History VideoGame / SteelPanthers

Both games are also freeware, available from [[http://www.shrapnelgames.com/Our_Games/Free_Games.html Shrapnel Games's publishing site]], though commercial versions with additional features are also available. Both games receive yearly updates, which add new features and update the forces available to each country.

* ArtificialStupidity: Until recent updates, players had to put tight fire control on units that have low ammo counts. Otherwise, ATGM crews (usually carrying only 4-6 missiles) will waste their ammo on jeeps during opportunity fire and have nothing left for tanks and other heavy armor.

* HomeGuard: The TropeNamer shows up in the [=WW2=] installments, though plenty of other examples are present, from the US National Guard (both Army and Airforce) to the Nazi German Volkstrum, to various militias. Several nations also have the option to deploy police forces, which are a mixed bag: Some of them have good morale but are less experienced than regular soldiers, like the Nazi German Ordnungspolizei or the Polish Policja, some have poor morale and less experience, like the Afghan National Police in the modern games, some are completely average, like the UN police in the modern game, and some actually have better morale and more experience than the regular infantry, like the Spanish Guardia Civil or the Italian Carabinieri

* MisguidedMissile: Less due to clever maneuvering on your foe's part, and more to your aircraft acquiring the wrong target in the first place.

* NoKillLikeOverkill: In any way you can imagine, there is justs something theraputic about using a AH64 to scout for enemy positions then bring down MLRS, 155mm howitzers, 120mm mortars, and paladin self propelled artillary down on one poor guy with an anti-tank rocket, or just levelling entire cities with artillary before rolling in and clearing out the few remaining units with tanks, ATGM, attack helicopters and airstrikes just because you can.

** Additionally, if an enemy armoured fighting vehicle ends up right next to one of your infantry units (or even on the same hex as one), that unit can attempt to assault it with any explosives they have, giving them a chance to take it out even if they don't have proper AT equipment. This is primarily meant to represent things like infantry taking out treads with grenades, or swarming the vehicle and dropping explosives into the crew compartment. Even if they do have proper AT weaponry, most of it has low range outside of the stuff used by ATGM crews, so they'll need to be close to have a chance of taking an enemy tank out.

** The majority of snipers. While there are a few special forces teams that carry them alongside other weapons, the majority of sniper units are made up of a single soldier, and as such will be destroyed with a single successful hit. The exception is the Heavy Sniper Teams some nations can get in the modern installments, who first show up in 1996 and have two members, as well as a number of special forces or scout units that have variants that carry sniper rifles, though they usually aren't as accurate as dedicated sniper units.

* RealityEnsues: Many tanks, and some other armoured vehicles, have pintle-mounted machineguns mounted on them, officially for use against aircraft but more often used against infantry. However, most of them require a crew member to be partially outside of the tank to operate them, meaning that if the tank takes enemy fire and buttons up (closing the hatches), they will no longer use the pintle-mounted machine gun. Which is also why rifles and machine guns that can't actually harm the tank can still supress them (that, and infantry aiming for their vision slits, making it harder for the crew to see).

* NoCampaignForTheWicked: Averted. The random campaign generator lets you play a campaign as any faction, and there are a number of preset campaigns, both shipped with the games and made by fans, that let you play as Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and others.

* WorldWarThree: Pretty common for hypothetical scenarios.

* NoSwastikas: The German flags in World War II use the ''balkenkreuz'' instead. Most games had the historical flag as backup and let you edit it back in instead (or vice versa), though.

** The majority of snipers. While there are a few special forces teams that carry them alongside other weapons, the majority of sniper units are made up of a single soldier, and as such will be destroyed with a single successful hit. The exception is the Heavy Sniper Teams some nations can get in the modern installments, who first show up in 1996 and have two members.

* RareVehicles: Goes as far as to include some vehicles which never actually saw service, such as the Nazi German Maus and Sturmtiger. Even for those that weren't quite as rare, you can again have more of a particularly rare vehicle in your core force than would ever have been available throughout the course of all of World War II thanks to the points-based purchasing system.

* OneHitPointWonder: Helicopters are a unique variant. While they can survive a fair amount of fire, they will retreat off the map if they take ''any'' damage, and cannot be rallied. They can still be controlled on the turn they take the damage, which is useful for unloading any transport helicopters that take damage so they don't take their passengers with them when they retreat.

** Additionally, if an enemy armoured fighting vehicle ends up right next to one of your infantry units (or even on the same hex as one), that unit can attempt to assault it with any explosives they have, giving them a chance to take it out even if they don't have proper AT equipment. This is primarily meant to represent things like infantry taking out treads with grenades, or swarming the vehicle and dropping explosives into the crew compartment.

* LesCollaborateurs: Yep, you can play as or against Vichy France and a few other Nazi puppet regimes.

* MacrossMissileMassacre: The German Nebelwerfer and most Russian rocket artillery, starting with the BM-14 "Katyusha."

* VehicularAssault: There is an option in the settings for "AI Tank Heavy." [[CaptainObvious It explains itself.]]

** In WinSPMBT, some Latin American countries are still using the Sherman tank in the 21st century.

* ''[=WinSPMBT=]'': Covers 1946-2020, with the option to use some currently in-development technologies TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture.

** There's also a WW2 scenario where the Germans are supposed to locate and kill/capture Yugoslav partisan leader Tito (also represented by a HQ unit). Victory points are irrelevant in that scenario, so losing the Tito unit results in an instant loss for the Yugoslav player, while its survival ensures a victory.

* MolotovCocktail: A surprisingly effective weapon - no WW2 era tank is safe from them. Used mostly by partisan and militia-type units.

* SeparateButIdentical: In the post-WW2 settings, most factions essentially use either an American or a Soviet equipment roster, although some factions (NATO nations, China, and Israel among others) do have their own designs. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] in that this is what happened in real history; both sides of the Cold War sold surplus weapons and vehicles to their allies and affiliated resistance groups.

* LaResistance: Some of the playable factions are this. It's not easy to win with them, since you'll probably be badly outgunned.
* LesCollaborateurs: Yep, you can play as or against Vichy France and a few other Nazi puppet regimes.

** GuideDangIt/inversion: the manual that came with the purchase edition of Steel Panthers 2 only gave instructions on the most basic control features. Otherwise, it did not explain what the different stats were or more detailed instructions on many of the controls (ie, artillery, air strikes, loading/unloading troops on vehicles, water operations, etc.).

* HouseRules: Some scenarios (particularly the fan-made ones) have "victory conditions" written into the description for objectives that the game engine itself isn't coded to handle, such as the survival of a particular unit.
** Also, players in head-to-head games will have agreed rules, such as purchasing points, number of air strikes, artillery purchase limits, etc.

* KillItWithFire: Napalm bombs, flamethrowers, {{Molotov cocktail}}s...

** And let's not forget fighters dropping fuel-air explosives or MLRS fuel-air rockets.

* NoSwastikas: The German flags in World War II use the ''balkenkreuz'' instead.
** Subverted: Most games had the historical flag as backup and let you edit it back in instead (or vice versa).

* TimedMission: Turn-based.

* VideoGameCrueltyPotential: Asides from what you do to the enemy, friendly fire is VERY much in play, and you are free to treat your men as you wish, even using them as CannonFodder. There's also nothing preventing you from doing things like calling in an airstrike to drop napalm in an urban area, despite the fact that this would be [[UsefulNotes/TheLawsAndCustomsOfWar generally inadvisable]] in real life.

** VideoGameCrueltyPunishment: Just don't whine when you get wiped out one one of the late levels of a campaign because you needed elite troops that you used as expendable bullet sponges back when they were green.

* ZergRush: A common (though not always viable) strategy for factions with cheaper units.

* ForcesWithFirepower: Pretty much the point of the game(s). Nearly all forces listed on the trope page are present and accounted for.

* WarsawPact: Unlike in many other games, each of the Warsaw Pact countries has its own, distinctive set of units (though a lot equipment is shared between the countries).

* AuthorityEqualsAsskicking: More "experienced" units like Navy SEALs will be far more effective than inexperienced guerrillas.

* UsefulNotes/KoreansInJapan: In many scenarios that see you up against the Japanese in battles that do not involve military-only islands, you are probably going to run into some Korean laborers, [[ShootTheDog all of whom you are going to have to kill as they almost always have been handed a weapon and are shooting in your direction at gunpoint.]]

* NoKoreansInJapan: Averted, particularly in WAW. In many scenarios that see you up against the Japanese in battles that do not involve military-only islands, you are probably going to run into some Korean laborers, [[ShootTheDog all of whom you are going to have to kill as they almost always have been handed a weapon and are shooting in your direction at gunpoint.]]

* CripplingOverspecialization: Not as extreme as most video game cases, but still present. Most specialized units have a task they're designed for (antitank, anti-air, scouting, etc.) and usually don't fare too well when they try to do something else. ATGM[[note]]Antitank Guided Missile[[/note]] teams can kill tanks all day as long as they have the missiles but don't last that long going head-to-head against an infantry squad.

* AmericaWinsTheWar: Averted. While the majority of scenarios and campaigns do feature the "major players" of most conflicts, there are some for the other contributing combatants of World War II (China, Poland, Australia, etc.) as well as some for small African and Asian "brush wars" (Chinese invasion of Vietnam, Rhodesian Civil War, etc.).

* {{NATO}}: In the post-WW2 games, obviously.