War in the East Q&A

[Theng]

You know they have to pay for the music? In all likelihood, the stock music will be public domain for just that reason or their cost goes up in a meaningful way.

[Zovs]

ORIGINAL: Neal_MLC

I want to make a request for the opening music. I think Al Stewart's "Road to Berlin" would be very appropriate.

I was thinking more like War Ensemble from Slayer...

War Ensemble - Slayer

[ComradeP]

As long as it doesn't include a 15 minute speech about how cool the Republicans are.

[Rasputitsa]

[/quote]

I was thinking more like War Ensemble from Slayer...

[/quote]

No, I think music would be a better idea. [:)]

[ComradeP]

Imagine some casual grognard installing the game and suddenly hearing...Tom Araya(with or without the obligatory pre-concert speech).

[PyleDriver]

You guys are killing me. If you want to talk about music start a music thread. This is a Q&A thread and Jim and others are here to answer questions not hear your views on music. Please start another thread on this...

[Shupov]

I second Neal_MLC's idea, but it's "Roads to Moscow"

[ComradeP]

If units in static mode require less trucks to move, does that also mean the unit has less trucks that can be captured/destroyed in combat as the trucks will be send back to the pool?

Can encircled units become static, if so, what happens to their trucks?

Can the Soviets attack across the Finnish no attack line. If so, what keeps the Soviets from getting some easy experience knowing the Finns can't attack them?

If training is included as something the player can control or influence (as in: if players can set a unit to train or if a unit will train automatically if left alone somewhere), at what rate will it gain experience?

It has been discussed that Soviet Tank Divisions split up into brigades late in 1941, but what happens to Mechanized Corps, or are the 1941 Mechanized Corps abstracted and not represented as actual Corps sized formations?

Hard Sarge recruited regular troops into a Guards formation a while ago. How many units need to be Guards to create a Guards Division/Corps if you combine them with other units to form the formation? In other words: do you get a Guards Rifle Corps when you combine a Guards Rifle Division with two regular Rifle Divisions, assuming the regular Rifle Divisions have a reasonable experience level but are not actually Guards?

As an aside, whilst checking Soviet unit strengths during the battle of Smolensk, I noticed that numerous 1941 Mechanized Corps actually included more regiments than the late war Mechanized Corps contained (although the ones I'm using for comparison might be understrength). A 1941 Mechanized Corps has a total (I'm combining some units for the sake of comparison) average paper strength of 2 motorcycle regiments, 3 artillery regiments, 5 tank regiments and 4 motorised rifle regiments.

[wurger54]

I am truely intimidated by the complexity of this beast. [X(] Still looking forward to it! [&o]

Question: Is there a way to simulate the intentional retreat/panic (depending on the interpretation) of Soviet units that resulted in the Germans 'kesseling' little more than air during '42?

[Hard Sarge]

ORIGINAL: ComradeP

If units in static mode require less trucks to move, does that also mean the unit has less trucks that can be captured/destroyed in combat as the trucks will be send back to the pool?

trucks will be sent back to the pool, so they are not there to be captured, so, yes, less will be lost if the unit gets attacked

Can encircled units become static, if so, what happens to their trucks?

hmmmmm, gamey, don't know, never tried it, yet

Can the Soviets attack across the Finnish no attack line. If so, what keeps the Soviets from getting some easy experience knowing the Finns can't attack them?

well, the Fin's can't attack across, that don't mean they can't defend, you slap them, they will slap you back, and Fins don't like to be slapped !


If training is included as something the player can control or influence (as in: if players can set a unit to train or if a unit will train automatically if left alone somewhere), at what rate will it gain experience?

you gain some, by sitting still or by week, but combat is the better trainer, you also have Exp and morale to worry about, you can be High Morale and low Exp, so, would think something like 50-50 would be better then 30-70 (I got one Guard Corps, with a Morale of 26, only thing I can think of, it was out of supply for a bit)



It has been discussed that Soviet Tank Divisions split up into brigades late in 1941, but what happens to Mechanized Corps, or are the 1941 Mechanized Corps abstracted and not represented as actual Corps sized formations?

in 41, the MC are HQ type units, so have troops assigned to them, like a SU Army would, so, a MC may have 3 Tank Divs and 2 Rifle Divs and a few Brigs under it's control (would have to look to be sure of the set up, mine normally die too fast for me to get a grip on what they should be

Hard Sarge recruited regular troops into a Guards formation a while ago. How many units need to be Guards to create a Guards Division/Corps if you combine them with other units to form the formation? In other words: do you get a Guards Rifle Corps when you combine a Guards Rifle Division with two regular Rifle Divisions, assuming the regular Rifle Divisions have a reasonable experience level but are not actually Guards?

2 of the 3, need to be Guard, to combine units and become a higher Formations
if the same type, any unit can be merged, but that will most likely lower the Morale/Exp level if you do it with a Guard (a trade off, you may need the men, but the unit itself will not be as good)

now, if as you say, if the 2 normals are high morale, adding the Guard to them, will still form a normal, but the little extra boost, may get it promoted to a Guard the next turn or so ???

As an aside, whilst checking Soviet unit strengths during the battle of Smolensk, I noticed that numerous 1941 Mechanized Corps actually included more regiments than the late war Mechanized Corps contained (although the ones I'm using for comparison might be understrength). A 1941 Mechanized Corps has a total (I'm combining some units for the sake of comparison) average paper strength of 2 motorcycle regiments, 3 artillery regiments, 5 tank regiments and 4 motorised rifle regiments.

I think that works with our set up, the MC will be a HQ type unit, and can have as many Brigs added to it as you want (there is a command limit, over that, and it gets HARDer to control those under them, but you can still add them, so say in 42, the Army size is 27, but you can go 30-35-40 points of units into that Army, you just are going to missing some command rolls)

[ComradeP]

hmmmmm, gamey, don't know, never tried it, yet

Yup, that would indeed be gamey. As said before: I'd rather discuss as many gamey actions as possible now, so that something might still be implented to prevent them if possible, than to wait until after release, which would result in something similar to the truckload of "this is broken/gamey" discussions on the WitP:AE forums.

well, the Fin's can't attack across, that don't mean they can't defend, you slap them, they will slap you back, and Fins don't like to be slapped !

Sure, the Soviets are not likely to kick the Finns out of the hex, but losses should be a lot lower than when attacking German formations because an actual counterattack isn't possible. As it stands now, the Finnish front could provide easy experience/training for Soviet units, as the Finns can't attack them across the no attack line, so the Soviet units can rebuild after an attack, or simply be swapped with other units so the Finns will suffer from serious attrition.

you gain some, by sitting still or by week, but combat is the better trainer

I'd say it's also more risky. Given the choice as the Soviets between a certain gain in experience without suffering losses, or trying to gain experience in combat which might all be nullified by the amount of losses suffered (or by the division being destroyed), parking some divisions somewhere so they can train for a while might not be a bad idea, provided you can spare them from frontline duties.

[Hard Sarge]

Sure, the Soviets are not likely to kick the Finns out of the hex, but losses should be a lot lower than when attacking German formations because an actual counterattack isn't possible. As it stands now, the Finnish front could provide easy experience/training for Soviet units, as the Finns can't attack them across the no attack line, so the Soviet units can rebuild after an attack, or simply be swapped with other units so the Finns will suffer from serious attrition.

yea but, most times, it is not the best idea to try to do a battle of attrition, vs a dug in hex, even more, vs a hex that should be stronger, and with better troops

plus, it would depend on how much you gain, vs how much you lose, you may get 1000 men in replacement, but lose 4000-6000 men on the attack, and those 1000 men, are going to be very low morale/exp, so the odds are you are going to be losing better troops then you are gain, and will lower the skill you gained during the attack

[Joel Billings]

Any non-isolated, non-frozen combat unit on the map may be placed in static mode if that unit has not moved during the turn.

Once isolated, cannot go static.

[Joel Billings]

Morale goes up for the following reasons:

The morale of a unit will increase when it is successful in combat (holds on defense or retreats the defender when attacking). The morale of a unit may also increase during the friendly logistics phase due to any and all of the following circumstances:

1) The unit's morale is below 50, and it is in refit mode.
2) The unit's morale is below 50, and it is more than 10 hexes away from the nearest enemy unit.
3) The unit’s morale is below its national morale. In this case it can recover as much as 10% of the national morale but not more than the country's national morale (Example: German national morale is 70 in 1942 so a unit could recover 7 per turn, not to exceed 70 for a non-elite unit).
4) The unit is in a very good supply and support situation and its morale is less than 75. If die(75) is greater than the unit's morale than a gain for this situation is possible.


As long as experience is higher than morale, than the unit will train and gain experience. Not sure what modifiers impact the experience gain, but ususally at the low end units gain 1-2 experience points per turn. When a typical Soviet unit is mobilized in 41, it comes in with a 40 morale and 20 experience. Leaving it out of combat for a few months can raise it's morale to 50 or a little higher and give the unit a chance to train. There's a big difference between a 50/35 unit and a 40/20 unit. Of course, that first summer, it's hard not to throw most of those 40/20s into the line which can be very painful.

[Rotherman]

Will there be any rules which allow the Fuhrer to intervene in any of the scenarios?

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: Rotherman

Will there be any rules which allow the Fuhrer to intervene in any of the scenarios?

None so far and AFAIK there will be none. Units come and go along historical timetables so you could look at that as Hitler meddling.

[wurger54]

Once more...

Question: Is there a way to simulate the intentional retreat/panic (depending on the interpretation) of Soviet units that resulted in the Germans 'kesseling' little more than air during '42?

[jaw]

ORIGINAL: wurger54

Once more...

Question: Is there a way to simulate the intentional retreat/panic (depending on the interpretation) of Soviet units that resulted in the Germans 'kesseling' little more than air during '42?

That is not a correct intrepretation of what occurred. Please read David Glantz's TO THE GATES OF STALINGRAD, it contains the most accurate explanation of the '42 campaign I've ever read.

[ComradeP]

The Germans present the battle for Kursk as the first major operation where the Soviet HQ's didn't more or less panic in the initial stages. In all other operations before that, the Germans say they intercepted lots of panicky "what should we do?" radio transmissions. The troops themselves might not have panicked at the start of the summer 1942 campaign, but their HQ's were still shaky if the Germans are to be believed.

[jaw]

ORIGINAL: ComradeP

The Germans present the battle for Kursk as the first major operation where the Soviet HQ's didn't more or less panic in the initial stages. In all other operations before that, the Germans say they intercepted lots of panicky "what should we do?" radio transmissions. The troops themselves might not have panicked at the start of the summer 1942 campaign, but their HQ's were still shaky if the Germans are to be believed.

Read Glantz, not self-serving German accounts.