The Wargamer

Supply Network:

We have linked supplies and efficiency to give the game a logistical context, namely with a supply and road network. Roads must be the lifeblood of your offensive and retreat lines, to control them is to control the game. As soon as your enemies take the road behind you, a quick retreat or energetic counter attack must be your top priority.

The map’s network of roads has depots spread all over it with most main depots in cities. The units in a supply node’s defined radius are supplied by depots or when they are close to other friendly units (via supply chain). Yellow and red symbols over units will provide you essential information regarding the supply status and a special layout map can be activated to see supply areas. Once a unit is surrounded, supplies can still be available depending on if the surrounded unit still has a depot and how much internal supply the unit has.

Some More Detail:

Army organization, Lead Units:

WWII: GC organizes battalions into regiments and regiments into divisions, as this helps the player to provide global orders. Regiments that are ordered around will have all of their subordinate battalions follow them, making ordering your army around easy and requiring only a few clicks, though when expecting combat you may want to be more careful.

Weather:

Real weather conditions have been included in the game and they follow the historical record of 1944. According to the time of day and cloud cover, there can be a penalty on  visibility. The climate also affects airborne units. In addition, bombing and close support from the air can only be carried out in clear weather.

Night Combat:

Combat done during low light periods (including morning and evening) has special combat and movement rules. For units not in hold or fortify status, their fire is less accurate and their efficiency is not nearly as high.

Deploy Phase:

This phase happens at the beginning of any match and defines your battle plan, each scenario has several ways to reach victory and the deployment of your troops indicates generally how you are going to surprise your opponent.  Each time you play, you will have some forces at your disposal that you may wish to deploy differently to try alternate strategies.

Artillery / Air force:

Heavy artillery and tactical bombers are modeled and have as their key mission to weaken enemy units by decreasing the efficiency, as well as causing casualties

Retreat flag:

We have incorporated the concept of automatic retreat and planned retreat, both quite important when coupled with our efficiency-oriented combat model. Units under 20% efficiency abandon their position and start a fast retreat to where their “white flag” marker is placed (every unit has their own white flag retreat marker about 500 meters behind their initial position). But gamers can also plan a fast retreat from their defensive position by clicking on the retreat order; learning to use this order is a key part of this “efficiency” combat model.

Paratroopers and Garrisons:

WWII: GC includes paratroopers so airborne units can assault strategic rear enemy positions as well as fighting as regular infantry. In the deployment phase, you can decide to place your airborne units at the airport for airborne landings some time during the battle or you can deploy them in your territory and use them like regular troops.

We also incorporated garrison units to aid in the visibility of the territory you control; these units have little combat worth but can detect enemy paratroopers and other enemy units. They are placed in cities and can not move.

Engineers:

Engineers can build, repair and destroy bridges. As can be expected, proper management of strategic river crossings (especially bridges) is essential for operational success.

Editor:

WWII: GC provides an easy-to-use editor to create new scenarios or modify existing ones. Designers can define the battlefield, army composition, unit hierarchy, unit names, deployment areas, victory points and whatever else is required for a new personalized scenario. You can share it with other players and enjoy your scenarios in multiplayer.

Mutiplayer:

Open multiplayer mode allows you to run on your own computer the server software and invite your friends to play a multiplayer match using TCP/IP connections.

Conclusion:

We endeavored to create WWII: GC for the pleasure of wargamers everywhere. We believe fans of this genre deserve something new.  New does not necessarily mean better, but my design team and I hope our game provides many hours of fun. We have designed WWII: General Commander to have easy gameplay to help gamers to concentrate on making interesting and fun decisions without having to focus on many complicated details. Just as new does not always mean better, more complex does not always mean more realistic (or fun!).  We hope that both veteran wargamers and gamers who are used to other genres will find enjoyment in WWII: General Commander.