W-I-P: Storm Over the Pacifc

quiet but busy :cool:

been adding in unit gfx as a i go along. so some slow (and excruciating) trudging through folders, text files, and units_32 sheet.

screen below is of the units_32 icons. they are military map symbols, fitting imo for this scenario. tom2050 made the sheet and i modified them slightly to better fit onto the units_32 sheet. i shrunk them exactly 4 pixels so that they don't overlap as much in the city view. i'll probably need to make some type of master image showing all of the symbols. but that is secondary to gameplay and construction at this point. i'm pleased with how it all looks. plus, it frees me up from having to paste a boatload of other units_32 images onto the master sheet :D note that i have not set tech requirements yet. so all unit builds are appearing in the queue. haven't gotten to air and sea yet. just ground units appearing...


updated US Ground stats


some notes : slight tweaks and corrections based off of the newly created Japanese Ground stats (see below). as with all my scenarios, infantry units have better defensive values than tank units who in turn, have better attack values. raison d'etre logic, dummying it down for the AI and also making it concise and simplistic for the human. infantry units will all have 'Defense' and 'Offense' checked as AI Strategies. armor will have only 'Offense'. this simple notation is what guides gameplay. can ruin it if not properly set. hopefully, this arrangement will work like it has with past projects.

there will indeed be some isolated unit builds (aka micro-zones). standard infantry will be buildable everywhere, probably for all civs. marine units will require Pacific Islands resource. airborne units only in homeland areas. light armored units will require Iron and Oil but the heavier models, medium, will require homeland resources (eg USA, Japan). artillery , the 75mm is the base gun, no resources, very portable. the 40mm AA piece is like this too. all extra infantry support on top of the organic support (note the 1 AA rating for infantry and the return fire bonus/bombardment value). SPA pieces will have two turns, a shoot and scoot if you will. but the field pieces pack just a little more punch...but lack the moility of the SPA pieces.

King Units label will refer, likely, to a 'Great General' and/or 'Great Adminiral' (or something to this effect). this is probably going to be the 'Battle Created Unit' (or the unit that you cash in the MGL for, an 'Army' unit in the base game [but not for this scenario]). it's possible that i may tag the big carriers with the 'King' flag also. premise would be to go the 'Mass Regicide' game mode and make it a vicgory condition : kill off all of your enemey's King units and you win. this will be tricky to implement, i would think. but in theory, it would work. pre place the king units, have them autopro'd by a building or wonder, or spawn them through combat. pre-placing them, there are options. i could set it to randomized placement or just set them in the editor manually. haven't gotten there with this all quite yet. but the basics are there, just need to flesch it out.

Japanese Ground v1.0


this is beta, keep in mind. went back and forth a little with the A/D values before finally decising that the infantry-type units should have far better defense than offense. well, not far better but better. from an hostorical standpoint, the japanese military logistical train was really hampered from 1942 onwards. the outermost japanese positions, espeically in the SW Pacific, suffered from lack of supplies, ammo, etc. something should be said of that in game terms, hence the lack of attack values as compared to US units. i was a neophyte with regard to Japanese armor. had to really dig and examine the specs. gotta say, not impressed. armor was paper thin, smallish and ineffective guns, impentatrable to shermans and up. to put it into perspective, when the M4s starting arriving in theater, they were like the King Tiger tanks in Europe but massed together :lol: the 75mm shermans blew the japanese tanks to pieces...when they werene't burried in static locations. noentheless, low marks for japanese armor, but still support to the infantry.

Japan should have a malus with worker rates and builds. they will get 2 worker type builds (US has 3 and better worker rates).

Japan will get an extra AA piece in its lineup (compared to the US). fitting since the intent of the Allies will be to bomb them to pieces. did not know that the 15cm AA piece, a late war innovation, was beastly.

next steps for me is to add in the Japanese unit gfx and into the editor etc. more painstaking work. but onward and upward :D
 
Looking really good, I'm trying to figure out which nation to try first. I've always liked the Commonwealth in the original WW2, so I'll probably try the Commonwealth countries here too.
 
back at it :) i've been pushing forward slowly. i added in all american ground and japanese ground so far. so on to British India ground.



first versions here but unit gfx added in, text, editor etc. next for them are their worker units.

a funny thing happens when devising unit stats and assembling gfx and spreadsheets :) a lot of the gameplay pieces start coming together. and that had happened here with the British India units :D

indian infantry, cheap and a tad inferior. can not traverse jungle and mountain tiles unless there's a road present on said tile. i set a key piece of gameplay tonight when i made almost all infantry types 'wheeled' (ie in addition to the wheeled armor units). i reset US Infantry, Japanese Infantry to 'wheeled'. this means they can't go on jungle or moutain w/out road. however, US Marine, SNLF, Paratroop & Airborne units are 'foot'.

see the front lines here along Burma & India. point will be for the British Indian side to push into the jungle and link up to China. shortest route it seems is from Ledo at the top and down south some towards Kunming. this was THE objective in this theater. japan also has some restrictions with traversing the jungles in Burma. they will have to guard the road and rail lines and use their own combat engineers to push into the jungles. i want to see if i can tweak it just right to make this possible, for possible unit builds and surely some buildings. still a ways off developmenatally though (all units first and then buildings and then techs).



Gurkhas make an appearance. iirc, this is the third scenario i've added them into :lol: (aoi revision i lost on my HD crash, tcw, and now this one). tough sons of guns, those Gurkhas. will be autorpro'd in 4 or 5 locations in India. wheeled also, so bring along your COmbat Engineer.

King's East African Rifles were in theater, other east african units as well (i think). so they get the generic 'East African' rather than King's East African (sadly, another from the lost AoI files). wheeled too.

Chindits were incredible imo. i had vaguely heard of them before. but they were militarily revolutionary imo. by that i mean that these guys, basically a division of light infantry, gnawed their way through the jungles, cut Jap rail lines, established air drop points and makeshift air fields. they were the first jungle long range recon patrol tactics in modern history. a very controversial outfit too it seems. many scoffed at their overall effectiveness, after all, they were an undersized division of light infantry in dense jungle with limited support. but they formed a logistical chain that was impressive. vietnam strategists, i would think, must have studied the Chindits playbook :D awesome perifery stats for the Chindit. low HP though. note the upgrade chain to the Indiain Paratrooper. will be pre-placed and unbuildable.

British Infantry will be autopro'd in 1 location only. haven't set a spawn rate yet but they will not be in supply, for sure. foot unit.

Chindit vets helped form the Indian Paratroop units iirc.

for now, i am going to include the disease penalties for jungle and marsh. have never had much success with curing this...although i may try to not be allowed to cure it with sanitation (as the editor strangely states). will have to play with it some to get it right. diseaease was wicked in burma and that should be reflected, i hope. did not have success with this with AoI. but will give it another developmental go. upwards & onwards :)
 
This is looking awesome, REALLY looking forward to this scenario! :goodjob:
King's East African Rifles were in theater, other east african units as well (i think). so they get the generic 'East African' rather than King's East African (sadly, another from the lost AoI files). wheeled too.
Yep, battalions from the King's African Rifles made up most of the 11th East African Infantry Division that fought in Burma within the Fourteenth Army commanded by General Slim. There were also two West African Infantry Divisions, 81st and 82nd, in Burma with men mostly from the Nigeria Regiment and the Gold Coast Regiment, and by all accounts I've read the Africans seem to have done very well in battle with the Japanese.
 
i reset US Infantry, Japanese Infantry to 'wheeled'. this means they can't go on jungle or moutain w/out road. however, US Marine, SNLF, Paratroop & Airborne units are 'foot'.

Hey EJ, wondering how the Solomons and all that will pan out if the Japanese and US Army troops can't enter jungles. I understand that you're limiting movement in the Burma campaign but plenty of jungle fighting to be had in the Pacific. In the game I was working on US troops were not wheeled (not worried about the US Ai going all the way to Imphal to penetrate Burma), while Japan had an Elite Division unit (autoproduced for a set time in the 1939 version and pre-placed in the 1942 scenario) to represent units like the 2nd or 5th Divisions. The 'jungle supermen'. Anyway, just a thought.

Chindits were incredible imo.

Best thing about them was that they weren't hand-picked, elite men, but a regular unit given good leadership and good training that made the difference.

All looks good, glad to see things progressing well.
 
thanks guys :)

that Wingate dude was quite a forward thinker in terms of tactics.

re the jungle terrain : US Marines won't have the 'wheeled' tag. so they can push into the solomons. SNLF are foot too. but it does raise a question for the Japanese Infantry (regular) and also the US Infantry. will have to flesh it all out, i imagine :D
 
Hi old bud, I´m glad this very interesting scenario makes good progress. :) Is it still planned for that scenario to keep a system of supply shipments as it is included in AoI? In that case, how big is the current map you are using?

When it comes to betatesting, please count me in. :)
 
thanks pal :) yes, the shipments will still be in. i want to start basic with it all and see how it unfolds. for the moment, it will be Japan shipping back only the core Strat Resources (iron, coal, oil, aluminum) and the US shipping units from the west coast to Hawaii. no plans atm to introduce them to the other civs as this is all conceptual. so it may evolve a little as i put it in and see it unfold. map is big, can't recall the specs atm but it is something like 300 wide by 200 high.

just looked at the SW of the map, the solomans etc. there are a few 'landing' areas that are jungle tiles, but only a few. now, i thought about it some and figured there may be a way around the no movement issue: use the pine forest gfx for an alternate jungle gfx (sub in the jungle gfx over the pine gfx on the pcx sheet). only catch is that it would have the Forest tile attributes (shields, food, etc). also, the 'wheeled' infantry units have the 'amphibious' flag. so they can attack enemy cities from the water...which is sort of what i would aim for in the pacific. anyway, open to opinions on it.

it's either leave as is, force amphibious landings in the SW Pacific but only in a few locations. would force player/AI to bring combat engineers along for the ride (ok for a human but asking a lot from the AI)

modify Pine Forest terrain to look like Jungle

ditch the restrictions for the infantry units (not really in favor of this one, to be honest)
 
happy Labor Day Weekend :D

completed British India Ground :



research on British Indian Army armor was laborious as well for Australia.



Matilda in there instead of M2 light tank, pretty much the same as the British Indian armor lineup. both civs will have 5 techs worth of tanks to research (ie 5 generations). thought about commando units for the Aussies but not large enough troop dispositions. by tht i mean that the commando raids were done mainly by real small units, like company and platoon size, nowhere near my preferred scale of, say, battalion to division (roughly). anyway, open to debate whether small size units can make it in the lineups.

notice Australian Infantry can move freely on jungle and mountain, unlike the Jap Inf (snlf & paratroopers can move on them though). i originally had Jap Combat Eng's buildable with Industry/Japan. but i want to free them up a little and letting foot unit workers be built in jungle/mountain areas will do that. also, with respect to a perceived advantage for the Aussies, one aspect i want to sort of concentrate on, and as a counter to the original firaxis ww2 in the pacific scenario, is to give the Allies the initiative, right at Battle of Midway. so this fits i think.

another aspect that i think i've nailed is the air traffic that went over the Hump. gonna deviate a little from my standard no air-sea trade and allow for British India and Rep of China to link trade by Air with wonders built in each civs' capital. will allow air trade but just with one another. key will be for the Rep of China civ to link it up by air with New Dehli or Calcutta and trade for the British India resource which will allow for armor and arty builds, even air unit builds (haven't gotten there yet). British India otoh can trade for excess China resources and build longer ranged aircraft. wish i could come up with a sexier option for British India but the airfireld network the brits and americans set up in china over the Hump was impressive. so a boost in ranges for the yet to be determined british india aircraft lineup. all a WIP of course. so i'll have to see how it unfolds once i run alpha and beta tests :)
 
Sounds good. I suppose you could also have luxuries in India that could be traded to China as supplies to help reduce war weariness, if that is going to be a factor in this scenario.
 
i will probably try and fiddle with the war weariness settings in an effort to mitigate unhappiness issues (to a certain extent). on another note :) just finished off the ground units for the Kiwis :D Aussies done yesterday. all gfx in, tested, and remarkably, not a single INI or text error on the two civs :thumbsup:
 
quick update :

just because i'm quiet, by no means, equates to nothing getting done :) quite the opposite, actually :D i prefer to keep my head down, not interrupt myself if you will :p

anyhow, i finished adding in the last of the ground units, almost. just need to touch up the chi-coms a bit. but for the most part, ground units are all in, stats assigned, costs, the whole 9. only thing missing is techs, which i have yet to tackle. but i wait until the end to do them simply b/c the tree essentially writes itself once all the game pieces are in. yeah, i can tweak it some. but for the most part, once all the units and buildings are in, the tech tree is already written based off when i want units and buildings to be unlocked. so it boils down to just how many generations of, say, tanks, i want in there. if it's 4 buildable classes then that = 4 tank techs. etc etc.

with that said, i am trying to keep unit classes streamlined. by that i mean that i don't want to add in multiple models of the same unit. for example, no -A, -B, -C models of aircraft (like in TCW). it's just too much, for now. maybe someday i would add them in. but not now.

i say that b/c i just started going through the air units. and it's been a doozy. now, i am somewhat knowledgeable about ww2 aircraft. but by no means am i an expert. i can visually identify aircraft but i could not tell you their rate of roll, max speed, dive speeds, and intricate flight characteristics. now i can :D i spent the last few days chewing over the specs on a host of american aircraft. off the top of my head, here is the list of US fighter aircraft for the scenario:

P-39 Airacobra
P-40 Warhawk
P-38 Lightning
P-47 Thunderbolt
P-51 Mustang

these will be the USAAC fighter units. compiled the prospective bomber/attack aircraft but have not gone over specs yet. B-17, B-24, A-26 probably, B-25, B-29, and probably the B-36.

probably USN fighter aircraft :

Brewster Buffalo
F4F Wildcat
F4U Corsair
F6F Hellcat

all carrier-capable aircraft will require Pacific Islands resource. land-based fighters will likely require Colonialism. bombers and the other heavies will likely be autoproduced back in US. probably.

naval planes will have slightly less a/d, range, bombardment, and rof. haven't gotten to specific a/d values yet. lots of qualifiers. but i have the data i need to assign the numbers. maybe this weekend. it's starting to coalesce in my brain and that's a good thing.

on another note, my old civ buddy Klyden has agreed to help me put together a sea unit list. this is a daunting task since it's the Pacific War. but i couldn't hand pick a better person to put together the list and stats. it will be in the mold of AoI.
 
to clarify :

here is the civ lineup :

US
Japan
Australia
British India
New Zealand
Republic of China
Chinese Communists

i will probably try to incorporate free Dutch Indonesia (KNIL) into Australia and US unit lines. pre-placed ships for sure and probably some type of KNIL units.
 
we're gettin' there, fellas :) Kly is using the AoI xl sheet for the sea units as a base. i've been working on the air units. got US land based ones into the folders and biq and have a pre-lim list for the naval ones. tedious work.
 
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