Idea about Product Licences...

[LostinSpice]

Right now minor and some major's equipment is either placeholder or generic. Medium tank 1, 1936 Fighter, that sort of thing. As equipment is now a major factor in the game it would be a bit naff if my Panzer IIIs and IVs engaged Light Tank 1 and Heavy Tank 2. Not very immersing.

So what I suggest is the use of production licences (similar to HOI 3). This is how they would work:

1. The nation with the missing piece of equipment goes to the diplomacy screen, picks a new tab called Product Licences and by scrolling picks a historical piece of equipment. They can then research the tank, plane, ship as if it were their own.

2. Like trade the other country has no say in the transaction but gets a little experience in that field (army, air or sea) like Lend Lease. For game play it matters not if this has been researched or not, many majors built equipment only for export - Germany for Turkey etc...

3. If you are at war if the other country you can't get their licence. Once you have the basic unit you can make variants as normal - like many countries did.

This idea seems good to me to allow the devs to use historical equipment in an abstracted export market and not worry money and filling every slot as a player/ AI can do this themselves. Some countries didn't make every unit the game has so I'd rather use a real unit than Tank 1 or Plane 2. Romania used many French tanks prewar, the Czechs exported many tanks, the Dutch had fighters and Norway used them and German aircraft. The list goes on.

This is the beginning and with some thought could be quite useful.

 

[inteljoe]

Hmmm.....

You could alternatively create a *.txt file with names based on primary culture/language or some other meta-tag. And have it choose a random name from the *.txt file.

Another possibility to expand on what you are saying is that a country could "purchase" the right to build a particular unit's blueprint (either the latest variant or being able to choose certain variants). But they can still research the tech they have (ie, Light Tank I).

- Poland purchases Panzer III from Germany, now they can build Panzer III tanks (but also the "Light Tank I" and other variants they have).
- This can be done as trade for x Oil for x Months or something of the sorts we have seen from the WWW's.

This can create a bit of immersion as countries now can purchase actual units (including variants/upgrades) rather than spend time on there own. Also for Major's, you can disrupt enemy fighting a "minor" nation by supply the minor nations with advanced designs they can produce on there own (assuming they have the resources) in addition to giving them actual stock from the originator's production line.

 

[Caesar15]

Good idea. Would fit for a lot of minors, not all of them though. However, wouldn't it be better to give the country who's tank is being liscened a choice in the matter?

 

[LostinSpice]

Good idea. Would fit for a lot of minors, not all of them though. However, wouldn't it be better to give the country who's tank is being liscened a choice in the matter?

Thought about that long and hard. If each nation's tanks were different in their vanilla form then yes, but as each tank name is really just flavour I feel a named tank is simply better flavour than 'Medium Tank 2' with a generic icon. As there's no money the transaction gives the host nation a small benefit in experience. This could be a minor nation as well, Netherlands, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungry, Canada and Sweden are good examples of countries that could be hosts for one of two items of equipment.

Lend Lease would be separate to this and carry on as is.

Using this system a minor nation could look slightly different every game but still look credible as they would be using historic kit.

 

[Caesar15]

Thought about that long and hard. If each nation's tanks were different in their vanilla form then yes, but as each tank name is really just flavour I feel a named tank is simply better flavour than 'Medium Tank 2' with a generic icon. As there's no money the transaction gives the host nation a small benefit in experience. This could be a minor nation as well, Netherlands, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungry, Canada and Sweden are good examples of countries that could be hosts for one of two items of equipment.

Lend Lease would be separate to this and carry on as is.

Gameplay wise it makes sense you wouldn't need to have permission but it would be kinda weird if some axis nation is getting British tanks or something similar.

 

[Denkt]

I think you should be able to choose the picture used like you can do with divisions. You can rename equipment with the model system.

 

[Caesar15]

I remember in Hoi3 minors would get tanks chosen for them. For example as republican Spain I got soviet tanks before and after I joined the Comintern.

 

[LostinSpice]

Gameplay wise it makes sense you wouldn't need to have permission but it would be kinda weird if some axis nation is getting British tanks or something similar.

Maybe, but Romania used French tanks and the Soviets used British and American tanks (admittedly lend lease).

If your nation had the equipment slot filled then you couldn't change it, this idea is for those empty slots. Like Germany's Grossakrctor - Heavy Tank AA 1.

 

[LostinSpice]

I think you should be able to choose the picture used like you can do with divisions. You can rename equipment with the model system.

Actually this would work very well and is in it's self a great idea.

 

[agus92]

I think that we should be able to choose to develop or license your equipment. License should cost an arm and a leg, but it would get us the opportunity to arm ourselves fast and with good tech. Developing our own stuff should be much more cost effective, but at the expense of time and quality.

Of course, for this to work, the game should track the quality of engineering of every nation.

 

[mdw1985]

I think that we should be able to choose to develop or license your equipment. License should cost an arm and a leg, but it would get us the opportunity to arm ourselves fast and with good tech. Developing our own stuff should be much more cost effective, but at the expense of time and quality.

Of course, for this to work, the game should track the quality of engineering of every nation.

Quality of engineering of every nation...i really like this idea!!!

 

[LostinSpice]

The AI would be influenced by the relationship with the other countries, so for example, a Russian influenced Latvia would go for their kit and Finland could seek German kit.

 

[Amur_Tiger]

This was discussed a bit in the lend-lease and technology transfer threads where there was some feeling against whole transfers of tech from one nation to another, in particular due to the potential gameyness of using tech transfers to get around tech year restrictions.

I'm of the view that barring a few extraordinary tech transfers ( namely British tech to the US in exchange for lend-lease equipment ) most technology transfer should apply to specific variants which should, at a cost, permit the buying country to build a specific model of aircraft/ship/tank/gun/etc with all XP related to that equipment going back to the maker of that variant.

 

[LostinSpice]

This was discussed a bit in the lend-lease and technology transfer threads where there was some feeling against whole transfers of tech from one nation to another, in particular due to the potential gameyness of using tech transfers to get around tech year restrictions.

I'm of the view that barring a few extraordinary tech transfers ( namely British tech to the US in exchange for lend-lease equipment ) most technology transfer should apply to specific variants which should, at a cost, permit the buying country to build a specific model of aircraft/ship/tank/gun/etc with all XP related to that equipment going back to the maker of that variant.

My idea is not a tech transfer but more flavour. The receiving country still has to research the kit as if it were their own. The host country gets a small amount of experience for the transaction. The main aim of my idea is to remove the equipment gaps so many countries have and retain the flavour of the game the devs are trying to instill.

This concept would allow the devs to leave gaps in equipment slots if they can't be filled and removes forever the dreaded generic 'Heavy tank 1 or Tactical Bomber 1940' Yuck! What nation calls their stuff that once in production? Better to have Grosstractor and JU88 for example.

 

[agus92]

This was discussed a bit in the lend-lease and technology transfer threads where there was some feeling against whole transfers of tech from one nation to another, in particular due to the potential gameyness of using tech transfers to get around tech year restrictions.

I'm of the view that barring a few extraordinary tech transfers ( namely British tech to the US in exchange for lend-lease equipment ) most technology transfer should apply to specific variants which should, at a cost, permit the buying country to build a specific model of aircraft/ship/tank/gun/etc with all XP related to that equipment going back to the maker of that variant.

I'm completely behind your approach. I think lend lease/licenses should not only regard aesthetics, it should affect combat gameplay, and therefore should be considered a major factor in diplomacy (as it was).

 

[Amur_Tiger]

My idea is not a tech transfer but more flavour. The receiving country still has to research the kit as if it were their own. The host country gets a small amount of experience for the transaction. The main aim of my idea is to remove the equipment gaps so many countries have and retain the flavour of the game the devs are trying to instill.

This concept would allow the devs to leave gaps in equipment slots if they can't be filled and removes forever the dreaded generic 'Heavy tank 1 or Tactical Bomber 1940' Yuck! What nation calls their stuff that once in production? Better to have Grosstractor and JU88 for example.

I understand your focus, I'm simply underscoring my own thoughts about a fairly closely related concept that gets more into the mechanical guts of the game. Personally I'm against making the names 'transferable' as it precludes or if not obscures the possibility for effective technology sharing through production licences for specific variants.

I'm much more concerned in allowing Canada to produce Sherman M4A1s on license then insuring that every tank has a nice name, nations that lack historical examples and thus names for 'medium tank 1944' can simply pull a random feliformia to produce a suitably intimidating name.

I'm completely behind your approach. I think lend lease/licenses should not only regard aesthetics, it should affect combat gameplay, and therefore should be considered a major factor in diplomacy (as it was).

Yeah, given that this is a clash of opposing alliances the ability to provide support back and forth either for free or for compensation would add a lot to the game. I've even thought that using the same system of transferring variants for production you could instead opt for providing say shermans directly for 6 months from 2 military factories ( thus removing those factories from being able to produce for your own armies ). Thus factory-months become a reasonable method of shifting materiel between allies without having to count individual guns or planes, though for naval ships going back to counting individual ships may be preferred due to the long build times of a ship.

There's also room for handing over completed units ( as seen with the handing out of 1942 light fleet carriers to so many nations ) with this. In all cases the diplomacy options would start with selecting a variant to offer, then either leaving it as that in offering licensed production ( unlimited I think to avoid too much confusion ) with options to offer production as well ( removing the tech transfer aspect ) and then direct offers produced equipment. The neat thing about this is that given the stockpiling nature of tanks, infantry weapons and support weapons it's possible to move all of these things around without dealing with the awkwardness of 'disbanding' a unit which would have been pretty much unheard of. Though I do wonder if naval ships will be stockpiled in the same fashion, left in stock until you choose to 'work up' the produced ship with a crew.

 

[LostinSpice]

I understand your focus, I'm simply underscoring my own thoughts about a fairly closely related concept that gets more into the mechanical guts of the game. Personally I'm against making the names 'transferable' as it precludes or if not obscures the possibility for effective technology sharing through production licences for specific variants.

I'm much more concerned in allowing Canada to produce Sherman M4A1s on license then insuring that every tank has a nice name, nations that lack historical examples and thus names for 'medium tank 1944' can simply pull a random feliformia to produce a suitably intimidating name.



Yeah, given that this is a clash of opposing alliances the ability to provide support back and forth either for free or for compensation would add a lot to the game. I've even thought that using the same system of transferring variants for production you could instead opt for providing say shermans directly for 6 months from 2 military factories ( thus removing those factories from being able to produce for your own armies ). Thus factory-months become a reasonable method of shifting materiel between allies without having to count individual guns or planes, though for naval ships going back to counting individual ships may be preferred due to the long build times of a ship.

There's also room for handing over completed units ( as seen with the handing out of 1942 light fleet carriers to so many nations ) with this. In all cases the diplomacy options would start with selecting a variant to offer, then either leaving it as that in offering licensed production ( unlimited I think to avoid too much confusion ) with options to offer production as well ( removing the tech transfer aspect ) and then direct offers produced equipment. The neat thing about this is that given the stockpiling nature of tanks, infantry weapons and support weapons it's possible to move all of these things around without dealing with the awkwardness of 'disbanding' a unit which would have been pretty much unheard of. Though I do wonder if naval ships will be stockpiled in the same fashion, left in stock until you choose to 'work up' the produced ship with a crew.

I think both ideas above are very good, mine just adds flavour whilst the other goes into more depth which is even better. I would support both options if they were added to the game.

 

[AlfredMV]

I believe you can name your equipment whatever you want. Also, being able to give any country experience to just use the name of their tank is pretty ridiculous. Light tank 1 is just as powerful as any nations light tank, even tho it's not named. Giving experience for a name is very gamey. I could choose to buff Germany or Italy or whoever rapidly before the war to give them the advantage, all by using their name. The lend lease giving experience makes sense because they must produce and donate equipment, but even then they might not get experience if it never goes to war or if it gets destroyed quickly.

There's also modding names and pictures without changing the checksum. It's super simple and you can completely customize every nation you want.

I don't really understand the point of this thread. It seems to ask for a feature that nearly does nothing except give free experience.

Now I'm not saying the license idea is bad or that I don't want it. I'm saying what you're asking for doesn't make much sense. The ability to license a piece of equipment (that you've already researched) that's highly upgraded with experience and specific manufacturer makes sense but still might not fit the rest of the game. In fact being able to outsource to another countries manufacturer would be pretty cool.