Panzer Battles Demo - Released!

[wiggum]

I think many appreciate what you have done David. But I think what you started with was so awful that there is only so much one can do with it

I think the Tiller engine is basically just a UI over a Excel Sheet that compares numbers and does some math and generates random numbers. As its closely related to boardgames that makes sense.

In my opinion, porting the math behind the whole think to a new UI will actual 2D HD graphics (!) cant be that hard.
Probably harder then modding every .bmp file out there but still, once you have done it you could pretty much port every Tiller game in existence over to the new engine. This would give the series a new life.

Many older wargame titles and boardgames got updated with new graphics recently, there are free tools avaiable to create a new engine.

[berto]

You did some great work but sometimes i wonder if all those hours would better have been invested in coding a new engine from scratch. Not saying you should code it by yourself. No offense.

Hours?  It would require years to "code a new engine from scratch".  A practical impossibility.

If these icons are based on feedback it's surely those persons fault because how anyone can think that a 7 is a proper icon for telling person completely new to the engine that this is for showing the map elevations is beyond my mind.

Again i have to agree.

That's what the tooltips are for.  If a newbie doesn't know what the "7" icon signifies, positioning the mouse pointer over the icon and seeing the tooltip -- "Map Elevations (.)" -- will tell him.  Soon enough, the newbie is no longer a newbie.  Soon enough, the player adapts to the toolbar interface, better still, learns to use the hot keys.

[ComradeP]

The updated graphics are a lot less vintage than the original graphics, which helps quite a bit.

I'm not a fan of the look of the new UI yet, mostly because I'm used to the old one. Yes, it's very Windows 3.1, but that's the kind of UI I've used to play some wargames in the last 2 decades or so.

As long as it's clear what everything does, and the graphic itself is clear, it doesn't need to be fancy. To me, functionality is more important than the look of the UI.

A full UI redesign would require an engine redesign as well, as functionalities would need to change too if you have right click menu's or clickable icons on the map or something like that.

The choice between more content or a radical redesign which some people will always dislike isn't that difficult. The people that don't understand the limited means involved in this kind of work might need a reality check. This is parttime hobbyism mostly in terms of the investment/gain balance.

I have some issues with no longer being able to use basic functions with 1 shortcut key as it's counterintuitive that less used functions require 1 key now whilst things you use in each game like T-mode require 2, but I'll learn to live with it.

Modifications to the combat engine to make full use of improved CPU power would in my opinion add more to the game than continued UI redesign.

Improvements to the way vehicle/gun/aircraft losses are handled, how Disruptions are handled or how quality and terrain adjusts HA/SA values, to name a few potential areas of improvement.

The combat system is simplified now in the sense that losses are determined as (relative) losses in men, and all bonuses and penalties are added and substracted instead of multiplied and divided.

To give an example of the last part: a unit with an adjusted quality fire modifier of 50% firing into a hex giving a penalty of -50% has an adjusted total of 0 instead of having its value multiplied by 1.5 and then divided by 2. This gives high quality units more of an advantage they should have.

Taking an A quality mechanized PzG unit with a SA of 12 as an example: its adjusted SA is now 12 (12 + 50% - 50%) instead of 12x1.5=18 divided by 2= 9. This makes A quality units very deadly even in difficult terrain, which creates some problems in Normandy.

[Strela]

ComradeP,

Pretty much agree with everything you said. We have done basically what we can with the UI to this point.

Any coding effort will now go into enhancements and fixes for calculations that don't gel (your examples are appropriate). We have toyed with a range of things including terrain impacts, range attenuation and even indirect fire spotters. We have also done a lot more exploratory work on exactly how the combat calculations work to allow us to map back exactly what is happening and what values are being determined and where. Berto has given us some great toolsets to use.

One minor point I understand longer term players are put off by some of the changed shortcuts. As explained elsewhere we tried to get consistency, unfortunately everyone's mileage will vary. In the example you bought up, we did leave the keypad 0 deliberately as a single press travel mode change button. No need for Ctrl T if you don't want to use it.

David

[ComradeP]

Sadly, I have one of those modern ergonomic keyboards without a numpad, but I agree that keeping a single button shortcut for T-mode was the right step. I use custom hotkeys now through autohotkey and it works fine.

As another example of the fire modifiers: firing into a hex giving a -50% modifier and through a hexside giving a -50% modifier currently makes the defender invulnerable, and it's this example where the higher quality units have a very real advantage.

C quality Allied units trying to hit men in bunkers won't do any damage through the bocage, instead of having their fire modified by x0.25 in total, which is a stiff but fair penalty and better than not being able to damage defending units.

There's no magical solution for the way vehicle/gun/aircraft interaction with elements composed of men is handled, but I appreciate that progress is being made in terms of adding more tools for tweaking that part of the combat engine to see what might work.

Another thing I've been thinking about is if it might be possible to have an alt assault rule for elements that are organically soft but become hard through fortifications, whilst not adjusting assaults against bunkers. This would give the scenario designer the chance to limit infantry assault effectiveness against tanks early in the war whilst still allowing them to assault bunkers. The current alt assault rules make it nearly impossible to assault bunkers, so it would be nice if that rule could be split in two flavours.

That would result in early war tank combat scenarios like Hannut being about tank vs. tank combat, instead of the current infantry vs. tank situation.

[Xaver]

Maybe situations of soldiers VS tank needs a special rule... i refer that is not the same engage with infantry units tanks in open VS non open terrain in assault situations.

I dont see bad made that the HA value of infantry units be related with the terrain type when we are in an assault combat situation... the idea is increase the HA value when terrain is better for defender with this the use of tanks as solo assault VS infantry needs be more carefull and made that units in villages, forest... be a more hard nut to crack and maybe force some soft fire before assault or the intervention of infantry to support.

Thats other point that for me needs be changed, the rule that affect assaults with infantry+tanks, for me combined arms penalty is obsolete and not reflect the true impact of armor+infantry in assults... punish to much that kind of assaults because is imposible have a perfect ratio of 1:10 tanks:soldiers in the moment OOB is static and you cant control the number of soldiers-vehicles in assault, for me armor needs be a bonus to assault, smaller if ratio is not balanced but NEVER punished only when you have a lot of vehicles and a minimal infantry support (and oposite) bonus need disapear but never be punished.

Something i allways want see in Tiller games is made gun units based in guns/soldiers where you kill soldiers and dont need destroy a gun to deal with that kind of units, firepower is affected by ratio gun-crew.

But i think first thing that needs a change is urban-close combat situations, improve game to deal with units from diferent sides in same hex fighting a more real close combat fight and maybe could help with bunkers problem... the option to infiltrate units VS force assaults to take and hex.

[BigDuke66]

While the resources could be used to adjust the in-game mechanics I would suggest to first make a step back and consider working on some more global things. I suggest to expand the way points can be earned in the game from objectives. A game called "Command Ops" is a good example, it has a wide range possibilities of how to achieve points and I think it could be a benefit not only for the PB series but all Tiller games if the objectives here could do similar things. Some examples:
- Normal objectives can bring points per turn and/or points on completion. The points per turn are only given if the objective is not contested, that means a set circle around it is free of the enemy. The points on completion do not always mean the end of the scenarios as objectives can be activated and deactivated throughout the scenario.
- Objectives can be active for a certain amount of time, That means objective only need to simulate the holding of an important position can be removed once the holding of that position isn't needed anymore.
- There are Exit objectives that limit the amount of points by unit type so one can only exit a certain amount of infantry, tanks, artillery, etc. to reach the point limit.

[Strela]

While the resources could be used to adjust the in-game mechanics I would suggest to first make a step back and consider working on some more global things. I suggest to expand the way points can be earned in the game from  objectives. A game called "Command Ops" is a good example, it has a wide range possibilities of how to achieve points and I think it could be a benefit not only for the PB series but all Tiller games if the objectives here could do similar things. Some examples:
- Normal objectives can bring points per turn and/or points on completion. The points per turn are only given if the objective is not contested, that means a set circle around it is free of the enemy. The points on completion do not always mean the end of the scenarios as objectives can be activated and deactivated throughout the scenario.
- Objectives can be active for a certain amount of time, That means objective only need to simulate the holding of an important position can be removed once the holding of that position isn't needed anymore.
- There are Exit objectives that limit the amount of points by unit type so one can only exit a certain amount of infantry, tanks, artillery, etc. to reach the point limit.

We have had a discussion at team level about this previously and it is a potential enhancement. We included earning points per turn, the ability to have different values for a victory location for each side and even time limits.


Here is what was written up to explain the concept;

The current system only matters on who holds the victory locations on the last turn and that is illogical. Delaying an enemy etc is not rewarded at all.

Suggested implementation for Panzer Battles; Optional ‘Per turn objective scoring’


• Each objective has a point value for the first side and second side. These will be non-negative from zero up. These values can be different for each side.
• Each turn a side holds an objective they accumulate points for their sides attributed value.
• Attribution is done at the end of the second players turn, ie end of the game turn.
• The victory display can either carry both totals or net the 2nd players points off the 1st players
• An alternative is that an objectives victory point value is only shown for the phasing player when fog of war is in play.

Rationale; with some of the scenarios (particularly longer ones), we are seeing that players have little incentive to play historically. In many cases holding objectives on the last turn is the only key requirement. Moving to a per turn basis shifts that emphasis. Having the ability to have a different value for each side will allow better balancing as well as different importance for each side of the various locations. Attacking players will now be motivated to be more daring and drive to take objectives that are higher value for them, despite the risk of isolation or counterattack. Defenders will be motivated to try and hold high value (to them) forward positions where each extra turn will net them a high value rather than just surrendering it to preserve troops and to hold the victory hexes that are higher value to all in the rear.

An additional benefit is that campaign scenarios can have different objective weightings based upon the situation picked by each player – this will really open up the replay ability. The campaign designer can vary victory points in each outcome based on the situation each player chooses. For example, a player who chooses a scenario that defends the left side of a map will have left side VP’s weighted higher for the time he holds the victory locations. 

Below is an example of the ‘set objective’ box with values for the first and second player. The Nation represents the starting owning player.



The selection of whether a scenario uses ‘Per turn objective scoring’ (PTOS) would be in the scenario header like asymmetric side is currently in the Squad Battles header. If PTOS is off then the first player value for the objective would only count or alternatively the above dialog box would only have two values when the header value is turned on.

The other possibly simpler solution is to allow two objectives to coexist in a hex if PTOS is turned on and the value for a side is attributed to the current owning player. This will require confirmation of the owning player for a hex, even after the hex is left.

Trying to keep it simple, but this would make a huge difference to the game and game play - campaigns could really be made to be very interesting with this.


The challenge is this is on a rather long wishlist...!

David

[Xaver]

Maybe add a pair of boxes more to define the objetives???

One with the number of points that objetive lose by turn and another one to control the number top turn while objetive can lose his value... take objetive later means earn less points, even 0 if you take to much and lose fast value... apart this if you retake the objetive it continue losing points while is under original owner control if it is not yet in the turn limit (retake it later is not interesting for original owner if cant made it lose more value).... and the points losed are added forever to original objetive owner because manage to control it before do it enemy.

[BigDuke66]

@Strela
That sounds already very promising, I hope this gets priority as it really makes certain scenarios much more interesting.