Shipping Losses.......

[HansBolter]

In an attempt to investigate and understand why I am losing so many victory points every turn to Losses, I started looking each turn at my shipping losses.

I am losing an average of 2 troop transports and 50+ cargo transports per week.
The troop transport losses occur even on turns where I get no reports of troop convoys being hit (even when I do get those reports I am only told what the transported troop losses are, not what the ship losses are).

I did start manually controlling naval patrols to cover the troop transport routes and have not had a reported hit on a convoy since, but still continue to suffer 1-2 troop ship losses per week. I'm not seeing where the Axis is bombing my ports and sinking ships so these losses are a complete mystery.

I'm presuming that the cargo transport losses are being incurred while shipping supply. However, since every last bit of this is hidden from the player, there is nothing I can do to effect any change. Additionally, losses of 50+ cargo transports per week is about as outrageous as it gets and is in no way keeping with historical results.

A player would really have to work his ass off in about as incompetent a manner possible in WitPAE to incur 50+ cargo ship looses every 7 turns.

Can anyone provide an adequate explanation for why this is happening?

[Zovs]

Which scenario or campaign are you playing?

[Platoonist]

A player would really have to work his ass off in about as incompetent a manner possible in WitPAE to incur 50+ cargo ship losses every 7 turns.
Can anyone provide an adequate explanation for why this is happening?

All I can provide for an explanation is how one of the developers described cargo "ships" in a 2015 thread.

The ships are an abstraction as it takes many ship points in the game to equal one ship. I think it's fair to say that the troop losses caused by ship losses is greater than it should be, even if the actual ship point losses are ok. That's because a lot of the losses are damage to ships that might not cause losses to material. I'll talk with Gary about tweaking down the losses to the manpower and material when ships are "lost".

So, they're actually ship points. How may points equal a ship? I dunno. Maybe they should have been called cargo points to avoid confusion.

It might be a bit dated but here is the full 2015 thread on the subject of high merchant & transport losses below....

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 5&t=276072

[HansBolter]

I'm playing the stock '43 start campaign.

My first campaign was the added one with the extra air HQs.

I took such a VP bloodbath in that one that it ended in a draw.

I've come to realize that my mistake was believing that the AI could adequately handle the air mission assignments.

It really chaps my ass that game designers include AI control of game aspects and then, after they have foisted their creation no you, tell you that the AI is so worthless that you shouldn't use it.

I'm working on learning how to assign my missions myself.
The degree of micromanagement necessary is incredible though.

And another thing, is this 109 turn scenario going to automatically end on turn 97 as the extra air HQ campaign did?

I was duped into believing I had 12 more turns to get above the Allied Minor Victory threshold only to have my hopes dashed by the automatic historical end date. And, BTW the Soviets were nowhere near Berlin when the game ended because the Germans still had units deployed in Poland.

Game designers forcing automatic historic end dates on scenarios when the conditions for the end of the war have nowhere near been met is yet another item that chaps my ass.

There are just so many incredible design failures in this game, it boggles the mind.

[Zovs]

I can't answer all your questions as I have more experience with WITE2. However, I'll try my best.

I'm playing the stock '43 start campaign.
My first campaign was the added one with the extra air HQs.
I took such a VP bloodbath in that one that it ended in a draw.

Okay good to know which scenario/CG your playing. Since your new I would suggest playing the Husky scenario a few times to get the hang of WITW, but everyone learns differently.

I've come to realize that my mistake was believing that the AI could adequately handle the air mission assignments.
I'm working on learning how to assign my missions myself.
The degree of micromanagement necessary is incredible though.

This is common also in WITE2, folks want the AI to do everything for them, and to an extend it can, but it does so poorly, its an AI bot or scripted and is only so good. Really the best way to run anything in WITE2, WITW or WITP-AE is to do it yourself and not rely on the AI at all.

To illustrate this I was a beta tester for WITE1, and then when I became a beta tester for WITE2 and they bolted on the air from WITW I had to do a crash course in the Air War first in WITW and then transfer that knowledge to WITE2. Once you get the hang of it its pretty straight foward.

It really chaps my ass that game designers include AI control of game aspects and then, after they have foisted their creation no you, tell you that the AI is so worthless that you shouldn't use it.

Well I don't know what to say about all that, I never trusted any AI's to start with anyway. Usually I'd let the AI try something and watch it and see what it was trying to do and then just take over anyway because in all the war games I have played in general the AI's are all pretty stupid or scripted. So it does not bother me as much as it seems to bother you, I am more distrusting of AI's anyway.

And another thing, is this 109 turn scenario going to automatically end on turn 97 as the extra air HQ campaign did?

I was duped into believing I had 12 more turns to get above the Allied Minor Victory threshold only to have my hopes dashed by the automatic historical end date. And, BTW the Soviets were nowhere near Berlin when the game ended because the Germans still had units deployed in Poland.

No idea on this one. I don't see why or how you were duped, the game is designed the way it is and after all these years it ain't going to change.

Game designers forcing automatic historic end dates on scenarios when the conditions for the end of the war have nowhere near been met is yet another item that chaps my ass.

To me its just some design mechanism them came up with trying to replicate historical ebb and flow. It also does not bother me but I have been playing historical board wargames since 1978 and they al have some type of historical ebb and flow and built in victory conditions. Granted in a board war game two fellows can discuss the rules and make adjustments whereas in a computer war game they can't and just have to accept what the game offers or move on.

There are just so many incredible design failures in this game, it boggles the mind.

Well I don't seem them all as design failures rather that quirks. But really what other wargame on the western front do we have? There is scenarios built for TOAW IV, but no a lot of choices.

For myself I have 2-3 other go to's those being SPI's Atlantic Wall, AH's The Longest Day, and some other games from SPI, AH and GDW that cover the west in detail.

Just my thoughts.

[HansBolter]

Played both tutorial scenarios multiple times.

Duped by being told by the scenario description that the game would last 109 turns.
Not hard to understand why I feel like I was duped.

Unfortunately, I sold both my Longest Day and Fortress Europa games.
When I left the metropolis for the country I had to seriously downsize and the bulk of the board wargame collection had to go. Don't have space to set up Longest Day anymore anyway.

You are correct about the ability of players to modify a boardgame.
I was not happy with the airborne drop rules in Longest Day, so I created breakdown counters for the paras and utilized the Crete/Malta game air drop scatter rules.

I'll keep plugging away at this game. Eventually, perhaps I'll succeed in pulling the teeth I need to garner the info I necessary.

[Zovs]

Played both tutorial scenarios multiple times.

Duped by being told by the scenario description that the game would last 109 turns.
Not hard to understand why I feel like I was duped.

Unfortunately, I sold both my Longest Day and Fortress Europa games.
When I left the metropolis for the country I had to seriously downsize and the bulk of the board wargame collection had to go. Don't have space to set up Longest Day anymore anyway.

You are correct about the ability of players to modify a boardgame.
I was not happy with the airborne drop rules in Longest Day, so I created breakdown counters for the paras and utilized the Crete/Malta game air drop scatter rules.

I'll keep plugging away at this game. Eventually, perhaps I'll succeed in pulling the teeth I need to garner the info I necessary.

Understood and sounds good.

I no longer have the table space for board wargames but I still play them on VASSAL, some great leaps and bounds have been made in VASSAL that allows this.

Still having issues with WITW locally for some reason, when I end the turn and its starts to process the end of turn it CTD on me.