Napoleon Dev-diary #3 - 30th of May 2007

Interesting news. Concerning this "war overview" issue, have you considered making it optional? If this is only an overview (as in, you wouldn't lose control over your country without it being there), then maybe it could be toggled in the game options, together with difficulty settings and so on? That would solve the problem of people saying that "it ruins realism/replaces spies" and, hopefully, the problems the peace AI currently has.

aberg said:

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Any chance of bluring the troop numbers somewhat.

I'd like to be able to see something along the lines of "Your enemy has a significant force on land." or something. Or for it to be linked with espionage in some way.

I don't like being able to just dial up the amount of troops the enemy has.

I think that with the 'war capacity' percentaje we'd have enough info about the enemy and its possition in order to evaluate peace offers. It's a good idea and a nice feature. But exact number of enemy troops of each class is unnecesary and makes a laugh of 'Fog of War'. It's the ultimate espionage system!

Id suggest either getting rid of enemy troop information or using 'aproximation' numbers. '+1000, +5000, +10000, and such...

cool deal....i like the overview...add-on should be a good one..thanks guys!

Balor said:

nopes.. quite alot more things it considers.

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Oh I expected as much, but my concern was that a nation with large manpower reserves will have that part of the equation be the same regardless of other things. A nation with larger reserves, with plenty of money to build units, and lots of land to field them from should evaluate that reserve amount more for the same levels than a nation with no place left to field armies.

That might be a more general comment on the Peace AI overall. If the plan is to have each thing being calculated be worht a certain amount, and that amount does not vary with other factors (which I would admit might be much harder to do) then we will always have situations where the seemingly sense resistance is true.

A nation that has had all it's home provinces taken, but has an army on a colony and no navy is much weaker than a nations with the same size army which has that army fighting in it's home lands. In this case the "value" of those troops is different despite equal numbers.

I am assuming that the peace AI does not make these value judgements, and further, that this may partially be why people sometimes see difficult peace AI, and further, that these changes will not make these complaints go away.

But I didn't design it, nor could I, so maybe you do have the system working so that utility is taken into account. If so I am worrying over nothing. I just would like to know a little more about what War capacity really means before I can relax. that is why I asked about a tool tip, since that would address my concerns.

Legolas said:

Interesting news. Concerning this "war overview" issue, have you considered making it optional? If this is only an overview (as in, you wouldn't lose control over your country without it being there), then maybe it could be toggled in the game options, together with difficulty settings and so on? That would solve the problem of people saying that "it ruins realism/replaces spies" and, hopefully, the problems the peace AI currently has.

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Easily solveed. If you don't like it, don't click on the button that brings it up...

I think I'm going to echo the call for this feature to be optional. In my case, I would prefer a more accurate warscore calculation, and then move to the war overview if that isn't working out.

I do like this feature in the sense that it can be used to gauge just how the AI views it's chances, although in MP this would be really unfair.

All the new features sound uber-cool but I'll join the crowd that asks for toning down the new overview window somehow - either by making it optional or blurring the numbers a bit.

I'm amazed that there seems to be a LOT of new features in this expansion. I'd be probably satisfied with extended timeframe + tweaking but this is looking huge... How many more instalments of NA Dev Diary? A this pace we'll be getting something more like EU4 in August .

Maciek

If you link the war overview with the espionage system, then it would be really cool. Better use of spies plus implemented the new feature. No matter what though, I don't think the overview should give away exact troop numbers. For once it's hard to obtain it should be below or above 10k, 20k, 30k etc. I think or else it is too effective.

I really like the colonisation option though, great work!

This new features looks pretty good. I'm liking the war interface and the improvement of spread of discoveries. Makes more sence since historically the discoverer claimed the land for it's country, if another country came and settle problems would arrise.

How about adding something like colonial core to newly discovered lands? For example, I'm playing spain and I send cortez to the new world. He discovers havana(no other country has discovered it yet, Spain is the first), so cortez claims the new land for Spain and spain gets this "colonial core" for let's say 5 years. During this time if another country creates a settlement in Havana Spain can attack them without declaring war, however the other country can get a cause of belli on spain risking an open war. If spain fails to take back havana it will lose the core and who ever has a settlement there gets it. Also if after 5 years Spain hasn't created a settlement for whatever reason(didn't send any colonist, all failed, indians destroyed the colony) it will lose this colonial core after the 5 years and havana will be up for grabs to anyone who settles it first.

Secret Master said:

I'll throw in my opinion on the new war interface.

I think it's a good idea. If the AI has access to this information, which is itself unrealistic and unhistorical even though it is vital for a good gameplay AI, then we should have access to that information. I do get irritated at times when trying to negotiate peace with the big boys, like Ming, and wondering why they refuse peace at -3 stability and 12% war exhaustion with a 99% war score. Now I'll know what they are thinking. I'll also know that they are hiding armies or fleets somewhere, and I need to go crush them to get the peace I want.

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But this can be achieved through qalitative rather than quantitative information.
Perhaps, have army display be:
"none"
"significantly lower"
"lower"
"slightly lower"
"about even"
"slightly higher"
"significantly higher"
"overwhelming"
"they will pleasure themselves in you blood"

I agree about the info. Get rid of the total accurate reports!!!

Secret Master said:

I do get irritated at times when trying to negotiate peace with the big boys, like Ming, and wondering why they refuse peace at -3 stability and 12% war exhaustion with a 99% war score. Now I'll know what they are thinking. I'll also know that they are hiding armies or fleets somewhere, and I need to go crush them to get the peace I want.

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I wouldnt expect it to shed any light on why they wont accept your offers unless the peace negotiations have been re-worked. Have you tried saving your game and loading-up as your enemy to see what they have left? I was at war with France, controlled all French provinces, they had no army or navy left and no free provices. I had 100% warscore, they were at -3 stab but they would only accept to cede 4 or 5 provinces to me out of about 30+.

Merlact said:

I wouldnt expect it to shed any light on why they wont accept your offers unless the peace negotiations have been re-worked. Have you tried saving your game and loading-up as your enemy to see what they have left? I was at war with France, controlled all French provinces, they had no army or navy left and no free provices. I had 100% warscore, they were at -3 stab but they would only accept to cede 4 or 5 provinces to me out of about 30+.

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Err... You are likely to be asking over 100% to get more than 5 provinces. That is more than the warscore

And 5 provinces is a LOT.

Just add "annex = yes" to all religions if you want total annexation wars.

Well id expect a trade off of this "realistic peace system" to be that the AI, when totally defeated, will accept to yield a bit more than it would have before.

A totally beaten opponent, imo, should accept 5 provinces, or vassalization and 2 provinces.

Anyhow, to get back on topic; Great update, Johan. I think this is a handy feature, plus its actually new material we never had in previous versions of EU. Im quite excited about it.

nachinus said:

I think that with the 'war capacity' percentaje we'd have enough info about the enemy and its possition in order to evaluate peace offers. It's a good idea and a nice feature. But exact number of enemy troops of each class is unnecesary and makes a laugh of 'Fog of War'. It's the ultimate espionage system!

Id suggest either getting rid of enemy troop information or using 'aproximation' numbers. '+1000, +5000, +10000, and such...

Click to expand...

NikkTheTrick said:

But this can be achieved through qalitative rather than quantitative information.
Perhaps, have army display be:
"none"
"significantly lower"
"lower"
"slightly lower"
"about even"
"slightly higher"
"significantly higher"
"overwhelming"
"they will pleasure themselves in you blood"

Click to expand...

Kung Karl said:

I agree about the info. Get rid of the total accurate reports!!!

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Fully agreed.

Kung Karl said:

I agree about the info. Get rid of the total accurate reports!!!

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I completely disagree. Give me the totally accurate reports!!! I hated this change from HOI2 to HOI2D. I only play single-player; go ahead and give me the information - as noted, the AI certainly has it.

I hope discoveries will not only be available through spread and exploration? I think "stealing maps" should also be available (through conquest and spying).
Or will these features come in patches?
As for war overview I think it should be "turn off"-able through difficulty settings with choices to display "numbers" or as mentioned "qalitative rating".

I love this new feature and nations at that point had a pretty good idea what their opponents could muster. Even if exact numbers would be unrealistical I do think that it would enhance the gameplay imho as numbers and statistic is always a good thing in my book.