Can we nerf this at some point next patch?

[Flaviusx]

Interestingly Kanev did the same for Stalin. He never really believed in them after that. This might have indirectly spared Japan from a joint Soviet-American occupation.

[Seminole]

This might have indirectly spared Japan from a joint Soviet-American occupation.

Well, that and a nuclear bomb. [8D]
Didn't the soviets use paras against the Japanese in Manchuria?

[Michael T]

IMO: No Soviet para ops prior to blizzard. Easy and historical. Then impose a range limit.

[AFV]

I find it ridiculous as hell anyone would defend a Soviet para drop 500 miles in.
Its really irrelevant of what the German player did or didn't do with his rail line.

I am marking this- its actually quite funny. Someone does something totally gamey and not only does someone else defend it but also attacks Pelton's game?

Really? OMG LMAO.

[Seminole]

I find it ridiculous as hell anyone would defend a Soviet para drop 500 miles in.

No one has defended a 'para drop 500 miles in'.
But I don't support removing from the game the types of drops that actually happened.

Its really irrelevant of what the German player did or didn't do with his rail line.

Actually, it's not. Had there been any redundancy, the move would have been moot and not occurred. Pelton eschewed redundancy for distance. Why should that have no risk?

Here's a look at my PBEM opponents southern rail net on turn 15. Note how he doesn't lack the rear area interconnects that Pelton needs.
I think all of those are performed by the subunit FBDs. Why doesn't Pelton have them? Is he keeping his HHQs too close to the front (perhaps to garner the command range modifier advantage conferred?)?



I believe the devs should create a degree of randomness based on the distance for para drops, as navigation was nowhere near as precise as the current setup permits. At long distances the troops would be more likely to land in any hex but the one they targeted.

The airborne can't be moved once dropped, so this would neatly solve the issue he encountered, and he can keep up his rail building without nearly as high a risk (just partisans).

[bevans]

Anyone who believes that the Germans can build redundant lines deep in the USSR by turn 15 has clearly never played the Axis side. Sure, every hex in Courland will be fed by 4 or 5 rail lines - at least that is where all my HQs seem to think the highest priority is for sending their attached units. You have your precious FBDs and that is all, so your choices are basically, don't bother to move from the start line or drive as deep and fast as you can in thrusts predicated by the few the rail lines that your FBDs can drive east. Arguably the first choice would have been better historically but it does make for a dull game. Yes, I use my AGN FBD to get within range of Leningrad, then start driving it SE to build the first cross line - but it is still a long ways north on T15.

[Aurelian]

ORIGINAL: Michael T

IMO: No Soviet para ops prior to blizzard. Easy and historical. Then impose a range limit.

And how is a range limit historical.

[Tarhunnas]

ORIGINAL: Michael T

IMO: No Soviet para ops prior to blizzard. Easy and historical. Then impose a range limit.

I agree completely on a range limit, for all drops, not only Soviet ones. Suicicdal paradrops were not made.

However, I do not agree on a blizzard limit. The Soviets did naval landings in early autumn 1941, so why not airdrops? In a realistic game, German air superiority should prevent Soviet dops, not weather or time.

I also think there should be a chance of the drop being unsuccessful, and the unit simply evaporating. That happened for example with the allied airdrops in Sicily, which just dispersed paratroopers all over the island that had negligible effect on the fighting. Or a chance of the unit ending up in an adjacent hex. That should prevent too gamey rail-cutting drops.

[Seminole]

Anyone who believes that the Germans can build redundant lines deep in the USSR by turn 15 has clearly never played the Axis side.

Was Pelton's line cut deep in Russia? The single point of failure existed as far back as 50 miles from the Rumanian border as far as I can tell. Had it been cut deep in Russia the effect wouldn't have been nearly as severe.

I haven't played through the Axis campaign, so maybe someone can enlighten me. Is it typical to support AGS on a single rail line? What did he do with FBD 1 since he didn't build the line through Rovno or Proskurov?

You have your precious FBDs and that is all, so your choices are basically, don't bother to move from the start line or drive as deep and fast as you can in thrusts predicated by the few the rail lines that your FBDs can drive east.

You're right. There must be no middle ground between plunges eastward well beyond the historical achievement without regard for establishing any north-south interconnects for redundancy and no advance whatsoever. [8|]

Sure, every hex in Courland will be fed by 4 or 5 rail lines - at least that is where all my HQs seem to think the highest priority is for sending their attached units.

Does it not work as the manual indicates?

For human players only, there is a limit to the distance that the automated rail repair units will operate from the HQ unit that they are attached, which is based on command range (7.6.4). For example, if a construction battalion is assigned to a Corps HQ unit, it can only repair rail line hexes up to 5 hexes from that HQ, but the same construction battalion attached to a High Command HQ unit (e.g. OKH or STAVKA) could operate up to 90 hexes away.

Wouldn't placing a Corps HQ, with the appropriate construction SUs, at the sites you want interconnected result in the AI performing this function during the logistics phase (and restricting them from going to Courland)? Sounds like you're leaving them in the Army Group, which while useful for repairing partisan damage, isn't necessary early on and results in leaving that element of rail construction up to the AI. [edited to add: from your description is sounds like the AI prioritizes rail repair of the construction SU it controls from West to East, so assign them to lower HQs with that in mind and see what your results are)

I'd like to hear what Pelton did with his construction SUs, and FBD 1. Hopefully he didn't disband them for manpower or something on turn 1.
A picture of his entire rail net at this phase would be interesting.

[whollaborg]

How to counter Pelton in the late summer 1941,

As this is a game I play against Pelton and used the operation in question. Which by the way first time used was labelled by Pelton "a good move" I feel like contributing here. Perhaps this thread should have had started by me with a topic "How to counter Pelton in the late summer 1941". As the tone of the discussion could have been a bit different. And bear in mind this tactics would not work or would be hideously expensive in para units (which SU cannot build by the way) against average Axis player with more careful approach in throwing weight to east as well for the reasons explained here.

I have played game quite a lot (not comparable to Pelton for sure) but I have experienced with the panzer-hq buildup a bit and feel that with excessive use it is unrealistic and unhistorical. Before we started I asked for a house rule to prevent technique of supply chaining which Pelton refused. This is one reason I feel that this game should be played as it is and to be able to use its mechanisms in full to test where the engine goes. Pelton has shown me and all of us how the Panzer puncture in its most massive form could be achieved even in winter and he has turned penetrations into very deep strategic movements very very far to rear. Combined with "maximized" rail building this has become a devastating tactic that has forced most Peltons opponents loose their fortified positions and great cities without a fight. Some times Pelton can even surround a front or three with these strategically devious thrusts where all or most of German mobile forces plunge behind using singular railroad for staging area and to feed multiple hq-buildups. As i started a game with Pelton, I was sure that this would face me as well. Form then I studied a bit of tactics and strategical goals of Pelton (in game he would represent OKH with similiar history in Poland and France) and decided that he's rather rigid thinking could be challenged (everyone must have noticed geometrically beautiful defense lines etc.).

Pelton's AAR with my infringements can be found here: tm.asp?m=3009329

The key in defence would be mobility and offering Pelton paths of advance to go. One such a path Pelton found in flat center and reported in the AAR. Only thing he forgot is the entrance to this "weak center in soviet lines" was fueled only with one railroad starting unconventionally (but efficient for Peltonizing, we all admit) from Rumania. AGS, half of AGC and most of the panzer forces of German army was thus supplied trough the very busy Romanias railroad net. One could ask how historical and realistic this was and should not one fight such a exploitation of the game engine with a larger partisan operation capable to turn such an exploitation into a disaster and to show the community that Germany truly needs to build few lines into east and maybe wait a bit for the supply network to catch up and to avoid the winning disease - the same disease which quite historically led German army too far from her supply?

The first "breaktrough" he refers to here was genuinely not a breaktrough as it was about to be plunged against the main lines of strong defenses in forests behind Smolensk and was not already trough as only the screening forces was touched. The risk of it turning a breaktrough was a possibility later on as Pelton was simultaneously launching atacks against the Valdai hills to threaten Moscow. So the first partisan operation was implemented and the AGC rail was severed near Viluns. The operation was praised by Pelton afterwards as he mentioned that it was first time he saw that. Few of the reasons it was done to was to counter the unhistorically fast pace of building railroad in center, because of Pelton gathering his panzers for buildup as far as I knew and because there was only three lines of rails build at all (AGN, AGC & AGS)- and i suspect that atleast the central line was build by two FDB's (wasn't there a post from Pelton reporting the devs that by doubling you could even build 7 hexes of railroad at once still after the railroad doubling was supposed to be fixed). The first para operation was put to effect and Pelton was approached with a message in which I told this was a practice operation (as in serious use I should delayed it until the panzers were committed and could not cancel and change their axis without being left supply cut behind the lines). I asked too what has Pelton done to he's small railroad units as those should have been already busy with the network building and were not! This would bring partisan trouble in the winter for sure. OKH was warned not to overextend.

I have not used this 'Partisan drop en masse' against anyone else, who stick to the 5 fdb's building rail-lines to east and who have the rest of Railroad troops connecting these lines into networks in the rear. If there was a railroad network in Ukraine the number of partisans in form of paratroop brigades might have exceeded the number of transport aircraft squadrons capable of transporting those! So be careful if you think that this tactics would be as effective against against average railroad networks if those were build by German player. Paradropping far to rear is very exhausting to the transport squadrons and both operations have eaten the squadrons dry and it takes more than month for those to recuperate (last operation left all three squadrons empty of working planes - so you know there wont be another drop very soon). The main point being that the German supply head would not be unhistorically east if the supply network was honed and not having 2/5 Eastern armies and most of panzers their lifeline hanging only from one thread trough Rumania.

So Pelton saw the gap in the center aranged for him. But he forgot what the Stavka partisans could do to hes very vulnerable single lines. As the counterfinal arguments go I have only to answer that there might have not been such a lucrative looking gap in the soviet defences if Stavka thought the partisans could not help to defend the gap arranged for the eyes of Peltonizer. In other world the situation might have been different and the breaktrough more hard to achieve in there and perhaps there was a retreat in the area as well - so no cries claimed by pelton would not have happened. You must see that this the concentrated partisan operation has been in the mind of Stavka for quite a while. So in here our ears face cries only from the Peltonizer.

I feel that this tactics can be seen as counter tactics and to pretty unhistorical things the engine allows Pelton who needs those to go Peltonizing in late summer 1941. These things being railroad rushing and hq-buildups for entire panzerarmies form singular railhead stretching all the way trough Romania. Honored Devs already have been toning these two things down with more or less success thanks to Pelton showing us how these could be exploited. On the other hand there just might have been an antidote already in the game - which just wasn't used, perhaps for the tenderness of heart, or other reasons against an opponent who quite frankly will use all the possibilities he finds from the engine to hes advantage.

Sorry Pelton, perhaps you now must consider of having a railroad network by summer 1942? I think that most of the counterattacks Southern Fronts wont kill many of your troops here and certainly not wipe whole AG's. And by the way I would be honored to have the game fixed because my actions as Pelton is and will be more honored in this respect. Perhaps these few points of the restrictions there already is on the transport capacities of early soviet airforce is and on the need for German player not to fully maximise or exploit the FDB's (and the other rr units) in a single minded fashion without a look to the sides of supply network. Perhaps these points could be considered as well in how to make the game better in representing actual historical possibilities.

And thank you devs who keep up the good work with this wonderful game!

ORIGINAL: Pelton

Before it becomes the flavor of the month?

It for one seems totally nonhistorical and is exploiting the rail conversion system by design.

Most games other then this one that deal with eastern front, the lines are converted so many hexs per turn per line.

This game because of the lacking logistical system has made 5 counters to convert rail lines. This has alrdy been nerfed down to 4 and 6, which means there will only be a few lines to the front areas by turn 12ish.Long lines with no way to defend then other then string out 10 divisions to defend 1 line.

The SHC player can drop 1 unit next to the 1941 start lines and the line will be cut for several turns as the RR unit will have to walk back to the cut.

Several players have pointed out to me this could be done more then 2+ turns in a row and cut off 1 AG for 3 or 4 turns and the RHC player could destory most of not all the units in that area because of a lack of supplies.

Is this historical for 1941? I hole AG wiped out because of a few air dropps?

Lets be honest allot of "exploits" have been removed from game or nerfed to reflex history. Mostly German, which is fine.

This really needs to be taken care of. The guys I talked to about it know they can do it but do not because its just plain stupid that its even possible. As you can simply drop one whenever your in trouble in 1941 and the german player is screwed for 2 turns min.

Pelton

[Flaviusx]

Savanniperkele, it is actually possible to manage Pelton's raids without this sort of thing. (The really scary guys are the grinders, and they're playing it straight.)

You're right that he (and others, Micheal T comes to mind here) are severely gaming the supply system of the game and doing a lot of impossible things. You could say that this para drop is rough justice from that standpoint. I'd rather not go down that route.

Eventually logistics is going to need a second look...as is the silly way the game handles HQ buildups. This is not an easy thing to fix. This para drop thing, however, is easy to fix, and two wrongs don't make a right.

[whollaborg]

Good answer Flaviusx and I do agree with all that the supply system has a flaw.

Perhaps we could conjure a house rule with Pelton to restrict paradrops to 200 miles from the front line or so as well, if he agrees.

[Michael T]

You know Flav no matter what logistics system you come up with there will be players who can squeeze more juice out of it than others.

I thought of this para ploy yonks ago and did several trials with it. But in the end I thought if I do that my opponent would scream 'blue murder' and quit. I wouldn't blame him either. In the end I thought there is no way I would tolerate this being done to me so I left it alone. I am a bit surprised it took this long to surface. Now that its out there I won't play a game without a house rule limiting it.

[AFV]

ORIGINAL: Seminole

I find it ridiculous as hell anyone would defend a Soviet para drop 500 miles in.

No one has defended a 'para drop 500 miles in'.
But I don't support removing from the game the types of drops that actually happened.

Its really irrelevant of what the German player did or didn't do with his rail line.

Actually, it's not. Had there been any redundancy, the move would have been moot and not occurred. Pelton eschewed redundancy for distance. Why should that have no risk?

Here's a look at my PBEM opponents southern rail net on turn 15. Note how he doesn't lack the rear area interconnects that Pelton needs.
I think all of those are performed by the subunit FBDs. Why doesn't Pelton have them? Is he keeping his HHQs too close to the front (perhaps to garner the command range modifier advantage conferred?)?



I believe the devs should create a degree of randomness based on the distance for para drops, as navigation was nowhere near as precise as the current setup permits. At long distances the troops would be more likely to land in any hex but the one they targeted.

The airborne can't be moved once dropped, so this would neatly solve the issue he encountered, and he can keep up his rail building without nearly as high a risk (just partisans).

I will try and type slower for you.
Regardless of what Pelton did, or didnt do- there should be no way that the game allows a para drop 500 miles in. I really don't give a crap about Pelton's game- the only issue here is the para drop. Maybe you will understand this- lets assume that Pelton did everything "right" by your definition. The capability to make this drop still exists. It might not be effective, again thats not the point.

Every word you say is defending a 500+ mile para drop. I do agree with you there should be a degree of randomness on drops but they should also be limited to 10 or so hexes.

So, try and focus on the actual point here. The point is not how Pelton could prevent this, the point is not how well or poorly he is doing in his game. The point, and the ONLY point here to consider is that the game allows the Soviet to make a 500+ mile para drop, and that is unrealistic, undoable in that era (particularly that year for the SU), and should not be allowed. Forget Pelton, forget other games, focus grasshopper, and quit defending such drops. The SU simply did not have the capability to do this at that time, and the game should not allow it.

And this is ignoring the fact that the supply/logistical system is so basic and simplified, that even doing this type of paradrop is just an exploit.

EDIT: To the devs- house rule? Should not be my job! I BOUGHT the game, I did my part, you do your part and work to fix bugs and glitches (not to say you have not been).

[Seminole]

I will try and type slower for you.

Drop the attitude, it's unbecoming, unproductive, and unnecessary.

Regardless of what Pelton did, or didnt do- there should be no way that the game allows a para drop 500 miles in.

Let's have Savanniperkele provide the details of what he did and when, because the limit I see with the Li-2 is 18 hexes. 180 miles isn't that far.
As Savanniperkele himself said, if Pelton wasn't gaming the supply system this would have never come up. Make gamey supply lines and get gamed. Made me laugh. [:D]

I do agree with you there should be a degree of randomness on drops but they should also be limited to 10 or so hexes.

I think better than an arbitrary distance limit would be increased randomness in the drop itself based on distance flown from the airbase.

Questions remain: what happened to Pelton's construction battalions (which can be deployed to create the interconnects without detracting from the march forward)? How is the game letting him still double up on rail building?

[AFV]

The question does not remain about Pelton's construction battalions. All irrelevant, at least for this thread.
For the sake of argument, I will agree he could have minimized this exploit being effective in his game. And will repeat, thats still irrelevant.
 
The game should not allow something to be done that that side did not have the capability to do. And a paradrop takes a lot more than several aircraft and a few hundred men, especially if your going to drop some 500 miles in, and the SU did not have that capability. Savanniperkele can provide details, but its not really needed- from the screenshot it looks like the drop was at least 40 hexes, and occurred in Sept 41. I say not doable, not historic, they never did that nor even attempted, and if tried you should expect to land 5 hexes from target, and likely have the unit destroyed/routed on landing. (Yes, they did paradrops but not that distance with that accuracy- if you find historical basis of something different, provide the details and source).
 
If he is still able to double up, then that is a new topic and should be discussed- because you should not be able to do that. You could not double up in 1.05.45 (if you can, show me how its done, I launched a new game, tried and I simply can't do it). Maybe it was changed in 1.05.61, but I didn't see that in the version change log.

[Seminole]

Savanniperkele can provide details, but its not really needed- from the screenshot it looks like the drop was at least 40 hexes

You know what they say happens when you assume, right?

Maybe the airbase/airborne were stationed in the Odessa region which Pelton bypassed according to this post:
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3009329&mpage=2&key=�

"Here's a screen capture from turn 12 soviet side. Pelton forgot to show off how well the Romanians are doing with Odessa still in the Soviet hands. The city is censored as after a month from this picture Odessa is still safe."



Perhaps he didn't want to reveal the airbase/airborne?
By my count, the "O" in Odessa is within 18 hexes of the spot Savanniperkele dropped his airborne.

I suspect in future campaigns Pelton will devote more attention to his rail net, and his flanks.

[mmarquo]

Face it, all we need is an Axis Auto Win button.

Marquo [:)]

[Peltonx]

ORIGINAL: Marquo

Face it, all we need is an Axis Auto Win button.

Marquo [:)]

Try to keep your self out of the mud.

It doesn't help the game.

[AFV]

Seminole, point taken it could have been shorter than 40 hexes. It definitely was Sept 41. Even if only 18, I don't think that was doable.
And its still an exploit considering how rail supply is represented in the game. (I'm not saying its bad, or I want it changed/fixed. I like it abstracted- I have no interest in playing a game where I have 200 counters for combat units and another 500 for supply/logistic units.)
 
I sure as hell don't want an Axis win button, especially when I am playing the Soviet side.
Marquo, perhaps you can approach the devs with your request. Be sure to include your reasons why, and how you feel it would improve the game.
I will be on the lookout for your thread.