Company of Heroes: Europe in Ruins News

Hey!
Wow, this is uh.. unexpected. Soviets are, in a way, here. And right before Christmas!

They're buggy. They're lacking an insane amount of polish. The launcher still doesn't recognize them fully, there's no reward units for em, but they are here.

Two out of the three doctrines, at least.

This project has taken an insane amount of time, and the full release will come soon(tm), but for now - Soviet open beta is officially starting on December 18th!

You'll have access to two of the three doctrines : Propaganda War and Breakthrough.

Propaganda War is based around being the biggest nuisance in the entire game - stand your ground with cloaking infantry, while using mobile vehicles to take out key targets in the back!



OSNAZ are elite infantry, capable of cloaking in cover. Their main attraction and difference from Fallschimjagers? - They are capable of firing twice before being uncloaked. As such - you're able to effectively deal damage without being detected (If you're using PTRD's, for example)



Lacking some firepower? Utilize all the benefits of American and Commonwealth industry! Bring modified bren gun carriers (DP and DShK carriers?), M4 Emchas and equip your cloaking partisans with M9 Bazookas! Leverage the massive movement and disabling bonuses the doctrine grants you, while also capturing all the destroyed light vehicle wrecks with your partisans!



And if that won't work? Just use more rockets.
More.
Rockets.



Breakthrough is all about pushing the advantage. Durable Infantry? Check. Powerful Vehicles? Check. Moving healing? Check. Combined-Arms abilities? Check and check!



Use the poweful IS2 to soak up damage and completely obliterate axis armor! Never surrender, even in the face of defeat.



Keep your tanks repaired in the middle of battle! Guard are durable infantry, capable of repairing all owned vehicles quickly and efficiently (They can also ride T34s!)

Don't be surprised if they also hold the line - They're fairly tanky, and can purchase some pretty powerful upgrades.



Pushed to the enemy spawn and don't want to run back? No fret! - Just bring up your mobile ambulance and provide your team with some well deserved heals.

Other Changes :
Launcher stability fixes
AI should be more aggressive with cqc units
A groundbreaking bug of fallschimjagers getting 1% more damage reduction than intended has been finally fixed
New 1v1 Map : Martlet (Thanks Ivsh)

Notice : Please report all found bugs to the bug-report channel on Discord! We'll be quick in squashing them ASAP.

Thank you to everyone who made this "meme" possible. My twitch viewers forced me to make this, and I'm eternally grateful for the motivation.

A personal thanks to everyone who helped with the project :

Jstek (Launcher)
Volsky (Design ideas, some models)
o4b (R.I.P?)
HSK (For fixing relic's own issue)
Eastern Front team (for generously lending us the models)
Speedy (launcher and in-game Icons)
Halftrack (DShK BREN Carrier and variants, T-70, Soviet infantry and associated webgear, KV heavy tank variants, Maxim HMG and custom animations, and many other assets in use by the existing Western Front factions)

Happy holidays,
Olazaika

Hi there! We're proud to present this seemingly small (in file size) update.

Our resident AI and Launcher coder, Jstek, has been hard at work adding in some long overdue QoL improvements :

Launcher :

1) Launcher is now fixed at a 100 FPS cap, no longer will it feel choppy and laggy

2) Launcher window is now resizeable - rejoice in being able to see everything on 4k monitors! (better resolution upscaling is in the works). If you ever screw it up - don't fret - just click F1 on your keyboard and all will return to normal :)

3) Battle reporting is finally fixed. Your hard battles should now always be reported, even if someone rage-quits! AI should no longer hold anyone hostage in a battle.

4) AI games and Multiplayer games are now consolidated. No longer will you have to rehost a 4v4 just to add an AI to fill the gap.

Game :

1) AI should now act far more aggressively - Expert AI is difficult to beat, to say the least

2) A multitude of crashes have been sorted. No longer will your battles be interrupted by the AI deciding to end the game after losing a vet 5 unit!

3) AI has learned to use some new abilities, should work quicker and react faster. ATG's are finally a threat again!

4) Localization updates

Tune in soon for another, more game balance focused update, and see you on the battlefield!

Hi there, it's Olazaika again!

Today is the last devblog before the big one. Work on Soviets is continuing! While some of us are tinkering with the models, I'm personally working on the final touches of all three doctrines! You'll see them in the next issue :) (Warning, they're OP as hell)


A proper, official EiR Trailer is in the works ;) Trying to give our little mod the proper presentation it desreves! Please let me know if it looks "good" :D



AI has been worked on again, you'll notice this in the next patch - far more aggressive, far more fun to fight. Expert AI is... difficult to win against, especially without any AI teammates on your own side. Try not to lose!

Lots of changes to the launcher back-end. Resizeable window size, fullscreen support, higher-framerates, better battle-reporting. You'll be able to experience it all in just a short while.



I know this isn't such an in-depth dev-blog as the other ones, but hopefully you'll manage to wait a couple of weeks for the grand one :) I'll try and incorporate a teaser before hand on our Discord!

As always - have a good one on the battlefield boys!

Hi everyone,

The autumn update R060 for EIR is now live and brings a slightly different kind of update as it introduces a major new feature to the mod which many of you have been asking for a long time: AI mode! Some of you will have already been able to test games against the AI in recent weeks but after some further tweaks we are now making it available to all players in the launcher.

While the AI isn't quite as good as your average EIR player *just yet*, it should already give you a proper challenge and a chance to get a taste of EIR gameplay when there are no multiplayer games happening. As of this patch, you will also be able to choose AI difficulty in game which will scale the challenge (read onslaught) accordingly.

You can play any of the gamemodes, 1vs1 all the way up to 4vs4, against AI either alone, co-op or with other players mixed in on both sides. A quick how to guide on launching an AI game is included below.

A huge thank you to Jstek who has committed a lot of time and energy to making this happen. And as always, please let us know if you run into any issues or have ideas for improvements via our discord.

- The EIR dev team



[h2]Gameplay:
[/h2]Terror :
Ostwind K.M.P rounds - Ostwinds gain access to incendiary rounds, capable of quickly demolishing any infantry inside buildings!

[h2]Maps:
[/h2]Bergen has been added to the 1v1 roster thanks to Ivsh. Expect to see more of your favourite EIR maps turned into 1v1 versions to accommodate the new AI mode soon.

[h2]Localization changes:
[/h2]Unfortunately, to make the AI experience work correctly - we've had to disable all localization for EiR except English. This streamlining process will hopefully allow us to make changes in a far simpler manner. Please let us know if you're suffering any unintended consequences

[h2]UI fixes :
[/h2]A multitude (over 50) ingame icons were changed or fixed with thanks to speedy. Please let us know if you see any issues appear!

[h2]AI Fixes :
[/h2]AI should now :

• Repair properly
  
• Be more aggressive
  
• Blob a little bit less
  
• Use off-map artillery correctly (axis SHOULD work, not verified)
  
• Retreat units more correctly (no repair kits/healing and vet? - retreat)
  
• AI now uses easy/normal/hard/expert - so if you're having troubles winning against it - try lowering the difficulty!
  
• Call off their units if they've lost the game
  

Launcher fixes/changes :

1. Launcher now checks if you have Company of Heroes installed/purchased
   
2. Launcher now checks if you have Company of Heroes : Opposing Fronts installed/purchased
   
3. New news page - links to all the required resources!
   

----------------------------------------------

[h2]HOW TO: launching an EIR AI game[/h2]

To launch an AI game, select AI mode and "create battle" in the launcher battle screen.



Once your lobby is created, fill it with AI players,



Click ready for supplies, then ready for launch and hit the red launch button next to the AI players to ready them up. After that, the big launch button will light up and you can go set up the game



Clicking the red launch button will send you into the game. Create a skirmish or multiplayer lobby, add the AI players (make sure they match factions selected in launcher), choose your difficulty and launch!



Once a game is completed, head back to the launcher where the battle outcome will be reported and your company updated to reflect the losses incurred and veterancy gained, just like is the case with a multiplayer EIR game,

It's been a while, hasn't it?

Hi everyone, Olazaika here! This has been an incredibly busy month for Europe In Ruins. Unfortunately, we were so tied up with our own lives, we couldn't even find the time to share what's been going on.

Anyways, you're here for the upcoming weekend patch deets, so let me give you some :

Terror doctrine Ostwinds now gain access to K.m.P rounds, which grant a penetration increase, while also giving an incendiary effect. Extremely effective against units in buildings!



AI mode optimizations : Jstek and I (Mostly Jstek) have made strides in making the AI feel more like a player. The gamemode has never been more balanced, and we're planning to open up the access to everyone in just a few short days!

UI improvements : Our resident artist Speedy and I have found a way to force Company of Heroes to accept modern sized textures. While this currently is only for some niche Soviet faction units - we're hoping to make all the textures look ready for at least 2017

Improvements to the lighting engine - I've worked tirelessly to give you guys a better experience in night-battles. Real-time lighting for rocket artillery has been implemented and stabilized - no more random crashes for all of you Soviet enjoyers!



I haven't forgotten about soviets. I know it's taking a while, and I know many of you are getting antsy about em ;) Making new abilities takes time, and i'm not just going to cobble together a copy-pasted mess :)

Honestly? It's been a rough month for all of us. Starfield, Cyberpunk 2077 2.0, Dota 2, Star Citizen, Masters of Orion... Actual work and studies. All of these things have stolen countless hours of our work.

Oh yeah, soviets throw a sh*t-ton of nades by the way.