1989: Scenario Development Thread

[El Justo]

cyprus has a rugged interior, especially in the north iirc.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

I do recommend Getting rid of Be'er Sheva(which is in the middle of the desert) and putting in Eilat on the Red Sea. Aqaba would have to be moved a smidge, though.

That's exactly how I originally had them. Unfortunately, I could not get the boundaries correct no matter how much I toyed with the placement and culture. Instead of that nice wedge shape for Israel, I had Egypt extending into the Arabian peninsula and all kinds of chaos. Eventually I just deleted it and added Be'er Sheva. The Red Sea ends rather quickly at the southern end of the map so it's not a big problem.

cyprus has a rugged interior, especially in the north iirc.

Yeah, Cyprus has two big East-West ranges in the north and south and plains in the center. The problem was that when you make hill terrain there, the island flattens out like roadkill and looks awful. I don't think it should pose much of a problem. Greece and Turkey can't fight over it since they're in a locked alliance. The Soviets could possibly invade, I suppose, as the Bosphorus is open to naval traffic. I'll mess around with it a little and see.

 

[El Justo]

i know exactly what you mean try a hill tile to two.

 

[wolf_66]

very interesting project
you might find useful attached data. These are quite detailed NATO and Warsaw Pact orders of battle in 1989

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Thanks, Wolf! Andy's Johnson's OOBs are hugely helpful. I first found them last October when I started my spreadsheet.

The Warsaw Pact list has a lot of holes in it. He does indicate where he's guessing, but as I've been researching, I've noticed many errors and omissions. It doesn't help that in the real world, the Soviets made massive changes from 90-91, disbanding and withdrawing many units. I'm confident that I have most of the divisions correct, but desperately need to get more regimental identification across the board: land forces, air regiments, and PVO regiments. If anyone has more on this it will be a huge help.

The NATO list is incredibly detailed and very accurate. I knew a lot of the major units in West Germany already, but they really get down to the nitty-gritty, and include neutral powers as well. This one's going right at the top of the bibliography; it's made my work so much easier.

Work continues, but not too much to show yet. I found a great website on Czechoslovakian forces (all in Czech of course) that covered everything. Nothing on the Czech Navy, though Also, I found a lot on Romania and Poland, although the Polish air force is kind of a mystery still. I have a copy of Combat Fleets of the World 1990, which has been a great resource for naval matters. It does get a lot of remarks from visitors who can't imagine what I would be doing with such a monsterous tome!

In addition, I got a lot of sounds gathered last weekend that should be a big help. I've also been creating buildings and started units in the Biq, and need to nail down resources and their map placement. Also, can you change the text color from black to white? I've been thinking about a greyish interface.

 

[montizzle]

I would like to applaud the attention to detail you have shown. I had started a similar project a while ago, but ran into a large number of hurdles. I was curious, I found that many western nations fielded similar brigades, so units were roughly the same in capabilities, but a few were problematic for me. France fielded divisions that did not breakdown into brigades, and were between one half and two thirds strength of an American division. How do you plan on representing these units? Also, it appears that Canada only had standing Brigade-Groups on active duty, and their reservists were in battalions roughly grouped into division like Areas. I had thought about using the CBGs of the nineties and just fudge the clock. I don't know if you had planned on it, but in my aborted scenario, divisions were given the army flag, and gave the nations that fielded large formations something to be feared.

Good luck, I plan on playing this as soon as it comes out, looks to be as addictive as El Justo's scenarios.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

At first, I had the French divisions as beefed-up single units. As you pointed out, they are larger than a brigade but small than other Allied divisions. I think they lose a lot with this simplification, so I tried something else. I'm breaking them down into a few units (groupe-ment, n'est-ce pas?) based on type. So a french armored division might have a tank unit of Cuirassiers and/or Dragoons with AMX-30, a mechanized unit of Chassuers/Infantry with AMX-10p, a SP artillery group, recon regiment and engineer regiment. French Regiments are kinda like everyone else's battalions, so it would be approximate. So the units wouldn't exactly correspond to how the French might integrate their mech and tank regiments, but at least they will work in game terms and give the French player some flexibility.

Artillery is another area where we have to decide where to integrate them into other units and where to have them separate. The Soviets, for example, had a battalion of 122mm guns in each regiment, as well as the 152's in the Divisional artillery regiment, and 2S5's at the Army level, and full artillery divisions at the Front level. So the 2s1's will be included in the combat stats of Tank and Motor-Rifle units, while artillery regiments and brigades (2S3,-4, -5, -7) will be separate units. The West Germans have both 155's at the Brigade level and Divisional artillery with M110's and FH-70's. The US, however, only had Divisional artillery, which gets pieced out to the brigades for operations. So this lack of artillery will be have to be included in the combat stats. Maybe units with organic artillery can have a no-range bombardment ability.

These kinds of questions come up at all levels, so I'm going to try stuff in testing and see what works best. US Marines, for example, are by battalion, but their Bn's are much larger than regular infantry ones, so they will have hit points and strength greater than a battalion but less than a full brigade. Similar thing for Soviet Airborne. The Soviets have seven Airborne divisions compared to 1 each for US, France, and Germany, but they consist of about 6000 guys. So their Airborne regiments will be similarly smaller, but elite. The NATO Airborne are full-sized brigades.

Don't know about Canadian Reserves yet, honestly. Like you, I'll probably have to combine them into some kind of brigade-size, which they surely would have had to do in wartime anyway.

No plans to have divisions as army units, cause the AI can't use them properly in Conquests and you can't load them up in the scenario editor. Too bad. There are Headquarters units (Army, Front, TVD, and Stavka for the Soviets, Corps, Army Group and AFNORTH, etc for NATO), but not sure exactly what role they will play, other than being worth a bunch of points. Right now, the battle-created unit is the Breakthrough (Our 10th Guards Tank has created a breakthrough!). Basically, it's a one-unit army, signifying that higher is directing his reserves to support the deep thrust. It will also be a telepad with a short range, so nearby units can race to exploit the breach created. Hopefully this concept works.

More to come. I probably can't do much for a week or two but I'll be grinding away.

 

[Civinator]

AnthonyBoscia, as you were so kind to post a biq of the map of 1989 I can give you a first feedback to that scenario.

The map is great and the placement of the cities (in a first look on the map) is good.

One question is, if 1989 is a good date for the clash between Nato and WP. There are a lot of people, who think, in 1989 the WP had no real chance any longer to win such a war. There was too much turmoil in the WP satellite states. I think for a scenario with this date one government "communism" for the WP is not enough. For the WP satellite states there would be to consider a government communism with a very high rate of war weariness (in an always war scenario) - a war weariness with a higher rate as in the government democracy in Civ 3 vanilla (if this would be possible).

You should also reconsider the idea to give only airfields in Europe to the US. With airfields in the neighbourhood to foreign cities strange things can occur. For example when the WP takes such a city it can happen, that you share soviet fighters with US Infantry and tanks in the same airfield (I posted something about it in the CFC forums).

In short: When there is a place for an airbase, there mostly also is the place for a city.
You can tarn that city as an airbase. This is no problem by using the methode with the transparent city graphics. Here it would be enough to set the US size-1 city graphics to transparency. I show here two screenshots of the WW II mod I´m working on for a longer time (and that will still need more time) to visualize what I mean:

The first screene shows the city BEF near Reims: It is a city, so it uses the normal airfield graphic of that scenario. This is achieved by placing a resource on the tile of the city. For gameplay it is a city with all it´s advantages - airlift, no sharing of the tile with units from the enenmy, a source to build up power and to convince the AI to do something to strengthen that position. It´s also no problem to give these cities the names of the airbases.

On the other side these airports will reduce the number of other cities on the map. But here an open word: When you do playtesting with that map and the tons of preplaced units, in my eyes there will be a good change, that you soon will wish to reduce the number of the cities cause of the looong AI-turntimes.

The other screenshot of that WW II scenario shows Rommel´s Camp, another way of using the methode of transparent city graphics. At that place there was no real city, but it´s a good point for the units of the DAK to take part in the game when the time for that action is reached. The DAK resource on that city-tile is a strategic resource, that allows to autoproduce and to upgrade the needed units just in time.

Spoiler :

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Thanks, Civinator! Some responses:

I chose the year for a few reasons:
-It allows the most modern forces to participate, which to me is a big part of the fun.
-It was, as you said, the time when NATO was most prepared to fight and had the best chance to win. Soviet forces alone were incomprehensibly huge, and if the Warsaw Treaty nations did fight with them, the West would have been in bad shape. Personally I think that the idea of fighting a conventional-only war was a delusion, but more on that when I revisit nukes in Post 2.
-It is a time period where a lot of accurate data is available on force dispositions.

You're definitely right about the turmoil in the WP nations, and within the Soviet Republics. In our timeline, we're dealing with a reactionary Defense Council that has rejected restructuring and has dealt with Berlin and Warsaw in the manner of Prague and Budapest.

In game terms, I like your ideas on war weariness and government. That's why I wanted to keep the WP separate and not in a locked alliance. The Soviet player, who moves first, can make military alliances and RoP, but when things go bad, these Eastern European nations might make peace with the West, or even swap sides. War weariness is a tough one, because although it might be more realistic, it's not much fun for a player to slow his roll because he has to garrison his cities with 'military police'.

There are only a few options open to us for nudging diplomatic behavior, besides the heavy-handed things like 'always war' and locked alliances. The Eastern European nations are mainly of the European culture group, while the USSR is its own culture group. Also, the WP have Communist gov'ts, but their preferred government is Democracy, and their shunned is Communist. All in all I have no idea if these diplomatic relationships will work at all. I may end up having to have a bunch of locked alliances and leave it at that. But I like your ideas and I'd prefer to test a few different styles to see what I like best.

Airbases: I meant to ask you if you moved all your forces off that occupied airbase and then back on, would it then destroy the aircraft?

I think I would like to attempt both ways and see how they turn out. Making invisible cities means I have to redo all that population work I did . I'm sure there will be some city placement adjustments. I reason that they are so packed tightly, especially in central Europe, is because I'd really like to have normal artillery in this game. Bombarding artillery is one of my favorite features of Civ3 and I want to try as hard as possible to make it feasible. Otherwise it's all bore-snore Civ 2/4 style direct attacks.

But here an open word: When you do playtesting with that map and the tons of preplaced units, in my eyes there will be a good change, that you soon will wish to reduce the number of the cities cause of the looong AI-turntimes.

I don't think there's anyway around this! I'm at 5700 units right now, with 553 cities. Trade only with the Airport flag in the capitals at this time. Personally, I don't mind long turn times. Especally, I don't mind watching the AI making his moves. I realize that game would be a lot more playable if I toned it all down, but I like the level of detail. I guess we'll see how it turns out. This game will most likely be decided in 5-10 long turns. In this way, I think Civ III will provide a fair prediction of the speed of operations. The rate of catastrophic destruction would have been unimaginably fast in such a conflict.

Thank you for the great comments and I hope to hear more. Also wondering when we can get our grubby hands on SOE!

As a general note, I've just done a bunch of work on the IDF and Syria. Iraq and Egypt are next. Also, I'm in the process of putting units in the biq and determining attack/defense values. I'm playing with the idea of having 'War Material'- a U.S. only build that takes the places of armies, flag unit, and captured unit. With no VP locations in the Western Hemisphere, the US can either ship these to his bases in Europe, or trade/gift them to friendly civs. No idea if it will work, but might be another way to con the AI into sending more troops overseas.

Also, if there are any PCX artists who would like to help, I have some very specific requests. I've been trying in this area but have zero artistic talent, and have already spent a lot of time attempting with no results. Suppose I just have to keep at it.

 

[Civinator]

Airbases: I meant to ask you if you moved all your forces off that occupied airbase and then back on, would it then destroy the aircraft?

No, it seems to be a bug. Unfortunately the save file with this bug is deleted.

Making invisible cities means I have to redo all that population work I did

No, it doesn´t mean that. Per example in the screenshots above, nearly all cities are resource cities.

Let´s take the US cities. You set city size 1 of the US cities (don´t forget the walled cities) to transparency. Simply wipe the graphics out. Now you place a resource graphic showing an American city in every city location of US cities. Now the US cities of size one look like these resource cities. They are the smallest size, so it is not so disturbing that they only have the size of resources (especially when the option "show units over cities" is deactivated). For the US airbases in Europe use resource graphics showing airfields, airbases and so on. You can even use different graphics without problems. Make sure, that the US-Airbase-Cities cannot reach size 2 or 3. The easiest way is, that the US cities for reaching size 2 or 3 need a building with the US-city-Resource in city-radius. The airbase-cities haven´t this resource in city radius.

US-cities of size 2 or 3 can have the normal city graphics for US cities.

Bombarding artillery is one of my favorite features of Civ3 and I want to try as hard as possible to make it feasible. Otherwise it's all bore-snore Civ 2/4 style direct attacks.

This would be a good situation to try out tom2050 statements about barbarian arty. Set some capturable barbarian arty units next to the WP or Nato units. If tom2050 is right, the AI should do a better performance with arty units that have barbarian origin. I didn´t test this yet.

I don't think there's anyway around this! I'm at 5700 units right now, with 553 cities.

Don´t forget the MUA (8192 units).

I realize that game would be a lot more playable if I toned it all down, but I like the level of detail.

I understand this very well.

Also, if there are any PCX artists who would like to help, I have some very specific requests. I've been trying in this area but have zero artistic talent, and have already spent a lot of time attempting with no results. Suppose I just have to keep at it.

You have to post what you need, so any artist has a change to help you. May be, some of the things you need are still existing.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

(don´t forget the walled cities)

I did forget walled cities. That reminds me of when this mod was just a daydream, and the original idea was to have level-1 cities without walls look like bridges (or be invisible with a bridge resource). The rivers would be coast squares, and the player would need to capture the crossing sites and build a bridge to connect the road network.

It would be cool to have Civ2-style rivers in the squares themselves. I suppose this could be done with landmark terrain with some editing. Then the owner of the square could cross rapidly on roaded tiles, but an invader would have to expend his movement points crossing until he captured the nearest city.

Make sure, that the US-Airbase-Cities cannot reach size 2 or 3. The easiest way is, that the US cities for reaching size 2 or 3 need a building with the US-city-Resource in city-radius. The airbase-cities haven´t this resource in city radius.

That would work great, although they would have to be placed away from rivers. Right now, city size 3 is practically unobtainable. Thus, capitals only have size 3 graphics. With the civs split by culture group and era, it's possible to have unique capitals. These are the main graphics I would like to incorporate. Currently, there's space for Washington, Moscow, London, Paris, Berlin, Rome, Ottowa, Ankara, Jerusalem, and Havana if we add Cuba. The two Berlins would be a combined set of graphics: one a city, and the other a resource with landmark terrain.

This would be a good situation to try out tom2050 statements about barbarian arty.

I thought of this too, but unfortunately Tom and Nick both reported that pre-placed Barbarian artillery doesn't seem to work. It has to be spawned au naturel.

Don´t forget the MUA (8192 units).

Knuckles!

I had my eye on those purty little country towns you have in your mod, too.

 

[Bengal Tiger]

On a different note, how will movement work? You said that the game will probably last 5-10 turns, so railroads would have to connect everywhere to give each unit a role in the war. However, that would completely ignore the fact that not all Soviet/NATO troops will be ready for action, especially if in the 5-10 turns it takes for the U.S. to ship its troops over, the war has already been lost. I personally am a fan of shorter turns, if only to allow realistic times to mobilize and deploy troops before its too late.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Yes, the game will be longer than 5 turns. That was a little exaggerated. What it means is that those first turns will be crucial in Central Europe. The attrition rate there will be extremely high. So what you accomplish or fail to accomplish early on will have a big effect on how you employ your follow-on forces. Also, many of those regular forces will be irreplaceable. Movement points are still up in the air. If air forces are going by their actual combat radii, they're going to have big ranges.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Over a year of work invested so far, but still a long way to go. New information emerges but the great majority of the Order of Battle is done. Stats based on equipment, training, and size have been devised for air, land and sea units with good test results so far. The building and Wonder list is being honed to put a lot of pressure regarding resources. The Rhineland is crucial to the Soviets, and the Middle East is becoming more vital to an oil-thirsty West. The tech tree is developing slowly, with multiple routes for units, diplomatic, and trade options. There have been two game-breaking problems: one resolved better than I could have hoped, the other remains at large. More to follow as I should have some extra time at the holidays.

Spoiler :

"At the end of May 1989, the Soviet leadership revealed some details of its revised defense budget; that for the current year is given as 77.3 bn roubles (around $120 bn at prevailing exchange rates)...This budget represents about %12 of national income or roughly twice what the US spends on defense."
International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance 1989-1990​

Spoiler :

"The offensive is the only type of combat action... the employment of which obtains the complete route of the enemy and the seizure of important objectives and areas."
A.A. Sidorenko, The Offensive​

Spoiler :

"No Soviet General, and for that matter no Soviet officer or soldier-no single member of this enormous organization-has any guarantee that he will be allowed to retain his privileges, his rank or even his life. They may drive him out, like an old dog, at any moment: they may stand him against a wall and shoot him."
Viktor Suvorov, Inside the Soviet Army​

Spoiler :

"Trimenko regarded Starukhin as grossly overrated, a holdover from another, more slovenly era. Trimenko didn't believe modern war was for cossacks. Not at the operational level. Now it was for computers. And until they had better computers-computers that could replace the weaker types of men-war belonged to the men who were as much like computers as possible: exact, devoid of sentiment, and very, very fast."
Ralph Peters, Red Army​

 

[Ares de Borg]

Looks like you've been busy. Good work! I guess the ugly Firaxis units will be replaced in the process? Keep up the good work, I loved "Red Storm Rising" and this might become the Civ equivalent.

 

[7ronin]

This looks very promising. Good luck and I hope you can finish.

 

[smirnoff]

I loved "Red Storm Rising" and this might become the Civ equivalent.

Oh Yea , Tom Clancy is the MAN , I love his Books , Video Games and few movies that came out

 

[Bengal Tiger]

Excellent, can't wait to see how it turns out.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Thanks, fellas.

I guess the ugly Firaxis units will be replaced in the process?

Wofür? You do not like the 'Mech Infantry' with its 25 mike-mike that kicks like a howitzer? But the Luftwaffe pilots at Fliegerhorst Büchel wonder if they might receive reinforcements before the imminent Soviet attack?

 

[Wolfshade]

A small detail which I can forget about if won't post (as I already did for the "Napoleonic Wars" and the capital in Moscow):

Spoiler :

Baranovichi (I was there a lot of times) is a small town enough, so this one can be renamed to Brest - much more important western border city.

And a bit more info about Baranovichi & Brest - of course you read it, but probably useful.