5.1.6 beta2

[MarKr]

Hi,

we're bringing another beta version to you. Since there was not enough feedback on the first one we decided to keep it in beta branch for a bit longer and add to it some other changes, hopefully the newer beta will bring more interesting things to try and people will test it a bit more. If not then beta will be turned into live version if some fixes are needed, they will need to come in form of some hotfixes.

Anyway, these changes are applied on top of the first beta. If you have beta branch active on Steam, it will download the files automatically as you switch to the beta branch.

General:
- Doubled delay between shots for all mortars (including morter Halftracks; barrage abilities keep their fire rate)
- Mortar smoke barrage abilities now fire 10 smoke shells per barrage (from 7)
- Flamethrowers now have 80% chance to insta-kill occupants of a building, trench or emplacement when they hit them with the flamethrower
- The "weak armor penetrated" message now stays visible for 3 seconds (from 1)
- Captured 50mm PaK38 should now deal correct damage to all Axis tanks
- Tweaked hull and coaxial MGs on vehicles to be a bit more useful
- Tweaked Top MGs on vehicles (to compensate for better performance of hull and coaxial MGs)
- General tweaks to .50cals (a bit more accurate, a bit higher RoF, can penetrate light armor)
- Removed damage bonus from all AP abilities
- AP abilities now cost 50ammo to activate (from 75ammo)
- Using HEAT/B or HEAT/C abilities should no longer cause very long (5+ seconds) delay before the shot
- Fixed wrong penetration values when shooting HEAT/B and HEAT/C (in some cases HEAT/B had higher penetration chances than HEAT/C)
- The range of HEAT/B and HEAT/C set to 50 as intended (from 60)
- Vision range of flak36 88mm corrected to 60 (from 85; the actual weapon range remains at 85 but to get the range some other unit will have to extend the view range)
- The AP ammo of flak36 88mm should now be less accurate against infantry
- The HE ammo of flak36 88mm should no longer deal too much damage to tanks
- Construction cone of fire of MG nests should now more accurately correspond with actual the cone of fire when the MG nest is finished
- 4000VP mode transformed into "750VP + 250pop cap"
- Thompsons can now fire one more burst before they start reloading

US:
- Fixed wrong range brackets of Riflemen M1 Garand
- Tweaked the cooldown of Ranger M1 Garand to 1.5-1.75 (from 1.75)
- Tweaked the cooldown of Ranger M1 Garand at closer ranges
- 60mm mortar barrage cost set to 20 ammo
- 80mm mortar barrage cost set to 30 ammo
- 80mm mortar barrage describtion no longer uses the texts of 60mm mortar
- Fixed a bug where US medics (built in Triage centers) were limited to 1 squad instead of 2
- Moved "Medkit" ability of Fortified Observation Point (Infantry doctrine) to slot 8 (from 12) to avoid ability clipping with garrisoned infantry
- Fixed a model bug on M3 Halftrack
- Fixed the range brackets on .30cal Jeep so that the effectiveness does not drop so fast
- Lowered the Veterancy XP requirements of Stuart and Chaffee to 12/24/48/96 (from 25/55/90/135)
- M10 with Bulldozer upgrade will no longer have the "Bulldozer balde" ability visible when camoed (so players can use the "hold fire" ability when in camo)
- Top mount .50cal is now an upgrade for most vehicles (30 - 35 ammo)
- Basic Ranger HP increased by 10
- "Ranger Training" unlock in Infantry doctrine no longer adds +10HP to Rangers
- "Ranger Training" unlock in Infantry doctrine now adds 25% damage reduction to Rangers
- Rangers are now only available in Infantry doctrine
- Rangers now require the "Ranger truck" unlock in order to be built
- Infantry cost reduction unlock no longer affects Rangers
- Fixed a bug where grenades dealt too low damage to emplacements
- Increased the aiming time of M10's HEAT shot to 2.5 seconds (from 1.5)
- Increased accuracy of AB M1 Carbine to 0.8/0.55/0.25/0.2 (0.65/0.45/0.21/0.17)
- Removed the detection radius of Calliope Jeep (it had same radius as .30cal Jeep, but Calliope Jeep is not recon unit)
- Lowered the detection radius of Armored .50cal Jeep to "7" (from 18)
- Added 5 fuel cost to Armored Jeep
- Medic team (deployed from Triage center) no longer reinforces anywhere with paradrop

CW:
- Fixed a bug where Achilles and Comet had old turret rotation speeds when shooting HE rounds
- 2inch mortar barrage cost set to 15 ammo
- 3inch mortar barrage cost set to 30 ammo
- 4.2inch mortar barrage cost set to 35 ammo (from 30)
- Increased maximum range of Wasp flamethrower to 25
- Lowered the Veterancy XP requirements of 2pounder Tetrarch to 12/24/48/96 (from 25/55/90/135)
- Top mount .50cal on Staghound is now an upgrade (25 ammo)
- Camouflaged Daimler Scout Car will now be revealed by bypassing units at range of "7" (from 20)

WM:
- 81mm mortar barrage cost set to 30 ammo
- Fixed a bug where PaK38 automatically fired at enemy infantry
- Sdkfz 234/3 ("Puma" with Stubby 75mm) now has the frontal MG active (it was on the model but never shooting)
- GrB39 squad should no longer detect stealthed units in overly large area
Experimental
- Removed Wolfram ammo from Sdkfz 234/3 (Puma with stubby 75mm) and 75mm stubby Haftrack
- Added the "Fire HEAT/B" ability to Sdkfz 234/3 (Puma with stubby 75mm) and 75mm stubby Haftrack
- "Timed HE" switched for "HE mode" for Sdkfz 234/3 (Puma with stubby 75mm) and 75mm stubby Haftrack

PE:
- 81mm mortar barrage cost set to 30 ammo
- Henschel planes no longer have doubled accuracy against certain tank types
- Sdkfz 234/4 (75mm L48 "Puma") now has ambush mode (static mode removed)
- Camouflaged Kettenkrad will now be revealed by bypassing units at range of "7" (from 20)
Experimental:
- Removed Wolfram ammo from 75mm stubby Haftrack
- Added the "Fire HEAT/B" ability to 75mm stubby Haftrack
- "Timed HE" switched for "HE mode" for 75mm stubby Haftrack

[The New BK Champion]

Wow, are you also planing to change the name of the mod from "Blitzkrieg" to "Warhawks"? Maybe I will live long enough to see 105mm sherman in armor doc too?

[kwok]

Hahahaha I also saw this as “the Warhawks patch”. Excited to try it out when I get home.
Glad mortar halftracks are getting a nerf. But i know I’ll have to start getting more creative taking on MG42 openings.

[MarKr]

Lot of these things are based on Warhawk's walls of text. Though it is not like "buff the Hull and Coaxial MGs" has been some new, never heard of, idea in the mod.
The extra damage on AP abilities was something inconsistent as hell because some shots added different ammount of damage, some added none and some reduced damage which made no sense and was sort of confusing too, not to mention that Axis tanks rarely used the AP ammo in the past because their guns could easily kill almost anything, especially with the crazy bonuses from camo, the bonuses became standardized and some tanks of Allies got more HP to be harder to being one-shotted and suddenly the usage of Axis AP goes up only to achieve the one-shots again (though the intention was to lower that chance in the first place).
The limiting of Rangers only to Infantry doctrine came only now, after reports from various players that "Rangers are pointless due to the new, better performance of Riflemen" - we like the new funcitionality of Riflemen so giving them some heavy nerf was not desireable so that meant that something had to be done about the Rangers so that they don't remain "useless". Rangers were sort of half-elite units because compared to other elites they had very lower HP and gun performance was lower than with enemy elites. Buffing them straight would mean basically providing elite infantry to all US doctrines which would not really be very good idea (why should AB have elite infantry when they have their own infantry types, and why should Armor doc have elite infantry when they are meant to be heavily focused on vehicles). So when the new Riflemen work better now, to the level that Rangers are obsolete, then the Riflemen can remain as the main combat infantry for US doctrines and Rangers can be made better but remain in the Infantry doctrine only. So now the Rangers start already with the HP bonus that normally they had only with the "Training unlock" and they got a bit of a buff for their Garands but they are only available in a single doctrine and come later because they require a doctrinal unlock.
.50cal rework is a nice faction-specific idea (and again, Hawks wasn't the only one calling for some changes in this area), so they are now better, can penetrate light armor but many units need to upgrade them first while Axis top MGs come already installed but cannot penetrated any armored targets.
Mortar nerfs were requested by various players.
The "flamethrower could one-shot garrisoned soldiers" was (iirc) kwok's suggestion.
The changes to stubby 75mm vehicles were reaction to one of those "make useless vehicles useful" (hopefully this will help), and the rest are fixes.

So it is not like "Hawks wants it so it is there" - if that was the case, then the changelog would also include something about "increased limit of 105 Shermans to 2", "removed Jumbo from infantry doctrine", "Combat engineers moved to armor doc" or "PIVs turned into a total crap while Shermans are now turned into the best medium tanks in the game"...

[Jagdpanther]

how do i play the beta?

[Gurkenkilla]

how do i play the beta?

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2685

[MenciusMoldbug]

I tested Rangers, they are great now, just where they should be. Though they lost their satchel charges they get with their last unlock for some reason.

If you are talking about testing artillery changes from first patch, only thing that stood out for me is that hotchkiss shoots its rockets too fast for its low cost barrage. I would make the rockets shoot a bit slower so it isn't blowing up vehicles/wiping squads in a single strike with no time to react.

By the way, is it possible to give the mortar halftracks smoke barrage? PE doesn't really get a buildable normal mortar team, so with the munition cost changes, I think their mortar halftrack should get a smoke barrage ability.

[MarKr]

If you are talking about testing artillery changes from first patch, only thing that stood out for me is that hotchkiss shoots its rockets too fast for its low cost barrage. I would make the rockets shoot a bit slower so it isn't blowing up vehicles/wiping squads in a single strike with no time to react.

The quick shooting is meant to be one of the advantages of rocket artillery over "shell" artillery. Also the Hotchkiss already got delayed the upgrade and the tank itself is no longer as fast so you have a chance to actually catch and kill it.

By the way, is it possible to give the mortar halftracks smoke barrage? PE doesn't really get a buildable normal mortar team, so with the munition cost changes, I think their mortar halftrack should get a smoke barrage ability.

You mean like the one which was given to PE mortar HT several patches ago?

Other factions have mortar teams with smoke so adding smoke even to HTs does not seem necessary.

[MenciusMoldbug]

I had brain fart. I never used that because it would put the barrage ability on cooldown I think and the barrage was (back then) way better than just firing smoke.

Also, a small thing I noticed when checking corsix is that the Stuh doesn't have accuracy penalties when firing through smoke(while the vehicles like Scott do). I think the same thing applies for the stupa; that is if I'm looking at the right value(stuh43_150mm_stup_iv).

[Viper]

i did a bit of testing with Tiger1996 and 2 others. we don't hate the new mortar changes. but Tiger mentioned about this very old post by Wolf,
viewtopic.php?f=27&t=1115&p=12393#p12368
currently all factions get +5 fuel income by default but +0 ammo income by default.
after the mortar changes, Tiger believes +5 ammo income should be implemented. me and the 2 others couldn't help but to fully agree.
Tiger said later he will give you more feedback about the beta over Discord.
but is the hold fire for big guns (kt, stupa, tiger1, pershing, panther, jagdpanther, sp) going to be added?
he brought up this question when we were testing.

[The New BK Champion]

I agree with additional ammo income. Mortars are the very basic way of counter most forms of camp. I really hate that they got nerfed in this patch.

[MenciusMoldbug]

I don't think +5 is enough, because the UI shows you income per minute so if you are starting from 0 you need to wait 6 minutes for a 80mm mortar barrage with just that alone(add onto the cost of buying the mortar for munitions too). Most games end at 25-50 minute marks.

So it should be +10 ammo and +5 fuel as income you get no matter what. Which also helps having more openings, because sometimes you run out of munitions on some maps to buy MG teams at the correct timings and stuff.

[MarKr]

Also, a small thing I noticed when checking corsix is that the Stuh doesn't have accuracy penalties when firing through smoke(while the vehicles like Scott do). I think the same thing applies for the stupa; that is if I'm looking at the right value(stuh43_150mm_stup_iv).

It is possible that some units are still like that. I will check it and fix it if it is the case.

@ basic ammo income: I would be careful about this. First, the changes to mortars were introduced because they were able to counter any sort of early defenses without any form of effort on the side of the player (aside from buying the unit) mainly because the barrage was for free and was easily spamable, while devastating at the same time. Now they cost ammo and you want to increase ammo generation by default - this means that getting those mortar barrages will be easier, especially when you mention here things like "if you are starting from 0 you need to wait 6 minutes for a 80mm mortar barrage" which completely neglects the fact that most maps provide you with at least low ammo point right next to your base, so now you're at +10 ammo from very early game. Yes, it requires you to spend time on capping it ranther than going for some higher-resource points near the middle of the map but that is decision making - do you want ammo for mortars/abilities/upgrades or do you want to grab some good position first?

Also more ammo income from the start changes more things than just availability of mortars - upgrades will be available sooner, abilities will be more spamable, PE upgrades from infantry-support buildings will be able to come sooner. No unit in the game has ammo upkeep so even +5 ammo by default simply sticks with you the entire game.

@seha: Hold fire is still considered but not all tanks have free UI for that so it needs to be solved first. And if Tiger has questions he should speak for himself - anyone can come and say "Player A says (something) and he also wants to know (something). There is no way of knowing if it is really what the player says/asks or not unless the people ask themselves.

EDIT:
I just noticed that the changelog is missing one entry - the 4000VP mode was transformed into 750VP+250 pop cap. I've added it to the original post.

[Viper]

i told him he could just go to the forum and talk about these things himself. but he doesnt want to come here. he never really explained why.
but i posted about these because it concerns me too. so thanks for the answers.

anyway. careful you should be with every change, true. so +10 ammo basic income by default is too much. but +5 ammo seems legit. there is no ammo upkeep in the game but all abilities cost ammo. on low resources it will be very hard to play with +0 ammo income after the mortar changes. from the topic i shared, we can see you approved this idea when Wolf said it. even though mortars were free to fire. i understand opinions can change and it's normal. but now the idea makes sense. you always need some ammo or at least few.

[MarKr]

Yeah, I agreed there but back then the situation was different - the mortar change was introduced to limit the mindless usage of mortars everywhere, now people ask for more ammo income to (from a large part) negate the change, so in the end the impact of the change will be almost non-existent. You can always just use the "attack ground" ability and the mortar will shoot to the location for free for as long as you let it (or until it dies).
On low resources it will be harder to get work with ammo but it is the same for every mortar in the game so it is not like it affects only allies or only axis.

[The New BK Champion]

Who says it affects only allies or axis? We say that now camping will be harder to counter, especially on low res maps where u will have to spend good 15 min on saving ammo and shooting your mortar at stupid bofors or at emplacement.

I really don't understand this decision. If you say that you can fire on the ground anyway, so why even bother to change something that seems to be broken/avoidable from beginning?

[MarKr]

You can still use the mortars to fire a smoke barrage on such emplacement and then decrew it with infantry with a grenade or if you manage to save resources, you can buy the flamethrower and it (with the new changes) will very likely decrew the emplacement as soon as the flame touches it. Yes, it is more risky but the smoke reduces the accuracy and suppression of the unit in the smoke by 75% so the infantry should have relatively save access to grenade throwing range. It can still use the "attack ground" command because limiting mortars only to barrages would nerf the units too much, also this way you can still kill emplacements or break defenses but it takes longer so opponent has some time to react.

[Warhawks97]

Big thx. Good job with rangers. Now they are what they are supposed to be. Thats something vcoh did way better and now we got it in BK. That was something that got discussed already in the old Forum.


About Mortar barrage ammo cost. I do like it a lot but isnt it a bit too much? 30 ammo for the 81 mm and just 5 more for the very heavy mortars? Perhaps going 15,25,35 ammo (from small to big mortars) would have been better?

Also mortars can get a bit cheaper in return?

Like when i see calli jeeps and 150 mm nebler costing just 300 MP and no ammo doesnt it look a bit too expensive now? When i get a 81 mm mortar i pay 25 ammo to build it and 30 to fire which makes first use costing me 55 ammo. Thats 5 more than a calli barrage which firs further, faster and with good spray effect.

I would remove the build ammo cost from mortars now just like arty units in general cost no ammo to be build.

Thx for the cal 50 changes. It was needed. In their current state they were barely more than silly noise makers in the late stage. Cant await to see them in action. But how did you proceed with the Mortar HT cal 50? I mean i gonna see it when i play but still.

Also the emplaced cal 50 is able to pen armored vehicles at default or do we still have the AP ability? i mean i am fine either way. Just asking.

Wow, are you also planing to change the name of the mod from "Blitzkrieg" to "Warhawks"? Maybe I will live long enough to see 105mm sherman in armor doc too?

i dont want the 105 in armor doc.

I really don't understand this decision. If you say that you can fire on the ground anyway, so why even bother to change something that seems to be broken/avoidable from beginning?

Barrage fires a shot like every 2 seconds or so. "Attack ground" makes your mortar shooting at a position for free but it doesnt fire every 2 sec and instead with normal rate of fire.

So you have a free continues shooting with lower rof or a high rof ammo costing ability similiar to arty units.
The barrages could be spammed all over which was stupid and extremely unrealistic since guns and mortars required to cool down after barrage. Thats why you often see rate of fire in continues shooting and rate of fire for a short time (barrages).

[MarKr]

@Mortar prices: As it is mentioned now, I remember that it was part of the original idea to drop the ammo price on the mortar units. I forgot that and so it was not implemented but I have no problem with that and I believe that rest of the team won't have either so I guess that can go, we'll see about the mortar barrage prices.

But how did you proceed with the Mortar HT cal 50?

It is still built with the .50cal mounted by default. If it brings issues i'll try to find some solution for it.

Also the emplaced cal 50 is able to pen armored vehicles at default or do we still have the AP ability?

It has the same penetration values as the rest of .50cals so it can penetrate light vehicles (effectiveness depends on type of vehicle) by default, it still has the "AP burst" ability which allows it to more or less penetrate light vehicles with every shot but in my test games it seemed almost as a waste of ammo because the standard shots did quite well even without the ability, perhaps only against puma-type vehicles it has some more sense to use as they are the most resistant to .50cals. It was needed to apply the same values to the .50cal nest too because otherwise it was not really much different from the normal .30cal nest.

[Mr. FeministDonut]

Is it intented so AT rifle grenade now higher range than a normal grenade? Seems to be a much higher range now, lol.
But I can say that allied top mg now is really OP, sherman 75 doesn't even need a HE rounds, which is good

Also, if flamethrowers were buffed, I think it would be right to delete the sprint ability, when its equiped

[MarKr]

Is it intented so AT rifle grenade now higher range than a normal grenade? Seems to be a much higher range now, lol.

It was one of the changes of the first beta:

- Riflegrenade upgrade is no longer mutually exlusive with other Riflemen weapon upgrades
- Increased the range of HEAT riflegrenade to 60

But I can say that allied top mg now is really OP, sherman 75 doesn't even need a HE rounds, which is good

It's been just reported to me that top MGs on Shermans actually act the same as before the patch (you need to upgrade them but the changes are by a mistake not applied to them) - so if they are OP "now", they must have been OP for the past several years too

[Mr. FeministDonut]

haha, my mistake then, new eye opened on a sherman without HE xDDDD
What about deleting sprint for the flamethrowers squad?

[Panzerblitz1]

Removing the sprint ability from the pios? For what? They are the slower unit to cap points and they are falling like flies in front of anything who have a gun...

[Mr. FeministDonut]

Flamethrower + sprint is the same thing, as it would be with tank hunters and their bazookas...

[MarKr]

The effectiveness of flamethrowers against vehicles and tanks has not been changed, so they are not more or less effective against them than they used to be in previous versions. On the other hand the tanks now have at least somewhat functional hull and coaxial MGs - they still suck against infantry in cover and also at longer ranges but if enemy has pios with flamethrower, he needs to run to you and get close, so if you turn the hull to face the sprinting dude with flames, you are very likely to kill him before he manages to use the flames. So flamethrowers against vehicles are still the same but flamers against tanks have a bit harder time - seems OK to me.