Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

Hi,
I was wondering if there is a possibility of updating the campaign system, maybe for the 2024 patch. Two things stand out to me:
1. I have received feedback regarding my 29th Infantry campaign that casualties that went unreplenished counted "double" in the next scenario, as if the AI destroyed the units again. Assuming this is the case: Would it be possible to change that?
2. It would be cool if the campaign designer had the option of "splitting" a fixed core force.
Some examples of how this could be utilized:
- You start a defensive scenario with only one platoon of your core company of the map, the rest arrive later as delayed reinforcements (so far only possible with aux troops) in order to save the day.
- You have a campaign where the player's core force consists of two different units, for example one paratrooper unit and one infantry unit. Depending on the success of the paratroopers, the next scenario, where you play as the infantry, is switched to a harder or easier variant. Maybe they managed to take out an artillery battery and the enemy has less offmap artillery to work with in the next scenario.

Would that be technically possible?

Re: Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

I will deal with point #1 for now but I need more detail...... you were given feedback but what battle in the campaign was this ? There are 16 individual scenarios. The campaign code goes back a long way and we have not made any adjustments to it that I know of in ages and I do not recall ever hearing that casualties were being counted twice so more details are needed to investigate this.

So... to be clear...... the player had taken casualties but had not rebuilt the units and in the next battle, the losses were carried over a second time?

How did whoever reported this know that unless they did not take many casualties in that next battle? That is really something a saved game is needed to investigate. It's hard to fix something without the evidence

Re: Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

Yes, hence my careful wording. I am not 100% sure this is even the case.
This is what SASTroop wrote a while back in the 29th Infantry thread:
"i) One more flaw, but I am unsure of this one. Axis gets weird bonus points other than artillery stack throughout most of campaign. I believe Axis benefits from any of my destroyed units even if these were destroyed in prior scenarios. This means that I get penalty for losses over and over and on many occasions I am pushed into draw even though I have clearly scored a minor win. I do not make campaigns though, so I am not sure if works like that;"

Back in 2012 this was also claimed by testers.

Re: Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

I just ran your campaign.... we have a way to generated final battle results without having to play the entire scenario.

NOTE there is a mixture of Decisive, marginal and draws

https://i.imgur.com/51dt6fz.png

The first real battle is a beach assault. I didn't load half the troops so they drowned on start. I fixed some but not all so the campaign always carried US casualties right to the end

The Germans didn't get any "surprise" points at the end of any battle

This was the end screen for battle #10
https://i.imgur.com/dWjOaLR.png

Re: Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

Ok then this is not an issue at all, great!

Re: Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

Maybe.

I need to run a full battle all the way through normally to know 100%.

The "cheat" ending assigns fixed points which may negate any points acquired by the Germans the way you describe giving a false negative

.....It's just a question of finding the time to play out 20 turns....

EDIT

I did play it out but I was letting the AI do most of the work while I did other things and for reasons unknown, I got to the end and saved the game with the intent of seeing how the damaged units carried over and if the German side had unexplained points but I somehow fumbled the save and lost it so now I have to start over.......if anyone else whats to try and can get a save that shows inexplicable points given to the German side then please do.

You will need to make a save game both at the end of that scenario AND the beginning of the next and post both so we can see the end of one and the beginning of the other with these mysteriously added points and debug it if need be.

MANY questions like.......

Was this observed after restarting the game and playing the next battle or was it only seen if one battle was played right after the other...

Re: Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

I did actually try around a bit (currently working on a rework of that campaign). I did not really do it in a "methodical way", but to me the scoring seemed completely fine. So if it actually happened for other people, it probably is not "standard game behaviour", but maybe some kind of weird edge case.

Re: Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

I MAY have found something:

I am testing an updated version of my 29th Infantry campaign right now. This is the situation:

I finished one of the scenarios, took losses but took all the v-hexes. Result is a DV, I get tons of points for the objectives, Jerry gets some points for losses (I assume).

After that I built in a "switch scenario". This is a scenario entirely without combat where the player can choose between two campaign paths. Basically it has a 2 round timer limit and either you hold still or move to take the one Vhex, worth 800 points. The Germans just have some HQ somewhere out of the way.

I finished that scenario by taking the VHex and got a minor victory. I get 800 points, as expected, the Germans also get 100 odd points, despite having inflicted no new casualties. I should add that there are no repair points for this switch scenario, so I still had the same losses as in the one before. Is this the problem described by SAS? Or is there some other mechanic at work? If so, that might explain the confusion some people have regarding the scoring system.

I attached pictures of the end screen.

Re: Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

Could be...129 points for doing nothing is suspicious.... the issue is that 129 points the Germans get does not correspond to anything that happened in the previous scenario. There was no combat in your switch scenario and neither side took casualties

Do you have a save just before the switch scenario you can use then make a simple change to the switch scenario and see if the result changes?

Also, if you switch both ways do the Germans get 129 phantom points both ways ?

Does this switch scenario have only one V hex and did you pile all 21 into that one hex? It's been a while since I placed scenario V hexes but a common error is one left in the top left corner but you've done this many times so it's unlikely but the German side has been given 129 points and the 129 is even more suspicious because it's such an odd number

If you have a pre switch save try the switch again, do the same thing and see if the result is the same each time. If it does not change then try changing the switch scenario in some way then try again

The issue I have with this is if phantom points given to the AI in a campaign was common I would have expected to hear about it more than once in 2 decades

Re: Question about possible changes to campaign system
 

The result stays the same. I checked and there is no phantom objective in the corner. If I don't take the objective, the Germans get 830 points, so only 30 extra.