screenshot_2016_05_28

Finally I’ve moved on to version 0.2.01a featuring ordnance and lots of new concepts and rules. Just to mention a few of them: In terms of rules, these are the most important additions/improvements to the game play: Ordnance (To Hit process, ammunition types, target acquisition, crews), hidden units, Close combat (now broken and concealed units are correctly handled), Weather conditions and changes, Wall Advantage, Crest status, Rout phase is now event based and fail safe, Unit substitution/ELR, Ammunition shortage, New terrain types (walls, hedges, rowhouses, rubble, gully, bridges, trenches, foxholes).

The fire attack tooltip now displays a chance to impose any damage on your target (or the To Hit chance in case of ordnance) . Some actions are now animated in the map (explosions, small arms fire attacks, smoke; no sounds yet). Movement Factors are displayed in a better and more accurate way during movement.

The user interface has changed in order to allow you to see more of the map: the hex inspector has moved to the upper left and will hide all location properties by default (this also addresses the confusion on how to select locations or units; now only hexes are selected directly in the map). Also the console has moved to the left hand side together with a dedicated chat window. Counters are no longer selected directly inside of the map. Instead when hovering over a counter(-stack) an overlay window will appear that allows you to select counters. Select counters from more than one location via Shift key. A Phase Bar has been added at the top to let you quickly see in which phase you are in at the moment. The setup phase now displays a dashboard to inform you about certain setup related capacities (hidden, concealed, trenches). The map editor now works visually and no longer requires you to go through the console, please see the section in the manual about how to use it. (Scenario editor is still without UI mostly).

This version comes with a new and rather long scenario Way To The Volga (loosely based on “In Sight Of The Volga”. It is the most complex scenario so far and really fun to play. Please give it a try. The (one and only) gun in it can shoot AP or HE and Smoke. It also features some rather elaborate Special Rules – I finally found a technical mechanism to exchange each and every rule for a certain scenario in case the need arises. You can see it at work in this scenario. Last but not least I wanted to say that although we did some intense testing before releasing this version it is – due to the sheer number of new concepts – quite likely that we will encounter some problems during game play. I will address these as quickly as possible and continue to develop in a more incremental way for the upcoming 0.2.x releases until we finally arrive at chapter D (vehicles).