Play Balance Revisited

[Avatar47]

Totallyagree with Uncle Joe. The games on the Ladder are too few to justify any radical change for now. MrQuiet conceded to me in 1941, making it a Decisive Victory for my WA. Not really a 'full' game imo. And I'm sure there have been other games like that.

My beef is that Axis players typically don't build enough defence mid-game, for the late game. They continually press with tanks, bombers, submarines and fighter production. What's really necessary are flak and infantry, for heavy defence in the late game. Fighters, subs, bombers, tanks are all very offensive, but they won't hold your territories. Typically an Axis player will press offensively for most of the game, when really he should be conserving. That way, a marginal Axis victory is very possible. They CAN hold til late game, it's a matter of skillful delay.
A change in strategy and tactics is IMO necessary. This game is still 'young', and players still need time to find what's good and bad. 20 Ladder games doesn't mean anything. Once we have a 100 listed, maybe then we can draw some more conclusions.

[Harrybanana]

I don't know Avatar. I just completed a game against Sgt Rice who is a very good player. He took Moscow but couldn't finish off the Russians and mid game went into defense mode. By mid 43 Russia was in poor shape with 20+artillery, 15+infantry but only 9 production and 5 tanks. I also had to repair a lot of RR and was short on supply. He had 40+ infantry built and teched them to 7/8's he also had 20+ tanks at 10/9. He concentrated on fighter production and had about 15 of them at tech 8/8. he also built lots of AA, I think about 15 or so. But these were no match for my 40+ WA inf teched to 9/9, 30 7/7 fighters, and 15 7/8 bombers. I managed to defeat him on the F45 turn to win a Decisive Victory; but I don't think I deserved such a margin of Victory on the play. At best I should only have won a Marginal Victory, perhaps even a Draw.

However, I take your point that perhaps more games are required. I think 100 a bit too many though. I would think 40 to 50 games should give us a good measure.

Myself I just think the game should be changed to make decisive victories by either side more difficult. This means making it more diificult for the Axis to win an AV but easier to achieve some level of Victory for holding out longer. The new patch (whenever it comes out) is suppose to make it more difficult for the Axis to double team Russia, but also take away some transport capacity from the WA. IMHO, the Axis can only win the game via an AV. If you make capturing Moscow more difficult while weakening the WA I predict that once the patch comes out we will see lot more games where the Axis launches Sealion.

[aletoledo]

IMHO, the Axis can only win the game via an AV.

I think out of 3 to 4 dozen games I've played as axis, I've never had a victory other than an autovictory. I suppose there is technically a way for it to happen, its just that I've either accomplished only a decisive victory or a draw. it seems most axis players seems to consider a draw a form of victory though.

A change in strategy and tactics is IMO necessary. This game is still 'young', and players still need time to find what's good and bad. 20 Ladder games doesn't mean anything. Once we have a 100 listed, maybe then we can draw some more conclusions.

the ladder may be young, but there are a lot more than 100 games prior to the ladder. the ladder is only really catching the tail end of the games in the past couple months. both sides have multiple different strategies developed over the past months.

if anything, the ladder seems a bit too in favor of the axis compared to regular games. I've played as allies 8 or 9 times in the past months and have only lost once (to a neutral land grab).

[Lebatron]

I have not tried the new VC condition that will probably be in the next patch. So my concern about it may not be justified, but I want to put it out there anyway. I like the 70PP and Moscow requirement. It stops the neutral land grab dead in its tracks. Its seems like the right number give or take 1. But I'm not so sure 70PP and London can be the exact equal in difficulty to achieve. I don't think its coincidence that victory by way of London is also 70PP. I think it was just tacked on without much thought. Have any of you guys recently won by VC with London? And what did you think? Was it harder to get to 70PP via the British first route? I would think it must be. Afterall once Germany commits that way and succeeds he will not be able to make great gains in Russia right? So where would he find 70PP to win by VC? My preference is to always go after Russia so my experience with the UK first route is nill. But it just seems like common sense to me that 70PP and London is way to high for this German option. Maybe 65PP and London is more in the ballpark of being equal to the other option.

[SGT Rice]

IMHO one dominant feature of play balance is that the Axis have far less room for error; they have to be aggressive for as long as possible to increase their production capacity, have to accurately recognize when the tide has turned in order to shift over to the defensive, need a build/tech plan that accomodates both phases, all the while needing to protect against crippling blows to their production that Allied transports, bombers and submarines can deliver from all points of the compass.

A game mechanic that would moderate those hazards might be to reduce the amphib rating of transports, forcing the Allies to research yet another unit attribute.

Another option would be to eliminate the amphib capability of transports and create a new unit class of amphibious transports (edging towards the World in Flames solution to invasions). Probably more than a patch involved, but it would be a huge improvement IMHO. It's fairly ahistorical for a major invasion to involve assembling most of your merchant marine off a hostile coast just to build up enough amphib capacity. It's also ahistorical for the WA transport network to give them the capacity to assemble Normandy-sized invasion fleets anywhere around the world within a single turn.

If the WA had to research/build amphibious capability it would delay their ability to threaten Axis core areas; if those amphibs moved like other surface naval units (not flowing over the transport network) then the WA would be unable to threaten all points of the Axis perimeter all the time.

Another feature of the current transport system that really hangs up the Japanese is that transports aren't scalable; e.g., to send a single supply point to Wake Island you have to deploy 5 transport fleets (enough to move six armies!) in a completely exposed line across the North Pacific from Japan. If players had a limited ability to "make change" with transports - deploy fractional units based on the amount of capacity required - then the Japanese might actually consider their historical strategy of building an island perimeter manned with aircraft and defensive garrisons, since they wouldn't have to risk half their merchant fleet just to resupply a single garrison. It's true that the Japanese merchant fleet was pretty much wiped out during the war, but most of that carnage took place on the main commercial routes from SE Asia to the home islands. I lose most of my Japanese transports trying to resupply units.

[aletoledo]

interesting Lebatron, I never considered that to a huge extent. thats one reason the game isn't balanced, you can't fight both the WA and russia. they each require didn't builds and there is no easy way to change gears mid way. if the german player hesitates for a turn or two in his direction, the game is completely lost because they have built the counter by then.

good points Sgt Rice, that goes along with I've always said. the axis have to play a perfect game to win and the allies just have to hold on. its what Harrybanana just said about your game also, it didn't matter how much of the map you conquered, you still can't win.

I think we all recognize that the allies are supposed to win ww2, but there has to be a chance past AV for someone to play axis. besides that the allied side is so easy at this point that you can make numerous errors and still bounce back (zero challenge). whereas one error, even if its in the research screen and not on the map itself and the axis lose.

[Lebatron]

Well I had concidered droping the transport ability some given so many see it as a good idea. I would probably leave the Japs transports alone as that value of 5 each is so important to them. The 3 for everyone else can be reduced to 2 I think. Also the 25 can be dropped to say 15 so that it takes a lot more transports to move a huge stack into France for instance. I didn't do it because I'm waiting to see what 2by3 does to fix it. Which may be months yet. Since its so early in my release of 2.0Beta would any be interested in me making that change? We could give it a try. If the idea stinks it can be dropped before I release a final 2.0.

[mcaryf]

I think it is rather unrealistic to consider the scale of a late war WALLIES style amphibious assault as being at all comparable with those undertaken by the Japanese in the early years.

I am not sure the following suggestion is feasible as I have not tried messing about with the unit values myself yet. However, based on the fields available in unit data file might it be a possibility to give the Japanese some special transport capacity values to address both their circumstances and their actual real usages.

The early Japanese successes were built on the deployment of really pretty small numbers of troops such as Special Naval Landing Forces (SNLF) to conquer large numbers of islands. GGWAW tries to simulate this by the somewhat strange concept of continuous strategic movement for amphibious assault. An alternative might be to treat the Japanese Militia as a special unit (I am not sure that they ever deployed much actual militia so the capability is not a great loss). This special unit would be more comparable to a small elite force rather than a large ill trained one. The unit could have a relatively low ability to hit (it is pretty small) but reasonably high evasion - its size makes it hard for air etc to eradicate it, but it could be destroyed by being forced to retreat off islands. However, the real plus would be a low transportation cost such as 1 or 2 hence the possibility of genuine multiple invasions. As a further implementation of what the IJN actually did, would it be possible to give their light fleets a transport capacity of 1 or 2 to match the new "militia" transport cost. This would enable them to transport the SLNF units and even help with the odd items of supply to distant islands. The Japanese actually did use DD's and even submarines in desperate attempts to supply their cut off garrisons. I suppose players would have to be careful not to inadvertently route supply via a Light Fleet (or even a sub) but the price of extra functionality is extra care.

Mike

[aletoledo]

mcaryf, those sound like great ideas, but it seems like a lot of work to recode things. I doubt we can get more than a few tweaks here and there at best.

[Joel Billings]

It seems to me that the simplest answer to the unbalance that some of you mention is to just end the game at the end of 1945 or perhaps a little way into 1946. I argued this somewhat with Gary in development and lost as he really wanted the game to go to the end of 1946 but he really wanted the game to play out historically re WA production (which I told him made it very hard for Germany to last to the end of 1946). I think if enough people feel that the game is unbalanced in the end game and requires more chances for marginal victories, then we should consider what the victory goals should look like if we end the game at the end of 1945 or perhaps after the 1st or 2nd quarter of 1946 (although since the Allies can't invade Japan in Q1 46, a Q1 46 end time would not help them take out Japan). Had we thought of this from the beginning, perhaps we would have made A-bomb development a little easier as it would be more important in order to win a Decisive victory by the earlier end dates. The new patch does do a few things to hurt the Allies (lower amphib rating), but I'm not sure it will have a huge impact on the end game. This is all very tricky because although I would bet that Gary would give in now to an earlier end date, testing the exact victory conditions that are the most balanced once we have made all of the data changes would take some time. No doubt we would have to make at least one additional alteration in the future after we had released a change to the public (once we got enough feedback).

[JanSorensen]

I think the after Fall 46 end date is fine.

Make
- not conquering the Axis a Deceisive Axis victory.
- conquest in Sum/Fall 46 a Marginal Axis victory.
- conquest in Win/Spr 46 a Draw
- conquest in Sum/Fal 45 a Marginal Allied victory
- conquest prior to that Deceisive Allied victory

[Harrybanana]

Jan's suggestions are identical to what I propose if the US or Russia (whichever is last) is activated inW43. Since this is what happens in every game anyway this is certainly acceptable to me. I still think there needs to be some incentive to an earlier attack on the US, but I'll live with what I can get. My next beef will be with how easy it is for the Axis to win an AV, especially by invading England. But I'll save that until after the patch comes out and we have a few games under the new rules.

[Fallshirmjager]

i gotta admit that i was one of harry bananas wins where axis threw in the towel early. bottom line is he beat me fair and square, but it required a brilliant move off the hop. he invaded n. italy in winter 41, i had my fleet still in port, he "gambled and it paid off bigtime" those were his words, it delayed barbarossa for me untill winter42. i had to rebuild the infrastructure in n. italy that cost 60 supply. by winter 42 the next logical attack time for me, he had his soviet troops upped to 7/7 his armor 8/9 and his art was 8/somethin anyways, barbarossa was bad from the start. axis can win as long as you can launch barbarossa by summer 41 uninterupted. i agree with avatar you gotta beef up fortress europe so its gonna cost the allies if they wanna screw around. russia aint that tough you dont need a monster army. you need to know what to use against what, and where to concentrate your armor it drives the furthest and will crush anything except super upped arty. dont waste your armor on the masses of militia send in infantry theyll choke em out and then hammer the outlying areas with panzer spearheads. bombard theyre resources so they cant use them if they wanna build flak ill crush em with mark lV's. Hopefully i can prove this theory cuz im playin a rematch with harry banana as i type, hey bob im gonna git ya this time.lol.

[Harrybanana]

ORIGINAL: Lebatron

I have not tried the new VC condition that will probably be in the next patch. So my concern about it may not be justified, but I want to put it out there anyway. I like the 70PP and Moscow requirement. It stops the neutral land grab dead in its tracks. Its seems like the right number give or take 1. But I'm not so sure 70PP and London can be the exact equal in difficulty to achieve. I don't think its coincidence that victory by way of London is also 70PP. I think it was just tacked on without much thought. Have any of you guys recently won by VC with London? And what did you think? Was it harder to get to 70PP via the British first route? I would think it must be. Afterall once Germany commits that way and succeeds he will not be able to make great gains in Russia right? So where would he find 70PP to win by VC? My preference is to always go after Russia so my experience with the UK first route is nill. But it just seems like common sense to me that 70PP and London is way to high for this German option. Maybe 65PP and London is more in the ballpark of being equal to the other option.

Actually Lebatron I think it is easier for the Axis to obtain an AV with 70VP's + London then 70 VP's + Moscow. The WA has a real problem holding London from a determined German Player. Their limited pop means that the English can't defend England with fighters as historically as the Germans will easily outproduce them. Anyway radar is not modelled in the game and their ftrs start inferior to the German. This means they have to build AA, but they can't defend both England and Scotland with enough. They also have to build artillery and infantry. Without artillery the Germans can simply build up large #s of transports and assault in the face of the artillery, sure they lose some units but eventually they will get ashore. The only way to defend Great Britian is to pull in your units from all over the Empire, of course this means the Axis will walk over Africa and perhaps even India. I'm not saying it is impossible to defend London, but it is very difficult. Once London is taken 70 VP's is easy. Sweden has 3, Norway 1, Spain 2, Iraq 2, Greece 1, etc. You don't have to attack Russia at all to get 70. Meanwhile the Japanese conquer China, repair the factories and resources there and can easily get 24 to 28 resources. You will have to attack the US to get 28, but if you do this on the last turn it will be just about impossible for the US to retake any on 1 turn.

The big benefit of attacking England is that you can just ignore Russia. On the otherhand if the Axis attack Russia the WA will be a thorn in their side. Taking Moscow will be difficult against an experienced player even if you double team with China. Even if you do take Moscow it will probably not be until Mid 42, which doesn't give you much time to repair all those resources to get you AV. If your geography change is implemented to make the double team more difficult (by the way I think it is an excellent change, but I think even more East Russia territories should be created) then it will be even more difficult to take Moscow.

The only ladder game I have lost so far has been with London captured even though in most of my games my opponent has gone for Moscow. It would be interesting to know how many of the Axis Decive Victories have been as a result of London being captured and how many from Moscow. Of course we would also need to know how many times the Axis player has gone for Moscow as opposed to London. As I've already said, I think once the new patch comes out we will see even more Sealions and fewer Barbarossas. But we'll just have to wait and see.

[Lebatron]

Will we see more Sealions after trasport capacity is reduced? I would think they would adjust Germany's too. Making it a bit harder for Germany to invade.

Like I said my experience with invading UK was nill. So I didn't know if winning that way was easier or harder. But you missed my point. Which was should the PP be the same for both methods of AV. So instead of reducing it to 65 as I first suggested make it more than 70. What I was trying to point out was that Germany's two options to AV victory can not by coincedence be exactly equal. One by its very nature would have to be harder than the other. And the only way to offset that would be to have a unique AV point for each option. I'm trying to get this community to realise this before the next patch comes out with the new AV. Because if this isn't addressed we are only going to be house ruling it again because even the new AV won't work.

On another point, I really think US production should goto x4 in 1944 instead of 43 if the game plays out to the end of 46. I think if this was tried many of the adjustments to victory levels that are being proposed will be unnecessary. If its ended in 45 then the old muliple is fine.

[aletoledo]

I think the after Fall 46 end date is fine.

Make
- not conquering the Axis a Deceisive Axis victory.
- conquest in Sum/Fall 46 a Marginal Axis victory.
- conquest in Win/Spr 46 a Draw
- conquest in Sum/Fal 45 a Marginal Allied victory
- conquest prior to that Deceisive Allied victory

I agree completely with Jan on this one. I like the 1946 end date (there is a rather limited number of turns as it is already).

it just seems like the victory categories were thrown in at the last minute, because when will the axis ever get anything in between decisive victory and draw?

I think jans set of victory conditions really solves half the issue. it essentially incorporates what harry was originally thinking since it is a form of variable end date. now the axis has a reason to fight till 1946 and the allies have a reason to end things at a historic date or better (the way most wargames victory are decided).

this doesn't address the issue of getting the japanese to attack sooner though.

[Forwarn45]

I like Jan's suggestion as well. If it were possible, though, I'd urge the designers to reconsider harrybanana's suggestion of a flexible enddate depending on when everyone is at war. I think this would be great for replayability as it opens up many different options in terms of how and when the Axis attacks. You would have to balance whether to wait until the last minute (as now) to try to get the most out of peace with the USA, or weigh an earlier attack and the possibly better prospects of survival to the end of a shorter game....... Other than fixing the bugs - this would be at the very top of my list of game changes. [8D]