Altering the promotion system.

[Merlin]

I'm not talking about changing the way generals earn experience or seniority, but the fact that we have to pull one-star generals out of armies/corps to promote them and the option is only available for the immediate turn.

I'd like to know what people think about changing the promotion mechanic to a "promote any/all" function for the stack and/or allowing promotion indefinitely once the seniority has been earned. I'm sure we've all lost many promotion opportunities to the current restrictions, and I think such changes would go a long way toward getting the one-stars into corps command and would reduce the amount of times a player has to make a leader eligible before he finally gets promoted.

I'd also be very keen to hear what the devs or those in the know (betas and others involved) think about the feasibility of such a change.

[Ol' Choctaw]

This is something that has been worked on and worked on again but some how it never seems to work.

The devs have worked on it and everyone has prayed for it. It just never seems to work the way everyone wants it to.

[Merlin]

The primary thing I'm getting from your post is that any change to the current system is dead. Is that a fair assessment?

[Jagger2013]

I don't know how it was done, but it was done in the RUS Fatal Years mod. Once promoteable, a general can be promoted at any time later. So it is definitely doable.

[Kensai]

But would it be more realistic that way? I kind of like the challenge of decision. After a glorious battle, it is nice you have to decide for the promotion of that General/Admiral in the next 15 days (average turn for AGEOD games). If not, the steam and political will may have been lost. But no worries, leaders usually have their chance again and again.

[ohms_law]

The primary thing I'm getting from your post is that any change to the current system is dead. Is that a fair assessment?

I wouldn't say that. I've seen these guys add whole new systems to their games with patches, in the past.
It just takes a while for things to shake out. Enjoy the game as it is; it'll get better with time.

[Merlin]

But would it be more realistic that way? I kind of like the challenge of decision. After a glorious battle, it is nice you have to decide for the promotion of that General/Admiral in the next 15 days (average turn for AGEOD games). If not, the steam and political will may have been lost. But no worries, leaders usually have their chance again and again.

The problem is that promotions very often come in sticky situations forcing the player to pass on them again and again.

I wouldn't say that. I've seen these guys add whole new systems to their games with patches, in the past.
It just takes a while for things to shake out. Enjoy the game as it is; it'll get better with time.

I'll never let any of the quirks and oddities of the engine keep me from playing.

[Jagger2013]

But would it be more realistic that way? I kind of like the challenge of decision. After a glorious battle, it is nice you have to decide for the promotion of that General/Admiral in the next 15 days (average turn for AGEOD games). If not, the steam and political will may have been lost. But no worries, leaders usually have their chance again and again.

Yes, I believe it would be more realistic. I don't believe we can rationalize the current system in which you must promote within 15 days as historical. If a general performs to the level justifying promotion by those with the power to promote, historically he is going to be promoted whenever the powers that be get around to doing it. Regardless of whether they can remove him from his stack of units or not. What we have now is just a quirk of the software modeling.

And I am really curious how the modder for RUS FY was able to mod the game such that you can promote a general at any time after he becomes elgible for promotion. RUS uses the same engine as all the other AGEOD games. What was done on RUS should be doable with CWII or AACW or BOA or any of them. Unfortunately no one can get in touch with the modder any longer.

[Jagger2013]

Ok, I just did a search. What happens if you don't promote a general within a turn, is the general loses a point of seniority which means he is no longer elgible for promotion. That same process happens in RUS but not in the RUS Fatal Years mod. So that suggests there is an on/off switch for whether a general loses a point of seniority within one turn if he isn't promoted. Just have to find it. Maybe in the model/unit database but probably not. Maybe but it is a universal trait, so probably a settings somewhere. If anyone finds it, let us know. I know my PBEM partners would probably agree to turning it off.

[minipol]

I really hope they get this code working, it's extremely annoying and unrealistic.

[Jagger2013]

What happens if you don't promote a general within a turn, is the general loses a point of seniority which means he is no longer elgible for promotion.----Maybe but it is a universal trait, so probably a settings somewhere. If anyone finds it, let us know.

Actually the modder may have done it another way as well. It might be possible to design an event to monitor the seniority value. If the seniority value decreases by 1, then action, add 1 to seniority. That would keep promotion elgibility in place indefinitely. The drawback is that generals would not lose seniority unless the seniority loss was greater than 1. I will have to see if there is an event like that in RUS FY events.

And there may be an AGEOD event. If seniority is +4, then -1 seniority. Although probably an engine activity rather than an event.

[Jagger2013]

Ok, finally figured out how it is done in Fiscal Years. Can be done for CW2 and probably any AGEOD game.
Here is the event that is used.

SelectFaction = $WHI

StartEvent = evt_nam_WHI_PromotionsA|1|1|NULL|NULL|NULL|NULL

Conditions

CheckAILevel = 1
MinDate = 1918/09/01
MaxDate = 1922/02/12
Probability = 8
SelectSubUnits = Models $ldr_WHI_Cherbachev1
EvalSubUnitSel = NULL

Actions

AltercuSubUnit = Convert TechUpg

EndEvent

NULL ==========================================================================

SelectFaction = $WHI

StartEvent = evt_nam_WHI_PromotionsB|1|1|NULL|NULL|NULL|NULL

Conditions

CheckAILevel = 1
MinDate = 1918/09/01
MaxDate = 1922/02/12
Probability = 8
SelectSubUnits = Models $ldr_WHI_Slushov1
EvalSubUnitSel = NULL

Actions

AltercuSubUnit = Convert TechUpg

EndEvent[/B]

Basically, this event is a tech upgrade. Every leader for each side that can be promoted has a separate entry. Every turn, each leader has a percentage chance of being promoted between the Min and Max date. If the percentage chance is "rolled", then the leader is elgible for promotion. And the leader can be promoted at any time after the event fires. The promotion elgibility does not go away once the event fires. In the sample events above, each of the two leaders have an 8% chance each turn of becoming promotion elgible.

This event is totally separate from the seniority system. You don't need +4 seniority to promote if the promotion event fires. I assume the seniority system continues to work as normal. If a leader reaches +4 seniority and is not promoted, he should lost his elgibility for promotion unlike the tech upgrade events above.

If someone wants to do the work, a tech upgrade events system just like the above could be created for CW2.

[Jagger2013]

PS: Not every leader must have a percentage chance of promotion. Although only leaders with a promotion model can be promoted by tech upgrade. Percentage chances of promotion for each leader can be different. You could give a higher percentage chance of promotion for the hotshot leaders. You could also adjust percentage chances to center the greatest possibility of promotion around the date of actual promotion.

[tripax]

I just noticed you found what you were looking for in FY (I didn't notice this post before - great job finding it!). It would be nice if it would evaluate seniority, but I'm not sure how that can be done. One alternative, though, would be for some leaders to have the upgrade as a tech and a train upgrade. Tech upgrade so that it works as normal and train upgrade so that it is more likely to occur as experience gets higher (experience isn't the same as seniority, but it is correlated I think).