Over the Reich - Creation Thread

[Prof. Garfield]

I'm working on the events. Will probably finish working on functionality to only unload specified ground units in cities by the end of the night.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

Changelog

Implemented functionality that transport ships can only unload certain units inside cities. The implementation is as follows:

When a transport is activated, unit types which must disembark in a port, or have a beach disembarkation penalty, have their movement allowance set to 0. This means they can't be disembarked by directing the transport into a land square. The transported unit must first be activated at sea, at which point a suitable onActivation event can be run.

When any other unit is activated, transport ships have their movement set to 0. This prevents an exploit where a transport is activated inside a city (which doesn't trigger the on-activation event) and then directed to a land square to unload its cargo. Since the sea unit was not activated, the cargo would still have its regular movement points.

Additionally, if a unit is activated that can't load onto a transport from a beach, the transports will have their cargo capacity set to 0.

When spacebar, w, s, or f (after a check) are pressed, the land units regain their movement points and the sea transports lose their cargo space. This makes it so that the game will activate the next unit as it should, rather than passing over all sorts of units that temporarily have 0 movement allowance.

If others are implementing this, some code has to be run onScenarioLoaded in order to initialize the system.


-- ships with the ability to carry units and the capacity they possess
-- absent index means the unit is not a transport ship
-- hold is the number of cargo slots for the ship
-- move is the movement allocation for the ship
local transportShips={
[unitAliases.AlliedTaskForce.id]={hold=2,move=12},
[unitAliases.GermanTaskForce.id]={hold=2,move=12},
}

-- land units restricted to the use of cities for loading and unloading
-- move is the movement allocation for the unit MANDATORY
-- onlyLoadInPort set to true if the unit must be picked up by transport in a city
-- onlyUnloadInPort set to true if the unit can only unload in a port
-- beachUnloadPenalty set to true if the unit can unload onto any square,
-- but is subject to the movement penalty and reaction from nearby enemies
-- Only one of onlyUnloadInPort and beachUnloadPenalty should be used
local harbourUsers={
[unitAliases.constructionTeam.id]={move=4,onlyLoadInPort=true,onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.FreightTrain.id]={move=12,onlyLoadInPort=true,onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.AlliedArmyGroup.id]={move=8, beachUnloadPenalty=true},
[unitAliases.GermanArmyGroup.id]={move=8, beachUnloadPenalty=true},
[unitAliases.AlliedLightFlak.id]={move=2, beachUnloadPenalty=true},
[unitAliases.GermanLightFlak.id]={move=2, beachUnloadPenatly=true},
}

specialNumbers.beachLandingMoves = 2 -- maximum movement a unit with beachUnloadPenalty Status can have after unloading from a ship

When a unit with a beach unload penalty is activated at sea, it and its carrying ship are subject to a reaction. At the moment, I'm using the same reaction functions as for when k or backspace is pressed. I'm willing to make a distinct reaction function if we need it (e.g. so units can do different damage to amphibious battle groups vs artillery barrage battle groups.


reactionGroups.gunBatteryVulnerable = {unitAliases.AlliedTaskForce, unitAliases.GermanTaskForce, unitAliases.AlliedArmyGroup, unitAliases.AlliedBatteredArmyGroup, unitAliases.GermanArmyGroup, unitAliases.GermanBatteredArmyGroup, unitAliases.AlliedLightFlak, unitAliases.GermanLightFlak,}
canReact[unitAliases.GunBattery.id] = {maxAttacks = 4, range=3, lowMap = reactionGroups.gunBatteryVulnerable}
reactionDamage[unitAliases.GunBattery.id] = {low={triggerTypes = reactionGroups.gunBatteryVulnerable, damageSchedule = ds.testing3}}

 

[Prof. Garfield]

Updated Events To-Do List:

-Implement reaction for Gun Batteries against amphibious Battle Groups. JPetroski fills in tables, maybe I write separate functionality if useful.

-Maybe give German aircraft the sub flag, and allied day aircraft the spot subs flag. This would allow Wilde Sau to work without sacrificing part of the hard to find night advantage. Events would involve changing a table.

-Revisit where the French trains spawn and consider randomizing these. Once I know what to do here, this should be quick. Is it just a count of battle groups and depleted battle groups? Is this a count of cities in France with a battle group in them? (13 cities in France, so 2 per train seems reasonable). Any count of battle groups will mean that the occupation bonus is unlikely to be impacted by the Allies until invasion time. That might be reasonable.

Perhaps we want to consider limiting how much damage can be done to Battle Groups via munitions? We might want to make it so that munitions don't do anything if the battle group is below 50% health or something. That way, air power complements ground force, and is not a complete replacement for it.

 

[JPetroski]

-Implement reaction for Gun Batteries against amphibious Battle Groups. JPetroski fills in tables, maybe I write separate functionality if useful.

-I'll do this the next time I have the events and a moment. I probably wouldn't be able to touch much until late this evening at earliest. By amphibious battle groups you mean the task forces correct? I don't think we have functionality yet in the events were simply activating a unit other than a k unit triggers (I might have missed it though - you've done a ton of work and it's possible it went over my head).

-Maybe give German aircraft the sub flag, and allied day aircraft the spot subs flag. This would allow Wilde Sau to work without sacrificing part of the hard to find night advantage. Events would involve changing a table.

-I will update this. You've convinced me.

-Revisit where the French trains spawn and consider randomizing these. Once I know what to do here, this should be quick. Is it just a count of battle groups and depleted battle groups? Is this a count of cities in France with a battle group in them? (13 cities in France, so 2 per train seems reasonable). Any count of battle groups will mean that the occupation bonus is unlikely to be impacted by the Allies until invasion time. That might be reasonable.

-I'd suggest we keep things simple and allow players to keep their battle groups wherever they wish, so long as they are west of that grey line. Probably just have a half point for a depleted one, and a full point for a full strength one. I think that your city idea, while interesting, might cause the German player to spread out units too much to be a significant deterrent to an early Allied landing (why not land as soon as you can get local --10 to 20 square-- air superiority if the Germans have their units spread out that far)?

Perhaps we want to consider limiting how much damage can be done to Battle Groups via munitions? We might want to make it so that munitions don't do anything if the battle group is below 50% health or something. That way, air power complements ground force, and is not a complete replacement for it.

-I like this idea a lot. This helps the above as well and will go a long way towards the Allies wanting to accumulate enough points to have enough reinforcements to make a proper invasion, and it also means that the game can't be "won" by the Germans simply by finding the very limited battle groups in England and destroying them from the air. The only caveat I would make is that if the unit is on water, this rule should not apply (so that if the Allies don't have air superiority and the Germans can sink their task group with a battle group on it, the battlegroup sinks).

I'll have to put together my own to do list so I can start cracking on stuff that will be needed for the release. We are closing in! I think much of it has to do with the readme and other documentation and making sure that is all in order.

As an aside - I may have missed this but were you able to figure out what was going on with the Mosquito reaction error?

 

[Prof. Garfield]

-Implement reaction for Gun Batteries against amphibious Battle Groups. JPetroski fills in tables, maybe I write separate functionality if useful.

-I'll do this the next time I have the events and a moment. I probably wouldn't be able to touch much until late this evening at earliest. By amphibious battle groups you mean the task forces correct? I don't think we have functionality yet in the events were simply activating a unit other than a k unit triggers (I might have missed it though - you've done a ton of work and it's possible it went over my head).

It was late when I wrote that. Let me make things more clear.

At the moment, activating a unit on an ocean tile with beachUnloadPenalty=true in the harbourUsers table will run the same reaction script as for a 'k' or 'backspace' press. The reaction script will also be run against the sea unit carrying the unit (i.e. a taskforce, unless we add another transport unit).

If we're fine using the same reaction script against a unit when it is unloaded onto a beach under fire as when it fires a munition, then all that has to be done is to fill in the reaction tables appropriately. If we want different reactions (say, a tactical bomber will reactively attack an unloading Bofors, but won't react to a Bofors firing flak, I'll need to make a separate reaction system.

Also, you'll need to fill in the table harbourUsers. I wasn't sure how you wanted the ground units to be able to load/unload onto ships.

On this topic, maybe we want to remove the amphibious assault ability from battle groups. Otherwise, players could conduct "raids" against coastal units (like gun batteries) and not leave the battle group exposed to counterattack on land. This sort of counteracts the idea of the battle group. With 2mp after disembarking (even if damaged), the unit can unload and still make an immediate attack.

-I'd suggest we keep things simple and allow players to keep their battle groups wherever they wish, so long as they are west of that grey line. Probably just have a half point for a depleted one, and a full point for a full strength one. I think that your city idea, while interesting, might cause the German player to spread out units too much to be a significant deterrent to an early Allied landing (why not land as soon as you can get local --10 to 20 square-- air superiority if the Germans have their units spread out that far)?

OK, I'll just do a simple count. I was figuring counting depleted battle groups the same as full strength battle groups for occupation purposes, on the basis that units on occupation duty don't need the same level of combat readiness as front line troops. I'll use a special number to make it easy to change. I was thinking that if the Germans had to concentrate troops to make a counter attack, that would make the occupation less effective while they concentrated forces to repel the Allied invasion, and that that would be a feature of the system. I have to wonder how much air superiority will be able to counteract the superior German numbers.

-I like this idea a lot. This helps the above as well and will go a long way towards the Allies wanting to accumulate enough points to have enough reinforcements to make a proper invasion, and it also means that the game can't be "won" by the Germans simply by finding the very limited battle groups in England and destroying them from the air. The only caveat I would make is that if the unit is on water, this rule should not apply (so that if the Allies don't have air superiority and the Germans can sink their task group with a battle group on it, the battlegroup sinks).

I'll make sure the Germans can sink a task force (and any carried battle groups) using munitions.

As an aside - I may have missed this but were you able to figure out what was going on with the Mosquito reaction error?

I forgot about that. I'll have a look once I finish up with these events.

I have the events for now. I'll try not to keep them too late this evening, so you can work on them if you get a chance.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

The events are available, but post when you take them. I may look for the mosquito bug tonight, and if the events are available and the fix is quick, I want to know if I can make it.

Changelog

Air units are not moved off of strategic targets if the location is a city/airfield.

Munitions can't increase damage to army groups beyond 10, except during a combat round where the damage is originally less than 10. This includes the artillery barrage munition.

specialNumbers.maxMunitionDamageToArmyGroup = 10 -- Munitions can't damage Army Groups and Depleted Army Groups if they already have this much damage (8 damage might be increased to 12 damage before this kicks in, however, for example)

If a battle group (or depleted battle group) is defeated in a stack (and the killer is a unit with the missile flag), the unit is re-created (including existing damage, vet status, fortificatin status).

This creates a problem where a battle group can defend an airfield against unlimited air attacks. I don't want to move the battle group, since it could be essential to defend the base from ground attacks.

The German occupation bonus is now automatic and occurs after production on the German turn. Movement points for German units are not expended. German Battle Groups in France give points towards the occupation, Allied battle groups in France reduce the points.


specialNumbers.armyGroupOccupationValue = 1 -- value in the german occupation score of having an army unit in france
specialNumbers.batteredArmyGroupOccupationValue = 1 -- value in germano occupation score of having a battered army group in france

specialNumbers.armyGroupOccupationPenalty = 2 -- reduction of occupation score for allied battle group in Franceo
specialNumbers.batteredArmyGroupOccupationPenalty = 0 -- reduction of occupation score for allied depleted battle groups in france
specialNumbers.occupationScoreTrain1Threshold = 3 -- minimum occupation score for first train
specialNumbers.occupationScoreTrain2Threshold = 6
specialNumbers.occupationScoreTrain3Threshold = 9
specialNumbers.occupationScoreTrain4Threshold = 12
specialNumbers.occupationScoreTrain5Threshold = 15
specialNumbers.occupationScoreTrain6Threshold = 18
specialNumbers.occupationScoreTrain7Threshold = 21 -- minimum occupation score for seventh train

Currently, the trains are generated on a random railtrack tile in France. They can be placed on random tiles from a list by uncommenting the following line.


-- comment out this table to choose a random train track square from all of France for each train to be generated
--local occupationTrainGenLocations = {{212,138},{215,131},{199,143},{205,125},{165,143},{164,134},{149,135}, }

Test occupation code from the console with the command

console.germanOccupationBonus


Things I (may) still need to do with the events (if there is something else, please say so).

If Necessary, make distinct reaction functionality for landings on beaches. Will wait for explanation of specific desired functionality before working on this.

Figure out a way to have planes in airfields take damage if there is a battle group on that square. Implement solution when it is agreed upon.

We might want to remove the airbase building restriction in Southern France, if trains can generate anywhere. Remove the code if necessary.

Find Mosquito Bug, make appropriate correction.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

It occurs to me that most of my effort to restrict loading and unloading outside of cities has been to prevent unloading units by sailing a ship into a land square. If you could change the menu for unloading units such that the option to unload is not available, I could reduce the code used for that purpose, and make things more seamless (at the moment, certain units can't be activated from inside a city, since their types have the movement allowance set temporarily to 0).

In fact, if we don't care about units moving from land onto a ship outside a city, I think the whole thing could be made completely seamless to the point where the player won't have to remember any special procedures (such as using the 'a' key to activate a ship in port) in order to use shipping.

 

[JPetroski]

What is the thought behind why we need to restrict loading/unloading outside of cities again? Was it so that the shore batteries would have a function that made sense? Is that why you're asking me to remove the "Sire do you wish to disembark" message? Just so that the player has to click on the unit which activates it and makes it susceptible to a reactive attack from a shore battery?

If I'm following correctly it shouldn't be a problem to remove that message. I'd prefer to let units land outside of cities but am OK with removing the "auto disembark" message if necessary to get the reaction working.

Also, I don't know that I'll be able to grab the events tonight. I got carried away on a work project. Just let me know when you grab the events and release them as I have a few windows tomorrow where I might be able to finish up those tables.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

What is the thought behind why we need to restrict loading/unloading outside of cities again? Was it so that the shore batteries would have a function that made sense? Is that why you're asking me to remove the "Sire do you wish to disembark" message? Just so that the player has to click on the unit which activates it and makes it susceptible to a reactive attack from a shore battery?

If I'm following correctly it shouldn't be a problem to remove that message. I'd prefer to let units land outside of cities but am OK with removing the "auto disembark" message if necessary to get the reaction working.

I thought that restricting unloading (and loading) of ships to cities would be desirable for a WWII scenario, and I figured out a fairly elegant way of doing it. I can take out the code (or some of it) if you prefer regular Civ II unloading.

Part of the reason to restrict (or at least advantage) disembarkation to cities is to simulate the logistic difficulties of supplying an army over the beach. Another reason is that our ground simulation has very few units, so we want to discourage bypassing cities for easier targets. (The retreat mechanic also helps in this regard.) Making gun batteries useful via reactive attack against the amphibious assault is a third reason. Perhaps the biggest reason is so that an initial invasion can't immediately penetrate 7 squares inland, or immediately set up a forward airbase (useful for both aircraft and preventing stack kills). Part of the activation trigger is to expend movement of the unit on the ship down to 2, if it is allowed to unload onto a beach at all. With this, a unit landed on a beach is exposed to a counter attack before it can do much good in battle. Unloading into a city would allow a battle group to be useful one turn sooner.

It would also make Calais a more desirable landing point.

By restricting Construction Crews to unloading in cities, the Allies have to defeat the Germans in a city before they can set up a forward airbase. This would represent gaining a reasonable foothold on the continent. It would also prevent shenanigans like sending a task force with a construction crew to build an airbase on some islands off the coast of the Netherlands or Denmark. It also seems silly to me to unload a freight train onto a railtrack that runs along the coast, rather than into a city.

Is that why you're asking me to remove the "Sire do you wish to disembark" message? Just so that the player has to click on the unit which activates it and makes it susceptible to a reactive attack from a shore battery?

Yes, the reason is so that the player must click on the unit to activate it, and that allows the onActivation event to check if the unit can disembark and apply the movement penalty and reaction if necessary. It will be much preferable to the current system of setting the movement of certain unit types to 0.

Also, I don't know that I'll be able to grab the events tonight. I got carried away on a work project. Just let me know when you grab the events and release them as I have a few windows tomorrow where I might be able to finish up those tables.

I couldn't replicate the P51 bug when I tried, so we'll just have to see if it appears in playtesting in the future. I'll take a look for the Mosquito bug , and prepare a fix if appropriate. Aside from that, I don't have any events to write until you give me further instruction or I figure out an elegant way to solve the battle group defending airfield problem. You can have the events for the whole day, and work on them when you have time. If I find the Mosquito bug, it will probably be a simple fix that can wait until the other work is finished (it hasn't stopped the gameplay of the playtest, after all).

 

[JPetroski]

I changed the events this morning. I assumed it would be OK this early to just grab them for 10 minutes so hopefully I didn't mess anything up.

I added the other land units to the tables and changed the reaction damage to mirror the K4's fighter interception for now, though we can tweak that. I didn't want to make it too strong if it can shoot 3 times, but I might need to in testing since I suppose with as few units as we have, it might need to do a lot of damage the first try.

If Necessary, make distinct reaction functionality for landings on beaches. Will wait for explanation of specific desired functionality before working on this.

Right now I just have all land units in the tables you've provided but I think it would be desirable to only allow the Army Group/Battered Army Groups to land outside of a city and if you want to bring in AA support, construction crews, trains, etc. you need to capture an actual city/port to do so.

Figure out a way to have planes in airfields take damage if there is a battle group on that square. Implement solution when it is agreed upon.

Do the Civ2 mechanics work in such a way that if a unit only had 1 defense (or 0) it would be "last in line" to defend? If so, and since we're making these units "invincible" to air attack, to an extent, anyway... Can we exploit that by reducing the defense strength if it is on an airfield square (maybe on the same square as that improvement as I don't think there's particular airfield terrain as there is with cities)? Basically if the defending unit occupies the same square as a city with the airfield improvement then it has a defense strength of 1 or 0? This wouldn't eliminate the problem but I think it would drastically reduce it as I'd imagine the game would select just about anything else to defend first.

We might want to remove the airbase building restriction in Southern France, if trains can generate anywhere. Remove the code if necessary.

Yes this makes sense given the adjustment.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

Do the Civ2 mechanics work in such a way that if a unit only had 1 defense (or 0) it would be "last in line" to defend? If so, and since we're making these units "invincible" to air attack, to an extent, anyway... Can we exploit that by reducing the defense strength if it is on an airfield square (maybe on the same square as that improvement as I don't think there's particular airfield terrain as there is with cities)? Basically if the defending unit occupies the same square as a city with the airfield improvement then it has a defense strength of 1 or 0? This wouldn't eliminate the problem but I think it would drastically reduce it as I'd imagine the game would select just about anything else to defend first.

I can do an onActivation trigger that reduces the defence of army groups to 0 if a munition is activated next to an army group/depleted army group and all adjacent army groups are at 10 hp or less (and resets it in all other situations). My only concern is that this leaves the possibility of exploiting the activate unit from inside a city bug to do stuff while the army groups have 0 defence.

Perhaps we should just move Army Groups off of airfields (in the same way we move planes off strategic units). I was originally thinking that doing so would make the planes vulnerable to ground attack from enemy army groups, and that this is undesirable since army groups should be able to defend the airfields. However, this may be the wrong way to think about it. If an army group is necessary to defend an airfield from ground attack, that means that the airfield is either very close to the front line or it has already been surrounded by the enemy. A surrounded airfield can't get fuel to operate, and it would seem to me that operating an airfield in or near a combat zone wouldn't be a very good idea anyway, even if the runways themselves haven't technically been overrun just yet.

Are there examples of significant airfields being operated close to enemy lines? Maybe the Stalingrad airlift was one? But that seems like a bit of an extraordinary circumstance.

The battle groups have 8 movement points, and that is cut to 2 on the turn they land on the beach. Most planes can go at least twice this distance in a turn, so even close support aircraft should be able to operate out of direct danger.

Maybe we should introduce an "obstacle" unit (perhaps the construction teams can create it with 'backspace'), a unit that is immune to munition damage and very weak, that simply serves to delay advancing armies. That way, a player could make sure that key areas can't be overrun before they have time to either retreat or bring in reinforcements. We may have to think about the mechanics a little bit. If it is immune to munitions, then ringing an airfield would render it immune to raids.

 

[JPetroski]

Apologies for going MiA for a few months. I had a team training to get prepared for and just kept getting pulled elsewhere.

Are the events I last uploaded the latest? I might have some time this week to plug away again.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

Apologies for going MiA for a few months. I had a team training to get prepared for and just kept getting pulled elsewhere.

Are the events I last uploaded the latest? I might have some time this week to plug away again.

Yes, they are.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

I'll have to go back and make a list of things to change and/or discuss.

However, for now, I've had an idea. Perhaps we should make a "destroyed port" improvement for cities. When a city has it, it can't build a military port anymore. The Germans could build this improvement to thoroughly demolish port facility capabilities before the Allies capture the city (but wouldn't want to destroy them too soon, since their submarines depend on them). The Allies, for their part, might get a bonus for unloading a convoy directly onto the European mainland (perhaps a one time bonus of several battle groups). This would make capturing an intact port (or mostly intact) a high priority for the allies, and preventing it a priority for the Germans.

 

[JPetroski]

I'll have to go back and make a list of things to change and/or discuss.

I was reading through earlier while I was walking around and unless I missed something, the big issue we have is the battle groups defending airfields and we weren't sure how to solve that.
I think we were also trying to brainstorm other ways to make the game fun for the Germans.

However, for now, I've had an idea. Perhaps we should make a "destroyed port" improvement for cities. When a city has it, it can't build a military port anymore. The Germans could build this improvement to thoroughly demolish port facility capabilities before the Allies capture the city (but wouldn't want to destroy them too soon, since their submarines depend on them). The Allies, for their part, might get a bonus for unloading a convoy directly onto the European mainland (perhaps a one time bonus of several battle groups). This would make capturing an intact port (or mostly intact) a high priority for the allies, and preventing it a priority for the Germans.

I'm going to have to go through and read again - I did some testing and saw that we could land battle groups anywhere so I'm missing the reason that the Allies are going to want the German port. We certainly have plenty of buildings to spare however.

I'm a little rusty with this scenario so I started a single-player playtest and will see how the stuff that we've incorporated works. I'm not going to min/max like I might do in a regular game so much as try and get a feel for how everything is working (I've already realized that my fighter bomber tweak has imperiled the shore batteries, so I'll need to bolster them or weaken the fighter bombers).

If I recall correctly, I think that most of the events are done, most of the map work is done, and for the most part what remains to be done is add a couple of events and then for me to do the arduous task of overhauling the scenario documentation.

 

[JPetroski]

So far this threw up an error when a 110 killed a beaufighter, but it did not throw it the first time that this occurred. There were 2 beaufighters killed and this threw up on the last one.

Stirling

^Stirling: 1
Stirling
Stirling

^Stirling: 2
Hurricane IV

^Hurricane IV: 1


Beaufighter

^Beaufighter: 1
Beaufighter
Beaufighter

^Beaufighter: 2
Beaufighter

^Losses: 1
^Beaufighter: 1
D:\Test of Time\Scenario\OTR - update\events.lua:8457: attempt to index a nil value (local 'lastMunitionUser')
stack traceback:
D:\Test of Time\Scenario\OTR - update\events.lua:8457: in function <D:\Test of Time\Scenario\OTR - update\events.lua:8445>

 

[JPetroski]

Something unusual is happening with the flak batteries. The 88mm Flak and the 3.7cm Allied Heavy Flak are both getting their movement points doubled for some reason. I double checked to make sure I didn't accidentally hit double all MP, and I also checked the rules, so I'm guessing this might have something to do with some code?

I don't think I need to make changes to the events at this point so they are available, by the way. I didn't make any changes since the last one here.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

Something unusual is happening with the flak batteries. The 88mm Flak and the 3.7cm Allied Heavy Flak are both getting their movement points doubled for some reason. I double checked to make sure I didn't accidentally hit double all MP, and I also checked the rules, so I'm guessing this might have something to do with some code?

I don't think I need to make changes to the events at this point so they are available, by the way. I didn't make any changes since the last one here.

It was the harbourUsers table, which was incorrect. Here's the updated version

-- ships with the ability to carry units and the capacity they possess
-- absent index means the unit is not a transport ship
-- hold is the number of cargo slots for the ship
-- move is the movement allocation for the ship
local transportShips={
[unitAliases.AlliedTaskForce.id]={hold=2,move=12},
[unitAliases.GermanTaskForce.id]={hold=2,move=12},
}

-- land units restricted to the use of cities for loading and unloading
-- move is the movement allocation for the unit MANDATORY
-- onlyLoadInPort set to true if the unit must be picked up by transport in a city
-- onlyUnloadInPort set to true if the unit can only unload in a port
-- beachUnloadPenalty set to true if the unit can unload onto any square,
-- but is subject to the movement penalty and reaction from nearby enemies
-- Only one of onlyUnloadInPort and beachUnloadPenalty should be used
local harbourUsers={
[unitAliases.constructionTeam.id]={move=4,onlyLoadInPort=true,onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.FreightTrain.id]={move=12,onlyLoadInPort=true,onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.AlliedArmyGroup.id]={move=8, beachUnloadPenalty=true},
[unitAliases.GermanArmyGroup.id]={move=8, beachUnloadPenalty=true},
[unitAliases.GermanBatteredArmyGroup.id]={move=8, onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.AlliedBatteredArmyGroup.id]={move=8, onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.GermanFlak.id]={move=4, onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.AlliedFlak.id]={move=4, onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.FlakTrain.id]={move=10, onlyLoadInPort=true, onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.Sdkfz.id]={move=8, onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.RedArmyGroup.id]={move=8, beachUnloadPenalty=true},
[unitAliases.AlliedLightFlak.id]={move=2, onlyUnloadInPort=true},
[unitAliases.GermanLightFlak.id]={move=2, onlyUnloadInPort=true},
}

If you want to change the game.txt file (I think) so that unloading troops via sailing into the land is impossible, I can change the code to work a little better. Give a message about how units must be activated at sea to land on a beach in this scenario.

So far this threw up an error when a 110 killed a beaufighter, but it did not throw it the first time that this occurred. There were 2 beaufighters killed and this threw up on the last one.

Stirling

^Stirling: 1
Stirling
Stirling

^Stirling: 2
Hurricane IV

^Hurricane IV: 1


Beaufighter

^Beaufighter: 1
Beaufighter
Beaufighter

^Beaufighter: 2
Beaufighter

^Losses: 1
^Beaufighter: 1
D:\Test of Time\Scenario\OTR - update\events.lua:8457: attempt to index a nil value (local 'lastMunitionUser')
stack traceback:
D:\Test of Time\Scenario\OTR - update\events.lua:8457: in function <D:\Test of Time\Scenario\OTR - update\events.lua:8445>

This is from the code that allows munition users to become veteran through combat. I made a check so that if lastMunitionUser is nil, the code is skipped. I think this happened after the game shuffled the unit id numbers, since I stored that in the state table, and made lastMunitionUser get the corresponding unit.

I'm going to have to go through and read again - I did some testing and saw that we could land battle groups anywhere so I'm missing the reason that the Allies are going to want the German port. We certainly have plenty of buildings to spare however.

At the moment, the Allies have little reason to want a port on the mainland (other than for unloading convoys directly onto the mainland, and reducing re-spawn chances for German wolfpacks). They'll need cities to unload most kinds of units, however.

I was thinking, however, that capturing a major port relatively intact was actually a significant objective for the Western Allies, and we don't model that here very much. So, my idea is that the Allies should get some sort of bonus for having a functional port on the mainland, and the Germans should have a means of preventing this (i.e. sabotaging the port before the Allies can capture it). My initial idea is that there should be a one time bonus of, say, 3 Allied Battle Groups when a convoy is unloaded on the mainland. This would be a significant bonus for the Allies, and so both the Allies and the Germans have a reason to care about usable port facilities on Mainland Europe.

 

[JPetroski]

If you want to change the game.txt file (I think) so that unloading troops via sailing into the land is impossible, I can change the code to work a little better. Give a message about how units must be activated at sea to land on a beach in this scenario.

I've made the modification to simply say, "Units must be manually activated to disembark in Over the Reich."

I was thinking, however, that capturing a major port relatively intact was actually a significant objective for the Western Allies, and we don't model that here very much. So, my idea is that the Allies should get some sort of bonus for having a functional port on the mainland, and the Germans should have a means of preventing this (i.e. sabotaging the port before the Allies can capture it). My initial idea is that there should be a one time bonus of, say, 3 Allied Battle Groups when a convoy is unloaded on the mainland. This would be a significant bonus for the Allies, and so both the Allies and the Germans have a reason to care about usable port facilities on Mainland Europe.

I'm not opposed to the idea. It's hard to keep track of all the changes we've made but I *believe* that the Allies get more freighters still if the Germans have LESS ports. So that would also be a good reason for the Germans to not just sabotage all of them off the bat.

 

[JPetroski]

I just want to let you know that the veteran event works awesome. I didn't expect to actually get the pop up when a unit becomes a veteran due to the munition they fired successfully hitting the target. It's great that it does this as it is easier to keep track of things.

As to the ports, the only thing I've thought of since our last discussion is that the Allies only start the scenario with 1 army group, and the reason for this is to prevent them from making too early of a landing (while still "theoretically" allowing them to land at any time. I'm a little concerned that if we give them a bonus of 3 battle groups if they capture a port intact, they might decide that they should rush a landing as soon as they have local air superiority. I'm not sure how that would play out as a strategy.

I almost think it's OK because if they get thrown into the sea they lose the game and the Germans start with so many more battle groups, but I wanted your thoughts on if there should be a "point delay" for this? Such as they only get the full three if they have so many points? Maybe they get 1 bonus BG for every 250 points up to a maximum of 750?

Edit--I think the freight trains that are spawning randomly in France for Germany are selecting the nearest city as a home city. This is causing issues because Lannes AF for example can't support them. Can we change their spawn to "none?"