Fortress Europe

Fortress Europe is a historical realism modification for Company of Heroes 2 that is currently in development.


Battlegroups, Combat teams, Kampfgruppen; all these terms describe a collection of units assembled for a specific mission or purpose.

In Fortress Europe, you will pick a Battlegroup at the beginning of every game. Each Battlegroup comes with a tailored selection of unit choices and abilities, similar to a Commander, but is modeled on an actual historical unit type and the support elements it would be able to call upon in battle.


All units are organized according to their historically accurate formations. Countless hours of research have gone into examining US Tables of Organization and Equipment, British War Establishment documents, German Kriegsstärkenachweisungen papers, and what little information is available on Soviet organizations. These wartime documents detailed the size, ranks, and equipment allocated to all military units, allowing us to make formations in Fortress Europe be as historically accurate as possible.

This means every squad, team, and section have the correct amount of men and exact weapons they would have been issued. Platoons you deploy will be constrained to the equipment they had and the amount of squads or vehicles they actually possessed.


Ever found it weird that the armour profile of a tank in Company of Heroes was just a single value for front and another for the rear? The loading tips may talk about side armour, but there is no such thing in the game.

So we changed it. Fortress Europe has the entire armour profile for every vehicle, containing each plate along with their thicknesses and slope angles. When ever a shot strikes a vehicle we determine which plate was hit for that side and at which angle. Using a formula derived from the book WWII Ballistics - Armor and Gunnery, we get the result of the impact.

Also, there are no hit points. Damage is done to the internal components and the crew inside. Kill enough crew members - or knock out enough systems - and the remaining crew will bail out and retreat. Igniting the ammo will take out the entire vehicle. Hits also have a chance to cause fires, which will either force the crew to bail out or waste their time extinguishing it.


Company of Heroes has always rewarded smart micromanagement, but babysitting your units can be frustrating. To ease the burden, infantry will automatically use anti-tank grenades and launchers on enemy tanks that get too close. Vehicles and towed guns will automatically switch to the correct ammunition for the target they're firing at. Infantry in the open will fall back out of range if suppressed, rather than lying prone and waiting to die.

• Our ballistics system is 75% complete. Armour penetration is working as planned, critical hits are the next task to complete.
  
• Units are 90% complete, most just need additional abilities and upgrades to flesh them out.
  
• Battlegroups are 50% complete, we are working on a system that can handle all the units in submenus.

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Wow this is so epic... Can't wait to try it out!

This sounds goooohoooood! Make sure it gets in the latest news section so we don't miss it.

Thanks, guys!

Make sure to check out our ModDB page, there are some screenshots showing off our armour and penetration system. Are there any match-ups you would like to see?

Great Idea! I am looking forward to it!

I'm hyped with this mod

good

I dig everything about this mod, in particular the ballistic simulation. Let me know if you need any help in the graphic design side of things.

Sounds amazing. im not really interested in all those exact unit stats but I admire the work that goes into it. I wonder how will you balance/compensate these real life values into the game. Or is this true assymetric warfare

And penetration based on accuracy hits. wow, didnt think that would be feasible in coh2. Could you shine a light on how you managed to do that?
Some sort of special model

So probably we will need new maps to this mod also, because CoH2 is an arcade game (weapon ranges etc. are so short).

Wait does this mean things like the king tiger will be practically impenetrable from the front?

Sounds amazing. im not really interested in all those exact unit stats but I admire the work that goes into it. I wonder how will you balance/compensate these real life values into the game. Or is this true assymetric warfare

And penetration based on accuracy hits. wow, didnt think that would be feasible in coh2. Could you shine a light on how you managed to do that?
Some sort of special model

Thanks! By unit stats, do you mean armour and penetration?

I will let Contrivance speak more about balance when he gets back, but hard limits and resource costs will prevent players from spamming Jagdtigers and such.

No special models, just a lot of scripting!

So probably we will need new maps to this mod also, because CoH2 is an arcade game (weapon ranges etc. are so short).

Actually, we plan on keeping ranges similar to CoH2, due to limitations of the engine. However, we do not plan on abstracting those ranges, so a range of 100 in-game represents 100m.

Wait does this mean things like the king tiger will be practically impenetrable from the front?

Depending on what is shooting at it, yes!

Also, angling your armour will be extremely important, as it could mean the difference between penetration or deflection.

Wait does this mean things like the king tiger will be practically impenetrable from the front?

On current maps it rather means "all tanks can penetrate each other". Irl even the heaviest german tanks could be easily penetrated if enemy was as close as 500m.

Are there any match-ups you would like to see?

What kind of matchups do you mean in particular? ^^

Also: Is there any chance to give this lika a Beta-Test? I would volunteer

On current maps it rather means "all tanks can penetrate each other". Irl even the heaviest german tanks could be easily penetrated if enemy was as close as 500m.

That is not entirely true. An M4A3(75)W has no hope of penetrating a Jagdtiger from the front, for example.

What kind of matchups do you mean in particular? ^^

Also: Is there any chance to give this lika a Beta-Test? I would volunteer

Such as T-34 vs. PzKpfW Tiger. I may actually post a video demonstrating our system later today, so if there are any match-ups that you would like to see in action, let me know.

We are not quite ready for a public release, there are still some things to finish and more to polish. When we are ready, it will be released on Steam Workshop for everyone to test.

That is not entirely true. An M4A3(75)W has no hope of penetrating a Jagdtiger from the front, for example.


Such as T-34 vs. PzKpfW Tiger. I may actually post a video demonstrating our system later today, so if there are any match-ups that you would like to see in action, let me know.

We are not quite ready for a public release, there are still some things to finish and more to polish. When we are ready, it will be released on Steam Workshop for everyone to test.

Yeah you're right, but in case of T-34 vs Tiger I, there will be no difference couse from what I remember frontal armour of tiger can be penetrated by T-34 from 600m. I don't believe we have a map large enough to make it count.

Such as T-34 vs. PzKpfW Tiger. I may actually post a video demonstrating our system later today, so if there are any match-ups that you would like to see in action, let me know.

Panzer IV vs. T-34/76 would be a good example

We are not quite ready for a public release, there are still some things to finish and more to polish. When we are ready, it will be released on Steam Workshop for everyone to test.

Okay Really looking forward to it

Yeah you're right, but in case of T-34 vs Tiger I, there will be no difference couse from what I remember frontal armour of tiger can be penetrated by T-34 from 600m. I don't believe we have a map large enough to make it count.

T-34 with 76.2mm gun cannot penetrate the front of a Tiger I at 100m with ease, unless it is using special ammunition.

T-34-85 with either 85mm gun can penetrate the front of a Tiger I at 100m without issue.

Panzer IV vs. T-34/76 would be a good example



Okay Really looking forward to it

Working on the video now.

Working on the video now.

Nice