The experience/morale/skill values in 8.4 for the minor nations are set way too low.
It's been said often (and rebutted often) but I'll say it again for the benefit of those new to the subject (yes, you; by the way, how was your trip to outer mongolia?)
It's certainly too low for PBEM. This too is not new, but I've just started a game in 8.4 as Italians with the settings as intended (XP 35, Morale 30). Four moves in and already things are not looking good. My opponent is parading his tanks and armoured cars in front of my masses of AT guns and HMG's. There's certainly a lot of ammunition expenditure from my force, but they're hitting nothing. My guys are also being spotted easily. Creeping snipers are being spotted ten hexes away by armoured cars that have moved quite some distance. A fifth of my force is already suppressed or retreating.
Still, it's early days yet, and I'll perservere in my experiment to see if the 8.4 settings can be used.
Now, the counter-argument for 8.4's (and maybe 8.5's according the scant info available) values being so low for the minor nations is that it's set for those who prefer solo play against the AI, a body of players who account for the vast majority. Apparently.
But I wonder, really. Does anybody really use those levels?
Certainly not the scenario designers. I've just looked (for the first time I'll admit) at the Italian series of scenarios. All the troops used in the first scenario (Italian vs French) are pegged at 70 average. Yet the hard coded country settings for these countries are 35 and 45 respectively. In the second scenario the settings are higher still.
I've heard some stuff about the 8.4 version settings being more reflective of 'historical reality'. Yet scenario designers are, in recreating most scenarios, very interested in historical reality. They don't, however, appear to be interested in settings that go below 60, much.
Here's a lovely quote from Bill Wilder taken from the notes on the Italian series.
This is also true for gaming industry, in most of the cases, since very few are the games covering Italian Army, and those published often suffer by an excessive underrating of Italian performances. While such a behavior could have some fundaments at a strategic level where Italy, no doubt, suffered by a generalized umpreparedness for the war as well as poor leadership, all this is less acceptable when the games scale down to tactical level.**
The Italian soldier and his field commanders per se, in fact, fought as well as their allies and their enemies. Isolated episodes of unwillingness to fight or cowardice were not above the rates of the other participants to the war. On the contrary, there are several examples where the Italians fought against all odds and well beyond their call of duty.**
Frankly, I think too much is made of the differences that should be present between nations. At a battlefield level (which is what this game represents) soldiers of different nations aren't all that different, and certainly not to the level represented in 8.4
Well we'll have to see what 8.5 brings. I shall be using it. But if the nation settings are as strange as 8.4's, then I shall be turning the Country Settings OFF.
Now I'll go and see if I can stop my guys from hotfooting it back to Mama. [:D]
