Air power still seems overpowered

[Hubert Cater]

ORIGINAL: Harrybanana

All I can say is that this is what happened to me in my game with Yeremenko (which I have now resigned). In fact, as I said it happened twice, first to a full strength Army in Portsmouth (which I think was only entrenched to level 1 or 2) and then to a full strength Corps in Bristol with maximum entrenchment. Admittedly I don't think either unit was attached to an HQ. But the unit in Portsmouth was defended by an AA in an adjacent hex and both Cities had their AA upgraded to level 1.

You say you attacked with 7 TAC, but in my game my opponent first attacked with 2 (or maybe even 3) Med Bombers to reduce the entrenchment and efficiency of the defending unit. Did you try that? The usual MO is to attack the enemy unit first with corps or Med Bombers to reduce the entrenchment, then finish it off with TAC.

Thanks and I just re-ran the test starting with 2 Medium Bombers, also with 1 experience point and Level-1 Ground Attack applied and also attached to the same HQ that has 2 experience points and then followed up with 5 Tactical Bombers instead of the 7, and on a first try was able to bring the Corps down to 3. Granted it could have been possibly knocked out with more favourable +/- modifiers per attack, but the 3 seemed an average result as it was +1 on a few attacks and -1 one on the others.

The defending Corps is attached to an HQ, and for the test I ran the Corps of course starts at 90% readiness and 100% morale. On the subsequent turn, after having its morale completely reduced from the previous rounds attack, and even though it started back at strength 10 after having been reinforced, it was much more quickly reduced and only needed half the attacks.

So on the surface it feels reasonable enough in the sense that an attached HQ for the defender, and morale and readiness are playing a big part in the combat results, and that after a few rounds of concentrated attack the unit would eventually be no longer able to withstand the withering assault. I just say this as it took arguably considerable effort to reduce the unit to 0 after two turns, but of course it started out optimally as well.

Granted, in game terms, not every defending unit will start out as optimally, but if it does, it will take a very thorough and persistent effort to knock it out which again tells me we are ideally not that far off from reality (with how the current game mechanics are working as it is taking into account all the other factors as needed) even if defending land units are being destroyed by air units in the end.

So for me at least it comes back to whether such a concentration of air power should be further curbed, and remember some may like the ability to be able to do this as there are still pros and cons to this choice for the Axis after the USSR gets involved, and/or if defenders should be destroyable by air power alone.

[Hubert Cater]

Thanks PvtBenjamin and if the US air unit had just been operated then it would have lost some morale as a result. I didn't test out the other example you provided.

Again I'd need to see all the factors to know if it is working as it should under the current game mechanics because as mentioned I can get wildly different results depending on all the numbers. Not trying to be difficult here, I'm really not, it's just a matter of do we want the other factors to play a role or not sort of thing? And if we do they really should not be discounted and need to be considered as integrally as all the other factors you've described.

On massing of air units, and especially in North Africa, has your opponent brought extra HQs there? And if so how did this strategy possibly hinder his efforts in the USSR? I'm just asking as it would be good to have a fuller and bigger picture idea on what sort of long term effects may have been in play, as well as if the new HQ attachment rules for air units is having a bit of a desired effect for situations like this or not.

[Hubert Cater]

Thanks KorutZelva, this is helpful as well and really any "solution" or adjustment just needs to ensure the game is not broken in another way due to cause and effect, which is why I am asking a lot of questions and running tests. This is something that needs to be thoroughly thought through as it potentially is not an insignificant change.

[cato13]

ORIGINAL: Hubert Cater

Thanks for the feedback everyone and off hand it is a bit hard to say one way or the other if things are potentially askew as there are a lot of different examples listed above, and without the numbers, i.e. levels, experience, supply, HQ attachments, there are potentially just too many factors that could have played a part in some of the results.

For example, in the unescorted German Strategic Bomber example above facing off against a 10 str Lv 5 US fighter, I can get results anywhere from 1:7, 4:5 to 7:1 depending on what Level the German Strategic Bomber is, how much experience it has, who it is attached to, the supply level and so on and this would also change depending on the US fighter experience and who it is attached to as well.

I also ran a test where I had a fully entrenched Corps in Bristol, with AA Level-1 and attacked it with 7 Tactical bombers, all with 1 experience point, attached to an HQ with 2 experience points and all at supply 9, and a range of Ground Attack levels from 1 to 3 for the Tactical Bombers and at best I could knock the Corps down to strength 5, but more often than not it stayed in the range of 7 or 8 strength.

However, generally speaking, and let's say we are looking at Tactical Bombers, they are currently set where you can expect them to take 2-3 strength points between closely matched units, i.e. a Level-1 Tactical Bomber at 9 supply with no experience will inflict 1:3 on a supply 8 fully strength Corps that is out in the open.

Since increased Ground Attack levels will be cancelled out by increased AA applied to defenders, this ratio will tend to stay the same until supply levels, attachments, and experience become alternative factors. In this light, I'd argue that having an air unit being able to take 2-3 points of damage is not necessarily a bad thing as it does help to keep the flow of the game moving, especially for the Axis in the early years regarding Poland, France, Balkans and then Barbarossa, but beyond that I can see two main points of contention, possibly three:

1) Should air units inflict any strength point damage at all?
2) Should air units be allowed to mass together?
3) Should air units be allowed to destroy a unit?

For 1) I would still argue yes as otherwise the early parts of the game, especially the flow and timelines, would potentially suffer. Very early on, many air unit attacks are spread out so inflicting 2-3 points of damage is helpful and typically a ground unit is required to finish the unit off. Unless you start with ground units and then finish off with air after the fact, but essentially it is rarer that a grouping of air units is wiping out units all on their own. Later on this can happen as more air units are built and tactics possibly change with this in mind.

For 2) we have attempted to limit this with recent changes to how air units are linked to HQs, but if a player would still like to mass their air units, and they put in the effort to do so with the right number of HQs, then this is possible. Question really is here if this should be forcibly limited further from our end, or is it reasonable enough for a player to be rewarded if this is their strategy? Often there are pros and cons to this strategy and other areas may suffer and increased costs may be involved and at times the gains are short lived especially if another part of the war has suffered as a result. For example, the Axis may go all in for North Africa and it may feel overpowered there, but in the long run Barbarossa suffers and big picture wise the war may ultimately be lost despite the initial feelings of things being terribly unbalanced.

For 3) the bigger concern for me would be if air units are destroying ground units outright, i.e. from full strength, or was it a unit already severely weakened and on its last legs, or from a concentration of multiple attacks, and even possibly air attacks. If it is the former I think this would be a problem, but I suspect it is only the latter, which could be amended if it is indeed a deal breaker, but we'd have to be careful to not disrupt the flow of the game that is also quite important as well.

Very interesting read hubert.

I would say yes to point 1 and 2. i have zero issues with air units inflicting pain on ground units although the more i think about it the more im coming round to the idea of air units not affecting strength at all but certainly reducing morale and readiness.

it just seems silly seeing large ground formations being wiped out single handedly by air units

regarding point 2, i havent played pbem so im not sure how big an issue this is but my gut feelin is that if someone wants to spend lots of precious IC massing air units then it means they aint spending those points on something else which can have a downside as well.

my main beef is point 3. my current game has pretty much been ruined as most of my axis african force has been removed from the map by air units alone. admittedly the units arent in great shape but they were all 10 strength units.

and this is against the AI. i can only imagine how frustrating this would be in pbem.

my solution would be to simply reduce the damage that air units inflict but you are better placed than me to decide what effect that would have on the game overall! [:)]

[KorutZelva]

ORIGINAL: Hubert Cater

Thanks KorutZelva, this is helpful as well and really any "solution" or adjustment just needs to ensure the game is not broken in another way due to cause and effect, which is why I am asking a lot of questions and running tests. This is something that needs to be thoroughly thought through as it potentially is not an insignificant change.

I'd help run test if I was more computer savvy. [:)]

It is true that there are many factor to consider. Right now Year 1 of Barbarossa can be conducted without air due to the poverty of USSR in units and poor fighting performance. There isn't much of an opportunity cost to not base much air force there until the USSR has inf tech 2 at the minimum. This rewards big concentration of air force in the middle east and NA.

[James Taylor]

I've been dealing with this air issue for like 15 years now and I think the relevant point is Hubert's #2, the massing of air units.

This is most probably the greatest deviation of what happened in real life. To cut to the chase, the new rule of HQ attachment was a good start, but not far enough.

Since an HQ usually represents an army group commander, the nominal attachment of air units should be capped at 2/per HQ. The players could still mass air units to some degree, but their effectiveness would be greatly diminished.

The other anominaly being a player would need to concentrate up to 4 HQs in one area to accomplish the current air massing status. Not a likely scenario.

[Sugar]

This is most probably the greatest deviation of what happened in real life. To cut to the chase, the new rule of HQ attachment was a good start, but not far enough.

The opposite is true: the Germans massed their air units in Poland and France, with devastating effects. They failed to do so in NA, now you want the Axis player to repeat that failing?

To quote Rommel: "Even the bravest soldier is hit by a bomb"; in face of the Allies` air superiority of course.

Beside the fact that conquering Malta would be nearly impossible, the attack values of bombers have already been reduced. And by the way, it`s not impossible to stop bombing, air superiority can also be achieved by fighters. I managed to destroy the entire DAK including superior bomber formations by attacking into their assembly in several PbEMs. Next time a player is confronted with such circumstances he will undoubtly demand to reduce attack values of fighters, instead of asking how he can improve his gameplay.

In comparison to Breakthrough SoE, the numbers and attack values of tanks are also reduced, and the necessity to develop Inf. 3 for the SU leads together to the impossibility to counterattack prior to 43; if something is disturbing the balance in PbEMs (and it is imho in favour of the Axis), then that are the reasons.

My suggestions: reduce the number of german tac. bombers by 1 from the start including their force pool cap., add. 4 (3 for Brits and Italy) tanks to the force pool cap. of each major, delete heavy tanks, and reduce russian Inf. to 2 again, with the same values of every other nation. Maybe it would also be necessary to increase the attack values of tanks by 1.

This way the tanks would gain a more decisive role, like it was in the beginning of the war.

[PvtBenjamin]

So Sugar you are arguing that the entire Axis air force in Northern Africa makes sense.

[Sugar]

Not only it makes sense, it`s necessary to do and in this case also easily available.

In SC no unit is insuperable, be it by multiple attacks of bombers or other units; aircraft are cheaper to operate than transporting land units (and unsinkable); but the same is true for the Brits. You`ll have to take Malta anyway, the planes are therefore already there.

In Breakthrough SoE there was no DAK, this could also be a solution, since it`s too cheap anyway. Or place the DAK in Palermo to give the Allies an opportunity to stop shipment.

If there were no other solutions, I'd perhaps agree to crippling the tac. bombing (which would have a huge impact on the Allies later in the war also); at least there are. I won all my Allied PbEMs despite those circumstances by never losing NA, although I prefer the Axis and they`re slightly in favour imho.

[Harrybanana]

ORIGINAL: Sugar

The opposite is true: the Germans massed their air units in Poland and France, with devastating effects. They failed to do so in NA, now you want the Axis player to repeat that failing?

In the game the "massed" air force attacking Poland is only 1 Med and 2 TAC. True the Germans will have more when they invade France, but generally not as much as they will have when attacking in NA. Historically I don't think the Germans could have sent the entire Luftwaffe to Libya even if they wanted to. Even if Malta were captured supplying that many aircraft would have been impossible even if there were the necessary number of air fields. But it is not that the Axis can concentrate all of the Luftwaffe in a small area that is so wrong IMO, it is that all of these aircraft can attack the same hex.

Beside the fact that conquering Malta would be nearly impossible

Would it be impossible? By using BBs to bombard the town hex to 0 and any naval unit to blockade the ports supply to Malta can be reduced to 0 so the AA there can not reinforce.

[Sugar]

In RL how many Germans would have been necessary to overrun the Brits? 1 additional Pz Div. (they had 21 in spring 41) and a few Jagdgeschwader I guess, and an undisturbed supply line after the fall of Malta. Stupid Nazis didn`t, they fought the war for political reasons, ignoring strat. requirements. (Just to clarify: there stupid for being Nazis, not for losing).

It`s of course questionable, if they could have won the war, but in this game Cairo is a stratical goal and therefore a necessary requirement for winning.

Would it be impossible? By using BBs to bombard the town hex to 0 and any naval unit to blockade the ports supply to Malta can be reduced to 0 so the AA there can not reinforce.

Of course, if the Allied player is just starring...

Why don`t you ever think about deniying them to let them bomb at will? The airfighting is one of the best mechanics I ever faced in a strategy game, it worked already fine in the predecessor, why shouldn't it work now?

The unbalance results from the sovyet weakness; they won`t be able to defend their objectives, nor will they be able to threaten them after losing.

[KorutZelva]

ORIGINAL: Sugar

The opposite is true: the Germans massed their air units in Poland and France, with devastating effects. They failed to do so in NA, now you want the Axis player to repeat that failing?

To quote Rommel: "Even the bravest soldier is hit by a bomb"; in face of the Allies` air superiority of course.

Beside the fact that conquering Malta would be nearly impossible, the attack values of bombers have already been reduced. And by the way, it`s not impossible to stop bombing, air superiority can also be achieved by fighters. I managed to destroy the entire DAK including superior bomber formations by attacking into their assembly in several PbEMs. Next time a player is confronted with such circumstances he will undoubtly demand to reduce attack values of fighters, instead of asking how he can improve his gameplay.

In comparison to Breakthrough SoE, the numbers and attack values of tanks are also reduced, and the necessity to develop Inf. 3 for the SU leads together to the impossibility to counterattack prior to 43; if something is disturbing the balance in PbEMs (and it is imho in favour of the Axis), then that are the reasons.

My suggestions: reduce the number of german tac. bombers by 1 from the start including their force pool cap., add. 4 (3 for Brits and Italy) tanks to the force pool cap. of each major, delete heavy tanks, and reduce russian Inf. to 2 again, with the same values of every other nation. Maybe it would also be necessary to increase the attack values of tanks by 1.

This way the tanks would gain a more decisive role, like it was in the beginning of the war.

Sugar, Sugar, Sugar... Where do I even begin?

Let's start with a famous example of the limits of bombing: Stalingrad being bombed to hell until the rubbles became a better defensive terrain for the defender.

If your argument is that the air is just fine by saying 'I blew up the DAK as it spawns (and before a real battle could occur)', how is it demonstrative in any way that the balance is just fine? You could make the opposite case, that you are forced to act as such because of the unbalance in the mechanics and that acting as such is your only way out of an air showdown in the med. If there is only one way out, that's a red flag.

Here's where we agree:
a-Game as of now is Axis favoured (and will be more so with the sub change)
b-The USSR is too weak (and can't think of counter-attacks in any capacity before 1943)
c-Land force could be more important in offensives

Bonus agreement: I don't think we should too overtly impede concentration of air force.

Here's where we don't
d-bomber pack too much punch

A big part of (a) is (b).

Let's look at the reason why the USSR can't really counter attack before 1943. There's the infantry tech gap, that's a important one. But technically the shock army, mech inf and tanks should have parity or close by 1942 and these one should be able to be used in such a manner but they can't currently. One of the reason is that you don't have enough of them yet but another, and that's a big one, is that it's not safe for them to venture anywhere because of the German Airforce (my reason (d)). They have to stay in entrenchment, covered by AA and fighters and bid for time.

So let's look at what makes bomber powerful, with a particular interest for the German wing.

-Tac reduce entrenchment at level 2, allowing them to overwhelm enemy in great numbers in most situation. (Especially opposing airforce!)
-Intercepting bombers w escort barely impede the bomber ability to cause damage to units.
-Super HQ mitigate damage to bombers and escort

Let's expand on the last one. German HQ start with higher rating (in general) and start with a command tech edge over the allies on top of it. They face weak enemy at the start where they can accumulate exp quickly. Given the HQ exp acquisition scheme that requires inflicting more damage than you receive to gain exp. Allied HQ can be shut up from the exp game for long stretch of time which impedes their ability to mount a air defence (and also USSR ability to counter).

Now what do we do?

You suggested taking a plane out of the force pool and upping the tank stats. This would marginally impact the air game but introduce a great change to the land game. We'd have to run the test, but that sounds like creating more problems than it fixes. Namely, USSR wouldn't be any better for it because they wouldn't have the number of tanks to make use of this to put up a stronger resistance. They would likely worst of even if we eliminate the tech 3 requirement. The german army would have an airforce still 95% as destructive but stronger and more numerous tanks. Yikes.

If we go nip at the super HQ syndrome it might mitigate the damage output of bomber without having to overhaul the whole stats scheme of units. Air superiority would have more an attrition component on the german side. The drawback is that we'd still get the huge NA airfield and maybe more so because you'd need more to do the same thing.

What if we turn them into flying artillery? Concentration of air would still happen but you wouldn't see 10 bomber in NA because the front there wouldn't warrant having that many. Sealion or Barbarossa though? Go crazy, targets and land units-a-plenty to overrun the suppressed unit. Another big thing: you wouldn't be able to use them to instawipe the opponent airforce and turn more the air battle into an attrition battle fought in the skies. The drawback is that overall damage potential of combatants would be reduced and would probably require to return the tank stats to Breakthrough-level like you suggested.

And with stronger tanks then maybe anti-tank tech suddenly becomes a relevant tech again... [:)]

[Taxman66]

What about keeping the USSR INF Weapons situation (i.e. they need 3 levels) the same... but give them a starting chit in it? And/or maybe a starting chit in Spying/Research?

The NA situation is begging for a more limited supply rule(s). Even with Malta taken out (which, btw, is so easy to do it's silly) there would be a shipping limit on what could get through and throwing more HQs into NA wouldn't/shouldn't automatically solve the problem.

----
However, as I said before, this is a game and the designers want a (near) equal chance for either side to win the war. If we made things historical (minus the FUBAR decisions) there would no longer be an equal chance for either side to win. The victory conditions would have to change to be more along the lines of 'When the Axis are defeated'.

[Leadwieght]

It seems we are discussing two related, but distinct issues:

1. Are bomber units too powerful TACTICALLY vs. land units? In other words are they capable of doing so much damage to land units that it creates highly unrealistic results?
2. Are they STRATEGICALLY too flexible, such that a concentration of air power is so easy and so deadly that it creates highly unrealistic results?

The rule changes since the first release have attenuated bombers' tactical strength somewhat and limited their strategic flexibility.

I'd argue against further waekening bombers' tactical punch, largely because doing so could easily make Sealion virtually impossible.
And a game without the realistic possibility of Sealion is MUCH easier for the Allied player.
Too much easier IMO.

So, on the tactical side I'd suggest either strengthening the defensive effects of AA upgrades, or better yet, allowing land units to upgrade to Level-3 AA, instead of the current cap of level-2.
In that way, the Luftwaffe could still be a potent force early in the war, but would gradually become less powerful as the Allies beefed up their AA defenses. But the Allied numerical advantage would, I think, give the Axis less benefit from the raised AA cap later in the war

On the strategic side, I'd suggest making Operational movement of air units a little less flexible.
Perhaps air units should only be allowed to Operate to City, Town, or Settlement hexes, and not to adjacent hexes.
Perhaps air units should only be allowed to Operate into Cities/Towns/Settlements with a supply level of 5 or higher.
(in either case they could move freely to other hexes after being Operated)

Those sort of restrictions on Operational movement would limit some of the more blatantly ahistorical possibilities that we've all seen:
Like the entire Luftwaffe appearing in Libya two months after the fall of France, or half the Luftwaffe pops up to Northern Finland for the summer to take Murmansk and is back south in time to help seize Leningrad or Moscow

Such moves of vast amounts of airpower to distant, sparsely inhabited regions would not be impossible (nor should they be), but such moves would be slower and a bit riskier.

I take the point (forget who made it) that we don't want the rules to force the Germans, for instance, to make the same mistakes they made in the real war, but surely one of the reasons the Germans did not send huge airfleets to Libya was the lack of facilities and the difficulty of supplying them once they got there.

[Sugar]

Gentleman, I highly appreciate this discussion, and I agree with most of you that the commitment of the german tac. and med. bombers is one of the issues, and the weakness of the SU is another one. Nevertheless I don`t like the idea to cripple one of the most valuable branches - especially considering it will be necessary to turn the tide for the Allies - more than absolutely necessary.

In addition to some thoughts I´d suggest to
- cut the range of both tac. and med. bombers by 1, in order to get them more easily into the range of fighters
- reduce the starting units for Germany by 1 tac., in addition to cutting their forcepool by 2 (would be 20% enough for you KZ? [;)])
- add 1 tank instead, and 1 additional to their force cap
- add 1 defense value to russian tanks to reflect their historical superiority (or maybe 0.5, if 1 turns out to be too much)
- increase costs of tac. + med. bombers by 50, as well as their costs of operating
- add 1 brit fighter, appearing after the fall of France, in order to represent their ability to deliver a greater deal to the Luftwaffe

[KorutZelva]

ORIGINAL: Leadwieght

I'd argue against further waekening bombers' tactical punch, largely because doing so could easily make Sealion virtually impossible.
And a game without the realistic possibility of Sealion is MUCH easier for the Allied player.
Too much easier IMO.

That's a different discussion but I wouldn't mind making Sealion harder, while upping its reward possibility. Right now sealion can almost be accomplished on the cheap, on a snap decision, bomb to hell, paradrop, capture port, transport troop in. Amphibious transport play a support role.

Turn bombers into artillery, you suddenly more troops on the ground at launch to take advantage. Amphibious and logistic tech become more important and probably would need to be invested in advance.

To raise the stakes I'd put a condition to UK moving their capital to Canada to: 'The USA or USSR must be in the war'. Basically the thinking is, if they get overrun and no other allied major are activated they would sue for peace and Germany wins a 'Major Victory'. After all they couldn't guess Germany was going to attack the USSR or if the USA would ever get off their asses, it's not too far fetched that they would strike a deal to preserve most of their oversea empire.

That way, it becomes a gambit to end the game early for the Axis player (a la SC 1 might I had!). To go for the jugular so to speak!

[PvtBenjamin]

On massing of air units, and especially in North Africa, has your opponent brought extra HQs there? And if so how did this strategy possibly hinder his efforts in the USSR? I'm just asking as it would be good to have a fuller and bigger picture idea on what sort of long term effects may have been in play, as well as if the new HQ attachment rules for air units is having a bit of a desired effect for situations like this or not. Bill

Bill I think the Axis has 2 German HQ 1 Italian HQ maybe 3 German in 1940 in Libya. With all the air power in Libya it doesn't take long to control Cairo Suez. I send additional Anti Air / Carrier /all fighters to no avail. Skilled Axis player will employ 2-4 massive attacks and wipe all allied Troops out. Then its a one front war. Many people mass deploy the airforce in Libya and could give you more information on how they do it. The people who incorporate mass deployment will argue vigorously that it is fine because its the key to their success.

Obviously the entire Axis Air force in Northern Africa was a logistical impossibility in 1940.


This takes away from the Axis attack in the USSR campaign for a few turns. ALL USSR reinforcements near border are wiped out by turn two of Axis invasion, so there is only multiple corps/ a few army/1 5 HQ/ 3 light tanks and 1 fighter left. I only buy corps prior to invasion because there are so many cities to protect with little $$$. Axis players will buy mechs/cavalry/para to race to unprotected cites.

The reinforcements are actually a huge asset to Axis and negative for the USSR. I appreciate the USSR had a large amount of troops near the border at the start of the war, but the reinforcements are primarily air/HQ/ Mech in SC that do zero damage to attacker and provide large experience boosts. Some say not to accept Baltic states, I haven't tried that.

I think limiting air deployment would greatly improve the PBEM experience and add another strategic component to the game.

More people would be interested in PBEM.

Maybe AA limits could be expanded from 2 to 3 on all troops and/or the range of anti-air increased to 2 at 50% in 2.

Thanks

[James Taylor]

Examine the dynamics.

A player brings 4 HQs to the desert, as Axis(2G & 2 It) and is allowed 8 air units. Let's say for balance its 4 bombers and 4 fighters.

The UK player usually has 2 HQs early in the game deployed in Egypt which allows 4 air units. On the defensive, I'd say fighters, do you see the parity?

Imagine other combinations, but capped at 2 per HQ the defense has a chance and in places like France & USSR the limitations are irrelevant, so Sealion is still viable.

[Guderian1940]

I had a post previously about Air power concentration in North Africa. The changes made to the HQ Supply of Air units did little if anything (Kudos for trying) to the possibility of loading up North Africa, with Air units or ground, for a quick victory. You bring in 2 Ge HQ's and bombers, Fighters and quickly destroy the Allies. Send them early, then there is time to get back to USSR. Or at least within a couple of turns of the Invasion. Timing is important, Egypt, Iraq, Persia and all North A. falls to the Axis. Nothing the Allies do will stop it. You only need them for a few turns till the combat power of the Allies is broken. Only a mop up is needed after that. Time to physically move to get to Persia is the big hurdle. No need to waste combat power on that. Of course the Italians can help as well.

Major weakness in the game is the supply rules. Based on towns and cities is not very workable. Seen an HQ get reinforcements in a desert hex with no towns or friendly unit in sight. Without a condition of a supply net, just basing it on a hex, a route to a supply sources, or at least a few towns cities linked by rail, would go a long way to remedy this situation. No supply net you go to 0 including HQ's. Why do out of supply HQ.s still give supply to unit?

In regards to powerful Air units. That's what you get when you can just keep hitting a unit till it is gone. What ever happened to odds ratio attacks instead of this piecemeal continuous attack system till a unit is dead. Any position can be broken you just need to concentrate. Changing the strengths only requires you to concentrate more to achieve the results you want. Once you figure this out your Gold.

The scope of this game is awesome. Diplomacy, Production, Strategic decisions are all very good. Weaknesses are, Supply, Combat system and last but no least non "simultaneous" turns. Took me awhile to get my head around that. If these would be corrected in any subsequent version, you would get a 10/10 from me. Instated of maybe a 7 which is pretty good considering.

IMHO

[Leadwieght]

Replying to KZ on Sealion--I can't see how the Germans EVER succeed if tac. and medium bomber units are altered and given the same characteristics as artillery and don't have the possibility causing SP losses or only a slight possibility of doing so.

Let's say there's a British corps in Dover. The Luftwaffe hammers its morale to a low level and reduces its entrenchment to zero. But the Germans have only three or maybe four attacks from offshore ampib units in which to cause 10 SPs of losses. And only one of those ambips get ashore--the remainder are still at sea at the end of the turn in plain view of the RAF and RN. The German player can try to supplement with paras, but only if the Allied player hasn't put AA or Garrisons behind the Corps.

My point is that it would be much too easy for the Allied player to forestall Sealion with minimal investment. It takes away a huge elemnt of doubt from the game.