Beethoven (Soviet) vs HLYA (Axis): '41 Campaign

[Beethoven1]

This is an AAR for a 1941 campaign between me and HLYA.


I will post a small amount of content in real time here on the forum (probably mostly showing Axis turn 1), but other than that I will generally be posting the Soviet perspective here on the forum with a delay of some TBD # of turns. This is so that I can post un-censored screenshots showing my units, their strengths, etc. If I posted un-censored screenshots like that in real time, I have little doubt that HLYA could pick apart my defense like Michaelangelo chiseling away at his masterpiece, David.

So, I will also be posting real time screenshots on discord in a separate AAR, here: https://discord.gg/FDeFYnNZDG

HLYA won't be able to see that, but verified/known players can receive a discord role to be able to see it. Alternatively, if you wait, more or less the same basic content will show up here on this forum AAR.

HLYA will also be doing his own AAR on discord, here:

AAR channel: https://discord.gg/QTfZFAmnqS
AAR Comments channel: https://discord.gg/rjZJwyx4pz

I will be reading HLYA's AAR, at least initially. However, if/when we get to the point where Soviets are on the offensive (winter, presumably), then I will likely stop reading it, at least temporarily, since it is primarily the player on the offensive who can gain a benefit from reading an opponent's AAR. We'll figure it out.

To see HLYA's AAR, you will need to be a verified/known player to avoid alts similarly to my discord AAR. However, I may end up posting some screenshots etc from HLYA's discord AAR on the forum, with his permission until HLYA decides to start posting his AAR on the Matrix Forums.



We are playing "no early end," but I will keep track of the VPs/checks for "sudden death" so that we know if any sudden death victories would be triggered, and will report on that in the AAR. For my part, I will do my best to avoid any situation which would trigger an Axis "sudden death" victory, the difference is just that if it is triggered, the game won't be automatically ended without us also deciding it should end at that point.


Settings:

AI Air Assist off
Theater boxes unlocked


House Rules:

1) No temp motorization
2) No paradrops
3) No naval invasions

Additional House Rules added on turn 5:

4) No airfield bombing.
5) No conducting deliberately failed attacks just as a means to getting planes to join a battle.
6) Until turn 10, if you want to do ground attack, the settings must be approved by the other player.
7) Until turn 10, we are going to continue allowing ourselves to freely change air doctrine settings and also to set non-default settings for air missions. This will allow a bit more time to test things out with the air war and see what counter-measures we can come up with in response to what the other player does. However, on turn 10 we are planning to switch to some stricter rules regarding air doctrine and mission settings, which will more or less mean we both have to stick to default settings (specifics pending).

Soviet self-imposed rules:

1) I won't take advantage of exploits that are not WAD but which Joel has confirmed can't be feasibly fixed at the moment like e.g. spamming small air missions, exceeding guards limits or other build limits by exploiting airborne/whatever, merging non-isolated but doomed units to rescue the equipment, or anything like that which might come up.

2) Regarding any new/unanticipated things that come up from new patches or unanticipated events in the game, I won't do anything to gain any advantage from anything that is unbalanced/bugged/broken. This also goes for anything that HLYA considers unbalanced/bugged/broken, even if I myself am not fully persuaded that it is game-breaking. If something comes up that is unbalanced/bugged/broken, Soviets are in my opinion strong enough to give up any possible advantage gained by the unbalanced/bugged/broken thing so that the game can go on. For example, if something comes up that is bugged or wrong regarding the air war, I can just not use the VVS until it is fixed, and am perfectly happy to allow the Luftwaffe free reign (I don't think I really need the VVS, anyway). Similarly, if something comes up that is bugged or wrong regarding Panzers being weakened too much by a new patch, I can sacrifice some Soviet units to compensate for it (I don't think I really need every last Soviet unit, anyway). ... etc, etc, etc...

[EwaldvonKleist]

Will follow, pls add me to the relevant discord channels

[Beethoven1]

I'm expecting this will be a challenging and fun game. Anyone who has read HLYA's previous AARs knows full well that he is an extremely skilled Axis player.

Hopefully the game will also be informative for the devs and for the community regarding overall game balance between two players who know what they are doing on each side, and who are willing to use the tools the game gives them, as is designed and intended, to try to win the game and the larger war.

One reason why it is likely to be interesting is that there is a strong chance HLYA will do something that is, in one way or another, innovative and unexpected. The element of surprise is key to the art of war, and if anything can shake up a perceived meta, it is a player like HLYA doing something that could challenge the assumptions of the perceived meta. I myself will be mindful of this, and respond accordingly - which may or may not be in the way that HLYA, you, or even I myself am currently expecting.

However, despite HLYA's manifest skill, my preconception of game balance (and hopefully not merely my hubris) makes me think that I have a significant overall advantage, at least insofar as 1941 is concerned. Moreover, I don't think that this perceived advantage is unique to me or a reflection of particular skill on my own part - I think that quite a few other Soviet players who more or less "know the meta" and are experienced enough to avoid large basic easily avoidable mistakes could do similarly. These include, but are not limited to jubjub, Bread, fracas, Kulik, Stamb, Albert N, etc etc (since I will inevitably forget/leave out some people, I apologize in advance to them, but I am pretty sure others could do the same also).



So, before we start the game, I will summarize my own current assessment of game balance (between players who know what they are doing and don't deliberately pull their punches) here, and then later we can see whether the game tends to confirm or dis-confirm my assessment. For those so inclined, in game theory terms, what we are talking about here is the "nash equilibrium" of WITE2 - more or less what the outcome looks like if players make the best moves available to them. Or, alternatively stated, what is the "meta" of WITE2?

Here goes:

1) I do not know with any reasonable certainty whether the game is balanced, too pro-Soviet, or too pro-Axis over the course of an entire grand campaign game.

2) Personally, I think that Axis likely benefits to some degree in the late war from some of the same factors that Soviets benefit from some of the same factors that Soviets benefit from in 1941 (particularly with regards to supply). For this reason, although Axis would obviously still eventually lose the war, Axis might nevertheless be able to hold out better than historical in the mid-late war. I cannot say this with any significant confidence, however.

3) However, in 1941, I think it is fairly clear by this point that overall balance is too pro-Soviet.

4) That does not mean, however, that in 1941 all aspects of balance are too pro-Soviet. Indeed, in my opinion some aspects of it are too pro-Axis, but are, on net outweighed by larger and more significant pro-Soviet aspects. Soviets can lose in 1941, but this mainly happens if the Soviet player makes some elementary mistakes such as prioritizing having a continuous front line spreading from north to south from the very start of the game in 1941, not using supply priority 4, keeping units in reserve rather than deploying them, or not using assault fronts and counterattacking.

5) In particular, a skilled Axis player can do a much better opening in the south than was possible historically. A "good" south opening probably though not necessarily includes sending at least some of Panzergruppe 3 south, can be defined for our purposes as one which does at least one (but preferably at least 2) of:
a) A Rovno pocket
b) A Lvov pocket reaching to the Romanian border
and/or c) Gets at least as far east as taking Proskurov.

6) In the face of a "good" south opening along these lines, it is unviable for Soviets to defend forward in the south, without getting wrecked decisively enough over the next 2-3 turns or so as to be sufficient to put the game at serious risk. This has been observed in countless AARs since release, and also in AARs in pre-release beta testing, according to what others have previously said about that. "Defending forward" means defending places in front of the Dnieper where, historically, the Soviets did put up strong resistance such as Brody/Dubno, Vinnitsa, Rovno, Zhitomir, Uman, Bessarabia, etc. In short, against a good Germany, it is simply not possible for a Soviet player to replicate the historical performance of the Southwestern and Southern fronts (or at least could not be done without sacrificing Moscow and/or Leningrad in a way which certainly did not historically occur). In terms of VPs, a good Germany will always be able to take Kiev and Odessa faster than historical, at least if they have any desire to do so, and barring exploits.

7) In the face of this "good" south opening, the Soviet "best response," in game theory terms is to in one form or another "abandon the south." "Abandoning the south" here does not necessarily mean that the Soviet player doesn't ever defend anything in the south, but it does mean they do not put up any sort of serious defense of this area in front of the Dnieper. Anything else is suicide which achieves little to nothing, apart from putting other more defensible parts of the front at risk by depriving them of much needed reinforcements. Clearly, the Soviet player must at some point defend something in the south or else Axis could simply walk unopposed to Stalingrad and Baku, but this does not need to be near the starting positions of the southwestern and southern fronts.

8) Nevertheless, despite this initial Axis advantage in the south, the other Soviet advantages are so significant that they, on net, more than offset this initial disadvantage in the south. The early Axis advantage - as real as it is - does not even necessarily stretch all that far to the east. Axis fairly rarely takes Rostov, for example, despite it being historically taken (albeit for a very brief time). After you get to Dnepropetrovsk or so, how far Axis will ultimately get in 1941 starts to depend more on the relative decisions/emphases and skill of the Axis and Soviet players. It also depends on how far Axis even wants to go, because they may not want to go further even if they can, to avoid making winter worse.

9) In my view, (and also in the view of seemingly a large and growing number of other players) the two prime contributors to these balance issues are the way that CPP and combat delay work, particularly with respect to very weak Soviet units (primarily NKVD, airborne, cavalry, and AT brigades), and Soviet supply being very good, particularly when set to supply priority 4 (which seems to have little to no short term cost, and possibly also little to no long term cost as well, though that is more debateable). Soviets do also have other significant advantages, such as the high morale units in the south, powerful assault fronts giving high CPP gain, and a surfeit of AP allowing generals to be changed very quickly. But in general, the issues of CPP and supply seem to be regarded as the most important of these advantages.

10) If these issues of CPP/combat delay of weak units and Soviet supply/supply priority 4 are addressed, then in my view that may well be sufficient to more or less balance the game in 1941, on net. By "balance," I don't necessarily mean that Axis can win the war, but I just mean that on average the result might be something similar to historical, with Axis sometimes doing better and sometimes worse than they historically did in 1941. I don't know that this would be the case - it is plausible to me that it might still be too pro-Soviet in 1941, but it is also plausible to me that might be too pro-Axis in 1941. Or maybe it would be about right.

11) If this did set overall balance about right, then the remaining issue of regional balance would remain, and would likely come to the forefront as the prime remaining balance concern - at least for 1941. If it did set balance about right overall, however, then more games would be likely to last until 1942 and beyond, making it easier to figure out what balance looks like later in the game.



With that out the way, let the game(s) begin! HLYA has the first turn. Though it will not be immediately finished, I will post screenshots when I get Soviet turn 1. This will be one case where I should be able to post real time screenshots, since the initial Soviet deployment is already known.

[jasonbroomer]

Looking forward to this. Why the house rule against temporary motorisations?

[Beethoven1]

Looking forward to this. Why the house rule against temporary motorisations?

Good question. One might ask, "If you think the game is unbalanced in '41 in favor of Soviets, why not allow temporary motorization to give Axis a boost, and make it thereby more balanced?"

In theory, I do sort of like the option of temporary motorization being a possibility in theory.

But... I would say the reason is because, in my opinion, it is pretty OP - at least if it is allowed to be used offensively, moving into enemy territory/attacking. In particular, I think it is potentially extremely strong/decisive because the isolation mechanics in WITE2 are binary, and there is a major difference between 'isolated' and 'not isolated.' Temporary motorization makes it possible to create (or break) pockets or breakthroughs in a situation where it would otherwise be impossible. Any infantry division, with no warning, at any location that happens to be convenient, can suddenly have up to 50 MP (in practice it may be a bit less, but that is still extremely powerful).

On the one hand, that is somewhat of a good thing - I would like to see it being easier for Axis to make pockets. But I would ideally like the key to that being the actual Panzer and Motorized units themselves.

If isolation were not a strictly binary state, I think that temporary motorization would be a lot less OP and potentially more acceptable. But with it binary, you could pretty easily have the difference between 30 divisions being isolated, or not, be temp motorization.


It can also be extremely strong for Soviets later... I don't think many Axis players want to find out just how devastating a temporarily motorized Guards Rifle Corps with 3 attached Rifle Brigades can be... Or, how about temporarily motorizing 20 of them in a single turn? (Soviets will have the AP (and, depending on how they build the Red Army, the trucks) for that later on in the game...)...

[M60A3TTS]

HLYA will also be doing his own AAR on discord, here:

AAR channel: https://discord.gg/QTfZFAmnqS
AAR Comments channel: https://discord.gg/rjZJwyx4pz

Doesn't seem to load.

[ElizabethWizard]

Like idk this is where y'all just lose me. The Soviet union is "OP" in 1941 but y'all house rule away an Axis super power?

Maybe it is too game altering, idk. But like, it makes no sense to talk about the game's balance when you just... Decline to use the game's mechanics?

Don't get me wrong, play how you're gonna play... But also if you think Soviet logistics are too strong, have you considered turning them down to 90? Even if just for 1941?

[HardLuckYetAgain]

Like idk this is where y'all just lose me. The Soviet union is "OP" in 1941 but y'all house rule away an Axis super power?

Maybe it is too game altering, idk. But like, it makes no sense to talk about the game's balance when you just... Decline to use the game's mechanics?

Don't get me wrong, play how you're gonna play... But also if you think Soviet logistics are too strong, have you considered turning them down to 90? Even if just for 1941?

What are you not happy about now? So explain in plain English what you would like because you lost my 1st grade mind on Para 1 and Para 2. I can understand Para 3. But before you explain what you are not happy about please answer this one first. Are you a PVP player or a Player vs AI? Thank you in advance for your answers.

[HardLuckYetAgain]

Like idk this is where y'all just lose me. The Soviet union is "OP" in 1941 but y'all house rule away an Axis super power?

Maybe it is too game altering, idk. But like, it makes no sense to talk about the game's balance when you just... Decline to use the game's mechanics?

Don't get me wrong, play how you're gonna play... But also if you think Soviet logistics are too strong, have you considered turning them down to 90? Even if just for 1941?

What are you not happy about now? So explain in plain English what you would like because you lost my 1st grade mind on Para 1 and Para 2. I can understand Para 3. But before you explain what you are not happy about please answer this one first. Are you a PVP player or a Player vs AI? Thank you in advance for your answers.

Short concise answers please the Book Novel posts I really don't read.

[Beethoven1]

HLYA will also be doing his own AAR on discord, here:

AAR channel: https://discord.gg/QTfZFAmnqS
AAR Comments channel: https://discord.gg/rjZJwyx4pz

Doesn't seem to load.

You should be able to see it, you just needed the "BeethovenAAR" role.

[Beethoven1]

Like idk this is where y'all just lose me. The Soviet union is "OP" in 1941 but y'all house rule away an Axis super power?

Maybe it is too game altering, idk. But like, it makes no sense to talk about the game's balance when you just... Decline to use the game's mechanics?

Don't get me wrong, play how you're gonna play... But also if you think Soviet logistics are too strong, have you considered turning them down to 90? Even if just for 1941?

I assume you are talking about temporary motorization as the "Axis super power." There have been some other games (though not many) where it has been allowed with AARs that you can look at, to see the effects.

In those, the game has tended to end quickly if it has been fully utilized. There was a Stalingrad to Berlin game for example where it was used, Soviets motorized a bunch of Guards Rifle Corps/divisions, and were able to form a bunch of extra pockets as a result, basically enabling them to destroy the German army quickly in a seemingly too strong/unrealistic way.

It is not really historical for random infantry divisions to suddenly become motorized and then perform effectively on an offensive basis the same as motorized infantry divisions. It makes it possible to form large pockets in places where there would be no possibility of anything like that otherwise. Basically it means there is no such thing as a "quiet" sector on the map, even if here is not a single mobile unit within 20 hexes or so, simply because every infantry division has to be regarded as having up to 50 MP and being effectively a motorized division. In so doing it makes the central pivot point of the game more so those temporarily motorized divisions than the actual mobile units themselves.

[Beethoven1]

Anyway, I can go ahead and share some screenshots and some basic observations from the start of Soviet Turn 1. Since the starting Soviet unit positions are fixed, this doesn't really give extra information about my defense away that HLYA does not already have.

Soviet Turn 1



The north opening is interesting. It seems fairly conservative in how far he advances to Riga/Daugavpils. However, he does advance quite a bi more to Polotsk and cross the Daugava there north-west of Vitebsk. I assume the reason he did this is he was scared of the damage that I could do with counterattacks on his flanks by my 3 fortified regions near Polotsk.

Accordingly, HLYA prioritized knocking out these forts ASAP. Even so, the forts did a lot of damage... 3 guns destroyed here, with another 6 damaged. Though some may try to give all the credit to our VVS bombers, we know who the real heroes were, the men of the 156th/61st Fortified Region:



The advance on (and past) Polotsk seems to keep HLYA's options open for next turn somewhat, which may be at least partly why he did it. From there, he can potentially break either to the north or to the center, but he has not yet really fully committed to either. On the one hand, this does make it a strong and threatening opener. But on the other hand, to some degree it may hand me the initiative (in a sense), in that by my response I can possibly guide him (or maybe even bait him) to go where I want him to go. Or maybe not. Maybe I try to bait him, but he doesn't take the bait, in which case maybe I am the one being baited? Whatever happens here, I think it will be interesting, because I don't recall seeing anyone else ever focus their turn 1 north/center advance on this area. Possibly in other future games players may start advancing here also due to the various options it can potentially provide.

HLYA here (and in general) did a pretty good job of limiting units routing out of his various pockets, and he put his special artistic touches on things, such as herding the Riga NKVD motorized division into a pocket rather than routing it.



In the center, it looks like a fairly normal Bialystok pocket. Here too, the advance is somewhat conservative relative to what is possible. He could have advanced further e.g. to the Berezina river, but chose not to. There would be some advantages to advancing further, but also some disadvantages (e.g. extra lost trucks and less supply)



If the north/center openings were somewhat conservative, the south opening is definitely more so. HLYA certainly knows how to do things like the Rovno pocket (or at least ZOC lock), how to do a large Lvov pocket to the Romanian border, and/or how to get to Proskurov and Tarnopol. But he chose not to do so.

At risk of hubris, I would even go so far as to say that not doing at least one of those seems to me like an unforced error. He is leaving some Soviet fruit on the tree, ripe but unplucked.

No doubt he has his reasons, and he did similarish openings in the south in games against Zovs and jubjub. It may mean that he can send more of his mobile forces more quickly to the north/center, for example. And it may have saved him a small number of turn 1 AFV losses, and a bit of truck attrition etc etc. It is also true that he did not unlock the southern front, so he can nab some additional Soviet troops from that next turn, but Rovno/Proskurov also would not have unlocked the southern front.

I think foregoing a more aggressive south opening puts some pressure on him. In order for it to be worth it, whatever he gains in terms of freeing up forces possibly for the north/center has to be worth at least as much as what he is giving up (basically, more valuable than Rovno or Lvov pocket). The more aggressive south openers do generally require sending some additional units south, which may have been why he didn't go for it, but afterwards they could be sent back towards the north/center (albeit not as rapidly).

So will it be worth it? The proof will be in the pudding. If HLYA can pull off something big in the north/center, then maybe it will in fact be entirely worth it.

I think one reason that Rovno/Lvov pockets are particularly valuable is that southwestern front troops have (random) high morale. Some, though not all, of these could potentially have been pocketed or otherwise doomed. But now these high morale divisions will be around in future turns, available to lead powerful counterattacks on his Panzer divisions. And on that note, here are my particularly high morale divisions.

I have 17 non-cav divisions with 55+ morale on the map, including 7 with 60+:



Of those, 4 are isolated, but that includes 0 of the particularly high morale ones:



The other thing that a conservative south opening does is to leave me with some actual ability to put up some sort of defense in the south worth its salt. Although there is still the question of how much that would really achieve, and whether it would really be worth it, but it is at least an option with this opening, whereas it would not be if I had to desperately scramble to save a lot of units from certain doom against a more aggressive south opening.



3 leaders have been killed, but no good ones:



678k isolated (down to 662kk after evacuations of planes):



losses:



Add up the isolated + the losses, and we are sitting at about ~939k.

air losses:





The Battle of Brody has officially occurred. Now nobody can say this game is not 120% historical, we have a Battle of Brody. 2 more German guns lost:

[HardLuckYetAgain]

Like idk this is where y'all just lose me. The Soviet union is "OP" in 1941 but y'all house rule away an Axis super power?

Maybe it is too game altering, idk. But like, it makes no sense to talk about the game's balance when you just... Decline to use the game's mechanics?

Don't get me wrong, play how you're gonna play... But also if you think Soviet logistics are too strong, have you considered turning them down to 90? Even if just for 1941?

I assume you are talking about temporary motorization as the "Axis super power." There have been some other games (though not many) where it has been allowed with AARs that you can look at, to see the effects.

In those, the game has tended to end quickly if it has been fully utilized. There was a Stalingrad to Berlin game for example where it was used, Soviets motorized a bunch of Guards Rifle Corps/divisions, and were able to form a bunch of extra pockets as a result, basically enabling them to destroy the German army quickly in a seemingly too strong/unrealistic way.

It is not really historical for random infantry divisions to suddenly become motorized and then perform effectively on an offensive basis the same as motorized infantry divisions. It makes it possible to form large pockets in places where there would be no possibility of anything like that otherwise. Basically it means there is no such thing as a "quiet" sector on the map, even if here is not a single mobile unit within 20 hexes or so, simply because every infantry division has to be regarded as having up to 50 MP and being effectively a motorized division. In so doing it makes the central pivot point of the game more so those temporarily motorized divisions than the actual mobile units themselves.

OH! Is that what was the meaning of Para 1 & 2. Yeah, Motorization is a game breaker on both sides and has been talked about extensively in the past. Here are some posts where it was brought up that Beethoven referenced.

In my AAR here https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 5&start=20 Towards the middle I show it being used post number 15 page 2

I begin a thread for people to converse about on demand motorization. https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 1&t=367597 Seminole shows what motorization does in his own test in a scenario and show results.

I also show what motorization can do for an FBD, which was quickly patched https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... D#p4883813

Motorization should not be used in a PVP game by either side, "period". If you are an AI player by all means go right ahead.

Hope this helps but some of the "mechanics" the Devs put in, motorization in this case, are a bit over the top and "motorization" breaks the game.

[tm1]

Like idk this is where y'all just lose me. The Soviet union is "OP" in 1941 but y'all house rule away an Axis super power?

Maybe it is too game altering, idk. But like, it makes no sense to talk about the game's balance when you just... Decline to use the game's mechanics?

Don't get me wrong, play how you're gonna play... But also if you think Soviet logistics are too strong, have you considered turning them down to 90? Even if just for 1941?

I assume you are talking about temporary motorization as the "Axis super power." There have been some other games (though not many) where it has been allowed with AARs that you can look at, to see the effects.

In those, the game has tended to end quickly if it has been fully utilized. There was a Stalingrad to Berlin game for example where it was used, Soviets motorized a bunch of Guards Rifle Corps/divisions, and were able to form a bunch of extra pockets as a result, basically enabling them to destroy the German army quickly in a seemingly too strong/unrealistic way.

It is not really historical for random infantry divisions to suddenly become motorized and then perform effectively on an offensive basis the same as motorized infantry divisions. It makes it possible to form large pockets in places where there would be no possibility of anything like that otherwise. Basically it means there is no such thing as a "quiet" sector on the map, even if here is not a single mobile unit within 20 hexes or so, simply because every infantry division has to be regarded as having up to 50 MP and being effectively a motorized division. In so doing it makes the central pivot point of the game more so those temporarily motorized divisions than the actual mobile units themselves.

OH! Is that what was the meaning of Para 1 & 2. Yeah, Motorization is a game breaker on both sides and has been talked about extensively in the past. Here are some posts where it was brought up that Beethoven referenced.

In my AAR here https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 5&start=20 Towards the middle I show it being used post number 15 page 2

I begin a thread for people to converse about on demand motorization. https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 1&t=367597 Seminole shows what motorization does in his own test in a scenario and show results.

I also show what motorization can do for an FBD, which was quickly patched https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... D#p4883813

Motorization should not be used in a PVP game by either side, "period". If you are an AI player by all means go right ahead.

Hope this helps but some of the "mechanics" the Devs put in, motorization in this case, are a bit over the top and "motorization" breaks the game.

I have not even thought about motorising well not until recently and that would be against the Russian AI, and even then I don't even think its of much value to me.

However for the PvP players it can have huge advantages,so I can understand why you don't want it in games.

But I am certain you would know that that there was some types of motorisation done during the war.

One E.G.
Kanev 1943, the German retreat to The Dnieper.

Kanev.jpg (182.59 KiB) Viewed 2367 times

General Woelher 8th Armee ordered the 72nd infantry Div Trucked to support General Nerhring's 24th Pz Korps ( 10th Pz Gren, 34th Inf,57th Inf and 112th Inf ).

This was a small instance and a short term one.

[ElizabethWizard]

What are you not happy about now?

Right now? Passive aggressive posts.

Thank you, Beethoven, for answering my question. That makes sense! It's hard to pour through all of the AARs as a relative late-comer to this game.

Is there a reason you didn't turn down Soviet logistics? Like you cited it as something you feel is over strong for the game, and I'm curious why you decided not to modify that setting.

[Jango32]

Lowering Soviet logistics doesn't change anything in practice. You would probably need an extremely low setting for noticeable effects, but those would likely have particularly bad consequences for 1944 and beyond.

[Beethoven1]

Is there a reason you didn't turn down Soviet logistics? Like you cited it as something you feel is over strong for the game, and I'm curious why you decided not to modify that setting.

What Jango already said would pretty much be my short answer, however I will add a few more things.

1) Specifically, AlbertN and Todger said that they tried this and it did not seem to have a noticeable effect.
2) In single player, you can adjust those settings in the middle of a game. But in a HTH game, you are stuck with the initial settings and can never subsequently change them. So if it is the case that it messed up Soviet logistics later in the game, there would be no way to change it and fix the issue at that point.
3) It is not necessarily Soviet logistics in general that I think is overly strong (although in 1941 they may simply be too good). But more broadly and more specifically, I think that supply priority 4 is a problem. And I don't think it is purely a Soviet problem either, although that is where we have seen it most so far simply because most games/AARs have been in 1941. From some mid-late war experience I have had in the game, I think that Germany can benefit from supply priority 4 from ~1943-45 in a similar sort of way that Soviets can in 1941 - although probably to a lesser extent, but it seems to exhibit the same fundamental issues.

[Beethoven1]

However, despite HLYA's manifest skill, my preconception of game balance (and hopefully not merely my hubris) makes me think that I have a significant overall advantage, at least insofar as 1941 is concerned. Moreover, I don't think that this perceived advantage is unique to me or a reflection of particular skill on my own part - I think that quite a few other Soviet players who more or less "know the meta" and are experienced enough to avoid large basic easily avoidable mistakes could do similarly. These include, but are not limited to jubjub, Bread, fracas, Kulik, Stamb, Albert N, etc etc (since I will inevitably forget/leave out some people, I apologize in advance to them, but I am pretty sure others could do the same also).

So, before we start the game, I will summarize my own current assessment of game balance (between players who know what they are doing and don't deliberately pull their punches) here, and then later we can see whether the game tends to confirm or dis-confirm my assessment. For those so inclined, in game theory terms, what we are talking about here is the "nash equilibrium" of WITE2 - more or less what the outcome looks like if players make the best moves available to them. Or, alternatively stated, what is the "meta" of WITE2?

Here goes:

..............................

..............................

I sent back turn 2 to HLYA yesterday. On turn 3, we are upgrading to the .39 beta patch, which includes CPP changes which Joel has mentioned are in the works for testing.

I was generally/vaguely aware that there were some sorts of changes coming, but at the time we started this game I did not know exactly what or when they would be. The changes have come faster than I expected (credit to Joel, Gary, Pavel etc for making things happen). At the time we started, I was thinking we would probably get to closer to turn 10 or so in this game before significant changes were ready.

I expect the CPP changes to benefit Germany substantially, in particular in 1941/42, and, to the degree they benefit the Soviets in Soviet attacks, only to start to have a significant effect either in attacks against Romanians or in 1944/45 or so.

I won't say too much about this so as to not spill any beans regarding details that I am not supposed to, but the basic point is that German units have much higher national morale and better leaders than the Soviets. When you get high CV odds in a battle, normally this happens because the defending unit fails some leader checks and gets totally beaten up/routs, causing its final CV to collapse to a level much below its initial CV. So for this reason, when Germany wins an attack, the odds can often go up to 30:1 or even 99:1, because a Soviet rifle division that had 10 CV may have its final CV drop to 1 due to leader checks/morale. Whereas even when Soviets do successful attacks with a lot of men, the final CV odds do not typically reach so lopsided ratios, because the German final CV does not collapse to the same degree. This is something that happens much more to low morale, badly led Soviet units than to German units. So any change that keys off those final CV odds will naturally come into play a lot more in attacks against low morale/bad leader units (Soviet units) than high morale/good leader units (German units).

So, to some degree this will make my previous balance assessment off. We will have to wait and see, however, exactly how much of a difference it does end up making, and if HLYA can make the Soviets bleed and sustain stronger offensive momentum with the help of the changes. While I definitely expect this to make the game harder, overall I think it will generally make it better, maybe with some fits and starts.

The .39 patch also makes some changes which are supposed to stop more than 300 Soviet bombers from joining a single battle, and various other things, but to me, the most important and impactful change is definitely the CPP change.

[Beethoven1]

Some turn 1 tidbits from my discord AAR, from when I was trying to figure out what to do on Soviet turn 1. This was before I did my actual turn (or at least the land phase). So this does not depict what I actually did, but it shows some of the stuff I considered doing but did not do.



Here is that save -->

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/ ... _units.sav





Some analysis with Feldmarschall von Kleist:



Here's another Smolensk defense that I considered, but did not actually do:



My thoughts on that one:



Here's another version that I did not do, but was thinking about, with some comments from Stamb:



I will probably post what I actually did do sometime after I get turn 3 back.

[HardLuckYetAgain]

However, despite HLYA's manifest skill, my preconception of game balance (and hopefully not merely my hubris) makes me think that I have a significant overall advantage, at least insofar as 1941 is concerned. Moreover, I don't think that this perceived advantage is unique to me or a reflection of particular skill on my own part - I think that quite a few other Soviet players who more or less "know the meta" and are experienced enough to avoid large basic easily avoidable mistakes could do similarly. These include, but are not limited to jubjub, Bread, fracas, Kulik, Stamb, Albert N, etc etc (since I will inevitably forget/leave out some people, I apologize in advance to them, but I am pretty sure others could do the same also).

So, before we start the game, I will summarize my own current assessment of game balance (between players who know what they are doing and don't deliberately pull their punches) here, and then later we can see whether the game tends to confirm or dis-confirm my assessment. For those so inclined, in game theory terms, what we are talking about here is the "nash equilibrium" of WITE2 - more or less what the outcome looks like if players make the best moves available to them. Or, alternatively stated, what is the "meta" of WITE2?

Here goes:

..............................

..............................

I sent back turn 2 to HLYA yesterday. On turn 3, we are upgrading to the .39 beta patch, which includes CPP changes which Joel has mentioned are in the works for testing.

I was generally/vaguely aware that there were some sorts of changes coming, but at the time we started this game I did not know exactly what or when they would be. The changes have come faster than I expected (credit to Joel, Gary, Pavel etc for making things happen). At the time we started, I was thinking we would probably get to closer to turn 10 or so in this game before significant changes were ready.

I expect the CPP changes to benefit Germany substantially, in particular in 1941/42, and, to the degree they benefit the Soviets in Soviet attacks, only to start to have a significant effect either in attacks against Romanians or in 1944/45 or so.

I won't say too much about this so as to not spill any beans regarding details that I am not supposed to, but the basic point is that German units have much higher national morale and better leaders than the Soviets. When you get high CV odds in a battle, normally this happens because the defending unit fails some leader checks and gets totally beaten up/routs, causing its final CV to collapse to a level much below its initial CV. So for this reason, when Germany wins an attack, the odds can often go up to 30:1 or even 99:1, because a Soviet rifle division that had 10 CV may have its final CV drop to 1 due to leader checks/morale. Whereas even when Soviets do successful attacks with a lot of men, the final CV odds do not typically reach so lopsided ratios, because the German final CV does not collapse to the same degree. This is something that happens much more to low morale, badly led Soviet units than to German units. So any change that keys off those final CV odds will naturally come into play a lot more in attacks against low morale/bad leader units (Soviet units) than high morale/good leader units (German units).

So, to some degree this will make my previous balance assessment off. We will have to wait and see, however, exactly how much of a difference it does end up making, and if HLYA can make the Soviets bleed and sustain stronger offensive momentum with the help of the changes. While I definitely expect this to make the game harder, overall I think it will generally make it better, maybe with some fits and starts.

The .39 patch also makes some changes which are supposed to stop more than 300 Soviet bombers from joining a single battle, and various other things, but to me, the most important and impactful change is definitely the CPP change.

The changes offset to a degree the advantage the Soviets is my take at the moment. But we are going to be playing this out in real time so will see at least one answer, even though it could by an outlier.

As you wrote Beethoven on the BETA forums about the Soviet supply and how much they receive compared to the Germans in 41. This in an of itself can goe to "ALL" Soviet units. Where the German attack ability (Soviets too since this is not "solely" a German buff but many will argue the effects of obtaining such advantage is heavily German favored but that is not my point here at the moment) goes to a great deal fewer units than "all" units set to supply level 4 receiving supply. The lopsidedness of this supply is very difficult to overcome for the Germans since that advantage gives the Soviets well supplied units and with 100 CPP can have a TOE over 100%. This can creates very powerful Soviet units. Not to mention the Germans are already attacking into VERY beneficial terrain for the Soviets in the North and Center. A well led Soviet Army after the first 4 turns, with the abundance of AP the Soviets get. And the BIG one is to not stay in contact with the Germans by different methods thus not being able to use this attack advantages by Germans having to traverse empty hexes or attacking brigades, regiments, and CAV division to not get to that army. So there are many mitigating circumstances but the big one still is the supply in my opinion since that can go to "ALL" units. But we shall see for sure.

Well supplied units take less attrition too I would bet ;-P