AOredone updated

[adiekmann]

Alright, I have been playing this mod campaign for a week or so now and am at the final French map before Operation Sealion in 1940. I am ready to give some of my thoughts thus far. My core began in Spain and everything else has been default difficulty (except I had DvG on for '39).

I like and was sometimes surprised by the map changes. Generally, they make the scenarios a little more challenging in their subtle changes. I won't go beyond detailing this because I believe those changes were done deliberately for those very reasons so you (Grondel/Andrea) already know.

Before starting this campaign, I completed the PC1 Remake, so I was already familiar with the equipment file changes and hero system. As I said previously to Grondel on Discord, I do not agree with all of the Hero slotting (what's top tier and middle tier), but this and other nitpicking aside I like it for the most part.

My biggest objection here concerns the new limits set for the Awards. Some I don't have a problem with, like Soft Attack. In the standard AO game, those are the ones I usually reached the earliest. Some of this varies by type of unit, however. For example, my Stukas always seem to max out on +3 Hard Attack long before Soft Attack. Others I already always felt were challenging to reach in the standard AO game and now have been made nearly impossible in this remake. I am specifically referring to Support awards. My style of play depends a lot of maximizing my support units (AA, ART, and AT), and along with the limits to Camouflage (powerful Hero so no dispute there) it makes it nearly impossible to reach the max level (Double Support). Or so it would appear to me at this stage in 1940.

I have a long way to go so I understand that my view on this may change by AO1943/44, but that's how I feel at the present. I'll post further feedback when appropriate in the future.

[DefiantXYX]

My biggest objection here concerns the new limits set for the Awards. Some I don't have a problem with, like Soft Attack. In the standard AO game, those are the ones I usually reached the earliest. Some of this varies by type of unit, however. For example, my Stukas always seem to max out on +3 Hard Attack long before Soft Attack. Others I already always felt were challenging to reach in the standard AO game and now have been made nearly impossible in this remake. I am specifically referring to Support awards.

Indeed. I have got the 21cm gun since scenario 1 with the russian zero slot hero. Later i assigned camo hero and more range + ammo + double support. This gun is my most important unit vs the overpowered russsian art. units.
Its often supporting 6-7 times for several turns, it reached the max. award in late 1944. No other units is even close to this. And I have a 88 AA gun with camo hero, its supporting 4x as long as the AI got planes left. Far away from the highest reward. But thats not a problem, double support sucks anyway since its eating up your ammo.

-----------------------------

I finished (1945) the ahistorical part yesterday. The story is far better, makes more sense with the additional scenarios. Its not just acomic bomb ==> peace. Still, I would like to take moscow and win the war in the east. Peace makes no sense imo, after everything what happened.

I was sometimes switching between DvG on and off. I think I am somewhere in between, since the Ai units already got a lot of overstrength DvG sometimes feels overwhelming, without it sometimes feels boring again, since I can overrun everything.
Well, my playstyle seems to not fit the lategame. Especially with the new hero script when you always take the 5k guys you got a high ammount of game breaking heroes. I combined for example a Panther II with some heroes (dont know the english names but AI will always surrender and not fire back, double attack) and I can just take out 2x 23HP IS-3. You get like 2-3k prestige for that, so thats no longer a problem. Then there is my 20HP Maus, 15 HP Jadgpanther and Jagdtiger with 2x attack and they can also overrun everything. I noticed anti tanks can overrun like tanks without any heroes, is this intended?
But well, thats my problem or a problem of the game mechanics.

Imo especially the new maps need some love, something unique. I cant really remember any of the maps because its always left to right / bottom to top and kill everything. You are always facing the same kind of enemy. Any city is defended the same way. I might be a bit unfair to compair these maps to the vanilla ones like Battle of Ploesti where a whole team was involved.
I think some events would be nice, especially to make the long maps (>30 turns) more exciting. But I have no good ideas, other then give you even more heroes and equipment that you dont need
Well, maybe some elite objectives again when you can collect some tokens. I noticed there are some bonus objectives but afair they have no effect on the game.

Like I already said before, AOredone is definately worse for another playthrough. Cant really say if its better or worse than the vanilla version. I think a combination of the versions could be the best way to go, like first half of vanilla 1943, second half of AOredone or something like that
So thanks again for all the work you guys put in this mod.

I will start these days to with 1943 histrocial.

[Grondel]

I noticed anti tanks can overrun like tanks without any heroes, is this intended?

Tank-like AT-guns(closed top) have overrun, yes.

sers,
Thomas

[Andrea69]

I finished (1945) the ahistorical part yesterday. The story is far better, makes more sense with the additional scenarios. Its not just acomic bomb ==> peace. Still, I would like to take moscow and win the war in the east. Peace makes no sense imo, after everything what happened.

I was sometimes switching between DvG on and off. I think I am somewhere in between, since the Ai units already got a lot of overstrength DvG sometimes feels overwhelming, without it sometimes feels boring again, since I can overrun everything.
Well, my playstyle seems to not fit the lategame. Especially with the new hero script when you always take the 5k guys you got a high ammount of game breaking heroes. I combined for example a Panther II with some heroes (dont know the english names but AI will always surrender and not fire back, double attack) and I can just take out 2x 23HP IS-3. You get like 2-3k prestige for that, so thats no longer a problem. Then there is my 20HP Maus, 15 HP Jadgpanther and Jagdtiger with 2x attack and they can also overrun everything. I noticed anti tanks can overrun like tanks without any heroes, is this intended?
But well, thats my problem or a problem of the game mechanics.

Imo especially the new maps need some love, something unique. I cant really remember any of the maps because its always left to right / bottom to top and kill everything. You are always facing the same kind of enemy. Any city is defended the same way. I might be a bit unfair to compair these maps to the vanilla ones like Battle of Ploesti where a whole team was involved.
I think some events would be nice, especially to make the long maps (>30 turns) more exciting. But I have no good ideas, other then give you even more heroes and equipment that you dont need
Well, maybe some elite objectives again when you can collect some tokens. I noticed there are some bonus objectives but afair they have no effect on the game.

Like I already said before, AOredone is definately worse for another playthrough. Cant really say if its better or worse than the vanilla version. I think a combination of the versions could be the best way to go, like first half of vanilla 1943, second half of AOredone or something like that
So thanks again for all the work you guys put in this mod.

I will start these days to with 1943 histrocial.

Hello, thanks again for your feedback. Well, the new maps surely can be improved in terms of gameplay, no doubt about this but also not easy to do in late war scenarios, I'll see what can I do.
Anyway, imho the very key here is that in Panzer Corps 2 you do absolutely need some kind of personal house rules to really enjoy the game, in other words it is up to the player forging the core he likes in terms of challenge/performance/fun especially in the late game, like avoiding the lethal heroes combo for instant surrender or any other too overpowered combos. Afaik I don't use overstrength and I already consider it a good starting point, for example. Sure as a developer I could add a no surrender hero to all enemy armored vehicles, but what would be the point of all this? It is up to the expert player to understand what is most useful and fun to do with what the game makes available to him according to his own vision. Do you want to overrun everything? The game more or less lets you do that, if you find it fun. Want a more complex challenge? You can easily obtain it by limiting the benefits that the game offers you. Ultimately this is a field where the scenario designer can do little.

[DefiantXYX]

Anyway, imho the very key here is that in Panzer Corps 2 you do absolutely need some kind of personal house rules to really enjoy the game, in other words it is up to the player forging the core he likes in terms of challenge/performance/fun especially in the late game, like avoiding the lethal heroes combo for instant surrender or any other too overpowered combos. Afaik I don't use overstrength and I already consider it a good starting point, for example.

I do not agree here because its only a lategame problem on a lot of maps. Map design makes it possible to counter it, a combination of turn limit, geography and very strong AI units (elite objectives). There are some really good maps in 1944 and 1945, not a single one in 1946 afair
I know there are a lot of players with really strange house roules but that does not work for me. Its like playing Fifa on easy but your house rules are no penalty for you and you are only shooting from distance. If you cant use basic features of the game something is wrong. Overstrength for example is such a nice feature, I would even call it a key feature. Same goes for heroes, game would be very boring without them. The hero script is a good approach but its need some finetuning.
AI rework would also be very nice. I just sucks that the AI is only thinkging prestigewise and does waste all the airforce just to kill one of my units.

It know its a hell of work and definatly not your job to fix some basis mechanics in the lategame. I was hoping for some kind of official "balance patch" after everyone should have noticed that 1946 was boring crap. Meanwhile I am only hoping for more sliders. Like I said, DvG was too much, with a slider you can set it the way you need it.

[Andrea69]

I do not agree here because its only a lategame problem on a lot of maps. Map design makes it possible to counter it, a combination of turn limit, geography and very strong AI units (elite objectives). There are some really good maps in 1944 and 1945, not a single one in 1946 afair

Well, don't worry the 1946 maps are coming

I know there are a lot of players with really strange house roules but that does not work for me. Its like playing Fifa on easy but your house rules are no penalty for you and you are only shooting from distance. If you cant use basic features of the game something is wrong. Overstrength for example is such a nice feature, I would even call it a key feature. Same goes for heroes, game would be very boring without them. The hero script is a good approach but its need some finetuning.
AI rework would also be very nice. I just sucks that the AI is only thinkging prestigewise and does waste all the airforce just to kill one of my units.

[/quote]

I can agree on this, but if you are looking for some more challenge please avoid the instant surrender hero combos

[DefiantXYX]

I can agree on this, but if you are looking for some more challenge please avoid the instant surrender hero combos

I had to, otherwise it would have been just too much. Like I said, i cant protect everything. If my AA gun is out of ammo the 5. bomber will hurt a unit, followed by artillerie and super strong tanks. Its not possible to defend this for a long time. Especially on some maps, where you cant cover everthing with your fighter because the distances are too far.

And if I dont use these heroes I have to recycle 5k heroes all the time. There is not much diversity

You havent touched the historical part at all? I was about to play it when i realised there are no changes

[Andrea69]

I can agree on this, but if you are looking for some more challenge please avoid the instant surrender hero combos

You havent touched the historical part at all? I was about to play it when i realised there are no changes

Unfortunately I have not touched it, only added the hero script. I'm also taking all the time I need for AO46, where I've completely redone many maps and added new scenarios, so considering that playtesting is obviously needed as well, it will be ready no earlier than the beginning of September, if everything goes according to plan. Well, at this point you just have to play AO39 and AO40 to see the changes that have been made, the maps linked to Sealion have changed a lot for example

[88Flak]

I disagree a bit in the fact that I like the new maps and encourage you to keep moving in the same direction. It’s tough to keep a game fresh after playing it so many times, but the work you devs are doing has been wonderful.

I would vote to not make the game ridiculously difficult because players are using overpowered corps. I don’t think it would ever work anyway. I wish the game handled difficulty differently. Adding more and tougher units instead of prestige and hit %.

[88Flak]

A little more feedback after my progress.

1942 - again the expanded maps are a nice improvement. I like adding Sevastopol. Kharkov’s bigger and better. I thought the Soviet’s were more aggressive especially moving south of the city. Voroshilovgrad was challenging as promised and I was hard pressed to keep the Soviets on their side of the Oskol River while still trying to move south. Grozny was similar to vanilla, but seemed tougher. The Soviets seemed a little too timid in attacking the Romanians in the Assault on Stalingrad. I moved out two battle groups to confront them and had some strong armor battles - maybe that slowed them down as they never took the rail station even though I didn’t approach it until very late.

1943 - Backhand blow was definitely better. The 3 Tank Corps didn’t stand and fight until destroyed. They withdrew after getting mauled and I had to hunt them down. I was skeptical of combining Yakovlevo and Oboyan but your version was good - I think I had to breach 5 defense lines. There is still something a bit off about Prokhorovka - I think the map could use a few more hexes north to south and the 5th Guards seems to arrive piecemeal and never seriously threatens to defeat me just as in vanilla. The ferocity of the attack from the east surprised me in Roland. I had to pause my move north until after they were sufficiently dealt with. After that the Soviets dug in and defended. I was expecting another counterattack as I approached Kursk. Thank you for adding the Manych breakout. The advance was really constricted until I could cross the river and it took me quite a while, but after that they were tough on defense and didn’t really threaten my advance.

Overall a big improvement in game play and immensely enjoyable.

Can’t wait for 1944 - that’s where vanilla really fell off for me.

[Andrea69]

A little more feedback after my progress.

1942 - again the expanded maps are a nice improvement. I like adding Sevastopol. Kharkov’s bigger and better. I thought the Soviet’s were more aggressive especially moving south of the city. Voroshilovgrad was challenging as promised and I was hard pressed to keep the Soviets on their side of the Oskol River while still trying to move south. Grozny was similar to vanilla, but seemed tougher. The Soviets seemed a little too timid in attacking the Romanians in the Assault on Stalingrad. I moved out two battle groups to confront them and had some strong armor battles - maybe that slowed them down as they never took the rail station even though I didn’t approach it until very late.

1943 - Backhand blow was definitely better. The 3 Tank Corps didn’t stand and fight until destroyed. They withdrew after getting mauled and I had to hunt them down. I was skeptical of combining Yakovlevo and Oboyan but your version was good - I think I had to breach 5 defense lines. There is still something a bit off about Prokhorovka - I think the map could use a few more hexes north to south and the 5th Guards seems to arrive piecemeal and never seriously threatens to defeat me just as in vanilla. The ferocity of the attack from the east surprised me in Roland. I had to pause my move north until after they were sufficiently dealt with. After that the Soviets dug in and defended. I was expecting another counterattack as I approached Kursk. Thank you for adding the Manych breakout. The advance was really constricted until I could cross the river and it took me quite a while, but after that they were tough on defense and didn’t really threaten my advance.

Overall a big improvement in game play and immensely enjoyable.

Can’t wait for 1944 - that’s where vanilla really fell off for me.

Hello, thanks for your kind words. You are right about Prokhorovka, I have not touched it a lot at gameplay level as it is more or less a scripted scenario, but something more has to be made. Currently, in the Kursk mini “campaign”, I am completely satisfied only with the Roland scenario, expect some more changes for the other ones.

[88Flak]

I’m still playing my way through 1945, but these last two years are incredible. AO 1944 was always my least favorite and AO 45 starts out well, but I didn’t like the ending of the war in the east at all.

Thank you for reducing the time spent messing around in Persia - 1 good battle is all that was needed and then back to the Soviet threat. Feel free to replace the Hungarian and Romanian coup battles - I get that they are supposed to be a change of pace from lining up against the Soviets and slugging it out every scenario, but it always drove me crazy to be sending your best units to deal with them while the Soviets were trashing army groups center and north.

The large scale battles are epic and it takes a lot longer to get through them. I appreciate that you made the Soviets much stronger without adding a ton of defensive minded heros. This way, they’re really tough without being almost unmovable for players who don’t play with super corps.

1945 gets a little nuts as every Soviet tank formation seems to include T-44’s, IS-3’s, SU-100’s and T-34/85’s being supported by waves of air units.

I’m having a tough time coming up with any suggestions. Maybe since the Soviets historically used large infantry and artillery formations, the game might have sacrificed some of those to add heavy tank formations? I don’t want to suggest it if it messes up the balance.

I can’t wait to replay the entire series.

[DefiantXYX]

The large scale battles are epic and it takes a lot longer to get through them.

Dont you get bored of it? I mean can you name 3 battles of 1944/1945 and describe what make these map so special?
I guess thats the reason the DEVs made these rumanian/hungary/persia maps, so that you dont have to fight russian armies from left to right 10x in a DLC.
Especially in the AOredone version I cant believe that the russians still have tanks and units left and get even stronger in each maps, after I am killing large armies all the time, over and over again.

Thats the problem in 1946: After a good start, its always the same over and over again.

[Grondel]

Dont you get bored of it?...Especially in the AOredone version I cant believe that the russians still have tanks and units left and get even stronger in each maps, after I am killing large armies all the time, over and over again.

While doing 1943NH of the PC1 remake i had the same bias. "This can´t be realistic, thats too much russians." Then i took a look at the real numbers and found that i had to double/tripple the russian forces to even get near realistic.
It´s mindbending how much man and equip they threw at germany in that time.

But i agree. It takes a lot to make that part of the war at least interesting in some way. PC2 does not have any decend mechanics to create retreating battles atm. In the Finnish part at the end of 1939 in the PC1 remake i tried some things i came up with.
Feel free to give feedback on those attempts and if u have any ideas, let us know.

sers,
Thomas

[DefiantXYX]

While doing 1943NH of the PC1 remake i had the same bias. "This can´t be realistic, thats too much russians." Then i took a look at the real numbers and found that i had to double/tripple the russian forces to even get near realistic.
It´s mindbending how much man and equip they threw at germany in that time.

How do you compare core size with real number?
In the first panzergeneral your core was like a whole army group.
In this game its more like you are small part of an army group. So its hard to say if you really kill 10 tanks with killing a tank with 10 hp or is it just one?
So its more like a feeling for me, you get after several maps. Maybe its also a problem if only face high end stuff, like IS2/IS3.
But thats is once again a problem of the game. You always need high end stuff in the lategame.

Feel free to give feedback on those attempts and if u have any ideas, let us know.

Well, like I said before i prefer some maps with encirclements. I agree the mechanics are not perfect and it brings up some variety.
In Stalingrad 1943 there is the manstein line. This could be an element to trigger the enemies more often.
If its possible to work with turn limits, maybe something like "take out this units/these cities within X turns, otherwise reenforcements will spawn".

[Andrea69]

Hello, honestly we are talking about problems that have always characterized this type of game since the glorious Panzer General. Basically the main scenario/campaign model is just this: leading your troops from point A to point B, defeating enemies, that's all. Some variations are possible, but these are, in fact, variations that function just as an interlude to the main campaign development model. It is a simple and quite fun model which just for this reason has been able to satisfy a large audience of users.
That said, the only serious alternative campaign model that has really convinced me in all these years of Panzer General/Panzer Corps is that of a mod of Panzer Corps I: Battlefield Europe, a gigantic, unique scenario that manages to combine historical accuracy with player enjoyment. But it's probably not replicable in this system due to the size required for the map, maybe it will be in PC3.

[adiekmann]

The only way to model realistic or challenging scenarios where you the player are on the defensive is to greatly restrict the number of units that you can deploy. With this in mind, the scenario designer then can create the AI attacking force with a more realistic (i.e. not all S Tier equipment or other overpowering elements) as well. There are of course problems with this approach that cannot be remedied entirely. For instance, the player can circumnavigate the deployment issue if they have an abundance of slot reducing heroes. Otherwise, if the player wishes to deploy an 20 str Tiger tank with 4 powerful heroes, he won't be able to deploy enough units to properly defend the entire map. So you are forced into tough decisions like "Do I reduce my slots by fielding tanks that are not all Panthers and Tigers?" for instance. Same would hold true for other classes of equipment as well. But the problem usually as it stands is then the AI is overpowered and you have no chance to win...unless the designer, well knowing that they have handicapped the player, can set the scenario up by adjusting the AI's units and resources accordingly too.

Perhaps my favorite mod for Panzer General 2 twenty+ years ago was a DAK campaign. The designer made the campaign with this philosophy in mind: He set "rules" that governed how many and what type of units of each class you could have to follow a historical deployment for the time period, or as best as the game unit models allow. However, there were no in-game mechanics to force the player into a limited, more realistic core. So in his notes he warned the player that if you build your "Dream Team" of all best units, the campaign will be a cake walk. I did follow his house rules and it was a very enjoyable, historically realistic campaign. I remember one line in particular from his notes that stated that "The Wehrmacht produced a great variety of different types of equipment, and not all of it was of superior quality compared to its enemies. You core needs to reflect this reality." It really did capture the issues that Rommel was dealing with. It kind of anticipated to a more realistic level Limited Stock and Collector.

But this is a different game than Panzer General 2 and as such there exists challenges to do this. I think the Hero management system in the AO and PC1 GC remakes take a step in the right direction, but more needs to be done. Some of this is the fault of a dumb AI when on the offensive, but I believe there are many out there who wish that there was a way to make good defensive scenarios that required you to retreat or make a fighting withdrawal.

Perhaps all of this will only be possible with an entirely new game engine and AI with a reworked design from the ground up. But I bet if you were able to integrate one of these super smart learning AIs that beat the best chess players and chess programs in the world, they could quickly humble all of us.

[DefiantXYX]

Imo a solution to a lot of problems is the limited stock option, but it needs some finetuning.
When you get Tiger tanks for the first time you only get some protypes. But of course the tank rules vs everything the russians have. But if you do 1-2 mistakes you run out of tanks and have to go back to Panzer IV. That is something you need all the time. If you get 20x Panther D, 20x Panther A, 20x Tiger all the time you should not have a problems to field only the best tanks all the time. You cant just set the slider to 10 or 5, because you might run out of other basic stuff, like infantry.
We already had this discussion here several times, there should be a limited stock slider for different pools. The tanks I just mentioned could be "high end stuff" and you only get 20 each map. You can do some math and calculate how many of these types player can have in a campaign. If a player is running 1x tiger and 1x panther and the rest is panzer IV you can also set up the russians that way. Not only highend stuff, even older modells and cannon fodder.

So @ DEVS just give us some sliders for some categories
The campaign designers can give the player some tips how to set it up and the player can decide if he wants a good challenge, an easy playthrough or a nightmare

[Andrea69]

Imo a solution to a lot of problems is the limited stock option, but it needs some finetuning.
When you get Tiger tanks for the first time you only get some protypes. But of course the tank rules vs everything the russians have. But if you do 1-2 mistakes you run out of tanks and have to go back to Panzer IV. That is something you need all the time. If you get 20x Panther D, 20x Panther A, 20x Tiger all the time you should not have a problems to field only the best tanks all the time. You cant just set the slider to 10 or 5, because you might run out of other basic stuff, like infantry.
We already had this discussion here several times, there should be a limited stock slider for different pools. The tanks I just mentioned could be "high end stuff" and you only get 20 each map. You can do some math and calculate how many of these types player can have in a campaign. If a player is running 1x tiger and 1x panther and the rest is panzer IV you can also set up the russians that way. Not only highend stuff, even older modells and cannon fodder.

So @ DEVS just give us some sliders for some categories
The campaign designers can give the player some tips how to set it up and the player can decide if he wants a good challenge, an easy playthrough or a nightmare

Totally agree on this, although all in all I am quite skeptical that this feature will ever see the light

[Grondel]

Imo a solution to a lot of problems is the limited stock option, but it needs some finetuning.

Yes, i am currently doing this for the PC1 remake. All the campaign will exist as a Ltd. version where u have handcraftet Limited stock, Limited Elite replacements and Limited ammunition.
Currently the preludes and 1939 can be played in the Limited version. i am currently redoing the original 1940 into something more PC2ish, which will probs be ready end of the year. adding the Limited to 41-43 is just a matter of weeks after that.

sers,
Thomas