Inferno: A Red Army Campaign - full release v 0.85

[bebro]

So it's here, the first full release of Inferno, my Red Army campaign. Single-Player, compatible with PzC 1.22, tested in Colonel and General levels. I also had no prob to continue 1.20 saves of that mod under 1.21/22.

Download: http://www.mediafire.com/download/idnf3 ... 5_full.zip (ca. 70 MB)

PDF Install Guide: http://www.mediafire.com/view/3czmxyz2z ... lguide.pdf


Installation is the same as with the beta, I'll add a more detailed guide tommorrow, so this is more for those who can't wait and are familiar with the procedure already

Key features:

Over 25 scenarios, based on historical battles between (mostly) the Soviet Union and Germany 1941-45, tho it's certainly not meant to be a 100% accurate simulation of everything -IMO not what PzC is made for.

Two different starting points - either Siberia 1938 with early battles vs. Japan or USSR, southern sector 1941 facing the German onslaught during Op. Barbarossa. Both paths converge into one after Moscow. Starting in Siberia means you skip summer 1941 battles vs. Germany and join the Great Patriotic War when your units are transferred from Siberia to defend Moscow. This path is an easier alternative compared to the first scenarios vs. Germany 1941. Those 41er scns before Moscow are not designed for DVs - they're not strictly impossible, but it might be better to settle for MVs in certain cases.

Scenarios are often bigger compared to vanilla, and need more time to play. Combat can be sluggish and often harsh, esp. in bad terrain and all-winter scns - you have been warned. That being said, it's easy to overdo things as creator, so it's all up to debate.

The battles are mostly classic warfare, no commando-style scns or guard/hunt supply etc. - I saw many like those in the DLCs, but it's not so my cup of tea. Several scns have changing objectives mid-scn though.

I make use of vanilla units plus many custom additions by me and several contributors - please see detailed credits in the OP. I left Soviet units in standard green, only "Elite" land units and airplanes got camo. For Germany I use vanilla grey for the first part of the war, but from 1942 you see more and more camo paint in use. This was done by DCS mostly, I just used the patterns I like most personally.

Units change to winter camo automatically in all-winter scns, using a modded theatre setting.

There are a couple of stat changes too, please see unit panels. Some unit ablities have been enhanced, for example by adding ground switches to several types of Soviet and German light AA.

Very rare or already outdated units still in use are usually set to "nonpurchase", or show up as free gifts in certain scns. A couple of captured units are in too.

Lots of info is in available the in-game library - cam path, rules changes etc.

Enjoy!

...or share what you don't like and think should be changed.

Credits and Thanks:

The work of other modders proved to be an immense help when creating this mod. I wish to thank all of them hereby!

One of the most obvious changes is the use of Massi's great terrain tiles for this mod.

For Inferno I use many custom units from other creators, en detail certain types from kerloc's "Support for Mother Russia" unit pack, from guille's PzC support base, some of Anfield's German '43 infantry, several Romanian units provided by Dragos and many Hungarian plus other units from McGuba's Hungarian Campaign. In some cases I modified those units further, I hope that's not against the intention of the original creators.

Furthermore many of the orginal PzC units have been reskinned with camo patterns separately for summer and winter using rezaf's DCS tool. The Kharkov map converted from the original Panzer General game is taken from his PG mod too. The map for Uman is modified from McGuba's map taken from his Hungarian mod. I also want to thank nikivdd for providing all material orginally intended for his Red Fury mod, for examples maps I used for the battles of Lake Khasan and Khalkyn Gol .

Thanks also go to everyone else who helped me - I hope I have forgotten noone.

[nikivdd]

Looks great. Love the Mod name too. I'm very curious with which scenarios you'll come up with.

[guille1434]

The icons looks great, as is usual with Bebro's work... Thanks for sharing the idea and happy modding!

By the way... are the icons for the four Maxim AA MG mounted on truck and the SP arty on truck also available for downloading somewhere?
Thanks again!!

[airbornemongo101]

Damn...I guess I'm gonna have to learn the InterNationalle and learn to speak fluent commie


Just kiddin'....thanks and please keep up the great work

[Razz1]

That's a rocket in the truck and the other unit is an 85mm AA.

If you are looking for Russian units. Down load the AT and AA Mod. For those requested.

[bebro]

Thank you guys.

It's indeed a quad maxim GAZ truck in the winter pic, guille, the other is a Su 1-12 SP gun.

Right now they're not online anywhere. They will be made available when the mod is out, though if someone needs them immdiately I'd have no problem giving them out earlier...they still need the big UI pics though.

[McGuba]

So I wish you good luck again.

they still need the big UI pics though.

Maybe you should consider using b&w photos for bigunit pictures. In this way you could save a lot of time. A full set is available for the vanilla icons, you only need to add the ones for the new units. Also, in this way you would not need to create new bigunit icons for the DCS camouflaged late war german units. All you need is a photo with acceptble quailty. However, if you can, just make them in vanilla style 3D, I really liked the ones in the IJA campaign.

Questions:
Are you planning to add nation specific hero pictures this time? It seems that most people like it and it would be a big plus together with the awards: Hero of the Soviet Union award would be terrific, I guess. Not to mention the Order of Lenin. (I wish I had one )

Are you planning to add Romanian units as well? (I could hardly imagine a proper Stalingrad or Crimean peninsula scenario without them...) If so I happen to work on them at the moment, but again, only with b&w bigunit icons, so they may not be suitable for you.


P.S.:
The Motherland Calls You!

[guille1434]

Bebro: Thanks for your answer... No problem, I can wait till the mod is out to add those marvellous icons to my collection...
I don't care much about UI Big Pictures, as they are seldom viewed by me when I play this game... As McGuba says, some good pictures of the subjects can be used instead of 3D graphics.

By the way, McGuba suggestions are good ones, as I see them!

Thanks again, Bebro!

[bebro]

I have not decided yet about the big UI pics, but using b/w photos is definately worth considering.

Yep, there will be "real" hero pics and customized awards.

Re Nico's scenario question, the Great Patriotic War will start for the player in the southern sector, at Dubno/Brody. The idea for this is taken from asuggestion in the Red Fury thread, and I thought it makes a good opener, being the largest tank battle before Kursk IIRC. Then it's Uman > Kiev > Moscow, and the first Rzhev-Vyazma counteroffensive in winter.

Then you move southwards again - Kharkov, and Stalingrad (covered in several scns, including Uranus and Winter Storm). Otherwise big battles like Kursk etc will be in of course, but I need to think about some in between...some areas will probably "visited" multiple times (Kharkov, Kiev)...

Minor axis forces will play a role when it fits historically, Hungarians at Uman (thx to McGuba) , Romanians at Stalingrad/Uranus etc.

[Razz1]

Your welcome to use my Big Unit color Mod.

Soon to be updated with more units.

[bebro]

Thanks for the offer, I'll definately take a look. Though which I finally use is a late decision, priority is to get some playable scenarios

Status right now is I have currently five playable scns. One of them is converted from McGuba's Hungarian Campaign (Uman now from the Soviet side with some changes of course), the rest made from scratch.

Below is a little preview how bonus units will look as opposed to their "normal" counterparts which still have the greenish vanilla look. There are some changes compared to vanilla, like the KV-2 having both a tank and arty swich. The one at the top is a KV-1S modified from the KV-85, since they had similar turrets, thought the former had still the short 76mm gun. I'll also include KV-8 flametanks (derived from the KV-1 as well), and some other goodies....

[nikivdd]

Very very nicely skinned. An extended database offers more choice and i am always in favor of that. Do you also intend to add some "capturable" stuff?

[bebro]

Yes, there's a bunch of German vehicles to capture

[nikivdd]

Yes, there's a bunch of German vehicles to capture

Splendid. Whenever i take a break, i know which mods to play.

[McGuba]

Minor axis forces will play a role when it fits historically, Hungarians at Uman (thx to McGuba) , Romanians at Stalingrad/Uranus etc.

One of them is converted from McGuba's Hungarian Campaign (Uman now from the Soviet side with some changes of course), the rest made from scratch.

I am very happy to hear it. Unfortunately, the role of the Minor Axis armies in ww2 is often downgraded or even completely neglected in most war games. Although it is not something that we are particularily proud of today, it is still part of our history, and as such it should not be forgotten. On the oher hand, overrating their impact on the outcome of the war be a would be a huge mistake as well, but putting them in the right historical context, as you wrote, "when it fits", is absolutely right, in my view.

I also like your general concept, I think I would do it in a similar way:

The first scns will be quite harsh, DVs there will be rather impossible to achieve, MVs mean you avoided total destruction - not that you won the overall battle.

so I suppose, we should expect huge losses in the first scenarios, as historically, but I wonder if the AI is able to defeat a numerically superior player controlled army also having a few really good tanks like the KV-2 or early T-34. I guess you need to buff the attacking Germans seriously: overstrenght, experience, maybe even heroes added to them to achieve that goal.

And there is also a trap here: some players might lose their motivation after losing several scenarios in a line, I remember in the IJA campaign the second scenario was impossible to win, and me and the other tester started to wonder if it would be as hard as this from now on, or just did WE do something wrong?
So, you might need to motivate the player in the briefings to keep carry on regardless of the losses and fiascos, only the ultimate defense of the Motherland counts, ect etc. (Well, as we know, historically, those early war Soviet Marshals were not so lucky, many of them were executed or sent to the gulag for losing a battle or for simply withdrawing...)

[guille1434]

I like very much the idea of a "switchable" KV-2!
By the way, those soviet tanks have very nice skins!

[ThvN]

The one at the top is a KV-1S modified from the KV-85, since they had similar turrets, thought the former had still the short 76mm gun.

Sorry for my Mr. Knowitall response , but the turrets were not really that similar, I'm afraid... Actually the turrets were so different that they could not be exchanged between the two models, and the hulls were a bit different as well.

The KV-85 mounted a bigger turret that was designed for the JS-1 (the game has this correct), but that turret was in fact too big to fit on the original KV-1S turret ring. So they enlarged the turret ring, and welded two 'fillets' around the ring at the spots were it extended over the hull. These are those bulges ('Beule' auf Deutsch denke ich?) in the hull sides under the middle of the turret you can see in the icon.

The KV-1S did not have these pieces, the hull was straight. And its turret was unique for this vehicle and quite a bit smaller, a bit more like a T-34 turret. Still, very nice icons, and a convertable KV-2 is a cool addition. But should you ever get some kind of perfectionist urge about it, here are some photos to help explain the difference. For the rest, just ignore my ramblings, and please continue making your excellent mods .

KV-1S. Straight hull sides, turret is relatively compact.







KV-85. Notice the bulge ('Beule') underneath the middle of the turret where the tow cable is lying against, these are the fillets to make the wider turret fit.


Bulge:

[bebro]

Thanks for the explanation, didn't know about those details. I just looked at some pics and noticed they have both the more "rounded" look etc....oh well, but no drama. There's still more than enough time to work on this

Thx for the comments, everyone else

McGuba: yes, there are a lot of difficulties to make it challenging, but not too frustrating. I may consider to throw out the 1941 (incl. Moscow) scns as some early mini-beta to see if people find them too harsh or unfair. Right now I can get MVs in the first two there, but I find them quite tough even on colonel, and of course I know what to expect, an advantage other players will not have...

DVs are out of reach mostly in the first three scns, partly because of axis strength, partly also because they have absurd requirements to replicate some of the overambitious goals the Soviets had in their first ops.

[guille1434]

Hello!
As always, ThvN enlightens us with a masterclass in research and exposition of facts... Very nice post!
As I read that information, I looked for and found a nearly perfect little image of a KV-8S flamethrower tank. This was a variant of the KV-1S (using the smaller, less squared turret on the hull with the narrower turret ring, without the bulges) wich mounted a gun, a flamethrower and a machine gun in its turret. To make room for the new flame weapon, the 76 mm cannon was replaced by a 45 mm gun M1932, but externally, the designers left the 76mm tube (the 45mm gun barrel was inside it) to disguise the true nature of this variant armament. The same icon can be used for the KV-1S and KV-8S tanks, as externally, they looked the same.

Well, I used that little image to make an icon for PzCorps, and I think it is rather "stock game" looking to deserve being added to any modding work (If any of the modders like it, of course!). As a bonus I modified the "vanilla" KV-1 icon into a KV-1 Model 1939 tank. This was the first model produced of this tank, and was used in the Winter War against Finland. The main difference with later model 1940 was its shorter 76.2 mm L-11 Gun (32 calibres long barrel), which had the recuperator above its barrel, so the gun looked mounted lower in the turret front.

As I said, I hope you like those icons, and as always they are given to anyone here to make any use of them, as they see fit.
Cheers!

[bebro]

Very nice work on those! I'd gladly use them in this campaign, of course crediting you properly

I also put a KV1/39 in the roster, but used the standard icon so far. The new icon will be a nice replacement