I hope the Kremlin is insulated (or the fire escape works)

[Montenegro]

Since I discovered the wonderful world of WIR back in late January, I have been playing German v. Soviet AI in the hopes of learning the many ropes of this game. I crossed two milestones in my current game when Lenningrad and Moscow fell on 11/30 turn after a series of infantry cat and mouse games with interdiction (man is it lethal in this version) paving the way to the collapse of many a wayward Soviet army. Currently in 12/7, I am frantically pulling my remaining arty and armor to the rear that helped stem the tide in the Centre and North offensives. I await the Zhukov/blizzard counterpunch with good entrencment in the South and North and a stable line around Moscow.

My two questions are:

1) PBEM games---how does one go about doing this? I am an admitted late tech bloomer and would like to start a game v. a human general once I play a campaign or two as the Soviet v. German AI. My overall preference is Wermacht.

2) Production---the manual is as vague as it gets in this area of the game. Does the replacement pool reflect prouction as well as attrition from combat? Do upgrades occur naturally, or is there needed manipulation here? How does one tweek individual factories to produce more? I am all a newbie in this category...

Kindest regards,

Montenegro

[screamer]

the manual is outdated its from the origional 1993 game NOt the matrix version

[davewolf]

Originally posted by screamer
<img src="http://www.taxrevue.com/zach/minime5.jpg">

arrrgggghhhh what did i do wrong?? someone help me with the stupid image

Did he also join the axis of evil?

If you want to know how it works, look at your 'Edit user profile' page, there's a link to 'vBCode' explanations.

[Possum]

Hello Montenegro
Some answers.
1) Yes, the production pool is where newly minted AFV's & aircraft are deposited each week.
2) Yes, upgrading of the Factories, and of the equipment that unis use will occur automaticaly, but many players like to do this for themselves.
To change production of a factory simply
a) press C to select the on map city your mouse is pointing at, or press Alt-C to select the off map cities.
b) from the menue of displayed factories, press the leter that corresponds to the factory you whish to alter (This only works with AFV & Aircraft factories BTW)
c) from the list of options displayed, select a new equipment type to manufacture.
To change the equipment of a AFV subunit or an Air unit
a) select the unit.
b) press c, or click the mouse pointer on the "Change" box
c) Select a new equipment from the list od displayed options.
Note, is you are dumped straight bact to the unit screen after pressing c /selecting change, then there is no other equipment type avaliable to swap to. (this may be becuase there is an insufficent number in the pool to swap for the equipment the unit already has, or there just is no alternative avaliable.)

Three other features of the Automatic upgrade system are
1) The computer follows the pre-determind upgrade path for that equipment series, that may result in a radical change of equipment type, not possible using manuall upgrade.
eg1 T-60 (tank) becomes T-70 (Tank) becomes SU-76 (SPG).
eg 2 Il-4 (Level bomber) upgrades to Tu-2 (Dive bomber)
2) The computer will sometimes swap scarce equipment type for a more common equipment type if units are unable to build up. eg If you are running out of T-34's, event though you are producing 200+ a turn, and you have 400 Valentines in the Pool, the computer will start swapping T-34's for Valentines untill it has reduced the Valentine pool to less than the T-34 pool (remember that swapped equipment is returned to the pool, so in this example, the computer will stop swapping once it has brought the Valentine pool down to 200.) Note this type of "upgrading" only happens to understrength units.
3) Some Formations are associated with a particular equipment type, and so if the computer finds a formation that dosn't have that equipment type, and it has plenty avaliable in the pool, it will swap over to the designated equipment type.
eg All Soviet Brigades are deemed to be Medium (T-34, + Lend Lease ) tank formations, so if it finds a Brigade opperating T-60's, T-70's, KV's, T-26's, etc it will swap them for T-34's or Valentines, or Grants....

As for Tweeking prodution, All equipment has a production cost, the cheaper the unit , the more you can build. but keep in mind the combat value of the unit, as just because it's cheep dosn't, mean it's desirable to build. Also there is a 4 turn delay in production, while the factory re-tools, if you manually change the factories prodution. There is only a 1 turn dely if the factory is doing an automatic upgrade.

[Montenegro]

Possum, all,

Thank you for the info. I really am way less in the dark now. This game and forum are great.

Regards,

Montenegro