How much time to play each turn?

[Grotius]

Hi guys,

I'm looking forward to picking this up, once my current crazy work week is over. But I'm wondering -- how long does it take to play each turn vs the AI? How about in PBEM? An hour a turn? Less, more?

Can't wait to try it.

[elmo3]

It really depends on how much micro managing you want to do.  And it depends on the scenario/campaign you are playing too.  You won't finish a campaign turn in an hour if you really want to manage everything in detail but you can finish scenario turns in that amount of time.

[Dr. Foo]

I am 40 mins into turn one of the campaign and I have not even got into Army Group Center yet. But I am really taking my time and going over everything, I am sure I am still missing tons of stuff I think I will be able to move along faster once I figure what I need to manage and what the AI can handle.

[Grim.Reaper]

Besides how long it takes a human player to perform all the moves, how long does it take the AI to process its turn?  Minutes...seconds...etc.

[Neal_MLC]

Just remember it took 1 week for them to complete the first turn in real life[:D]

[malfid]

As a Soviet player primarily concerned with responding to Axis attacks during the first months of the war, I spend about 30 minutes on the orders phase, each turn.

Shuffling my forces around consumes the bulk of that time, as I am not really attacking, for the moment. I am also being very lackadaisical when it comes to the micromanagement - leaders, air groups and supply don't really interest me too much, for the moment. I'll use the operational lull in September to make sense of the mess.

I can imagine that a decent Axis player would probably take a fair bit longer with his turns, at this stage. There are always long turns and short turns, though...

[Zovs]

The 1941 campaign for the Soviets can last up to four hours or more if you really try to squeeze everything out of your forces. On average for me I was doing 2.5 to 3 hours per turn versus the master tester (Saber). The Axis turn does not seem to take as long about 1.5 to 3 hours in micromanagement mode.

Depedning on what I am playing I'll micro manage the air force, HQs, divisions/corps, support level attachments TOE %, review the Leaders performances, watch and analyze the dead pool and inflicted losses, and a bunch of other myriad things, so it really depends on the person. Also this is for the campaign games and the smaller 10, 17 and 20/25 turns scenarios do require as much time due to smaller map and unit density.

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: Grim.Reaper

Besides how long it takes a human player to perform all the moves, how long does it take the AI to process its turn?  Minutes...seconds...etc.

Well again that depends on your CPU, what scenario/campaign you are playing, and what settings you are using. Some campaign turns can take 5 minutes or more for the AI even on my system which is an i7-930 @ 2.8 GHz. When testing campaign games of AI vs AI with all reporting and sound off it only took a minute or two.

[markgravitygood]

I too am close to taking the plunge on this game and I'd like to know how long it takes to play a single turn if I let the computer manage all the things it can outside of my basic move/attack orders. Pretty much playing it in a way that would be similar to playing an old hex-and-counter game like Avalon Hill's Russian Campaign.

if I have to really spend 2-4 hours per turn over the entire game learning this monster it might not be for me. Given it will be slow at first, but I'd like to know that I can jump into the game with some enjoyment after a little trial by fire and start pushing counters with some effect.

Any comments?

[Oshawott]

The best way to learn the game is to play the Road to Leningrad scenario. You can play the whole scenario against the AI in one day and learn all the key concepts.

The Grand Campaign is a monster. If you don't take the necessary time you get frustrated fast.

[Disgruntled Veteran]

ORIGINAL: markgravitygood

I too am close to taking the plunge on this game and I'd like to know how long it takes to play a single turn if I let the computer manage all the things it can outside of my basic move/attack orders. Pretty much playing it in a way that would be similar to playing an old hex-and-counter game like Avalon Hill's Russian Campaign.

if I have to really spend 2-4 hours per turn over the entire game learning this monster it might not be for me. Given it will be slow at first, but I'd like to know that I can jump into the game with some enjoyment after a little trial by fire and start pushing counters with some effect.

Any comments?

For the axis: The 41 year can take up to 2-3 hours for the first turn and 1-2 hours for the whole campaign. The mud turns take considerably less and by the time the first winter comes you have such a good grip on your formations that turns should take between 1-1.5 hours. Sometimes less than an hour. The start of the 42 season will take a bit of time too, but you get the hang of it real quick.

[heliodorus04]

One thing to read between the lines in ALL of these answers:
none of the answers are telling you that they find it tedious, regardless of the way they micromanage (or don't).

In the end, you'll do it to the level that's enjoyable for you. The menus and interface are pretty elegant. Once you know what information matters to you, it's one-click away. The Road to Leningrad is indeed a great teacher.

I have found that as I evolve as a player, I learn more of the nuance that micromanagement can produce, and I've slowly delved more and more into it, always finding it more fun than not.

Most people who play vs. the AI (and I'm one of them) get good enough (quickly) that as the German they have to turn the difficulty up one notch from Normal, and as the Soviet, one or two notches.

Another aspect of turn duration is how much detail you want in your combat resolution detail.
Set it to 9 accidentally one time, and go take a nap... (note that if you accidentally set it to 9, you can adjust mid-combat to shorten it). I have never cared for step-by-step combat results. Just tell me who won/lost.

[carlkay58]

If you have the expansion sets you will have quite a few small scenarios that can be played in four to five hours total. If you do not, you will find that an hour or so a turn for a campaign game is about right for most people. The more you micromanage the longer your turns may take, but most micromanagement is time consuming for a turn or two to initially set it all up and then becomes second nature to maintain your desires.

[cato12]

I probably average about 1 hour a turn. this is playing as axis, haven't played as soviets yet.

turn processing is very quick for me, takes around 1 minute.

im talking about the grand campaign playing the alternate cv campaign as well which is meant to take longer to process turns.