Helping Test New Danube Front Update

[JDR Dragoon]

The proposed individual changes for 1.02:

- Added Magnified 2D view with 2x sized graphics.

Appears to work fine, at least on my older rig. Scrolling is flawless, although the resolution gets a pit "pixelated" at times, but I am guessing that this is a "feature" rather than a "bug".

- Change so that Disrupted units do not receive replacements and
Detached units receive replacements at one-fourth (not one-half) the
normal rate.

Seems to work as advertised, but it is hard to ascertain whether or not detached units receive their replacements more slowenly, since this calculation takes place "under the hood" hidden away from the player.

- Change to allow Battleships to fire AA at high flying aircraft.

Not tested, since it didn´t really seem relevant.

- Added new Forced Bridge Crossing Rule which allows units to force a
bridge crossing against enemy ZOC (see Users Manual under Movement).

Unquestionably works BUT ONLY ON HEXSIDE BRIDGES! If you are trying to cross a full-hex bridge and the enemy is ZOC-blocking the exit-hex, you are stuck in travel mode on a bridge spanning a full hex river.

- Increased Engineer digging in bonus from 2x to 3x.

This also seems to work as advertised, an engineer or a unit assisted by an engineer, can now dig in at a very brisk pace. Very appropriate, since a major staple of the equipment park of modern engineer units is earthmoving equipment.

- Added toolbar button for highlighting units in Travel Mode.

Appears to work flawlessly. When this button is pressed, and you take a unit out of Travel Mode, it even stops being highlighted any more, and if you put it back into Travel Mode, it is highlighted again. Good work.

- Added new Bunker and Mine Prob Parameter Data Values and allowing
non-bridge engineer units to construct Bunkers.

Yes, so I see. But none of the stock .pdt files have so far been modified to have a "bunker prob" value, and I reckon that the "mine probability" is simply just 50% of the "Digging in" value by default (although it would seem that having it as a seperate value means, that you can adjust it independently of the Digging In value).

- Added new Night Move Disruption parameter data value which determines
probability of night movement by non-rail and non-travel or
non-road movement units causing Disruption.

Probably works as intended, but I couldn´t test it, since none of the stock .pdt´s have so far been updated and the value is 0% per default.

- Change so that Interdiction attacks have twice the chance of Disruption
and can cause the loss of up to half the movement allowance in movement
points.

Works as advertised, but it is hard to be certain whether or not a unit hit by interdiction really has twice the chance of Disruption, since the calculation is hidden.

- Added a range 1 hard target artillery fire modifier (see Users Manual
under Firing).

The Users Manual has not yet been updated, So I cannot really ascertain what this rule is about. I am guessing, that an artillery unit firing at a hard target at 1-hex gets to multiply its hard Attack value by this factor? In the stock .pdt´s this value is set to 1, and thus doesn´t matter.

- Added Optional Rule for delayed reporting of enemy Disruption.

Works.

- Change so that towed AT gun unit which changes to Travel Mode after
firing at most once before the change will not trigger enemy
Opportunity Fire.

Also seems to work as intended, although whether or not the unit triggers opportunity fire seems to rest upon whether it has spent MPs, and not whether it has fired or not ;)

- Added Quality Fire Modifier Parameter Data Value which applies to
quality A and B units.

The Users Manual has not yet been updated, So I cannot really ascertain what this rule is about. I am guessing, that an A or B quality unit firing gets to multiply its Attack value by this factor? In the stock .pdt´s this value is set to 1, and thus doesn´t matter.

- Change so that half Frozen Penalty is applied only to Urban (Village, Town, City, and Industrial) hexes.

Not tested since it didn´t really seem relevant.


Overall I am very impressed with these changes, mos of which goes a long way towards redressing the advantage the attacking/phasing player used to hold. This will make the task of defending so much more viable and will insure that the attacker will need appropriate odds and thorough preparation.