(Warning. This is LONG to read.)
Introduction and Manifest
The Game handles Rogue states through morale. I won't learn you anything : revolt chance = if it revolts, a unit spawns. Once the province belongs to the Rogue State, the morale doesn't raise, and each day, if it "revolts", another insurgent units spawns. This lead to the situation where sometimes, insurgents hideout look like a Red Army Corps.
The team is working heavily on the frustration created by too much insurgents, and the situation is already better for the disgruntled players. Here, i'm not proposing "how to solve a problem". I want to brainstorm on "how to make them marvelous", because i'm convinced the actual insurgents are a superb framework for additional features.
I start from the hypothesis that in our modern world, this kind of insurgency and organisation try to establish a political entity that can be recognised (either through external support, or through media recognition) as an illegal state.
Framework meaning, in this case, how to make them marvelous without asking devs to spend ludicrous amount of times on "creating", and instead reuse at their best what is already in use.
Executive Summary :
I trust that organised and aggressive rogue state can help to improve the PvE experience of the game while providing good incentive to reduce blobbing, and new narrative stories for Rpers.Tools used :
- Reduce drastically the revolt chance both in cities and provinces
- Improve drastically the severity of an uprising, through numbers and a random factor (D&D style)
- Create new type of insurgent units off already existing assets
- Rebalance (down) the basic insurgent
- Make them expand.
- Change their handling in the daily european.
I°) Spawn Rate / Spawn Severity
Generally, the feedback from players is that insurgents spawn too often, and i do agree to some point. It feels more like hooligans are starting fires in some parts of the country, instead of an insurgency.However, if we take "one" revolt alone, it's not severe. It's basically one infantry, that doesn't move with 19 HP. It can fend off a basic infantry, but it will be easily killed by either planes, tanks/recon, helicopters. With time, however, if you left it unchecked, it will become a human blob with 150 HP, that isn't more dangerous, but bothersome.
Actually, the typical 25% province has a 3% chance of uprising, and the city has a 50% chance of uprising
The underlying goal is to shout to you : "MAN DO NOT LET CITIES EMPTY". However, people do it, i do it on a regular basis : i try not to, but the blitzkrieg sings like a siren. It seems they just don't care :D, and it's their choice. Now, without deleting this "anti-blobbing feature", i would propose to make it more like "If you let your cities empties, there is a chance you will create a difficult to handle monster".
My modification proposal :
-25% morale Province chance : 2%. If we consider your usual player country has between 55 and 65 provinces, it means that through annexing him, you would ensure a typical 1% * ~60 chances, meaning a solid chance that at least one province will uprise per full country expansion.
-25% morale city chance : 25%. 8 * 25%, meaning you are pretty sure at least one/two city will uprise (if you don't let units in it.)
This reduce, of course, very much the occurences of an uprising, and the general bordergore. now, i do propose something harsh with them.
Instead of just one unit : spawn a random scaled amount (meaning that there is a lower chance of spawning five units rather than two) amount between two and five units, but not only basic insurgents. Here allows me to go to the second point of my proposal : rebalance and new units.
II°) Redesigned basic insurgent units and new rogue state units
Here is my proposal of rebalancing of the basic insurgent : (with the original to compare)
To explain it with more details, I transformed this unit (following Germanico advice, to be honest) into some kind of low-cost special force, with horrible efficiency when it comes to attack in open field, or entrenched positions in city. On the other side, when they fight in their rural area, they take advantage of the terrain, being able to cause much more damage.
I shifted their focus to be more efficient as soft-damage dealer, while i reduced their hard capacity, both offensively and defensively. The underlying idea is as such : We already saw insurgents forces manage to force some standing armies to retreat, in specific case of isolated units, or superior numbers, or surprise attacks. On the other side, i've yet to witness the report of a battle where a line of militarized pick ups managed to break through plains in the middle of a defensive battleline with entrenched military personnel, or worst, armored vehicles. French Operations in Mali and Côte d'Ivoire give plenty of examples of what happens when a pick up rushes frontally in clear sight of an defending infantry fighting vehicle, even using light caliber. In open plain, a ill-equiped insurgent wouldn't manage to hurt significantly a tank without being forced to withdraw/disband under a heavy firepower.
On the other opposite of the specter, a very badly used hard-hp unit, such as a tank, could be slightly damaged by this unit ( Western Tank in mountain combat against this unit = 55 PV hitting 3 against 10 PV hitting 2,25. The western tank needing ~4 rounds to kill this unit, it would end with ~10 damages on its hull. In absolute, it's nothing, but it's attrition, especially considering the spawns (see I°) and 3°) )
I also raised the damages done on population and infrastructure, for the simple fact that soldiers, even in the most disciplined armies, are not the last to pillage to some extent and cause unecessary degradations of civilian infrastructures... so imagine irregulars. Who let his cities with no garrisons anyway when there are Fanatic fighters at the door, anyway ?
They are stealthy because they fight non-conventionally. It's hard to identify them as a fighting force before they uncover themselves, and they don't hesitate to move or occupy space disguised as civilians. In this regard, they are hard to uncover before you have reports of their activity in a province, except if you maintain an active military presence there.
Now, you would imagine that this makes the rogue state very weak ---> just reco/reco/reco, and ultimately, they will lack of luck and fall on a infantry that will wreck them. Or worst, they will hear the Charge of the Valkiries. Insurgent lack variety of units that regular countries have, but this can be improved :
Proposed Rogue State Roster :
Insurgent (Revised) (As explained higher)
Freedom Fighter --> uses the eastern basic infantry asset (before we find a nice asset of a guy holding a stinger), and is a solid defense unit intended to disallow complete safety of aircrafts and helicopters over the rogue state, as well as holding cities or mountains
Mercenaries ---> uses the eastern mechanised infantry asset (before we find a nice asset of an armored pick up), and is intended as an offensive shocktrooper with solid all-round stats, able to actually fight on equal ground with low-tier infantry and vehicles
Stolen APC ---> uses the eastern combat recon vehicle asset (before we find a nice asset of a early cold war infantry fighting vehicle), and is intended as an offensive hard-hp unit, that can't conquer but can really hurt unprepared positions or units
Stolen Tank ---> uses the eastern tank asset, is intended as a sub-tank with anti-aircraft/helicopter capacity, dedicated to spearhead or holding cities under siege.
Running an online alliance is pretty much like running a small company, except you need to find other way than money to keep your employees productive. May they play or work, they are humans.