Replace generic weapons with historical ones?

[wodin]

I'd have liked to have seen historical weapons used with their own unique stats\modifiers.

For instance things like AK47 etc, seems to apply to Infantry weapons from HMG downwards even like grenades to done aswell.Was surprised actually it was very generic esp for a wargame at this scale. Seems to be the case with most tactical wargames in that it's either the armour Is more generic than the infantry modelling or the Infantry are the ones with less love than the armour (take stepped Inf units at squad or platoon level, that was done cos of boardgame restrictions).

Is this something to hat can be done through modding?

[CCIP-subsim]

Honestly, it's mostly a matter of renaming things like "Ball" to "7.62x39mm FMJ" or something like that - most of the distinctions are already there.

You could of course play around with numbers and individualize things to a really fine level of detail (i.e. if there's a 10-meter difference in effective range in real life, put that in game) - but I'd actually argue that you have to be careful about that, because it might result in unbalanced, unrealistic or exploitable AI behaviour which fails to understand those differences. I'm actually quite happy with assault rifles being relatively generic, because it lets me focus on more general principles of using infantry.

That said - for optics (i.e. things being named in a way that's more detailed) and maybe some fundamental national differences... it's actually pretty easy!

[noooooo]

I think this is entirely possible, it would just take a lot of effort renaming and changing each unit to match the weapons they use. I may do this sometime in the future depending on whether it's worth the effort.

[CCIP-subsim]

It's actually not too much work! Just for an experiment, I went through and changed some of mine like this:

To be on the safe side, I'm gonna test this out before I try to put it up - but it's honestly something that would take an hour at most for anyone with the DB editor [:)]

[noooooo]

ORIGINAL: CCIP-subsim

It's actually not too much work! Just for an experiment, I went through and changed some of mine like this:

To be on the safe side, I'm gonna test this out before I try to put it up - but it's honestly something that would take an hour at most for anyone with the DB editor [:)]

If you only replace ammunition I guess it's not much work. If you want to replace all units with their proper weapons, like AKM for Soviet Union, AK74 for SU after 1974, M16 for US etc. it would take quite a lot of effort.

[wodin]

I think effort worth while however also think they should have same firing (ie accuracy, power etc) and reliability aspects as the historical weapon had. This would add another level of realism, esp with regards to small arms.

[nikolas93TS]

Evidence tend to show that in actual combat, and in hands of average grunt, accuracy and similar differences among various weapons of same category tend to be minimal in practical terms. Training is much more important aspect.

[CCIP-subsim]

ORIGINAL: nikolas93TS

Evidence tend to show that in actual combat, and in hands of average grunt, accuracy and similar differences among various weapons of same category tend to be minimal in practical terms. Training is much more important aspect.

Yeah, that's what I was getting at. And well, if you look at how military doctrine documents consider this - they're not concerned with the differences in individual weapons in the same categories. A rifle is a rifle, an LMG is an LMG. Operationally, I don't think I've ever seen anyone suggest that there's much between them across nations - and in the Cold War, both sides watched each other carefully and went pretty much toe to toe with things like engagement ranges that their troops drilled for with the same weapons categories. It's only when you bump into really distinct categories of weapons that the difference matters, and even there, otherwise it's often more doctrine than anything. And well, even there, there's often not enough detail in AB to model some of the nuances (e.g. consider the Soviet preference for having infantry fight at closer ranges, mainly with automatic fire - even though they still could and did also engage at longer ranges with short burst or semi-auto fire. Unfortunately AB doesn't really go to the fine-grain level of having selective-fire weapons used differently at different ranges). On the end, I don't think either side had actually considered there to be a meaningful material difference in capability - both had weapons that could fight about at equivalent ranges, theoretically. The real difference was training priorities and resulting troop quality in specific respects.


Anyway! I pretty much did it in my own Chechnya DB already, but I'll be happy to do it for a modified standard DB. What should I use for this, just the stock DB or perhaps one of the modded versions with snipers etc?

One caveat I've found is that you have to keep ammunition names pretty short, or they mess up the ammo readout in the unit info box. So I think something like "5.45x39mm AK" or "5.56x45mm AR", or even just "5.45mm AK", instead of "Ball" for typical rifle rounds us about as much as can reasonably fit into the info box.

I've been playing around with it and I prefer it a LOT to the default system, because now I can actually tell from the game message box who is shooting what with what! "Ball" or "HEAT" told me virtually nothing, whereas even an abbreviated caliber helps you figure out what worked.

[Rosseau]

A big reason I bought this game. That and it's not turn-based.

Because, the turn-based Squad Battles system can do quite a bit despite its age. Just took Tour of Duty up to the early '80s, and it's been fun. The scenarios that came with the game were historical but not a lot of variety. The database editor is not as powerful as AB though, and the map generator, dynamic AI, etc., is light-years ahead. And of course, there is no combat message box!

[CCIP-subsim]

So, here is what I've made (see attachment for files) with ammunition types:



Personally, I definitely prefer it that way - the main difference for me here is that it shows up in the event log when a friendly unit destroys something, and that makes for useful info.

For comparison, here is the "before", with the game's default ammo names...


...and here is "after", with the added munition info:


I've tried to keep it as minimal as possible, so for the bulk of things I've simply added caliber (which already gives you enough feedback on what the weapon was in most cases). In others, I've added identifying information such as the weapon type, or a note in brackets in the end for special cases.

1) For specific weapon types:
(m) - mortar
(g) - grenade
(r) - recoilless rifle

2) For SAMs - guidance method:
(O) - optical
(IR) - infra-red
(R) - radar
more than one for some systems, such as (O/IR)

3) For ATGMs - missile command link:
(W) - wire
(C) - radio command
(I) - infra-red
(L) - laser

-----

In every other respect, the included DB is just the default one. I did not change any of the weapon names, just the ammunition.
If you want to use it or modify it or include it in any other mod, feel free! [:)]

[Rosseau]

Great idea and extremely useful, while making the game more immersive, imo. Wish there was an easy way to do the same for the released "Modern" database by Ariel. Still enjoyable to switch between the two anyway. We are fortunate to have them.

Was playing HPS Squad Battles with heavily modified database, and now realize how much I miss not receiving combat messages. I have no idea if a modded SA-2 or gunfire took my chopper down.

Anyway, thanks [:)]