Gary Grigsby’s War in the East: The German-Soviet War 1941-1945 is a turn-based World War II strategy game stretching across the entire Eastern Front. Gamers can engage in an epic campaign, including division-sized battles with realistic and historical terrain, weather, orders of battle, logistics and combat results.
The critically and fan-acclaimed Eastern Front mega-game Gary Grigsby’s War in the East just got bigger and better with Gary Grigsby’s War in the East: Don to the Danube! This expansion to the award-winning War in the East comes with a wide array of later war scenarios ranging from short but intense 6 turn bouts like the Battle for Kharkov (1942) to immense 37-turn engagements taking place across multiple nations like Drama on the Danube (Summer 1944 – Spring 1945).
If the forum allowed Polls. We should have a poll.
Is the First Winter broke? etc
I have no idea only played ze Germans once.
I think we should first form an "Exploration Committee" to see if the idea of "polls" has any merit and should be undertaken. Once the committee report is in with their first draft, we can consider electing representatives to a permanent guidance body. After they decide who gets to sit at the head of the table, and other important issues, the real work can begin.
We really should take this idea, turn it into "Game Development by Committee" and run with it.
I kid, but not really.[;)]
PS: This isn't aimed at you, Cookie. Just a general feeling of malaise as we wait for the Developers/Testers to come to terms with what they want to do with the winter, if anything.
ORIGINAL: Mynok
It's quite a curious behavior that people feel compelled to start another thread about a subject that has been incessantly beaten about for a solid week.
People don't read other threads before posting.... that's why some opinionated people (khm!) feel the need to repeat their opinion in every thread. I mean, I would not want anyone to miss on my opinion about two waves of supermen! [;)]
ORIGINAL: Mynok
It's quite a curious behavior that people feel compelled to start another thread about a subject that has been incessantly beaten about for a solid week.
People don't read other threads before posting.... that's why some opinionated people (khm!) feel the need to repeat their opinion in every thread. I mean, I would not want anyone to miss on my opinion about two waves of supermen! [;)]
As a matter of fact, if you google "two waves of supermen" you are the only hit!![:)]
Pompack does make a very valid point that applies equally to AI and PBEM games, in that the relative condition of the 2 armies going into the blizzard has a major influence on the condition of the 2 armies coming out of the Blizzard, although I disagree with him about the location of the front line not mattering.
I would agree that his numbers are pretty good benchmarks, and I always tried to get across the 4 million threshold in all my tests.
The contentious point remains that an imbalance going in magnifies the imbalance coming out.
So of course our friend Oleg, with his vast experience of one whole turn of blizzard as the Axis chimes in and says "what about the AARs where the Axis have gone in in a better condition, and come out worse"? Well, I think, but cannot confirm yet,that the morale, experience, and most importantly the armaments bugs turned the Axis army into a very fragile entity compared to the condition it was in in my tests up to October. All the bugs were introduced after my tests, due to the phenomenon of fixing one thing and breaking three others, and although we intended to have pathfinder test games that would spot any problems, games were being played much faster than the pathfinder tests, so players were finding the problems before testers were.
As Joel has noted in another thread, 1.03 does not "fix" the blizzard, and the Axis army, even with the bug fixes will be more fragile than the one I tested, but not as bad as the ones that suffered from the armaments bug. I plan to start a check list in a separate thread, of things to do to get the Axis into the best possible shape to face the blizzard.
A stronger Axis army will reduce the ability of a weaker SU Army to attack it, but again I don't know the "tipping point" that will get the number of soviet successful attacks below the "Manageable" threshold of 45ish. And again, the only benchmark I have is my game with Trey. I have asked Joel if he will move the AAR of this game from the development forums to the public forums to help me better illustrate the points I have been trying to make.
I based the house rules suggested in another thread on my assessment of the current fragility of the Axis army under V1.03, so I think the Soviet punch, will stagger, but not shatter the Axis.
I'm restarting my game with Von Beanie, with Bob's house rules. I think it will help alot. If I emerge in OK shape, then we'll see how 42-43-44 go.
I will remind anyone that gives up so early, it took 5 years to get WITP-AE "Right", and that was a complex game engine. This is also a complex game engine, there are so many levers to pull, that it's very tough to do it "Right" the first time.
I still had fun against Von Beanie getting my butt handed to me, so approach it in that spirit, and give Bob and the testers the data they need to tweak it to make it better.
PS: If you are playing against the AI, winter works fine. The AI needs the extra "Help" IMO. If you are still losing, you need to play better.
Pompack does make a very valid point that applies equally to AI and PBEM games, in that the relative condition of the 2 armies going into the blizzard has a major influence on the condition of the 2 armies coming out of the Blizzard, although I disagree with him about the location of the front line not mattering.
Oh, I get carried away with the rhetoric sometimes (many times? Usually? Always? whatever [:D])
I was just trying to point out that if you take Leningrad, sit on the outskirts of Moscow and fort up in Rostov after inflicting 3,000,000 casualties then you are in for a very rough winter. OTOH if you are holding the line Riga-Minsk-Vinnitsa-Odessa after slaughtering 5,000,000 then you should count on an auto victory NLT mid43.
The amount of progress you make does matter but so far it seems to be secondery to inflicted casualties in the AARs and my experience to date. I wish that I could demonstrate that a pure Comrade Robinovski can be defeated but so far I have not seen it.
I bought WITE pretty much when it came out and have played 3 games against a buddy, each one up until December. These games spanned from the very first release right up to 1.05.
Yes, the winter 41 implementation needs further tweaking. But we noticed great improvements as Matrix and 2by3 listened to users and implemented incremental changes and fixes at a blazing pace, each one providing improvements. I work in IT and am amazed at the level of support these guys are providing.
They will get this game to where it needs to be to satisfy their customers - there's no doubt about it. But these things take time, and a large user base in order to spot the otherwise unspottable. (I recently put an app into pilot after months of testing with a team of 5. Days after we had broadened the base to 100 users, we had a list of 30 new bugs or improvements to deal with !)
WITE-wise, my opponent and I decided to take a bit of a break from redoing the opening moves of Barbarossa earlier this week. We fired up a 1942 campaign.
WOW ! Whole new situation, whole new set of challenges. It brought the first thrill right back.
And it still has 170-some turns ...
We're going to tinker with this a bit. It required a mindset change to forego the start of the campaign and "accept" a pre-set 1942 start, to be honest. But then, I harken back to my days of playing board games like Third Reich or World in Flames : One could start in 1939 (or even earlier with add-ons) and by mid-41 (or even earlier!), unleash one's own flavour of Barbarossa. Starting in 1941 with a pre-set Barbarossa in those games would have meant foregoing the ability to invade Russia "differently", and seemed like anathema. But our group eventually tired of invading Poland, France, etc. and we eventually came to 1941 starts.
Those historically-set-up 1941 starts were eye-openers, and skipping the "preliminaries" brought us to the crux of WWII.
I guess my point is that there's a tremendous amount of value in WITE for the price. Explore the other start points for a while if winter 41 has you down. It will get adjusted in good time.
ORIGINAL: BigAnorak
So of course our friend Oleg, with his vast experience of one whole turn of blizzard as the Axis chimes in and says "what about the AARs where the Axis have gone in in a better condition, and come out worse"?
[:D]
I love you too Big, no kidding I truely believe you testers are doing a great job. Just don't give up yet, and don't let those tactless bastr'ds on the public forum sidetrack you with their "vast experience".....
I believe we all have one sensible goal, regardless of fanboyism, and that's to finally get the HvH 41 GC in *playable* (kinda realistic/historic) state in spring 42. I think you will agree so far in all AARs and player stories it simply didn't happen.
ORIGINAL: pompack
I was just trying to point out that if you take Leningrad, sit on the outskirts of Moscow and fort up in Rostov after inflicting 3,000,000 casualties then you are in for a very rough winter. OTOH if you are holding the line Riga-Minsk-Vinnitsa-Odessa after slaughtering 5,000,000 then you should count on an auto victory NLT mid43.
That is correct, however it's incredibly hard to inflict that many casualties in HvH game.... so the game should find a way to "award" Axis players for territory not only casualties.
Common sense would suggest that Axis player is (sort of) awarded for the territory he took by the VP system, where he can retreat slowly, and, having more territory than historic Axis, may win on points in 45. However, that is not the case if in blizzard he loses all that he gained (and more).
Oleg this continuos complaining about the blizzard is now mute until the developers unveil their modification. Joel has indicated that sometime in 1.04 they intend to mod the winter. We can safely assume it will benifit the German army/hinder the Russian army. So we may as well be patient now see what transpires.
As far as the Russian run away strategy goes it means that Russia will loose much industry and manpower against any competent German. The new rail costs make it impossible to get the bulk of it out in time. So Russia faces the decision of either loose army or loose teritory/industry/manpower. Either = Bad.
As for how that will play out in the post 1.04 world of blizzard no one can tell at this stage.
I bought WITE pretty much when it came out and have played 3 games against a buddy, each one up until December. These games spanned from the very first release right up to 1.05.
A post from the future!?! [:D]
Do tell us how things are in release 1.05! [:'(]
"Measure civilization by the ability of citizens to mock government with impunity" -- Unknown
Pom, what do you mean by winning? Gamewise or ideal?
As for the 2 waves of supermen. I report what have been written in other thread : isn't the low loses of the German a result of the Soviet Strategy? Historically the soviet counter attack a lot which in the end did damaged the German manpower. The corrolary point of view is that the ability to the soviet to launch lots of counter-attacks is linked to the fact that they save a lots of manpower (I do think the winter help a lots but to which extend?).
Before wanting to solve the 2 waves of supermen, one need to sort out the part due to strategy (which is fine and shouldn't be change) and the part due to the rules (that should be tweaked). The only way : try to mimic historical event.
Well, how badly do you get mauled? Historically they had to take the front hundreds of kilometers back in some spots.
okay, i know i repeat myself...
IF the germans push to far they should get kicked in winter 41.
If they do better as the historical results, they should be better prepared.
Also - the germans were kicked back in CERTAIN areas, causing huge losses.
In the moment, blizzard say: it doesn´t matter how good the german player is, how prepared. Blizzard kicks him around and his army is shattered beyond any sense.
THAT is the problem.
Sadly it is hardcoded.... so no easy workaround.
I hope you unterstood the problem - untill know i do not belive you do - no offending words in this, just a plain answer to your comment
Don't tickle yourself with some moralist crap thinking we have some sort of obligation to help these people. We're there for our self-interest, and anything we do to be 'nice' should be considered a courtesy dweebespit
Don't tickle yourself with some moralist crap thinking we have some sort of obligation to help these people. We're there for our self-interest, and anything we do to be 'nice' should be considered a courtesy dweebespit
ORIGINAL: pompack
I was just trying to point out that if you take Leningrad, sit on the outskirts of Moscow and fort up in Rostov after inflicting 3,000,000 casualties then you are in for a very rough winter. OTOH if you are holding the line Riga-Minsk-Vinnitsa-Odessa after slaughtering 5,000,000 then you should count on an auto victory NLT mid43.
That is correct, however it's incredibly hard to inflict that many casualties in HvH game.... so the game should find a way to "award" Axis players for territory not only casualties.
Common sense would suggest that Axis player is (sort of) awarded for the territory he took by the VP system, where he can retreat slowly, and, having more territory than historic Axis, may win on points in 45. However, that is not the case if in blizzard he loses all that he gained (and more).
I haven't tried it but I strongly doubt that killing 5,000,000 Soviets will result in an automatic German victory if the Wehrmacht only reached the mentioned line by the first winter. I could be wrong but I'd imagine all the production from the unconquered cities would make a Soviet recovery possible, especially given the time necessary to take the vast areas still held by the Red Army.
I also don't believe that common sense suggests that the VP system should automatically reward the German player for taking more territory than historical. If you overextend to take territory and get crushed because of that then there is obviously no reason to be rewarded for that. It's different, of course, if you only get crushed because of unrealistic game mechanics.
