View Full Version : Breaking the Game: Testing the Limits of the Engine
I promised I'd make this thread once this sub-forum was created (and if it goes into more subforums just move it to where it is most applicable). I, along other modders of WinSPMBT and WinSPWWII (and the versions before it), have often attempted to get as many real life capabilities as possible into the game, exposing the very limits of the games engine.
This thread is an idea of mine to serve as a collecting place for people's various experiments, and I will start it off by creating individual posts to go over what I've learned both from experience and from others nice enough to share their experiments, on thing from tear gas to propoganda speakers to daisy cutters. I hope this will serve as a valuable resource on what people have already learned through trial and error about breaking the game.
Enjoy
Less than lethal weapons were what got me started in my experiments to get a real life capability into a game engine that really doesn't model it well. In my travels I bumped into a modder by the handle of Listy who seems to be everyone's starting point when trying to create weapons of this type. Listy's improved British Obat for SPMBT contained both riot agents and less than lethal baton guns. Everyone I've talked to who has attempted similar weapons cites Listy's work as the basis for their own.
Now it is important to immediately realize that the WinSPMBT engine is not set up to properly model gas weapons of any kind, especially those that are non-lethal incapacitants, such as CS, CN, DM etc. For those interested in realism this means that you have to accept one of two rationalizations for casualties caused by these weapons:
1) It is unrealistic, but hey, the game engine doesn't model it properly anyways, and besides you need to cause casualties to your opponent to win within the game parameters.
or
2) It is realistic to assume that since a casualty does not mean a dead person, so a person incapacitated by a riot agent or less than lethal weapon would count.
One, or both of these rationalizations must be accepted because with one exception (which I will get to last), it is impossible to create a weapon on an appropriate type in WinSPMBT that doesn't produce casualties 100% of the time while also causing suppression. Note that it is possible to create an ineffective system with all weapon factors 0, but it also won't suppress the target making the system pointless to implement.
The usual weapon class for gas weapons is a flame class, often Class 08/Infantry Flame (for infantry weapons) or Class 18/Napalm (for air delivered weapons). This is most often used because it creates smoke and fire that are in many ways realistically associated with the use of gas. Of course a CS hand grenade would no likely fill the entire area of a hex, but then again infantry smoke grenades wouldn't either. This is part of the game, and is perfectly acceptable. The most common ways of further tweaking the weapon have been to try and find the best possible combination of warhead size and accuracy with a relatively low HE Kill factor (if not just giving the system 0 HEK).
Riot control weapons such as bean-bag loaded shotguns, rubber bullets, baton guns, etc can be modeled in a similar fashion.
There is one exception that I have discovered, however, and that is that the cluster munition class, Class 14, appears to be the only instance where casualties can be avoided but where hits cause suppression. In my Vietnam pack, the United States Air Force has access to aircraft loaded with CBU-30/A cluster bombs filled with CS grenades, modeled as a cluster munition with 255 accuracy and 0 for every other weapon stat. This consistantly deals no damage to infantry units, while suppressing them, regardless of cover (suppression of course varies slightly depending on cover). Cluster riot control munitions are however limited just to the US, as I know of no other country which developed such weapons.
However, I have hypothesized that the cluster effect might be realistic for aircraft spraying agents at low levels and other situations where the weapon might be large enough for an area effect. However, the CS cluster bomb is so far the only weapon I feel 100% comfortable in implementing.
Propoganda speaker equipment is common to many armies around the world. However, implementing it in WinSPMBT means many of the same issues as implementing riot control agents. The two rationalizations for riot control agents must be again assumed for speaker equipment. The modification to these rationalizations is that a speaker system might be enough to spook, immediately convince or otherwise cause a unit or members of a unit to flee.
Just as with riot control agents, a weapon with high accuracy and zero for all other weapon stats was required. I used 255 acc because of my belief that it would be impossible for a unit not to hear the speaker system.
Infantry speakers and land/sea vehicle speakers were created as a Class 3 weapon to take advantage of possible splash into other hexes. Airplane speakers were of course Class 11, and then mated with an unit of the gunship class so that it would orbit the targeted unit. The stats are the same from weapon to weapon, different weapons were created only for flavor (and because of the need for a Class 11 version).
The term "Daisy Cutter" has been very liberally applied to a variety of very large bombs, of both conventional and fuel-air explosive (FAE) type. The weapons have historically been used to clear helicopter land zones in dense foliage, to destroy underground facilities (or attempt to through "earthquake" like concussion effects), and simple demolition tasks (whether they be combat or otherwise).
These weapons have historically been too heavy or awkward for conventional bomber or fighter-bomber aircraft, and their only real user, the United States has historically dropped them from C-130 cargo aircraft. The fact that these weapons were dropped from cargo aircraft and that air drops were available in WinSPMBT led me to attempt to create an airdropped daisy cutter using a modified ammo carrier unit.
During my testing I found that Listy had also attempted such experiments, and he was nice enough to share with me that even by modifying the experience and morale ratings of the parent formation (to help ensure destruction on landing) of an "ammo crate" unit, there was no way to get 100% functioning. There is no reason, however, why these weapons cannot be created as regular weapons and a C-130 bomber unit created for them. The ultra-realistic idea of actually getting an air-dropped weapon is essentially impossible.
UPDATE
Apparently its not so impossible. I thought I had attempted the following, but apparently I was mistaken. PatG has noted that while a ammo carrier with 0 crew is technically destroyed at game start, one can still select it through the next/last unit function (the n and p keys) and after selecting it, load it onto an aircraft. When the aircraft drops it, all works as is should. Note there are still some realism issues associated with such a unit. Firstly, it counts toward your destroyed unit count, which is points against at game end. Secondly, while in real life this method is more accurate than conventional level bombing, it is likely to be less accurate in game terms. An LZ in WinSP is not as fixed as a strike on a particular hex. While the ammo dump explosion gives you 7 hexes of damage, and therefore a little margain of error, it still may not be real enough for some. My current plan would be to implement the bombs as a player only decision, and also create a bomber class aircraft with a conventional equiped weapon.
FAILED EXPERIMENT
...
During my testing I found that Listy had also attempted such experiments, and he was nice enough to share with me that even by modifying the experience and morale ratings of the parent formation (to help ensure destruction on landing) of an "ammo crate" unit, there was no way to get 100% functioning. ...
Stupid question I know but did you set the crew to "0"? It has worked every time for me for static bridge demolitions.
An ammo carrier unit with crew 0 is destroyed at the beginning of the game. This is why its good for static scenario demolitions and the like. However, since it is destroyed immediately, when the carrier aircraft comes in it drops nothing, because the unit is listed as destroyed before it is ever dropped. It might be possibly to use this method for individual scenarios even so, but I'm pretty sure you can't do this so that the unit is purchasable in regular play.
Load up the attached blue OOB (Spww2) and save it in the custom folder.
Start a 1945 battle blue vs whoever, with at least one airstrike.
From the misc purchase window, buy the bomber unit
manual deploy - you won't see the bombs but use p and n to find them, load them up into the dakota and plot a para drop.
quit deploy
and run the battle
Is this what you wanted?
Yes, as a matter of fact it is, now I'm off to WinSPMBT to see if that method actually works. I thought I had tried that. We'll see.
-edit- Well I stand corrected, but not for lack of trying. I thought I had attempted this method. Well it works, but there are still some obvious realism issues. I'll edit the post above.
CODE LIMITATION
Unfortuantely their appears to be no work around with the existing game code for this one. Cluster munitions that are stand off must be made into an artillery class. Class 14 (cluster munitions) dropped from aircraft have range 1 regardless of what the range is set to. This means that even if you set the range to a stand-off type range, it will still be dropped like a normal cluster bomb.
So-called "Fast FAC," or jets used in the forward air controller role, are also not capable of being 100% modeled due to code limitations. If the FO aircraft touches the edge of the screen it immediately goes off screen, even if it has not completed its sweep. The FO Aircraft code is therefore designed to prevent these aircraft from immediately going off the screen. FO aircraft classed units only recongized speeds from 1-4. Any number larger than 4 is treated as 4. Now of course this doesn't mean you can't create these aircraft, just that it doesn't necessarily create anything special, though the aircraft type might make it a better buy (better armor, EW, vision, or other factors).
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