Matrix Games Forums

I thought some of you would be interested in a few of the change notes from the upcoming patch that's currently in testing. Read carefully and enjoy, but note these are just a few excerpts from a longer list and that while in development and testing, everything is still subject to change... [8D] That means no complaining. [;)]

13) CHANGE V1.2.4: Add disease variables to AcwConstants file.

16) FIX V1.2.4: Prefer to retreat to home provinces w/o enemies

24) FIXED: V1.2.4: 6pdr no icon in quick combat?

44) CHANGE V1.2.4: Move supply caissons back behind line.

45a) CHANGED V1.2.4: Filters on City List for Ironworks and Universities.

53) CHANGE V1.2.5: Can now click on names of cities in Cities List to open City Details for the clicked city.

61) CHANGED V1.2.5: When "Advanced Buildings" option is off, USA now gets base 8,000 reinforcements per turn, CSA gets 4,000.

73) FIXED V1.2.5: US/CS have swapped victory songs.

78) CHANGED V1.2.5: Academies now provide more ranks. Each Academy allows:
3 Two-Star Generals
2 Three-Star Generals
1 Four-Star General
Furthermore, it now only requires 7 Academies to obtain a Five-Star general.
The cost of Academies has been increased to 150 Money.

79) CHANGED V1.2.5: Added promotion button to generals' Command Box. Any number of generals may be promoted in a turn this way.

80) CHANGED V1.2.5: Demoted generals now have a 50% chance to resign in protest.

88) CHANGED V1.2.5: No randomly legendary indians/freedmen/british/french

65) CHANGE V1.2.7: Lowered QB damage cap and lowered QB pursuit losses.

83) CHANGE V1.2.7: A brigade with a Medical Attribute now lowers disease losses by 20% for all units directly attached to the same military group or fort; brigades with two Medical Attributes lower disease losses by 40%. This supercedes the old rule under which the Medical Attribute reduced disease losses by 50% only for the brigade with the attribute.

90) CHANGED V1.2.7: Can no longer buy new plantations after emancipation.

94) CHANGE V1.2.7: Training grounds now provide +.2 quality to all newly built units in the same state.

95) CHANGE V1.2.7: March attrition, chance of lowering disposition has been increased from 5% to 6.25%; this chance is now doubled while force-marching to 13%.

95a) CHANGE V1.2.7: Loss from march attrition is now dependent on disposition:
Rebellious: Loss is 10%
Disorganized: Loss is 5%
Low: Loss is 2.5%
Normal: Loss is 1.25%
Inspired: Loss is .83%
Zealous: Loss is .5%

97) CHANGED V1.2.7: Added flags to Overview/Statistics screen and thickened statistics lines.

105) CHANGE V1.3.0: Strategic supply now reduces losses from disease; every level of strategic supply reduces base disease casualties by 5%. Units at zero strategic supply, however, take 50% more casualties from disease.

105a) Disease casualties penalty from swamps increased from 10% to 25%.

105b) Base disease casualties reduced from a Gaussian distribution around 15% to a Gaussian distribution around 11%.

109) NEW FEATURE V1.3.0: PBEM Replay. In PBEM games, after the Movement Phase has been completed, a replay file will be created in the PBEM directory with the following nomenclature: <GAMENAME>_Replay_<TurnNumber>.<sve|rep>. The USA player may load this file, view the replay, and then take his turn in lieu of loading his normal turn file, if he wishes; the CSA player may view this file, but cannot take his turn immediately after viewing this file as the USA player can. When the replay file is loaded, the player will be prompted to choose either the USA or the CSA as the "viewing" player -- a password check will be initiated if players have chosen passwords. Note that the replay file is a PBEM game file, and as such must be loaded from the "Load PBEM" option from the main-screen; attempting to load it in-game will result in an attempt to convert the file to a single-player game format.

110) CHANGE V1.3.0: Infantry attacking other infantry in quick combat now have their damage adjusted closer to the average damage dealt by both units.

111) CHANGE V1.3.0: Added battle history and battle animation replay to statistics screen.

Nice&nbsp;[:)][8D]

As usual for Matrix, this is a great beginning response to some major FOF gamer concerns. My only question is approx. when is this due for a release? We're anxious to begin playing with some of these fixes and enhancements so that we can point out other areas of concern. I hope you are not going to try to fix everything in one go and delay the update for weeks if not months.

Thanks for the update Erik.

Rook

Are you planning on making any changes to camps in the next patch?

Camps really do need to be addressed

Personally I'd put a camp in each state capitol at the start of the game and change it so they can't be built.

78) CHANGED V1.2.5: Academies now provide more ranks. Each Academy allows:
3 Two-Star Generals
2 Three-Star Generals
1 Four-Star General
Furthermore, it now only requires 7 Academies to obtain a Five-Star general.
The cost of Academies has been increased to 150 Money.


With that change, will the ratio of Academies needed to upgrade container staff be altered too?
Its 1 to 5 pre patch with the upped costs of academies shouldnt it be lowered to 1 to 3 or 4? not to remove / outbalance the possibilty of getting better better staffs?
Know u not directly involved Erik, but it might be passed on to Eric. Less he checks all the posts on the forum ´


Kind regards,

Wally

Hi Erik,

You have been very busy, thanx. I left a message for HS and you that the Napoleon is also not showing itself in my QC, but rightclickicking shows all the stats, and the gun can be placed and it does fire.

I have previously applied the patch, but maybe I should do this again, and if I do, will it mess-up my present saved game??

Thanx, Chris

I hope it comes soon. I won as CSA and don't want to start a new game until it is patched.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

...That means no complaining... [;)]

With this crowd?! You are a funny man Erik.

Thanks for the advance information! The changes generally sound sensible and useful.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
53) CHANGE V1.2.5: Can now click on names of cities in Cities List to open City Details for the clicked city.

Excellent.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
61) CHANGED V1.2.5: When "Advanced Buildings" option is off, USA now gets base 8,000 reinforcements per turn, CSA gets 4,000.

This seems reasonable enough to me, but I still think it should be affected by loss of territory -- in which case the base CS figure (without loss of territory) should probably be higher, because in reality the CSA lost territory steadily throughout the war.

I understand that the Basic game should be simple, but making this kind of refinement to the program's calculations doesn't make the game any more difficult to play.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
73) FIXED V1.2.5: US/CS have swapped victory songs.

How sporting of them! Jolly good show, chaps.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
65) CHANGE V1.2.7: Lowered QB damage cap and lowered QB pursuit losses.

Yes, the pursuit losses seem to have been a bit over the top for the ACW. What is the damage cap?

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
90) CHANGED V1.2.7: Can no longer buy new plantations after emancipation.

Not sure about this. What's the logic of it? Also worth bearing in mind that a 'plantation' in the game is a rather artificial concept, not really simulating a plantation in reality.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
109) NEW FEATURE V1.3.0: PBEM Replay.

Sounds good. Nice to have something of the sort.

ORIGINAL: christof139

Hi Erik,

You have been very busy, thanx. I left a message for HS and you that the Napoleon is also not showing itself in my QC, but rightclickicking shows all the stats, and the gun can be placed and it does fire.

I have previously applied the patch, but maybe I should do this again, and if I do, will it mess-up my present saved game??

Thanx, Chris

hi Chris, okay I think what I meant to say, was we got it corrected in the patches I have been working with (I get so many changes, I forgot what is in and what is not in yet)

ORIGINAL: chris0827
Personally I'd put a camp in each state capitol at the start of the game and change it so they can't be built.

I like this idea in a way, except that in reality the populations of the states were very unequal, so the loss of recruits when losing a state should be somewhat related to its population.

Thanks for all the feedback, gentlemen.&nbsp; We are trying to address the issues that seem to us to be getting the most attention.&nbsp; We can't keep patching forever and ever, so it's important for us to identify the most important areas of interest and address those.&nbsp; We are decidedly not trying to do everything in one patch, but we are trying to do the few things that seem to be getting the most interest, subject to constraints based on how difficult those things are to do, of course.

As far as camps go, speaking of an area which has a lot of interest, we're talking about (1) making the cost of additional camps in a city progressive beyond the first camp, (2) tying the reinforcement rate from a camp into the population of the province, perhaps 300+15*Men -- if the advanced population rules are on, then this would be the average of the current Men and maximum Men, otherwise it would just be the maximum Men for the province, and (3) giving camps a chance to reduce the province's Men by 1 in the Early April turn.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins


105) CHANGE V1.3.0: Strategic supply now reduces losses from disease; every level of strategic supply reduces base disease casualties by 5%. Units at zero strategic supply, however, take 50% more casualties from disease.

105a) Disease casualties penalty from swamps increased from 10% to 25%.

105b) Base disease casualties reduced from a Gaussian distribution around 15% to a Gaussian distribution around 11%.

In general, lots of great improvements. Thanks, guys.

The 105 change linking supply level and disease seems very smart. It makes sense historically and also in terms of game play. However, it could increase the demand for gold, in effect, making everything else more difficult to buy.

I find the only way to get enough gold to build vital 100-gold buildings, containers, weapons, etc., is to keep lots of forces on No Supply and almost none above Low Supply. If supply protects against the dead scourge of disease, then it will be very desirable not to use this ... well, to call it an ugly name ... "exploit."

I hope your play-testers will check to see that this improvement does not inadvertantly dis-improve something else.

ORIGINAL: Jonathan Palfrey

ORIGINAL: chris0827
Personally I'd put a camp in each state capitol at the start of the game and change it so they can't be built.

I like this idea in a way, except that in reality the populations of the states were very unequal, so the loss of recruits when losing a state should be somewhat related to its population.

I was just suggesting something that could be done quickly. It would be more accurate to tie it to the state populations.

We did drastically reduce the cost of containers as well.&nbsp; I read over all my notes on diseases again.&nbsp; The worst-hit regiments seem to have been northern regiments operating in southern swampy areas that were low on certain supplies -- hence the increased emphasis of swamps and the new rule on strategic supply.

ORIGINAL: ericbabe

We did drastically reduce the cost of containers as well. I read over all my notes on diseases again. The worst-hit regiments seem to have been northern regiments operating in southern swampy areas that were low on certain supplies -- hence the increased emphasis of swamps and the new rule on strategic supply.

That makes decent sense - make the danger of disease something you tolerate most of the time, but ahve to pay active attention to when campaigning in areas that are disease prone.

ORIGINAL: ericbabe

We did drastically reduce the cost of containers as well.  I read over all my notes on diseases again.  The worst-hit regiments seem to have been northern regiments operating in southern swampy areas that were low on certain supplies -- hence the increased emphasis of swamps and the new rule on strategic supply.

I gather this is responding to my concern that adding a supply factor to disease, which seems like an excellent move, verified by your research, could nevertheless add further to the desperate need for gold to meet other hard-pressed needs.

One would expect that reducing the cost of containers and needing fewer academies should help offset that pressure. However, playing as the Union, I rarely buy either containers or academies until late 63 or early 64. Equipting my troops and fleets, starting some research, meeting the most urgent of governors' demands, and the high cost of diplomacy take almost all my gold the first couple of years.

In other words, the counterbalancing does not come when it is most needed.