Bright Idea!

[5cats]

One way to make combat a lot more realistic, IMHO, is this:
Have attacks comming from multiple directions receive big bonuses!
It was every commanders nightmare to get outflanked, right? But in GGWaW it's a non-factor. This can easily be fixed.
Suppose you attack a Province from 3 directions, this should be a much easier attack than doing it from 1 direction. I propose that the attackers from the 2nd and 3rd directions get a "to hit" bonus. Which is the 1st, 2nd & 3rd you ask? Easy! The largest attacking force is the 1st, then the next largest is 2nd & etc.
SO the 1st direction gets the regular "-1" to hit. The 2nd gets "0" and the third gets "+1" & etc. It could even be -2, 0 and +2, for a more dramatic effect. This will make for a lot more thinking & strategy! Suppose you're attacking a coastal Province, and you sneak a unit in via Amphibious Invasion. That unit would recieve a bonus, rather than being "just another unit". Ditto for air-drops.
Right now the common practice is to make huge stacks of units, leaving adjacent Provinces empty if need be. Surrounded? Who cares! As long as you have supplies it doesn't change the odds in combat. With this change, it'd be a good idea to keep units more spread out. Both to make attacks from different directions and to prevent being attacked from multiple directions. Realistic!
Discuss!

[toddtreadway]

I like that idea. HOI2 uses a similar concept, and it works well.

[Oleg Mastruko]

Im afraid WAW is too attack-oriented as it is. When the attacker is determined, he can take any province he wishes to take. WAW is game of constant attacks and counter attacks as there is no real strategy for defending. Every good WAW strategy must depend on some form of attack. (Perhaps the only exception to this rule may be China, with its mountains of insta-militia helping the defense.)

So giving additional bonuses to attacker, no matter why, would be really too much.

Besides, what you see on grand strategic level is not "outflanking". Outflanking is operational and tactical term. On grand strategic level this game portrays, you see 20 divisions entering from east, and 10 from north, but with clever comander defense does not have to be outflanked on *operational* level (operational level being totally abstracted in WAW).

O.

[Daykeras]

Even a completely surrounded province could technically cover all flanks equally and never be flanked.

[5cats]

Hummm, too much attacking already? lol!
That's why I offered the second idea there, to make "regular" attacks -2 (now -1) and benefit those comming from other directions by +2 per direction. This would make many attacks more difficult, eh?
Being surrounded is supposed to be terrible, (worse than outflanking) but in WaW it's no biggie if you have a few supplies with you. Think of the "big" surroundings of WW2! Stalingrad, Lenningrad, Dunkirk (ok, they got away there, mostly) & etc. In WaW, if the Germans have 4 supplies with them in Stalingrad, they can last a whole year with no adverse effects! At least with my suggestion, it would be much easier for the Russians to attack them, since they'd come from 3-4 different directions.

[a511]

i agree with "many cats" idea.

but the changes, -1 to -2 for std attack, and +2 for each additional side, could be too much. i propose to change the attack from the second, third ... side from -1 to 0. imo, that reflect the effect of multi-side attack but w/o doing too much to seriously affect game balance.

i have also consider to change the defenders' evasion but imo, change in evasion will seriously affect game play and it just leave the defender with no chance.

AN