New LnLT v2.0 Vassal Modules Now Available

[David Heath]

Here is LnLP Official v2.0 Vassal Module for

Heroes of Normandy
Heroes of the Falklands
Heroes of the Pacific and
Heroes of the Nam

The screenshots show the new Vassal module in play. These show off the new custom UI buttons on the toolbar, which use graphics directly from the LnLT games in some cases, and they are all bigger and flashier than the stock Vassal graphics.

Additional things to look for is our new counter look, now with rounded corners and light shading. The maps and counters are all larger hi-res digital images designed to match the boardgame contents, which makes them all easier to see and read.

You can Download it At - https://goo.gl/fLhcuH

 

[Umbra]

Hello all,

I's great to see the Vassal module Heroes of the Nam come out. I own Forgotten Heroes and am waiting to purchase the newer HotN.

The Vassal module HotN seems to be missing the "Mines" and "Bunker" chits though. Is this because these chits were no longer used in HotN vs FH?

Thanks for any help.

 

[The Plodder]

Could we have the HotP and HotN maps each available as extensions? This will enable us to use them in each module for battles made up in the generators.

 

[Trent Garner]

Sorry about that. Good catch Umbra, I just missed those. There are Bunkers +2 and Bunkers +3, and the 1FP Landmines. Not to make excuses, but there are so many counters, it's easy to miss one (or two, or three).

Please be sure to let us know if you find anything else that needs our attention, we'll address it as quickly as we can.

EDIT: Module has been updated with the missing counters for bunkers and mines. New module uploaded. Thanks to Umbra for his sharp eyes, and to Ethan for his awesome graphical skilz!

 

[Trent Garner]

Plodder, apologies, but I think we'll have to look at doing customizations for these Vassal modules at a later date. We've got about as much as we can do right now just to produce all of the new Vassal modules that are being planned. I do like your idea, however.

 

[Umbra]

Hey Trent,

First of all, thanks for all your work and quick responses.

I was playing around with the HotN module (setting up a game with my brother) and found the Bunker chits can't rotate and the Healer chit is missing from Skills deck. Also just a minor note, the Starshell chit does not have the "Show Area" option available.

In view of all the work you and your company is doing I realize these are minor things, just thought I would let you know.

 

[Trent Garner]

This is good information, thanks and keep it coming. I'll continue working on the module(s) to get them in tip-top shape and will let you know when these are properly fixed.

P.S. I have made notes from this feedback, which will (hopefully) help ensure these items are checked in all future modules before release.

EDIT: All noted issues above have been addressed and a new module file has been uploaded, both here and at the Vassal website.

 

[Trent Garner]

Well, unfortunately, it looks like the Starshell AOE isn't working in any of the new modules, for some unknown reason. I thought I had it working in Nam, but I was mistaken. Apologies everyone, I'm working on it right now and will fix all the new modules as quickly as I can.

I also noticed a couple of Hot-key oddities that I'll address, as well. It would be really good to get these problems all sorted out before publishing anymore modules.

EDIT: OK, the Starshell should now show the AOE radius properly when the maps are set to nighttime. I think the hot-key problem was partly to cause, there were double-assigned key combos that had to be fixed. Thanks a bunch for pointing out this problem, it was a bit more critical and needed to be corrected for several reasons, especially the fact that it was a flaw in all the modules, even the one's in development. This was kind of a big deal, dude.

All modules have been updated and tested to be sure this feature was functional again. New files are ready for download!

 

[Ralph Ferrari]

Is it possible to add the option to add notes to the counters? Falklands has Forward Observers which I was looking to add a note to the Leader Counter that has this ability. There are some other instances where this may come in handy.

Also, is there a way to be able to rotate the maps at 90 Degree intervals when setting up a scenario, instead of only being able to flip it 180 degrees? Helps to have the VASSAL Map layout match the way it is shown on the scenario sheet.

Thanks for all your hard work getting these guys out. I'm sure it's not a fun experience getting all these maps, counters, and features into the VASSAL modules.

 

[Trent Garner]

Hello Ralph, glad you are enjoying the new modules. Thanks for the support, it's appreciated. This project is a labor of love for me, really. I want to be able to play the LnLT games in Vassal, I know how to develop modules in Vassal, so I put my money where my mouth is, so to speak. But I also see this as a community effort. Without some excellent work done before me by other fans, and the great feedback from everyone, this would be much harder and take a lot longer. The full support of LnLPublishing is just icing on the cake.

As stated above, we may look at customizations to the Vassal modules at some later date, but there are too many base modules yet to develop, so getting those out takes priority for now.

As for the maps, I am not aware of any way to rotate maps 90 degrees, unfortunately. This has been a question of mine in the past, as well. However, being able to add as many rows and columns as you need in the map selection window should allow you to recreate any map configuration that is possible.

 

[Umbra]

When playing with the HotN module I noticed that the Wreck chit delete hot key was CTRL-X which looked like should be CTRL-D. So to confirm this I checked what the other Wreck chits looked like in the other modules. Which led me to finding some anomalies and suggestions.

As for the anomalies, in HotP when changing the IJA Armor to a Wreck it changes to a Cave. The Type 93 does correctly change to a Wreck, but the IJA Wreck chits don't have the Crew option. In HotF the one Wreck chit is labeled "Argentine Wreck", not sure if there should be a US Wreck chit also or just one chit labeled "Wreck". Only the Argentine crew appear for the Wreck chits when drawn from the the Wreck Markers, though the UK crew will appear correctly from a Wreck chit that was created from UK Armor.

As for my suggestions, there appears to be good options that could be used uniformly across multiple modules that would fit well for Wrecks and Crews. When only one nationality uses one Wreck chit (as with HotP) then it's simple, one Crew option with one Hot-key command always, but when multiple nationalities use one Wreck chit it's a little different.

When more than one nationality uses one Wreck chit a Crew sub-menu could be used (see example pic). It could be used with both the Wreck chits drawn from the Markers bin and those created from Armor chits. The other option would be keep the sub-menu for the Wreck chits drawn from the Markers bin, but have the Wreck chit created from Armor have the one Crew option with no sub-menu.

Example pic:

 

[Trent Garner]

Umbra,

The problem with the cave marker has been fixed. It is odd that one tank would show a wreck while the other showed a cave marker. The vehicles all work using shared, pre-defined unit prototypes. Theoretically, they should all show exactly the same thing. I'll give HotP a look to be sure everything is setup correctly, thanks for pointing this out. Also note that there should actually be unique wreck markers for US and IJA, which I will correct. Once these have been verified, I'll upload a new copy to LNLP and Vassal.

The setting of CTRL-X for delete is the default, provided by Vassal when you create a 'Place Marker' object. I will change this to CTRL-D, so that it matches the delete option in the rest of the modules.

As to having the ability to place crew counters from a sub-menu, I had actually removed that option, or so I thought. As implemented, it was incorporated with the wreck marker in such a way that the crew counter would replace the wreck marker, which is not really what you want. The option to add a crew counter, if incorporated properly, should be placed on the main unit menu with everything else, in my opinion. You might need to place a crew counter after bailing out, but the vehicle is not a wreck, for instance. I'll give this some serious consideration, however, this would be a customization, more or less, which we are trying hard to stay away from until all the modules are completed.

Your suggestion for handling crew from several nationalities is good, I'll keep that in mind if this becomes standard to all modules. My inclination is to add this to all modules, but time is a factor, so no guarantees at this time.

 

[Umbra]

Ah, I see what you're saying. If the crew counter option were in the main unit menu then there would be no need for crew sub-menus because you would place the crew before placing the wreck and also when the vehicle is abandoned. I was thrown off by the fact that some modules have the ability to create a crew counter from a wreck.

Thanks for all the the good information. I have some background in Vassal module creation so it was helpful.

 

[Trent Garner]

OK, I have given this some serious thought and I agree having the ability to place crew from the right-click menu of a vehicle is something that should be included. Since a variant of this was in the Falklands module, and a partial implementation was in the Pacific module, I feel sort of committed to it now. After careful consideration, the easiest way to implement this is to create a vehicle prototype for each nationality with appropriate crew, which can be done quite easily. SO, while this can be accomplished with little effort, it will take some time to add to each module. It looks like rain this Sunday, so I may have some spare time on my hands. We'll see how it goes.

 

[Umbra]

Really good to hear your thoughts on this.

Before your last post I tested the feel of the crew option in the armor right-click menu on how it plays out with wreck and abandoned outcomes with armor and it felt right. I feel it would give uniformity across the Tactical modules that LnL would like.

 

[Trent Garner]

Indeed, nice uniform modules is a worthy goal, but they should also be well designed and playable, as well. To that end, there have been several good suggestions for improving the modules and making them more useful already. I'm taking notes and giving some thought to each idea.

For instance, I have no prior experience making module extensions, so that is something I'll need to learn how to do before the map idea could be implemented. However, I can't imagine creating extensions would be much different from creating the modules themselves.

Thinking also about putting notes on counters, but I'm just not too sure about how this might be done. There are some Vassal objects that could possibly be used for this, but most available objects use pre-defined values that can only be edited in design mode, rather than dynamic values assigned during gameplay.

 

[Trent Garner]

Just a quick update on the Vassal modules. We are releasing v2.1 of the current modules. Enough changes were made to warrant a new version number. The changes made include:

Several issues with hot-keys have been corrected in all modules
Added Crew counter to vehicle right-click menu in all modules
Corrected the image for the IJA wreck marker in Heroes of the Pacific
Removed unneeded 'ARG wreck' counter in Falklands module
Renamed the remaining 'US wreck' counter in Falklands to just 'wreck'
(There is only one wreck counter in the Falklands game)

Modules have been updated at the Vassal website and will be updated here at LnLP very soon.

We're always interested in feedback, so please let us know what you think.

 

[Ty Snouffer]

"Thinking also about putting notes on counters, but I'm just not too sure about how this might be done."​

When I read the initial request I immediately thought we were talking about labels on counters which I have seen in a few of the modules I use. It ends up being a B&W bar of text that sits at the top of the counter.

Here's an example. No label on the left. With label on the right:

I'd have to think about use cases for LnLT, but it might be a nice touch.

Keep up the great work on the modules though. Starting to use 2.1 this Thursday for Heroes of Normandy. Will get to the other titles when they are printed. Good gaming ahead!

 

[Paul S Young]

Hi Trent

Thanks for the work you are putting into this; I mess around with modules myself, so I appreciate how painstaking the work can be, especially with that many counters with that many functionalities!

That said, I'm afraid I'm going to have to burden you with more work .... Two things missing from the Falklands module:

The Argentinian Marine full-squad - It is showing as the Ghurkas; the half-squad is fine.

The Paras MMCs - They are showing as Marines; SMCs are fine.

In other news .... What do you think the ETA for Defiance and North Africa is likely to be? Not that I have entered into a kind of Vassal frenzy or something ....

 

[Trent Garner]

Hello Paul,

Thanks for the kind words, I appreciate it. Thank you for pointing out the counter issue in the Falklands module, as well. I have corrected the images and uploaded an updated module, both here and at the Vassal website. As this is only a minor correction, the version remains at 2.1 for now.

We are ready to release a new Vassal module for Heroes of the Motherland, which should be very soon, indeed. This will be the final module for those LnLT printed games that were released in the last couple of years. Release of the remaining VASSAL modules will likely coincide with the release of the printed games, sometime in the very near future. We are working hard to get the modules finished on time.

After releasing all the main LnLT game modules, there are several extensions yet to be created, such as Bear and the Jackal, July '43, Noville, plus all the maps from the Compendiums. These will come a bit later, though. I have very little experience with module extensions, but it will be good to learn all about them as we work towards this second phase of the LnLT Vassal module project.