Panzer Corps 2?
Are you asking me or telling me? :)
Heh, it’s my best guess. ;-)
I just Googled and it comes out March 19th so that lines up with what they are talking about. Good lookin’ strategy game…
sorry, it’s Panzer Corps 2. Sequel to Panzer Corps 1 which was inspired by Panzer General 1,2, and 3.
New update looks really good. Here is the twitch stream where some of the changes are discussed.
I especially like the resource change which applies sector resource terrain bonuses automatically, rather than having to research/produce them. Those upgrades are immediately in effect, making sector selection more relevant from the start.
Good point. Ok, I’ll try again once the update is live. And I’ll try to make an earlier time work.
From the Stream, here are the starting bonuses they created to help make the races feel a bit more unique. I think they did a good job, things like the Kir’ko having cheaper upkeep on low-tier units will make them a bit more like the swarm race they want to be, or the Assembly being able to have no delay when applying mods which makes not only aesthetic sense, but is really cool as well. I like all of these bonuses.
This is cool - a lot (all?) of animal units from Tier 1 and II (the only ones Amazons can steal, iirc) now have Meamorphosis allowing them to evolve into a higher tier, more powerful unit when they hit Prime rank.
Wow, those Dvar bonuses are complete ass compared to some of the others, haha. I mean, -15% to Hurry Production compared to -25% upkeep on T1 and T2 units, an extra doctrine slot, or extra ranks on units? Yikes.
I disagree - that’s a significant discount on rushing production, and in the late game (which is when this will really take off) you’re going to be able to stack that with other economy building rushing bonuses and save a TON of energy on fast-building units and structures and in every game I’ve been the most successful in, rushing production has played a big part of it. Starting with extra energy and with that bonus might also mean shaving a few turns off an early game building, as well. I think it cannot be discounted.
EDIT: Also, don’t forget the Dvar already have a big early game bonus with their scouts being able to prospect.
A look at the cleaned up tactical view (scrolling out on the main overland view). I tried to find what it looked like before, and except for a few less icons I can’t really articulate why it looks more useful and easier/cleaner, but it sure does.
On the left is an old shot I grabbed from my screenshots. I’m sure the zoom level is off and that could be part of it, but the new one does a good job highlighting landmarks and it removes what seems like redundant icons, so it’s easier to take in what sectors are capable of. Also, and this was mentioned in the diary this morning but it bears repeating, I love that resources are available from the jump just to simplify the empire management layer a little. Those icons on the right image, like double-trees or double-science? Available from the moment you declare it a food or science sector.
EDIT: I also noticed, though he didn’t point it out and he’s playing with BLACK as his color so I could be wrong, but I think that they finally shaded in controlled sectors with a transparent layer of the players color rather than relying on border colors. I’ve been wanting this for awhile, so I hope that’s the case.
(I am drawing an arrow to his sectors to show they are shaded black, which is his faction color in this gameplay example)
I’m exceptionally impressed at Triumph revisiting anything/everything in the game.
Interesting changes in combat.
They made the combat maps a bit more readable by slightly lowering the colors on the parts of the map no units are near, so your eyes are drawn to the units a little more. It’s pretty subtle, I can’t really tell on the stream, but I’m guessing it will be more obvious when it’s before you.
Also, the little icons over units, like Overwatch, are larger and easier to see.
Change to Morale damage and the Fumble effect low morale brings. One, effects that damage morale tend to do MORE morale damage so it has a great overall effect (as a tactic and an effect). However, Fumble (the % chance you will miss, which gets more and more likely the lower morale drops) is itself not as punishing - rather than a Fumble being an auto-miss, it instead reduces the hit by a step. So a “hit” becomes a “graze” and a “graze” fumbles into a miss. Presumably, you cannot crit as that just becomes a normal hit. It actually reminds me of Pillars of Eternity (both games), in a good way. It means you’ll do a lot less damage, but it’s not the end of the world.
An example of the changed research tree - Amazon’s used to have two doctrines on the first research tier that allowed for bonuses to sectors with forests (or Arcadia sectors) and so the arcadia sector bonus doctrine was strengthened and moved out further, and replaced with this, so you have a good/fun choice to make instead:
The other doctrine being bonus production, or you can make your military units stronger earlier in the game. I love tough choices like that in games such as this.
Some other juicy new and updated research. Like this new one:
And this upgraded one (the frenzy effect is new, if I understand correctly):
Just dropping in before going to bed, we made a lot of smaller tweaks to the overview map that are not as interesting such as size changes for different icons or the new coastal resource icon. You are correct that we added colour fill for domains, it’s a lot better visible in this image from the announcement/dev diary Tom wrote.
Edit: One of the little things we added that is not as obvious is in regards to Sector Exploitation. When you look at the icon for the Landmarks you can see that it now also has a roman numeral that corresponds with its level. All sectors with a exploitation will show their level on the overview map like that. This way it’s easier to see how developed a colony/area is at a glance.
Oh, good, I am glad that’s the case - thanks for the example! Yeah, the new map looks fantastic, the patch itself is going to be very impressive, so know we all appreciate the extra attention and time you spent listening to feedback from forums like this one, for sure!
That is so awesome Jordi. Can’t wait to dig into the game when the update hits!
Dang, just started a game yesterday. I think I’m going to kill it and restart when the patch is out. Playing without colonizers sounds like a huge improvement! Excited about the simplified economy research also. I wish I had more time to play! I still haven’t tried all the factions and secret techs.
This all sounds great.
I’m especially curious about visibility improvements. I think it’s an underrated problem. I have slight color blindness but it’s often enough to make me very confused about reading maps. Of course it’s not as bad in TBS games as in RTS games, but even graphic intensity of, say, Age of Mythology remaster makes it hard to understand what happens as quickly as you should. And even though I really like Endless Legend I have to mostly play it in schematic mode cause even after a few years I constantly confuse resources with exploration sites and such. AoW3 had this problem for me too as many sites were easy to miss even on cloth map. And missing creature spawn site was deadly, of course. AoWP seems much better now but still those battlefields get pretty busy.
All this detail are basically forcing many developers to turn graphics into a meaningless background with everything important being shown by icon overlay (see Civilization 5+, Fantasy Warrior 2, Total War) and I wonder if there’s a better way.
Edit: And yeah, Dvar bonus makes me think I don’t understand the game at all.
Art direction is the answer, but it’s hard. I’d argue that Civ V is the best example of beautiful but clear and readable graphics. Offworld Trading Company too.
Funny, they share an art director ;) Wonder what Dorian is up to now.