the Future of Arsenal of Democracy

[Fürstbischof]

That's a good idea! I was thinking about this last night and thought of something similar, where a player places the fort then clicks on 3 provinces they want the fort to face. Then I would use the proposed solution for saving/storing what provinces the fort faces. But your proposal is much more simple. Here's what we could do:

1. When the level 1 fort is complete, it would be a reddish color, denoting that the fort's directions have not been set.
2. Any more progress (levels) on the fort will be halted until the fort's directions have been set.
3. To set the fort's direction, we use your proposal where the player clicks on the fort then is prompted to select an adjacent province.
4. Once the player selects a province, the code would get the two adjacent provinces to it that are also adjacent to the province that the fort is in.
5. The code then "locks" the player province choice, so no changes can be made. We don't want the player to have the ability to change a fort's direction later.
6. Now progress can be resumed on the fort, leveling it up 10.

Just read about your ideas to revise landforts. Yes, I concur that a change is overly due. I really like your ideas, I'm just suggesting a minor change to your proposal to take larger, remote, and almost isolated provinces into account.

At best a fortification system could defend half of the borderline of its province. Therefore I'm in favour of revising their usefulness and also cutting their build costs. A fort should thus face never more than 30-50% of its neighbouring provinces, with a minimum of 1 to prevent edge cases. Additionally there could be an upper limit of 3 or 4 neighbouring provinces, in case there are more than 8 neighbouring provinces, to prevent gameyness.

This will come along with a minor revision of the province layout. Since the transfer of provincial AA into a movable AA division/brigade is planned (or already done?), we can now also remove the number of landforts, so that we can use the emptied space to increase the width of the window listing the connections to neighbouring provinces. Then we'd move the type of 'crossing' (river or not) to the left side of this window and leave enough space for a two digit number representing the fort strength facing this province (or the other way around) before the name of the neighbouring province. This might allow even longer province names than before which improves readability. Construction can only be ordered if the direction the fort should face is given.

TBH, this will probably work, but I prefer a simpler way: each fort faces only 1 province. (this takes also build commands in events into account, which are somewhat limited) The build cost should be cut severely, but we might consider to introduce increased build costs for the higher levels to represent more sophisticated defense systems - this should be also considered for coastal forts.

Things would be easier if the connections to neighbouring provinces would actually be listed clockwise and not by province number. Then we could automate the orientation of fortification systems. Luckily, clicking on provinces will work, too!

 

[Fürstbischof]

The other iron cross extras we should, at least, look into:

• Block Supply Depots - If AoD is automatically moving supply depots and it's a concern to players, then we should look at doing something similar. I would implement a Lock Supply Depot option on the Province pop-up menu.
• Besieged Capital - This is something we should look at since surrounding an enemy capital without taking it and letting the enemy units shrivel up and die, is exploiting the game a bit too much. I would use the same logic as they do but also add a penalty to the country, or countries if they are allied and control a province(s) that is besieging the enemy capital.

The dependency of your army upon the sole supply center in your capital is something which has bothered me ever since. Why can we not move away from this simplification which only invites gameyness?

Why not define already in the scenario files a number of national supply hubs, which are located in major industrial areas, e.g. the Ruhr. Yes, this effectively means, that all resources are placed on the map in depots. If we want to cut the enemy army off from its supplies, we'll have to destroy them directly or the source of their production or hamper the distribution to the units at the front. Direct your war effort at the enemy's weak spots and wear them down!

re: supply depots
It'd be nice if we'd place (movable) strategic supply depots far in the hinterland for each army group.

 

[Czarina Julie]

The fort logic and possibly even the province AA might have to wait until 1.14 map release. The fort logic will take some time to do (code, test, tweak).

Why not define already in the scenario files a number of national supply hubs, which are located in major industrial areas, e.g. the Ruhr. Yes, this effectively means, that all resources are placed on the map in depots. If we want to cut the enemy army off from its supplies, we'll have to destroy them directly or the source of their production or hamper the distribution to the units at the front. Direct your war effort at the enemy's weak spots and wear them down!

I like this idea and it's a bit more simple than the Block Supply Depot and Besieged Capital logic. We could:

• Create a new division/unit called Supply Depot
• The Supply Depot would be able to move on its own but with a speed no more than 1 (like the older garrison units did) or 2.
• Players could create as many as they like. However, we could use buildtime to hold down the ability to spam them. Additionally, the more they produce, the less that each Supply Depot has available.
• Since unit resupply consists of fuel (oil), food, water, ammo (supplies), and replacements (manpower), then creating a new division/unit that already has these 3 resources would be easy. So a Supply Unit would be able to have thousands of oil, supplies, and manpower that divisions would be resupplied from.
• Of the 6 resources that a country can have, 3 (oil, supplies, & manpower) would be split between the Country (capital) and whatever Supply Depots have been deployed. The Energy, Rare, and metal would stay as Country resources. Daily incomes of oil, supplies, and manpower would be distributed among the Country and Supply Depots evenly.

All of these would mean that country would now have to protect its supply depots, post them in or near naval ports to resupply their navies, near on in airbase provinces, and even have to manually ship depots overseas.

 

[Hopekeeper]

The fort logic and possibly even the province AA might have to wait until 1.14 map release. The fort logic will take some time to do (code, test, tweak).


I like this idea and it's a bit more simple than the Block Supply Depot and Besieged Capital logic. We could:

• Create a new division/unit called Supply Depot
• The Supply Depot would be able to move on its own but with a speed no more than 1 (like the older garrison units did) or 2.
• Players could create as many as they like. However, we could use buildtime to hold down the ability to spam them. Additionally, the more they produce, the less that each Supply Depot has available.
• Since unit resupply consists of fuel (oil), food, water, ammo (supplies), and replacements (manpower), then creating a new division/unit that already has these 3 resources would be easy. So a Supply Unit would be able to have thousands of oil, supplies, and manpower that divisions would be resupplied from.
• Of the 6 resources that a country can have, 3 (oil, supplies, & manpower) would be split between the Country (capital) and whatever Supply Depots have been deployed. The Energy, Rare, and metal would stay as Country resources. Daily incomes of oil, supplies, and manpower would be distributed among the Country and Supply Depots evenly.

All of these would mean that country would now have to protect its supply depots, post them in or near naval ports to resupply their navies, near on in airbase provinces, and even have to manually ship depots overseas.

Hi Czarina Julie!

Great variant of improving the game. I have some thoughts on it as well, and may I share those with you.

Overall, I think it would be more complex, but more realistic, to split such kind of division to 3 separate ones: Supply Depots, Regional/District Training Centers and Fuel Silos. The reasons to do so are below with more details.

1. Supply depots.

Overall proposed logic: Current Supply number shown in above the map string would represent all supplies available in all Supply depots (described below). Only supplies (and fuel in lower-level depots) will be used by this type of depots.​

​

- Huge Country/Frontline Supply Depots (either a provincial building or a division unit with 0 speed, only could be moved through "Strategic redeploy") - to simulate the biggest depots, with underground storage or mass amount of buildings used for storage.​

Could have, say, 20 thousands supply capacity. Can be build only a certain number maximum.​

If used as a province building, we can have 5 levels of it, each increasing max capacity a little (i.e. 5 000). If used as a division - can have some brigade attachment with the same effect - brigade will add some max capacity, with each new brigade level - even more max capacity.​

All IC-produced, traded or event-procured supplies will split accordingly between this type depots.​

​

- Army/Corps-level Supply Depots (only as a division type with 1 or 2 level speed). Will simulate the backbone of moving army.​

Could have like 2 or 5 thousands supply capacity and 1 or 2 thousands fuel capacity. These will be used to resupply neighboring units.​

Also can be equipped with brigades for garrisoning and defense (Light Infantry, Static Anti-Air, Engineers for fortifications), capacity increase (maybe also Engineers) and Supply delivery improvement (for quicker or more Supply delivery to units). Will get supplies from nearest Country/Frontline Depot.​

​

This depot could be "specific" - contains only branch-specific supplies (Artillery, Armor, All Infantry, Aircrafts, Ships, Submarines etc) and will only supply its specific units. This option is, I suppose, next-level difficult in terms of game implementation and gameplay. So it's rather just a thought to look forward.​

2. Fuel silos.

Overall proposed logic: Current Fuel number shown in above the map string would represent all supplies available in all Fuel silos and Army/Corps Supply depots (described below).​

​

- Regional Fuel Silos (a provincial building) - to simulate the biggest silos with fuels stored.​

Could have, say, 10 thousands supply capacity. Can be build only a certain number maximum.​

If used as a province building, we can have 5 levels of it, each increasing max capacity a little (i.e. 5 000).​

All IC-produced, traded or event-procured supplies will split accordingly between this type depots.​

​

After stored in Regional Fuel Silos, fuel will then go to Army/Corps-level Supply Depots and after that to units in need.​

​

3. Regional/District Training Centers.

Overall proposed logic: In real life, not all eligible manpower in country (say, men, 18-45) are sent to divisions on its' creation time. Firstly, they serve at training centers, take some experience, and then they will be sent to their units to frontline.​

That's why, I propose to make a new provincial building, Regional/District Training Centers, where all available manpower would go first.​

It could train, say, 5 000 men at once. With each new building level add +1 000 men to train, 10 levels max (15 000 men at once at max level).​

Unit production will take manpower from these Training centers, and then they will get it from country manpower pool. Full 5 000 men would need to train, say, 3 months, each 1 000+ men building level would require additional 5 to 10 days to fully train.​

If province with Training center will be lost to enemy, there will be no trained men in it for him, and original owner will not lost those men (they will be back to country manpower pool), but he will need to start training from beginning.​

​

This centers could be "specific" - providing only branch-specific training (Artillery, Armor, Generic Infantry, Mountaineers, Airborne, Fighters, Bombers, Naval Bombing, Capital Ships, Escort Ships, Carriers, Submarines etc) and will only be used for manpower for its specific units. This option is, I suppose, next-level difficult in terms of game implementation and gameplay. So it's rather just a thought to look forward.​

​

Also, regarding Manpower - can we get some game mechanics like Officers needed for Units commanding?
Not the generals, who commands Corps/Armies, but Junior officers/NCOs. Let's say, there is a need of THIS percentage of Officers among the total Manpower, used in Division to have full Organization. If Unit does not have enough Officers, it could get either combat penalties or org loss.
Officers could be trained in Military Academies (provincial building), used some amount from country manpower pool and trained there for 1/2-1 year.

This academies could be "specific" - providing only branch-specific Officers (Artillery, Armor, All Infantry, Fighters, Bombers, Naval Aircrafts, Capital Ships, Escort Ships, Carriers, Submarines etc) and will only be used for its specific units. This option is, I suppose, next-level difficult in terms of game implementation and gameplay. So it's rather just a thought to look forward.

Nevertheless, I once more greatly thanks all AoD 1.13 team for providing us with new exciting features updates!

 

[Czarina Julie]

Hopekeeper,
A bit more complex but I like the main idea you have, a tier down approach. Firstly, I must state that this wouldn't make it into the 1.13 release but should be highly considered for the 1.14 release. I would also like to lose some detail due to the code effort and it slowing down the game a bit. So summarizing your ideas and coming from a coding perspective, let's discuss this more in depth.

1. Front (level) Supply Depots - These would be provincial depots because strategic redeployment of a unit doesn't allow it to strategically redeploy overseas. They would pull supplies from the national resource supply pool. Maximum allowable supply stockpile could either be done by allowing only 1 Front Supply Depot with a maximum supply stockpile set high or allow 1-10 (or 5 as you mention) level Front Supply Depot with each level increasing the maximum supply stockpile by X amount. Whichever way we want to go, they both would take about the same time coding. How we implement this, is something that everyone needs to voice their opinion. Me, I'm for your suggestion of using levels.
2. Regional (level) Fuel Depots - These would also be provincial depots that pull oil from the national resource oil pool. They would use the same logic as Front Supply Depots.
3. Army Depots - These would be the units (divisions) that would have the slow speed of 1 or 2 to simulate the effort to relocate an Army Depot IRL.

This centers could be "specific" - providing only branch-specific training (Artillery, Armor, Generic Infantry, Mountaineers, Airborne, Fighters, Bombers, Naval Bombing, Capital Ships, Escort Ships, Carriers, Submarines etc) and will only be used for manpower for its specific units. This option is, I suppose, next-level difficult in terms of game implementation and gameplay. So it's rather just a thought to look forward.

I really couldn't see this one happening from a coding effort and slower game play. It would be a huge coding effort. I even thought of limiting these by having naval, land, and air depots but I would still be concerned about gameplay.

Also, regarding Manpower - can we get some game mechanics like Officers needed for Units commanding?
Not the generals, who commands Corps/Armies, but Junior officers/NCOs. Let's say, there is a need of THIS percentage of Officers among the total Manpower, used in Division to have full Organization.

The 1.13 land doctrines do address this a bit with the 1905 Leadership Initiative technology and its Non-Comissioned Officer Initiatives and Platoon & Company Commander Initiatives components. DH even has a bit with their 1907 by orders and Leading by task. In 1.13 we have the 1905 Top Down Leadership and 1905 Leadership Initiative respectively.

We could add some formal schooling for NCOs but it would be limited between the years 1900 - 1960. Pretty much everyone knows I'm retired US Army and the NCO Professional Development Schools didn't encompass much until the later 1960s. When I was in, we had PLDC (Primary Leadership & Development Course) which were for non-combat MOS' (Military Occupation Specialty) that eventually merged into the other primary school, PNCOC (Primary NCO Course). PLDC/PNCO was for new sergeants, corporals, and specialist 4. In total there were 5 NCO courses (PNCOC, BNCOC, ANCOC, First Sergeant Academy, and the Sergeant Major Academy) and the Battle Staff NCO for Staff Sergeants promotable and above (usually Master Sergeants).

If Unit does not have enough Officers, it could get either combat penalties or org loss.
Officers could be trained in Military Academies (provincial building), used some amount from country manpower pool and trained there for 1/2-1 year.

The problem would be the resources (memory and coding) to track the NCOs and Officers of each unit and the IRL doctrines that a nation implements. The memory issue is tracking 2 more stats (NCOs, Officers) for each unit and then tracking their replacements through training and military academies. The national doctrines of a nation would need to be tracked also, since some majors use a top-down leadership approach (Soviets, both Chinas, Imperial Japan, Warsaw Pact). So these nations would an advantage over the nations that use imitative styled doctrines (USA, UK, France, NATO) or new logic is created for the top-down leadership nations that reduce, more than normal, the readiness of a unit due to lost of their leaders. A good example is how the individual soldier in NATO was/is trained compared to the same in the Warsaw Pact/Soviet/Russian doctrine armies. Just one simple thing, leaders...in NATO the priority is enemy leaders through hitting Command, Control, and Communication centers all the way down to soldiers targeting APCs, vehicles, etc. that have multiple antennas or directing troops on the battlefield.

All said and done, I really like your tier down approach and especially the combination of front level depots being provincial assets with the mobile army depot units. We should see what others think and get it schedule for the 1.14 if it's something they want.

 

[Hopekeeper]

Thanks for your extensive reply!

Your proposed structure for 3-level depots sounds good for me.

Front (level) Supply Depots - These would be provincial depots because strategic redeployment of a unit doesn't allow it to strategically redeploy overseas. They would pull supplies from the national resource supply pool. Maximum allowable supply stockpile could either be done by allowing only 1 Front Supply Depot with a maximum supply stockpile set high or allow 1-10 (or 5 as you mention) level Front Supply Depot with each level increasing the maximum supply stockpile by X amount. Whichever way we want to go, they both would take about the same time coding. How we implement this, is something that everyone needs to voice their opinion. Me, I'm for your suggestion of using levels.

Building with 10 max levels, each increasing the maximum supply stockpile is, probably, the most common variant. It would be good to set some limit of those buildings by number of countries provinces or states (or just allow placing it 1 in state).

I really couldn't see this one happening from a coding effort and slower game play. It would be a huge coding effort. I even thought of limiting these by having naval, land, and air depots but I would still be concerned about gameplay.

As I mentioned - I understood, that it could provide a lot of unnecessary coding and thus I put it only as an idea, just to think about it

Regarding Officers. Maybe, I didn't explain it as I thought. I mean, there could be another Manpower-like stat in Units to represent NCOs and Junior Officers (Sergeants, Lieutenants, Captains etc) that actually command smaller combat groups inside Divisions (Sections, Platoons, Companies, Battalions).
They will not be selectable as Generals/Field Marshals currently are, just some amount of them would be needed to build a Division.
They could behave the same, as regular Manpower do, so they can take casualties, which need to be replaced.
And when there are not enough Officers, the Division will be operated worse, with some penalties to, say, time between attacks, attack/defense efficiency, organization etc.
To separate them from regular Manpower, I proposed Academies.
We can simplify it just to buildings, where regular Manpower will be used and some amount of Officers will be added to newly created Officers Pool, from where it will be distributed to Units in production or Recovery, as currently regular Manpower does.
As you propose, different Doctrines (and Units, of course) will require different amount of officers. The more officers would be used in Unit, the more bonuses it could get.

All said and done, I really like your tier down approach and especially the combination of front level depots being provincial assets with the mobile army depot units. We should see what others think and get it schedule for the 1.14 if it's something they want.

I hope these suggestions of mine will find acceptance among other players, and together we can think about the best version of implementing such a concept for 1.14 patch.

 

[VTs]

would it be possible to make a thread with all the proposed/desired/guaranteed ideas for 1.14? I really feel like I am losing the big picture.

( Or maybe it's just me)

 

[Czarina Julie]

I'll start one with what we know will be in the 1.14 release. The initial list can be added to and might contain some 1.13 items that need to be carried over to the 1.14 list