Defending a river line

[Telumar]

ORIGINAL: ColinWright


...sounds unnecessarily obscure. Really, we could find similar problems with all kinds of terrain. Take hills overlooked by mountains -- the defender gains an advantage by being in that position? I could go on, too.

Disagree. I like Bob's idea.

The advantage the defender gets is already that of the mountain terrain's defensive benefits. Of course the defender can oversee the lower terrain, but at 10km/hex? Or at 15? There are always valleys or lower ground in the hilly terrain where one is safe from enemy observation. Or forests.. Whereas in a river hex there are not always many bridges..

[ColinWright]

ORIGINAL: Telumar

ORIGINAL: ColinWright


...sounds unnecessarily obscure. Really, we could find similar problems with all kinds of terrain. Take hills overlooked by mountains -- the defender gains an advantage by being in that position? I could go on, too.

Disagree. I like Bob's idea.

The advantage the defender gets is already that of the mountain terrain's defensive benefits. Of course the defender can oversee the lower terrain, but at 10km/hex? Or at 15? There are always valleys or lower ground in the hilly terrain where one is safe from enemy observation. Or forests.. Whereas in a river hex there are not always many bridges..

Yeah -- but at 5 km or 2.5 km? I was working on Seelowe. Being dug in on a range of 300 meter-high hills is not an advantage if the attacker is looking down on you from a 1000-meter high ridge a few kilometers away -- with no low ground between you and him.

The point is that there are all kinds of problems with the terrain in the game -- the above is just a random example. To fixate on rivers as 'the problem' is mildly absurd. The rivers actually work relatively well.

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: IronDuke

However, you could argue you could present a case hereabouts for "Rifle Squads B" and "Rifle Squads" and have it patched.

And C, D, E, F, G and H. Same for support squads, engineer squads, mounted rifle squads, MMGs, certain types of artillery and other heavy weapons.

Sounds like a lot of work? Good thing we've got an equipment editor, then.

Yes, but then we're not about simulating things as difficult or really difficult, but simulating them correctly. The question is do they work as they should IRL, which is where I'd say no.

I'd say they do. You've been arguing about how TOAW is an operational game. At an operational level, rivers have much the same effect now as they would if they were on a hexside. The differences would be tactical.

This has been my impression. To be fair, you have an issue needing solving, but much else that I have seen hasn't really lit any fireworks with me. The current discussion in Bioed HQ about designing more Naval units is a good case in point. The game doesn't do Navy so having "accurate to the relevant refit" Destroyers strikes me as only marginally more relevant to scenarios than simulating concert parties and Bob Hope in theatre tours would be.

Yeah. Using generic ship types with an accurate naval model would be much more realistic than using specially designed ship types in the current naval model.

What scenario is so large in scope, you're simulating both Russian, British and American squads? What is the scale?

This is my version of "Europe Aflame". Because of it's scope the original scenario is probably the most popular out there, and I re-designed the whole OOB for it in my own version. However no-one plays my version, and I haven't updated it for TOAW III.

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
Yeah -- but at 5 km or 2.5 km? I was working on Seelowe. Being dug in on a range of 300 meter-high hills is not an advantage if the attacker is looking down on you from a 1000-meter high ridge a few kilometers away -- with no low ground between you and him.

But "hills" or "mountains" doesn't refer to the elevation, it refers to the defensive characteristics of the ground. If there is a "ridge" dropping down 700m over a few kilometres, you would class that as minor escarpment- which does in fact give advantages to the attacker on higher ground. In fact you have done so already.

Really, you're arguing for designing maps a certain way. Seeing as how your Seelowe map is already designed in that way, I don't see the problem.

[Telumar]

ORIGINAL: ColinWright

ORIGINAL: Telumar

ORIGINAL: ColinWright


...sounds unnecessarily obscure. Really, we could find similar problems with all kinds of terrain. Take hills overlooked by mountains -- the defender gains an advantage by being in that position? I could go on, too.

Disagree. I like Bob's idea.

The advantage the defender gets is already that of the mountain terrain's defensive benefits. Of course the defender can oversee the lower terrain, but at 10km/hex? Or at 15? There are always valleys or lower ground in the hilly terrain where one is safe from enemy observation. Or forests.. Whereas in a river hex there are not always many bridges..

Yeah -- but at 5 km or 2.5 km? I was working on Seelowe. Being dug in on a range of 300 meter-high hills is not an advantage if the attacker is looking down on you from a 1000-meter high ridge a few kilometers away -- with no low ground between you and him.

The point is that there are all kinds of problems with the terrain in the game -- the above is just a random example. To fixate on rivers as 'the problem' is mildly absurd. The rivers actually work relatively well.

If you want ultimate realism in such tactical situations you're better off with the AA series.. With toaw providing such a flexibility and variety of scales and periods one has to live with a certain degree of abstraction.

Otherwise as the golden apple said. And: Attacking into the mountains provides the defenders with terrain specific defensive bonus. Attacking out of the mountains into the hills means that the attacker has to enter the hilly terrain and thus this terrain's combat modifiers are applied. Where's the problem? Regarding escarpments there is already a big disadvantage for those sitting on the lower ground and being fired at with long range weapons from the high ground.

[a white rabbit]

ORIGINAL: ColinWright

ORIGINAL: IronDuke

ORIGINAL: golden delicious




In other words, focus in on what your real objective is. It isn't to get all sub variants of the Fiesler Storch into the game,
All the very best,
IronDuke

.

..easy, helicopter, active defender, 1 AP, 0 AT, recon..

..so much easier than all that tiresome flying from airfield to airfield stuff..

[Curtis Lemay]

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
As of now, I know how a river hex works -- and I don't have any major issues with how it works. I don't particularly want to have to be trying to work out just who gained control of it how and calculating what that means the implications are for my attack. I want to see a river hex and know enough just by that.

I probably wouldn't have posted about it if James hadn't said in his post that he intended to get Ralph to look into changing it so that defending in the river hex would incur the river penalty. If we're going to do that, then we might as well do it right.

As to figuring it out, there would obviously have to be some display of the defender's Case 1/2/3 status - at least in the info panel, perhaps elsewhere as well.

As for the disadvantages of holding a bridge -- well, keeping a bridgehead open is hard. You want the defensive benefits of the river, you lose the offensive potential a bridgehead offers.

That's the point. Within the river hex, units could be in a "beachhead" condition (mostly on the enemy side of the river, in a "defensive" condition (mostly on the friendly side of the river), or somewhere inbetween. This is a way to tell that from the context. If the hex has been in the friendly player's control for some time, he's unlikely to still be in the "beachhead" condition, and is very likely to have fallen back to the "defensive" condition. That makes it easier to defend any bridge in the hex, and deserves a defensive benfit.

[Curtis Lemay]

ORIGINAL: IronDuke
Very complicated for the User (who after all is what we are all about) but a far better option (I happily concede) than flawed mechanics. I also agree with the rules and the logic and particularly like the way it sorts out the defence of bridges and river crossings (which would get a benefit if I understand this when the attacking units incurred a penalty) and brings all the missing territory into play.

As I said in my post to Colin, there would have to be some display of the Case 1/2/3 status. (It might be a good idea to call them something besides Case 1/2/3, too - say something like "Hedgehog", "Mixed", and "Beachhead". Other ideas are welcome if anyone has any.)

Therefore, if you were going with this, I'd urge a switch within advanced game options to turn it on and off.

That's pretty much standard practice.

That said, a compromise I'd be very comfortable with. Are super river hexes exempt, or would we allow movement on them, but not allow movement across them without ferry assets.

It would apply to all river hexes. It would have no effect on how movement functions now. There is a wishlist item about giving super rivers a greater penalty than regular rivers, but that's a separate issue.

[Curtis Lemay]

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
Yeah -- but at 5 km or 2.5 km? I was working on Seelowe. Being dug in on a range of 300 meter-high hills is not an advantage if the attacker is looking down on you from a 1000-meter high ridge a few kilometers away -- with no low ground between you and him.

We currently have a feature that increases the weight of an artillery unit's fire if it is firing down a major escarpment. That could be employed for that case.

[ColinWright]

ORIGINAL: Telumar

ORIGINAL: ColinWright

ORIGINAL: Telumar




Disagree. I like Bob's idea.

The advantage the defender gets is already that of the mountain terrain's defensive benefits. Of course the defender can oversee the lower terrain, but at 10km/hex? Or at 15? There are always valleys or lower ground in the hilly terrain where one is safe from enemy observation. Or forests.. Whereas in a river hex there are not always many bridges..

Yeah -- but at 5 km or 2.5 km? I was working on Seelowe. Being dug in on a range of 300 meter-high hills is not an advantage if the attacker is looking down on you from a 1000-meter high ridge a few kilometers away -- with no low ground between you and him.

The point is that there are all kinds of problems with the terrain in the game -- the above is just a random example. To fixate on rivers as 'the problem' is mildly absurd. The rivers actually work relatively well.

If you want ultimate realism in such tactical situations you're better off with the AA series.. With toaw providing such a flexibility and variety of scales and periods one has to live with a certain degree of abstraction.

Oh I agree. But that's precisely why I'm less than enthralled with the prospect of any programming time at all going into this inane river issue. The rivers work reasonably well in the scale of things -- so move on to something else.

[ColinWright]

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
Yeah -- but at 5 km or 2.5 km? I was working on Seelowe. Being dug in on a range of 300 meter-high hills is not an advantage if the attacker is looking down on you from a 1000-meter high ridge a few kilometers away -- with no low ground between you and him.

We currently have a feature that increases the weight of an artillery unit's fire if it is firing down a major escarpment. That could be employed for that case.

Yeah -- but really,my point is that the modelling of the effects of rivers is the least of TOAW's deficiencies, and as the last ten pages or so demonstrate, one of the more debatable. So I say leave the rivers alone. We'll worry about changing the color of the tile in the bathroom after we've fixed the leaky roof.

[rhinobones]

In country, out of the www for only a few days and I come home to find several new pages of debate that seem to be predicated upon the idea that massive (massive isn’t my word, it was first used by someone else) reprogramming of TOAW is required in order to incorporate hex side rivers.  I read that neither TOAW III nor IV is scheduled for such a feature.  I read that the TOAD team is of the opinion that people who desire certain features are crying like babies.  I read about people declaring other people’s thoughts as “irrelevant”  .  .  .  doesn’t sound like the debate I participated in just a week ago.
 
This thread has evidently strayed far from the original intent.  Or, at least, what I thought was the original intent.  That was to discuss/debate the merits of hex side rivers as opposed to Koger rivers.  This debate was to be in the context of a “Wish List” item.  Emphasis on “wish”.  The debaters in favor of the existing Koger river system appear to understand this as an attempt to perform an overhaul of the current code and replace it with an evolutionary code.  This is simple not the case.  Far as I know there has never been an intent, or suggestion, to replace the existing TOAW system with a new TOAW system.  However, this seems to be the interpretation some people have given to the wish for hex side rivers and constructed their arguments accordingly.
 
Kids, it’s just a wish.  Please consider it as such and make you responses in that context.  The ultimate wish is that some day there will be a companion to TOAW that has all the realism, flexibility and functionality as TOAW, but with hex side rivers and WEGO.  I see no reason why there cannot be two TOAD teams, exchanging information and improving their products cooperatively for the gaming community.  This may not be currently on the Matrix drawing boards, but I think there may be a war game on the horizon that will force TOAW to consider these changes.
 
I made this prediction a couple of years ago, and I stick to it.  That is:
 
When Combined Arms is published (WEGO, hex side rivers, editable scenarios, battalion level combat, Matrix support), the TOAW forums will go silent as war game enthusiasts quickly migrate to a new, and better, game system. 
 
Of course the die hards of the TOAW community took issue with my prediction, but that is to be expected.  I still stand by my prediction  .  .  .  I just need for Combined Arms to be published!!
 
Regards, RhinoBones

[ColinWright]

ORIGINAL: rhinobones

In country, out of the www for only a few days and I come home to find several new pages of debate that seem to be predicated upon the idea that massive (massive isn’t my word, it was first used by someone else) reprogramming of TOAW is required in order to incorporate hex side rivers. I read that neither TOAW III nor IV is scheduled for such a feature. I read that the TOAD team is of the opinion that people who desire certain features are crying like babies. I read about people declaring other people’s thoughts as “irrelevant” . . . doesn’t sound like the debate I participated in just a week ago.

This thread has evidently strayed far from the original intent. Or, at least, what I thought was the original intent. That was to discuss/debate the merits of hex side rivers as opposed to Koger rivers. This debate was to be in the context of a “Wish List” item. Emphasis on “wish”. The debaters in favor of the existing Koger river system appear to understand this as an attempt to perform an overhaul of the current code and replace it with an evolutionary code. This is simple not the case. Far as I know there has never been an intent, or suggestion, to replace the existing TOAW system with a new TOAW system. However, this seems to be the interpretation some people have given to the wish for hex side rivers and constructed their arguments accordingly.

Kids, it’s just a wish. Please consider it as such and make you responses in that context. The ultimate wish is that some day there will be a companion to TOAW that has all the realism, flexibility and functionality as TOAW, but with hex side rivers and WEGO. I see no reason why there cannot be two TOAD teams, exchanging information and improving their products cooperatively for the gaming community. This may not be currently on the Matrix drawing boards, but I think there may be a war game on the horizon that will force TOAW to consider these changes.

I made this prediction a couple of years ago, and I stick to it. That is:

When Combined Arms is published (WEGO, hex side rivers, editable scenarios, battalion level combat, Matrix support), the TOAW forums will go silent as war game enthusiasts quickly migrate to a new, and better, game system.

Of course the die hards of the TOAW community took issue with my prediction, but that is to be expected. I still stand by my prediction . . . I just need for Combined Arms to be published!!

Regards, RhinoBones

In brief, (a) you vote for hex side rivers, (b) you want two development teams, and (c) it doesn't matter, because Combined Arms is going to be so much better (when it's released).

Hexside rivers are indeed just a wish. However, it's perfectly reasonable to (a) explain why one doesn't share the wish, (b) point out that if Norm did program this change, he hasn't turned over the code to anyone, and (c) submit that it would indeed involve a lot of programming to implement this wish -- which unlike many wishes, isn't even universally agreed to be desirable.

I see it as like my wife wanting to build a helipad in the backyard. Well, maybe I should just agree that it would be a fine thing -- but then, I'm just not that way. I'll feel obliged to point out that (a) I don't want a helipad in the backyard, and (b) it would be quite a project to build it. How about a deck instead, dearest? We all agree we want that.

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: rhinobones

When Combined Arms is published (WEGO, hex side rivers, editable scenarios, battalion level combat, Matrix support), the TOAW forums will go silent as war game enthusiasts quickly migrate to a new, and better, game system. 

I'm sure Combined Arms is a fine system. However, it doesn't compete with TOAW because the scales are different. And then there's the question of the first word in your above quote.

[Telumar]

ORIGINAL: golden delicious

ORIGINAL: rhinobones

When Combined Arms is published (WEGO, hex side rivers, editable scenarios, battalion level combat, Matrix support), the TOAW forums will go silent as war game enthusiasts quickly migrate to a new, and better, game system.

I'm sure Combined Arms is a fine system. However, it doesn't compete with TOAW because the scales are different. And then there's the question of the first word in your above quote.

If CA had the flexibility in time and scale like toaw has i would agree with Rhino, but it hasn't. Nevertheless a definite buy.

GD, it will definitely be the competitor to Toaw. No matter the scales and such.

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: Telumar

GD, it will definitely be the competitor to Toaw. No matter the scales and such.

I remain unconvinced. What are the most popular scenarios for TOAW? The large scale, strategic ones. It's a completely different kind of experience from a 1km/hex battle. Most TOAW players want the grand scale- not the nitty-gritty.

Further and on a cynical note, although I'm interested in realism, most players aren't too bothered about it. WEGO may remove a lot of the unrealistic occurences in TOAW, but these things don't bother players much. Look at the discussion of Europe Aflame: for them, it's like a game of chess. It doesn't matter than a castle can't move, that bishops have limited offensive capability, and that queens don't generally kick arse across the map. The appeal is that it's a familiar system where you can test out the various strategies which have developed over the years, and compare your skill against another player. Cavalry in commando brigades doesn't lessen this aspect of the game.

[Curtis Lemay]

ORIGINAL: golden delicious
WEGO may remove a lot of the unrealistic occurences in TOAW, ...

And inject more. It is no panacea.

Real forces operate both simultaneously AND sentiently. WEGO gets the simultaneous part right but the sentient part wrong. IGOUGO gets the sentient part right and the simultaneous part wrong.

For most situations the sentient part is far more important. Most of the time one side is primarily in a positional defense, where WEGO will have little impact.

On the other hand, think of the now universal infantry tactic of infiltration developed in 1917. It's principle was "take the path of least resistance". That can't be programmed in advance, unless movement allowances are so short that no unrevealed forces can be encountered.

TOAW is just too flexible. Scenarios can have huge movement allowances. Try and imagine CFNA using WEGO. I suppose one could design specific scenarios tailored to function in a WEGO environment, but IGOUGO would have to be retained for most.

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

Real forces operate both simultaneously AND sentiently. WEGO gets the simultaneous part right but the sentient part wrong. IGOUGO gets the sentient part right and the simultaneous part wrong.

It isn't necessarily a bad thing for the player not to have minute control of every movement a unit makes. Of course a simple WEGO system would apply this very unevenly.

TOAW is just too flexible. Scenarios can have huge movement allowances.

This tends to make the problems of IGO-UGO more apparent, though. Force A completes a stunning encirclement of Force B over the course of a week. Force B just sits there.

Overall, WEGO is probably better for realism. As Rommel would say, any reaction is better than no reaction. But until it is applied at the full range of scales covered by TOAW, it won't threaten to replace TOAW, and even then the vagueries of the system may lead a lot of people to stick to IGO-UGO because it's what they're used to.

[rhinobones]

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

And inject more. It is no panacea.

Real forces operate both simultaneously AND sentiently. WEGO gets the simultaneous part right but the sentient part wrong. IGOUGO gets the sentient part right and the simultaneous part wrong.

For most situations the sentient part is far more important. Most of the time one side is primarily in a positional defense, where WEGO will have little impact . . .

Telumar - Check out this response. It is a perfect example of the way people bend backwards to rationalize IGYG as more reliastic than WEGO. "Sentiently" Not real sure what sentiently is intended to mean, but I suspect it just might be a case of watching too much Star Trek.

Curt - Next time you're on an open highway try the IGYG at 65 mph. If you survive, write us a note.

Regards, RhinoBones

[rhinobones]

ORIGINAL: golden delicious
However, it doesn't compete with TOAW because the scales are different. And then there's the question of the first word in your above quote.

Yes, agree that the big "when" is a critical milestone for CA. Hopefully the "when" comes while I'm still capable of punching computer keys. There is hope though; a few of Iron Duke's statements make me think that a release is in the foreseeable future.

Also agree that CA has a serious limitation on scale. Would like to see spatial and distance scales more in line with TOAW, but at this point in time it is much too soon to make a “wish” list. However, with all that said, there are still quite a few TOAW scenarios at 2.5 km and battalion/company units that would do very well as CA scenarios. As examples, I think that Two Weeks In Normandy, A Bridge Too Far, Leros 1943 and CFNA would do very well as 1 km, CA scenarios.

Regards, RhinoBones