0.5 developer's thread

[Zuckergußgebäck]

About time we had one of these, so that work can continue.

IMO, we should find ourselves some good AI coder to get the 1914 scenario a going concern. I also have some ideas for the 1897 scenario that I would like to try out.

And there will always be ministers.

And it turns out I gave this thread a gramatically incorrect title. We need a mod to move the apostrophe.

[v.Manstein]

Yes, AI should have highes priority.
Maybe I have to contact Lothos again?!

Then I would like to remove radio towers to prevent more questions about it

And finally, we should discuss about map changes

[Tegetthoff]

Ok, to justify the moving of the apostrophe (it would be correct if there were only one developer) here are my ideas:

Things that I plan to do:
I plan to spend some work on Austria-Hungarian events, mainly with the purpose of making it more realistic and difficult to play. As usual, I will start with 1897.

I plan to model the 1897 civic unrest related to the language reforms in Bohemia and Moravia issued by Count Badeni, including alternative solutions.

This will be closely related to the 1897 Ausgleich negotiations between Austria and Hungary, which failed in 1897 and 1898, were temporarily solved in 1899, came up again in 1903 and were finally completed in 1907. Lack of success in the Ausgleich negotiations will severely hamper A-H´s ability to increase army size (I am currently thinking of disabling infantry and cavalry construction in 1897 and allowing only Landwehr and Honved infantry to be construced until the Ausgleich is approved).

In 1902/03 Hungary was ready to increase army size, provided Hungarian regiments were allowed to use Hungarian as their command language. So you get a reduction in army ORG and dissent from the officer corps in exchange for the possibility to increase the army (a-historical option).

Since the best strategy for an A-H player in 1897 is to knock out Serbia as soon as the Russian guarantee expires, I will try to model the very good relations with Serbia up to the Royal Assassination in 1903, perhaps with a non-agression treaty.

The possibility of military intervention in Serbia after the fall of the house of Obrenovic in 1903 (with a possible early WW) should go in, as well as the decline of relations over the Pig´s War (alternative: anger the Hungarian farmers by keeping cheap Serbian imports).

The Bosnian Annexation Crisis will be expanded, with the possibility of various local and global wars as a consequence. My largest problem there is how to model Russian access through the Dardanelles, which was what Russia wanted to get out of a deal with A-H over Bosnia.

The infrastructure program of the Körber government should come in (and infrastructure should be lower in 1897) as well as the growth of industry in 1904 to 1914.

I want to start the process of dissolving the major alliances by taking Italy out of the Central Power alliance and replace the Dreibund treaty with a set of events that fires if the treaty is activated.

Things that should be done where I cannot take the lead:
Reduce the size of the download (0.5 will have to be one set of files again) by eliminating unnecessary files

We need somebody to work on the infantry tech tree (I can code it but I have no time for the balancing of unit stats, changes to scenario files, graphic work for unit pics, getting sprites to work in HOI2 and DD).

Changes to the map: maybe we can get a map wizard to make the most important map changes.

Graphics artist: old issue, we need one urgently, and one who knows the mod and improves graphics on is own initiative

Get tech teams (if necessary generic tech teams) for each country on the map

AI has already been mentioned

Let´s get started!

Tegetthoff

[Zuckergußgebäck]

Originally Posted by v.Manstein

And finally, we should discuss about map changes

Map changes as in province ownership or map changes as in using the map editor?

I would also like peace events for all event triggered wars. That is one of the things I would like to start with. I am also experimenting with verious non ai ways of making the mahdist war last longer, but so far I have had little luck. Perhaps we should rid ourselves of the war bit completely and have the entire war event-driven? After all, Britain gets wartime modifiers which she IMO shouldn't get when fighting a backwards moslem sect in Africa.

[Tegetthoff]

Originally Posted by Zuckergußgebäck

Map changes as in province ownership or map changes as in using the map editor?

For me: map editor

My wishlist:
Separate Südtirol and Trentino (divide the Bolzano province)
Add a Trieste province out of the Venice province
Add the Sanjak of Novi Bazar
Add a Bukovina province out of the relevant Romanian province

Solve the Thorn problem
Solve the Metz problem

[Zuckergußgebäck]

Originally Posted by Tegetthoff

For me: map editor

My wishlist:
Separate Südtirol and Trentino (divide the Bolzano province)
Add a Trieste province out of the Venice province
Add the Sanjak of Novi Bazar
Add a Bukovina province out of the relevant Romanian province

Solve the Thorn problem
Solve the Metz problem

I think I had a whole raft of such suggestions in the other thread about the map editor.

[Tegetthoff]

Originally Posted by Zuckergußgebäck

I think I had a whole raft of such suggestions in the other thread about the map editor.

Well we need a guy who loves doing this sort of work. I think we all can come up with reasonable ideas for map changes and map documentation to show how it should be done.

The E3 map project is way to ambitious and will not be finished for several months.

The map shown by General_Grant had at least some of the changes I would have liked.

[Zuckergußgebäck]

What do you think about making the Sudan War event driven? We have already proved that it is impossible to make the war last beyond the first months of 1897, and reducing infrastructure to zero orfilling the Sudan with level ten forts that are to be removed by event only results in both parties signing a peace in February 1897. Thus, it might be more prudent to remove the British troops in Egypt and remove the war altogether and instead make a number of events where Mahdiya cedes her provinces to the British, which in turn are subjected to events draining them of supplies and manpower.

[Tegetthoff]

Originally Posted by Zuckergußgebäck

What do you think about making the Sudan War event driven? We have already proved that it is impossible to make the war last beyond the first months of 1897, and reducing infrastructure to zero orfilling the Sudan with level ten forts that are to be removed by event only results in both parties signing a peace in February 1897. Thus, it might be more prudent to remove the British troops in Egypt and remove the war altogether and instead make a number of events where Mahdiya cedes her provinces to the British, which in turn are subjected to events draining them of supplies and manpower.

That´s a possible solution .....

One added advantage would be that the British Empire is not at war for the first year of the 1897 scenario and would thus not get the war production bonus.

Do you see any a-historical option where Mahdiya survives beyond 1898? From my reading on the battle of Omdurman the Mahdists made several errors (like not going for a dawn attack and then fighting out of range of the guns of their Nile fleet)

To me, Mahdiya seemed more or less like the ultimate challenge to a human player (I never tried it, though).

[Tegetthoff]

Originally Posted by mandead

Oh, and on another note, I can certainly try and do some GFX work for you, but I warn you now that my skills barely extend beyond EU3 flags. Nonetheless, if one is needed urgently, I am at your disposal. In terms of P'dox projects, this and the AGCEEP are my priorities anyway...

Finally, the infantry tech tree certainly needs expanding. Hell, they all do - the problem here is that starting in 1897 and not say 1911 or whatever means that the vanilla HoI2 gap of three years before war is now twenty years before war - that's a lot of researching and ship-building...

I'm not suggesting we scrap the 1897 scenario as it's too far gone, but in hindsight it was perhaps a little too adventurous a starting point.

GFX: even simple things like unit icons are highly welcome

Infantry tree: Please go ahead! I can help you coding it into a tech tree file once the basic layout is done. I have done some preliminary reading and would like to go for a scheme where you develop weapons advances and then go for the corresponding infantry unit.

e.g. Basic Maxim machine gun - 1895 infantry
Improved Maxim machine gun - 1900 infantry
Advanced Maxim machine gun - 1905 infantry
Vickers machine gun - 1910 infantry

I do not know enough about early 1900s infantry technology to make detailed proposals.

[Kaiser Franz]

Hmmm, is there anything i my bracket of expertise that needs handling at all? I can give a bit of my free time to helping out again lol.

[Tegetthoff]

Originally Posted by Kaiser Franz

Hmmm, is there anything i my bracket of expertise that needs handling at all? I can give a bit of my free time to helping out again lol.

So what´s your bracket of expertise? (sorry I have to ask)

[Kaiser Franz]

ministers, leaders and general things...mainly on leaders though...but it depends on whether or not i can get info, pics and other things. Thats what i'm best at lol...

[Tegetthoff]

Originally Posted by Kaiser Franz

ministers, leaders and general things...mainly on leaders though...but it depends on whether or not i can get info, pics and other things. Thats what i'm best at lol...

How about tech teams? Lots of work on minors´ tech teams remains to be done (South America calling ....)

[Gigalocus]

Any news on a HOI 3 compatibility of 0.5?

[Tegetthoff]

Originally Posted by Gigalocus

Any news on a HOI 3 compatibility of 0.5?

At least this gives us a time frame and thus an idea how far we can take 1914 before HOI 3. Q3 2009 .... if we go for a Q1 2009 release of 0.5 this gives us half a year of fun before we go for HOI3.

[Tegetthoff]

As we move into 0.50 event coding:

Should we use the new event numbering system proposed by Manstein some time ago?

I have started to work on Austria-Hungary in the 1897 - 1900 range and can still go either way.

[Zuckergußgebäck]

Originally Posted by mandead

Updated GFX for Newfoundland (so as to match the colour of Canada's flag) here.

Thanks.

I made the previous flag using a rather poor flag generator, so I am pleased that someone finally made a proper flag for NAM.

[Zuckergußgebäck]

I shall now proceed to code the Sudan war. It might require some balancing once it's done, though.

[Zuckergußgebäck]

Originally Posted by mandead

From what I've read so far, Morocco and somewhere beginning with 'F' (sorry, I forget, and I can't find the page with it on) were important.

Fashoda is in, although since the Sudan war is to be event driven we might need to alter the events a bit.