1939 World at War Experimental MOD

[Hubert Cater]

As indicated in another thread, I put together a shorter turn length experimental mod for those that would like to try 7 day turns as opposed to the current 14.

It can be downloaded from the following link:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/2u3b44tz8b0kg ... L.zip?dl=0

Once downloaded it needs to be decompressed and then pasted into your USER campaigns folder, typically found here:

C:\Users\<username>\Documents\My Games\Strategic Command WWII - World at War\Campaigns

This is a quick mod with the MPP collection halved per turn so that it works out the same as it would after a single turn in the default version of this campaign. As a result it does increase the importance of convoy income as that hasn't been adjusted (net income remains the same however) and the AI may feel accelerated as it was fine tuned to the 14 day turns. For example, in a quick test on my end the Axis AI conquered France by early March 1940.

Other than that we would appreciate any feedback on this turn length for those that were finding there were not enough turns in the default campaigns.

[ArmouredLion]

Pretty cool... didn't realize this game was this modded. New and newb green with a bunch to learn, I guess... I'll give it a go. Thanks.

[Hubert Cater]

Our pleasure and the Editor that ships with the game is quite powerful and the same one we use to design the campaigns for release. Quite a bit can be adjusted as desired including in this case the turn lengths as described above.

[pjg100]

Were unit action points halved?

[Hubert Cater]

No and only because half the action points would dramatically change the feel of the game, more western front WWI than WWII, and especially considering zones of control, terrain effects etc.

The other reason is that if players felt there wasn't enough time as is, then halving the action points would essentially leave things unchanged time wise if we are also halving the turn length.

However it is not to say that action points could not logically benefit from being lowered slightly due to the turn length change, but that is a bit tricky as any less AP doesn't seem to work that well at this scale. For example we had slightly reduced AP earlier in development and it just didn't feel right in game for a WWII game at this scale, less likely to blitz or encircle or sweeping movements or penatrations etc.

[pjg100]

That makes sense. How about research, is the research advancement halved? If not that would have a significant impact.

[Numdydar]

The build time of units would need to be adjusted as well wouldn't it?

[pjg100]

Don't see why - build time is based on number of months, not number of turns, as I understand it.

[Hubert Cater]

ORIGINAL: pjg100
That makes sense. How about research, is the research advancement halved? If not that would have a significant impact.

At the moment no and as mentioned this is a quick experiment with just a basic change in order to get a feel on what the game would play like with double the turns.

I've been running an AI vs AI test just to get an idea on my end as well and it does feel like research is proceeding along a bit too quickly. If this were a more formal change, we'd have to consider how to slow down research and diplomacy as you've figured.

I'd be curious to see how others find the pace with double the turns since from what I've seen in the AI vs AI test it looks to be too much so far. For example, France fell March 1940, Yugoslavia fell December 1940 and the USSR fell in February 1942. China is about to fall now in August 1942 as well.

[Hubert Cater]

ORIGINAL: pjg100

Don't see why - build time is based on number of months, not number of turns, as I understand it.

Correct

[pjg100]

I like the concept of weekly moves and keeping action points as is. The movement capabilities of the land units seems about right, since in reality each move cycle spans two weeks. Seems that research and diplo could be addressed pretty easily by changing the per-turn % increases and adjusting the bonus hits (breakthrough, diplo) accordingly.

The main problem is that there are twice as many combat opportunities and in the early game that significantly advantages the Axis. Perhaps the imbalance could be addressed in Russian and China by reducing supply, FREX by doubling the movement cost of each hex for supply purposes so it is more in line with the equivalent supply chain length in WIE. Not sure how to address the issue in France; perhaps trade out some French corps for armies and add one or two GAR to stick in the Maginot Line or the Alps.

[Numdydar]

As far as research goes, a simple house rule is that the max research you can have is 50% of the total. So the max research Japan/Germany could have is 1,000 versus what the game says.

Unfortunately, the AI is going to max things out so you would need to mod out the max research for all sides to keep things balances

[Numdydar]

Have not gotten very far playing this, but to me this makes a LOT of difference. So thanks Herbert for putting this together.

I did take it one step further and modded it so that the max research amount was halved for all countries that had research and eliminated research that was ongoing at the start to bring the starting research level to or below the new maximum. We will see how that helps things [:)]

I also really like the smaller amount of MMP. You really have to save up for research and Diplomacy and contrast that with replacements, new units, and upgrades. I think it adds an additional layer to the game.

So at least you made me happy lol.

[Schokolokos]

This Mod is just very bad and does not fit to the actual WaW map at all.

Turn length has to be at least 10 days or more. Due to the smaller map compared to War in Europe, its allso possible to advance more fast, I conquer Paris in November 1939 without problems with this Mod.
Winter feels endless.
Tech can built up way too fast, it does not fit with the game progress at all.

Either widen the European Theatre to the old WiE scale or a movement malus for 30%, but this will influence the whole game in a bad way.

Right now this 7 days for WaW is rubbish.

[Hubert Cater]

Thanks for the feedback everyone as it is helpful as we don't always know for sure if our design choices are as good as they can be. Granted our gut told us that the release turn length was about right, but sometimes having an alternative to compare to will paint a better picture.

Based on some of the early feedback on this mod, it sounds like the game is pretty close as is, my AI vs AI tests also indicate that 7 day turns are simply too many, or that if by going with 7 day turns it would require quite a bit of an overhaul or adjustments to make it work... which again has us lean towards keeping it as is as well.

But that being said, some may still enjoy the 7 day turn mod as Numdydar has found which is also definitely fair enough and another reason for us to keep this mod available for those to try. In the worst case it can be used as a foundation to make further refinements as desired as Numdydar has done as well.

[Numdydar]

ORIGINAL: Schokolokos

This Mod is just very bad and does not fit to the actual WaW map at all.

Turn length has to be at least 10 days or more. Due to the smaller map compared to War in Europe, its allso possible to advance more fast, I conquer Paris in November 1939 without problems with this Mod.
Winter feels endless.
Tech can built up way too fast, it does not fit with the game progress at all.

Either widen the European Theatre to the old WiE scale or a movement malus for 30%, but this will influence the whole game in a bad way.

Right now this 7 days for WaW is rubbish.

If you do not change the research like I did, then things get really messed up. That has made a huge difference in my game.

Reducing movement may also be needed. But so far this timescale seems to be a lot better to me.

But you must be a much better player than I and the weather was just horrible in my game until mid April '40.

I'm going to wait until Russia before I provide any additional feedback on movement. As that is where it will really matter. [:)]

[apec]

Thanks Hubert for providing the MOD, I will give it a try.
For what is worth, I tried to do something similar with War in Europe. Based on what I learned, I think that the best way to keep a proper game balance is to have Diplomacy, Research and MPP production fire every other turn i.e. on turn one you get research advance, diplo rolls and MPPs, on turn two nothing and so on. In this way all the current balance will remain the same. In fact, halving diplo and reseach % progression and doubling the turns does not give the same result you get with the present figures.
Of course, the other (the main) factor is that with twice as much turns, the axis gets a large early game boost. For instance, in the regular 1939 campaign we have 2 or 3 turns with good weather; with weekly turns we have 4 to 6 good weather turns, that is enough to conquer Poland and take Denmark, Norway and perhaps LowCountries and Belgium as well. the same apply for Barbarossa etc.

Just my two cents, but I am sure that you have already considered all this [:)]

[Tanaka]

ORIGINAL: Hubert Cater

As indicated in another thread, I put together a shorter turn length experimental mod for those that would like to try 7 day turns as opposed to the current 14.

It can be downloaded from the following link:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/2u3b44tz8b0kg ... L.zip?dl=0

Once downloaded it needs to be decompressed and then pasted into your USER campaigns folder, typically found here:

C:\Users\<username>\Documents\My Games\Strategic Command WWII - World at War\Campaigns

This is a quick mod with the MPP collection halved per turn so that it works out the same as it would after a single turn in the default version of this campaign. As a result it does increase the importance of convoy income as that hasn't been adjusted (net income remains the same however) and the AI may feel accelerated as it was fine tuned to the 14 day turns. For example, in a quick test on my end the Axis AI conquered France by early March 1940.

Other than that we would appreciate any feedback on this turn length for those that were finding there were not enough turns in the default campaigns.

Thanks looking to mod this a bit more. Where in the editor can you mod convoy income?

Looking at the mod changes appears to be a mistake that GB MPP is reduced to 5?

[Tanaka]

ORIGINAL: Numdydar

Have not gotten very far playing this, but to me this makes a LOT of difference. So thanks Herbert for putting this together.

I did take it one step further and modded it so that the max research amount was halved for all countries that had research and eliminated research that was ongoing at the start to bring the starting research level to or below the new maximum. We will see how that helps things [:)]

I also really like the smaller amount of MMP. You really have to save up for research and Diplomacy and contrast that with replacements, new units, and upgrades. I think it adds an additional layer to the game.

So at least you made me happy lol.

How did you mod the current research mpp (research ongoing at start)? Removing all the intial chits for each country?

[Numdydar]

You go into the research button and it lists all the countries that do research. Select each one and a window pops up that shows what they are researching at the start of the game. So I just removed items they were researching until their total was less than the new max total.