The Great Patriotic War: WWII on the Eastern Front (Development Diary)

[ww2commander]

Update: May

This project just keeps getting bigger by the week! Every time I start working on a new feature or component, a few more new items and ideas end up on my to-do list.

Now I know what game designers refer to when they speak of project creep

Along with countless hours of coding, I have also started designing some of the key UI components that will be required.

Below are some screenshots of some new UI components I have included in recent weeks. Testing is still heavily underway and bugs/issues are still lingering in many dark places of my code....so as always.....be patient with me


Screenshot 1 - Worldview (updated)
This is a simple start turn shot that shows the overall world map as is currently. New additions to this screen (compared to previous ones) include the new morale system 'dot' indicators on each unit flag.

The bright colored equipment icons are still undecided. I have chosen bright colors to tell the difference between the tank, assault gun, tank destroyer and aircraft types.

On the top left hand corner (near gold) I have also included a points system counter. I hope to make the point system align to objectives and time frames (i.e. you can not lose more than x points before date y as this will trigger a victory for the enemy). More on this in future as I am still designing the system.

Spoiler :

Screenshot 2 - Production Summary
A while back I tinkered with various ways to display the enhanced production system info but never liked the approach (an example screenshot was posted here).

With much guidance from whoward69, I have final developed a universal screen that can be applied to any of my production resources.

By clicking on any of the production resource icons (steel, aluminium, food, fuel, power), the player now gets the below popup screen with relevant information.

The best part of this screen is that I have also included a sortable city list to further drill down into your production system.

Spoiler :

Screenshot 3 & 4 - Industry Evacuation
The industry evacuation module is still a work in progress, but enough has been done to give you a good example of how it will work.

Industries can be evacuated via the city view screen in a similar manner to selling a building. Depending on the building type, the player will be presented with a confirmation box that now asks them whether they would like to sell or evacuate the building.

If they choose to evacuate the building, then a list of possible destination cities will be presented. The player chooses the destination and then the industry will be shipped to its destination. Evacuated industries are calculated to arrive at their chosen destination based on the route length and other conditions.

Screenshot three also shows what the new building icons will look like in the city view screen along with the tooltip information for each building. Lets just say I love my tooltips and FontIcons a bit too much.

Spoiler :

That's all the eye candy for now. Enjoy and thanks for the support

 

[Gedemon]

I think I've already said it, but great work on the UI

 

[S.O.T MAHak]

I watched this mini serie, in German its called "Unsere Mütter, unsere Väter", directly translated: "Our mothers , our fathers". The american adaptation is called "Generation War". It's about 5 young germans who gets involved with WW2 one way or another. 2 of them are fighting on the eastern front. Which is depicted with some very nice combat scenes. I urge you to see it.

Also, is the Soviets going to have a base or some unit/s at Hanko(a small military base in Finland the Soviets possessed after the Winter War with Finland?).

Oh this mod/scenario looks very, very promising.

 

[ww2commander]

I watched this mini serie, in German its called "Unsere Mütter, unsere Väter", directly translated: "Our mothers , our fathers". The american adaptation is called "Generation War". It's about 5 young germans who gets involved with WW2 one way or another. 2 of them are fighting on the eastern front. Which is depicted with some very nice combat scenes. I urge you to see it.

Have not heard of it (seems to be new according to IMDB), but I will keep an eye out for it. 'Stalingrad' was a very good German movie and is probably more well known. I liked how it did not shy away from the brutality and madness of the fighting on the Eastern Front.

I have also heard from some friends about a few Russian movies that are good as well as a popular Finn one on the Winter War (can't remember names right now!).

Also, is the Soviets going to have a base or some unit/s at Hanko(a small military base in Finland the Soviets possessed after the Winter War with Finland?).

I have allocated a hex off the coast of Finland that starts with a Soviet unit. Unfortunately it does not last long against the Finn 17th Division when play testing!

I was thinking of making this tile into a citadel or fort, but for now it is one of those things to sort out later on my to-do list. Overall, I need to revise and research the Finnish area a bit further as I have not considered all units on the map.

Right now my efforts are being taken up on the industry evacuation module. I am designing another UI screen for it as I type this.

Thanks for the words of support

 

[snafusmith]

I'm glad to see that you're still making good process with your mod, it looks awesome! I've still got some of the units you requested in the queue. I can't get to them right away (I'm still trying to flush out the modern eras), but I will in not too long.

 

[ww2commander]

I'm glad to see that you're still making good process with your mod, it looks awesome! I've still got some of the units you requested in the queue. I can't get to them right away (I'm still trying to flush out the modern eras), but I will in not too long.

Not a problem at all. I am a very patient man. We world war II modders have been spoiled quite a bit compared to our modern and fantasy colleagues...so it only seems fair.

 

[ww2commander]

Update - Industry Evacuations

The industry evacuation module is not operational in the scenario. It turned out to be not as difficult as I anticipated. At a specific point in the game, the Soviet player has the option to evacuate key industrial buildings each turn from cities to prevent them falling into enemy hands.

So how does it work?


Step 1 - Can it be evacuated?
Assuming the player has an open rail connection and sufficient rail points then the option to evacuate will be available when hovering over specific building icons in city view mode. Only one building can be evacuated per turn similar to selling a building.

Evacuations are only possible up until the winter of 1941 sets in (thus you have a 5-6 months window to work with).

Step 2 - Choose your destination
Assuming requirements are satisfied, the next step is to select a valid destination city. Evacuation can only be shipped to cities located in 4 specific regions of the map: Ural, South-Ural, Volga and Transcaucasian regions)....more on regions in a later post as this feature is in its initial stages right now.

Some industries can only be shipped to cities in these regions that have the appropriate industrial capacity and prerequisite support buildings to sustain the industry.

Note: This screenshot was taken before the regions feature mentioned above was implemented!


Step 3 - Getting out of dodge!
The logistics involved in putting an industry on trains is quite significant...probably more than can be realistically represented in this scenario!

In game terms, once you choose to evacuate an industry it must take 2 turns (approx 2 weeks) to disassemble and pack onto numerous trains which are represented by the quantity of rail points required.

This unfortunately means that you must keep your rail connection and city away from the enemy during the turn the evacuation is initiated and the subsequent turn. Failure to keep the route open will result in a failed attempt and retry. After a second failure attempt, the evacuation will be cancelled!

If the city is lost....well you know what that also means for the industry!


Step 4 - En-route to destination
With the hard part over, a building resumes on its way en-route to the destination city. The only thing that could go wrong from here on is losing the destination city (highly unlikely given that your destinations are out of enemy reach). If this does happen, then the code tries to find an alternative city within the same region and then re-routes to that destination. If none is available then the train is lost (wasting away in some siding, captured by the enemy after too many rerouting....you use your imagination!)


Step 5 - Arrival and assembling
Industries take 1 additional turn to assemble once they arrive at their destination (factored into the travel turns). Once things are put together (most industries were up and running even before walls and roofs were up!) your building will resume production and contribute to the cities output.


Here is a screenshot showing the evacuation summary overview

Spoiler :

Hope you enjoyed this little update

 

[S.O.T MAHak]

I saw on one of the screenshots, you posted, that you are able to sell building aswell as relocating them.

The thing is I wonder, who in a planned economy whould buy a building when the germans are next door!

Maybe just make so that when you "sell" a building you dont get any money, meaning that the build is just being demoslish. I dont want to intrude on your game mechanics! If you got some undisclosed features, covering my question, that we havent heard about.

Did you know that when Kiev was conquered by the germans in 1941, the soviets booby trapped alot of buidings. And set them of via remote control, killing thousands of germans.

 

[ww2commander]

The thing is I wonder, who in a planned economy whould buy a building when the germans are next door!

Maybe just make so that when you "sell" a building you dont get any money, meaning that the build is just being demoslish. I dont want to intrude on your game mechanics! If you got some undisclosed features, covering my question, that we havent heard about.

By no means are you intruding. I prefer to discuss and rethink ideas. As an example, a comment a while back triggered a complete re-haul of my map...so feedback is important to me

Good pickup on the selling issue I face. I plan to allow selling of minor (non-strategic) buildings which translates to stripping valuable fixtures and contents and placing them on the back of trucks (if you want to imagine how it is done). From a game mechanic point of view, I have allowed the selling of some buildings as an emergency mechanism if a player is running low on funds.

I will re-review which buildings can be sold before releasing the scenario.

Buying buildings on the other hand, will be disabled as I don't see how one walks into a shop and buys a steel mill or armaments plant off the shelf!!!! These things take quite some labor and time to complete.

Did you know that when Kiev was conquered by the germans in 1941, the soviets booby trapped alot of buidings. And set them of via remote control, killing thousands of germans.

Yes I was aware of this interesting fact. The way I represent this in game is to set the capture percentage for key buildings quite low, thus making it challenging for the enemy (and player) to successfully capture all useful infrastructure intact.

 

[S.O.T MAHak]

The way I represent this in game is to set the capture percentage for key buildings quite low, thus making it challenging for the enemy (and player) to successfully capture all useful infrastructure intact.

Picture this. The soviets have the ability to evacuate their buildings or demolish them, so of course they will try to do so.
So when the germans capture a city, the buildings still there, should be those that the soviets did not have the time to interfere with. Thus the chance for capturing buildings intact should be high.

PS. There is a different between razing a building to the ground, and a building suffering collateral damage but with some repairs could be ready again soon.

Also is there an option for the AI German, to treat the ukrainians and the those living in the baltic countries, better then they did. And thus gain some more manpower or units. Instead of the "we will recruit you, but you are stil inferior, and we will eradicate you sooner or later" policy that they historical planned.

I have a gameplay feature you could include, called "The Russian Liberation Army" meaning that, for every city the germans capture they will get some manpower modifier, representing the anti-soviet elements, who wanted to "join the crusade" against the Bolsheviks.

On a personal note I visited Moscow in 1996 at the age of 8. My father had some "cold war connections" so we visited an embassy reception where among other people present, was a former defence minister of the Soviet Union. Also I saw the "tank obstacles" that marked the final frontier of the german offence towards Moscow, and a military museum dedicated to the Red Army, but at the time they were very low on founds, so their RSD-10 Pioneer/SS-20 missiles they had in their backyard (of course without their nuclear war heads), was overgrown with weed.

 

[ww2commander]

Picture this. The soviets have the ability to evacuate their buildings or demolish them, so of course they will try to do so.
So when the germans capture a city, the buildings still there, should be those that the soviets did not have the time to interfere with. Thus the chance for capturing buildings intact should be high.

The issues I see with a higher percentage is that it does not represent the destruction most major cities went through on the Eastern Front. Think Kharkov, Stalingrad and Smolensk as famous examples.

According to most accounts I have read, a very small percentage of any industrial infrastructure captured by German forces was deemed usable. More specifically, no city was considered capable of being placed into production after capture. This is my reasoning for setting building capturing to a lower chance.

On the other hand, the player and AI are rewarded for capturing cities by receiving booty steel, aluminum, food. This represents salvaged industry and supplies being stripped out of the city. It also results in the losing player taking a hit to its equipment stockpiles as well.

Another thing I want to encourage is for players to actually fight to hold on to cities as opposed to pull out and then recaputre them with infrastructure mostly intact.

If a player loses a significant production center, they should not be able to simply capture it again and expect its production infrastructure to resume where it left off.

Also is there an option for the AI German, to treat the ukrainians and the those living in the baltic countries, better then they did. And thus gain some more manpower or units. Instead of the "we will recruit you, but you are stil inferior, and we will eradicate you sooner or later" policy that they historical planned.

I will revisit my current personnel recruitment process to consider captured (occupied) cities, but I prefer to obfuscate the 'how' and 'why' of personnel recruitment in-game to avoid touching on sensitive historic issues.

My design philosophy (or culling process) for these types of ideas and events is that as long as the player can see and understand the benefit or outcome of a process or objective then you should not have to elaborate any further.

Thus, capturing an enemy city will by default mean that a percentage of that city's population will be recruited. How or why the recruits come about is irrelevant as long as long as the players personnel pool increases as a result of the capture.

I have a gameplay feature you could include, called "The Russian Liberation Army" meaning that, for every city the germans capture they will get some manpower modifier, representing the anti-soviet elements, who wanted to "join the crusade" against the Bolsheviks.

Vlasov's 'army' really consisted of one fully manned division (600th). A second one (650th) was not at full strength.

However your suggestion is a good idea. I might work in a modifier to the previously mentioned recruitment process whereby cities in specific regions have a random modifier applied.

Also I saw the "tank obstacles" that marked the final frontier of the german offence towards Moscow, and a military museum dedicated to the Red Army, but at the time they were very low on founds, so their RSD-10 Pioneer/SS-20 missiles they had in their backyard (of course without their nuclear war heads), was overgrown with weed.

This reminds me of the sad reality of preserving history for future generations. Its like the stories you hear about countless PzIV and Panther tanks being used for target practice and scrap in the 1950/60. Now museums and enthusiasts count their blessings if they find a rusted deteriorating haul somewhere that can provide parts to reconstruct a single working tank of these types!

 

[ww2commander]

Just a further followup to my previous post...after some skimming of historic info, I am thinking of overlaying specific influence modifiers to each region. Thus specific regions on the map provide a higher recruitment bonus than those deeper in the USSR. Its an idea which of course needs to be coded some how but worth investigating.

Here is a map of the games regions.

The regions are as follows:
1. Arkangelsk region
2. Leningrad region
3. Baltic region
4. Belarusian region
5. Kiev region
6. Odessa region
7. Moscow region
8. Orel region
9. Kharkov region
10. North-Caucasian region
11. Transcaucasian region
12. South-Ural region
13. Volga region
14. Ural region

 

[S.O.T MAHak]

Returning to my idea about having the germans getting some "manpower" when they capture cities in regions where there are anti-soviet sentiments.

So when the Red army rolls over countries like Bulgaria, Romania and Poland, should'nt they get some manpower bonuses aswell, seeing that these countries switched side when things "got to hot for them". And soldiers(communist) from these countries joined the Red army.

Of course I dont want it to be a walk in the park, once you turn the tide. And you get maasive manpower bonuses through disgruntled populations, who built up a hatred for their german occupation.

Anyway, what is the victory condition(s)? Is it to conquer Berlin?

PS: Im still scheming for my "Baltic brawl" scenario. Plus: I got plans of making a 'Battle of Dien Bien Phu' scenario, where the whole map is battlefield, with the french pitted against the Viet Cong. The vietnamese commanding general (Vo Nguyen Giap) is still alive today.

But I got many exams coming up soon. I hope to have some time in the window between early summer exams and late summer university enrollment.
Gotta love my scadinavian nanny state!

Oh I almost forgot. Check out this Russian movie, "Stalingrad". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalingrad_(2013_film)

"Rascals do you want to live forever"

Note: Did you know, that when Kurt Zeitzler was Chief of Staff of the OKH during the battle of Stalingrad, he insisted on being fed the same rations as the encircled germans, until he got too thin and an annoyed Hitler ordered him to eat normal.

 

[ww2commander]

Well your idea is growing on me. I think it would not be too hard to implement it now that the region system is off the floor in the scenario.

Here is an example of what I had in mind:

["Baltic"] = {	PersonnelFactor = 0, 
		OccupiedPersonnelFactor = 0,
	        AgricultureFactor = 0,
		IndustrialFactor = 0,
		ResistenceFactor = 0,
		CollaborationFactor = 0,
		},

Each region (e.g. Baltic above) has a modifier applied to its personnel recruitment depending on whether they are the original owner or occupier of a city in the region.

Agriculture and industrial factors will be linked into my production system to emphasis heavy production regions.

Resistance and collaboration will link into event based triggers such as spawning partisans.

As with all plans, it still needs to be balanced and coded. Will see how it goes!

Anyway, what is the victory condition(s)? Is it to conquer Berlin?

Still need to decide exact VC for the scenario but at this stage there is a time limit and Berlin is the main objective. I have implemented a points system which is ready to use.

Like all things at this stage, I am putting the building blocks into place and once all that is done I will sit down and tweak variables and gameplay. Thus why I don't have info on unit and building stats in the scenario even though they are in screenshots.

Oh I almost forgot. Check out this Russian movie, "Stalingrad". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalingrad_(2013_film)

That looks awesome, thanks for the heads up . Can't wait to see it. Hope they make an English translation but subtitles is fine.

 

[magzhi]

So how is the progress so far?

 

[ww2commander]

As of this week I have put things on hold until BNW is released.

I am also waiting to see what the seasoned DLL modders find in the new patch and extra files included.

For the time being I am playing a few games of the Huge Earth map in YnAE mod with the new patch

 

[illathid]

Just wanted to say I'm quite interested in this. Can't wait to see how it turns out. I'm a big fan of Hearts of Iron, so this looks amazing. Keep up the good work!

 

[ww2commander]

Thanks.

Taking a short break from this project as I play a few games of BNW to get a hang of the new features and figure out what new stuff can be recycled in the scenario.

Will let you guys know when things pick up again as I still need to convert it over to BNW.

 

[ww2commander]

So where are things at?

After quite a few BNW games I have come to grips with the new features and at this stage I don't see any BNW features that would make a significant difference to the scenario.

As of the last few weeks, the following things have progressed:
1. Region overlay on map is almost finalized and active within scenario code.
2. Lend Lease interface is under development
3. Lend Lease rail line detection is finished.
4. Projects are getting some focus with a new trigger system being written based on turn availability and unitcombat experience levels.
5. Developing a whole bunch of new UI screens to support a lot of the new scenario features.
6. Rewrote unit supply line code so that it now takes into consideration distance from available city or town plot. Close supply points get more supply. Town plots require a rail connection to a supply dump city. Now it is not a simple case of having a supply line to a city but how close that city is and if it even provides supplies.
7. Tuning the demographic and economic model (basically getting the right 'define' values across things like food usage, metal production, equipment manufacturing).

At this stage a new problem has arisen in that I need to eventually document all these new features and I am starting to forget myself what things I have done or added. At times I revisit code with the intent of adding some improvement only to realize I have already added it!

Also, I am still trying to keep a fine balance between modding for fun and work so I have to occasionally step away to keep my sanity.

 

[ww2commander]

Update: Promotions

This week I provide a preview of the promotions that will be available in the mod. Promotions, IMO, is one of those areas that can easily cause problems if things get out of control. For the scenario, promotions have been simplified somewhat and are based on a system of combat experience and leadership 'promotion openers'.

Combat Experience Promotion Openers include: Trained, Bloodied, Battle Hardened and Veteran. There is also a penalty promotion Untrained that units begin with if they are built in a city without barracks.


Leadership Promotion Openers include: Confident, Experienced and Inspirational. There is also a penalty promotion Unproven that Soviet units begin with to represent the damage caused by the purges.


As a unit gained experience points and meets a point threshold, the game unlocks a specific promotion opener that enables a set of promotions to be chosen. Secondly, some units have inherent penalty or ability promotions that reflect its combat purpose and capabilities. As an example, cavalry are good at attacking infantry units but have poor defense.

Finally, there are also special game promotions that are only controlled via the game code. These types of promotions include unit morale indicators and supply line status.

The diagram in the spoiler below provides an overview of every promotion currently in the game.

The colored columns represent the Combat Experience and Leadership promotion opener levels (4 in total). A unit must progress through each level to open respective promotions shown below. The red column shows penalty promotions and conditions (if any) that apply to each unitcombat type. The yellow column shows the unique abilities that apply to each unitcombat type

One last thing. These promotions have only had limited playtesting and still need balancing so let me know if you spot anything out of the ordinary or broken.

EDIT: I noticed an error in the Poor Open Defense promotion. This should read -10% Open Defense Modifier

Spoiler :

As always, please let me know your feedback.