Norm Koger's The Operational Art of War III is the next game in the award-winning Operational Art of War game series. TOAW3 is updated and enhanced version of the TOAW: Century of Warfare game series. TOAW3 is a turn based game covering operational warfare from 1850-2015. Game scale is from 2.5km to 50km and half day to full week turns. TOAW3 scenarios have been designed by over 70 designers and included over 130 scenarios. TOAW3 comes complete with a full game editor.
RE: linked campaigns. I agree completely. For the reasons you enumerated, I did The Road to Moscow for TOAW, I-VIII. (Crossing the Border, Smolensk, Kiev, Vyasma, At the Gates, etc. One-day turns, Division level, roughly 30-50 turns.)
It is included in TOAW v3.4, and I am working on the most recent updates. Let me know what you think...
That's cool. I loaded up a couple of the scenarios from Road to Moscow. Interesting. I'll give these a closer look.
But what I meant was a full-theater, all-encompassing, multi-year linked historical campaign using the FITE map (or its equivalent). Has anybody thought of solving the "mud problem" by that means?
ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson
Yeah, what Telumar said. There's rules about the morale and fatigue of each individual unit ( TOAW has readiness and supply ) and there's attrition just from being adjacent to an enemy unit ( simulating low-scale snipping back and forth I guess ) and there the aerial re-supply of units which I think is the cat's meow. So those Panzers that are way way out in front of the supply pipeline can still be re-supplied ( somewhat ) and the Soviets can have night flights of transports to supply their partisans ( and drop NKVD supervisors, small arms, explosives, etc. to the partisans )........I mean there's a whole new level of detail in WITE. But the turns aren't so time consuming that play is inhibited. Most of the things a human being can be involved with ( aircraft upgrades, committment of reserve aircraft, rail-road engineers being expedited to specific repair sites, etc. ) are also automated so effectively all the human is there for is to move the units around and squeeze the last ounce of performance out of the units. The manual for this WITE game is almost 400 pages long packed with pictures and verbage to explain just about everything that can happen in the game so I've read it about four times now and I'm STILL "finding" new things. I'm told that WITE is WITP-AE lite. Which means that there's player involvement but not all that much ( WITP-AE is viewed more as a click-fest or "chore" than a game per se. I've seen some of my turns as the Soviet player take about 30 minutes or less. Zort and I can do perhaps four turns per day to each other. But then again we're both retired. There's a controversy on-going about whether or not the winter of '41-'42 is too severe on the Germans and that that reason alone may be the cause of more abandoned games in early '42. But there's a patch ( version 1.04, scheduled for sometime in April ) coming out to specifically address that. So the AAR's dealing with the winter are going to be under development staff survailence to see how the new patch effects things. Or is that affects things? And like Telumar was hinting there's an OOB that is flexible.......you can detach one or more units from one ARMY and attach it( them ) to a different Army on the fly. We're told that disbanding the Soviet Rifle Corps HQ unit is a good thing as it removes an effectively unused link in the chain from the Front HQ unit to the actual rifle division on the front line. Stavka HQ -> Front HQ ( or Military District ) -> Corps HQ -> Army HQ -> Rifle Division(s) is the chain I'm referring to here. And each of those steps in the chain can have supporting units ( engineers, artillery, mortars, etc. ) that they can commit to any of the battles of any of the divisions under their command ( either offensive battles or defensive battles ). And there's a "die-roll" to determine if the committment is successful or not. The thinking is that it's easier to have the supporting units in the Army HQ unit rather in each of the individual divisions as long as there is a "good" leader in charge of the Army HQ. Oh, and leaders have attributes as well, which can vary somewhat around a "national average" for that nation. Serbian leaders suck naturally and German leaders are world class and Soviet leaders vary depending on who you're talking about. And each leader can be "dismissed" and replaced with a better leader by you ( or by the AI that drives the game depending on the win-loss differences). The turns are weekly so they have abstracted out the blowing / repairing of bridges which is one thing I miss from TOAW and I'm not used to units not having to dig in when you stop moving them but go ahead and think of some detail from real life that deals with warfare and it's probably already been dealt with in some form or fashion. You'd have to peruse the manual to see what I mean. The learning curve is steep ( like in TOAW ) but that's only because of all the details you can have an effect on. Gameplay is rather simple though. Did I happen to mention that I really like the aerial re-supply of units? I'm posting a picture that shows the graphic representation of a re-supply mission. The black line is the airplane(s) coming from their home base to the "staging base" where they take on the cargo ( either "supplies" food for the horses, ammo, etc. or like in this case, fuel) and the red line is the actual flight path from the staging base to the individual unit receiving the supplies.
Thanks, Larry. But, I'm not sure if I'm all that impressed - yet. I think everything you've mentioned above was also present in War In Russia (Grigsby's earlier EF sim). While WiR was good for it's day, that was long ago. I was hoping WitE would take a big step beyond that. Perhaps it does, but I just can't tell from what's been posted.
Volume Supply. A good thing, but only as good as the model for distributing it is. In WiR, it was very abstracted. As a result, using a few C&C tricks, you could keep the Axis forces fully supplied all the way to the Urals. Furthermore, the entire captured rail net was repaired shockingly fast. Just how is the "volume" transported? Physically, or abstractly?
I'm also concerned about the map shot you showed. No roads? No towns? Are there distinctions between large and small rivers? Between light woods and forest? Between marsh and flooded marsh?, etc. Where are the rail heads? WiR had a very simplistic map.
What about equipment? WiR only had generic squads and artillery. There were tank-types, but that was it. How does WitE compare with TOAW's equipment list?
So I downloaded it ( 638 M bytes....about 1/2 hour on broadband ) and started pushing some counters around and I fell in LOVE with it. It's got great graphics and sound effects and details out the ying yang.
Larry, can you elaborate some? Are there things we could incorporate into TOAW (or FITE)?
A lot of stuff people have asked for and been told it's not necessary actually.
Volume Supply. A good thing, but only as good as the model for distributing it is. In WiR, it was very abstracted. As a result, using a few C&C tricks, you could keep the Axis forces fully supplied all the way to the Urals. Furthermore, the entire captured rail net was repaired shockingly fast. Just how is the "volume" transported? Physically, or abstractly?
Works great. Even divides up ammo, fuel and supply (everything else). Just like people suggested for TOAW for some time. Oh, and a truck is a truck. [;)]
ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay
I'm also concerned about the map shot you showed. No roads? No towns? Are there distinctions between large and small rivers? Between light woods and forest? Between marsh and flooded marsh?, etc. Where are the rail heads? WiR had a very simplistic map.
The way movement is depicted roads aren't really necessary. Towns, lots of them and they have good purpose. Rivers are two types, just like in TOAW. Woods ditto. Swamp is swamp. One size fits all. City, urban, heavy urban, depending on pop.
ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay
What about equipment? WiR only had generic squads and artillery. There were tank-types, but that was it. How does WitE compare with TOAW's equipment list?
Nothing generic. All weapons are modeled down to the individual weapon. The equipment list is a bit more detailed than TOAW. And probably a bit more correct. Have to remember, TOAW is a toolbox type of game. WitE is WitE. Can't really compare the two actually. It's like comparing a 1/2 inch socket to an adjustable wrench. The socket will always fit a 1/2 inch head better. But that's all it will fit.
I bought it and wish I had waited. They are still doing a lot of patching.
I'm a bit curious about how much you paid for WITE, as it is sold a surprising 60/65 euros (90 bucks [:o]), rather expensive.
I thought so too but went ahead and used up my yearly game budget. If they would drop the price a little or put out a demo they would probably sell a lot more copies. [:D]
ORIGINAL: Panama
I bought it and wish I had waited. They are still doing a lot of patching.
I'm glad I didn't wait. I'm having a ball even with the patching going on. To each his own I guess.
Unfortunately for people who are playing the 41-45 scenario the next patch will have a large impact on game play. tm.asp?m=2762023
I would suggest people who are considering buying the game and want to know what it's like go to the forum. Lots of information there. I wish they would at least let people have the manual for free since they don't want to do a demo for a very expensive game. It would help.
ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay
Larry, can you elaborate some? Are there things we could incorporate into TOAW (or FITE)?
I could only hope that a game designed to do just the Eastern Front would be the best representation. And that players of only this scenario would move on. But alas, I am wrong. TOAW will likely continue to neglect it's unique advantages in concept in order to pursue one specific scenario.
ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay
Larry, can you elaborate some? Are there things we could incorporate into TOAW (or FITE)?
I could only hope that a game designed to do just the Eastern Front would be the best representation. And that players of only this scenario would move on. But alas, I am wrong. TOAW will likely continue to neglect it's unique advantages in concept in order to pursue one specific scenario.
The vast majority of enhancements people have asked for have nothing to do with one specific scenario. They would be very useful in any scenario.
You're probably right. If not all, some should be enough I suppose. Still I think the point needs to be made, and I'm willing to take the criticism for making it.
ORIGINAL: sPzAbt653
How does WITE handle the mud turns ?
As I recall the FITE mud turns are non-combat turns with free movement allowed. WITE turns the MP's down drastically depicting the difficulty in getting from A to B and combat occurs as usual.
ORIGINAL: sPzAbt653
How does WITE handle the mud turns ?
As I recall the FITE mud turns are non-combat turns with free movement allowed. WITE turns the MP's down drastically depicting the difficulty in getting from A to B and combat occurs as usual.
That is different from the cease-fire mud turns in FitE, but not as good as the negative shock in D21, because in D21 you get reduced supply, reduced movement, and reduced combat. The mud historically affected combat, as the ability to move heavy equipment around was greatly impaired.
I glossed over a LOT of the details of winter / mud turns and actually the rules are just about to change. There's a patch coming out soon which will address the alledged game imbalance due to the winter rules. Here's Joel Billings ( developer for WITE ):
We are testing a 1.04. Many bugs were fixed, and several major changes were made that will have a big impact on game balance. We are targeting a beta release during the first full week of April, but things could get delayed. Also, because these changes are significant and will require a lot of time to test, we will probably be in beta with 1.04 for awhile, and anyone using 1.04 should realize that the game balance could be significantly different then what it was. We think 1.03 is a good stable game worth playing. For those interested in helping us make the game even better, we welcome your participation with the beta 1.04 when it's ready. We hope that obvious bugs will be found before release, but the balance is something we won't be sure about until we have more (and longer) test results from the public and the testers.
Here's is our current list of changes. This list has been changing and will likely change again before we release a 1.04 (not just new items but some of these items may be changed or removed entirely.
V1.04.001 – Beta – March 22, 2011
• New Features and Rule Changes
1) Changes with Version Numbers – The main menu now lists both the installed version number and the exe version number for the program being used. This makes it easier to use multiple copies of the game with different versions on one computer. The top windows bar will still display only the installed version number. We have also changed our version numbering to show 3 additional digits in the version number instead of labeling versions beta 1, beta 2, etc. --- The exe version number is also shown now as the last entry in the logistics phase event log. This is the version number that was being used during the logistics phase, so it is now possible to see what version your PBEM or Multiplayer opponent was using at the end of their turn.
2) New Rule - Damaged equipment and manpower returned to the pool during the logistics phase are not available immediately to be used as replacements. Although they appear in the pool on the production screen, they actually are put in a “transit pool”. At the start of each friendly logistics phase, 25% of the amount in the transit pool is moved to the available pool. This represents the lost time from the front of lightly wounded soldiers and damaged equipment.
3) New Rule - Units from different Luftflotte’s or Air Armies will not participate in the same air mission.
4) Rules Changes to First Winter rules:
(a) (Section 22.3.1) Changed the CV modifications in January 1942 as follows: Attacking CV is divided by 2 (instead of /3). Any missed check (admin or combat skill) causes CV to be further divided by 3 (instead of /4). Defending CV is divided by 1.5 (instead of /2 – previously this was incorrectly listed as /4). Any missed checks causes CV to be further divided by 1.5 (instead of /2). The displayed on counter CVs are divided by 2 for attack and 1.5 for defense (instead of /3 and /2).
(b) (Section 22.3.1) Changed the CV modifications in February 1942 as follows: Attacking CV is divided by 1.5 (instead of /3). Any missed check (admin or combat skill) causes CV to be further divided by 2 (instead of /4). Defending CV is divided by 1.33 (instead of /2 – previously this was incorrectly listed as /4). Any missed checks causes CV to be further divided by 1.33 (instead of /2). The displayed on counter CVs are divided by 1.5 for attack and 1.33 for defense (instead of /3 and /2).
(c) (Section 22.3.2) The percent of damaged elements has been reduced in December 41 so instead of roughly 5-20% the losses are now roughly 1-7% (the damage losses are still reduced by 50% in Jan/Feb 1942). Units subject to this damage will now see their damage reduced if they are in a hex that has a fort level. The amount of the reduction is the fort level squared as follows:
1. Fort Level 1 – 1% reduction
2. Fort Level 2 – 4% reduction
3. Fort Level 3 – 9% reduction
4. Fort Level 4 – 16% reduction
5. Fort Level 5 – 25% reduction
So a unit in a fort level 4 that would have suffered 6% attrition will now suffer roughly 5% attrition.
(d) (Section 22.3.3) The Morale drop for exposed units was reduced from 2 to 1.
(e) (Section 22.3.3) Removed the automatic pre-combat morale reduction of 2 when morale was less than 60.
(f) (Section 22.3.3) Added a loss of 1 morale for non-Finnish Axis units whenever they are attacked and the final end of combat odds are greater than 1:2.
(g) (Section 22.3.4) Axis units tracing supply to a railhead in the affected area (22.3) will have the amount of supply they receive reduced by 25% after all other modifications. (previously it was reduced 50%).
5) Rule Changes to fort level construction rules:
(a) (Section 15.3.2.1) Decreased the fort build rates as follows:
Fort Level 0 3.0 (was 3.0, no change)
Fort Level 1 1.0 (was 1.0, no change)
Fort Level 2 0.25 (was 0.33)
Fort Level 3 0.05 (was 0.10)
Fort Level 4 0.01 (was 0.02)
(b) Construction values are reduced based on the supply level of the unit. In no event will they be reduced below 20% of normal due to supply level.
(c) Level 5 forts may continue to build up to 10% over level 5. This allows them to take some damage and still remain at Level 5.
(d) Artillery (especially Heavy Artillery) can cause small fort reductions during combat.
(e) Fort build rates for building forts greater than 3 can be divided by 2 if a leader admin check fails.
6) Rule and Formula Changes to Movement Attrition:
(a) Non-AFV elements of motorized divisions will no longer suffer enhanced movement fatigue.
(b) Increased the average movement fatigue, especially for non-motorized units.
(c) Increased the chance of non-AFV elements breaking down during movement.
(d) Movement break down is decreased in case of successful Admin Rolls.
7) Rule Change – The amount of support units can be increased by the level of fortification in the defending hex.
8) Rule Change - Introduced the concept of a commanding HQ for each side for each combat. Generally this commanding HQ is selected because it has the most CVs directly reporting to it in the battle. Units not reporting directly to the commanding HQ will suffer command battle modifiers that will reduce their CV for the battle. The battle report now lists the units in the battle grouped under the name of the HQ they report to. If an HQ’s units are suffering a command battle modifier, the amount of the CV reduction is shown next to the name of the HQ (for example XXIV Panzer Corps -36% indicates that each unit listed in this corps has had its CV reduced by 36%). The greater the number of HQ’s that the unit must trace through to reach the commanding HQ, the greater the modifier. In addition, units that report directly to a high command HQ suffer an additional 20% modifier, and those that report directly to an Army Group or Front suffer an additional 10% modifier (these are shown as part of the total modifier percentage displayed).
9) Rule Change – Adjusted the amount of morale a unit loses after a battle. Now units are not guaranteed to lose a morale point when a battle is lost. The higher a unit’s morale is over its national morale, the greater the chance the morale will be reduced when it loses a battle.
10) Rule Change – (Section 18.2.1) Damaged units sent back to the pool during the logistics phase now have 40% of their manpower disabled (instead of 20%).
11) Rule Change – (Section 15.4.1) Artillery (ART,MORT,ROCKET,AT) support units have priority to be committed into a battle during a special commitment phase. During this round of commitments, defending HQ's have a chance of committing 3 more than the normal limit of committed HQs (so 9 or 21 instead of 6 or 18). After this round, the normal commitment round is conducted.
12) Rule Change – (Section 9.5.2) Increased front line attrition, but reduced the proportion of these attrition loss that is KIA to 30% (was 50%). The net impact should be similar KIA but an increased amount of manpower disabled due to front line attrition.
13) Multiplayer Change - Added 'Resign' option to the games list.
14) Multiplayer Change - Added 'Show Completed' and 'Show Resigned' buttons to the games screen to allow filtering of the game list
15) Multiplayer Change - Added 'hover' text to the games and challenges lists to display additional information about games.
16) Multiplayer Change – Now when an attempt to save the game fails, the user will be informed of this event and given the opportunity to try again.
17) Formula Changes - Reduced the effectiveness of interdiction in terms of casualties caused. Increased the chance that interdiction will cause movement point reduction to the interdicted unit.
18) Formula Change - Decreased the morale reduction for air groups.
19) Formula Change - Air strikes are more fragmented now depending on experience and leader checks.
20) Formula Change – Reduced the amount of planes flying recon interception missions.
21) Interface Change - Added AA units directly attached to cities to the OOB display.
22) Interface Change – Added turn, date and location information to the battle reports.
23) Interface Change - Units that are already assigned to an HQ will not appear on that HQ’s list on the Pick Support Unit Window when the Assign/Form button has been selected.
24) Interface Change - Added the number of ready, damaged and reserve aircraft to the reinforcement screen for each air group listed.
25) New Message - Added a message to the event log when an empty unit is disbanded.
26) New Editor Feature - Added COPY/CLEAR functions to the TOE(OB) editor.
• Bug Fixes
1. Fixed a bug causing incorrect numbers being shown in the number of men moving to and from the pool in the Event Log.
2. Fixed a bug causing some withdrawing units to incorrectly place their equipment and manpower in the pool.
3. Fixed a bug where Axis units could ignore the TOE% settings during the first winter.
4. Fixed a bug in the truck loss routine that was adding manpower to the pool when trucks were damaged.
5. Made sure that the CR and OOB screen numbers agree. There were some discrepancies that could cause the two to disagree.
6. Fixed bugs that caused the AI to sometimes move support units to off-map/delayed HQs and “inactive” support units to on map HQs.
7. Fixed a bug that caused units moving by naval transport to get stuck in a water hex when it was interdicted.
8. Fixed a bug in which small factories could report different amount of equipment built than those that actually went to the pool.
9. Fixed combat so odds may no longer be shown as 0:0.
10. Fixed a bug that could cause routed tank divisions to not correctly transform to delayed tank brigades.
11. Fixed a problem in which the disband routine was not bringing some damaged equipment back to the pool.
12. Fixed a bug where inactive support units were passing through the upgrade/swap ground types procedure, placing and taking equipment to/from the pool.
13. Fixed a bug where the number of partisan cadres formed was incorrect.
14. Fixed a bug that was causing ports to be repaired too quickly.
15. Fixed a bug in the path tracing that could prevent defending units to receive support units help in a battle.
16. Fixed a bug that caused a unit to not be able to trace a movement path through a hex with 3 friendly units.
17. Fixed a bug where a guards unit was created with the same name as that of an existing guards unit.
18. Fixed a bug causing manpower loss/gain when escaped squads convert to partisans.
19. Fixed a bug in the Set All Unit MPs function in the editor that doesn't set MP for the Axis units correctly on June 22 1941.
20. Fixed Motorcycles Squads so they are set to infantry class instead of artillery class.
21. Fixed Heavy Infantry Guns so they are set to artillery class instead of infantry class.
22. Fixed a bug where Artillery Regiments had the option to assign another support unit to them, something that should never happen.
23. Fixed a bug where damaged elements were not having their manpower sent to the pool when due to an OB change the elements were no longer needed (the manpower was just being lost).
24. Fixed a bug where elements that were being exchanged due to a TOE change or upgrade were not properly accounting for the difference in manpower between the old and new elements.
25. Fixed a bug that could cause inaccurate record keeping of manpower lost from retreat attrition.
26. Fixed a bug that could prevent a totally empty Soviet or German unit removed from the map from being brought back on the map to be rebuilt.
27. Fixed a bug where ground elements which had an upgrade path set to 0 (instead of to themselves) could have some of their elements incorrectly sent back to the pool.
28. Fixed bugs where the map popup was not closing correctly when either ground element details of support units were displayed, or when TOE(OB) of support units attached to a city were displayed.
29. Fixed a bug where HQ units moving by naval transport were stopping when they entered an enemy zone of control in a water hex.
30. Fixed a bug where CV counter values for Axis units during the first winter were not displaying the correct modified CV value for the “attack”.
31. Fixed a bug preventing support units directly attached to combat units from helping in fort construction. Also fixed a bug that had allowed “inactive” support units to allow in fort construction.
32. Fixed a bug where undoing an air base unit movement could wipe out air groups recently assigned to the air base from reserve.
33. Fixed another instance where an isolated AI unit makes an illegal escape.
34. Fixed a bug where new units could be formed in reserved slots in the database (0, 8172-8191).
35. Fixed a bug where Soviet Military Districts and the Moscow Defense Zone that were isolated could not be destroyed when they should have been (they should be disbanded after October 1941 if they are forced to retreat).
36. Fixed a bug where HQ or routed units can start the turn next to an enemy combat unit when other units in the stack surrendered during the logistic phase.
37. Fixed a bug where enemy units were revealed by selecting a friendly unit and then shift-clicking on remote hexes.
38. Made a change so that frontline attrition will never cause damage beyond the amount of ready squads.
39. Fixed a problem where the unit names of units disbanded during combat were not being reported in the battle report.
40. Fixed a bug where delayed air groups could reset their plane count on load/saving a scenario.
• Data and Scenario Changes
1. Small adjustments of Heavy Panzer Battalions for correct OBs for arrival dates
2. Moved the 653rd and 654th Heavy Panzerjager Battalions arrival date to 3 Jun 43
3. Changed the Soviet 1st BAK Commander to Izotov in all 1941 scenarios
4. Adjusted Operation Blue's Victory Points to make a German decisive victory a little easier. Stalingrad is now worth 300 VPs to the Germans at the end of the scenario (was 200). Soviet VPs for Baku is now worth 200 (was 300).
5. Fixed Soviet overstack in 1943 Campaign at 85,24
6. Ernst Leyser put as commander of XXVI Corps in 1943 Campaign
7. Ran SET ALL CITY SUPPLY REQUIREMENTS in all non-campaign scenarios
8. Updated leader file with corrections to German names
ORIGINAL: sPzAbt653
As there is volume based supply, do attachments affect supply of the parent formation, or is each unit treated separately ?
Each unit is treated separately but they draw their supply from two sources: the owing HQ unit OR from a railhead hex ( defined as a working rail hex).
ORIGINAL: sPzAbt653
Can you attach whatever you want ? For example, can a corp hold 20 divisions ?
There's no limit to what you can attach ( air bases attach to "air" HQ's though ) but there's a catch: each new attachment lowers the chance for a successful die-roll for that leader so there's a practical "limit". The working "limit" is something like 24 divisions per Corps HQ and something like 90 divisions per Front HQ. Something like that. I've owned the WITE game for something like two weeks now so some details are still hazy in my head.
Think you're quite a bit off there Larry. The limits are much less, but without the game in front of me, I can't give exact answers. They can be found on the WITE forum, hiowever.
Occasionally, and randomly, problems and solutions collide. The probability of these collisions is inversely related to the number of committees working on the solutions. -- Me.
While there is no limit to the number of units that can be attached to an HQ, the "Penalty free" numbers are 4 divisions per corps, 12 divisions per army in 1941 and 48 per army group, with these numbers increasing each year.
Overloaded HQs can compensate to a degree by placing leaders with high admin ratings in command.
