Initial Impressions

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flynavy
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Initial Impressions

Post by flynavy »

Downloaded and loaded the file with no problems. Everything was extremely smooth.

After starting it up I went immediately to the tutorial campaign. Easy enough to get to and self explanatory.

Upon immediately looking at it I felt as if I'd seen this before. I have played Panzer General before and felt it was the same. I haven't played it in a long time but I really don't see much of a difference in what I remember. This is not necessarily a bad thing, I really enjoyed playing Panzer General but I look forward to finding figuring out what's new.

I didn't find the tutorial to be very helpful. I was able to work through it but I do wonder if that's because I've had prior experience with this type of game and it could be a turn off to someone new to this type of game. It may be helpful to have a text screen telling players how to move, attack and so on. I was in the middle of the third tutorial wondering why I couldn't attack with some of my units before realizing they were out of supply and then another couple of turns before realizing how to provide supply. The same with purchasing new units.

There was mention of Core units, but I had a tough time determining which of my units were core units and which were not. I believe it said something about a gold border but was not entirely sure where this is.

I feel I should mention that I did not read the manual, and that may be obvious from my post. I admit I'm more of the type to just jump into a game and go from there.

More information on the units would be nice. I did see the little side panel that pops out with the information but I would like to see a pop up window with this data as well and maybe some historical information on this type of unit, how it was used, etc. Perhaps it could pop open when I right click on the unit? When I play these types of games I like to learn a little from it as well.

I will write more as I get deeper into the game.
Thank you very much for this opportunity, I've enjoyed the time I've spent with it so far.
Rob (Flynavy)
sullafelix
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Post by sullafelix »

I only played it for a few minutes and besides the feeling of time travel I was impressed.

I liked the graphics and animations.

I'll dig deeper into it tonight and see what we have under the hood.
Steelslayer
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Post by Steelslayer »

I have just played through tutorials one and two and considering the strange timing of this I had in the last week started playing the original Panzer General, I was impressed with the similiarities as well, and this is a good thing from my perspective.

My experience with PZ I and II made playing the game and understanding the interface was helpful, and perhaps like has been mentioned above small text boxes explaining some of the concepts would help in the tutorials for those that are indeed jumping in right away.
I am very impressed with what I have seen so far in these two tutorial scenarios. In some of the previous forum discussions I recall a discussion of leaders and their traits, perhaps they come later, but I did enjoy that aspect of PZ II and People's General.

In tutorial 2-
I purchased an additional artillery piece when I saw the victory hexes and felt like it was the prudent move, considering the fact that they were reinforced positions and did not know what to expect. I moved two of the INF units directly north and weaved through the mountains to recon and then link up behind the main objective with the main force. I felt the additional time it would take for these two units to get there would be offset by the time it would take the main force to attack up the main road. The recon unit did its job as I was able to identify, encircle, envelop and destroy each unit as I moved up the main road. The main objective was secured after destroying the supporting artillery and then multiple rounds of artillery and assault by the HW and INF units. I had to resupply the light tank once. I have to say I did like the fact that it took a couple rounds of attack to lower the entrenchment level and destroy the enemy, it added to the realism that a properly entrenched enemy will be very hard to dislodge.
Steelslayer
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Post by Steelslayer »

A couple of intial points of thought for discussion:

1. Again, maybe they come later, but leaders and traits would be good
2. On the unit menu displayed (not the one brought up by toggling) it would be nice to have the range of artillery
3. On the toggled "unit list" indicate by colour that a unit has moved.
4. The "Unit Fired" as displayed by the cross through its strength is helpful

More later
sullafelix
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Post by sullafelix »

It plays a lot like PG and anyone who owned it will be able to sit down and start playing relatively easily. It is just like PG where at first glance it seems like a beer and pretzels game but you soon realize there is much more to it than that.
Steelslayer
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Post by Steelslayer »

tutorial 3

Great tutorial. Using the Bridge/Engineer unit.

This scenario gave me a great impression about one thing that i hope will be an excellent standout feature: a proactive AI that has initiative. I was caught a number of times moving units into assault staging positions, only to have them attacked by enemy units. The closest unit to the initial deployment area even left the city to attack!! The battles seem to have what I call an element of "measured chance mixed with measured certainty"-in other words it is not a forgone conclusion that my armoured unit will overun the damaged arty unit, it seems like both sides have a reasonable chance of inflicting the 'lucky-shot damage' along with the more certain damage that one might expect.

I wish there was an option for the units to move more slowly. That way it would look like a number of units were moving at once-no big deal but a more fluid movement system would be really neat to watch as some units would begin their movements, while others were finishing. Again not everyone would like this but as an option it would be great. The units are nicely detailed and when they move they race across the screen you can't see them.

Also what size are these units supposed to be? What is the hex size? Brigades? Regiments?
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Post by IainMcNeil »

Thanks great feedback. The tutorials are only in structurally at the moment without any actual tutorial help. This will be coming soon!
uran21
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Post by uran21 »

Thanks on a detailed feedback on tutorial!
Steelslayer wrote:Also what size are these units supposed to be? What is the hex size? Brigades? Regiments?
There is no consistency in scale neither for units neither for maps. Considering land unit classes included you could compare them with Battalion - Regiment scale but when you look what operations are included in main campaign it is easy to say some of them are Divisional - Corps scale. We combined several aspects that generate most fun, Battalion like units in Divisional sized operations where emphasis was given tu pure tactics. We didn't aim for realism defined with consistent scale.
tonywkim
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Post by tonywkim »

First thanks for getting me into the beta! Tried game for first time a bit last night. I played two tutorials and first mission in the 1939 campaign. My very first impressions:

1. when units move, they just "appear" and the destination. this threw me at first. i was looking for units to actually "move" on the map and see the path they would take. i think it would be cooler to show the path the units take
2. odds of an attack. could there be a little numeric odds calculator that shows the odds of an attack? maybe there is something but i didnt see it
3. i love how when u select a unit to move in particular for infantry, it shows the potential hexes where it can move and whether a truck is needed or not
4. supply? does supply matter? can you cut off enemy units supply?
5. aircraft. i noticed i lost two our of my three aircraft. they just disappeared. did they crash because they ran out of fuel and not go back to base? i have no idea what happened to them. aircraft rules weren't transparent to me
Steelslayer
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Post by Steelslayer »

uran21 wrote:Thanks on a detailed feedback on tutorial!
Steelslayer wrote:Also what size are these units supposed to be? What is the hex size? Brigades? Regiments?
There is no consistency in scale neither for units neither for maps. Considering land unit classes included you could compare them with Battalion - Regiment scale but when you look what operations are included in main campaign it is easy to say some of them are Divisional - Corps scale. We combined several aspects that generate most fun, Battalion like units in Divisional sized operations where emphasis was given tu pure tactics. We didn't aim for realism defined with consistent scale.
thankx Uran


Ok it makes sense now, as you said the size of the varying size of the operations would suggest in some cases Div, and then much smaller. Again in terms of fun and ease or playability it works.
sullafelix
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Post by sullafelix »

1st. Tony yes your aircraft can run out of gas and crash. I used to forget about them all the time in PG and lose them.

More impressions, as usual instead of playing the tutorials first I just started playing small scenarios. It is very intuitive so I had no problem just playing. Although I did play PG in all it's forms when it was out.

For me it is a good solid game that allows you to play a scenario in a short amount of time but still has enough meat that makes it worthwhile.

The maps did seem a bit bland. But I think that is because you were trying to create a feel of playing PG in this game.
conger
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Post by conger »

i've only beaten the poland mission on 1939 camp and looked at a few scens to see the map. all in all, i enjoy it, the font and unit icons seem a little small to me though.
Fastheinz
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Post by Fastheinz »

Hi! Thanks for the invite! I am enjoying the game, graphics and sound are adequate, would like to see unit info better.
Daroc
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Post by Daroc »

I only played the tutorials so far - my impressions will be relating to sces 1-3.

I like the overall feel - I have played all the PG's and this felt the same to me this is a good thing.

I jumped right in not changing any default settings except the music (I do this in all my games).

I was getting the "this is awesome feeling when playing". I had no prob with the mechanics of the game with my prior experience.

If however I was new there is some details that would need to be explained to a novice. IIRC there was a walk thru in one explaining exactly howto do moves, attacks, and bombardment - I think if done by stages of concepts going from the basic to more complex would help beginners to feel right at home. If done completely and with solid understanding then jumping from the tutorial to the campaign would be no problem. The way the game plays and feels is great atm.

The way the game handles campaigns one would want to be concentrating solely on tactics and not on game mechanic concepts (in prior experience IIRC I had to restart a campaign because of this which detracts from the scripted AI placement when replaying).

The mention of having a odds calc and a range # for arty would be needed IMO.

Some kind of warning signal about low supply/ammo status of units would be helpful.

As of this writing I feel that it is a very solid and playable game.

The showing of foot/mech move is a great change from the original - plus for this.

The core units from the original are bordered in gold and the others are in silver/gray. I remember pushing the limits and sacrificing the auxs FTW.

Did not complete the 3 sce so cannot comment on the plane aspect.

I give it at least a 8/10 overall - with the improvements made I would easily give it a 9.5 - 10/10.

Daroc
deadtorius
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Post by deadtorius »

I have tried the 1939 campaign three times now, first time I took too long for Poland then I ended up in Norway twice.... the old PG Norway was easier than this one thats for sure. Have not managed to win that one yet as I did not notice the very far northern victory city till I was down to 3 turns left and there was no way I was making it there so....

Few things: Where is the old Pz IVD? Seems we get all kinds of new toys in the campaign but no infantry/artillery smashing PZ IV. I always had a few of them for taking out allied artillery.
I have to say getting the big artillery guns right off the bat was a nice surprise, no having to settle for 7.5cm guns for a bit. I do miss the second part of the Poland campaign though, and the Polish airforce is bigger and stronger than it was in PG, nice work guys.

When in campaign mode your units do no auto repair back to full strength between battles, that came as a real surprise during deployment. Not sure if that is intentional but was not what I had expected, but you can repair them before they deploy.

Sounds: I get the foot marching and shooting stuka scream (nice surprise on that one) but my trucks, and half tracks have no sound at all. Planes don't make any noise when they move and I think it is the PZ 1 that occasionally sounds like its marching when it moves. Guess the crew is pushing it along the road. Naval units are also without sound for movement. Falling bombs from the level bombers would be a nice touch. Perhaps you dont have all the sound files in place yet but just wanted to point it out in case.

Visually: It looks like and feels like the old PG alright. Nice work on taking us back to the old days. Problem is I keep trying to remember what my old PG army was like and trying to rebuild it in this game, have to keep reminding myself its not the same game so different things might be in order.
I am happy to say that it is nice to see different icons for the heavy weapons and engineer units, they used to be the same and sometimes I would mix them up in a city attack :shock:

Trains: Nice touch, you can sit in a city and put your troops on a train and rail them along the rail line, problems seems to be to get them back out again. I have had to reverse them to the nearest rail city to derail them, and that was just an infantry unit so seems kind of useless as you end up almost at the start point to get them off that train again.

If you could add some extra colour to the unit info box so that perhaps fuel and ammo show red when they run low, I seem to be ending up in ammo less battle situations all the time and then I can't replenish because some enemy is next door or there is a hidden plane overhead.

Being on the receiving end of air attacks needs to be displayed better, perhaps have the game automatically change to air mode so you can see the enemy planes attacking you. as it is now you just hear some gunfire and then your unit drops strength and it is not until your turn when you switch on air mode that you see what just made your life so miserable.

I would also like to see units move across the map instead of just teleporting to their last hex, would also be nice to see where the enemy went instead of just disappearing on you.

Are there auxilliary units in the game still? I go into the campaigns and everything looks the same, so not sure if those nice extra planes and paras are permanent or just a one game deal like they were originally.

Weather needs to be made easier to see what is going on, even if it just told you what the weather was when you mouse over the little circular thingy, at present it always looks the same so when my planes can't attack I wonder is it 0 ammo or rain? Also it would be nice if turn one was always clear. Last run of the campaign in Belgium turn 1 started out with rain so no sending in the Luftwaffe to try and soften up those targets over the Meuse in that run.

Units: I have to say its nice to see that the paras are now strong enough to get dropped on their own and they can stand up for a while without needing help from the rest of the army right away or they die. I used to be a bit hesitant to let them attack in PG as they would usually end up losing the fight and lose too much strength as well. So far they have worked out well to drop behind cities and take on the arty that is waiting for you.

Another thing, level bombers on an objective city used to cost the allies prestige points as well as lower the entrenchment value. It used to have a message that would say something like bombing paris, allies lose 25 prestige. No indication if this is still in the game or not, although the JU88 is great for killing the Royal Navy ships in Norway

Good start it looks good plays very much like Panzer General did. Keep up the good work and I think you might just be able to bring back the fun of conquering Europe in a fun and easy way.
:twisted: :)
uran21
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Post by uran21 »

flynavy wrote:I didn't find the tutorial to be very helpful. I was able to work through it but I do wonder if that's because I've had prior experience with this type of game and it could be a turn off to someone new to this type of game. It may be helpful to have a text screen telling players how to move, attack and so on. I was in the middle of the third tutorial wondering why I couldn't attack with some of my units before realizing they were out of supply and then another couple of turns before realizing how to provide supply. The same with purchasing new units.
It is not implemented jet but final version of tutorial should have pop up messages explaining some basic things about the game.
flynavy wrote:There was mention of Core units, but I had a tough time determining which of my units were core units and which were not. I believe it said something about a gold border but was not entirely sure where this is.
On the strength plate beneath unit you have either golden (core) either silver (auxiliary) border.
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Post by uran21 »

tonywkim wrote:2. odds of an attack. could there be a little numeric odds calculator that shows the odds of an attack? maybe there is something but i didnt see it
Before the attack when you point over the enemy there should be combat prediction together with crosshair.
tonywkim wrote:4. supply? does supply matter? can you cut off enemy units supply?
If your unit is adjacent to enemy unit you will not be able to supply with exception of being in cities, than it takes three enemy units to block the supply.
tonywkim wrote:5. aircraft. i noticed i lost two our of my three aircraft. they just disappeared. did they crash because they ran out of fuel and not go back to base? i have no idea what happened to them. aircraft rules weren't transparent to me
Aircrafts crash if they run out of fuel. If you don't plan to move them it is best to keep them on or adjacent to friendly airfield and while you are moving them hexes from where they cannot return to friendly base will be marked in red. You can enter that area but do that only if you plan to capture some airfield in the same turn and thus change strategic situation.
uran21
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Post by uran21 »

deadtorius wrote:I have tried the 1939 campaign three times now, first time I took too long for Poland then I ended up in Norway twice.... the old PG Norway was easier than this one thats for sure. Have not managed to win that one yet as I did not notice the very far northern victory city till I was down to 3 turns left and there was no way I was making it there so....
Norway in next beta should be easier than now. The most northern city is removed as victory objective.
deadtorius wrote:Few things: Where is the old Pz IVD? Seems we get all kinds of new toys in the campaign but no infantry/artillery smashing PZ IV. I always had a few of them for taking out allied artillery.
I removed it from Poland to LC to have better upgrade path for tanks but now I rechecked and apparently there was typo in new availability date so I fixed it. It should appear in purchase screen when you start LC. In stand alone scenario mode it stays in Norway but you cannot buy it. In campaign mode I don't think it will cause problems by not having it in Norway and Poland. Available equipment is sufficient for dealing with it. Thanks for pointing out on this!
deadtorius wrote:When in campaign mode your units do no auto repair back to full strength between battles, that came as a real surprise during deployment. Not sure if that is intentional but was not what I had expected, but you can repair them before they deploy.
Now you need to pay replacements between scenarios. You can replace or overstrength before deployment as well as upgrade of course.
deadtorius wrote:Sounds: I get the foot marching and shooting stuka scream (nice surprise on that one) but my trucks, and half tracks have no sound at all. Planes don't make any noise when they move and I think it is the PZ 1 that occasionally sounds like its marching when it moves. Guess the crew is pushing it along the road. Naval units are also without sound for movement. Falling bombs from the level bombers would be a nice touch. Perhaps you dont have all the sound files in place yet but just wanted to point it out in case.
There was a migration how sounds are going to work internally that caused some mixed and missing sounds. It will be fixed.
deadtorius wrote:Are there auxilliary units in the game still? I go into the campaigns and everything looks the same, so not sure if those nice extra planes and paras are permanent or just a one game deal like they were originally.
Auxiliaries are in the game. Difference can be seen on unit strength plates. Cores have golden border, auxiliaries silver border around strength plate.
deadtorius wrote:Units: I have to say its nice to see that the paras are now strong enough to get dropped on their own and they can stand up for a while without needing help from the rest of the army right away or they die. I used to be a bit hesitant to let them attack in PG as they would usually end up losing the fight and lose too much strength as well. So far they have worked out well to drop behind cities and take on the arty that is waiting for you.
I also think paras are much more useful now. Their disadvantage is to run out of ammo faster than ordinary infantry.
deadtorius wrote:Another thing, level bombers on an objective city used to cost the allies prestige points as well as lower the entrenchment value. It used to have a message that would say something like bombing paris, allies lose 25 prestige. No indication if this is still in the game or not, although the JU88 is great for killing the Royal Navy ships in Norway
Those messages are not in the game for now but if you hit "L" key you should get detailed combat log.
deadtorius
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Post by deadtorius »

thanks for the response, finally almost won Norway but the game froze up after I took the last city, so cant say it counts for sure... allied plot
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Post by Striker »

Initial Impressions:

The opening splash screens are will done clean,crisp,quick.
Title screen is easy to navigate, the music is very panoramic nice intro theme.
(I listened to it for a couple of min.)

Button Clicks Main Screen:

Exit - Quick and clean not lagging at all.

Library – One click right to it, not much in it (pretty sure that's gonna change)
upon exit from the screen right back to the main screen you may want to put a back button rather then a close window x in the upper right hand corner.

Dossier – Coming soon.

Load Game – opens a Windows box to in computers “DOCUMENTS” folder looking for
*.pzsav files. None there haven’t saved any games yet. No special “Panzer Corps” save game screen at this moment.

Multiplayer – Quick to Login / Password screen the get online to waiting room fast.
Logs out quickly also.

New Game – fast transition nicely tabbed screen for Campaigns and Scenarios.


So far so awesome. Now I get to play. :D
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