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

[pandakraut]

If any of those units were split or had their size changed that can do weird things with the casualty numbers. I thought I had resolved part of that issue, but maybe not. That would only apply to allied units though, your own units should not be affected. Are you sure your unit didn't end up revealed while in artillery range or had an AI unit nearby it couldn't see that was shooting at it?

I can't remember if casualties taken on day 1 show on the unit in day 2. I'm leaning towards no but would have to check.

If you can come up with any other details on how to reproduce this let me know.

[echelbergere]

I can attest to this happening with split units. The casualties have already happened upon deployment, but the animation triggers upon the first volley. 

[pandakraut]

1 hour ago, echelbergere said:

I can attest to this happening with split units. The casualties have already happened upon deployment, but the animation triggers upon the first volley. 

Does this actually seem to impact end of battle numbers? There is definitely an animation bug with split units where a bunch of sprites die the first time they are hit. But I didn't think it had anything other than a visual impact.

[Sanny]

9 minutes ago, pandakraut said:

Does this actually seem to impact end of battle numbers? There is definitely an animation bug with split units where a bunch of sprites die the first time they are hit. But I didn't think it had anything other than a visual impact.

As far as I know it's just a visual impact and doesn't accurately represent numbers.

Would like to point out if you have an infantry brigade of about 1850 and above they are likely to suffer hundreds of casualties on first volley opposed to a brigade of 1000 for example. More men in a brigade, the greater the cost of first volley.

[pandakraut]

9 hours ago, Sanny said:

As far as I know it's just a visual impact and doesn't accurately represent numbers.

Would like to point out if you have an infantry brigade of about 1850 and above they are likely to suffer hundreds of casualties on first volley opposed to a brigade of 1000 for example. More men in a brigade, the greater the cost of first volley.

Thanks for the data. It's good that it doesn't affect the numbers because I have no idea what is causing this. My attempts to decipher what is going on with the code related to sprites have been unsuccessful so far.

[echelbergere]

I’m not sure, but it seems to affect weapon recovery. 

[pandakraut]

40 minutes ago, echelbergere said:

I’m not sure, but it seems to affect weapon recovery. 

Did you happen to have a number of captured units when you noticed this? The mod fixes an issue where captured units weapons were not being recovered correctly so that would lead to an increase. Both WVPM and I have looked into the weapon recovery of split units and we're pretty sure they aren't returning more weapons than expected.

The extra sprites dieing is mostly likely because there is a sprite related hp variable that I should be updating when I change the split units hp and hpmax. For example, if a unit starts at 2k then gets split into two 1k brigades. The first time each unit gets shot the sprite hp gets reduced to 1k - dmg. Since the sprites start at 2k you see hundreds of sprites die. There is some kind of compression between sprites displayed and actual unit numbers so those numbers are just vague approximations. Or at least that's what I think is going on.

[Lt. Gen. James Longstreet]

Hey, pandakraut, thanks a lot for all your hard work and dedication to the gaming community. As I like to say about modders in general, "never in human conflict, has so much been done, by so few, for almost no appreciation" Modding!!

So I have been wargaming for almost 50 years, I have done my mind-blowing challenges and frustrating experiences. I want to enjoy a game with a fun but realistic play through. At first thought, the surrender mod looked like a must?  Then I noticed that that had been added to the other mod, Rebalance Mod.but only seems like an older version. So what do I want? What do you recommend for a better player user-friendly more comfortable game experience for my CSA campaign?

 

Thank You

Brian

[pandakraut]

Brian, can you give me some context around how familiar you are with the base game? Difficulty of campaigns completed? Below is my attempt at summarizing the various mods. Feel free to ask more questions.

Customizations Mod: base game experience with some UI improvements, less suicidal player skirmishers, and a few bug fixes.

Surrender Mod: base game experience with some improvements/changes. Surrenders will be a bit more consistent, recruits more dependent on surrenders than completing battles, most AI units will split into smaller sub units. This can make the AI a bit more interesting, but also makes the game a bit easier for a skilled player in my opinion(smaller units are easier to overrun/destroy).

Surrender Mod + Rebalance: perks, weapons, career points reworked from base game. The surrender logic changes are all that was pulled over from that mod. As you noted this is a bit out of date so it will have a few more bugs and there are some balance issues.

Rebalance: perks, weapons, career points reworked. UI and AI improvements from the customizations mod. Unit size caps increased. Units can split but this tends to increase the total amount of men the AI gets. In general this mod makes the game harder as you will face larger forces and have to pay more attention to condition and morale of units. Several exploits have also been removed. For both this and the Surrender + Rebalance I would probably recommend BG if you're looking for something new but not overly difficult.

[Lt. Gen. James Longstreet]

Many thanks again pandakraut. I have attempted many times to start this game after I first got it. Always failed in the second part of holding the River Fort against the counter-attacking Union and hence the Confederacy would never employ my talents. Very aggravating! At last, just recently re-acquiring the Civil War bug (Yes I have played them all going way back to the Commodore 64) I used a trainer to give me an extra punch. The only thing I could see to use at the time was "massive units"! Well should have seen the Unit in question...ahaha, So utilizing this big Unit  I held the fort, and finally got the campaign started.

So I disband this big unit and received a large pool of recruits and a cache of muskets, and proceeded to create new brigades and play from there. As far as I know, I'm playing on the easiest level and have advanced to and won Sharpsburg/Antietam. I have lost one battle and missed a bunch, not realizing at the first what the smaller battles meant for me. So the big battle cost me to lose the chance to play them.

So I have learned the hard way the game, and have a pretty good idea now how to play better and want a good experience at a restart campaign. I don't want a frustrating game or hard, but just one sort of realistic and enjoyable. If the mods give me more enjoyment and even some user-friendly realistic perks with a small increase in the difficulty I'm all for that. Hope this helps.

p.s. So does the last J&P Rebalance mod have all the above content?

[pandakraut]

The Rebalance mod updated the starting battles so they should be a bit easier now. Just make sure to rest your troops up a bit before taking the fort. I'd give that mod a try on BG and see how it goes for you. If it's a bit more challenge than you're looking for can always go down a difficulty as well.

I'm obviously biased, but I think the updated perks and career points give you some more interesting choices than what the base game provides. There are a lot of changes though so if something doesn't make sense I'd recommend taking a look at the 2nd post at the start of this thread. All of the changes in the mod are listed there.

We've restricted it to 6k now, but you used to be able to make 15k infantry units in prior versions of the mod as long as you had the recruits and weapons. So if you want to make a giant unit you still can. Though the AI will scale with you a bit.

Edited November 6, 2018 by pandakraut

[Lt. Gen. James Longstreet]

Thanks again, Mate. I was looking through the download a bit ago and noticed that the mod employs a junior officer taking over the Brigade upon a superior officers demise or wounding. That's terrific, that reminds me so much of Sid Meyers Gettysburg, that is what I'm looking for  I love that perk

[pandakraut]

1 hour ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

Thanks again, Mate. I was looking through the download a bit ago and noticed that the mod employs a junior officer taking over the Brigade upon a superior officers demise or wounding. That's terrific, that reminds me so much of Sid Meyers Gettysburg, that is what I'm looking for  I love that perk

It's one of my favorite additions. One of the few cases where ideas and ability to implement actually lined up.

[Lt. Gen. James Longstreet]

wow, I tanked up and started Fredericksburg, and was attacked on the Eastern Flank by Hancock and Smith. It claimed that Burnside is in command of over 230,000!! My reconnaissance estimates about 124,000 more than expected. I don't know if I won it, I definitely didn't lose, yet. It moved to Sunken Road and Marye's Heights. Great Scott what a beautiful scene!

p.s. I chased one poor unit, Torbetts Brigade halfway across the map and should have driven him into the Marye'Heights engagement, but that poor bugger refused to surrender losing steadily in casualties from 7000 men to somewhere around 2400. When He broke, I put two Cavalry Brigades on him of 2000 men each. Later I saw them come tumbling back in some distress, while he remained for the remainder of the battle at the furthest point possible from my lines. Should he have not surrendered due to my new files and the Surrender Mod in the JP Rebalance 1.23a?

p.p.s. Most of my units seem really slow on the map. Most certainly slower than realistic at least of the terrain scale visually, Really noticeable after inserting the mod??

 

Edited November 6, 2018 by Lt. Gen. James Longstreet

[pandakraut]

3 hours ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

Should he have not surrendered due to my new files and the Surrender Mod in the JP Rebalance 1.23a?

Make sure to only install one mod at a time. Whichever gets installed last will overwrite the others. With either the base game logic or the surrender mod logic you're still relying on random chance. Sometimes you get unlucky and you just have to chase the unit until it shatters.

3 hours ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

p.p.s. Most of my units seem really slow on the map. Most certainly slower than realistic at least of the terrain scale visually, Really noticeable after inserting the mod??

The Rebalance mod reduces the base gamespeed from 5 to 2. Unit speeds were also reduced and game timers were increased. There are perks available to increase units movement speed as well.

Edited November 6, 2018 by pandakraut

[Lt. Gen. James Longstreet]

Thanks, for the help and responses pandakraut. After playing the first part of Fredericksburg and reporting back here earlier, I realized that the AI scaling was way too much, so seeing as you cant subtract from units and mine were too big, I reverted back to a previous save. I chose one that I didn't complete fully. Weapons Factory I think, the one at Harpers Ferry before Sharpsburg. This was much better and Jacksons 2nd Corps was about perfect for size around 24000 maybe more cause I increased the number of Divisions exactly as they did historically. The only problem was they never appeared fully and the 3rd division was missing a Brigade and their artillery battery because they would not fit into the scenario.

1st) I only installed the one mod, JP Rebalance1.23a I think, and I presumed the Surrender mod was already a part of that. As for the point of surrendering units, almost the entire Union force surrendered to Me, as I had most of his units surrounded by the end. Although not so huge in numbers around 4000, the actual number of units, was my biggest haul! I presume that surrender mod kicked in.

2nd) I was really disappointed though because I missed the full objectives in my first playthrough. I felt that by seizing Harpers Ferry my haul in captured Ordnance and material would be great, but it wasn't? 4000 men captured translated to 1000 recruits, ok that's standard but kinda hoped that would be better with your mod. In real life, it was a big haul, in guns, horses, and accouterments, so I figured when I got the objective 100 % I would receive so much more than I did. Or do I have to finish the final battle of Sharpsburg before I receive my rewards?  I guess what I m thinking is that missing Harpers Ferry the first time through was no big deal and that's disappointing.

3rd) Wow, this one is disastrous, and I don't know what to do??? Of all my rewards so far in the game, from my Government, has been of course actual Southern Generals. And my 2nd Corps was my best. I had Lt. Gen. D.H. Hil, 1st division command. Jackson was corps commander but only Brigadier. I had A. P. Hill as Division 3 commander. Also as Brigade commanders, I had Rodes with D.H. Hil. In Ewell's division, I had Early, Taliaferro, and Harry Hayes, and in A.P. Hill's Division, I had Archer. After the Battle ended there were a number of promotions including all these generals, but all these illustrious gentlemen listed above were knocked back to Colonels, and DH Hill went from Lt.Gen. to Brigadier and Erell going from Major General to Colonel as well. Obviously, I can't have that, but don't know what to do, advice would be most welcome. And for the record, It actually did say they were promoted, but their ranks show them dropping in ranks in the actual results window. I presumed this was sort of a typo or hoped it was until I got back to camp and saw the real results

 

[pandakraut]

1 minute ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

1st) I only installed the one mod, JP Rebalance1.23a I think, and I presumed the Surrender mod was already a part of that. As for the point of surrendering units, almost the entire Union force surrendered to Me, as I had most of his units surrounded by the end. Although not so huge in numbers around 4000, the actual number of units, was my biggest haul! I presume that surrender mod kicked in.

Ahh, no the surrender mod functionality is not implemented in that version of the mod. It has some side effects we aren't happy with at the moment. We may end up implementing something similar in the future though. However, since melee damage has been increased by the mod surrenders can be easier to get, especially with cavalry.

3 minutes ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

2nd) I was really disappointed though because I missed the full objectives in my first playthrough. I felt that by seizing Harpers Ferry my haul in captured Ordnance and material would be great, but it wasn't? 4000 men captured translated to 1000 recruits, ok that's standard but kinda hoped that would be better with your mod. In real life, it was a big haul, in guns, horses, and accouterments, so I figured when I got the objective 100 % I would receive so much more than I did. Or do I have to finish the final battle of Sharpsburg before I receive my rewards?  I guess what I m thinking is that missing Harpers Ferry the first time through was no big deal and that's disappointing.

The base game rewards for winning the Harper's Ferry battle don't really account for the material benefits in the historical campaign. The game primarily represents this with weapons and supply captured in battles. Since you will face a large force at Antietam, if you can destroy them you will end up with a lot of weapons. We will probably look into trying to add more post battle rewards like the few officers and 3* units that are currently in the game but it isn't something we have gotten to yet.

Recruits are capped at 1k for balance reasons though you are getting better weapon capture rates and reducing the AI's size in future battles with captures.

7 minutes ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

3rd) Wow, this one is disastrous, and I don't know what to do??? Of all my rewards so far in the game, from my Government, has been of course actual Southern Generals. And my 2nd Corps was my best. I had Lt. Gen. D.H. Hil, 1st division command. Jackson was corps commander but only Brigadier. I had A. P. Hill as Division 3 commander. Also as Brigade commanders, I had Rodes with D.H. Hil. In Ewell's division, I had Early, Taliaferro, and Harry Hayes, and in A.P. Hill's Division, I had Archer. After the Battle ended there were a number of promotions including all these generals, but all these illustrious gentlemen listed above were knocked back to Colonels, and DH Hill went from Lt.Gen. to Brigadier and Erell going from Major General to Colonel as well. Obviously, I can't have that, but don't know what to do, advice would be most welcome. And for the record, It actually did say they were promoted, but their ranks show them dropping in ranks in the actual results window. I presumed this was sort of a typo or hoped it was until I got back to camp and saw the real results

This is due to the changes made in the mod to officer experience levels. If you are using saves from a base version of the game you will see officers demoted as their experience level switches to match the levels used in the mod. This change was primarily due to gameplay balance. With perks being much stronger unit and officer experience gain was decreased. Colonels are now much more common and it takes much more experience to hit the higher ranks. While this does result in the historical officers having lower ranks than they normally would it also prevents the issue of having every brigade commanded by a major general toward the end of a campaign.

While the mod will work with old saves, you will notice several issues like the above so we usually recommend starting  new campaign. Since the AI has much higher unit size caps in the mod if you are using a save with modified unit sizes you will definitely see the AI units increase in size quite a bit.

[Lt. Gen. James Longstreet]

OK, new campaign start under way, Just finished Norfolk and waiting on Bull Run. So here is my take! I saw a lot of familiar faces in Norfolk, and while using them I really worked them hard and was very successful in the engagement.  I saw 2 Cavalry Brigades for Stuart, Infantry Brigades for Ewell, Bee, Shank Evans, Pelham, and Imboden's Artillery As well as Kempers, Archers, and Greggs in my 1st Division. Which leads to my point! I was only supposed to have one division of three, but I had like 5 made up from my leftover "massive" start Unit that I disbanded and put normal sized Brigades in those divisions after the Potomac Forts scenario.

I was sure once I used the above-forementioned units they would have been incorporated into my forces but that never happened, Was this never going to happen? Or was it because I had these full slots already filled? If I get to keep those units I will restart again and not create those extra divisions in the first camp

Edited November 7, 2018 by Lt. Gen. James Longstreet
additional remarks

[pandakraut]

5 minutes ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

OK, new campaign start under way, Just finished Norfolk and waiting on Bull Run. So here is my take! I saw a lot of familiar faces in Norfolk, and while using them I really worked them hard and was very successful in the engagement.  I saw 2 Cavalry Brigades for Stuart, Infantry Brigades for Ewell, Bee, Shank Evans, Pelham, and Imboden's Artillery As well as Kempers, Archers, and Greggs in my 1st Division. Which leads to my point! I was only supposed to have one division of three, but I had like 5 made up from my leftover "massive" start Unit that I disbanded and put normal sized Brigades in those divisions after the Potomac Forts scenario.

I was sure once I used the above-forementioned units they would have been incorporated into my forces but that never happened, Was this never going to happen? Or was it because I had these full slots already filled? If I get to keep those units I will restart again and not create those extra divisions in the first camp

I'm not entirely sure what you are describing. From Potomac Fort you only get to keep Sigfreid, Kemper, and Cabell. The allied units in the Newport News battle do not get added to your army after the battle. 

The mod does increase the number of deployment slots, but anything you deploy will still be in your army post battle assuming it isn't captured or destroyed. 

Does that answer your question?

[Lt. Gen. James Longstreet]

OH, one thing of interest. My trainer that I use to give me the "massive" unit at the start, the one I disband and get a pool of recruits and Springfields no longer works after rebooting the game with your mod. It comes up with an "error cannot find AoB" Which I find strange as the only culprit I could see would be the replacing of the "Assembly-CSharp.dll" Could this be modified to recognize this again?

Quote

 

 

Edited November 7, 2018 by Lt. Gen. James Longstreet

[Lt. Gen. James Longstreet]

Yes, thank you for the answer concerning Norfolk News. I was hoping if I didn't have those additional divisions and brigades, there would have been room for those Stuart, Ewell, Bee, Evans, Pelham, and Imboden's units to be acquired by my corps. You replied that this never would have happened.

 

Many Thanks

[pandakraut]

3 minutes ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

OH, one thing of interest. My trainer that I use to give me the "massive" unit at the start, the one I disband and get a pool of recruits and Springfields no longer works after rebooting the game with your mod. It comes up with an "error cannot find AoB" Which I find strange as the only culprit I could see would be the replacing of the "Assembly-CSharp.dll" Could this be modified to recognize his again?

I'm not sure why that program wouldn't work and it's unlikely that I would be able to fix it. The mod does increase the unit sizes in the first mission and increase the rewards for completing it. Have you tried the battle without the trainer?

[pandakraut]

3 minutes ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

Yes, thank you for the answer concerning Norfolk News. I was hoping if I didn't have those additional divisions and brigades, there would have been room for those Stuart, Ewell, Bee, Evans, Pelham, and Imboden's units to be acquired by my corps. You replied that this never would have happened.

 

Many Thanks

Other than the starting battles the only time you receive a unit post battle is Forrest post CSA Shiloh and the Iron Brigade post Union Antietam. Any other allied units just return to the void after the battle, feel free to suicide them for their weapons

[Lt. Gen. James Longstreet]

No, I always lost when I didn't use the trainer. So I use the trainer to give me one massive unit, beat the part where I get excepted into the army and then disband before the actual campaign part begins. Replaying that Potomac Fort scenario over and over and not succeeding in one half or the other just got frustrating, not because I lost or didn't get 100%, its because the game would not except your services in the army, and wouldn't start the actual game.

Ok if you can allow a named junior officer to take over the position of a superior one, in case of wounds or death in battle. Then retain his services in the officer's pool or barracks upon the completion of the battle in which case they both survived! Would it not be possible to retain the services of the Norfolk News units after that battle as well? I mean maybe not the actual units and the men and guns, but even the names of the officers or copies that you could place in your own versions of their units? I mean the two functions are so similar, and you have already implemented one in your mod I can't help but feel this could be possible! I mean the two ideas are so uncannily alike that inclusion into the mod is theoretically feasible would it not?

[pandakraut]

1 hour ago, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet said:

Ok if you can allow a named junior officer to take over the position of a superior one, in case of wounds or death in battle. Then retain his services in the officer's pool or barracks upon the completion of the battle in which case they both survived! Would it not be possible to retain the services of the Norfolk News units after that battle as well? I mean maybe not the actual units and the men and guns, but even the names of the officers or copies that you could place in your own versions of their units? I mean the two functions are so similar, and you have already implemented one in your mod I can't help but feel this could be possible! I mean the two ideas are so uncannily alike that inclusion into the mod is theoretically feasible would it not?

I've been trying to get extra units from the tutorial battle to join the army but have not gotten it to work up to this point. Getting an officer into the barracks pool had some good examples in the game code but storing the units appears to be more complicated.