Hex of Steel News

- Added : Option to add the original german flag with the swastika (which is not included in the game for obvious reasons, but if you wish to get a modification of it and get the original one, join the discord ill leave it there).
- Added : Encirclement : When there are 3 or more units from one faction around another unit that is from another faction the modifier starts to take effect. Starting at 3 units, the enemy will deal -1 damage for every unit surrounding it. Basically, encirclement reduces the damage the unit that is encircled will deal, which makes sense because the unit, which represents like a battalion, needs to spread its forces along all sides of the hex, thus spreading thin its forces. So it makes sense it is actually dealing less damage. The more units you have to encircle an enemy unit with, the better. There is a penalty of -1 starting at 3 units, say you have 6 units (max) around an enemy, the enemy will have a -4 damage penalty.
- Added : Load any picture in the map editor and draw your map on it ! This really helps when you want to recreate historically accurate map where you need the EXACT shape and location of cities. It works brilliantly ! Not super convenient as of now (You need to copy/paste the COMPLETE path of the picture then click 'load') but it works ! Have fun creating super accurate map ;)
- Added : Possibility to deactivate moving the camera using the mouse on edges of the screen. This is mainly for the map editor, because it pissed me off that while i was drawing on top of the picture, the map would move whenever i was getting too close to the edge. Once again, have fun creating your own maps !
- Added : Custom songs ! You can add the songs you want in a special folder called "Custom musics". Just drag and drop your songs there, they will be automatically loaded in the game and will play normally. IMPORTANT : only .wav are going to be readable !! Do not try to put any .mp3 or .mp4. Unity refuses me to stream .mp3 for copyrights reasons, so only use .wav. You can convert any .mp3 or any format to .wav, don't worry.
- Added : Road automatization in the map editor. You have to select the first road tile, the one that is straight, then just draw, and it will automatically place the good chunk of road you need (orientation). If there is a city next to it, it will connect automatically too. You still can place them manually if you want, just dont hold the left button of the mouse and just do separate clicks. Not yet made for rivers or railroads.
- Added : New button for switching from air to ground view. You still can use the 'spacebar' shortcut.
- Added : Previous unit button. So there is now a next and previous unit button.
- Added : new units ! BA6, StuH42, T-34/76 1941, T-34/76 1942, T-34/76 1943, BT-2, T-34/57 1941, Panzer III Ausf. A B C D E F H.
- Change : Clicking on the notification (red thing on the right side of the screen) will not select the unit anymore, just take you to it.
- Change : Revamp of the sprites of the following units : Panzer V Panther, Panzer VI Tiger I, Panzer VI Tiger II, Panzer II Flammingo, Sd. Kfz. 232, Sd. Kfz. 251/22, sFH18, Sd. Kfz. 222, Elefant, Panzer 38(t) A and E, Panzer III Ausf. A, T-28, T-34/76 1940, T-35A.
- Change : Now plays a random musics when the scenario starts.
- Change : Nerfed heroes, no more +3 MP, +3 soft damage and +3 hard damage on 1 hero, this was way too overkilled.
- Change : All units are now ordered and classified by their price (cheaper to more expensive) in the store, it kinda was a bit random before, not its all calculated.
- Change : SUPERB optimization for the AI. Go check it out.
- Change : Stummel year was 1940, but in reality it was supposed to be 1942.
- Change : Ton of unit stats modification that I did not keep track of ... sorry.
- Fix : Notification not coming from a plane that was running low on fuel and soon could not be coming back to the closest allied airport.
- Fix : Brest-Litovsk map was broken sorta.
- Fix : I forgot to add the logo for mechanized/motorized units in the map editor when deploying troops.
- Fix : Bug with heroes not loading correctly when loading a map, thus causing a freeze. I recommend everyone NOT to continue their campaign but to restart it.
- Fix : Music starting to play twice when starting a scenario.
- Fix : Hero's images not showing correctly.
- Fix : Getting the same hero multiple times.
- Fix : AI going over river (wtf valentin, again ?? thats like the 3rd time).
- Fix : HUGE performance issues with the AI. NOW ITS ALL GOOOOD.

I did not release any update in so long because I really wanted #40 to include the new UI.
Unfortunately, I did underestimate the time it would take to re-do it ENTIRELY. So it's taking longer than what I had anticipated and therefore I chose to release this update WITHOUT the UI upgrade. Hopefully, will be part of #41 ! :D Crossing my fingers.

Have fun playing, please tell me what you like, or not about the game. Don't forget to leave a review if you have the time, this would help me greatly :)

Im available on the discord channel as always at almost any time, so don't be shy to stop by and stalk a bit or even send me a message !

Cheers

- Added : Panzerjager I, SIG 33 15 cm, Sd. Kfz. 233, T19, VK16.02 Leopard.
- Added : In the deploy menu, it will now show wether your unit is motorized or mechanized.
- Added : Popup appearing when successfully upgrading to another unit.
- Added : NATO counters for all units, mechanized and motorized for all types missing (Artillery/Mortars/Infantry).
- Change : I remade all sprites for the following units -> Sturmpanzer I Bison, Sturmpanzer V Brummbar, Panzer Ausf. IV G, Panzer Ausf. IV F2, Panzer Ausf. III G, Hummel, Flak38, Flak 36 88mm, Panzerwerfer, Sd. Kfz. 251/9 Stummel. That's the ones that looked the worse, so that's why I remade them, they now look super nice !
- Change : A lot of unit's stats, especially german ones
- Change : Stug III A is now in the artillery category/filter.
- Change : Camera won't move to defensive AI units as it was doing previously, I thought it was useless as they are not moving.
- Change : Reorganized all german artillery in order of strength so when you buy the best is at the bottom.
- Change : More money from captured VPs.
- Change : Easy difficulty now doubles your starting money.
- Fix : Camera glitching, i finally found what it was (Z axis was changing constantly, now its good).
- Fix : HP of the AI being not in the good orientation when you discovered them in the fog of war.
- Fix : Your unit's little red target and little green arrow were being shown like you could move or attack even when the AI was playing.

I forgot to mention in the previous update, and could not find any button to edit the previous event so IMPORTANT PLEASE READ :

If your save / map contains any of those units : Sd. Kfz. 251 / SS infantry (the STG one). Your map / save is broken and will not launch as they have been removed from the game.

- Added : 1 new scenario for the US campaign.
- Added : Moving the camera using WASD (Sorry it took so long, I forgot about it).
- Added : Motorized / Mechanized units. When buying infantry or artillery, you can choose as an option to motorize or mechanize it (trucks/half tracks). Trucks give a +2MP bonus, whilst Half tracks give +1MP, +1 Armour, +1 soft damage. It obviously costs an extra cost to get either of the option, +20 for trucks, +50 for half tracks. You can still use your infantry normally to capture VPs.
- Added : Elite units (SS, Red Guards only for now). When selecting the "Elite unit" option in the store, the unit you will buy will instantly get lvl 4. It will also have a little icon to symbolize its an elite unit.
- Added : Visibility of the selected unit in the store.
- Change : Disposition of stats and other things in the store.
- Change : Reduced the size of the infantry sprite (all kinds, all countries).
- Change : Flags are now shown under the units and other sprites.

Haven't added the NATO counters for motorized/mechanized units yet, they will get the same icon as usual units get. I'll make it available in next update.

- Added : 5 brand new musics ! (I'll try to make it possible for you to put yours into a folder and that the game accesses this folder so it can read them from there).
- Added : 1 more scenario for the US : Operation Market Garden.
- Added : A new button in the map editor, the "Replace" button that basically when clicked on when having a unit selected, it will just sent the unit back in to the reserve of the selected player instead of deleting it completely.
- Change : I reinstated the possibility for the AI units that are set as defensive to leave this move and capture any enemy VP that is within a 2 tiles radius. You'd better watch out for those units you left alive until now, because you did not really need to kill them ... Now they will capture stuff back.
- Change : Only resupplying the HP of the units will now prevent it from attacking any further during the turn. You still can resupply the ammo and the fuel and still be able to attack, your MP will still be set to0 for the turn.
- Change : All the units of the map "Eastern front 1941" have been placed and selected according to historical ones. It's going to be a lot of units, YES. I mean it is. Haha.
- Change : Units stats changes for : T-34/85, IS1, IS2, IS3, PaK43, PaK44, Hornisse, Maus, SMK.
- Fix : Clicks going through the UI when hitting "Resupply".
- Fix : Freeze when deploying core units in a second scenario.
- Fix : AI walking on river (yup, again, damn AI hehe).
- Fix : Popup not disappearing when clicking in the map editor (really minor thing).
- Fix : Save/Load not refreshing in a scenario, when quicksaving for example, would not show the newly made quick save.

- Change : More steel from captured VPs (1/3rd more).
- Change : Panzer 38(t) E sees its armour increasing to 3 and its price increasing to 130.
- Change : Reinstated the AI planes going back to base when they have no more ammo or when they are low on fuel (I previously disabled it for easier bug fix, but as now everything seems fine I re-added it).
- Fix : Removing units in the map editor caused in-game crashes because it was not removing them properly. If you made custom maps, I advise quickly changing the number of players, so it will reset all list of units for the players and wont cause any crashes. If you made a map and never removed units, then its fine. Problem really came from removing units in the editor.
- Fix : Raining instead of snowing on campaign maps.
- Fix : Visual fo units clipping / glitching with activated option "follow AI movements".
- Fix : URSS AI crash/freeze because of the fact that I added the Sherman yesterday and did not do it properly apparently.
- Fix : Clicks going through the UI (all the buttons located in the bottom right corner of the screen).
- Fix : When clicking on the notification, if it is a unit that died and its tile was in the fog of war, previously clicking on the notification would illuminate the tile where the unit has died and therefore adding one tile to your field of view. The fix basically set the tile back to fog of war after it flashed.