NOKorp FAQ:
Q: Why yet another E-File? OG needs campaigns, not E-Files.
A: So true. The thing is that E-Files are like cars, they are tailored to specific uses: Is a "Land Rover Discovery" better or worse than a "Ferrari Testarossa"? Depends on what you expect them to do.
My point is everyone has a different focus, so everyones' E-File reflects different priorities. I guess you see where I'm going with this.
My true pleasure is making campaigns, but I needed an E-File to make them. Unfortunately I have a very precise idea about how I'd like various technical specs to be translated to the game, and the existence of some units and capacities was very important to me. Obviously I couldn't ask somebody to completely change his E-File to please me, so the only realistic option left was to make my own, built to my own specifications...
Q: What time frame does NOKorp cover?
A: NOKorp is supposed to work from the early 1930ies up to a fictitious later end of WWII. There are no hard limits, but it is not meant to be used for conflicts before or after WWII, just to allow for a longer WWII. Which means the 1950+ expiration dates you see just mean "equipment available till the end of WWII, whenever that is", not that you can make early Cold War scenarios with NOKorp.
Q: You claim historical realism, yet you go beyond 1945. How does that work?
A: Historical exactness is important to me but OG is not a history book, it's a game. The point of a game is to see if you can do better than the people who fought those wars, and doing that you will invariably depart from the real events and create new situations. There can be no "historical accurate" game, the best you can achieve is a (relatively) historically accurate starting situation.
So, if the German player keeps winning, there is no reason why Germany shouldn't indeed be able to mass-produce all those nifty super-weapons they had planned, or even started to build (although they still might not be able to afford them in large quantities).
And this is self-regulating: If you're in a winning "what-if" situation, you'll definitely need (and buy) those new modern units when the time comes, just to get past 1945; But if you're in a historically accurate losing situation, it doesn't matter if they become available to buy - You won't be able to afford them anyway.
Q: Is NOKorp a High- or a Low-Cost E-File?
A: In the spirit it's a High-Cost one, but realism often primes. For instance, in reality, despite being slightly better, a Panther tank cost less than half the price of a Tiger tank (without the leather seats...), just a little more than a Panzer IV. And the following "Entwicklungserie" tanks would had been even a little cheaper than the Panther, being industrially mass-produced Panther clones.
I think those historical details are interesting and help immersion. So wherever I had them, I used the ratio of real equipment prices to determine my prices (Obviously this doesn't work for some units, like infantry).
Q: I experience heavy losses.
A: I don't make impossible campaigns: All of those have been tuned so that at least 2 players (including me) were able to consistently get "Brilliant Victories" in
every scenario of
every campaign (except in case when you're actually meant to lose, but even then I try to let you down easy).
Most scenarios require just a little thought and strategy. I always make sure the player has everything he needs to not only win, but to achieve a BV, so please check all the units I gave you: Wonder why I gave you each specific unit. There are often many Chekhov's guns in your core army (but also the occasional harmless red herring
)...
Last but not least, NOKorp has a number of specificities compared to other E-Files, and requires getting used to. Until you do, take a habit of closely checking each unit you get. Its strengths and weaknesses should determine the way you need to use that unit, and if you use everything right, everything should fall into place. Keep in mind that repair and supply units change game play: Getting damaged doesn't necessarily wastes prestige, or condemns that unit to stay out of harm's way anymore, and a well-supplied artillery can fire continuously. Moving your artillery and its supplies efficiently are often one of the keys to victory, and fighting aggressively and repairing your damaged units will make them gain experience very fast at no cost. Only planes require prestige to be repaired.
Also, you almost always get seemingly useless non-combatant construction units. They are not useless at all, they will build your airports, repair your roads, remove or place mines, and all that. In many scenarios your only airports are the ones you build yourself, and without airports you can't bring in your planes.
Q: In the E-File I see lots of duplicates, of which all but one are "No Buy", with an [X] in the name and a comment saying you should use some another unit instead.
A: Sorry, leftovers from BaseKorps, which had many duplicates: I initially left them in because I planned to retain some compatibility (at least unit number wise), something which became pointless after BaseKorps was temporarily retired by its maintainer.
Which means: Scenario makers, please use the right unit, do
not use the duplicates, even if they all have exactly the same stats, because the duplicate will eventually be changed to something else in a future version of the E-File. Duplicates are normally easy to spot: They are "No Buy", "No Proto", have a [X] in the name, and a comment stating "Duplicate - Use #... instead".
In case you stumble upon a set of duplicate units I oversaw, the rule is simple: I will always keep the one with the lower unit slot number: If slots #100 and #101 contain the same unit, #100 will remain and #101 will be marked as duplicate and eventually reused.
Note: It's a good idea to always check the comments ("Custom" name in OpenSuite), they try to explain some choices, like for instance why some units are "No Buy" (like extremely rare/unique or captured pieces of equipment), or how some units are supposed to work (like composite submarine parts).
Q: What about some really strange units which are "No Buy", with a cryptic "????" as a comment. What are those?
A: Sorry, leftovers from BaseKorps. I personally don't know what those were supposed to be either. Same explanation as above, I initially left them in because I planned to retain slot compatibility (unit number), something which became pointless after BaseKorps was retired by its maintainer.
Don't use them. Those slots contain apparently fictional or otherwise strange units, and will eventually be reused for new stuff.
There is currently a lot of chaff in the NOKorp E-File, but since this doesn't impact its usability, cleaning it will happen over a period. Generally speaking scenario makers should stick to units the player can buy, those are 100% safe. In case of doubt, or for rare/unique units, check the comments of the unit in the "Custom" name field in OpenSuite.
Q: What does the [F] in the names of some units mean?
A: It means "Fictitious", units which have not existed, at least not in that form and shape. There are around half a dozen of those.
- Note "fictitious" does not necessarily mean they are nonsense and/or gratification units; The vast majority of them are units which necessarily would had existed if some logical condition had been met. For instance, if Germany hadn't scrapped its aircraft carriers in 1939/40, it would have needed carrier planes, wouldn't it. And to create those missing planes, I didn't go invent anything crazy, I simply extrapolated naval versions of the dominant land planes of the current year.
Note that equipment that
was actually planned doesn't get an [F] tag, even if it was never actually built in reality. As I said, your successes change the situation, so those plans lying in a drawer might actually get used after all.
Q: What does the [H] in the names of some units mean?
A:
For scenario makers only: It means "with Hangars". Sometimes I made a second copy of a normally hangar-less unit (like a destroyer) and gave it one or more hangars able to contain infantry, artillery or other light unit types. Those are for specific scenario requirements and can not be bought in the game. Only the scenario maker can hand them out, if he wants to.
Note that units which would normally have hangars (like carriers) do not bear that [H] badge, much like any unit for which there is no hangar-less version: The badge is only there to help scenario makers pick the right version among several in the OpenSuite unit list.
Q: Why are there 2 identical sets of some Destroyers (and other ships)?
A: Check their name and comments: One version has hangars and can be used to transport troops and commandos from coast to coast. These "hangar" versions, marked by a [H] in their name, are "No Buy" and can only be given by the scenario maker, if his scenario requires them.
Q: Recon bombers, recon fighters?
A: Many people suggest putting recon planes in "Level Bombers"; Which is sub-optimal since the AI will try to use them as a bomber, not as a recon. Now many countries (Italy, Poland, and many more) had an "armed aerial reconnaissance" doctrine ("find enemies, kill them"), but given those planes are still (armed) recon planes, I put them into "Recon" so they get all the specific perks and, more important, so the AI knows what to do with them, especially when using them itself.
The AI needs lots of efficient recons, it has no imagination or memory, so it is quickly lost without them. Fortunately it knows how to use recon planes just fine, as long as it knows them for what they are.
Some nations have also Recon-fighter combos which might prove interesting: They won't intercept, but you can use them to assist your fighters, go on enemy plane hunting, or just use them as tougher, fearless scouts.
All those are in "Recon", so don't forget to have a look in there when looking to buy a new plane.
Q: How do you decide who is a "Dive Bomber" and who a "Level Bomber"?
A: The clue is in the name: The "Dive bomber" is a bomber which dives to precisely place its bombs on the target. On the other hand, a "Level bomber" is a bomber which always flies at the same level, dropping bombs as it passes over you. Obviously the later is much less precise, but since they don't need to dive, they can be bigger and thus carry more bombs. Their modus operandi is "quantity over quality".
In NOKorp planes use different formulas to calculate their bombing damage and suppression, depending on how they deliver their bombs, so I really needed to separate those who will hand-deliver the bomb at your feet, from those who will just lob a dozen overboard and hope that one of them will fall somewhere near you.
The general idea is that dive bombing is precise but affects a limited area (big damage, small suppression), whereas level bombing is very imprecise but affects everyone around (low damage, high suppression).
Now there are lots of exceptions, addenda and caveats to this general rule: For instance ground attack planes stay in "Dive Bombers" even if they don't actually dive. The idea is that they are as precise as Dive Bombers. In the same spirit Fighers-Bombers and Recon Planes use the "Dive Bomber" formulas too, as do all other low altitude/precision bombers. As always, in case of doubt I always pick the more favorable choice (in this case "Dive Bomber").
There are also adjustments for notoriously precise/inaccurate bombers and/or for special weapons (Fritz X, Hs 293, and so on). For instance the Ju 87 ("StuKa") with its wailing attack siren gets a small suppression bonus, because that howling siren did indeed demoralize its targets...
Q: So what are those bomber damage and suppression formulas?
A: Dive Bomber soft damage is x/Sq(8*x), where x is the max. carried bomb weight in kg. Dive Bomber suppression is Sq(160*y), where y is the aforementioned soft damage value.
For Level Bombers soft damage is x/Sq(40*x) and suppression is 3*(Sq(y*100)).
Hard damage is extrapolated from soft damage, and always lower than soft damage (bomb shrapnel affects soft units more than hard ones), usually 2-3 points, sometimes more. Naval damage gets a penalty depending on the chance to hit a lone ship in the middle of the sea. It thus is just a little lower than hard damage for Dive Bombers (except torpedo bombers of course) and a lot lower for Level Bombers.
Note that if a plane's forward-facing defensive armament is of caliber 12.7 mm or bigger, it will count towards its hard and naval damage, since that gun can be used to strafe the target. That's why even pure fighters always have some hard/soft/naval damage, depending on their guns: Calibers smaller than 12.7 mm only affect soft targets, bigger calibers increasingly affect hard/naval (but not soft: You're just as dead when hit by a 7.62 or a 30 mm projectile, and big caliber guns have limited ammunition so you can't afford to hunt soldiers with them, you have to make each bullet count).
Q: Why use those logarithmic scales for damage and suppression?
A: Let's take an early WW2 biplane carrying a single 100 kg bomb, and a B-52 Stratofortress carrying 31.5 tons of them. That's exactly 315 times more, so if I give the biplane a damage of only 1, the Stratofortress would need to get a damage of 315 (the maximum being 255)...
Obviously things are not that simple: That single 100 kg bomb falling on a specific house will obliterate it, but there is no chance those 31.5 tons of bombs might all fall on the same house, so damage isn't actually 315 times higher, it's rather like 315 bombs will destroy 315 different houses in the vicinity. Which means that if you're inside a specific house, that biplane can potentially do just as much damage as the Stratofortress.
So, same damage? No, that would be silly too, wouldn't it.
Given we can't simulate the difference in damage of 100 kg on 100 m² versus 31000 kg on one km², I chose a logarithmic damage scale so the big bombers do indeed more damage, but the smaller ones aren't useless either: The difference between 100 kg and 1000 kg of bombs is huge, but the difference between 5 tons and 30 tons of bombs is relative.
Q: How comes some cheap, very slow Recon planes have "Partisan" and "Evade"?
A: Marketing! Without that they would be totally useless... No seriously, they are so slow and rugged that they can see things coming, and they can hide and evade (if only by landing, pushing the plane under a stand of trees and waiting till the enemy goes away...). Besides it's extremely hard to hit a tiny, agile plane flying so much slower than you.
Q: Airplane speeds and ranges?
A: In NOKorp airplane speed is the plane's real world maximum speed (in km/h), divided by 30, plus 5. Fuel is maximum combat range (with external tanks if available) divided by 10. Values are rounded, depending on the plane's general quality (usually rounded up). This makes some older planes very slow, but well, those planes were indeed very slow...
Keep in mind that the
only point of airplane speed in a turn-based game is the opportunity of interception: If an enemy plane zooms through the whole map in a single turn, you will never get an opportunity to "intercept" it. If it takes it 2 turns to get there, you get 2 opportunities to intercept it, and so on. It's the only way to simulate the (dis)advantages of aircraft speed in a turn based game.
Q: Airplane spotting values?
A: Spotting is generally 1 for fighters (they tend to look up, not down), except for biplanes: They are so slow they can count squirrels on the ground, so they get a +1 spotting bonus (their spotting is 2).
Dive bombers are usually looking down, so spotting = 2, unless they are faster than "30" (750km/h), in which case I consider they are too fast to spot anything.
Here too biplanes get their +1 spotting bonus (meaning their spotting is always 3, there are no biplanes flying over 750 km/h), making them quite efficient spotters.
Level bombers usually fly way too high to see any details, so spotting = 1.
Float planes get a special treatment; They fly over water where everything sticks out, so they get a +1 spotting bonus (but no additional biplane bonus). Still with me?...
Recon planes (no matter their shape or speed) get spotting = 4, as do the rare recon-bombers I've left in one of the "bomber" categories (you can easily spot them because they have high spotting and the "recon" movement special). Some very rare recon planes have a spotting of 5, those are special cases of famously efficient recon planes.
Q: "Range" implies going somewhere and coming back again, so a range of "1000 km" means a plane can fly for 2000 km, isn't it? Given the unofficial scale of 1 km = 1 hex, that would mean in this case it should have a fuel allowance of 200, not 100 as it has, isn't it?
A: Yes, potentially, but we're coming up against the limitations of the game engine and the game's maps here.
If I had indeed used the traditional 1 km = 1 hex conversion, the vast majority of planes would have a fuel allowance of way over 255, and yet that's the maximum possible value the game accepts. Take a PBY Catalina for instance; With a real range of over 4000 km it should have a fuel allowance of 800 (out of 255)... Now with the formula I used its calculated fuel allowance is 400, which is still clipped to 255, but it's slightly less ridiculous, it's
more than half...
Second problem, given the tiny size of most maps and the length of most scenarios, it would had meant that most planes would never need to refuel: As long as your plane has ammunition left, park it over the enemy and hit him, turn after turn...
To avoid this cheesy tactic, I fixed plane ammunition to a maximum of 6 for fighters and 4 for bombers (on average). That's enough to defend once or twice against enemy fighters and bomb your target once before needing to go back to resupply.
(Note that once again terms and conditions apply: Torpedo bombers for instance have less ammunition, since they do only carry one single torpedo. I had to give them a little more ammo though, given they need to be also able to defend themselves against enemy planes. Same applies for Fritz-X or H 293 bombers, since those bombs were huge. Small fighters with big caliber guns also had limited ammunition onboard, and so on.)
Q: How do those new composite submarines work?
A:
Scenario makers only - The big drawback is that you can't buy (or upgrade) submarines in the game anymore. Scenario makers have to hand them out.
To give the human player a submarine, give him the part with "(comp)" in its name in the "Submarines" class, and then add the identically named NTP (Naval Transport) as organic transport to it. The effect is that you can dive/surface the sub (by loading/unloading), and while submerged it can't go that far, unless it surfaces again (moving your mouse show you the limit). On surface those subs are very vulnerable, being mere NTPs... But they also have different weapons. Deck canons become available only while on the surface, allowing them to shell things from afar.
Caveat: Some rare subs don't follow the general "sub with NTP transport" idea because of their specificities (like having plane hangars, which NTPs can't have). Follow the unit names and comments for details on how to assemble those.
Important: The AI doesn't know how to use those newfangled submarines itself, so there is still a version of the old, simple subs for the AI player: The idea is to use old-fashioned simple subs for the AI and composite ones for the human, but you obviously can also give simple old-fashioned subs to the human player if you don't like the composite ones. It's your choice as a scenario maker.
Q: I got/bought a German "Mistel", and it doesn't seem to do any damage.
A: The "Mistel" system consisted in filling up an empty Junkers Ju 88 bomber with 2 tonnes of explosives, and "steering" it towards some unfortunate target using a modified Bf 109 fighter (other plane models possible).
Now when you buy a "Mistel" in the game, never heed the icon, you actually just bought that specially modified Bf 109 fighter. Only. You'll still need to buy the explosive-filled payload to make your "Mistel" work.
You'll find them in "Special Units", under the name "Mistel Payload". They aren't cheap, but hey, you're throwing away a perfectly serviceable medium bomber filled with explosives, that can't be cheap...
Once you buy a payload, load it in your "Mistel" unit like you would load a plane to a carrier. You can only do this in airports obviously.
Note: If the scenario gave you a "Mistel", check first if it's not already loaded (chances are it is), and also check if the scenario creator didn't give you some free payloads (you would find them as undeployed auxiliary units). In most of my scenarios you do get some free payloads thrown in, since they are very expensive, prestige is scarce, and one can assume that High Command had planned that battle, and thus made provision for what would be needed, so you won't need to go begging and using your prestige to get the bombs you're supposed to use.
Now to use the "Mistel", fly it near your target (max. 4 hexes away), open it like a carrier, eject the payload and now fly that one to the target and attack it: The payload will explode, most of the time destroying the target unit. Then fly your "Mistel" plane back to the nearest friendly airport to load another payload (if you have one), or just to put it out of harm's way.
Do
not, I repeat,
do *not* deploy Mistel Payloads outside their carrier planes: They only have 4 fuel units and when those are spent, the Mistel Payload goes "boom". You must deploy them directly inside a "Mistel" plane.
Why did I use this system? Well, besides the fact it simulates pretty well how this system actually worked, it is also because else the Mistel is totally overpowered. Only the fact you can't afford to use it all the time prevents it from being the one and only weapon you'll ever need to win any scenario...
Q: What about the British "Lancaster B.1 Special" level bomber?
A: It's the plane that delivered those huge bombs (Cookie, Tallboy, Grand Slam). In the game it works exactly like the Mistel, you need to buy the "
Bunker buster bomb" payload in "Special Units" and load it into the plane. Whatever I said about Mistel just above applies here too, except that the "Bunker buster bomb" has a flight range of only 1 hex (compared to Mistel's 4), so you'll need to be adjacent to your target to hit it. The Mistel payload was a radio-controlled plane, while the monster bombs just dropped the classical way.
Q: My German "Mistel" or British "Lancaster B.1 Special" is on an airport, yet I can't reload it (deploy a new payload into it).
A: This is probably due to a ground unit being just beneath your plane. It's an OG thing. Move that ground unit away (one hex is enough) and you will be able to reload.
Q: Unitpedia?
A: Some units (not all, just the most intriguing/strange) have a little explanation: In the game, if the unit's name starts with an "{i}", click on it and a small window will pop up, containing some fun or useful facts about it.
Q: How do I make a repair or supply vehicle/vessel for my scenario?
A:
Scenario makers only.
Repair: Take the fitting repair unit (you'll find them in Ground Transports and Naval Transports), and when you place it in your scenario, don't forget to set how many health points it will repair each turn in the "Healer Unit" checkbox (1-10). Note that this consumes ammunition and repair units don't repair themselves (important for naval units which can only be repaired in a port). Also note repairing takes an action, so your repair unit will only repair if it hasn't done anything else that turn. Repairing takes place at the start of the enemy's turn.
Supply: Take the fitting supply unit (Ground Transport / Naval Transport), and when you place it in your scenario, don't forget to check the "Supply adjacent units" checkbox. Supply units don't supply themselves (critical for naval units which can only be resupplied in a port).
Q: What's "Obodu"?
A: A fictitious, very underdeveloped (even for the 1930ies) (semi-)tropical nation for a what-if campaign of mine ("The Colony"). I created a fictitious nation to avoid insulting any existing one. Feel free to use it if you want (since they're there).
Q: And "German Colonial"? There was no such thing after WWI.
A: Indeed, it's a fictitious part of the German army spliced off for that same what-if campaign of mine ("The Colony"). Please disregard.
The point was to create a underfunded, under-equipped version of the German army using exotic auxiliaries and cheap, outdated equipment (which is why I could not achieve the same thing with a purchase list or Fronts & Factions). Making a new nation was the easiest and most efficient solution to properly separate things; I could have named it "Frgwtpz", but for more clarity and flavor I chose "German Colonial".
Q: What about "Ordrac", that sounds right out of some Medieval-Fantasy game.
A: Guilty as charged. Yet another fictitious nation, this time the adversary in the "dungeon crawler" campaign "Go Get'Em". Note its units are totally anachronistic and unbalanced, so please do not use it for anything serious!
Q: "Go Get'Em"? That sure is a strange campaign.
A: Indeed: No historical pretense whatsoever, just pure hack & slash (shoot & bomb?) fun, it's a
Diablo™-like, with WWII units! Have pure fun with your army, winning battles to gain prestige allowing you to buy better units, which allow you to fight stronger adversaries. Yes, it's a dungeon crawler with the Open General engine, the only point of it being to build the ultimate core army and test it against ridiculously overpowered adversaries...
While you as a player will be playing with German equipment, Ordrac gets the best equipment of all Allied nations, so expect some shifting challenges as the years pass in the game. To push the dungeon crawler paradigm even further, there are lots of treasures and bonuses hidden in most maps, not to mention some very hard to destroy bunkers which give you 200 prestige if you manage to capture them. You don't need to capture them to win the scenario, but they do give you 200 prestige points, and there is no prestige cap...
Q: I don't agree with anything you said above!
A: Tough crowd... Well, it doesn't really matter, the fact I released my campaigns and E-File to the general public is just an experiment (I never released anything I did for
Pacific General™). If nobody likes it, well, it just means the experiment failed and I was wrong to bother.
My true pleasure is making campaigns for my own fun, and nobody can take this away from me.
Of course I'm almost human and obviously it would please me if other people liked my campaigns and used this E-File too, but if push comes to shove it is only a by-product of my wish to make OG campaigns, so, as far as I am concerned, it has already fulfilled its purpose.
Copyright notice:
NOKorp E-File can be freely used, copied, shared or modified as long as it isn't made part of commercial stuff. If you use it to make your own E-File, credit is welcome but not required (Yes, that would be "credit: none"
).
My own NOKorp scenarios and campaigns can be freely used, copied, shared or modified as long as they aren't made part of commercial stuff. If you use them as a base for your own, or port them to other E-Files, credit is welcome but not required.
In any case a link to "open-general.com" is
required. Fragmentation is what stifles this game.
back on board none
My bad 
