Penalty for Hoarding PPs

[battlevonwar]

For Western Nations I see this is not a bad thing, but the -50 PP hoarding event is rather irritating. Especially for the likes of the USSR/Germany... Both nations being less than Free

Often I notice it forces these two nations to spend frivolously when a large savings account would be nice for a future defense or offense.

[Rasputitsa]

ORIGINAL: battlevonwar
For Western Nations I see this is not a bad thing, but the -50 PP hoarding event is rather irritating. Especially for the likes of the USSR/Germany... Both nations being less than Free

Often I notice it forces these two nations to spend frivolously when a large savings account would be nice for a future defense or offense.

There should be a limit to how many PPs a nation could stockpile, as there would not be the ability to store unlimited supplies. There is a cost in moving and storing resources, but historically nations had the ability to store several weeks (game turns) of supply and equipment (PPs).

I read somewhere that the US had more equipment in the supply chain at the end of the war in 1945, than had actually been used in fighting the war, that would be many game turns worth of PPs. However, that sort of stockpile could unbalance the game, but a compromise figure might be possible.

Another point on PPs is how they are spent, it is unrealistic to be able to spend all your PPs in a turn on providing replacements for only certain types of unit. For example, spending all your PPs in repairing TAC air units, how many hundreds of aircraft would there be to provide the replacements, certainly not from one week's production.

I am thinking about some method of setting PP priorities, requiring the player to chose whether the replacement production priority should be on Subs, or Fighters, or Armour, etc.. The PPs you could spend on the reinforcement of each category of unit, each turn, would be limited by the production priorities you have chosen.

It would be nice if the game could permit the setting of production priorities in respect of replacements/reinforcements, but if not, then it could be done with self imposed house rules, as usual, this would not apply to the AI, but it needs the help and I need the challenge. [:)]

[battlevonwar]

1 week is a short time..I totally agree... and the ability to say heck I am going to spend cash on any number of items I choose. i.e. In an emergency, when you are facing an unexpected offensive and you really need reinforcements. If you were focusing on building transport ships for a naval offensive, now you're really in deep doodoo. You could lose 10-20 divisions very fast on a Large Front.

I could see where this would add a dynamic to the game.

[Razz1]

Germany swims in prestige.
That's why Norway must be conquered in the Third Reich.

The PP's penalty has been increase to 550 in the Third Reich and the chance reduced a little.

[Omnius]

I think the corruption penalty is a case of chrome gone wild. I think it's rather petty to punish players who are trying to save up PP's for major items like nuclear research that costs 1,000 PP's or Tank Corps that cost over 900 PP's. I think that maybe over 1,500 PP's should trigger the corruption penalty.

Saving PP's for some emergency is rather silly, as building new units that take time to build and deploy isn't the best way to counter some emergency. Much better to get units built, even if not deployed to save on upkeep. At least then you have a reserve that's rady to deploy at a moment's notice.

Oh well one can always use the F12 key as Rasputitsa loves to suggest or can go in and edit the saved game files like I found is easy to do to replace stolen PP's due to corruption events. [X(]
Omnius

[doomtrader]

I can reduce the effect of this penalty

[gwgardner]

Don't do it! It's moddable. Let those who don't like the effect mod it.

to me it is an immenently practical effect, reflecting the incredible inefficiency and corruption of government; a reading of economic histories of the war is replete with examples.

[Rasputitsa]

ORIGINAL: Omnius
Saving PP's for some emergency is rather silly, as building new units that take time to build and deploy isn't the best way to counter some emergency. Much better to get units built, even if not deployed to save on upkeep. At least then you have a reserve that's rady to deploy at a moment's notice.

Oh well one can always use the F12 key as Rasputitsa loves to suggest or can go in and edit the saved game files like I found is easy to do to replace stolen PP's due to corruption events. [X(]
Omnius

Omnius
Surprised that you suggest building units and not deploying, especially after throwing the 'cheat' word around so much. It's like coming to a card game with aces stuffed up your sleeves, cards should be on the table and units should be on the map.[X(]

It's a good strategy to have units in reserve, but hiding them in the deployment box to avoid upkeep costs must be an exploit. They are hidden from air recon and can't be bombed, with no upkeep they would be skeletons in rusty tanks, by the time you spring them on your opponent.[:-]

Building up a stockpile of supplies and equipment is a reasonable and realistic strategy, having units in reserve is also a good policy, but holding them near the front, or maybe in the rear areas, is part of the strategy of the game, not hiding off map.[:'(]

The stockpile discussion is about replacement and repairing units and not just about building new units. The problem with a stockpile of PPs is how they are spent, as in any one turn you can choose to spend all your PPs on replacement TAC bombers, or ships, or tanks, at will. History wasn't like that, you couldn't draw on hundreds of replacement aircraft one week, then decide to make your replacement stockpile all tanks the next week. I would like to see some kind of replacement production priority.

It would be part of the strategy that if you have chosen to put priority on replacement subs and aircraft, you can't have as many replacement tanks, or if the decision is for fighters, then fewer bombers and so on. I am thinking of a having a display to select priority on spending PPs for repairing Air, Sea, or Land forces and sub-categories like Fighter, Tactical, or Strategic bombers and, if you have selected the priority for one type, then there will be less PPs for the other types.

It would be the nice if the game could do this and happy to have a more detailed discussion if there is any interest, especially if Doomtrader thinks that this is something the game could do. Either way, I have a framework of personal house rules to control the setting up of a nation's PP stockpile and allocating priorities on how they can be used. It's more book-keeping, but using 'notepad' I can easily do this, as with other house rules I use.

F12 allows me to adjust the PP levels for nations, removing PPs each turn to create the equivalent of a national stockpile of supplies and replacement equipment, then releasing PPs back into the national account to be used under a framework of house rules, depending on what replacement priorities have been set in previous turns. At the moment experimenting with setting replacement priorities at the beginning of one game month, to be active in the next game month. If the game has a feature, like F12, that can be used to quickly adjust the way it works, without the need for modding, its seems stupid not to make use if it.

The object is to make the game more realistic and challenging and, as I am playing against the AI I can set these things up for myself, if the game can provide a display and do the book-keeping all the better, either way I'm happy.[8D]

Rasputitsa

[Rasputitsa]

ORIGINAL: gwgardner
Don't do it! It's moddable. Let those who don't like the effect mod it.

to me it is an immenently practical effect, reflecting the incredible inefficiency and corruption of government; a reading of economic histories of the war is replete with examples.

There is a natural reluctance to modify game files, I am just as guilty in making use of other people's modding work, including yours (for which I am very grateful), but changing the game files has been doable, even for a novice modder.

The much maligned F12 gives a quick and easy way of adjusting PP and DP levels for each nation, without the potential for making a mistake modifying game files. Anyone who thinks the PP levels are wrong can easily change them to what they believe is a more accurate figure. However, the game is easily modded for those who want to.

Everyone's view of the correct game settings is going to be different and the devs can't bounce around trying to please everyone. If there is a clear consensus, then fine, change the game, otherwise the devs have made the game flexible enough for most people to get what they want. [:)]

[Omnius]

ORIGINAL: Rasputitsa
Omnius
Surprised that you suggest building units and not deploying, especially after throwing the 'cheat' word around so much. It's like coming to a card game with aces stuffed up your sleeves, cards should be on the table and units should be on the map.[X(]

It's a good strategy to have units in reserve, but hiding them in the deployment box to avoid upkeep costs must be an exploit. They are hidden from air recon and can't be bombed, with no upkeep they would be skeletons in rusty tanks, by the time you spring them on your opponent.[:-]

Building up a stockpile of supplies and equipment is a reasonable and realistic strategy, having units in reserve is also a good policy, but holding them near the front, or maybe in the rear areas, is part of the strategy of the game, not hiding off map.[:'(]

The stockpile discussion is about replacement and repairing units and not just about building new units. The problem with a stockpile of PPs is how they are spent, as in any one turn you can choose to spend all your PPs on replacement TAC bombers, or ships, or tanks, at will. History wasn't like that, you couldn't draw on hundreds of replacement aircraft one week, then decide to make your replacement stockpile all tanks the next week. I would like to see some kind of replacement production priority.

It would be part of the strategy that if you have chosen to put priority on replacement subs and aircraft, you can't have as many replacement tanks, or if the decision is for fighters, then fewer bombers and so on. I am thinking of a having a display to select priority on spending PPs for repairing Air, Sea, or Land forces and sub-categories like Fighter, Tactical, or Strategic bombers and, if you have selected the priority for one type, then there will be less PPs for the other types.

It would be the nice if the game could do this and happy to have a more detailed discussion if there is any interest, especially if Doomtrader thinks that this is something the game could do. Either way, I have a framework of personal house rules to control the setting up of a nation's PP stockpile and allocating priorities on how they can be used. It's more book-keeping, but using 'notepad' I can easily do this, as with other house rules I use.

F12 allows me to adjust the PP levels for nations, removing PPs each turn to create the equivalent of a national stockpile of supplies and replacement equipment, then releasing PPs back into the national account to be used under a framework of house rules, depending on what replacement priorities have been set in previous turns. At the moment experimenting with setting replacement priorities at the beginning of one game month, to be active in the next game month. If the game has a feature, like F12, that can be used to quickly adjust the way it works, without the need for modding, its seems stupid not to make use if it.

The object is to make the game more realistic and challenging and, as I am playing against the AI I can set these things up for myself, if the game can provide a display and do the book-keeping all the better, either way I'm happy.[8D]

Rasputitsa

Rasputitsa,
That's rich, you of all people complaining about how to cheat? You are the most prolific at suggesting to everyone who complains about something on this forum to use the F12 cheat, I never would have known about it if you hadn't been the one to suggest using that in-game cheat to me.

Whether I would build units then keep from deploying them to save on upkeep or have a secret reserve or you use notepad to make a list of how many PP's you're keeping off the real books it's really pretty much the same, cheating. Besides many times in the war someone's "secret" reserve really ruined someone else's day, like the German secret buildup for the Battle of the Bulge.

I found that while the AI cheats it really isn't challenging, it just makes too many stupid moves and too few smart moves. I find that the best challenge is to play every country myself, then I'm only cheating myself and I can cheat for any country I want. This game just doesn't lend itself to honest play considering the far too easy saved game files that can be edited at a whim.

I did try out being able to move a Polish unit into Slovakia, then add 6 more AP's so I could move it to Bratislava on turn 1 to dump Slovakia. Heck I even saw that I could change another unit's position to just magically "beam" that unit straight to Bratislava. The nice thing was that Slovakia was gone and Germany gained a little for Slovakia as annexed production.

It's really just personal preference. I doubt that this game will ever last long for me, just not the WW2 strategic game system I was looking for. The political system is pathetic when it comes to Vichy France, oh it forms really nice but to have the Allied AI attack Vichy France so it becomes German home territory is just too unrealistic for me.
Omnius

[Omnius]

Rasputitsa,
I'm sure you'll be glad to know you convinced me to try out Commander - Europe at War. Unfortunately Time of Fury just isn't the WW2 strategic level wargame I was looking for, nor Strategic War in Europe. It's the messed up political system that dooms this game for me. Italy not surrendering until it's last VP city is conquered, or the same for any country just doesn't track with history. The lack of liberation just doesn't work for me. Plus the lack of data integrity that promotes cheating just isn't my cup of tea.
Omnius

[Rasputitsa]

ORIGINAL: Omnius
Rasputitsa,
I'm sure you'll be glad to know you convinced me to try out Commander - Europe at War. Unfortunately Time of Fury just isn't the WW2 strategic level wargame I was looking for, nor Strategic War in Europe. It's the messed up political system that dooms this game for me. Italy not surrendering until it's last VP city is conquered, or the same for any country just doesn't track with history. The lack of liberation just doesn't work for me. Plus the lack of data integrity that promotes cheating just isn't my cup of tea.
Omnius

Omnius,
I would be glad to know that you have found a game that you like, I play TOF and Commander-EAW (Lordz-Grand Strategy v2.10 mod) and enjoy them both, also looking at Commander-The Great War which I have bought, but not played yet. I am lurking on the Great War forum, seeing how the issues of naval warfare and air power are resolved. If you are interested in WW1 naval operations, look at Naval Warfare Simulations (NWS) 'Steam and Iron', don't be put off by the basic graphics, it's a great game, with a realistic 'feel' and good product support.

We differ on the question of liberation, but we each pay our money and what you want from the game is up to you.

You can see, from the TOF forum, that those players who have been able to change, or modify the game are enjoying it the most. Some have gone further and created full scenarios, which the accessibility of the game system makes possible. I have made adjustments to many aspects of the game and that has paid off in improving the game for me, but it's obvious that others don't want to have to change game files, which is the reason to refer so often to F12. It is a way to adjust PPs and DPs, which are the currency of the game, without having to resort to modding files and risk scrambling the game.

The ease of modding files does bring in the problem of data integrity for PBEM, but this is not an issue for me, as real life intervenes too much to commit to PBEM.

You will have seen that all the suggestions that I have made are intended to make the game more challenging using the AI, more realistic limitations on amphibious operations, delaying the speed of rail repair, adjusting trenching to allow the Soviets in particular to dig deeper, restrictions on PP spend to stop all PPs in any turn being spent on the same type of replacement equipment, etc.. I don't see this as a cheat as the object is to make the game more difficult, not to get some advantage. PP accounting in 'notebook' merely ensures that I don't spend PPs inadvertently, when I have allocated them for another use, especially when planning for an amphibious operation with house rules that require up to 6 moths game time to achieve. It does not increase the number of PPs, just makes the book-keeping easier, which is not a cheat.

It's infuriating when you go onto forums to be told, 'just play the game my way and it'll be fine'. That's not the intention here, it's sharing experiences and ideas, but it's always up to each player to decide how far to go.

The AI may be dumb, but it's not that dumb and when you're not able to rail move units easily around the map, repair air units at will, essentially work under the same restrictions which applied historically, then the AI is no push-over. If I find that things are getting too easy, then I look for a way of making it realistically more difficult, reach for F12, or into the scenario 'const' file.

The main thing is that we each enjoy the experience, however we find to do that. I am enjoying TOF a lot and I hope that you find what you are looking for. [:)]

Rasputitsa.