New Great Patriotic War Scenario

[Captain Cruft]

Well after a night's sleep I decided to kill the AI processing. It was over 20,000 steps and still going ...

I will start an H2H game against myself instead, and continue to report on any issues found.

[Bombur]

ORIGINAL: Captain Cruft

Well after a night's sleep I decided to kill the AI processing. It was over 20,000 steps and still going ...

I will start an H2H game against myself instead, and continue to report on any issues found.

-Maybe we could start a PBEM game?

[Captain Cruft]

Yes OK PM sent ...

I will still play against myself too for testing purposes.

[gingerbread]

Ah!

Now this is good for some serious gaming.

Some observations:
Air ranges - a bit overrated for '41
Factories and inf production centers (nice idea, btw) can be built by engineers...
Some starting units have low Xp, in particular Ge HQ staff.
While the SU did field Md & Hv tanks in '41, they did not have doctrine capable of utilizing them - that came later
Would love an event like "Zhukov arrives to set up defence of Leningrad" (50 Lv3 100 Xp staff in an HQ)

g

[Captain Cruft]

I'm not sure about being able to build production centres. It seems to me that since engineers can effectively reproduce themselves by building recruitment centres you can go on an exponential growth curve.

I have no doubt that tweber has thought of this though, and the process is limited by PPs, for which the production capacity is not expandable. So it might work out OK, we will have to see

[tweber]

Actually, I did not intend to make production centers buildable by engineers and will turn off in next version. 
 
I also found 2 other bugs that I will fix for v2:
 
- the 'worker battalions' arrive as rifle
- conscripts can be upgraded to rifle 2.  Both units will be non-upgradeable.
 
As for Freeboys question, I show the 2 regimes that are active if you play the entire side and the 6 regimes that are active if you split into sectors.  This is because you have to select AI before variants are executed.  If you play with the entire side, it does not matter how you set the sectors as they will immediately join the appropriate side and then go dormant. 
 
I also tried AI and I think this scenario is just too big for the AI
 
 

[BULLDOGINTHEUK]

Looks like a multiplayer game of this scenario is starting soon.[/align] [/align]Any chance of doing the patch in the next few days before the game starts? [/align] [/align]Its worth a try asking, lol [:'(].[/align]

[IRONCROM]

Holy Crap!!!

I was wondering how long it would be before we saw an East front monster like this.

Way to go Tom.

[Barthheart]

ORIGINAL: tweber

Actually, I did not intend to make production centers buildable by engineers and will turn off in next version. 

I also found 2 other bugs that I will fix for v2:

- the 'worker battalions' arrive as rifle
- conscripts can be upgraded to rifle 2.  Both units will be non-upgradeable.

As for Freeboys question, I show the 2 regimes that are active if you play the entire side and the 6 regimes that are active if you split into sectors.  This is because you have to select AI before variants are executed.  If you play with the entire side, it does not matter how you set the sectors as they will immediately join the appropriate side and then go dormant. 

I also tried AI and I think this scenario is just too big for the AI

Tom, I'd suggest turning on the location names as well. At least for all the cities/towns. makes it easier to discuss and AAR.

[Gresbeck]

ORIGINAL: tweber

Mark did the OOB and used historic divisional names and include leader names in the HQs.

That sounds great. But as the game goes on the player can build ahistorical divisions and include ahistorical OOB in them, or did you find a way to have only predefined OOB?

[Captain Cruft]

One more small thing.

The sub-formations that are in the 1st and 2nd NKVD Divisions which start at Moscow are of Soviet People. Perhaps they could be of NKVD People, which gives a bit of a morale bonus?

Ditto the unit at Brest and there may be some others.

BTW speaking of Brest, despite their enhanced attributes I have found that the Elite Infantry at Brest have precisely no chance of surviving an attack by Panzergruppe 2, and since you cannot move all the units of said army beyond the city on Turn 1 such an attack is pretty much inevitable IMHO. Perhaps a Fortress in the city would not go amiss?

P.S. Thanks for the clarificaton about building production centres.

[Captain Cruft]

ORIGINAL: Gresbeck

ORIGINAL: tweber

Mark did the OOB and used historic divisional names and include leader names in the HQs.

That sounds great. But as the game goes on the player can build ahistorical divisions and include ahistorical OOB in them, or did you find a way to have only predefined OOB?

There is no way to have a pre-defined OOB or fixed unit ToEs. This is inherent to the game, it's philosophy is not to force anything on you.

What the historical units in this scenario do give is a bit of flavour, and I think it adds a lot. I for one will be maintaining my named HQ and armoured/motorised units (including any new ones) and just leave the masses of infantry to exist in generic-land.

[Captain Cruft]

3rd Res. Army HQ

Small bug:

Soviet unit 3rd Res. Army HQ has 20 x Staff (Ger) SFtype at start.

[tweber]

Thanks for the catches.

[BULLDOGINTHEUK]

We are a picky bunch aren't we? Poor old Tweber [:D].

[Captain Cruft]

I'm up to Turn 5 now playing against myself. It's definitely gotten a bit more difficult for the Germans due to:

a) Loss of uber movement and combat bonuses.
b) Starting to bump up against the Soviet Reserve Armies.
c) Arrival of conscripts and partisans on map in various places.

One thing - the Soviet Conscripts counter graphic is facing the wrong way ...

[JAMiAM]

ORIGINAL: Captain Cruft
One thing - the Soviet Conscripts counter graphic is facing the wrong way ...

Maybe they're turning around to fire at their NKVD officers? Or, getting a headstart in running from the Panzers?[:D]

[xBoroNx]

Hm i have finished one Great Patriotic War pbem now vs. a friend of mine, a very good player too. My friend wanted the soviets. He surrendered turn 10. In that turn the soviets had only ~8000 powerpoints while the axis had 16000. I was 3-4 hexes away from voronezh with AG South, 4-6 hexes away from moscow with AG Center and started to siege the leningrad forts. I had the 4 september turns still, so 4 turns with guaranted good weather. At least 2 of the 3 mentioned objectives would have fallen by late september.

Today we started a 2nd match, my friend wanted to take the soviets again. I will report how this match goes.

I did check the production. Axis starts with production centers who have 31,7k production points and they have 16k resources. Soviets start with 50,3k production points and 22k resources. But 12k (Minsk, Kiev, Riga) will fall most likely within the first 4 turns.
Then the axis get +3k production and the soviets -12k, so it is 34,7k axis vs. 38,3k soviets.

Soviets start with troops worth 19416 powerpoints and the axis with troops worth 16525 power points. In the first turn the axis kills at least 5000 powerpoints, more likely 5500. Then it is already something like 14000 powerpoints soviets vs. 16xxx powerpoints axis. But the axis has 3 more blitz turns, they will inflict more casualities on the soviets then and take at least 2 of the 3 soviet production centers close to the front.

So i think the soviets might need a slight boost. Only something very minor like adding one more industry complex in the hinterlands with a factory and a recruiting center or increasing their industry growth modifier from +10% to +15% per year + sibierian reinforcements event once the axis is close to moscow and not as currently scripted to a fixed early december date.

[freeboy]

I may start my delayed match aganst XbX above.. so he will have his plates fill, me as German... Tom we had delayed playing, perhaps I should not have as he is getting experience! Are you working on a mdfix? Will it be out soon.

[xBoroNx]

Here are the kills/losses stats of our rematch at the end of my 2nd german turn.
Currently the axis has 16000 pp strength and the soviets are already down to 12500.

Riga will fall in turn 3, my opponent decided to try to defend Riga, Minsk will fall in turn 3 or 4 and Kiev i think in turn 5 or 6. The soviets likely drop to 10-11k powerpoints by the end of turn 6 i guess.

Overall the scenario feels quite balanced and is very fun to play. Only the first 3-4 months are very tough for the soviets. Voronezh, Moscow, Leningrad and Maikop are all potentially within reach for the axis in 1941. If the axis player manages to get at least 2 of those objectives he only has to survive the winter and should win with the 1942 summer blitz then.