Napoleon WWI Mod

[A Nerd]

I don't know if this is the right place to post this but I though it might be interesting. I haven't bought Napoleon yet, but plan to soon so bear with me. I watch a youtube video where this guy is using a WWI mod for Napoleon (it's in the early stages and I didn't know Napoleon was moddable as such), it looks interesting and fun and perhaps WWI will be the next TW. Though it does seem to lack tactic and arty is quite powerful. Anyone seen this or have opinions?

https://www.youtube.com/user/twbattl.../3/g3RJe6LzrWo

Hopefully I put the link in correctlly!

[antisocialmunky]

I've toyed around with the idea but I don't think the NTW AI is all that capable of doing trench warfare. You could do something with the fences or something...

[A Nerd]

You definately need some form of cover. I thought that with the range and accuracy of the artillary, most infantry and calvary would be widdled away before even reaching the enemy lines. Tactic seemed lacking, for they generally just stood idly by firing at one another. THough I loved the rate of fire and high casualty count. Calvary's only use seemed to be taking out arillary. I didn't notice much flanking in the videos. I hope it stays away from trench warfare, you know, keep it ahistorical in that sense. A nice implimentation in the future could perhaps be mine fields and MG nests. Perhaps placed during deployment of the defender. I dind't think that WWI would tweak my interest, but those videos were kind of compelling.

edit: I thought of this just now in regards to defenders deploying mine fileds and MG nests...perhaps the modders could develop a scout like unit that could survey the field during the battle to note the before mentioned. They would be made vulnerable such that infantry or calvary would deal with them rather effortlessly. Sort of in the vein of those units that could hide in open terrain in earlier TW versions. It might add in tactic as you move the rest of your army toward the enemy lines. Perhaps even these scout units could unrealisticly deal with mine fields or tamper with MG nests if gone unseen. Perhaps this is dumb, but it just came to mind presently.

[The Stranger]

awesome. where can u get the mod? too bad it seems a bit laggy.

[A Nerd]

I thought I saw a link to TWCenter on the youtube page for TWBattles. I'm not sure though.

[The Stranger]

yes i already found it... though im not playing it untill its updated with new skins and stuff. i tried one battle and it was a bit unfair. AI couldnt handle the rate of fire etc. i mean that airrifled hungarian unit that can hide everywhere. i forgot its name but that single unit singlehandedly ripped 6000 men apart. so im waiting for such units to be removed, new starting positions etc!

[A Nerd]

That sounds cool! I didn't know NTW could be modded as such. Hidden units should be smaller and less effective than the one you described in my opinion. How was tactic and how did you employ it? Is calvary worthless? 6000 men!? You must have fought a large battle! Hopefully they could do a campaing map too!

edit: Practice makes perfect!

[The Stranger]

well it obviously was an elite unit, so it had high accuracy and reload time. and since it can hide anywhere and even remain hidden while firing it could take out every unit without being shot back at. and every volly took out about 100 men that is 1/4 bullets hitting, in itself not so high, but since it takes only seconds to reload u can take out a unit within a minute. and i mean completely annihilate it to the last man. cannons are totally awesome, but i think the battery size needs to be limited and they need to be alot more expensive, because now u can just pick all cannons and 2 infantry and u can rip appart any army unless it has better and bigger cannon. so the need for infantry is obsolete. and i know that cannons were so lethal but infantry was still needed. and they never carried that many guns to the battle. so i'd say ok howitzers can go for 12 per battery, but no more than 2 batteries can be fielded. and fieldguns go around 2 or 4 per battery but are highly mobile and such. i think 400 men per unit is very nice. this means u can get 6000 men on a battlefield easy and this awesome.

cavalry is not entirely useless, but i cant charge infantry anymore, atleast not head on. it might do some flanking. but it is best used to rout cannon when the battle is almost over. i did one charge across the map when i had routed the enemy infantry and i still lost like 100 men out of my 200. it was like the charge of the light brigade :P


the mod is working on a campaign map with ww1 diplomacy and starting positions, so thats what im waiting for. they even have previews of ww1 cannon and even machine gun, a vicker. totally awesome!

[A Nerd]

That does sound awesome indeed. I'd like to try it too, but I think I'd wait for the skins and campaign map. Is the mod hard to install? Can you still play vanilla NTW when it is installed? I did fear armies with an arty spam, for exactly the reasons you stated. I wonder if the campaign map (or even battles) will do anything with airplanes and tanks? I would assume the engine is incapable. Quite exciting! I didn't think I would like a WWI based game, but so far I like what I am seeing!

[The Stranger]

no surprisingly easy :P u unzip the downloaded packs and place them into the right map. that is all. no install etc. just unpack and place. also easy to remove. u just delete the packs. there are only 2 of them.

i cant wait for the vickers.

i just played another game though. and the ai cant really handle it. but even though that being said its not as if they dont resist. they do aim for your elite units and cannon. and if theyd change one thing in the mod i think the battles will become evenly matched. and quite challenging. ofcourse the deffending army is highly in advantage. so they should make the ai more prone to sit back and soften u up with arty. if they do attack however they should do so at double pace. because walking through the nomans land is just waiting to get blasted to bits by enemy artillery. however usually 2/3rd of the infantry does get through. that being said they break very fast because the arty already demoralise them. the attacking army will suffer 90% casualty rate and the defending around 33%.

they should also make the units more thinly spread and less cannons in the batteries and this mod will be awesome!!!

on the sidenote, i only have version 1 of the mod. so very few things have changed and its still crude.

[A Nerd]

That does sound quite interesting. I may have to buy NTW sooner than I had planned! No more shoe shopping binges on Ebay I guess! I think is is quite refreshing and realistic that the attacking army takes so many more casualties than does the defender. What is a vicker? MG's and the like will also add a nice dynamic to assaulting a defenders lines! I was also thinking, these lop-sided battles and high casualty rates might make the campaign play alittle more interesting. It would take more time to refill your armies, map movement would need to be thought about alittle more if an objective is targeted and due to casualties that will be sustained before reaching the objective, this will perhaps limit success if your casualties are too high that you can no longer take said objective. It will take some intelligent moves by both parties and make it so that you can't just rush your enemy in battle for those soldiers in it are necessary for taking a city, fort or strategic position on the map.

Cannons definetly need to be dumbed down alittle. Granted, they were deadly and relatively accurate (as far as I know), making them more expensive and perhaps making them more accurate at arty crews gain experience (ie. inexperience gun crews have poorer aim then more experienced ones). Expereince gained for arty crews should be more slowly acquired than say infantry and calvary for perhaps that arty crews are realatively safe and firing a field gun takes less effort considering the casualties that could be inflicted in one volly.

A crude mod at this point perhaps, but it still sounds fun and it can only get better! (hopefully)

[The Stranger]

i think the new version of the mod is up!

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=349267

[A Nerd]

Wonderful! Keep me undated as to the changes if you can!

[Veho Nex]

The second they add Campaign map trenches, kinda like building forts i guess, thats when I will buy NTW. It looks awesome though.

[A Nerd]

I'd love to the the unit skins and campaign map as well! I too think I am going to buy NTW when this mod evolves alittle more. I'm quite content with ETW for the timeframe.

[The Stranger]

the skins of the new unitskins look cool. the campaginmap seems unchanged except for some faction banners. the ai still cant handle the rate of fire though and that will be mayor problem. your cannon is way more effective at taking out theirs than vica versa and they aim for your elite trioops rather than your cannon. last game i suffered 1500 casualties vs 4500 killed. the casualties suffered were mostly due to cannon and because i attack headlong into melee.

i think the biggest problem for this mod is that the ai cant handle all the changes. they seem to use cannon reasonably effective. but they still form the line, while that is unneccesary, give the rate of fire, size of units and range etc. they also seem to be unable to effectively adapt to the new rate of fire and more problematicly the range of fire. which has been increased by almost 50% sometimes. so thats why they walk into your range and get destroyed before a single shot has been fired bt them.

i think the units should be spread more thin and cover should be more effective, rate of fire should be decreased a bit, because now it looks more like machine gun fire than anything else and also the accuracy has to be decreased. unit numbers i think would be better at 200 to 300. 400 is a bit of an overkill. I'd opt for 250 since that is infantry company size.

things that would be awesome to see are bunkers you can garrison. i guess if they would be able to make some new buildings and stuff, they might make bunkers. a city that has forts will also have trenches, a bit like verdun. that would be awesome. a army that is dugin, will also have trenches maybe... though a mobile war like the eastern front might also be awesome. portable machine guns and maybe flamethrowers!

[A Nerd]

That sounds really cool! Does the AI function well on the campaign map or is it more NTW/ETW behavior? You know, camping in cities, little armies (weak and ineffective) milling about, and lack of any useful development, etc. I found, from observaton, that the battle maps need to be revamped to provide better infantry tactics to evoke a more enjoyable combat experience. Terrain cover, forests, bunkers, dare I say trenches and other static objects to reduce high casualties so quickly. This would probably involve the field units to do more than move, stand and shoot. Perhaps the current engine isn't campable of such things. I like your idea of spreading on infantry units somewhat, allowing for missed shots and less lethal artillary fire. Too bad the developers couldn't include misfires (due to weather perhaps) and arty shells that are 'duds'. Perhaps a misfire will cause one foot soldier to be inactive for the entire battle. I used to also like from the MTW days when artillary pieces would occasionally explode. Back to trenches, perhaps they could be used well if garrisoned for a fight then at the right moment give an 'over the top' order and move on the enemy. Machine guns and flamethrowers...tantilizing!

[The Stranger]

i havent yet played campaign cuz starting positions arent up yet, not starting armies. and i never played etw though in my ntw campaigns ive always faced alot of resistance, fought big stacks etc. and have been attacked alot, so much it started to annoy me.cuz i couldnt hold my frontline effectively with all the sabotage going on.

as for the machine guns, ive seen a texture for it, so i guess theyll be in somewhere in the future. flamethrowers probably will stay a fantasy :P but i think its cool for the variaty of units. now there are only 3 sorts infantry that can be recruited.

[A Nerd]

I like the limit of infantry types, brings back fond memories of STW. An agressive AI on the campain map might not be a bad thing, especiallly if he manages himself capably behind his lines. It is annoying however, when all the AI factions gang up on the player while leaving each other realatively alone. How is the calvary going? Any mentions of mechanized warfare like planes and tanks?

[The Stranger]

hehe ive just been told i should just tone done unit sizes :P i think thats a valid option.. though i might just manually change it to 250.

i dont think planes and tanks will be implemented, tanks maybe, planes i think definitly not.... but you never know. theyre talking about changing the stakes into barbed wire which is cool!

[A Nerd]

Keep me posted! It will probably be awhile until I try out this mod!

[The Stranger]

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...68#post7260368

check this post out!

open the hide and see some treats!

[A Nerd]

That looks amazing! Though I expected all the skins to be those generic green fatigues. I can't begin to imagine how tanks will be implemented, but apparently, we will see soon! Thanks for the link.

[The Stranger]

no french infantry wore blue, germans wore black. only americans, rus and brits wore green.

[A Nerd]

I also expected to see the Germans in those helmets that looked reminicent of the ones worn in WWII. The French helmets, the metal ones with two rib like things on the top, and the brits with the metal helmet that had a dome with the visor all the way around (same as Americans). But all the units I saw in the previews looked to have cloth hats. No problem though, I'm not well versed in uniforms of the time anyway.

[The Stranger]

they dont have a way to implement new models into the game. so as soon as they have a method to do so, you will see helmets, tanks, trenches, machineguns, barbed wire, etc!

[A Nerd]

I think the mod would be more interesting with the more modern looking infantry units. I didn't know there was a way to mod NTW and ETW as such. Hopefully there is because as of now the mod has quite a bit of appeal.

[The Stranger]

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...28#post7323728

take a look at this, the first version of flamethrowers!

[A Nerd]

That is really neat! I'm more into the MG's, but that is quite a nice touch.

[The Sultan]

[Aside] It's entirely speculatory in nature but I wouldn't be in the least bit surprised if the next major installment of the TW series was... "The Great War" and if i was CA then I would be timing it's release for 2014 to coincide with the 100th anniversary - plus of course it gives them 4 years to er... *coughs* iron out the bugs. Most of the mechanics are already there with the notable exception of Aircraft - although I did notice a little balloon floating around when I was hammering Boney again last night.