Hello, long time Cossacks fan here. As I also love the Napoleonic Era and I am not really satisfied with all the current games out there as each of them is missing someting. Cossacks 3 would be great with an 19th century add on (Loner's mod is good, but there's only so much he can do) or a Imperia Remake would be great as well. But that seems unrealistic. So I was thinking a lot about a possible Cossacks 4 and wrote down many ideas, so that I have a fleshed out game idea at hand, that I would love to share with you. Cossacks IV - Wars of Napoleon Game Modes: 1. Singleplayer Battle for Europe This would be a mixture of Cossacks 2 Battle for Europe and the Napoleon Total War Campaign. So the map would be a bit bigger than in C2 and like in NTW you would have more than 1 General. There would also be more diplomatic options like in NTW and you could ask a allied fraction to attack a certain region. The movement on the map would be turn based, and the skirmishes or battle in real time on maps similar to C2. Each region would have economical buildings to get more ressources and military buildings to increase the garison. With no enemy general on it, you would fit a garrison like in C2. The garrison can be increased by upgrading the military building, which also increases defensive structures on the map (redouds). Garrisons would be similar to C2 and mostly consist of Milita units like National Guard, Landwehr or Guerilla. The highest developed garrison would consist of 8x National Guard / Landwehr 4x Line Infantry 2x Mounted Jaegers 4x 6 pounds cannons Generals would increase in rank after succesfull battles, but the composition of units would be different. 1. Rank 3x Line Infantry 1x Light Infantry 1x Light Cavalry 2x 6 pounds cannons 2. Rank 4x Line Infantry 1x Light Infantry 1x Grenadier 2x Light Cavalry 2x 6 pounds cannons 3. Rank 4x Line Infantry 1x Light Infantry 1x Grenadier 1x Jaeger 2x Light Cavalry 1x Heavy Cavalry 4x 6 pounds cannons 2x 8 pound cannons 4. Rank 6x Line Infantry 2x Light Infantry 2x Grenadier 1x Jaeger 3x Light Cavalry 2x Heavy Cavalry 4x 6 pounds cannons 4x 8 pound cannons 2x 12 pound cannons 5. rank 8x Line Infantry 2x Light Infantry 2x Grenadier 2x Guard Infanty 2x Jaeger 3x Light Cavalry 2x Heavy Cavalry 4x 6 pounds cannons 4x 8 pound cannons 2x 12 pound cannons 2x Howitzer So no more unrealistic armies of French, where you have 20 units but only 2 are line infantry. The more regions you have the more generals would be able to recruit. One option would be that France, Russia and Austria would have the most regions at the start and would beginn with 2 generals. Prussia, UK and Spain would need to conquer one more region to get the second general. This avoids the unrealistic scenario that Napoleon for example is conquering Italy while France is open for the UK to attack. Campaign: This would be more historical focused and shorter parts of the Battle for Europe Mode. For example you would have the War of the Third Coalition with France and Austria as playable nations on a map section consisting of the German Area, Northern Italy, Vienna and the area around Austerlitz. France would need to take Vienna and beat the Austrian and Russian Army, whereas Austria would need to hold Vienna, conquer Bavaria and beat the French until a certain number of turns. More campaings would be the War of the Fourth Coalition, The Russian Campaign or the Campaign in Spain. Battles: Similar to C2 you can play Historical Battles like Austerlitz, Waterloo or generic battles Custom Map: The traditional Cossacks mode, but there would be a few changes to the maps. Most options to chose from would be as usual like number of players, amount of starting ressources, starting with alliances, piecetime, landscape and so on. You could choose a geographical region (central europe, northern europe, mediterranean, east european / russian) and season (spring, summer, atumn and winter). The main difference would be the construction of the map. The see following image as a badly drawn example. https://ibb.co/19K3662 The map would be at least the size of the biggest map in C3 or maybe even double. In the middle you would have a neutral zone with a neutral player, with whom you could trade by sending a messenger unit (more later under units). The zones of the player would be more open, so that you can build freely, whereas the neutral zone looks more like the maps of C2 with villages and streets. The areas of each player can only be reached through the neutral zone, so you would avoid the annoying situation that a player reaches your undefended city with a fast horse unit while your army is still in fighting. Mining location wouldn't be simple on the ground anymore as they would be located at mountains. This would be the case for stone as well, which could be mined at quarries. Also you would rather have one or two bigger forests instead of many small ones. With these features it would be insured that you would have big army clashes in the middle of the map and the villages and city of the neutral zone would give it more flair of Napoleonic fighting. 2. Multiplayer Battle for Europe: Same as in single player, with additonal players playing other factions. You could set a time limit for a turn and the otpion for the other players to play as the AI in skirmishes or battles. Battles: 1v1, 2v2, 3v3 or 4v4 on Historical oe generic battle maps. I would set unit limit to 16.000 or 32.000 so you could play some battles on 1:2 scale or 1:10 Custom Map: see comment in Singleplayer, just with more non AI players Factions/Nations Austria, France, Prussia, Russia, Spain, United Kingdom These are the factions I would start with. Others that could be added later are: Poland, Ottoman Empire, Sweden, Denmark, Portugal, Batavarian Republic, Sicily, Naples, Piemont Rhine States (either as one fraction or as Saxony, Bavaria, Westfalia and Wurtemberg)
Buildings and Ressources I would change the way you build your city and work your economy. There would be no more peasants to control as it would be more in the vein of Anno, where you just build and the peasants, horses and carriages would be more animations. You could turn the buidling in 90° angles and also need to build streets. Buildings would be devided into civil, economical, political and military buildings. Ressources would be the same as in C1, C2 and C3 but would be gathered a bit different. Civil (number of created living space): Town Center (250) - necessary to build market, church and university - offers civil research Market (0) - offers trading Church (150) University (0) - necessary to build factories and storage houses - offers economical and military research Residiential building (small 75 | medium 150 | big 300) Streets - necessary to connect buildings, so that ressources will be transported to the city - could be improved through research in Town Center Economical: Blacksmith (0) - necessary to build barracks, stables and artillery depots - offers economical and military research Storage Units - necessary to increase the amount of ressources you can win - offers upgrades to increase the amount of ressources you can handle Mills - necessary to get Food - offers technologies to increase speed of food mining Farms (small 75 | medium 150 | big 250) - necessary to get food - can be upgraded to offer more living space and increase capacity of getting food Quarry - necessary to get stone - can be upgraded to increase capacity of getting stone Lumber jack camp - necessary to get wood - can be upgraded to increase capacity of getting wood Mines - necessary to get gold, iron and coal - can be upgraded to increase capacity of getting wood Political Palace (200) - the starting building; you lose if the enemy captures it - can spawn the monarch - offers economical and military research Diplomatic Centre (0) - can spawn a messenger/envoy Military Infantry Barracks (400) - can spawn Infantry Guard Barracks (300) - can spawn guard Infantry Stable (300) - can spawn cavalry Officer's mess (100) - can span generals Artillery depot (50) - can spawn artillery Army Camp (750) - fleeing soldiers will flee to this area - offers special recruitng (will explain more in detail later) some more information on the building and winning of ressources - streets connect them and ressources will be transported on them from mines, mills, quarries and so on to the storage unit and factories to increase them - if streets get developed through research it will get faster - peasants will count in smaller doses in the total population - units will not get recruited as a single soldiers per click but as a finished battalion --> 1x line infantry would be a full formation with officer, drummer and flag bearer, same with cavalry Units Palace: - Monarch: can be recruited once; his death will make you lose the game; increases moral of nearby troops Diplomatic Centre: - Envoy / Messenger can be recruited up to the numbers of players +1; can be send to messenger of other player to for trading or forging of alliances ; can be send to the neutral player for trading (more on that later) Officer's Mess: - General up to 9 generals can be recruited; increases the moral of nearby units; necessary to merge more units into a corps and control them (more on that later) Infantry barracks: - Line Infantry – costs low | loading medium |range medium | melee medium |morale medium - Grenadiers – costs high | loading medium |range medium | melee strong |morale high - Light Infantry – costs medium | loading fast |range high | melee weak |morale medium - Jaeger – costs high | loading fast |range very high | melee weak |morale medium - Militia – costs very low | loading slow | Range low | melee weak |morale low Stables: - Mounted Jaegers – costs low | range low | meele weak | riding speed fast | morale low - Lanciers – costs medium | range melee | melee strong | riding speed fast | morale medium - Hussars – costs medium | range melee | melee medium | riding speed very fast | morale medium - Cossacks (Russia) – costs low | range melee | melee weak | riding speed fast | morale high - Dragoons – costs medium | range medium | melee medium | riding speed medium | morale medium - Cuirassiers – costs high | range melee | melee high | riding speed medium | morale medium - Elite cavalry – costs high | range melee | melee very high| riding speed low | morale high Guard Barracks [maximum number of units]: - heavy guard infantry [4] – costs very high | loading fast |range medium | melee very high |moral very high - light guard infantry [6] – costs high | Loading medium | range high | melee medium |morale high - guard jaegers [1] – costs high | loading very fast | range very high | melee low | morale high - light guard cavalry [4] – costs high | range melee | melee high | riding speed fast | morale high - heavy guard cavalry [2] – costs high | range melee | melee veryhigh | riding slow | morale very high Artillery Depot [maximum number of units]: - 6 pound cannon [18] – costs low | movement fast | precision/damage low | range low - 8 pound cannon [12] – costs medium | movement medium | precision/damage medium| range medium - 12 pound cannon [8] – costs high | movement slow | precision/damage high| range high - Howitzer [4] – costs high | movement slow | precision/damage very high| range low Except artillery, general, monarch and messenger, there are no more single units. All the other units are recruited as battalions (infantry) or escadrons (cavalry). For example if you would recruite 1 French Line Infantry you woud get 120 men with officer, drummer and flagbearer. This unit is similar to the unit in C2 and you could put them in different formations. Line -> 3 ranks, best for volley fire, prone to flanking attacks Attack column --> 5 ranks, best for melee attack, units won't lose as much morale when attacked form the flank, prone to atillery fire Marching column --> similar to the collumn in C2, used for marching on streets and in non fighting situations Square --> similar to C2, very low movement possibilty, prone to artillery fire, best against callavery Instead of recruiting let's say 10x line Infantry you can directly recruit divisions. 1 divison would consist of 4x Line Infantry, 1x Grenadiers and 1x Light Infantry. Divisons have formations as well. Line --> all 6 units will deploy in one line of 3 ranks xxx xxx xxx xxx xxx xxx xxx Mixed collumn --> all 6 units will deploy in 3 lines a 3 ranks with 2 units wide xxx xxx xxx xxx xxx xxx Square --> the 6 units will form a square xxx xxx x -------x x -------x x -------x xxx xxx From the army camp you can recruit Corps. For this you need a general and there would be 3 sizes of corps and 2 special corps. If you recruit a corps you need to assign it to a general and the units will be recruited directly from the corresponding building and meet at the general Type of corps [maximum number] small corps: - 1x infantry division (4x line, 1x light, 1x Grenadier) - 1x jaeger - 1x light cavalry - 3x 6 pound cannons medium corps: - 2x infantry divisions - 1x jaeger - 2x light cavalry - 4x 8 pound cannons big corps: - 3x infantry divisions - 2x jaeger - 2x light cavalry - 1x heavy callery - 4x 12 pound cannons - 2x howitzers Cavalry reserve corps [1]: - 4x light cavalry - 4x heavy callery Guard corps [1] - 4x heavy guard infantry - 6x light guard infantry Of course units can be arranged individually, this is just for speeding up the process and giving it a more historical edge. Also for each unit the following orders can be issued: - shoot on sight --> unit shoots once enemy reaches the outmost point of there range - shoot once in good range --> units waits until enemy is "in the yellow zone" - only attack when enemy is in meelee range --> units waits until enemy is "in the red zone" - don't attack These options would make it easier to control a big army. In C2 you had to controll each unit individually to. You hat do control when they need to shoot, when to change formation to square and so on. With a big army being attacked on several spots this was really annoying has you have to skip around all the time. With above mentioned options these could be avoided and you could enjoy the battle more.
You've obviously put a lot of thought into this, I've always liked the idea of C2 Battle for Europe but with C3 graphics, have you got the skills to make this happen or are you waiting on GSC, because you might have a long wait as they have been absent from this Forum for quite some time.
Units per Nation As follow the units per nation. Not all factions will have every options (for example Elite cavalry is only available for France and UK). But I have some balancing ideas in my mind that will follow later. Austria* Infanty: - Deutsche Füsiliere [Line Infantry] - Ungarische Füsiliere [Line Infantry] - Deutsche Grenadiere [Grenadiers] - Ungarische Grenadiere [Grenadiers] - Grenzer [light Infantry] - Jäger [Jaeger] - Landwehr [Militia] Cavalry - Berittene Jäger [Mounted Jaegers] - Ulanen [Lanciers] - Husaren [Hussars] - Dragoner [Dragoons] - Kürassiere [Cuirassiers] *The only country without guard units, but additional line infantry and grenadiers. Also no Elite cavalry, but their cuirassiers and hussars would be the strongest. So more of a numbers army instead of quality. France: Infanty: - Fusiliers de l’infanterie de ligne [Line Infantry] - Grenadiers de l’infanterie de ligne [Grenadiers] - Voltigeurs de l’infanterie de légère [light Infantry] - Chasseurs [Jaeger] - Garde Nationale [Militia] Cavalry - Chasseurs à Cheval [Mounted Jaegers] - Lanciers [Lanciers] - Hussards [Hussars] - Dragons [Dragoons] - Cuirassiers [Cuirassiers] - Carabiniers [Elite Cavalry] Guard - Tirailleurs de la Jeune Garde [light Guard Infantry] - Grenadiers à pied de la Vieille Garde [heavy Guard Infantry] - Eclaireurs de la Garde [light Guard Cavalry] - Grenadiers à cheval de la Garde [heavy Guard Cavalry] Prussia Infanty: - Musketiere [Line Infantry] - Grenadiere [Grenadiers] - Füsiliere [light Infantry] - Schützen [Jaeger] - Landwehr [Militia] Cavalry - Berittene Jäger [Mounted Jaegers] - Towarczys [Lanciers] - Husaren [Hussars] - Dragoner [Dragoons] - Kürassiere [Cuirassiers] Guard - Leibinfanterie [light Guard Infantry] - Gardegrenadier [heavy Guard Infantry] - Gardehusaren [light Guard Cavalry] - Berittene Leibgarde [heavy Guard Cavalry] Russia Infanty: - Mushketiory [Line Infantry] - Grenadiory [Grenadiers] - Yegeri [light Infantry] - Streiki [Jaeger] - Opolchenie [Militia] Cavalry - Konnye Yegeri [Mounted Jaegers] - Kazaki [Cossacks] - Ulany [Lanciers] - Gusary [Hussars] - Draguny [Dragoons] - Kirasiry [Cuirassiers] Guard - Gvardeiskie Yegeri [light Guard Infantry] - Gvardeiskie Grenadiory [heavy Guard Infantry] - Gvardeiskie Gusary [light Guard Cavalry] - Kavalergardy [heavy Guard Cavalry] Spain Infanty: - Fusileros de Infanteria de Línea [Line Infantry] - Granaderos de Infanteria de Línea [Grenadiers] - Cazadores de Infateria de Línea [light Infantry] - Tiradores de Infateria de Ligeria [Jaeger] - Guerrilla [Militia] Cavalry - Cazadores de Caballeria [Mounted Jaegers] - Lanceros [Lanciers] - Husáres [Hussars] - Dragones [Dragoons] - Caballeria de Linea [Cuirassiers] Guard - Fusileros de la Guardia de Infanteria Española [light Guard Infantry] - Granaderos de la Guardia de Infanteria [heavy Guard Infantry] - Carabineros Reales [heavy Guard Cavalry] - Guardias de Corps [heavy Guard Cavalry] United Kingdom Infanty: - Infantry of the Line [Line Infantry] - Grenadiers of the Line [Grenadiers] - Highlanders [light Infantry] - Riflemen [Jaeger] - Fencibles [Militia] Cavalry - Light Dragoons [Mounted Jaegers] - Hussars [Hussars] - Dragoons [Dragoons] - Dragoon Guards [Elite Cavalry] Guard - Highlanders of the Black Watch [light Guard Infantry] - Infantry of the Coldstream Guards [heavy Guard Infantry] - Riflemen of the 95th [Guard Jägers] - Royal Horse Guard [heavy Guard Cavalry]
Unfortunately I have zero skill...I would need a whole team that would make these ideas into a full game and I though maybe if I post it here someone with the abillity might see it.
I've also had zero skill with modding and now I'm able to fully produce own unit, buildings, maps and scripts. It's about dedication and feeling you have about your ideas. If you thinking about this daily/weekly/or even only monthly you shloud definitley start to develop yourself and you ideas. It will take a lot of time, months and even years to move to some meaningful result. I also thought that in 2016 that modding community will last only -+2 years and it's 2020 and we are still here, producing small or REALLY LARGE projects (State vs Country), proffesional and amateurs. Took me 6 months to do one single mission and 4 months to produce my first unit. But all I can say is: it's definitley worth it to start with your project. Time does not flight that fast and even after one year there still be someone to play your mod or test yor units/maps etc. Don't forget that new content is THE THING that attract players to play games again. Start with coding in pascal, modeling in 3DS Max, dig into sctructure of files, google historical facts, try to do you own scenarios to check if you NPC village idea is somehow programmable. It's always 50% fun and 50% annoying hard work, 50% thing works completley different than you thought and 50% of them cannot be done. So stop dreaming and start doing. PS: Sorry fot that I've got theatrical, but it's like I'm hearing myself 2 years ago. "I have zero skill" is not and excuse. Make a plan, take a small steps and move your ideas foward. That's how things are done. "where is nothing, you can do anything"
