Coming Soon
I've mentioned an update for Zero Hour coming soon, so you might well be wondering what this fabled release will be about. Neo and Dirty Harry have been hard at work preparing the game and here is a rundown of the changes:
Gameplay:
The tech tree now has 9 steps. All games start from December 1940 up to tech 9 on June 1945. Players uptech according to time and points they get during battles.
Players can build up to 9 factories:
Allies: Chrysler Detroit Arsenal, General Motors, Press Steel Co., Pacific Car Co., American Locomotive Co., Vauxhall Motors, Vickers, Leyland Motors, Nuffield Mechanisation.
Soviets: Kharkov factory no.183, Leningrad LKZ Factory, Stalingrad Factory, GAZ Factory in Gorky, Leningrad Factory no.174, Factory no.112 in Gorky, Kirov Factory no. 38, Uralmash Factory, Tankograd.
Germans: MAN, Henschel, Krupp, Alkett, MNH, Daimler, Nibel, plus V2 launch sites.
This version focuses on ground vehicles with called-in air support. Infantry's role is more to capture income buildings and manpower is only supplied slowly.
Units:
Units are now 50% smaller than before. More tanks are rolling on the battlefield. The result is the maps look twice as large as before which allows pincer and flank moves.
Weapon's range is also longer than before to allow sniper units like Panthers, Tigers and others to be used in this specific role if necessary.
Many new units are now included in the game, here are some of these:
Allies: 9 types of Shermans are now included - up from the 3 available currently, Churchill VII, Crusader II, Crusader III, Valentine IX, Achilles, Archer, M10, M36, 2pdrs AT gun, 6pdrs AT gun.
Soviets: 6 types of T-34 are now included instead of 2 before, 4 types of KV-1 instead of 1 before, SU-152, ISU-122, SU-85, 45mm AT gun.
Germans: Stug IIIb, Panzerjager I, PzIVF1, sIG33, Nashorn, StugIV, 50mm AT gun.
As usual, every unit has stats based on historic gun power, ROF, range, accuracy, armour thickness, armour angle factor, speed, price, build time and fuel consumption.
Fuel
Because all heavy tanks and some medium tanks use more fuel than others, the players have to make sure they have enough fuel depots before launching a mass production of heavies. Some of these tanks can be disabled if there’s a shortage of fuel like the one Germans got at the end of the WW2.
Hopefully that gives a better idea of what's coming. Things are still looking good for a release either later this month or early next month so hopefully there will be some more updates soon!
Is there any chance we can see some screens of the new units and factories?
It's not as cool as it sounds, there have been minimal graphical changes.
The 50% scale reduction does make a big difference though, so we can probably get some cool screenshots to show how the game looks now.
Sounds nice but... "release either later this month or early next month" I hope you wont dissapoint us :D a release that soon would be incredible! will there also be a working AI or something that works in Singleplayer cause i barely have people playing this sadly...Anyway, Im really looking forward to it! this is still the best large scale WW2 RTS mod/game! [also dont take my first sentence serious, I know you do all this for free in your freetime]
Yes, feel free to blizzard-out your release date to make sure its absolutly polish-perfect.
Here's a secret - contrary to popular belief, fans actually love it when you do that. It simply means it will be even better when it is released.
Holy crap, as if there wasn't enough variety in the vehicles already!! :D :D :D :D
One thing I must point out, though the new squad system for the infantry is interesting, I don't really think it's that necessary to limit producing one kind of infantry at a time, or have that much infantry spawn at once.
I am really excited for this new release. Good luck!
Well the problem we have is that in terms of game-resources 1x infantry and 1x tank are basically the same. But you need massed infantry to replicate the fun and awesome of each tank - so we want to focus players on the tanks. It makes the game a lot more enjoyable!
Yes, and I like the fact that infantry spawns in large squads, but why can you only make one at a time, even if you have many barracks?
Well either we limit the production or we make them suck so badly that noone wants to use them. I'd rather limit production but keep them useful.
I really really hope that the AI will now use Airpower.
Good luck !
Quick question : I now see a lot of American Factories... does that mean American vehicles are no longer ordered and delivered in groups at the Command Centre?
Yeah that mechanic is totally changed now.
Sounds great
Can you please put some work on infantry like giving them a realistic look ,more roles and some power to face tanks ,That was the only problem In blitzkrieg for me.focus on unbelievable amounts of armor that always out range you no matter the situation kinda killed the game for me.
well infantry together with some armor and some guns can do ALOT, open fielded probably not but you can build bunkers or put them in cities, that works well, in my opinion infantry had the perfect role
but what i see from the change list is a upcoming mod overhaul which makes it more realistic
they should make a new realistic infantry skins with there weapons instead of sticks
good luck
Infantry at 50% scale are really really tiny. A graphical improvement would be a waste of time.
With the gameplay itself there's two ways to make infantry more realistic - give them more HP so that they're basically like tanks or make them able to crawl, take cover, build entrenchments and so on. What it comes down to is a mix of engine limitations and pace. Men of War is a great game that does this type of gameplay really well. We wanted a faster game that has a bigger scale. More tanks, more back and forth cut and thrust and a focus on the higher level economic strategy - massing up and expending forces.
We try to marginalise infantry because we want a fast game with lots of tanks!
ah ok i just wanted the infantry to look like the ones from CWC with a bigger role.
Anyway i like what are you trying to change a new type of gameplay with a large forces
Good luck and thanks for the reply korona
Wow. I like the new scaling of units.
Looking forward to the Zero Hour update.
Nice, I always wanted to see more updates for this excelent ZH mod. Gj!
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