorter than 150. It also has a heavy focus on the European theater, as I had mentioned this was an opportunity to port my ongoing European mod into the world scale, with some additional tweaks. Much of what I've included in the European mod would not fit at this scale, so I adjusted and removed where I thought I should. The Pacific can still be shaken up, but it's more on the Allied player to do so, otherwise Japan's goals are clear leading up to and around Pearl Harbor.
UK:
The Anglo-Portuguese Alliance
Blockade American Imports To Spain
Reaction to the Blue Division
The Allies Jointly Pressure Turkey
Military Exports to Portugal
Military Exports to Turkey
Relations with Switzerland
Switzerland Ends Axis Relations
Relations with Portugal
Blockade Turkey
Training Norwegian and Danish Forces in Sweden
Upgrade Malta Garrison
Trade Agreement With Greece
Military Support of Greece
Deploy 1st Canadian Infantry
Secret Irish Protocol
Invasion of Norway
Mobilize the Whole Commonwealth
Crush Burmese Independence
Invade Syria
Soviet Naval Base at Cyprus
Operation Sledgehammer or Overlord
USA:
Allies Jointly Pressure Turkey
Military Exports To Turkey
Commitments to Turkish War Entry
Military Exports to Sweden
Swedish Convoy To Germany
Lend Lease to Saudi Arabia
Oil Embargo on Japan
Unprovoked War Entrance
Recognize Vichy France
USSR:
Allies Jointly Pressure Turkey
Non-Aggression Pact - Military Imports From Germany
Stalingrad Reinforcements
Civilian Engineers
German Soviet Commercial Agreement
Non-Aggression Pact with Turkey
Non-Aggression Pact with Japan
Deploy Modern Tanks
Placement of Strategic Reserves
Investment in Strategic Reserves
Demand Sweden Surrender Baltic State Gold Reserves
Germany:
Spanish Blue Division
Collaboration with Switzerland
Relations with Portugal
Trade Agreement with Portugal
Switzerland Seizes German Gold
Recapture Swiss Gold
Treaty of Friendship with Turkey
Trade Agreement with Turkey
Non-Aggression Pact - Military Exports to USSR
Civil Aid To Spain
Deliver Modern Tanks to Romania
Military Exports To Spain
Development of Spanish Mines
Repayment of Spanish Debt
Vichy Collaboration Policy
German-Soviet Commercial Agreement
Fall Blau
DAK Reinforcements
Offensive In the Ardennes
Relations with Greece
An Alliance with Greece
Trade Agreement with Switzerland
Transfer Troops Through Sweden
Operation Sealion
Oil Exports To Italy
Coal Exports To Italy
Schwerer Gustav Gun
German Naval Strategy
Naval Infantry - Abandon Kriegsmarine
An Alliance with Vichy France
Iraqi Reinforcements
Motorized Garrison - East Africa
Influence Paraguay
Alliance with Turkey
Italy:
Military Exports to Sweden
Civil Aid to Spain
Military Exports To Spain
North Africa Reinforcements
Sale of Naval Assets
Aircraft Industry Investment
Egypt Offensive
BETASOM Submarine Base
Revised Decision - DOW Greece
Hi Crispy,
I've been aware of your mod since SC2 days, but I finally took your newest version for a spin. The Axis AI could not be defeated as quickly as in the original version (or have I played the original version thoroughly enough I know the Axis AI too well ...) Great stuff! I really enjoyed it.
I recommend for anyone.
Thank you.
