mod J & P Rebalance Mod by JonnyH13 and Pandakraut 05/06/2023 1.28.4

[pandakraut]

Interesting optimization, if training weren't already getting nerfed that would certainly convince me that it needed to be

[PaulD]

11 hours ago, pandakraut said:

Interesting optimization, if training weren't already getting nerfed that would certainly convince me that it needed to be

My intention was to help demonstrate that the build combo can be maniputed without the AIConfig changes, plus just wanted to apply what I've learned and see if I could do it. 

By the way, after fighting my last two campaigns with the AI scaling cranked up, I found the battles very easy in this little mini run. In my campaign prior to starting my YT series I fought 40k CSA with 22k Union at 1st Bull Run. 

I will probably play MG with the new version of the mod just to get the feel for the changes then work on going to LG.  I'll do a video covering the changes, compare and contrast the obvious stuff, then try different strategies and post a new series. Maybe CSA first this time.

Edited June 24, 2022 by PaulD

[JonnyH13]

Finally updated to 1.28.  Have fun everyone.

[PaulD]

Here is a features overview of the new 1.28 mod.

 

 

[o Barão]

@pandakraut o7!

Is it possible to tell me what these values do in battle?

chargeRangeMultiplierCavalry, 0.52
chargeRangeMultiplierInfantry, 0.575
chargeRangeMultiplierSkirmishers, .4

And what this line does

AdvancedChargeLogic, true

 

The mod is great, but the AI charging from long distances ruins the battle experience for me.

When a unit is charging, it doesn't matter if it is melee with another unit or not. Will be targeted and shot by all units in the area. This alone makes AI charging incredible weak for them. I suppose this is an engine limitation impossible to be improved?

And then we have situations where we can see the AI charging from far away. Getting tired and getting shot in the flank. 😒

So, I would like to know if it is possible to lower the distance for the AI to consider charging the player? Or maybe other tweaks to help the AI to save the troops in battle.

Thanks.

Edited July 3, 2022 by o Barão

[pandakraut]

52 minutes ago, o Barão said:

chargeRangeMultiplierCavalry, 0.52
chargeRangeMultiplierInfantry, 0.575
chargeRangeMultiplierSkirmishers, .4

These are modifiers to the max range that units can charge. Note that units do not all have exactly the same default max range. It varies a bit through some formula I haven't gotten around to figuring out.

In general in the mod you should very rarely ever see units charging much further than from 500-700 distance. In my experience the upper end usually only occurs when fortifications or impassable terrain are involved, as these do weird things to the distance calculations. This is most likely what happened in your second screenshot.

52 minutes ago, o Barão said:

AdvancedChargeLogic, true

This setting enabled custom chain charges logic for the mod. This increases the chance that ai units charge when a charging friendly unit is nearby. It will never be perfect but it increases the chances that the ai will make a coordinated charge with a better chance of overwhelming the player.

This tends to be more effective on higher difficulties where the AI has more experienced units. From your screenshots you have mostly 2 and 3 star units facing mostly 1 and a few 2* units. In this scenario the AI is unlikely to be very aggressive and will probably only charge sporadically. Switching to a higher difficulty or using the config files to increase the ai's experience would probably help here.

I can't tell for sure from the screenshots but it looks like you haven't yet switched over to the new version that just came out? Quite a few changes in there that should increase the challenge including a small reduction in charge distance along with other changes that will make them more effective. Best results when starting a new campaign though.

[o Barão]

9 minutes ago, pandakraut said:

These are modifiers to the max range that units can charge. Note that units do not all have exactly the same default max range. It varies a bit through some formula I haven't gotten around to figuring out.

In general in the mod you should very rarely ever see units charging much further than from 500-700 distance. In my experience the upper end usually only occurs when fortifications or impassable terrain are involved, as these do weird things to the distance calculations. This is most likely what happened in your second screenshot.

This setting enabled custom chain charges logic for the mod. This increases the chance that ai units charge when a charging friendly unit is nearby. It will never be perfect but it increases the chances that the ai will make a coordinated charge with a better chance of overwhelming the player.

This tends to be more effective on higher difficulties where the AI has more experienced units. From your screenshots you have mostly 2 and 3 star units facing mostly 1 and a few 2* units. In this scenario the AI is unlikely to be very aggressive and will probably only charge sporadically. Switching to a higher difficulty or using the config files to increase the ai's experience would probably help here.

I can't tell for sure from the screenshots but it looks like you haven't yet switched over to the new version that just came out? Quite a few changes in there that should increase the challenge including a small reduction in charge distance along with other changes that will make them more effective. Best results when starting a new campaign though.

This was played today with the latest update 1.28

"This setting enabled custom chain charges logic for the mod. This increases the chance that ai units charge when a charging friendly unit is nearby. It will never be perfect but it increases the chances that the ai will make a coordinated charge with a better chance of overwhelming the player.

This tends to be more effective on higher difficulties where the AI has more experienced units. From your screenshots you have mostly 2 and 3 star units facing mostly 1 and a few 2* units. In this scenario the AI is unlikely to be very aggressive and will probably only charge sporadically. Switching to a higher difficulty or using the config files to increase the ai's experience would probably help here."

This is playing on MG difficulty and already from the start I saw the AI charging from far away. Of course, the unit would get tired and focus by all my units before getting into melee. And if they managed to get into melee, this will not protect them from fire by my nearby units anyway. Shooting canister at my own troops to kill the enemy? Sure why not. This is a big limitation in the game engine that makes AI incredible weak in charges.

What I liked to see is the enemy charging together. Fun to watch and some moments it seems they could break the line. +1

But then they would rout and sometimes surrender. Losing too many men.

"Quite a few changes in there that should increase the challenge including a small reduction in charge distance along with other changes that will make them more effective."

In the second image. The unit wasn't far away, the problem is the river. It seems the AI doesn't understand that it needs to go around the river, pass the bridge before reaching the target.

Anyway, thank you for the explanation. I will lower the charge distance values. 😉✌️

 

[pandakraut]

43 minutes ago, o Barão said:

This is playing on MG difficulty and already from the start I saw the AI charging from far away. Of course, the unit would get tired and focus by all my units before getting into melee. And if they managed to get into melee, this will not protect them from fire by my nearby units anyway. Shooting canister at my own troops to kill the enemy? Sure why not. This is a big limitation in the game engine that makes AI incredible weak in charges.

Can you try to get me a screenshot of an example of them starting the charge from too far away? I want to compare what you are seeing to the distances I normally see to make sure there isn't something slipping through.

The mod does have some increases to the damage dealt to your own units when firing into melee. In a lot of cases I find that when I do this I usually end up routing my own unit in the process, though this is more a opportunity cost than actually preventing me from doing it in the first place. Given that the AI will always fire into melee when given the option, we're hesitant to increase this damage too much as the player would have plenty of ways to abuse it.

48 minutes ago, o Barão said:

This was played today with the latest update 1.28

Did you start a fresh campaign? If so, just surprised to see you at Antietam already on a new campaign. That's a lot of UG over the last few days

Looking at the screenshots some more, is this the custom/historical battle rather than the campaign? We basically don't touch those at all, so they tend to be all over the place with balance.

52 minutes ago, o Barão said:

In the second image. The unit wasn't far away, the problem is the river. It seems the AI doesn't understand that it needs to go around the river, pass the bridge before reaching the target.

I'm pretty sure the AI calculates straight line distance for charges rather than pathing distance. That's probably not something I'll be able to change though. Which is unfortunate because there is a lot we could do if I we were able to check pathing and terrain between the unit and a target.

If this was the historical battle, definitely give the campaign a shot. Some fun surprises in the battles up to Antietam. Either way, definitely try lowering the those charge values a little bit and see if that gets behavior closer to what you are looking for.

[o Barão]

7 hours ago, pandakraut said:

 

Looking at the screenshots some more, is this the custom/historical battle rather than the campaign? We basically don't touch those at all, so they tend to be all over the place with balance.

Oh, I see. I saw your update, installed the game, and I immediately went to Antietam.

If this was the historical battle, definitely give the campaign a shot.

Yes of course! ✌️

Can you try to get me a screenshot of an example of them starting the charge from too far away? I want to compare what you are seeing to the distances I normally see to make sure there isn't something slipping through.

I supposed the charge values will take effect in both campaign and historical battles, right? I will revert to the mod stock values and start a campaign just to make sure everything is on default and take a print if I see it happening again.

The mod does have some increases to the damage dealt to your own units when firing into melee. In a lot of cases I find that when I do this I usually end up routing my own unit in the process,...

So is possible to lower the fire damage to units in a melee? Because if that is the case, I want to reward the charging units if they reach their destination. Seems odd to me that if 2 units are in a chaotic close quarters fighting situation, to see other units nearby having a clear line of sight to unleash deadly volleys against them. If it is possible to lower the damage by 60%-70% I have a feeling this will make AI charges much more successful if they manage to reach their destination and of course much more difficult for the player to win the battles.

I'm pretty sure the AI calculates straight line distance for charges rather than pathing distance. That's probably not something I'll be able to change though. Which is unfortunate because there is a lot we could do if I we were able to check pathing and terrain between the unit and a target.

I got the feeling it was an engine limitation when I saw it.👍

 

UPDATE:

Here we can see the McHenry unit charging, coming from the left, far away, outside the musket range. The Cutler unit saw this and decided to join the charge, leaving a strong position. Both were defeated and one of the units surrendered.

Brynes unit charge my skirmishers coming from the town. (late print) Leaving a strong position and charging a unit impossible to reach. An engine limitation to understand what unit is worth it to charge or not.

Edited July 4, 2022 by o Barão

[pandakraut]

4 hours ago, o Barão said:

I supposed the charge values will take effect in both campaign and historical battles, right?

Should be, though I very rarely play the historical battles.

4 hours ago, o Barão said:

So is possible to lower the fire damage to units in a melee?

Technically possible, but would require dll changes so it is not something that is easily configurable without programming knowledge. Adishee's submod took the opposite path and increased damage considerably for example.

My guess is that if this kind of damage reduction were implemented you would see a very high focus on counter charge units. The AI tends to clump a bit, and with that much damage reduction you could pretty safely throw melee units at a unit on the edge of their formation, then use it to draw the fire of all nearby AI units while you either setup more charges or fired at the exposed flanks as they turned to fire at the melee.

Would also provide a major bonus to cavalry as one of the main risks of using those is catching volleys while in melee.

Screenshot #1 is basically the worst case scenario with both a river and a fortification involved. While visually it's on the outer range of when they should charge (remember the ai cannot account for having to charge across bad terrain for 3/4 of the path) if you look at the fortification firing arc you can see that the unit is charging only a little bit out of infantry firing range which is what we want to happen when the distance calculations are working normally.

In screenshot #2 I think this is less an issue of charging from too far away and more that the ai doesn't account for speed differences and doesn't know to stop its charge when it's clear they won't catch the target.

Dedicated skirmishers are a tricky problem for the charge logic. They need to be chargeable so that the player can't just make max size skirmishers and out shoot(or infinitely delay) the ai without any chance of charges. But if they can be charged then the player can exploit this with speed perked skirmishers. Small speed perked infantry could still enable this kind of exploiting, so the trade off fixing that one isn't currently worth the cost of what it would enable.

I've tried adding more complex logic to get the ai to not charge units faster than it, but have not yet figured out how to make that work in a way that is a net improvement.

[o Barão]

@pandakraut  thank you for the explanation. I already made changes to the charges ranges and started a new campaign.

[pandakraut]

1 hour ago, o Barão said:

@pandakraut  thank you for the explanation. I already made changes to the charges ranges and started a new campaign.

Have fun! And if you have more questions feel free to ask.

[KeithD]

First time I've played the game in a long time.  For me it had all got a bit stale, but having started a confed play through to Shiloh (so far) with the latest mod, the grand battles changes gives the game a new lease of life.  I like the way the extra units drew me into trying to defend Matthews Hill at BR1, and the way the Union now concedes ground and tries to defend the Hornets Nest at Shiloh instead of stupidly getting trapped and wiped out in pockets.  Feels more historical as well, and looking forward to seeing what else you have done.  Nice work.

Edited July 7, 2022 by KeithD

[pandakraut]

Updated to 1.28.1

Battle Changes
- Modified CSA Bull Run to improve reinforcement spawn locations and timer interactions in the first phase.
- The following change has been disabled. It can be enabled using the equalizeRewards value in the configFile: Recruit, money, and career point rewards are now static across win/loss/draw. This is to allow players more leeway in accepting a loss or a draw and continuing the campaign.
- Corps commander xp gain rate was higher than intended and has been reduced slightly.

UI Changes:
- difficulty now displays next to battle date on post battle summary. 

Bug Fixes
- Fix multiple bugs that were causing damage to be lower when setting artillery to canister only or canister/shell only.
- Fix bug with endOfDayMultiplier for specific battle/value combinations.
- Fix bug with lt colonel officer prices on easy and normal difficulty.
- Fix bug with custom save files on mac
- Fixed bug with hotkey groups
- Fixed bug with running not applying an increased reload speed penalty.
- Fixed bug with a manually routed unit losing less condition than a unit that is routed from combat.
- Data folder for custom saves is now created if not found.

[o Barão]

@pandakraut o7!!

Just a quick feedback

The Enfield shortened version have a higher effective range in comparison to the stock version.

In my recent campaign with the confederates at BG difficulty in the second battle (I forgot the name battle) I noticed this:

- With an overall 6k troops (mine+allies) the AI will deploy 12k. So 2x more. ok.

- I recruit another 4k troops, so a total of 10k now. I am going to start the battle and now the AI have 20k or 19k troops (if I restart, the troops number will change) so again x2 +/-

So what is the point to get another 4k troops if is they are recruits with no experience and will only make things harder for me?

[pandakraut]

9 hours ago, o Barão said:

The Enfield shortened version have a higher effective range in comparison to the stock version.

This is intensed, though there is no good thematic explanation other than skirmishers aim more. We've gone in circles on a better name for this weapon that fits the stats better, but nothing has come of it yet. Weapon names and descriptions are all controlled in config files in /mod/Rebalance if you'd like to change it.

Regarding scaling and unit sizes. The mod allows the player to choose what size units they want to make and tries to keep the AI units around that size. So if you build 1k units you mostly face 1-3k enemy units depending on battle and difficulty. If you like giant battles and build 6ks then the AI fields similarly sized units.

This does lead to cases where simply adding more men to your units does not actually improve your odds. This is a compromise between adjusting to how the player is doing in the campaign, maintaining a standard of challenge, and allowing the player to build to the size they like.

So in the case of this battle, adding more men to your units is likely just lowering their stats. If your goal is to play with larger units this may be acceptable. The larger your units the more you face, but also the more you can kill for weapons and XP. But if you're planning on using smaller units then sticking to a smaller size may be more effective.

All that said, if you would prefer if this system worked differently the mod provides several options. In the /mod/Rebalance/AIConfigFile you can change the max size of enemy unit types to limit scaling, or you can use the aiScalingsizeMultiplier to directly adjust the size of all enemy units up or down. Every time you restart a battle any updates you have saved will take affect, so they can be adjusted throughout the campaign.

Hope that helps provide some context and options, feel free to ask more questions.

[o Barão]

8 hours ago, pandakraut said:

This is intensed, though there is no good thematic explanation other than skirmishers aim more. We've gone in circles on a better name for this weapon that fits the stats better, but nothing has come of it yet. Weapon names and descriptions are all controlled in config files in /mod/Rebalance if you'd like to change it.

Regarding scaling and unit sizes. The mod allows the player to choose what size units they want to make and tries to keep the AI units around that size. So if you build 1k units you mostly face 1-3k enemy units depending on battle and difficulty. If you like giant battles and build 6ks then the AI fields similarly sized units.

This does lead to cases where simply adding more men to your units does not actually improve your odds. This is a compromise between adjusting to how the player is doing in the campaign, maintaining a standard of challenge, and allowing the player to build to the size they like.

So in the case of this battle, adding more men to your units is likely just lowering their stats. If your goal is to play with larger units this may be acceptable. The larger your units the more you face, but also the more you can kill for weapons and XP. But if you're planning on using smaller units then sticking to a smaller size may be more effective.

All that said, if you would prefer if this system worked differently the mod provides several options. In the /mod/Rebalance/AIConfigFile you can change the max size of enemy unit types to limit scaling, or you can use the aiScalingsizeMultiplier to directly adjust the size of all enemy units up or down. Every time you restart a battle any updates you have saved will take affect, so they can be adjusted throughout the campaign.

Hope that helps provide some context and options, feel free to ask more questions.

Weapon names and descriptions are all controlled in config files in /mod/Rebalance if you'd like to change it.

I am no expert in weapons from the American Civil War period, but it is great to have the option!

...or you can use the aiScalingsizeMultiplier to directly adjust the size of all enemy units up or down. Every time you restart a battle any updates you have saved will take affect, so they can be adjusted throughout the campaign.

Thank you!! This solved my biggest issue with the mod. 😉

I already played almost 30 hours with the mod and I must say I am impressed. The AI deploying skirmishers or charging in coordination makes everything much more interesting and harder. The changes to fatigue, moral and other changes add so much depth. Great mod.

Here, both choices cost the same. Maybe is possible to make Mississippi rifles to cost more?

[KeithD]

Hi Panda

I have 4 points in recon but the current army size just shows 0/0 for both armies in 1.28

Is it fixed in 1.28.1? 

Edited July 10, 2022 by KeithD

[pandakraut]

9 hours ago, o Barão said:

Here, both choices cost the same. Maybe is possible to make Mississippi rifles to cost more?

Rep buy costs are somewhat intentionally not priced directly by value. Sometimes the deals are better than others.

[pandakraut]

1 hour ago, KeithD said:

Hi Panda

I have 4 points in recon but the current army size just shows 0/0 for both armies in 1.28

Is it fixed in 1.28.1? 

Do you mean the balance bar at the top of the screen in battles is not displaying? That would be intended as the bar was moved to unlock at 6 points. With recon now providing weapon recovery bonuses, having the balance bar at 4 was too much concentrated value.

If I'm misunderstanding just let me know.

[KeithD]

10 minutes ago, pandakraut said:

Do you mean the balance bar at the top of the screen in battles is not displaying? That would be intended as the bar was moved to unlock at 6 points. With recon now providing weapon recovery bonuses, having the balance bar at 4 was too much concentrated value.

If I'm misunderstanding just let me know.

Ah ok. 

Unless I'm misreading it, the hover over text box states 'current army strength during battle' on 4 bars, which is why I thought it was supposed to show on the balance bar.

Thanks for the super fast response.

[pandakraut]

46 minutes ago, KeithD said:

Unless I'm misreading it, the hover over text box states 'current army strength during battle' on 4 bars, which is why I thought it was supposed to show on the balance bar.

You're correct, the tooltip is wrong. I thought I had changed it, but I guess not. Will get it fixed in the next patch.

[o Barão]

@pandakraut o7!

Is it possible to change the perks values? I am asking this to know if it is possible to nerf the accuracy bonus and also maybe add some penalties, to balance them. The issue is stacking so much accuracy bonus completely makes the game unrealistic.

Yes, I am in a strong defensive position in this battle, but still this is just too much.

My 1 Virginia Brigade had 12k kill counts. Historical speaking, the entire union had 12k casualties in Fredericksburg (killed, wounded, missing)

 

And then there are some perks that are completely OP.

+35% accuracy / -5% reload time. Ok, I would prefer to be something like +10% accuracy / -5% reload time. Not crazy values, and maybe a penalty. But in this situation, he also have the option to choose this...

Not only pickets perk give the same accuracy bonus without the reload penalty, but also 50% bonus to stealth and spotting. Completely OP.

And then we have the campaign experience. When in the beginning I am fighting and having around a 1-3 in casualties in comparison to the AI and sometimes struggling to win battles if I am not careful. An interesting game.  When we reach around the middle campaign experience, my troops with 10 training and 10 medicine are already well-trained and also stacking crazy perks' bonus. They will melt the AI brigades. 

I would suggest to nerf / balance almost all perks (units and commander perks).

 

[pandakraut]

13 hours ago, o Barão said:

Is it possible to change the perks values? I am asking this to know if it is possible to nerf the accuracy bonus and also maybe add some penalties, to balance them. The issue is stacking so much accuracy bonus completely makes the game unrealistic.

You can find my guide to modding perks here: https://forum.game-labs.net/topic/26225-weapon-and-perk-modding-guide/

Anything more complex than changing values or swapping existing bonuses requires programming ability to modify the dll. Swapping some bonuses might also result in needing to do dll work to get all the descriptions to be correct. I don't think the perk values are the real source of the problem here, but by all means feel free to experiment.

I'd also suggest checking out the config file guide in the mod/rebalance folder. There are some morale impact values you may want to increase as you drop kill damage via perks.

13 hours ago, o Barão said:

My 1 Virginia Brigade had 12k kill counts. Historical speaking, the entire union had 12k casualties in Fredericksburg (killed, wounded, missing)

A few things here. The balance of all battles past Antietam is not in a good spot currently. We have not yet had a chance to update them, so the timers are generally far too long and a variety of other issues exist that need to get fixed.

While we have tried to reign in casualties somewhat, the way this game is setup chasing historical casualty rates is not something we are particularly focused on. In my view, the games battles are abstracted enough from how historical battles worked that there is no real expectation that casualty numbers will be the same or even close. Perhaps with enough work someone could try and get the numbers closer to historical, but there are a lot of followup issues that would need to be resolved to keep everything running. The economy and xp systems are all designed around large numbers of casualties, so that would need to be addressed.

13 hours ago, o Barão said:

+35% accuracy / -5% reload time. Ok, I would prefer to be something like +10% accuracy / -5% reload time.

We moved a lot of units power out of base weapons damage and into unit stats and perk bonuses. We prefer that the perks and stats be much more impactful than they are in the base game. In general we're fairly happy with the potential damage output of units, though implementing a full custom perk system that gives us a lot more flexibility is something we'd like to get to.

13 hours ago, o Barão said:

Not only pickets perk give the same accuracy bonus without the reload penalty, but also 50% bonus to stealth and spotting. Completely OP.

-5% reload time is a bonus not a penalty. Any penalties are highlighted in red. For what it is worth, some players swear by Musketry drills over pickets as they don't make use of the spotting or stealth.

13 hours ago, o Barão said:

And then we have the campaign experience. When in the beginning I am fighting and having around a 1-3 in casualties in comparison to the AI and sometimes struggling to win battles if I am not careful. An interesting game.  When we reach around the middle campaign experience, my troops with 10 training and 10 medicine are already well-trained and also stacking crazy perks' bonus. They will melt the AI brigades.

Through Antietam we are decently happy with the experience so far. Past that it's definitely a mess as most battles are far too easy. Something that we hope to improve over time. A core issue with difficulty in this game is always how much can the player snowball be slowed down. The player will basically always perform better with equivalent units than the AI will, so the longer it takes the player to reach that point the longer the difficulty is maintained. Past that the only question is will there be enough attrition on the player, which definitely isn't the case currently.

It might help to increase the AIsizeScalingMultiplier and AIexperienceScalingMultiplier in the second half of the campaign so the AI can keep pace with you more.

I'd also believe that the lategame training and medicine systems need some adjustment. When implementing new systems we tend to aim for being a bit too generous over too punitive. Especially in the endgame which we just don't have the ability to do much testing on in any reasonable timeframe. As more data comes in, these will likely get adjusted, but it's good news that the first half of the campaign seems to have held up decently.

[General Rah]

Okay, the randomized starting positions of units in battles has to be the biggest breath of life in my 1000 hours of this game. Really appreciate the work and love that has gone into this mod! Thank you for creating, maintaining, and continuing to update this mod.