Warlords of China complete!

[techumseh]

Originally posted by fairline
Right, settling down to another game with the new version. You made it harder!

Yes, I did, but also more interesting, I hope. AGRICOLA had the original scenario beat six ways from seven, so I did add some stuff, mostly minor warlord events, using barbarians. I did manage to beat it myself as the Koumintang, so it can be done by a mere mortal.

The KMT is slower at the start, but picks up steam once a few key arms deals have been researched. The 4 warlord civs start quicker, but are harder to actually win.

There's a problem with the sound format of the wav for building a temple. Is it cathedral.wav? If so, there are two identically named cathedral.wavs in the zip for the scenario....

Use the one with Cathedrl capitalized. I guess when I replaced the sound files, the new one was capitalized and the old one wasn't, so it wasn't overwritten.

Enjoy and good luck!

[Dr Kellogg]

I don't have much free time at the moment but I've begun as Fengtien Faction.
The first turns were a little bit exhausting but it's getting more and more exciting. We're in the 20's now.

Only a few foreign troops and engines have reached China so far, so the battles are still balanced. The warlords concentrate on taking Barbarian Cities and so do I.

I have just taken Peiping but the counter-attacks are heavy! I expect problems with the mighty Kwantung Army as well...

[fairline]

It's much more difficult than the playtest! I'm playing as the KMT and I'm able to expand initially with liberal useage of Chiang's persuasive powers; arty seems less use now, even with veterancy - did you reduce their stats?

To stay in the arms race game I've had to max out science at the expense of income and mass rebellion. Every city has to be starved to maintain order and I'm relying on income from coastal fortress sale and bribes from Warlord civs to survive. Building new units is not an option and my early expansion is stalled as I reach the limit of garrison units I stated with. Relief comes in the form of White Russian mercs and I can expand again. I'd recommend researching White Russian aid above all else initially; you're rewarded with 2 lots of potential garrison infantry and those splendid armoured trains.....

I'd aim to eradicate the rival Warlord civs at the earliest opportunity Dr K, as that will remove the posibility of them researching arms deliveries that you want first.

BTW Tech, the sound problem is such that the wav used for building a new temple is an unrecognised format in-game. I get a mesage telling me this rather than a sound

[techumseh]

Yes, the artillery and mortar units were both dropped 1 AF.

Both Cathedrl wavs? Here's one that works:

[Patine]

Tech, could you please zip that .wav file. My browser insists instead on trying to play it, or, when I right-click and save, it wants to save the webpage. I've had this trouble before with posted .wav files. If you could, it'd be appreciated.

[typhoon]

Left click, follow to the webpage, then click Skip.

[Patine]

That's what I did, but it instead wanted to play it. May be because RealPlayer's my default .wav player. Could that be?

[AGRICOLA]

Finally back on-line AND with DSL.

I have been playing the Fengtien faction and got the 15 objectives in Jan 28, Turn 70. At present, May '28, I've got the Barbs reduced to 2 cities and, as matter of principle, am scheming to completely wipe out the communists.

The scen has played very, very well. The Fengtien are unexpectedly but definitely by far the easiest faction to play because they are the only faction to have a barracks. The barracks, together with Sun Tzu in Keijo (Kwantung), make for an irresistible combination.

I might add that I don't see how the Kwantung can win; they cannot build Mortars, the only offensive unit which can both be built and can ignore city walls. IMHO, the other 4 warlord factions appear to be winnable.

This is a superbly crafted scenario with many of the surprises which techumseh always seems to manage to dream up. Trying to capture western China is somewhat like disturbing a nest of fire ants; it can be a very painful experience.

Great scen!

[fairline]

Just to add some mere-mortal balance, I'm at July '27 and still have 34 barb cities left in China-proper, not counting those in Manchuria. I've destroyed my rival warlords bar the Fengtien faction though. As for the Communists, I've let them get out of hand and the buggers have dozens of units spread liberally across China. If I take them on now I'm in for a nasty shock I fear

I like the new events mobilising barb regional armies; nice touch I didn't like the new Shanghai event with those pesky Tong gangster assassins however They're too strong by far - I lost both my armoured trains and a Soviet advisor after their missile attacks, which seems a bit harsh to me. Who ever heard of a Tong gangster assassinating an armoured train? I replayed with their attack values halved, which was more than sufficient for them to destroy Warlord infantry or White Russians, and still infilct serious damage to my trains.

As John says, great scenario

BTW, I get the same probem as Patine with the wav. Any chance of a zip please?

[techumseh]

Geeze. You guys are better than me. That's just one more reason to have good playtesters.

Here's a zip of the sound. To convert sounds, I use the standard sound recorder that comes with windows under accessories/entertainment. The correct format is PCM 22.050 kHz, 8 Bit, Mono (or Stereo). It's easy.

[AGRICOLA]

Doing well with Fengtien is no big deal, and playing it is certainly no indicator of the difficulty of playing the other factions. With barracks in Hsinking, from the start one can disband unneeded units to IRB vet mortars. With these, it is not difficult to conquer the surrounding Barb cities. In turn, these cities can build more executioners and warlord inf. and use these to IRB more vet mortars. With about 20 mortars one can then overwhelm the Kwantung cities in Korea and capture Sun Tzu. After that, with all built units being vets and the barracks allowing quick repair of units damaged near the RR's, Fengtien has a pretty easy time of it.

Originally posted by fairline
I didn't like the new Shanghai event with those pesky Tong gangster assassins however They're too strong by far - I lost both my armoured trains and a Soviet advisor after their missile attacks, which seems a bit harsh to me. Who ever heard of a Tong gangster assassinating an armoured train?

My very suspicious mind went into overdrive when tech mentioned in an earlier post that Shanghai would be a tough nut to crack. Ruefully only too aware of his ability to sucker punch unwary players, I did try to occupy as many squares as possible around the city to block the spawning of nasties. The idea was good but my execution was abysmal . When the city was captured, one tong killer not only managed to spawn but also to put a big hole in an armored locomotive.

[techumseh]

I'm glad you're finding it interesting, if not difficult. I didn't know there was a barracks in Hsinking. It's a relic of the scenario's development, rather than a conscious design element. I'll fix it. Don't use it anymore.

On the Green Gang in Shanghai: Historically, this powerful underworld gang was bribed by Chiang Kai-shek to kill his own supporters and allies - the left-wing leadership of the Koumintang (associates of Sun Yat-sen, who had died 2 years earlier), Communists and trade unionists. They first lulled them into dropping their guard with offers of cooperation, then massacred them when their guard was down. A great depiction of this is contained in the Jet Li movie "Once Upon a Time in China - III"

So, to Fairline - It's not the Tong attacking the armored trains with pistols and daggers. It's the Tong inviting the officers to a dinner, and killing them in a time honored Chinese manner. So don't fiddle with the attack factors - the scenario is easy enough as it is.

[AGRICOLA]

I didn't know there was a barracks in Hsinking. It's a relic of the scenario's development, rather than a conscious design element. I'll fix it. Don't use it anymore.

Me and my big mouth.

[fairline]

Originally posted by techumseh
So, to Fairline - It's not the Tong attacking the armored trains with pistols and daggers. It's the Tong inviting the officers to a dinner, and killing them in a time honored Chinese manner. So don't fiddle with the attack factors - the scenario is easy enough as it is.

Too late, I already did

I must say that all other unit's stats are perfectly balanced; I had some initial reservations about the arty attack, but they're still useful against weaker cities once they're veteran. I'm into the mid-30's now and I still have 4 cities to gain just to achieve a marginal victory, so I guess that's perfectly balanced too for an average player (ie not Agri!) on his first play through.

Playing as the KMT into the 30's got progressively easier and more enjoyable as I had some developed cities with armouries producing garrison units for newly conquered cities and researched a few bomber deliveries. The changes in events and difficulty level since the playtest version have made this the best scenario I've played in a long while - good job sir!

I've struggled to find any faults (other than those damned Tong bastards - I don't care if CK-S used 'em to massacre his allies! LOL). There are a couple of bugs I've noticed other than the sound problem:

- the Breguet bomber has no sound
- Sichuan province is mis-spelled ' scihuan' in events.
- Should the T-28 tank be a T-26? If not, I have a T-28 graphic if you want to use it.

All in all a superb scenario. Did I mention I love the sounds btw? They create an excellent atmosphere.

[techumseh]

Good points.

1) Kwantung Army not having mortars. I will try giving the Japanese artillery the 'ignore city walls' flag, and see if this improves their performance. They are not meant for play, otherwise this would flip play balance too far in their favor.

2) The Breguet not having sound. I have no idea why the unit in this slot won't play it's assigned sound. I've tried to fix it, but can't.

3) T-26 or T28. Yes, it should be T-26. The graphic is correct. The T-28 was a failed multi-turreted heavy tank that looks cool, but was never exported.

4) Various spellings. Will be fixed whenever reports are recieved.

5) Background music. I made 3 clips of Chinese music, each ~ 30 seconds long. I set events to play them every 3 turns, then gave the second event a 1 turn delay and the third event a 2 turn delay. The result is that they play in rotation, a different one each turn.

If you get tired of them, just rename the wav files. They are Warlords 1 to 3.

Thanks for the suggestions.