***CLOSED*** DarthMod Napoleon v2.6++ Open Beta 26 [Updated 21/1/2013]

[torongill]

dont know if this is hardcoded but cannister shot is still fired to high by the cannons it just whizzes over the heads of the target battalion

I think that's by default. I suggest you try and point the guns to shoot in front of the unit they're targeting. For me it works, although I'm not sure to what extent. The number of projectiles is low and I can't get my NTW to start just when I need a lil bit of distraction from my studies...

[Retrop Neb]

Hey Darth, thanks again for the good work. I know you're not being as active with editing your mods anymore so we appreciate the work you do to keep on improving them. Most of the mod works great but again I've got a few small recommendations/bug reports to try to make the gameplay the best it can be.

1. Baden Wurtemburg still doesn't become French in certain campaigns

2. Navy strength bug: Often after naval battles it tells you that your fleet is at full strength when it is in fact often severely damaged.

3. All Swedish/Norwegian/Courland and possibly Danish troops should be winter attrition resistant

4. All factions should be able to hire appropriate mercenaries

5. The powerful nations NEVER build their 'wonders': I think that they should be built already at the start of the campaigns and their bonuses available to anyone who captures them.

6. Give all generals and more units the path seldom trod ability: Or if not all of them have it as a trait for some of them. This way you could have an army of light units all with paths seldom trod able to sneak behind enemy lines led by a competent general wreaking havoc. This was historically how many of the Free or light brigades were supposed to act anyways. It would not be too unfair an advantage either, because the army will not be able to have artillery, as this would negate the hiding ability, making it not a match for more balanced/ heavier armies or well defended provinces, limiting its role to ambush or raiding. I also think more units should have paths seldom trod including all light infantry, all skirmishers, all riflemen, all light cavalry, all mounted infantry (like Russia's mounted riflemen) and all 'light' lancer units (such as cossacks, but obviously not any 'heavy' lancers such as dutch guard lancers). This will mean that all factions will be able to do it.

7. Change Russia/Prussia's victory objectives: One reason I think Prussia and Russia are more likely to stab each other in the back is because they have no victory objectives in France, like Austria has to capture Belgium. Therefore there is less incentive to work together and fight France than there is to fight each other. If both had to capture Paris for example they'd have to work together for a while, making each more active, and then eventually the coalition could break down.

8. All factions should have access to the basic howitzer: Whilst playing as spain I've noticed the only arty they can recruit are 9 and 12 pounders. I feel this limits many factions - it seems a bit pointless that they can all research the technology but not have access to them. I say only the basic howitzer because if you wanted to maintain the 'backwards' theme for some of these nations they can be 'backward' enough to not recruit rockets or experimental howitzers.

9. Make a hardcore mode/submod where every building/technology is already built/researched: With this all out of the way players would be able to focus solely on campaign and battle strategy, with the funds and capacity to build huge armies of the best and most advanced troops. Obviously being a submod it would be optional, so players that dislike the idea could play without it. But I like the idea of the major nations going toe to toe with all the best units they can get from the start. Obviously it may need tweaking, for example Russia has the most provinces and would become the richest, so maybe be a little less developed than the others, but I'm sure a reasonable balance could be struck. Maybe not have forts built straight away though as this would affect the dynamic of early campaign gameplay, preventing any rush strategies from taking place.

10. Units should have the 'guerilla warfare' ability in the grand campaign: I think it'd be cool if rifle units or skirmishers in particular and some light cavalry had the guerilla warfare ability. This is in keeping with the skills these units are supposed to embody, sneaking behind enemy lines and ambushing. Certainly for factions that do not have any rifle units such as Russia, I think their basic light infantry should be given this ability, if not indeed all light infantry for all factions. This is in keeping with the methods of warfare used in the period.

11. I too have noticed cannister shot firing too high above units

12. City unrest is still too high after capturing: I could understand and see the fun of having to defend against an uprising when capturing a capital city of one of the great powers, but the level of unrest when capturing a small nation seems ridiculously high at the moment. One full stack army should be enough to prevent a country like Oldenburg from revolting for example.

13. Light infantry and rifle units are far too inaccurate to be useful at the moment: I feel there should be a noticeable difference in accuracy between line and light for example. At the moment their only real use seems to be to soak up enemy fire.

14. Units still seem to run out of ammo too fast

15. Chausseurs a cheval are still quite overpowered

I know you're not going to be doing as much modding in the future and it may be that my suggestions would need to be done by other capable Darthmod fans, especially in terms of modding unit abilities and stats, but either way I'll put my suggestions here and hope they can be included in some form or another.

Thanks again for everything and all the best,

Retrop Neb

[torongill]

11. I too have noticed cannister shot firing too high above units

I can't yet test it, but I've given the guns more projectiles per canister. The problem with the inaccuracy seems to be a hard-coded one. In effect the lower part of the cone of projectiles touches the enemy unit, but just barely. The rest just flies over, but the system counts that as a hit. In addition, I think we have too many guns per battery. At Waterloo Napoleon did have an average of 276 men per gun(counting every soldier), but a full stack with 10 foot regiments, 4 units of artillery, 1 general, 3 cavalry and two light units gives a total of 4680 men or 292 men per gun(using x2 modifier). However not all armies are full stacks and if we have Napoleon in command with his grand battery with 8 guns, then the total comes down to 234 men per gun. At Waterloo the regular French corps had around 450-490 men per gun, the exception was VI Corps of Mouton. However the Guard corps alone had half of the cannons of the French army and that, as well as the horse guns brought the number down to 276 soldiers per gun. Wellington had 150 pieces for 67 000 men, or 446 men per gun. It's just that right now the guns are too powerful or too numerous, even with the dispersal and lack of bouncing at extreme ranges. Fix canister and the guns become practically overpowered. Either we need to limit their reload rate or numbers or both and compensate with more powerful(historical) canister damage. Right now the only thing I need to do to secure my center, where I usually have the artillery is to put some stakes in front, so that cavalry can't rush them. Afterwards they can pretty much hold their own against infantry, especially with the barrage upgrade. I'll start testing tomorrow. I'm doing some math right now and with a 10 line infantry army and 3 guns per battery even if half of the infantry are attack columns, conscripts and/or militia, who are 500 per unit, that gives us the bare minimum of 448 men per gun.

13. Light infantry and rifle units are far too inaccurate to be useful at the moment: I feel there should be a noticeable difference in accuracy between line and light for example. At the moment their only real use seems to be to soak up enemy fire.

I have no problems with the accuracy of the rifles. However I'm giving them more range, because right now french units just run through the sixty meters and start blazing away. A bit more range lets the rifles score more kills, but imho doesn't make them too strong. It just demoralizes the enemy. Accuracy for the rifles seems adequate. Light units however could use a bit more, but not that much. Light companies were still supposed to stay in the line, they just doubled as skirmishers. So yeah, give them a bit more accuracy, but still, they should be just a little bit better than regular line units. Slightly better stamina, speed and accel, but apart from that nothing more.

14. Units still seem to run out of ammo too fast

That depends on the way they fire. I have given some of the units two-rank fire and they do seem to run through it very fast, so I gave them 25 instead of 10. Now it works better.

15. Chausseurs a cheval are still quite overpowered

I suppose they had carabines, which were less accurate than the muskets and had less range, So maybe give them line infantry range and that will be okay.

[Retrop Neb]

11. I too have noticed cannister shot firing too high above units

Thinking about it this may actually be to do with the firing arc that has been given to artillery in Darth mod so they can now shoot over hills/infantry. When you target a unit then the trajectory will be aiming too high, so I'm not really sure what could be done about this other than giving canister shot a wider projectile spread/more canister shot per volley. I like the new firing arc so we'll have to see what solutions can be done to keep both. On the same point I personally don't feel they're too overpowered at the moment but would be open to suggestions.

13. Light infantry and rifle units are far too inaccurate to be useful at the moment:
I have no problems with the accuracy of the rifles. However I'm giving them more range, because right now french units just run through the sixty meters and start blazing away. A bit more range lets the rifles score more kills, but imho doesn't make them too strong. It just demoralizes the enemy. Accuracy for the rifles seems adequate. Light units however could use a bit more, but not that much. Light companies were still supposed to stay in the line, they just doubled as skirmishers. So yeah, give them a bit more accuracy, but still, they should be just a little bit better than regular line units. Slightly better stamina, speed and accel, but apart from that nothing more.

Good points but not sure I entirely agree with you on this. Maybe the better range for rifles would be an idea, but when the unit only has 80 men I don't think they have as much of an impact as they should. Improving the accuracy would increase their effectiveness more realistically. As for light infantry, since they cannot form squares to really make them useful their accuracy needs to be improved. For example, the standard British foot infantry have an accuracy of 38, as does their standard unit of light foot. With their accuracy being exactly the same there's almost no point in having light infantry other than they can soak up a bit more fire.

With other nations i think the usual difference in accuracy is about 5. I think maybe having light infantry accuracy on average 10 points above comparable units of foot is probably fair, and wouldn't make them too overpowered.

I also noticed as a side note that guerilla tiradores in the spanish campaign no longer have rifle unit range... anyone know why this is? Now there's only one unit of rifles which can be recruited, and only by the British... seems a bit unfair.

Originally Posted by Retrop Neb
14. Units still seem to run out of ammo too fast
That depends on the way they fire. I have given some of the units two-rank fire and they do seem to run through it very fast, so I gave them 25 instead of 10. Now it works better.

That's true, but I fought a battle today that only lasted 5 minutes or so on the battle timer and the ammunition for most of my units was about 1/4 to 1/3 depleted, making the actual shooting phase of a battle only last about 15-20 minutes. This was with all my infantry units in standard 3 ranks deep formation. I'm not sure how much more ammo they need to be given, but for a siege battle for example this isn't really enough, and forces battles to descend into melee a bit too quickly in my opinion.

Originally Posted by Retrop Neb
15. Chausseurs a cheval are still quite overpowered


I suppose they had carabines, which were less accurate than the muskets and had less range, So maybe give them line infantry range and that will be okay.

You're right there but I'm not just talking about accuracy. Their moral and fighting strength is quite high too. I charged a unit of them with two of my cavalry once, one unit lancers and the other heavy cav in the flank. Although I eventually beat them they managed to kill about 3/4 of both of my units, and one of them ran away before that happened, and without them shooting any of my cavalry before then. It may have been I was facing a great general which increases moral but even so that just seems a bit over the top for me, although I do like a challenge...


Thanks for commenting though Torongill, gives me an opportunity to explain what I meant better. And of course you're free to disagree.

Regards

[Baltizar]

Hi Darth

Started a new game using your beta 9.I played this game using 60 unit armies and on hard setting. My first battle was with the Prussians who had invaded hanover and were seiging the capital. I broke their siege by attacking them with napoleons army. After deployement the prussian were in good and strong positions on High ground oposite my position. I was looking forward to a great imersive battle. I unlimbered my cannon and began a sortie on their lines with guns that were in range weakening them before my attack and also to notice what their response would be. The prussian guns still stood their limbered with no response. Then movement, I thought at last the were going to unlimber and retaliate, but no. With the rest of the army they began to swap positions moving to the right and left.

The Prussian were sill keeping more or less keepinf their army on the same initial position on the ridge opposite my army . Still no response from their cannon. I moved infantry and artillery from my right side to line up nearer to their left side to try and provoke a response using my usual flanking movement. The Prussians responded, but not in the way I hoped...They began to change position again moving the units that were on the left side to the right side and vice versa. Still no response from their cannon which remained limbered even though my units that were moving to a new position were well within range.

I then began to move a column of 6 battalions from my left to attack their line on their right. Again the same left and right movement ...and still no artillery responce from them. Moved right to the top of the ridge in line this time. prussians continued their swap movent to left and right. However, their infantry began to respond...but only the ones nearest to my line..the rest still moving to left and right...still no unlimbered cannon...no responce other than moving to left and right.

In the end the battle was an absolute route. The battle AI felt dreadful and non agressive not as good as your earlier beta's ( 3 + 6) even though with these the artillery sometomes again did not respond and unlimber, but that was very far and few between, plus at least their forces tended to counter act my movements in a believable way.

i don't know whether it is because I was using 60 unit armies that caused these problems although, your earlier patces had no problems handling these.

I have included some images showing the prussian movements.

[Baltizar]

Hi darth

I went back and tried the same battle with Beta 6...A vast improvement to 9. The prussians unlimbered their guns and bombarded my line. The rest of their army moved slightly but kept their position on the ridge. I made the same movements as previosly with beta 9 ie moving batalions cav and artillery units to a new position near their left flank and the responded by bombarting my advancing infantry and sending infantry units to meet me. i then tried to outflank ther right, but met with the same responce. Their artillery and supporting infantry were begining to make my attack lines wave forcing me to advance 6 sqadrons to get rid of the artillery.

All in all the battle AI in beta 6 is better than 9 in the way it acts more defensive and aggresive, plus they do unlimber their artillery to teach my arogant attack moves a lesson...However i still managed to beat them with losses of 3,482 compared to their 11, 772.

[airborne guy]

Hi Darth... Doing an Austria campaign just for the heck of it. So far looks great!

A few things...

1) Ammo count should be slightly higher
2) Cavalry stills comes in for a frontal assault
3) Units tend to get blobbed during the first vollies and when they are moving into attack positions making them very easy targets for my arty.
4) I was tinkering with Bavaria after I took it and gave it to Hessen-Kaselle and they never built any troops(now 20 turns they have had it.
5) After I took out Italy the French really didnt attack much anymore, it looked liked they started to build a stronger Navy.


25 Turns in now and a great campaign, I think I may do a video AAR with a faction once you complete it. Great Job!


I thought you were retiring? Its pointless to resist lol

[DARTH VADER]

New Update 3.
Made the musket/rifle calibration a little more accurate. Please tell me if you like it better this way asap, because this will be the last open beta before the full release.

[adanjose]

New Update 3.
Made the musket/rifle calibration a little more accurate. Please tell me if you like it better this way asap, because this will be the last open beta before the full release.

Hi Darth...

I'm still thinking that units runs out of ammo too fast.

[mennelik]

yo Darth can you include pdgurus napoleon with not all staff generals, this should be with all leading generals.

[Hawkeye74]

I'll have a test over the weekend and give feedback as soon as I can.

One thing I would request similar to Retrop's request is howtzers from the beginning, it is the 19th century after, didn't we spend all that time in Empire in the 18th cen' researching the tech already")

Peace

[Condottiere SOG]

Ammo for all units are far to low. Current ammo limits represent auxilliary/guerilla unit profiles for the period. Line unit usually had 60 rounds of ammo. Garrison units, 40. Skirmish/Rifle units, 80. Artillery units, 120-300. Changing this to match period scale will cause pitch battles and likely stop the massive brawling sessions which rarely happened. Tested this myself.

[DARTH VADER]

I am not sure if it needs to increase ammo because now it is important in a battle to have reserves with this balance. It is historical. And do not count real ammo with "game ammo" because it is working differently.

I would like to know from everyone that has played enough with the latest beta how are the battles.
Specifically:
-How is the AI (Better or Worse)?
-How is the musket lethality balanced (Ideal or Not)?

[BrodY]

I am not sure if it needs to increase ammo because now it is important in a battle to have reserves with this balance. It is historical. And do not count real ammo with "game ammo" because it is working differently.

I would like to know from everyone that has played enough with the latest beta how are the battles.
Specifically:
-How is the AI (Better or Worse)?
-How is the musket lethality balanced (Ideal or Not)?

I've gotten through some battles in my russian campaign with the latest beta. And here's what I've found:

- The AI is working out. I'd say it's near perfect. If it weren't for the incessent suicidal melee-charges they seem to launch at random. I don't know if it's supposed to be like this, but at least it works out for me. I like a good melee as much as the next guy. They form up real nicely (at least with the x1 unit size setting, haven't really tried with x2 yet) and it gives some really nice line-battles. I've also noticed that they try to counter-maneouver and flank more frequently, which is refreshing.

- The musket lethality is balanced enough, I'd say. More ammo is definately not needed, and as long as you actually think and plan before you do battle and maneouver your troops well you can actually get some really nice musket-led victories (and as you said; I've definately started using reserve troops more). Example; I move my men into position, take a few losses while moving into position. I make sure Fire at Will is disabled, and as soon as the enemy moves close enough you just enable fire at will. It makes for some glorious and epic musket discharges, which actually has (in some cases) broken the enemy centers by the sheer force of that first round of volleys. I'm not sure if the accuracy could be somewhat increased, but as I said; I think the musketry mechanism works as it should. I'd focus more on melee mechanics sure, it's always fun with some man-to-man brawls, but to have it happen almost a 100% of every battle gets a bit tideous =/

Anyway, I'm having a blast! Thanks for this wonderful mod. Can't really say that enough

[Retrop Neb]

I am not sure if it needs to increase ammo because now it is important in a battle to have reserves with this balance. It is historical. And do not count real ammo with "game ammo" because it is working differently.

When you're playing a battle with only 20 unit stacks you don't have enough units to really hold any in reserve. Like I said in a previous post, when units are the standard 3 ranks deep then the ammo only lasts for 20 minutes as an absolute maximum. This simply isn't enough for many circumstances. For example, if you were fighting a battle against an enemy which had two armies then you'd probably have enough to beat the first army, but chances are you won't have enough ammo to face the reinforcements.

Another example is with siege battles, there is little chance to soften up the defenders before it descends into a mass melee, which potentially offers the defenders a big advantage. Ok it is possible to win regardless, but at the moment it doesn't seem fair or realistic to me.

I feel that unit ammo should be at least double what it is now. That way you'd have a maximum of 40 minutes of shooting, so there is still plenty of time left for hand to hand combat to occur, but I would be interested to know what others who believe there isn't enough ammo think.

Other than that AI as always is good and getting better, keep up the good work.

[SHUMER]

hello darth well i think the mod is great but it need a few adjustments. for example i play with austria in the hardest dificulty and russia and england being my allies and being at war with france did't interfere much in the conflict they didn't send some troops or wathever. some other nations like sweden, norway, oldenburg, papal states, etc didn't join to wars or declaring war to themselves etc. i believe that in the campaign map all the nations have to participate not only being in stance position for the whole campaign i think this is very important.
the musket lethality is perfect, i think that a sligther amount of ammunition will be cool and A.I is agressive and defend very well but this have to be for all the factions, all the factions have to participate. other thing that i notice was that the A.I didn't upgrade much their buildings economys etc and they should recruit a more variety of units i see that france didn't recruit chasseurs only some elite units and a lot of colonne de ataque, cavalry and artillery. there should be more diplomatic relations from A.I like peace treatys, alliances, thecnology offers etc.the navy stuff seems to be cool. maybe you can put some graphics improvements to the campaign map and battle map
the fire by rank should stay has it is by now perfect for all units .
i saw a video in youtube and it was from empire it was about line infantry combat and i see that the infantry fire by ranks and the officer says "fire" every time they open fire so ¿there is any posibility to put that in NTW? it would be great and could you put more missions in the game like capturing regions, researching thecnologies, forging alliences etc.
i hope to see more constructive comments about making NTWDM a better game

cheers!

[SHUMER]

¿what about adding some units to austria and prussia?

[BrodY]

¿what about adding some units to austria and prussia?

I second that.

[Little Legionaire]

Game is perfectly balanced to me and Darth' reserve suggestion makes sense the only thing that i can say:

Smoke levels! After couple shots its almost impossible to control battle due to heavy fog. If is there way to reduce it that would be perfect. Darthmod Empire levels were great thats what i mean. And i really love that effect my point is its just a bit overdone.

Great mod so far Darthis you made me play Empire and Napoleon once more. Godspeed man

[BrodY]

Smoke levels! After couple shots its almost impossible to control battle due to heavy fog. If is there way to reduce it that would be perfect. Darthmod Empire levels were great thats what i mean. And i really love that effect my point is its just a bit overdone.

I like the smoke as it is, however I can understand how it is annoying at times. But then again I think it really simulates the ensuing chaos and disorder a prolonged battle had back in the time. I bet the increasing smoke levels really had a somewhat chaotic effect on both troops and issuing orders. I like it, but of course I can't speak for everyone else