balancing national capability offsets

[WanderingHead]

Thought about this more. It would be nice to have national units tend to clump together and serve in areas that seem of interest to their nations. So I am experimenting with the following.

1) any artillery or flak unit in combat without at least one infantry/para/armor of the same nationality in that combat will suffer a -3 penalty on land attack.

2) any non-naval unit which is in combat on land either in or adjacent to their home nation gets a +1 attack modifier.

3) any non-naval unit which is in combat on land which is neither in nor adjacent to their home nation gets a -1 attack modifier.

This encourages a bit of build diversity for nations, and encourages them to serve somewhat close to home. It's not perfect, of course. Once Germany is deep inside Russia Rumanian and Hungarian units won't care anymore. But then, that sort of makes sense anyway.

Note that (2) and (3) tend to disadvantage the player with momentum (Axis early, Allies later). I actually think this may work well, given Germany's new ability to build minor nation units and the early weakness of Russia. By the end of the game with tech upgrades the +/-1 isn't going to mean that much anyway.

[runyan99]

I don't really like 1, 2, or 3. At the corps or army level, artillery and flak can  probably support units of different nationalities without too much problem. For example, the Americans fought pretty much all of their WW1 battles in France with French artillery support, and were pretty effective.
 
As for 2 and 3, it strikes me as a freebie for the Russians, who are going to be fighting in Russia most of the time.

[SGT Rice]

I'm a little uncertain about 2 & 3; will be curious to see how big an effect it has. Germany will be suffering more casualties (and inflicting fewer) during the Russian campaign, along with other key battlefields such as Western France, Norway & Greece. Japan will be penalized when invading China, India & Australia. The Axis will only benefit during the end game.

As for #1, I'm all for trying something; the current implementation for artillery has a fundamental flaw that needs to be addressed.

At the corps or army level, artillery and flak can probably support units of different nationalities without too much problem. For example, the Americans fought pretty much all of their WW1 battles in France with French artillery support, and were pretty effective.

Have to respectfully disagree here; I don't think parellels with WWI are justified. The French battlefield in 1918 was a much more static environment; mechanized movement was almost non-existent (especially for the Axis) and the need for rapid communications (which usually presumes talking in the same language) far less pressing. During WWII, even among colingual (is that a word?) allies like the US & UK, I can think of very few instances where units were mixed together below corps level for any length of time; national armies didn't specialize in certain types of combat units then loan those units to other armies (which is what Brian is trying to create disincentives for).

[WanderingHead]

I'm pretty sold on #1.

For 2 and 3, merely experimenting. What I was thinking is that it is nice if national units have a motivation to operate near their nations. It's what I came up with. I'd still like a better idea.

[runyan99]

So, the Americans and British should get a penalty for fighting in France? Not sure that makes sense. These allies will always be fighting away from their home countries, aside from a possible Sealion.

[WanderingHead]

Do you have a suggestion? Or is the objective (national forces motivated to operate near national territory) not worth the effort? Note that there is some small incentive from national surrenders. E.g. the surrender of nations like Rumania. It just doesn't make much difference to play until things turn around for the Germans.

[WanderingHead]

Here's an interesting idea. I don't think it is a great idea, but interesting anyway. I throw it out as a discussion point.

1) On the attack - the first unit of a given nation to move from a region expends an extra supply. If you move 10 units from one nation, it costs 11 supplies. 10 units from 5 nations, costs 15 supplies.

2) on the defence - instead of expending just 1 supply per region, expend 1 supply per represented defending nation.

The supply can be considered an operational cost for activitating a distinct chain of command and logistics.

#2 is probably the easier to implement, and it is less disagreeable to me from a play perspective (an overwhelming endorsement [;)])


* edit * I could see changing (1) to be "entering an attacked region" instead of "leaving a region", and also to make the first nation free to minimize changes to play (no impact in homogeneous situations). E.g. 10 units of 1 nation is 10 supply, 10 units of 5 nations is 14 supply, U units of N nations is U+N-1 (ignoring the possibility of extra fuel expenditures).

[runyan99]

I think you are jumping the shark a little bit, and are on the verge of making rules for rules sake. Know when to say when.

[Lucky1]

Gotta love Happy Days. Woaaaaa!
 
I think that if the arty rules (e.g., 4b) are implemented, I am a bit reticent about further complication. I think the existing (in the beta) -1 and -2 penalties might also be abstracted as representing problems of operational integration with Germany.

[SGT Rice]

How about this ...

2) for every nationality in excess of one in any region, add -1 attack modifier to all units in that region.
3) for every nationality in excess of one in any region, add +1 attack modifier to any attacks against the units in that region.

This combat penalty would simulate the crux of the problem in coalition warfare; the inherent difficulties in coordinating across separate command structures, language barriers (i.e., from English to American), communication networks, codes, doctrines, etc. I would propose that this apply not only on land but also in the air and at sea; one example that jumps readily to mind is the ill-fated ABDA command in Java in late 41/early 42.

One sticking point would be that the Commonwealth (UK, Canada, Australia & (maybe) India) don't deserve the penalty because they didn't have most of the differences cited above.

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: runyan99
I think you are jumping the shark a little bit, and are on the verge of making rules for rules sake. Know when to say when.

I'm trying not to go to far, that's why I let you know what I am thinking about. So you can stop me .

But they aren't rules for rules sake. They are rules to attempt to achieve an objective (national forces tend to operate in regions of national interest, and minor nations don't specialize in building just 1 specific unit type). It sounds like you are saying "the objective is not worth the effort and complication".

The thing is, after this thread I added the national capability offsets to allow Axis minors to build a greater variety of units. And I think it may lead to certain unnatural play patterns. Or really, the patterns are already there to some extent but less obvious before you can easily see all the unit nations. Mostly I would like to avoid having minors focus on specializing on building a specific unit type.

The easiest fix would be to expand the minor builds to include reduced capability infantry, but not flak and maybe not artillery.

[runyan99]

I mainly object to the 'areas of national interest' rules.
 
As for the potential problem of specializing, implement what you already suggested.
 
1) any artillery or flak unit in combat without at least one infantry/para/armor of the same nationality in that combat will suffer a -3 penalty on land attack.

[Marshall Art]

As far as the areas of interest go - so what would exactly areas of interest be for Romania, or the other nations? I think this is the wrong path...

If you attempt to "clump" units together, you render single units useless, militia or already weakened minor arty are not worth even producing. Most minor nations have a very low production, so you only can have one stack of Romanian units somewhere, another of Hungarian units elsewhere. What is the "improvement"?

I am not in agreement with this at all. Of course there were certain difficulties when mixed nationality units operated together but that is nothing I would try to discourage. IMO the -1/-2 penalty on minor units just because they are of minor nationality is more than enough.

The only rule I could be sold on is the -3 attack penalty for artillery/AA units without infantry/armour support.

[Marshall Art]

ORIGINAL: WanderingHead

1) On the attack - the first unit of a given nation to move from a region expends an extra supply. If you move 10 units from one nation, it costs 11 supplies. 10 units from 5 nations, costs 15 supplies.

2) on the defence - instead of expending just 1 supply per region, expend 1 supply per represented defending nation.

I do not see a rationale - 2 units of different nationality have a different "mileage" than those of the same nationality? Same for defending units - one German and one Romanian unit expend 2 suplies while 2 German ones expend just one?

As you were not in favour of altering the way defending unit's supply was deducted previously I wonder why these ideas are better then others previously rejected.

[joe_canadian]

I dont like the area of intrest idea, it seems like it would weeken the axis to much, pushing deep into russia would be that much harder

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: joe_canadian
I dont like the area of intrest idea, it seems like it would weeken the axis to much, pushing deep into russia would be that much harder

I agree. It was something I was experimenting with, but I don't like it. It is too broad and odd of in effect.

I'm beginning to think that I will be satisfied with the simple "artillery in combat without support of at least infantry of the same nation in that combat is penalized" rule.

Still, I suspect that the common approach will be Hungarian, Rumanian, and Italian troops manning the Atlantic wall. It is simply the best thing to do with subpar units. It's what I have always done with those nation's militia, now you'll be able to do it with their infantry, artillery and flak (at the expense of fewer supplies and less research).

[Forwarn45]

ORIGINAL: WanderingHead
[Still, I suspect that the common approach will be Hungarian, Rumanian, and Italian troops manning the Atlantic wall. It is simply the best thing to do with subpar units. It's what I have always done with those nation's militia, now you'll be able to do it with their infantry, artillery and flak (at the expense of fewer supplies and less research).

I just finished a beta test game with the new rules and thought I'd comment on this. The reduced evasion artillery capability of minor Axis units made a noticeable difference in picking them off by air before invasion. And unsuppressed German flak can be deadly to invading ground units - Italian flak were not so scary, due to the weaker ground attack value. In fact, I can recall that in at least one invasion - looking at the combat die rolls, etc. - I thought at the time that it would have been a failure if not for a couple weaker Axis units on the defense. So I think it is still a bit of a balance. The Germans might also want to commit some minor Axis troops in Russia because they will suffer more regular casualties and can draw from the population pools of those countries instead of solely from Germany's population.

[runyan99]

I don't see why Germany could not have sent the Italians and Romanians to France instead of Russia. Perfectly plausible.

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: runyan99
I don't see why Germany could not have sent the Italians and Romanians to France instead of Russia. Perfectly plausible.

I didn't mean to say I thought it was a problem. Just that I thought it would be common.

In fact, as I recall a lot of the units in France at the time of D-Day were actually conscripts from eastern Europe.

From everything all the comments I've seen I'm beginning to think things are in decent shape. Don't worry, no "regions of national interest" modifiers .