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unmerged(42223)

Imperial Minister
Mar 28, 2005
3.437
0
RISK BATTLE MOD_BETA5

Yep, that's right the announcement has arrived!!
:cool:

Risk Battle Mod_Beta5

For those who have for a length of time been active supporters as either player/beta testers or lurkers I am presenting this outline. Future players will simply ‘inherit’ that which is accomplished.

Some background:
Risk Battle Mod is built upon HOI2_1.3a; there ‘exists’ two compelling reasons why I did not migrate to DD. One, I modified the province.csv file to such an extent I found myself resistant to the work that would be required to move my changes to DD. Second DD is built ‘primarily’ upon the mystique of playing under the ‘fog of war’, hence emphasis on spy’s etc. Where I have ‘never’ played any strategy game in anything but ‘no fog’. If this not possible I quickly lost interest.

That disclosed, I realize most seem to play in ‘fog of war’, no matter however I do not. With this I want the AI’s to beat a human even when the human player can see it coming at them! I am sure this attitude drives me to bring the AI’s to better combat estate.

Change_Log so far for Beta5 (as per remembering <smiles>)
~Tech files for ½ the 55 starting countries have been updated
~Many land connections are added
~All id conflicts have been eliminated. Please note, I did this by literally inventoring with a spreadsheet every single instance of use I could access, events, tech, ministers, leaders and country inc. There were at least 50 id conflicts found (and the game still runs stable); half were of my doing, half are vanilla errors. It seems in vanilla they run the id numbers from 1 to 500,000 not once but three times! Leader files, minister and tech file conflicts were the most prevalent. Most of the id conflicts I contributed to came from using dormant or minor countries as I found them in vanilla and then expanded leader/tech files.
~Result, Beta5 is extremely solid. (As a note of record, I have from time to time found anomalies in the vanilla province.csv file and corrected them as well.)
~Removed 50 ‘mountain’ provinces and generally made hills. This to speed game play. Mostly affecting the greater Chinese area, some Central America and Ottoman/Persia.
~Added 65 ‘urban’ provinces worldwide. (This also ties into new stuff coming)
~Changed thirteen OOB
Highlights:
~~Nat. China added 18 locked garrisons
~~Japan added 9 locked garrisons
~~Reduced Tibet by 12 inf divisions
~~Egypt now 26 inf/28 cav instead of the standard 50 inf/4 cav
~~Finland reduced overall by 12 div. and changed to 14 inf/ 28 mtn or HA instead of the game OOB standard of 4 mountain or heavy assault.
~~Iberia reduced by 12 inf divisions
~~Kazakia changed to 14 inf/ 40 cav
~~Mongol Empire changed to 26 inf/ 28 cav
~~North African Alliance changed to 26 inf/ 28 cav
~~Persia changed to 26 inf/ 28 cav
~~Russia now has the largest land OOB totaling 136 to the average 91. This includes 41 garrisons instead of 20 and 74 inf instead of 50 inf.
~~Saudi Arabia changed to 26 inf/ 28 cav
~~Turkmenistan reduced by 12 inf and changed to 26 inf/ 16 cav
~Made a certain kind of ‘combat’ protocol changes (which I will not explain here, you will instead experience the surprise :) ) However, the effect is at least a 25% more effective combat AI all around, this improvement is also available to the human, but I suspect the AI will manage it better overall. I like these kinds of changes. :D

Now there are lot of beta tester suggestions that are also to be addressed that I just consolidated and am going over in detail. A nice long list which I am sure will further improve Beta5 game play.

However, these changes are mostly that which I did while beta4 was in motion and those suggestions were then collecting on the Beta4 thread.

So Beta5 also includes a lot of testing which I mostly kept ‘under wraps’ thus far and for which some of the changes above will tie into. Much of which is event driven, AI switching etc. I will unfold more it as we go.

But some of it includes these changes thus far as done:

~AI alliances are no longer for one point in time, which I believe is spring 1935 in Beta4, (which is game year 5) and here it happens to over half plus of those AI’s still remaining in game.

~Now AI alliances occur from summer 1930 at the same rate throughout the game. This rate being 1 to 2 small alliances per year average. In later years this could also mean earlier alliances simply add a new country in. Also it will be very difficult but not impossible for the human to know when a country will be receptive to alliance as they will change their ‘posture’ often. In other words the ‘window’ of opportunity could only last for a week or two once or twice a year with first a few countries here and then some other countries there. And from game to game, this will always be different.

~Next big change is ‘claims’ which, by and large occurred frequently first two months then became ‘rare’ at best. Also there were definite repeating patterns which were occurring often.

~Now ‘claims’ occur in a sprinkled manner for the duration of the game generally or at least after the first year, not so rarely. But they are completely random game to game, so you will see it thoroughly different game to game and with the added benefit that the same country will get two or three claims against all neighbors if possible or the same country gives into to two or three neighbors one game and the next refuses everyone. Also with this some odd claims that beta’s early on pointed out were corrected.

These changes all together already bring Beta5 to a higher level of polish and challenge.
Yet much more is cooking, much more…

What is beyond this however, I am going to first confer with a few long-time Risk Battle Mod supporters by PM.
 
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Sounds very interesting. I am especially looking forward to the new combat changes. Also, can the Republic of America get some extra men too :( :D?
 
GeneralHannibal said:
Sounds very interesting. I am especially looking forward to the new combat changes. Also, can the Republic of America get some extra men too :( :D?

Funny, I don't seem to 'feel' so much for them, since they are played so much by humans.
:D

You guys want to 'vote' on it?
 
Yukala said:
Funny, I don't seem to 'feel' so much for them, since they are played so much by humans.
:D

You guys want to 'vote' on it?

True, but we still need to give the AI a fighting chance, I mean, we don't want a human CSA to have as easy a time with them as I had with the CSA ;).

Really though, maybe you could add some locked garrisons in the west, as other countries have locked GARs. No more mobile troops though.
 
Yukala said:
Funny, I don't seem to 'feel' so much for them, since they are played so much by humans.
:D

You guys want to 'vote' on it?
They get ganged up on in my NatChi game too, and seems to be losing there, so I suppose the could do with some more divisions.
Also, will my Beta4 save file be compatible with Beta5? I.e. if I update to Beta5, will my Beta4 save file be playable?
 
I got these two screenshots from my NatChi game, and RoA is taking a beating:
screensave31yv8.jpg


screensave50qo9.jpg
 
Comrade Kalle said:
They get ganged up on in my NatChi game too, and seems to be losing there, so I suppose the could do with some more divisions.
Also, will my Beta4 save file be compatible with Beta5? I.e. if I update to Beta5, will my Beta4 save file be playable?

Not really updatable, but I was not pushing Beta5 out the door any time soon anyways.

Ok, Ok I got 'inspired' idea about shoring up Republic of America's OOB. How about, 'drum rolls please' two cav units smartly posted in Dakota under the careful command of the grandson of Custer?
:rofl:

You can see here my native American prejudice shinning through? :D

Actually I will look into some additional infantry locked down in the west and then 'unlocking' maybe by 1 August 1930 via event.
 
Maybe give them (ROA) an ai only event that gives them extra garrisons and forts or more mobile infantry or both...

Also Ukraine is missing a tech team with the very necessary factory/ind engineering specialty same as Russia.

A good Idea imo for a land connection would be to give Greenland a connection to Labrador and Iceland so if Scotland and GQ wanted to slug it out directly.

UPA is simply too tough a nut for the AI to crack. Their central industry/resource base in the isthmus of Central America is just too well defensable especially considering they have most of the time to only worry about one front of attack. I would suggest making some more land connections to NA/SA which would help them too since they can't exactly move either with 40 Columbian division stacked in Colon or that one province below. Unfortunatly the game only recognizes smphipious ship invasion as one angle of attack even carried out from multiple sea zones so its impossible to get an envelopment from what is actaully a much harder to coordinate attack :wacko:

edit: Just wanted to add you might want to consider upping the inf in some instances like the American and Canadian west. The center of African/SA and Asia and where there are huge provinces just because it doesn't help the ai at all ive found and instead gives a huge bost to the human player who can consuct encirclements without having to worry about the ai braking it (which I've found is very possible and frustrating with smaller high infra provinces ;) )

HQ's definitely need a speed boost to iinfantry levels at least for their first two levels. (reiteration here)

Also just a question but are you going ot revamp some brigades like SPA, TD, HA and the RArt lines? From what I can tell these are unchanged from vanilla
 
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lloyd007 said:
Maybe give them (ROA) an ai only event that gives them extra garrisons and forts or more mobile infantry or both...

Also Ukraine is missing a tech team with the very necessary factory/ind engineering specialty same as Russia.

A good Idea imo for a land connection would be to give Greenland a connection to Labrador and Iceland so if Scotland and GQ wanted to slug it out directly.

UPA is simply too tough a nut for the AI to crack. Their central industry/resource base in the isthmus of Central America is just too well defensable especially considering they have most of the time to only worry about one front of attack. I would suggest making some more land connections to NA/SA which would help them too since they can't exactly move either with 40 Columbian division stacked in Colon or that one province below. Unfortunatly the game only recognizes smphipious ship invasion as one angle of attack even carried out from multiple sea zones so its impossible to get an envelopment from what is actaully a much harder to coordinate attack :wacko:

Hi, thanks for these comments. Central America is one of the places I removed some mountain provinces and also added two urban in the area. UPA does not hold now so well.

Ukraine has now 30 tech teams; 20 to begin with in 1930, 5 more coming on line Jan 1931 and the last 5, Jan 1932. This is now what 1/2 the countries now have. Mostly those who did not inherit large teams from vanilla.

The one major caution which with these two suggested island links and the few more to look at that have been suggested is not having the AI's 'bottle-neck' too much, especially far from other fronts. It works though now most everywhere else it is done, so generally the AI's are with all the modding not so inclined to get hung-up over-long anywhere on the map most of time.

Something to test. :D

The thing about RoA is that their problems are in the first few weeks, so events could simply be too late even if set only one month into the game. And maybe the balance would shift just by posting more units on the western borders. If they only had two antagonists instead of 3 or 4 they would probably be alright.

Yet, I remember what has brought the balance to this point; in the past RoA was often too strong and dominated North America 2 out of 3 games. So I guess that is why I remain cautious about how much to give them.

But I have other tricks maybe to try with balance, so will see of course. But first maybe just a little nudge up.
 
lloyd007 said:
edit: Just wanted to add you might want to consider upping the inf in some instances like the American and Canadian west. The center of African/SA and Asia and where there are huge provinces just because it doesn't help the ai at all ive found and instead gives a huge bost to the human player who can consuct encirclements without having to worry about the ai braking it (which I've found is very possible and frustrating with smaller high infra provinces ;) )

HQ's definitely need a speed boost to iinfantry levels at least for their first two levels. (reiteration here)

Also just a question but are you going ot revamp some brigades like SPA, TD, HA and the RArt lines? From what I can tell these are unchanged from vanilla

Could you specify in detail the brigades cause I have not looked at all since beta4, but before I seem to remember going over most of them with a fine-toothed comb.

Actually, thanks about the HQ that is going be shifted via early techs.

Good idea about nipping encirclement in larger countries, maybe with more of something (some countries are already with too many units for 'support' reasons, that was one of reasons for reducing some OOB).

Yet as well things have changed in Asia and North Africa since I added well over hundred cavalry to those areas, the AI's respond and move. There is also another combat setting that helps the AI's hold a line better, I will review that setting again, I may have already shifted it back.
 
Yukala said:
Could you specify in detail the brigades cause I have not looked at all since beta4, but before I seem to remember going over most of them with a fine-toothed comb.

Actually, thanks about the HQ that is going be shifted via early techs.

Good idea about nipping encirclement in larger countries, maybe with more of something (some countries are already with too many units for 'support' reasons, that was one of reasons for reducing some OOB).

Yet as well things have changed in Asia and North Africa since I added well over hundred cavalry to those areas, the AI's respond and move. There is also another combat setting that helps the AI's hold a line better, I will review that setting again, I may have already shifted it back.



Wouldn't Urban be just as bad as Mountain? Also, will we be seeing more of the International Trade Guild in this version?
 
GeneralHannibal said:
Wouldn't Urban be just as bad as Mountain? Also, will we be seeing more of the International Trade Guild in this version?

Not for all units. However, urban is not meant to replace mountain as such, only in Central American where things are bit crowded that may of happened once. For instance, generally unless situated in a natural bottleneck a capitol located on a mountain terrain stayed that way, such as Mexico City for instance, or if a capitol was located in the jungle that too remained so. They were actually separate design decisions.

Yes about International Trade Guilds, but you will know first by PM, the outline is taking shape.
:cool:
 
Just caught up with events! Exciting news!

I have found that alliances in B4 can work well for the human player. 1937 has come round and I am allied with one of my more powerful near neighbours (along with their conflicts) It is basically us against the rest of Euraisia. Not only tech trading but am happy as a pig in mud!
 
therev said:
Just caught up with events! Exciting news!

I have found that alliances in B4 can work well for the human player. 1937 has come round and I am allied with one of my more powerful near neighbours (along with their conflicts) It is basically us against the rest of Euraisia. Not only tech trading but am happy as a pig in mud!

There you have it! You two against the world, nice to have friends about. 1937 that is good while, seven years game time.
:D
 
I am not anymore a supporter of Risk? :(

I actually have plans for starting yet another musicAAR to make it a trilogy in HoI2 forums and Risk might fit my style best, though it has by no means the variety of material for songs CK or even EUIII offer. But this will have to wait until summer, atleast.

Until then: gimme gimme gimme some Risk!
 
EvilSanta said:
I am not anymore a supporter of Risk? :(

I actually have plans for starting yet another musicAAR to make it a trilogy in HoI2 forums and Risk might fit my style best, though it has by no means the variety of material for songs CK or even EUIII offer. But this will have to wait until summer, atleast.

Until then: gimme gimme gimme some Risk!

:D :cool:

Yep you are, sorry; but what I am talking about is discussing design ideas for Beta5 not the mod itself as that will not be ready for awhile. I will add you to the check over ideas list before I post them here in this thread. However, I have not compiled the outline yet, though I did make a lot a progress last night.
 
Risk Battle Mod_Beta5 update:

RISK BATTLE MOD_BETA5 UPDATE:

By this time I had hoped to have PM'd a half dozen or so long-time or recently active Beta4 testers so as to bounce off some ideas.

That has not happened, yet I have kept to a work schedual of sorts and continue to make great progress. It is just a little more involved. Going from concept to fact. It requires a few steps which includes 'testing', change etc, catching things I missed as well. All of the concepts however, have thus far in mostly straightforward ways, proven feasable. Well with one minor disclaimer; the game will be a tad bit more busy... and consequently a tad bit more demanding of computer resources.

I ran longer hands-off games last two days, and I can see that with more events it is going to get a little tricky and very complicated.
 
I have a couple of suggestions.

WRT tech teams (which you most likely have already done or considered)

Every nation should have at least

3 industrial tech teams (industry is perhaps the most important tech screen)

2 infantry tech teams (lots of tech but you don't want to give anyone too many tech teams since this is an important sceen that requires choices to be made)

2 armor tech teams (at least dedicated armor tech teams since many armor tech overlap with others)

1 aircraft tech team (not as many techs here to research)

1 nuclear tech (just so its availible)

1-2 naval tech- a lot of countries get shortchanged in this area imo especially Japan/Scotland/Scandanavia/Pacific Fire who should have awesome tech teams here but are just bleh but maybe I'm spoiled by the three N's (Norfolk, Newport News and New York :D ). Island nations should have great naval tech imo while landlocked nations should have better infantry/armor but not be so far behind as for it to be a waste of time trying.

2-4 good air doctrine researchers (soo many freaking tech that are worhtless by themsleves.

2 naval doctrine- lots of very diversified techs would make it impossible to have just one maybe have a carrier/big fleet and a sub/small fleet.

1 land doctrine- its important but there arent many techs to research. Landlocked and some others maybe should get 2 or more, each specializing in a different path so as to have a choice.

I think keeping the level of the teams at 6 or above is good since we start 6 years before the historical dates for most things but again it would be fine ot have one super level 9 aircraft and hten a second level 6 if you wanted or needed to research a second tech or something but having both lvl 8 works fine as well or even have lvl 9 land doctrine and lvl 6 naval to balance.

just my .02. I don't think all countries should be equal but they gotta have at least 1 research team for every field.
 
No problem, great ideas, I did work up a new tech team default. I will get it posted here so you might review it and compare with your great suggestions here.

Many thanks!!!!!