The Vietnam War development thread

[McMonkey]

Quick question

In the Advanced unit fields section of the rules file can all my new units be added or only normal ones + Extra and Test?
I have added all the units I intend to use and this includes the New Units a-z but I am not sure if the computer will read the extra fields as it only went up to Test Unit 8!

Can every unit have its own sound? Do you just attach a wav. file with a corosponding name?
I.e. If I add a Cobra Gunship can I put Cobra .wav to the left in the @SOUNDS section and add a .wav file in the sounds folder with the same name?

What does: "A) 'tribe may build' mask: 0 - can't; 1 - can" mean?

Cheers

[Patine]

Yes, it'll read ALL units as long as all lines are in the propers format. It will use the appropriate .wav files you list as long as you attach them. And, 'tribe may build' is for establishing unique units to a civ (instead of 'dead' obsolesence techs) going, in reverse notation from right to left barbs, then white through purple civ, with '0' they cannot build the unit, and '1' they can.

[McMonkey]

Thanks

If I had realised that you could do the sounds that way I could have put the units in order a lot easier, my own fault for not looking properly!

The tribe may build bit will make the tech tree a lot easier to do, not so many loose / dead ends!

The game is starting to gather momentum!

[McMonkey]

Invisible units

Another quick question? In General flags it says 00000001 Invisible until attack: 1 - Invisible.

Could someone explain exactly what this means (if possible - sarcasm ) as it sounds like it is the sort of thing that would suite my VC units!

[Boco]

You don't see the unit on the map unless it is involved in combat. If it is 'spotted', its label will show on the status pane during your movement period. The idea is pretty effective, but compulsive players will beat it by moving a unit a square, then right-clicking all adjacent squares, etc. That workaround makes for a boring game, though.

I'd recommend testing it out. You may even want to combined it with the sub flag for stationary units, especially if most of the human units can't see subs.

[McMonkey]

Could be very useful for the hidden VC Bunkers / Tunnels that I intend to include.

Image removed as it looked s*$t!

[McMonkey]

Have just finished editing the terrain values. Thought it would be a quick job but it took ages as all the terrains were mixed up. Ended up resetting everything to 0 and started from scratch. Now that is done I can now crack on with irrigation and improvements. Another screenshot to indicate 'Progress'!

[McMonkey]

And the latest large map. The US have a few Special forces bases and an airbase near Saigon. As the game progresses the US player can build more bases.
You can no longer see the borders but they are marked on the screen of play as black and white border posts and are impassable by the US troops.
As far as I can see so far the concept is still sound and this scenario should be near to the testing stage soon.

What I would need is someone who is willing to do a little bit of hex editing and a volunteer to do a bit of playtesting. If anyone is up for either let me know

[Exile]

Hmmmmmm . . . . .

I'll volunteer to do some testing.

Um, will the USA have helicopter gunships, B52s, aircraft carriers offshore, and tons of 105 mm artillery? We Americans like peace through massively superior firepower.

Westmoreland never seemed to have a solid grip on what was happening, and I've always wanted to see if I could do better. Saw the guy once couple years ago in a roundtable discussion w/former Sec's of State, Ambassadors, and other generals. He seemed clueless. After a few aborted attempts, the moderator quit asking him questions. Possibly he's now senile, but if that was an example of the military intellect in charge of the thing, no wonder it was such a strategic boondoggle.

[McMonkey]

Thanks Exile

I may try and set up some very early testing to see if some of the special units (advisors/choppers etc...) work as they should. This will have a bearing on how the game pans out later on.

At the moment I am Westmoreland but I am trying to be Giap, I'm trying real hard.
An interesting fact about General Westmoreland was that he served as a young artillery officer in the Battle of Huertgen Forest in 1944. This battle cost many American lives for very little gain and was kept quiet by the military. The generals kept sending division after division into the death factory for no clear objective. I wonder if his early experiences could have any bearing on his later running of the US forces in Vietnam?

I find ithe war a fascinating subject. An interesting 'what if' can be found in the fact that the US military believed they had dealt the VC a crippling blow during Tet only to find that public opinion had turned decisively against them just when some sort of victory was within their grasp. Could the US finish off the remnants of the VC and secure the borders had public opinion stayed with them just that bit longer.

Any help you can offer would be appreciated, especially as you are so busy with your own projects at the moment!

Attached pic = Holiday in Cambodia!

[Exile]

Nice graphix. Like the cities especially.

As I understand it, through reading and talking with some of the former soldiers who were incountry, American artillery was the decisive factor in very many actions. American ground units had plenty of firepower, but the ability to call in indirect fire from waaaaaaaaay off was instrumental in very many ways. How you simulate this is your dilemma though. With a map of this scale, I'm at a loss for suggestions. Any American artillery unit from this era would not need to be in an adjacent square to attack. The range was much longer than that. This is undoubtedly why American commanders established firebases full of artillery. Patrols to find 'em, and artillery to break 'em up, kill a good number of 'em, and then move in and mop up.

[Case]

Originally posted by Exile
How you simulate this is your dilemma though.

One option would be to give the US ground units high attack and defence statistics and/or high hitpoints and firepower but limit the number of replacements the non-Communist player can build or generate.

This would create a dynamic where the player would have to carefully look after their very powerful US units to ensure that these almost irreplaceable units aren't lost forever (with the result that the actual combat power of the US units is less than it first appears as these units need to be withdrawn to rest at regular intervals). Such a dynamic would be pretty realistic as the non-Communist's huge firepower advantage pretty much guaranteed them a tactical victory whenever they got into a stand-up fight.

An different take on this approach would be to make good use of the helicopter flag so that the highly mobile and powerful US units get weaker the longer they stay in the field.

[Cyrion]

Originally posted by Case
This would create a dynamic where the player would have to carefully look after their very powerful US units to ensure that these almost irreplaceable units aren't lost forever (with the result that the actual combat power of the US units is less than it first appears as these units need to be withdrawn to rest at regular intervals).

This sounds good, but then it might be good to:
- suppress casern: they would shorten rest time!
- pay attention to the "healing power" of allied cities!

[Von Bert]

Artillery power ?

maybe as exile suggest elsewhere, he can setup "fire-base" unit, that ll then carry Ammo-air-units (HE ? napalm even ? )
this ammo-units.. can have 2-3 square of range , and act as flying bombs..
probably a human player can use them properly.. (i dunno i Ai ll ) and it can add a logistic-flavour to the game...


about POWERFUL USA inf.units.. i dunno... usually in this kind of scenarios.. the higher-quality troops are smaller units then the low-quality-one .. i mean.. designers tend to create many-small-high-quality unity.. against MANY big-low-quality-units..

i mean.. would american inf. units be battalion? division/brigade?
or maybe just companies ?
so.. many little elite units ? or fewer bigger powerful ?
in the end is a design choice ..

[McMonkey]

Thanks for the input guys. I will try and outline my ideas for the US forces as briefly as I can:

The American player (US only in version 1!) has to work as a democracy. Therefore the number of troops in the field will be limited and new happyness techs will need to be researched. The player will also need to rely on technology.

The tactical unit will either be company or battalion size. The main US offensive arms will be the Airmobile, Airpower and Artillery (the three As).

Airmobile units include:
-Airbmobile Infantry. Basically Paras with a drop range of 12.
-Transport Helicopters. Flying settlers with a range of 12 that and build LZs (airbases) and Fire Bases (size 1 cities).
-Airlift Helicopters. Like Chinooks, these units are sea transports with the paradrop ability and can carry ground units to LZs and Fire bases.
-Helicopter Gunships. Offensive choppers like the Cobra.

The idea of the Fire Base is to set it up with a Transport Helicopter in a strategic location. Airmobile infantry can then drop in to protect it and Airlift Helicopters can bring in heayer equipment. Fire bases can build airfields that will allow conventional airlifts too. They will also produce Artillery Shells (see below) to fire off at the Cong. When the Fire Base is no longer required the Airmobile infantry and Airlift Helicopters can para back out and the city can be disbanded by producing another Transport Helicopter that can then fly off. LZs would allow units to parachute out of remote areas too!

-Artillery. Basically a cheap, medium power missile unit that will give the US infantry in the jungle support from a longer range as Exile suggests.

-Airpower. Longer range and more powerful than than artillery. These expensive units, such as Phantoms and B52s will be the ultimate offensive weapon but will have enemies to watch out for, such as the SAM!

Other arms include the Special Forces, the Mobile Riverine Force, the Marines and the US Army and armoured forces.

I like the idea of using the helicopter flag for US units to represent fatigue and limit their time in the bush but I do not think it will work in the system I have developed.

What I want to do is give each unit a strength and a weakness to ensure the player has to use a combined arms system. The MRF will rule the Delta, Armour will patrol the roads, Airborne will operate in the highlands and jungles and the Marines will cover the north and the DMZ. As well as this there are your Korean allies in the central coastal plain and I expect the ARVN will at the least do a bit of patroling.

The Communists will be the real challenge to get working but with clever manipulation of the stats, events and their protected base camps and Ho Chi Minh trail I think they should be kick ass too!

I am currently trying to set up the Tech Tree which is incredibly hard but I think I have worked out a system. I look forward to getting to the playtest stage which should be soon!