Directive 21 playtesters thread

[sPzAbt653]

That's a maximum of 3 rounds per battle, not 3 rounds per turn. So no restrictions, whale away and get 8 rounds per turn if you can!

[Rekm41]

Right I misread that. Thats for clarifying it. Must be getting old

[sPzAbt653]

Turns 21-32. My plan to get close to a line Moscow-Rostov by this point has failed, in most part because I did so poorly in the south, I think. It shouldn't take this long to get where I am, and I think I can blame it on my mistakes with a couple of Panzer Korps. My first regret was the bright idea to take a panzer korps from AGC and move it south of the Pripyet marshes in order to reach Kiev quickly. The terrain in the center is difficult and AGC has enough mobile formations anyway. This idea did work, but once at Kiev, there was nothing for this valuable formation of two panzer divisions and one motorized division to do except threaten Kiev from the west while trying to protect two extended open flanks. Then to compound the problem, I took another Panzer Korps from AGC, one that was making good progress towards its' objective of Bryansk, and diverting them south to come in behind Kiev. I'll make a separate post about this next.

The loss penalty so far is 393/10, with a ratio of German Heavy Rifle Squad losses to Soviet Rifle Squad losses ranging from 9.8-1 to 10.7-1. The Soviet side ran out of 'on hand' rifle squads at turn 23 and has been dealing with '0' since. I didn't take the time to count aircraft losses, it doesn't seem important at this point. I've tried several different tactics (ground attacks on bridges and ground units, airfield attacks when I can get in range of one) but nothing gets better results than the standard 60-70 Axis losses compared to the Soviets 300-500 losses per turn. It seems best to just make sure that I have as many aircraft forward as possible, so that when I am moving and executing combats, Elmer will have some resistance to his interdiction and combat support missions.

[sPzAbt653]

This shot shows the Panzer Korps that I moved away from AGC in order to get behind Kiev. Two panzer divisions, a motorized division and the kavalry division ended up holding an area of no importance. What was I thinking. Without infantry following up, there is nothing that can be done. It would have been much better to use the two infantry divisions available in holding a bridgehead at Chernigov, while the panzer korps went on to take Bryansk.
My solution to the whole mess was to free up the panzers west of Kiev by putting Italian and Hungarian formations in their place, and shifting that panzer korps south, with another panzer korps coming from the Vinnitsa area, to find a place to cross the Dniepr. This worked, they crossed the river, moved north, and hooked up with the Chernigov panzer korps. Kiev is surrounded, as is Odessa, and now the mud is here. Now Elmer gets eight turns free from casualties to rebuild his lines. I need to get ready to do something by turn 48 when he gets double replacements. After the mud I'll have ten turns, I'm thirty hexes from Moscow, sixty hexes from Rostov. I need to have some beers and shots to devise a plan, spend the mud turns getting ready, and then put Guderian in charge.

Cheers!

[larryfulkerson]

Good job dude.  Keep up the good work.  I especially like the progress in the deep south.

[Karri]

Oooo.


Where can I get the latest version?

[sPzAbt653]

There is no way that I am going to allow Elmer to be subjected to the FitEMasters' wrath!

Just kidding, send me your e-mail address and I'll forward it to you.

Now I regret having not added the 'Beginner', 'Novice' and 'Advanced' player options.

[Silvanski]

A question for all playstesters.. On average, how long does it take for Elmer to complete his turn? I know it'll depend a lot on your hardware but it's gonna take him more effort when more Soviet units apppear in play.

[sPzAbt653]

10 minutes on my old Win98 machine, which is what I mostly use for playing (Caps Locks off, as I am trying to see what he is doing). However, it seems like about every 10-15 turns Elmer gets snagged on one unit and does nothing for a long time, making his turn last 30-40 minutes. Also, if a number of units are surrounded, he takes longer. I expect that as he is trying to figure out what to do. Currently I am playing thru the first mud period, turns 32-39, and he has taken 20-30 minutes for each of these turns. I am only guessing, but maybe Elmer doesn't have any specific protocol for cease fire turns, as it appears he is trying to act as if it were business as usual. With no active zones of control, he shuttles back and forth, back and forth, where during a normal turn he would get whacked by a disengagement attack that stops him doing that.

Overall, except for the unit snags, it's been quite acceptable. I get some time to think, or do laundry.

[cesteman]

10 minutes average for me. I am only at turn 7 on the update I just loaded. something very annoying, but I'll have to post a screen shot and let you see. Two Russian units showed up where they couldn't get unless they had an engineer unit with them and I haven't seen/destroyed one yet. I control most of the front, but there is a small gap for elmer to slip into, so he must have done it 2-3 turns prior, as I've been slow to move in this area trying to clear out some pesky units. I'll post later so everyone can see.

EDIT: I will have to post the pesky problem tomorrow.

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: Silvanski
...how long does it take for Elmer to complete his turn?

I can set the Soviet play option, go get a cup of coffee and when I get back the Soviet side is done. Maybe 2-3 minutes tops. But then again, my machine has 2 CPU's in it and I'm running Windows XP PRO and I don't have a multitude of other windows open either.

[Zorchi]

On that, may i ask if anybody knows if TOAW3 can handle more than two cores PC. Namely with the new Core Q7 cpu that can handle 8 threads, would the game be able to make benefit of all 8 logical cores (on win XP)? Just wondering, since most (if not all) games are made for most 2 cores/threads currently...

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: Zorchi
...may i ask if anybody knows if TOAW3 can handle more than two cores PC.

Back when I was a playtester for TOAW3 I remember Ralph having TOAW3 check the machine for more than one core. I don't know what he did ( does ) with the information though.

[ralphtricky]

Nothing right now. It runs the sound on the other core (big whoop.)

The new algorithms are also fast enought that it's going to be difficult to put onto multiple cores. There's a cost to switching between cores.

You DO know that you can hold the shift key, put the caps lock key on or minimize the applicaiton, and it goes a lot faster, right?

Ralph

[Zorchi]

Yea i knew about shift/caps but not about minimizing.

Thx for the info.

[ralphtricky]

ORIGINAL: Zorchi

Yea i knew about shift/caps but not about minimizing.

Thx for the info.

Minimizing probably helps a little bit more than the caps lock.

One nice thing about only running on one CPU is that a designer could actualy run one copy of TOAW per CPU in POvPO play to balance the PO.

Ralph

[sPzAbt653]

In response to posts #303-305 in Mr. Fulkerson's Directive 21 AAR, I thought I would post some strategy on supply issues. Because of the scope and scale of the scenario, there are different things to be done depending on the situation, but I'll post a screen shot and explanation for one. Note that this does not specifically apply to those that take the all out, Guderian-Hoth type approach to advance. And I know that to some this is common knowledge, but it may help some others.

At start the Axis get full supply within 6 hexes of an intact rail line. That drops to 4 and sometimes 2 later in the scenario. This is important because once you get beyond that range, you have t pay attention to what you are doing. Moving thru 'unconverted' or 'unconquered' territory will cost your units twice the readiness and supply as moving thru 'conquered/converted' territory. In the screenshot you can see that the 3rd Motorized and 1st Panzer divisions advanced along the blue lines, at that point out in front, in order to convert the road hexes and take up blocking positions. The infantry following up along the green line now only pays 1 mp for each road hex it enters, greatly reducing the drain on supply and readiness. The lead infantry division (in the green circle) has just dropped out of the bright green, and there I stop it (even though it could move farther). As you are going thru a turn you will get the idea of how far a unit can move before it goes beyond the point where it can recover adequately for the next turn. The infantry in the yellow circle moved farther in order to block the Soviets from crossing the Luga River and interfering with me there. This was more important than conservation, as that Luga Line is where I plan to stop for awhile, and I don't want to spend time securing it. Dropping the 7th FJ and some Brandenburg units helps to secure this area. Now you can see how over the next two turns I will have strong infantry units moving into the positions of the 3rd Mot and 1st Pz. Once the infantry makes short work of the unit surrounded by the 3rd Mot, that division will be free to move unimpeded by enemy zoc along a 'cleared' road to the southeast to assist the 1st Pz in repeating the process.
In addition to these points, it is also important that not moving at all for the turn greatly increases a units recovery. If a unit goes into the yellow, I typically let him sit there for the turn. And it is also important to make good use of the supply units. These give a 150% supply boost to units they are next to, and raise the supply level to units within the supply radius (of the supply unit). There are only 3 of these units at start, but you get 6 more at turn 22.

Hope this is a help to some. Cheers!

[sPzAbt653]

Some have asked how to tell what the supply radius is. Check the unit report of any of the supply units.

[cesteman]

Thanks for the info buddy! It's always great to see stuff like this as I HATE reading the darn manual. Cheers!

[larryfulkerson]

Hey you guys........I've found evidence that the rail road repair guys in Directive 21 need some engineer / ferry dudes.......to be able to ford rivers to repair rail line(s). Here's an example where the rr dude usually repairs bou cou rail hexes but for two turns now he hasn't gotten off the train. ------------>