Happy New Year! It is time for the first dev diary of 2019, and we are more than excited to delve deeper into the Army General. Today we will lift a veil on battalions, and how these historical army formations take center stage in our “game-within-a-game” turn-based Dynamic Strategic Campaign mode for Steel Division 2.

As always: All of the images and videos in this article are from an early development version of Steel Division 2. They contain work-in-progress elements, as well as some typos and baguette language. Obviously, this will be fixed in the final version.

Before we continue, did you know that the pre-order for Steel Division 2 is now live? From early access to the beta to exclusive Aces and Camos and free DLC, make sure to check out the different pre-orders that are now available on our webstore.

Let’s back up a little. With Army General, we set out to recreate some of the most important and brutal operations that took place on the Eastern Front in the early summer of 1944. This new mode allows you, the player, to control dozens of historical battalions across a set number of days, involving everything from ad-hoc Kampfgruppen to behind-enemy-lines partisan troops, and air assets such as reconnaissance planes.



The turn-based Army General campaigns combine the strategic aspect of warfare, such as movement, supplies, reinforcement, and deciding where and when to do battle, with the familiar real-time tactical battles where you fight it out across the plains, hills, dense forests and open countryside of Belarus. You can decide to do this all yourself, or let the AI take control of certain tasks, such as auto-resolving the battles.

We’ll talk more about some of the particular gameplay aspects of Army General in our future dev diaries, but first, let’s look at the order of battle in a bit more detail.

Army General will be played at the battalion level. It will be the key building block of your order of battle and the main unit the player will be able to control. Each battalion has a number of companies assigned to it, which is translated into a numerical strength, as well as the number of tanks or equipment depending on historical data. To give you an indication of their size, during the Second World War, a German infantry battalion would number about 600 combat troops, or if armored, approximately 70 tanks. We tried to be as authentic as possible with the battalions you are able to field; this means that some of them will be understrength, while others will use captured or outdated tanks (German security units for example) or lend-lease equipment (on the Russian side).



An important disclaimer: all the battalions are historical in Army General, which means that the player will not be able to customize their own formation in this mode. Instead, you will have to use whatever forces are available at the start - though you will have access to reinforcements in the course of a campaign.

A country’s army follows an organizational chart shaped like a pyramid, with at the top the all-encompassing Army Group (German) or Front (USSR), and at the bottom the company. The battalion takes its place under the umbrella of a regiment or brigade, but is placed above the company. The division - the units with a recognizable identity like the ones we featured prominently in Steel Division: Normandy 44 - is made up of a gathering regiments or brigades and independent battalions. Each battalion, in turn, is made up of a number of companies.



In-game, we have represented this breakdown of unit composition as closely as possible. Within the Army General mode, you can use the Battleorder viewer, which shows all the formations that were present in all its details, including the number of armored vehicles, for instance.

We should note that due to a difference of organization between the Soviets on one side and the rest of the belligerents (the Germans and Western Allies), we have decided to adapt the Soviet order of battle to match the scale. Soviet mobile units (armored, mechanized and cavalry), at any given level of command, were always smaller than their Western counterparts. For example, a Soviet tank brigade, although made up of two to three tank battalions, was actually slightly less powerful than a single German armored battalion. Therefore, in Steel Division 2, Soviet tank brigades are played as battalions with their “official” battalions counting as companies. It doesn’t affect overall strength ratio and makes it easier to manipulate the larger number of Soviet formations.



There is an additional exception: the actual strength of a battalion or division is less than their real-life counterparts. We made the decision not to simulate the masses of cooks, clerks, runners, administrative assistants, radio operators and more, who, behind the scenes, make any sizable unit run. Instead, we focused on the combat troops; we think this is clearer and makes it less confusing for the player.

In Army General, a battalion has three attributes: assault (infantry and close combat units), armor (tank and anti-tank units) and support (mostly indirect fire, such as artillery). Furthermore, each battalion always features one HQ company. This HQ is the beating heart of the battalion: small in size but packed with command staff, supply, and recon units communication to coordinate everything. Subordinate to an HQ company are your combat companies, which again, are divided into different types: from assault companies equipped with small arms, grenades, and machine guns, to armored companies and artillery companies. Each battalion can have a maximum of 7 companies under their wings.



Likewise, there are HQ battalions. These are, in much of the same way as the HQ company, small but specialized units that the player will need to use for other combat troops to be put into battle. For each HQ battalion you bring to an engagement, you are allowed to bring one additional combat battalion. You can do this three times for a single battle. This means, three HQ battalions and three of your combat battalions. Why did we do it like this? It represents the higher HQ’s ability to exercise command and control over large formations. Besides, we wanted to make sure that the player wouldn’t be fighting dozens of small-scale battalion-vs-battalion battles, again and again. This mechanic allows us to have all the combat be equally exciting, with a sufficient number of forces involved to make each set-piece battle interesting and worthwhile.

To give the player an indication of their combat power, each battalion has a numerical value, calculated by the price of each company, which is displayed above the order of battle of a battalion. The first value is what the battalion brings to the battle; the number in brackets is the reserve combat power. Each battalion also displays the number of action points. Formations use these points to move, engage into combat, and perform other special abilities (recon, ground denial, bombardment, etc). Different types of troops see their points replenished at different rates. Some, like reconnaissance troops, might find themselves fully replenished much quicker than other units.

Rest assured, there is much more to unveil about the Army General. We will talk about how the battalions interact with each other on the strategic map in a future dev diary, including combat, how movement works, and special units and actions.

In the meantime, make sure to tell all your friends about Steel Division 2, make them wishlist the game on Steam, or sign-up to the newsletter here.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/919640/Steel_Division_2/

We will be back in a week. That’s when we hope to talk a bit more about some of the new tactical mechanics and aspects players will encounter in Steel Division 2.

Merry Christmas to you all! Here at the Eugen headquarters, we are back again with a new dev diary before the year’s end. This time we are going to talk about a feature in Steel Division 2 that we have brought over from Wargame: Red Dragon due to popular demand. Today’s topic is our in-game virtual museum: The Armory.

In the last dev diary we talked about how we take our community’s feedback to heart. We listen to what you have to say, and we always look if we can change something for the better. Without your feedback and comments, we wouldn’t be able to do this.



The new Armory is precisely one of those fan-favorite features that we have worked hard on to implement in Steel Division 2 because you asked for it. Fans of our Wargame-series will recognize this mode. In Steel Division 2, the Armory is not only a virtual museum where you will be able to inspect each and every one of the 600 historically correct units that we feature, but also compare their weapons and stats, research their strengths and weaknesses, and customize their camouflage among other things. This is also the place where you will be able to learn all about the personal histories of the game’s exclusive Aces - Steel Division 2’s one-of-a-kind leaders and their iconic vehicles.



We put in countless hours into creating each unit, from your regular boots-on-the ground Schützen infantry squad to the mighty Tiger II tank or the rarest, one-of-a-kind prototype. You can admire all these up close in our super detailed, custom-made hangar, where you can rotate the camera and zoom in on the tiniest of details of our 3D models. From designing the initial specs to the modeling department and the animation team, we put in a lot of effort to make sure the units you see are not only historically accurate but also beautiful to look at.


Behind the scenes

The Armory also allows you to check out the detailed statistics for each unit and vehicle, including their primary and secondary weapons and associated ammunition, search by type or nationality, compare them to other units, and all in all, allow you to become a certified weapon expert. This mode will be your go-to place to figure out the strengths and weaknesses for each individual unit. The level of detail is much greater compared to Steel Division: Normandy 44, and is updated to reflect the new tactical gameplay in Steel Division 2. For instance, players can now check the thickness of the armor plating (in realistic mm’s) on each side of a vehicle, find the armor penetration, suppression, damage and blast value of a weapon, and investigate the capabilities of different tank shells and bullets. Other basic info, such as road speed, level of optics, production year, type of unit, rate of fire, maximum fire range, is also available.


New statistics

The Armory also allows you to customize the camouflage of a select number of units in Steel Division 2. These Camos, as we call them, are unique cosmetic patterns that can be applied to a select number of units. One of the places where you can get the Camos is on our pre-order webstore, where we offer four different pre-order editions of Steel Division 2. Regardless of which version you choose, you’ll be the proud owner of not only 2 exclusive Camos but also the same number of Aces, receive access to the closed beta ahead of launch, and ten DLC for free. Be sure to check out the pre-order if you haven’t done so already!

That’s it for this dev diary. We will be back next year with a brand new one. Keep your eyes peeled on the newsletter (sign up here if you haven’t done so); and before you leave, make sure to wishlist Steel Division 2 on Steam.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/919640/Steel_Division_2/

The whole team at Eugen wishes you all the best for the last remaining days of 2018, and of course, 2019! May the new year be as inspiring and exciting for you as it will be for us.

Welcome back to the second installment of the Steel Division 2 dev diaries. In the first one, we talked about the Army General, the new single-player turn-based Dynamic Strategic Campaigns, where you are the commander in charge of your army and have to direct the course of battle during World War 2’s massive Operation Bagration. In this dev diary, we’ll take a look at the real-time tactical battles in Steel Division 2 and how they have changed to reflect the reality of fighting on the Eastern Front.

Before we continue, did you know that the pre-order for Steel Division 2 is now live? From early access to the beta to exclusive Aces and Camos and free DLC, make sure to check out all the different pre-orders that are now available on our webstore.

Important note before reading: All of the images and videos in this article are from an early development version of Steel Division 2. They contain work-in-progress elements, as well as some typos and baguette language. Obviously, this will be fixed in the final version.

Compared to the other theatres of the war, the fighting on the Eastern Front was on a truly massive scale - when we talk big, we mean really big - involving hundreds of thousands of men under arms, and tons of tanks, trucks, artillery and planes. The frontlines stretched for many kilometers, much of it being wilderness, low-lying hills or sparsely populated countryside, which we have recreated in our authentic, new maps. This is a big difference from the close combat battlefields we depicted in Steel Division: Normandy 44 with its “bocage country”: almost impenetrable hedgerows that narrowed sight lines and brought the battle forward to knife-fighting range.

Warfare in Belarus was different. That’s why we wanted to evolve the tactical experience, introducing a new scale to match the terrain and the larger distances that the players wouldwill encounter. The nature of the fighting during Operation Bagration made us realize that we needed to make some changes to the tactical battles, to have the fighting be more fun and more realistic at the same time.


The new Tactical Interface

We couldn’t have accomplished this new tactical experience in Steel Division 2 without the fantastic support from our community - you, dear player. Thanks to you and your extremely useful feedback and comments in the course of development, we have been able to introduce a host of improvements, updates and new mechanics to the game. We couldn’t have done it without you.

Without further ado, keep reading to find out more about some of the new mechanics and features you might encounter in Steel Division 2.

To give you an indication on how combat differed between the Western Front and the Eastern Front in the summer of 1944: the average engagement distance during your typical tank battle was around one kilometer in France, at most, while in Belarus, due to the topography, fights would frequently take place around 1.5 kilometers, and in some cases, even further than that.



The decision was easy for us: we needed to allow the players to fight at longer ranges. Whereas in Normandy we simulated engagements up to one kilometer, in Steel Division 2 we doubled the maximum combat range to roughly two kilometers. It doesn’t simply mean that we multiplied all the distances; it is important to keep the same rhythm and gameplay flow as well. A lot of our mechanics needed to reflect the increase in scale: from armor penetration (read more about that below) to the line of sight mechanic and cover, we have changed quite a few things under the hood. It has been a considerable amount of work, and we are still knee-deep in development, but we are satisfied how some of the changes have turned out.

A. Tanks can now move in light forest
It is one of the many details that will change the way you play in Steel Division 2; tanks can now move into light forest. Battles between tanks were far more commonplace on the Eastern Front, and the difference in armor composition between the German and Russian forces was not that dissimilar. The increase in scale means that maps are now more dangerous at longer range, and we needed the player to have more flexibility in planning their options to fight (or hide) from combat. Heavy forest is still off-limits to tanks; like the first game, only infantry can move in this type of terrain.


A Tiger in its natural habitat

B. Firing on the move
Tank gun stabilization was pretty non-existent during World War 2. Doctrine across the different sides told any prospective tank commander to not shoot on the move, but as we know from a lot of the action reports we researched, the Russians did use their T-34’s to fire while moving. When they attacked en masse, they used everything they had. So in Steel Division 2, the player can now instruct their tanks to fire on the move while assaulting a position. It might not be a very accurate tactic, but if your crew is skilled enough, you might be able to suppress enemy troops, or - if you are close enough - even destroy them.

C. New armor penetration system
This change is a bit more complex, but we feel upgrading the way armor penetration behaves in the game would better reflect the reality of a typical engagement on the Eastern Front. In the first Steel Division, due to the combat range being capped at one kilometer, the 88 mm gun of a Tiger tank could be less effective compared to the 75 mm gun of a Panther tank when firing at distant targets. To be more realistic, we changed that in Steel Division 2, as the weight and velocity of an 88 mm shell, for instance, will now allow it to penetrate more armor at longer range. This change is across all tanks - not only the guns but also armor - meaning that some of the units you have grown to love will behave more realistic (and differently).


Units’ icons now stack when viewed from a distance for a better visibility

D. More realistic armor display
One of the many small, but important, tweaks is that we display all armor levels in mm’s according to the thickness in real-life. It should be easier to read the exact amount of armor on a vehicle. The new display works hand in hand with the new penetration system, which should allow players to find it easier to figure out if a particular tank gun can penetrate the armor of a target, or in the case of the bigger, nastier tanks, will only dent it.

E. New critical damage models
In Steel Division 2, players will find themselves dealing with more and different types of critical damage across their vehicles. Depending on the kind of weapon, the will do certain forms of critical damage, which should now be more varied and distinct. You might imagine that an HE shell will have a different effect on armor plating compared to an AP shell. Not only that, but airplanes will now also be affected by critical damage; your barrage of AA fire mightcan kill the pilot or set the fuel tank on fire, for instance. Players can now also remedy certain critical damage situations: if your crew gets killed, a support unit can be sent to replace the dead crew members.

F. Special ammunition
Special ammunition is something that we wanted to include in the game for some time now. Historically, both the Germans and Russians developed special ammunition shells. Using exotic materials, they were rare and expensive and only deployed in limited numbers such as the tungsten Panzergranate 40 (Germans) or the BR-365P APCR shell (Russians). We wanted to find a way for older tank models, such as a Panzer III, to pack a punch and have the ability to deal with stronger opponents. At the same time, we wanted to have something that was powerful, more precise, but limited in availability, forcing the player to be careful in when they choose to use their special shells.

This is just the beginning of a long list of changes and tweaks, new mechanics and systems, we feel does justice to the new setting and experience we set out to recreate in Steel Division 2. We can’t say much more for now, but be sure to check out the upcoming dev diaries as we will lift the veil on a couple of very exciting new features that haven’t been announced yet. If you haven’t done so, wishlist Steel Division 2 on Steam and subscribe to the official newsletter to receive an update when our next dev diary goes live.

Steel Division 2 is now available for Pre-Order on this page! Pre-Order the game now to secure your access to the Beta and unlock exclusive bonuses at the game's release!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pN7LFy4o6HU
Check out this page to discover the different editions of the game and pickup the best for you, from the Standard Edition to the Total Conflict Edition packed with awesome stuff such as the Digital Art Book and tons of additional content for the game.

Last but not least, we're happy to announce that we will release 10 Free DLC for the game for everyone! Yeah, just like that.

Steel Division 2 couldn’t have been developed with the incredible amount of feedbacks we had from our community, and it was important for us, as an indie developer, to reward you with something special.

We know how much you like to expand your gaming experience with awesome new content, and we will be glad to provide you, for free of course, with very cool DLC for the game.

Releasing during the year after Steel Division 2’s release, 10 free DLC will be available for everyone who purchase the game, no matter which edition you pick or if you choose to preorder or not.

We sincerely hope you guys will enjoy the content we’re preparing for you and again, thank you for your support.

The Eugen Team

Army General, Steel Division 2's Dynamic Strategic Campaigns, is a single player turn-based strategy game mode in which you can, if you wish, fight every single battle in real-time. More than just a new game mode, our philosophy is to develop it as a new game within the game. As the General of your army, you are in charge of dozens of historically-accurate battalions, hundreds of companies, thousands of men, in up to 150km-wide maps. During each turn (representing half a day), you will have to manage their movements, their combat, and make sure the supply line is intact.

In this first article, we'll give you the first details on how it is played.


The Battle of the Berezina River, one of the available campaigns.

Important note before reading: All of the images & videos in this article are from an early development version. They contain work-in-progress elements, as well as some typos and baguette language. Will be fixed for the final version, obviously, and you will be able to watch the evolution of the game throughout the dev diaries.

“Bagration” was one of the most massive WW2 operations that ultimately led to the war’s end. In June 1944, just a few weeks after Operation Overlord in Normandy, the Red Army launched a massive offensive in Belorussia, resulting in 17 Wehrmacht divisions being completely destroyed, a blow from which the German Army never recovered.



When starting Steel Division 2's development, we identified what was missing in the previous game by spending an incredible amount of time reading & analysing our community's suggestions. It greatly helped us to obtain a pretty clear idea on where we wanted to go with this new game's campaign, which can be roughly summarised in three points:

A. Massive, time-consuming Single Player Campaign: Even if Steel Division 2 will have way more skirmish content than its predecessor on day one (10 more maps, 200 more units, new game modes, etc.), we wanted to make sure that a solo player could enjoy a long, highly replayable and interesting campaign in addition to the skirmish experience.

B. Reinforced & contextualised Historical Accuracy: While Steel Division: Normandy 44 offered an authentic real-time tactical combat experience, it could feel that some gameplay elements, like phases for example, were here only for gameplay purposes. Moreover, despite explanatory intro videos, fighting a battle in solo kinda felt like missing an element: "Why am I fighting?"; "How does this fit into Operation Overlord?". The Dynamic Strategic Campaigns are a good way to provide more context, to understand why you fight a specific battle, and how it affects the story you're playing. Moreover, as you'll see in this article, gameplay elements -such as phases- are now fully understandable and logical.

C. Innovative Strategic & Tactical experience: We didn't want to simply reproduce a dynamic campaign as we did, for example, in Wargame: AirLand Battle, but to push the experience further, and explore new exciting ways of playing. For example, it was important for us that you are able to play not only one battalion against another, but to have the possibility of building your own assault force with multiple battalions. We also wanted to get rid of the cells on the map and allow complete freedom of movement. Of course, being able to fight every battle in real-time was never off the table!

We have selected massive 1:1-scale operations from Bagration; key-moments that offered the most interesting strategic and tactical situations, and the most exciting divisions. In these campaigns, playable from either the Red Army or the German sides, you will start with the actual divisions & battalions that fought during Operation Bagration, and aim to lead your men to victory.

If the Real-Time Tactics put you in the boots of a Commander, leading your men in ~3km-sided battlefields, the Dynamic Strategic Campaigns make you a General, supervising your army on an operational level. In order to provide an authentic feel, each map is designed from original Ordnance Survey maps, and battalions are represented as pieces on the map. As a General, you have access to detailed information on every battalion, such as its combat values (Assault, Armored, and Support) and, more importantly, the companies and the units within them. You can also display the units' stat sheet at any time with just one click.


Details on the battalion's composition & combat power.

Each battalion has a number of Action Points that will allow it to move, assault a position, or execute an order. These points will recharge at night, every two turns, if the line of supply is intact. A battalion's movement capacity will depend on its type, and will be affected by the nature of the terrain. You will want to use the roads as much as possible, as they provide solid ground. We're providing all the decisional tools you might need to make the proper order.


The dotted area indicates the battalion's movement range.

Selecting an enemy battalion will display the battalions you will be able to send to battle, and an indication of the phase where it will be available. The combat phase will depend on its movement capacities (influenced by the distance and the nature of the ground); some of them will be able to arrive in phase A, B or C, representing different moments of the battle. Before starting the combat, you will be able to select up to six battalions for a battle.



If you are a pure Strategy player, and you prefer Strategy to Tactics, you will be able to auto-resolve the combat instead of fighting it. After a short animation showing the different battalions in action, you will have access, phase by phase, to a detailed summary of the battle, including the losses and out-of-combat units. Of course, the nature of the terrain will affect the outcome of the auto-resolved battle. For example: wooded areas will reduce tanks' efficiency.

Another option is to fight the battle yourself in Real-Time. Depending on the situation and the terrain, the tactical map and the game mode will be different, reflecting a realistic combat situation. Launching an assault on a defended position near a wooded area will result in an Attack/Defense situation on a Forest map. Three different game modes and 25 maps will be available, allowing a wide array of situations.



We'll tell you everything you want to know about Steel Division 2's Strategic Game's Combat in a future article. There's so much to talk about, it wouldn't all fit here. Spoiler alert: it's different from the pure Skirmish mode.

Last but not least, as a General, you will also have access to important information, such as the current strategic situation on the general front, and the Order of Battle:


The Order of Battle can be displayed at any time.

As a final note to this very first dev diary, a quick reminder on the game's content. If the campaigns are designed to provide hundreds of hours of gameplay and a unique experience by itself, Steel Division 2 will also offer, on day one, 25 maps, 600 units, an improved skirmish experience, and multiple game modes, all playable in Single Player, Co-op and Multiplayer. The game will be packed with a brand new Deck Building System (oh, this one will have its own dev diary!) allowing more tactical freedom, as well as a brand-new Armory. And we're not talking about unannounced stuff (wink-wink). If you haven't yet, don't hesitate to add the game to your Steam Wishlist:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/919640/Steel_Division_2/

We have lots of things to reveal in the coming months, so stay tuned!

Last month, our team traveled to gamescom to show Steel Division 2 to a bunch of lucky journalists, and the first previews start to be published. If you feel like reading their first impressions and learn more about our upcoming game, here's a list of some fine reads:

English:

• PC Gamer - "everything the last game was missing"
  
• Destructoid - "Steel Division II is the next step in strategy game evolution"
  
• Windows Central - "Don't miss this authentic WW2 experience"
  
• PC World - "I’ll certainly be back to admire Steel Division II in all its wargame glory"
  
• WCCFTECH - "It can’t come soon enough."
  
• Gamereactor - PapaYankee Interview (Warning: Strong Chocolatine Accent)
  
• Gamesoulz - "deeper improvement in almost every way."
  
• Press Play News

Deutsch:

• Spieltester - "Anyone who has an eye for detail, is interested in history and strategy games or just wants to prepare for history lessons can look forward to 2019."
  
• TotallyGamerGirl - "The historical accuracy gives the title its own charm."
  
• Buffed
  
• Rebelgamer

Français:

• Canard PC - "feels like an waking dream"
  
• Gameblog - "it's hard to imagine a better treatment of the World War 2 from a tactical and strategic perspective"
  
• Actugaming
  
• Nota Bene (Video)
  
• ToysAndGeek
  
• Moovely

Dutch:

• Pixelvault - "it is already clear that this will again become a game for real connoisseurs of World War II history"

Hungarian:

• Playdome

Serbian:

• Svet Kompjutera (Print)

Czech:

• Skillzone - "Steel Division 2 looks like a gift from heaven for all virtual generals"

Italian:

• Game Experience

Make sure to add the game to your wishlist:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/919640/Steel_Division_2/

We'll update this list everyday :)