Some mod concerning issues...

[Charbel]

Hi .. Great mod again, I started to mess around with PFM and some issues became aparent. I had written a note about it but it has somehow found it s way to the trash can

1 Please increase crew size for SoL ships please, I read Jam`s other post about being impossible but I had done sucessfully (for a day one modder). Marines should be added so that bigger ships have more pople on deck and dont suffer to much from casualities penalties, it gives a better feel and look to sea battles,|

2 One of frenchs over first rate (probably, maybe wrong), have a different smaller crew than other similar ships, probably some overlooked issue,

3 there is something wrong about naval gun balance, some of them have unusual values, some ships have more firepower than the others , different guns and chase guns resulting in some not normal readings, I can t remember now but I think 6>12>9 pders

4 some infantry units are classed like elite infantry while most certainly they aren t and others like british guars and highlands units aren t, Had not time to test several factions

5 please could you do something about unit numbering system? I have some obsessive behavior tryng to recruit 1 st, 2nd , 3rd regiment of something units with out repeating, or skipping the numbers.
I had already disbanded everyone unit to make sure it go right but that was not possible. something probably wrong on somewhere .

6 Please take a look at starting positions, there should be some tweaks on starting units/regions to increase earlygame experience

7 please do some textures submod compilations for people like me that have problem to put this mod with some skins mod and make them work nice. A list of ER Aproved skin mods (that you just use them together with no complicated steps required to work fine)

8 I hate some units, some weird clone regiments where everyone are the same but somehow could not chose a single colour of pants. Why some elite units (like Prussian ones) could not have a unique (similar) looking uniform?


Edit: again great mod, but you should again reconsider the policy about big ships to factions like Prussia, I read all over the statements supporting them but I can t agree, of course there could be better way to implement your ideas without hindering the late game so much...

06/24 update: on point 1 concerning ship crews: sailors and gunners can t be changed, I tried to increase marines and ended up having a great result, musket volleys deck to deck, with enough marines ( more on 3 deckers) to make a difference without putting too many.... I know musketry on naval battles don t have a big relevance, but it makes a much better experience....I added very few men on smaller ships to a handfull on that over 1st rate...

[BlueMax]

Charbel, some very interesting observations in your above post.

Do you know if they have been addressed by the most recent version (v4.92 as of Dec'17) of the mod?

Thanks.

[JaM]

Adding more marines is tricky, as having more crew onboard than ship's maximum level will have one nasty effect - any crew that is over its maximum, will start to get dropped offboard... such ships will lose men even when not in combat, which will cause them morale penalty.. finding the maximum number of crew is tricky, but i'll see if there is something i could do for next version.

regarding guns, i will check those 12pdrs, anyway idea behind damage value was to use kinetic energy value instead of linear progression, and surprisingly, some small caliber guns came out quite good in this, because while being smaller, these projectiles had higher muzzle velocity, which gave them better kinetic energy.. anyway, as everything, this will be changed in next version, where i plan to implement a splinter effect, so solid shot will create a lot more damage after penetration, while amount of wooden splinters created will depends on weight of projectile (so 12pdr shot will deal more splinters than small 6pdr)

i'll check other reports and try to fix them in next version. Thank you a lot for feedback, sometimes its hard to notice everything myself, so having good feedback is very helpful.

[Charbel]

WOw.. that took some time but got read. My english writing skills have become somewhat rusty along the years, beware the emotions.

Good you will have/had a look.
about the marine crews: No need going to the max amount, just adding some men across the board, more for bigger ships will do good.

I have something more important to talk about, You have some excellent Ideas that are /were badly implemented in the mod, like fatigue/cohesion stuff, musket reload times to simulate ranks passing over muskets to the front and the lack of bigger ships to all most nations.
I like Realism, I like empire, but some adaptations required to make the above work ingame does not have the desired effect, and while excellent for you (and me, for the most part) does decrease the fun and replayability of your mod, the examples above are all good ideas, badly implemented. I do know the difficulty of doing all this modding, and I dont want my comments to disrespect you, but I do feel the need to say this. You are definetly creative, and I feel I could give you some feedback despite my bad writing skills.

I definetly liked last version`s changelog and got very excited to install empire again. Please tell me if I could be of any assistance. I don t log very often in TWC but I read it a lot. Will check this thread in the future.


I have been away from ETW for some time and I am downloading ER as of right now. ER does get really close to my ideal ETW settings, You definetly does very good stuff, despite me hating
some of the modifications you implement in YOUR mod along the years.
If I am misunderstood in my posts just know that i have a lot of love for you and your work.

[JaM]

First - Unit limits have its purpose that is sometimes not evident - it prevents AI from recruiting too many units which will eventually blob the save file, and can even cause slowdowns or crashes. Because of this solution, there is no Ottoman slowdown bug, that is evident in vanilla game for example.

At the other side, ship restriction is also important from balancing perspective - I dont want certain continental powers to spend too much resources into navy, and leave their borders unprotected - factions like Poland, Prussia or Austria are better off with limited navy, as they practically dont really need it.. Besides, building those large ships of the line required advanced infrastructure, and naval tradition.. It was just not possible to build such ships from scratch.. Only few European countries were capable building such ships, and only those richest could actually afford having large fleets, where those big ThreeDeckers were in big minority - England for example had at its peek power just 10 Three Deckers in operational service, where only few of them were 1-rate ships with 100+ guns...

btw, whats bad about cohesion system or reload rates exactly?

[Charbel]

The unit limits is an excelent thing that some people just ignore. I like them, it is very difficult to find where to draw the line though. The cohesion system was just bad in my opinion, it makes you unlearn and learn again to play the game. I really could never get the reason to just order some unit to stop shooting , and then start again. I never liked anything that required user interaction without a clear reason/motive. But that is just me, it should not be used to judge it`s merits. I am a RTS guy, but never liked those games more arcadish or with just too many clicks.

back on topic, great game, I took some battles to get used to it but now I love it, non-tiring movement (standard movement thar refreshes troops) fixed the things I disliked before. It is sad to see that high pompous elite unit just routing away from the enemy but hey, battles are fun again! naval is good, shot speed feels like just awesome, naval battles are fun,
campaign seems OK, much better not-infinite money.

I feel like I cheat AI playing on N/N
fells like another cheat when I uses grape or chain shot.

Two things just repeat themselves:
british ministers like mistresses boys and girls,
and the feel that EMPIRE could benefit so much from the rebelion (emergent nations) mechanic of rome2/attila

work is hard lately and progress had halted. No crashes/bugs/placeholder problems happened.
Nice of you to give the unit naming list of names some work (probably you had a lot of work there)