Game Balance

[Nirosi]

I've played 3 games as the Axis, and in all 3 the Allied player quit after I took the Middle East and invaded the USSR from Persia, which I don't believe the Allies can stop if the German player is determined. My latest game I was able to get both Spain to enter by a limited invasion of England as well as Turkey by taking Baku in '41.

I must say I am curious how it happened. From my experience on both sides, for the Axis to take Egypt requires a lot of determination on the Axis side, but also a lack of determination (or maybe overconfidence) on the UK side (or the common mistake of forgetting about the Syrian ports). Could it simply have been a huge difference in skills? I agree with Alvaro on this one, skill difference is the main factor still. For example, I'm playing MagicMissile now and I am afraid on both sides... Then again, it is a fun fear...

[canuckgamer]

Last game as the Allies I built 2 UK and 2 USA strat bombers. Not sure what impact the bombing had besides drawing 2 fighters in to western Europe. I found that I couldn't bomb with non stop because the efficiency levels of the bombers had to be managed. In addition I believe weather such as rain, heavy rain and snow impacts the effects of strat bombing.

In our current game which is now the winter of 41 I noticed that the Axis have built a lot of AA in the target cities and oil hexes. My experience attacking a hex with 6 AA is you can lose a number of air strength points. I assume that my opponent is thinking that having the AA will save him from having to station fighters in western Europe and/or build less fighters.

Considering how expensive strat bombers are, I am wondering how many you build.

[ncc1701e]

The secret of Air Power is effectiveness. I have learned this in Warplan Pacific. Always insure that your air units are above 80% before using them. It means you have to rotate them each turn. Easy for the Allies that can have plenty of them, hard for the Germans. Once done, you can defeat the Germans fighters trying to destroy your bombers with your escort fighters.

[Nirosi]

I believe that AA guns are the same the whole war, while strategic bombers get better with time, both in defense to avoid been hit and in bombing effectiveness. I try to build 4 or so, but first for anti-sub duties. And when (if?) the subs threat is in control, and strategic advancement level good enough, then I would switch to bombing cities.

But it also depends on the defense in Germany. 1941 advancement strategic bombing is 1) not that effective yet and 2) the German production multiplier is also still too low for good damage. So if Germany is empty it is good enough yes, but if it is full of AA guns, not that good yet. However, putting 6 AA in most Germany cities in 1941 is also quite expensive for Germany... So it is still good for the Allies in a way...

[kklemmick]

I'll have to play around with strategic bombing some then. I built 4 strategic bomber units in my current PBEM game in order to destroy subs and they have been so effective at that they may not have much more to do soon.

[stjeand]

Actually later in the war if you start to smash the German oil production that gets costly.

Especially late 42/43...I always ran low on oil yet no one had any bombers to make it worse.

[kklemmick]

I've played 3 games as the Axis, and in all 3 the Allied player quit after I took the Middle East and invaded the USSR from Persia, which I don't believe the Allies can stop if the German player is determined. My latest game I was able to get both Spain to enter by a limited invasion of England as well as Turkey by taking Baku in '41.

I must say I am curious how it happened. From my experience on both sides, for the Axis to take Egypt requires a lot of determination on the Axis side, but also a lack of determination (or maybe overconfidence) on the UK side (or the common mistake of forgetting about the Syrian ports). Could it simply have been a huge difference in skills? I agree with Alvaro on this one, skill difference is the main factor still. For example, I'm playing MagicMissile now and I am afraid on both sides... Then again, it is a fun fear...

It's generally pretty easy to get into the Middle East, as the UK really can't afford to garrison all their ports with corps sized units. I usually capture Yugoslavia in the winter of '39, which gives the Germans a port on the Med, then you land in Cyprus (which in both my games required a fight). Between that and an advance in Egypt you'll have enough recon on the UK ports to determine which one has a small unit garrison. Even if all that fails, you wait for France to fall and Syria to go neutral, then invade Syria for free. Add to that, that the Germans have nothing to do with their armor in the winter of '40, you might as well ship everything to the Med and overwhelm the Brits.

England is more problematic, but what I've found is if you push to take several ports while attacking France, you can mount a surprise invasion of England in '40 when they still have troops in France. Between that and countering you in the Middle East, they usually leave England lightly defended.

All this requires Germany to build nothing but landing ships for the first year of the game, which likely would impact the sub war later on. But since both games I played the Allied player quit in '41, it's hard to say how much that would work against them.

Of course, now I'm giving away all my strategies, so this might become harder in the future.

I think one thing that could make things a little more difficult for the Germans in this regard is to place a unit in both Syrian ports after the fall of France. If they're both still divisions I don't really see this as stopping them though, just makes it a little riskier especially if the UK covers these ports with air power, and would cost them 60 landing ships instead of the 20 dropping two divisions in unoccupied ports does.

[kklemmick]

BTW, the same thing happened to me while playing the Allies, despite my heavy air cover in Egypt and covering all the ports (including Syria), they were able to land and knock me out of a port (even though I destroyed the Italian fleet earlier), then bring in armor and it was game over. The upside in this game was that they were only able to do this in '41 because they decided not to attack the USSR until '42, which may ultimately work against them. Next time I'll probably hold an armor unit in reserve there to try to counter the invasion, rather than pushing forward in Africa. So yeah, it's quite possible a skilled player can counter this, I'll just have to play a bit more in order to determine that.

[Nirosi]

Hum.. things to ponder...

Thanks kklemmick...

[canuckgamer]

kklemmick, your comments about the middle east are interesting but different then what we are experiencing in our pbem game where the Axis have not been able to advance in North Africa and the front line has been static since the fall of France.
I am playing the Allies and I have Haifa, Beirut, and Tripoli garrisoned with divisions. I positioned units so they could immediately move in when France fell. I also have the two ports in Cyprus garrisoned and invaded Rhodes as soon as Italy declared war. I doubt I would be able to do that again but Cyprus is much more important because without it the Axis will not be able to base air to support for invasions attempting to take any of the above three ports.
In North Africa the Allies have two armour corps and about 5 infantry corps, most of them with a specialty such as anti tank. I also have two interceptors and two bombers. My first line of defence are hexes 187,10 and 187,9 and the second line are hexes 188,10 and 188,9. In hexes 187,10 and 188,10 I placed coastal defence units and placed units with the AT specialty. In fact, all the defending units have the AT specialty. On each line one of the hexes can be attacked from only one hex and the other by two so it is difficult for the Axis to get decent odds. The Allies also have the option of coming out of Alexandria to support the ground units and they cannot be intercepted because it would be a night move. In addition, as the Axis are further from their ports like Tobruk, Benghazi and Tripoli their supply situation is worse than the Allies.
Any attempted invasion of the three above ports would be intercepted by the two bombers that I have set on naval. In addition the fleets I have in Alexandria are more numerous than the naval units the Italians could send. The Italians would probably lose any naval engagements which would really impact them later in the war. Any invaders would have to take a port in the invasion turn or they would not survive as the Allies can move corps by rail to the invasions site. With Allied ground air superiority, a larger fleet and a very narrow front the Axis haven't even attempted any attacks.
Finally, if the Italians wanted to invade with corps sized units they would have to spend PP's constructing landing ships since they only start with 10 which takes away their production of ground and air units early in the war.

[kklemmick]

One thing to think about is that interception isn't reliable. You get only one attempt per enemy move no matter how many air units are available, and the chance to fail to find is high. It can stop an invasion in the tracks if it succeeds, but in the game where Germany did this to me, he was able to get 4 units ashore in England without a single interception hit. Same when invading the Middle East. Could be luck, but in my experience I get away with it a lot as well. For me personally, if there are only 1 or 2 air units, I "suck off" their interception with decoy DDs. Move it out for one move, then back to port with the second. It may take a hit or two but I've never seen one sink. Repeat with next ship. Once you can move a ship out without interception, then you're good to bring in the troops with no chance of being intercepted. The same tactic can be used for invading England.

Agreed that Cyprus is pretty key though. It's possible to do from Rhodes, but much more risky because of the lack of support from air units. I think as the UK player my #1 strategy for defending Egypt would be to secure Cyprus, but this spreads the UK even further and it simply doesn't have the strength to put there by the time the Germans can invade. I was able to take Cyprus as the Germans even with a full UK corp and division defending by Dec '39.

I plan to start another PBEM game as the Axis soon, so I'm curious if this has been a fluke. But in my experience there really isn't much the UK player can do to stop this. Either England will be vulnerable, or the Middle East will, or France will fall much quicker. I don't think they have enough strength to even do 2 of the 3.

[Nirosi]

Hum... dec 39? Then no Italy. And since Cyprus is far from Yugoslavia, it means that the UK has two turns to find the transports as the Germans can not land in one run... And there would be no German DDs to suck up the air interceptions. And from my experience air-naval interceptions chances in a friendly hex (such as Cyprus beaches) is very very high.

I must say I am not quite sure what the UK player is doing to let that happen...

Unless you are playing with the scenario where Italy can enter the war early?

[AlvaroSousa]

As the UK you need to 100% prioritize the defense of the UK. It is a delicate balance of how much to send to France and how long to delay Germany.

Your fleets will be spread thin once Italy is in the war.

1-2 CV, 3 BBs + 2 CA in scapa flow should do the trick

2 CA in Gibralltar

Rest in Egypt. You get some ships from the minor countries.

Uses range to place your interception fleets able to engage at different ranges to coastal invasions. I showed how to do this a couple years ago. It will make it very tough the the Axis to land behind you in the Middle East.

Strat bombing is a game of attrition. Focusing on 1 city till it is leveled is key, Once it is leveled you can bomb it once to keep it leveled them use all the bombers to level another city, It forces the Germans to react. You only need 2-3 to do this and KO 2 cities for a good time.

Once you get 4-5 bombers it really starts impacting them. I'd focus on larger cities.

While Germany's production did go up from my research, and consulting with my expect, we estimated they lost 30% of their full capacity due to strategic bombing.

This is about 5 strat bombers worth by 1944 to match realistic numbers. You can level several cities with these numbers.

[ncc1701e]

We are in to our second pbem and in my opinion it is Axis biased. I think the experience levels of the Russian have to be adjusted in some way as the war goes on besides gaining it in combat. Yes they can get from defending as well but a decent German player can surround and eliminate a lot of Russians by encirclements. Multiple ground strikes followed by attacks by German armour with the infiltration specialty is very effective and the Russians don't ever seem to have enough units to form a double line. The 1 op cost to enter the hex of the retreated unit is deadly.
The Russian air force is never a factor and have read comments where players have scrapped the Russian air units to gain PPs. I think the Germans can take out any of the major three cities, namely Leningrad, Moscow, or Stalingrad regardless of what the Russians do because they cannot defend all 3.
This our first pbem game with the change in rail advancement and the winterization of the Siberians and we are in to the end of November 41. The advance of the Germans is pretty well the same as the last game with Leningrad cutoff except for the ice road and the Germans one hex from Sevastopol and adjacent to the Kerch Strait.
My friend and I are evenly matched and have been playing wargames since the days of Avalon Hill so two old gamers. We have another two friends who are starting a pbem game next week so it will be interesting to hear what they think of the game. Regardless, it is way better than the Strategic Command series.

For me, German player knows exactly what they have to do:
1. Invade Russia in 1941 and take the maximum of key cities like Leningrad and Moscow to crush Soviet production.
2. Then stop, don't do any campaign in 1942. Just defend against any Russian assault.

This way, Germany saves manpower. They saved their units. And Russian cannot build experience based on a defensive combat. Russian are building experience by attacking Germans entrenched positions. As such, they are losing ton of guys and they have a manpower problem much quicker than the Germans that have plenty of events to gain 120 manpower every six months.

Russia depends entirely on the Western front.

[PanzerMike]

Germany needed oil, hence the campaign in the Caucasus in 42 and the need to attack. Does Germany ever have real oil shortages in your experience?

[ncc1701e]

No. Defending on railroads, you are not spending any oil. So, there is no shortage. But, historically, even with a failed Caucasus campaign, Germany had oil for 1943 and 1944.

I am not sure oil must be changed. For me, the problem is the attrition of German army in Russia that is not enough.
Thus, what I am playtesting increasing the attributes of the Soviet rifle armies. With 30% experience, it won't hurt too much in 1941 and in 1942...

[PanzerMike]

Opinions on German oil shortages differ I guess. I would like to think Germany has a real need for oil or suffer accordingly.

[canuckgamer]

Experience must be a key factor in whether a unit retreats. Russian units are continually retreating even when attacked at low odds. For example, last turn, May 42 I had full strength Russian corps (36 SP) defending Vitebsk. His experience was about 30%. The Germans used the usual formula, ground strikes and it only took one attack at odds of 2-1. The Germans suffered 5 land casualties while the Russian unit lost 4 and retreated. I have attached a screenshot.
It will be interesting to see how the summer of 42 goes. Leningrad is already cutoff and about to fall. The Russians start the summer with more strength than our last game and I have been building nothing but armies with anti tank. Strange that I still have one army forming.

[ncc1701e]

Not only experience, a Russian army has -1 defense compared to a German corps. And a Russian army has -1 artillery compared to a German corps. It helps a lot. Artillery numbers should be at least equal or better for the Soviets starting 1942. Thus the idea to play only with events to change just one little thing.

[canuckgamer]

I too think that Russian artillery should be at least equal to the Germans beginning in 1942. Overwhelming artillery was part of their tactical doctrine.
I made a comment in an earlier post that the Axis satellite units are over rated. When you consider that the Italians had to be rescued by the Germans in both Greece and North Africa it is surprising that their experience is 50% compared to the Russians from 30 to 35%. Both the Italians and Hungarians are at 50%. In North Africa they were routed by UK forces that were only a fraction of their size.
What I am finding in WarPlan is that the Allies really have to make significant invasions in 1943 maybe even in 1942 to take the pressure off Russia. By significant I mean France.
Although the numbers voting in the Game Balance poll are small the fact that it is 2-1 for a Axis bias is something I agree with. It is telling that pretty well every change to game balance has been to supposedly help the Allies. When I open up a scenario using hot seat like the 1942 one I see that all the front line German units are 70 - 75% experience. The Russians are at 40% although I don't see how even that number can be attained in 1942 if you play a 1939 scenario. As mentioned, even the Hungarians and Italians are better at 50%.