Well What Do You Think.

[KG Erwin]

David, I love the game but unfortunately the same quirks that bothered me before still exist. If you put the AI in OPERATIONAL control of your army and army group commands, and in FULL control of your theater commands (OKH, OKW etc.), the AI does some very strange things in creating new corps and allocating divisions. I suppose all this means is that you are FORCED into micromanaging each element of the Axis or Soviet war effort, IF you want to recreate anything like the real war. Is that the case?

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"Klotzen, nicht Kleckern (roughly translated, 'Boot em, don't spatter em')"--Heinz Guderian

[RickyB]

Originally posted by ChrisF:
David: First let me say thanks for the free "mega patch" to WIR - this game was always one of my favorites and I am sure I will enjoy many more hours with it now.

I have noticed something funny though that I that I thought you'd want to know about. I have played two games as the Germans against the Soviet AI. Both times my Afrika front collapsed before I even reached August '41. Both times I significantly strengthened this HQ with land and air units and bumped up the replacement level to 85%. I know the update documentation said that this routine was tweaked to make it nearly impossible for the Afrika front to collapse in '41 unless the Axis player practically withdrew all his assets (certainly not the case in my game).

Could I be doing something dumb to cause this?

I don't think this is anything you are doing. We had a problem with this exact behaviour during the playtesting of the game. That is when Arnaud Bouis tweaked things to make it more unlikely. He says that if no troops are withdrawn, there is only a small (no more than 2% per clear weather turn) chance that the Italian front will collapse in 1941, even without reinforcements. It could be that later changes messed this up again, but I would guess that this is the same or a similar problem to before.

If anyone else is having this problem, please post it and I am sure Matrix and Arnaud will adjust the routine again.


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Rick Bancroft
Semper Fi

[RickyB]

Originally posted by Mockingbird:
I cannot get any sound, so I'm wondering what sounds should I be hearing?

I've not played this game before but looks mighty interesting.

The only sound in the game used to be "music" during the original intro screens, and it was fairly pitiful. These original intro screens have been replaced and there is no sound at all.

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Rick Bancroft
Semper Fi

[RickyB]

Originally posted by RobBrennan:
Then ( it gets worse ) BLIZZARD !! eek .. i know its supposed to be a 2% attrition rate but when i moved a pz corp 2 squares every tank/gun/flak died ! . This didnt seem to happen with plotted movement.

Rob,

On the 2% attrition, that is losses to infantry squads (except in cities) east of Warsaw I believe at the beginning of each blizzard turn before 1942. For movement, I don't remember exactly what the losses should be in the new version, but they shouldn't be 100%. I think it is supposed to run somewhere around 100% minus your readiness level doubled, or if your readiness is 25%, you should on average lose 50% of the equipment. Are you losing 100% every time?

Regarding the tank type problem you are having, are you playing the standard 1941 campaign game? We haven't had a problem with playtesting this, but there were some late changes to the equipment table. If this is the standard 41 campaign, could you e-mail me a sample file at rickbancroft@uswest.net to look at. I am also going to work on reaching the same point myself to see. Non-1941 games may not play out correctly, though.

Thanks for all the info.

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Rick Bancroft
Semper Fi

[RickyB]

Originally posted by KG Erwin:
David, I love the game but unfortunately the same quirks that bothered me before still exist. If you put the AI in OPERATIONAL control of your army and army group commands, and in FULL control of your theater commands (OKH, OKW etc.), the AI does some very strange things in creating new corps and allocating divisions. I suppose all this means is that you are FORCED into micromanaging each element of the Axis or Soviet war effort, IF you want to recreate anything like the real war. Is that the case?

Hey Glenn,

Unfortunately, I don't think any changes were made to the way the AI handles these kinds of things. I have never trusted the computer to handle my men as I would guess its capabilities at around a Popov rating (a 3) so I don't know this for sure. I think to have any kind of real plan for your strategy, you will have to control it just like in the earlier versions. Unfortunately, as someone who has been working on his own computer wargame for a couple of years, I understand the problems trying to code a good AI and it isn't easy, especially when working with someone else's AI code as Arnaud Bouis, the WIR update programmer, has had to do.

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Rick Bancroft
Semper Fi

[Nick Papp]

Originally posted by ChrisF:
I have noticed something funny though that I that I thought you'd want to know about. I have played two games as the Germans against the Soviet AI. Both times my Afrika front collapsed before I even reached August '41. Both times I significantly strengthened this HQ with land and air units and bumped up the replacement level to 85%. I know the update documentation said that this routine was tweaked to make it nearly impossible for the Afrika front to collapse in '41 unless the Axis player practically withdrew all his assets (certainly not the case in my game).

Could I be doing something dumb to cause this?

Thanks for the post Chris...

The chance of the African Front collapsing had been modified for the release. Acccording to what we were told, there is only a 2% chance of the front shattering, and that is ONLY trigered when Rommel fails his "die roll" AND the turn in the game is clear weather. So, the chances of this happening, especially in '41 should be pretty small indeed.

However...there was one post on the beta forum just prior to release with a similar collapse in '41 by one of the testers. If you can caputire this and save the game if it happens again, please send the file along to us.

Thanks,

Nick

[Nick Papp]

Originally posted by laurent Favre:
great games remain great games, even with a Dos interface and without sounds, animations.

About the turn structure: I like as always the plotted move because it hinders most of the gamey tactics. Howewer I think it 's totally unrealistic as implemented: player is unable to alter orders during the combat phase. I don't think putting him in a " order then pray" attitude simulates well either the issue of new orders or the initiative of corps commanders. Moreover, the total passivity of the opponent during enemy turn is a real limitation too.

I think that having more control over the turn structures would be a very good idea. One simple way of doing this might simply to make each impulse one day instead of one week. There was some similar discussionowith the Beta Group as to the same issue for air missions.

Originally posted by laurent Favre:
A wego system would solve the second problem but not the first. Maybe it should be possible in a future game to cut the turn in several plotted impulses shifting from one player to his opponent. The player with initiative would get the first impulse then a good chance to play immediatly the second. The second player would then get one or 2 impulses depending of his initiative level. Then the first player would get one or two impulses. But the second player would get yet belonging to initiative level 0, 1 or 2 impulses to end the turn. last the first player would complete his turn.

Again, a very good idea! This would require an almost TOTAL rework of the combat routines as they are now. We have to thank Arnaud Bouis for all the time he put into the current game and the MANY bugfixes and changes. But...as unpaid voulenteers, we have to be thankful for whatever time we get from our programmers. ;- )

Originally posted by laurent Favre:
It could be interesting too to try a wego system with turn duration different for players belong to initiative level: one player would get more impulses when his oppenent would get less.

Anyway, a great game by a promising company. Can't wait for WON
{/B]

If we get to a Ver. 3.0 for this gam, you can bet the possibility will be discussed.

Thanks for the post Laurent (no relation to Brent Farve, by chance?)

Regards,

Nick

[Nick Papp]

Originally posted by RobBrennan:
in respone to your original question david i love it ! .. I havnt played in years and had forgotten how bad the graphice were .. but that dosn't count .. its the game play that matters.

How true Rob...if the game does not play well, why play it?

One note - don't count out any "Graphic" changes yet. We are looking at some possible modifications to the 16 color palatte and color swaps for the snow, mud and blizzard turns. We also have a terrific editor which can let us modify the map and tank icons. I already know that one memeber of the Beta is working on an improved map. So...keep checking in on the site!!

Regards,

Nick

[Nick Papp]

Originally posted by RobBrennan:
Re dumb AI .. i have noticed a definate improvement in the AI. as germans i am finding it tougher going in 41 by a long way.

Just tweeking some of the formulas for things like Readiness, Aircraft Combat Effectivness and the dreaded "Blizzard" Rules make quite a difference in the game play by themselves.

By the way...anyone notice the the Finns now do NOT suffer from the Axis Blizzard penality rules anymore?

Regards,

Nick

[Bill aka Bearwolfen]

Originally posted by ChrisF:
Rob - Thanks I'll take a look at how much I am rotating into that HQ - In my last game, I only transferred three German infantry divisions in, and one air unit. Does not seem like that much with Rommel in command with an '8' rating. But who knows...I'd Be interested to know if anybody else has seen this.

My name is Bill and am member of WIR project.
I'm curious about that Africa Front collapse.
in '41! Any transfers? Move the Hq.?
The 85 Replace Lvl. is good. Remember with this WIR version we must stay in the '41 Campaign mode not the '41 Scenario.
Bill

[laurent Favre]

Originally posted by Nick Papp:
If we get to a Ver. 3.0 for this gam, you can bet the possibility will be discussed.

Thanks for the post Laurent (no relation to Brent Farve, by chance?)

Regards,

Nick

No, we have no relation. I just see him in a very bad movie.

I know my suggestions are somewhat too heavy to be implemented in a free update of WIR. I just propose them in case of a total rework of this game

I would like to thanks too the playtesters; as I'm doing such a job too, I know how time consuming the job is.

And now, let's go to Moscow ( or Berlin)!

Regards,

Laurent

[This message has been edited by laurent Favre (edited August 27, 2000).]

[Jeff Norton]

So, this is the 2.0 (free) version.

Will the 3.0 version be a pay version?

-Jeff

[Nick Papp]

Originally posted by Jeff Norton:
So, this is the 2.0 (free) version.

Will the 3.0 version be a pay version?

-Jeff

Hi Jeff,

IF there is a version 3.0, and it involves any aspect of the original SSI/Grigsby source code, it would NOT be something that we could charge for. Remember, we are working with this code due to the graciousness of the folks at SSI.

Regards,

Nick

[Ian Earl]

Many thanks for a truly great effort.

I have been playing Second Front,WIR,Western Front and PW since they first came out.
My old 8Mhz 286 and i had a great deal of time on all of them.

I think you blokes are doing a fantastic job!
Keep up the good work!

[dalbrech]

So far GREAT! Will there be updated Scenario files for the Shorter Scenarios? THere are times when you want a shorter game.
I did have some memory problems, but then I rebooted using a generic boot disk and had no problems. Please do not ask me how to make one, it has been a year and I did it with the help of Tech support from a game compnay. I remember it involved making a copy of the system files using the Floppy drive menu in My computer then a couple of other steps I don't remember. If anybody
at Matrix knows the kind of boot disk I am talking about perhaps they could post instructions. I do know it involved very little editing of files;I made the disk in about two minutes. It gives me 600k of base memory at the cost of no CD Rom access in Dos Only mode....But thanks for a great name.
Now get the new updated scnearios out...

[coach3play4]

Originally posted by oleary111:

Long time WIR player - but this download bombed out when I plotted my first Air mission - got insufficent memory flag. running W95. tried to run under dos - but froze (but I didnt do any work on it - ie didnt boot mouse etc.)

Follow-up - I transfered game to a faster (more everything) computer running W98, and no "out of memeory" problems - so no complaints!

[Don Shafer]

Looks like we need to work on the Italian Front routine. Even the rail movement of this HQ lowers the Op points enough to cause it to shatter during summer 41.


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Don Shafer Commander of Army Group Shafer

[Kelso]

This is a GREAT game.
Thank you, Matrix games for this fine job.
Now, I am eagerly waiting for a true (graphically) up to date Eastern Front campaign computer war game.

[Yogi Yohan]

I find that the AI is now much tougher on the defense as Russian, but that might be because now tank losses are sky-high. After blitzkrieg phase, taking on anything stronger than a 1 Div? Soviet Army is sheer folly and even a 0 Div? typically results in heavy casualties. Is this really OK?

One minute change that could be made is a rail connection between hexes 40:0 and 43:0. Historically, the Finns stopped on the Svir river, which cannot be reached by them in WIR without running out of supply unless they link up with the Germans over the Volkhov and Tikhvin.

[sbond]

Thanks for all your work love it very much.