Hex of Steel News

5.6.11

[h3]Changes [/h3]

RAM usage has been reduced by a lot, as well as the game’s weight. RAM by TWO, weight by 2.
Units will now rotate from right to left or left to right depending on where it is going on the map. You can now turn ON the «Left right only rotation » setting. This will make the game look better as units will not all look in the same direction :)
Dicker Max is now an AT tank and considered as a prototype.
The Sd. Kfz. Stummel is now in the tank category with tank stats.
Trucks will provide with 1 less MP. So will half tracks.
AA cannot attack ground units at a range of 2 anymore. That was too OP and used as arty or sniping antitank weapons.

[h3]Fixes[/h3]

Units could retreat on mines.
Cavalry didn’t surrender.
Country editor UI.
Reset tile in the map editor on a tile that had text on it would create an error in the code
On mobile the units didn’t surrender.
When clicking on the unit you could deploy several times and not deploying it, the countdown near cities would not be destroyed.

[h3]Additions[/h3]

4 new achievements. Play 10, 50 and 100 turns in multiplayer, and swapping two units positions.
Swap unit positions. Select your unit, move your mouse over the unit you wanna swap position with, hold left SHIFT down and click. Swapping counts as a move, so both units need to be able to move, need to have enough MP, and need to be able to walk on each other's tile. So an engineer that is on a river won't be able to swap with a tank nearby. Also, swapping works only around the unit, not 5 tiles away. You cannot swap with the AI or any unit that doesn't belong to you.
Show countdown time for cities / tiles you just captured (how many turns before you can deploy anything there) once you click on a unit in your reserve to deploy it.

[h3]Changes[/h3]

Optimized clouds algorithm.
Made the weather impact morale more in depth. Experienced / veteran units will not suffer as much as recruits from bad morale.
Neutrals do not share their FOW anymore with other neutrals.
City names style. They now have a black thin outline.
Damage, ammo and fuel loss, XP gain or loss and Surrender and Retreat font and style has been changed.
Updated manual. Added all keybindings. Corrected many things.

[h3]Fixes[/h3]

El Alamein Mosquitos graphics had the "?".
KV-1S graphics were wrong, such as the Panther Ausf. D.
When toggling left right only rotation OR disabling NO rotation the unit’s graphics would disappear.

[h3]Additions[/h3]

[h3]Changes[/h3]

Cavalry now having the same debuff as tanks (fighting in rough terrain).
Little UI changes to the XP gain / loss and fuel / ammo loss from artillery.
AI generals are not allowed to rush forward and capture enemy VPs anymore. Most of the time it resulted in the loss of the general.
Ammo and fuel loss will be displayed 2 seconds instead of 1.

[h3]Fixes[/h3]

Captured units that were in your reserve after you made a save and loaded that save would retrieve their old background colour (origin country would be reset).

[h3]Additions[/h3]

Curtiss Hawk H75A, FCM 36, Hotchkiss H39 to France.
Engineers for Yugoslavia and Australia.
New AI behaviour. If the AI has units near one of its victory points and if this victory point is empty (no unit garrisoned) and there are enemies around his VP he will send a unit there to defend it / garrison it.

[h3]Changes[/h3]

When selecting an Anti Air unit and when showing the potential targets, if on a tile there were 2 units and only one you could attack, this latter will be shown. QoL feature asked by a player :)
Japan has been added to the list of countries allowed to declare war when being played by the AI when historical focus is ON (now the second country allowed to do so with Germany).
When you have a unit selected, on the UI element at the bottom center where it shows the units stats, you will be able to click on the unit's type (the 2 icons on each side of the panel) and this will bring you / focus the camera on the selected unit (if you moved the camera around and lost it or just by accident).
Submarines will not be able to attack ground units anymore.
AI improvements.
Reduced Militia’s HP by 2 (down to 50).
Militia and volkssturm will not be used to spawn units as garrison anymore in the map editors.
German AT infantry 43 graphics.
10 more hard damage to Volkssturm.

[h3]Fixes[/h3]

Dead planes could not be deleted from the map and re appear later on after loading a save for example (only with realistic planes option ON).
Range for supportive fire indication was missing from the manual.
Chalons-en-Champagne was actually named Chalons-en-Marne.
El Asnam was named Orleansville.
Hungary 1944 was missing on mobile.

Thank you @Vince for the donation ! You rock ! :)

[h3]Changes[/h3]

Mouse pointer, for something more original :)
When a unit reaches a new rank, it will deal +3% of damage. Max rank / level is 5. So, having a unit level/rank 5 will give it a +15% damage modifier.
No more fuel sound when resupplying a unit on foot.
Undo button graphics. More obvious :)
In the tile info, the city name will be shown instead of its type.
Tweaked a very little the Low Countries campaign scenario.
Added a button in the modding panel taking you directly to my video explaining how to mod the game.
Improved randomisation algorithm of the random generator scenario.
With historical focus ON, only Germany will declare war on neutral countries. Other axis will not.

[h3]Fixes[/h3]

Unit spawn unit random scenario generator.
Road generation in random scenario generator.
Starting position being shared by more than 1 country (ex : Germany has 1 airfield and the Soviet Union has a factory and a city next to it) in the random scenario generator.
Reinforcement tiles without player set generating AI freeze when playing the scenario.
Roads sometimes not properly generating / overlapping in the random scenario generator.