v1.23.06 Beta, Update 8/18/2020

[pzgndr]

As before, please have a clean separate installation of the game with the comprehensive v1.23.00 Beta update, and THEN copy the v1.23.06 Beta EXE file and \Setups folder into the game directory (it is the game executable and not an installer executable). The updated database data files are too large to include in the attachment; it really only changes the Swedish light fleet and French artillery morale so just ignore that for now; these will be included in the official comprehensive patch later.

Here is the change log for this update:

Empires in Arms the Napoleonic Wars - 1.23.06
=============================================
- 0000099: [Game Enhancement] Please add the ability to add newly captured/ceded provinces or minors to New Political Combinations – resolved? (Create Kingdom function should now add province if applicable.)
- 0000247: [UI Enhancement] Detail trade listing – resolved (see updated TRADE summary in Nation's Statistics box).
- 0000506: [Game Bug] Display of die roll modifier changes on battle report – resolved.
- 0000823: [AI Enhancement] AI Great Britain Economics – resolved, for AI Great Britain blocking American trade with MPs it is at war with and for negotiating peace if at war with United States.
- 0000825: [AI Enhancement] AI Austria Insurrection Corps – resolved.
- Great Britain and United States not at war in 1812 - resolved.
- Pursuit after trivial combat not working - resolved.
- Attacks on depot sometimes not resolved as trivial combat - resolved.
- Retreats after combat do not also check for closest allied depots - resolved.
- French artillery morale is 2 but should be 4 - resolved, table data files updated.
- Autoforage enhancement - resolved; now autoforage only forages units that cannot pay for supply, all other units must manually forage or pay for supply.
- Single skip for naval phase not working - resolved.
- Combat screen does not properly center the battle map on the battle area - resolved.
- Artillery bombardment losses not recorded in combat log - resolved.
- Austrian Insurrection areas stop enemy movement even if no Insurrection units available - resolved.
- Unit name mouseover hint incorrectly shows "Click Here To Give Unit Orders" - resolved, now hint shows full unit name.
- 1812 scenario not creating the Confederation of the Rhine - resolved, and documentation updated with corrections.
- Garrisons and corps under siege that must forage roll not handled correctly for besiegers in some cases - resolved.
- AI enhancements for strategic advances and retreats - resolved.
- 1812 scenario setups for France updated for Baden, Hesse, and Wurttemburg corps and depots in Spain - resolved.

As before with v1.23.05, this version went through several iterations as Maple Leaf's pbem groups found various issues along the way. The good news is that the pbem games are progressing fairly well now, but the bad news is they are also reaching points where new issues arise. For example, Insurrection areas and kingdom units. Most all of these issues involving movement, combat, or supply are resolved now, and I have not had any problems reported in the past couple of weeks. This has allowed me time to work on some AI improvements and I think(?) adding new areas to active kingdoms should work now (this needs a test).

Let us see how this version plays and I will respond to game bug reports as they arise. Looking ahead to the final stretch, there are still some 1812 scenario updates to work on, so more feedback on the 1812 setup situations is needed. Again, I'd like to get a stable version running and the 1812 scenario updated so we can proceed to an official patch sometime in the next few months. We're close!!

[pzgndr]

- AI enhancements for strategic advances and retreats - resolved.

Screenshot shows the second turn of the 1812 scenario, with AI Russia making strategic retreats and AI France making strategic advances. Way back when I got v1.23.00 going with the 1812 scenarios set up, the French and Russian AI behaviors were unacceptable. Now, the computer opponent is behaving a bit better. Players should find the AI to be more challenging - not brilliant of course but less stupid.

- 0000823: [AI Enhancement] AI Great Britain Economics – resolved, for AI Great Britain blocking American trade with MPs it is at war with and for negotiating peace if at war with United States.

This should also improve AI Great Britain a bit, by helping it and hurting its enemies, where this wasn't happening before. Every little bit helps.

[prielo]

I love seeing that the game is still being maintained. [:)]

Please carry on!

[pzgndr]

ORIGINAL: prielo
I love seeing that the game is still being maintained. [:)]
Please carry on!

Thank you. I am getting very close with v1.23.07. I was actually playing some yesterday as Great Britain and got into May 1805 before experiencing some AI player lockups, due to something with pathfinding I think but not sure. I want to get through a couple of good playtests before wrapping up. Getting closer!

[roos]

This thing with no auto forage is very annoying. Going through every unit clicking forage for each one of them every turn is not my idea of fun.

[pzgndr]

ORIGINAL: roos
This thing with no auto forage is very annoying. Going through every unit clicking forage for each one of them every turn is not my idea of fun.

Probably so. The problem was that many units previously checked for auto-forage were not actually foraging. There is a risk of losing units. That wasn't happening. Now, the auto-forage only forages those units not eligible for depot supply, which the end phase will do for you anyway automatically but by manually foraging you get to prioritize which units check first.

The other option would be to auto-forage all units. But then how would the player get to choose to not forage and risk losses but to use depot supply instead? Should there be a pop-up box to click and verify every single forage or to decline? It would become very annoying either way.

Now, I could add some logic to check for units in home country, season not winter, area forage value 4 or 5, etc. But again that's an all or nothing proposition, and if you have a large stack eligible for depot supply then you would have units taking losses. I don't see a great solution. I'm willing to consider ideas. What might be better?

[roos]

I think we need a third button. One that can be pressed before End of turn to make all units forage that can do that without the loss of factors.

[pzgndr]

ORIGINAL: roos
make all units forage that can do that without the loss of factors.

I may be able to make auto-forage do this. I need quiet time to look at the code. This would speed things up a little bit, and then leave the player with the choice to pay for supply or risk forage loss.

[roos]

ORIGINAL: pzgndr

ORIGINAL: roos
make all units forage that can do that without the loss of factors.

I may be able to make auto-forage do this. I need quiet time to look at the code. This would speed things up a little bit, and then leave the player with the choice to pay for supply or risk forage loss.

[pzgndr]

I apologize for these latest delays but the new AI strategic redeployment routines I introduced are causing me headaches and will take some more time to sort out. Being long-range moves to find eligible units and assign them, the code gets locked up with the search routine and path-finding routine. It worked well enough on the continent, but I've had to exclude units in North Africa, the islands, and Scandinavia. I'm still getting game freeze and it's tough to track down where/why exactly. But I'll get there sooner or later. I also want to relook the auto-forage routine and make some adjustments to improve that.

So. At this point I hope to get something to Matrix before the holiday rush so they can maybe get a comprehensive public beta released for folks to try out. Then if all goes well we can make it an official patch in early 2021 after the holidays.

[pzgndr]

Quick update. I was productive this past weekend and resolved the game freeze issue. So the new AI strategic redeployment function is working. Auto-forage is updated. I was able to playtest 1805 for the first year without any glitches. However, I did spot a few cosmetic issues to clean up. Like battle messages were not consistent between AI-AI and human attacker vs AI and AI attacker vs human defender. That's cleaned up. I also have a couple of other items to resolve and then get in a playtest for 1812. Status update from MapleLeaf and his ongoing pbem games is good, with no showstopper reports in past couple of weeks.

So. I seriously hope to wrap things up this week, assuming my RL distractions are kept minimum. And then files to Matrix later this week or next and hopefully a public beta package before the holidays. This four-year project is nearing completion on getting an official patch released that gets folks playing Empires in Arms again.

[pzgndr]

Another quick update on the v1.23.07 saga. The bad news is that my 1812 playtest hit another snag with the strategic redeployment function. The good news is that I have it mostly working again except for how the function terminates, and I hope to resolve that this week and continue playtests.

Here the challenge I've been working on. A new function to assign unassigned units at the end of the move phase to redeploy towards the selected enemy nation. In the case of Russia to advance toward ally Austria or Prussia at war with France (think Austerlitz), or on to France if everyone is at war. How many forces? I created a function to check for factors on the map minus factors already deployed into an enemy nation and then assume some fraction of that remainder as a max to move, since you don't want everyone to move. Which units should move? I created another function to find the nearest eligible unit. That had a path-finding check that proved problematic, so I replaced that with a simpler distance check. Another function cycles through the eligible units and assigns them up to the max factors and that one requires path-finding. Complicated? You betcha. But after tracking down issues to individual lines of code and figuring out how to resolve things, it's working OK now. But again, still some issue at the end that isn't exiting the function correctly.

What does this mean? Players can now expect the AI computer opponent to actually advance units at war toward a theater of operations. Then strategic advances/retreats are made as applicable. Then units in range to make attacks or defend objectives can be assigned accordingly. Previously only the last piece was happening. Now, the AI should be more challenging. That's the idea.

[pzgndr]

Today's update on the v1.23.07 saga. After much digging into why things were not working as expected, I think I've finally got the strategic redeployments working. Screenshot shows June 1812. Russian AI has strategically retreated. French AI made no attacks, but made strategic advances into Russia. But now see that France is also making some strategic redeployments with a few corps from Germany moving towards Russia.

I have also made some improvements to auto-foraging and rolled them into the AI. Good news is that the AI is auto-foraging better now prior to paying for supply or risking losses during regular forage. Same as for human players. Bad news is that I'm noticing the game appears to hang while the AI goes through all those foraging checks, but it's just slow; players will have to have some patience with this. I need to verify if this is more because of the debug version I'm playtesting or if the optimized release version may be faster.

Anyways, I am back on track. A few fine-tuning things to adjust and then a couple of playtests to verify all is well. Hopefully I will be wrapping up soon (this week?) and sending files to Matrix.