New Panzer Campaign Graphics

[Andrea G]

I will add my voice to the old and visually impaired gamers gang; the new obstacles symbols are a little too hard to see, I would prefer to have the option to use to "old" symbols which are easily readable.

[Lowlander]

Well guys I got a large windows 10 feature update the other day which messed up my screen settings, vanilla setting is standard but I use gaming mode, also the back lighting was activated so as I ain't gett'in any younger this took several attempts to rectify, my point is people are using different machines with slightly different screen graphics to suit our individual needs hence the different opinions.

[Bioman]

Let me see if I have this right. You want to move away from a map where rivers. canals and streams are easily identified and go to something where it will almost be impossible to tell the difference without going to a hex and see what terrain borders the hex side. Also in your example polder is easily identified as different than marsh but the new terrain it is difficult to tell as they are the same color. This is supposed to be an upgrade? Of course I should expect this as in a prior update you got rid of fortification counters that were easy to tell apart by looking at them and went to ones that you can only tell by clicking on the hex. Jison's new art mod has made the type of fortifications very easy to spot. In general the new maps look good.
i feel that putting more and more info on unit counters just makes them harder to read and just adds useless clutter. Newer and fancier is not always better.

[Strela]

Let me see if I have this right. You want to move away from a map where rivers. canals and streams are easily identified and go to something where it will almost be impossible to tell the difference without going to a hex and see what terrain borders the hex side. Also in your example polder is easily identified as different than marsh but the new terrain it is difficult to tell as they are the same color. This is supposed to be an upgrade? Of course I should expect this as in a prior update you got rid of fortification counters that were easy to tell apart by looking at them and went to ones that you can only tell by clicking on the hex. Jison's new art mod has made the type of fortifications very easy to spot. In general the new maps look good.
i feel that putting more and more info on unit counters just makes them harder to read and just adds useless clutter. Newer and fancier is not always better.

Again, I will reply more formally soon, but did you even read the blog post?

How do you interpret this statement?

This gives us so much more ‘canvas’ to work with and today we wanted to share the current draft of these graphics. They are draft as they have only been created in the last week or so and we will be tweaking them as we work on the three zoom levels and get feedback on usability etc. As an example, rivers, streams, and canals need further work to ensure visibility, but the base is there.

[2-81 Armor]

I'm willing to give all of the proposed graphic changes a chance.

Do I agree with all of them? See my post above and you'll find that I don't. Everyone has their own personal preferences, and as long as we retain the ability to mod and change graphics as we see fit, then I'm satisfied.

As David says above, this is a "canvas" and the illustrations are part of a draft, subject to feedback and change. To me that means that they're listening and nothing is engraved in stone (yet). Fair enough I think.

When things are finalized if I don't like a certain look, I'll change it myself for my own use. I do this now and I'll bet a lot of other people do too.

I'm just happy that WDS is keeping the series fresh and evolving.

[Xaver]

I understand the problem with black in counters... when arrive PzB series y try mod the counter but affect other areas, you need a good tool to create the counter from 0 and not simple made it darker.

Option 4 looks fine but if are problems with other divisional colours... i dont know if is possible made for SS a counter in 2 parts, border in black and the grey used now in heer for the area around/behind NATO counter.

I dont dislike at all the new PzC map art but with new counters i find map to... thin/skinny maybe because things like villages are not very easy to see... in general i feel is to clear.

For naps the idea of letter inside NATO symbol is something i like because made info more visual, maybe needs bigger NATO symbol and made the line formation be showed more clear not using the double line of points... a single line is better and you can intregrate the arrow showing facing to it.

Well, you are right ComradeP, looks more 1943, guards in summer 1941....no, and not a lot armor for 1942 but well, if we are going to see non very late east front i prefer 1941 in the South because soviets have more options VS axis, apart play as axis is harder thank to the "exotic" OOB.... i focus more in desires and not in reality of pics.

PD: maybe i sound very negative but i dont think you are doing a bad job, only is i see visual changes to update game that made harder see info over map or add a type of art i dont find interesting... but is true that WDS move JTS games to XXI century... and help we have a much better release rate.

[Outlaw Josey Wales]

As far as I can remember, SS have always been black counter with white symbols and text. If that can be done with another folder, I'd say do it. SS are the only ones. Any ohters have been somebody just trying to be fancy.

[2-81 Armor]

I did some investigating about counter colors in general, and found that the Europa series of games from GDW and later GRD always had German Army units in gray-green, Luftwaffe in light blue, and SS in black with white symbols. This is true for all titles in the series.

SPI (War in Europe) had the German Army in gray, with SS in black.

The only instances I can find for Tiller style blue-gray German Army counters are Avalon Hill's Squad Leader and Advanced Squad Leader games.

A great source to check these out is the Board game Geek site that has full color scans of counter sheets.

This is mainly for David and WDS. Maybe it is time to change at least the German Army color. SS appear to be close to impossible to change without some type of programming change, and that would be a lot of work for a cosmetic thing.

I'll continue to do it for my personal mods, regardless. Just thought I'd try and shine some light on the Europa theory. For what it's worth my German Army counters are gray-green, SS dark gray, and Luftwaffe pale blue-gray. If KM units are present I make them light gray.

[CountryBoy]

Appreciate your work Strela and all involved.

[Kool Kat]

Hi David: 

I appreciate all the work you and your team have done to enhance the PzC Series with "Gold" upgrades! 

However, regardless of the availability of a "larger canvas," - why the decision to focus on graphics - especially since PzC and MC have been standardized on "Gold?" Why not pat yourself on the back, say "job well done with Gold graphics" and move on to other issues?

Could not the limited resources of your development team be better spent on continued focus on creating new games and scenario variants for existing titles?