Matrix Games Forums

Hi all,

ORIGINAL: 76mm

This game had obviously not been adequately play-tested past 1942 (and really probably past 1941) when it had been released and some major things have been changed based on continued beta-testing by paying players.

I sincerely hope that you do realize that in such case the WitE would be released sometime in 2015... [;)]

There is _NO_ chance whatsoever to adequately playtest such huge game with so many turns - this was the case in the past with UV ("Uncommon Valor"), WitP ("War in the Pacific") and WitP-AE ("War in the Pacific - Admiral's Edition") and it was the same with WitE ("War in the East")!


Leo "Apollo11"

ORIGINAL: Apollo11
There is _NO_ chance whatsoever to adequately playtest such huge game with so many turns - this was the case in the past with UV ("Uncommon Valor"), WitP ("War in the Pacific") and WitP-AE ("War in the Pacific - Admiral's Edition") and it was the same with WitE ("War in the East")!

Sure, it is a huge and complex game, and I can buy your argument for it not being thoroughly play-tested through the bitter end in 1945. But the original release was basically broken by the blizzard, and the game has seen some rather massive changes that cover the period through mid-1942, including blizzard rules, HQ-refits, fortifications, 1:1->2:1, Sov HQ capacity, etc. etc. Frankly, I think that the game should have been much more thoroughly tested than it was at least through mid-1942.

To me the patches swing between a blessing and "omg whats gonna happen to my game now" thought racing through my head.

I have had all my games impacted by them and many restarts as well as many just dropped. Frustrating!

However the game needs the patches to improve...

For now I will take a break and watch the game improve the sidelines and maybe practice against the AI.

Hi all,

ORIGINAL: 76mm

ORIGINAL: Apollo11
There is _NO_ chance whatsoever to adequately playtest such huge game with so many turns - this was the case in the past with UV ("Uncommon Valor"), WitP ("War in the Pacific") and WitP-AE ("War in the Pacific - Admiral's Edition") and it was the same with WitE ("War in the East")!

Sure, it is a huge and complex game, and I can buy your argument for it not being thoroughly play-tested through the bitter end in 1945. But the original release was basically broken by the blizzard, and the game has seen some rather massive changes that cover the period through mid-1942, including blizzard rules, HQ-refits, fortifications, 1:1->2:1, Sov HQ capacity, etc. etc. Frankly, I think that the game should have been much more thoroughly tested than it was at least through mid-1942.

The game was tested a lot - believe me!

The problem is that we still don't see good player practice in many many AARs for both sides - this shows that most players are still learning the WitE...


Leo "Apollo11"

Well, I stopped WITE playing a while ago and I´ll only start again if I get the feeling from this board that the present state of the game has significantly improved.
 
I have been buying Grigsby games for about 30 years and this is the first time that I regret to have spent my money[:(]
 
Hopefully they get it right (for my taste of course[;)]) one day...
 
Best regards
 
Rainer
 

Um........I'm retired now but when I was working I was a computer programmer and wrote programs using C++ and C.  I for one can tell you that your programs are never PERFECT.  Especially complex ones with multiple threads and many independent processes going simultaneously ( like WITE ).  At first the bugs are numerous (  as with any program ) and after a while the bugs are seldom and after the passage of much time and effort the bugs become almost never, but random places when they occur.  No one playtester will find *ALL* the bugs.  That's one thing. 

Another thing is that there's 220+ turns in the play of one game of WITE and that's time consuming for volunteers who do the playtesting.  I used to be a playtester for TOAW and I consistently put in weeks of full-day playtesting when I was doing it but I was the exception.  Most of the volunteer playtesters had real lives they had to lead and other priorities to take care of and had to stay up late to stay committed.  Sometimes its tough to stay committed.  I think the playtesters for WITE are unsung heros.  And I thank them for their efforts. 

Having said that I too think the game was released too early.  A lot of the work going into these patches fix things that *should* have been found and fixed before release.  But I too understand the pressures of economics on the free market system and I really really don't mind helping to find the bugs and fixing them.  I would have bought the game just to be a playtester.  Which is the effect my having the game is having on me anyway.  I would have paid for the privilage to play this magnificent game and help find the things that need to be fixed yet.   

Anybody who feels like quitting *now* that it's getting a lot better may need to consider marry-ing a woman named Patience.

For me recent patch is major disappointment. It didn't introduce anything, that can make fighting more meaningful and didn't address issue of fixed changes of combat effectiveness of both sides.


After year of intensive and rewarding playing I feel that at the moment game doesn't have much more to offer to me.

ORIGINAL: Apollo11

Hi all,

ORIGINAL: 76mm

ORIGINAL: Apollo11
There is _NO_ chance whatsoever to adequately playtest such huge game with so many turns - this was the case in the past with UV ("Uncommon Valor"), WitP ("War in the Pacific") and WitP-AE ("War in the Pacific - Admiral's Edition") and it was the same with WitE ("War in the East")!

Sure, it is a huge and complex game, and I can buy your argument for it not being thoroughly play-tested through the bitter end in 1945. But the original release was basically broken by the blizzard, and the game has seen some rather massive changes that cover the period through mid-1942, including blizzard rules, HQ-refits, fortifications, 1:1->2:1, Sov HQ capacity, etc. etc. Frankly, I think that the game should have been much more thoroughly tested than it was at least through mid-1942.

The game was tested a lot - believe me!

The problem is that we still don't see good player practice in many many AARs for both sides - this shows that most players are still learning the WitE...


Leo "Apollo11"

Leo

Thats just rude to say the players are playing "wrong".

Baelfin,

The problem is, he may be right...maybe many of us still are not playing even close to optimally.

Marquo

ORIGINAL: Marquo

Baelfin,

The problem is, he may be right...maybe many of us still are not playing even close to optimally.

Marquo

I totally agree with that. Count me among those guys. Marquo can vouch for me: he is a) massacring many of my red hordes and b) grabbing a lot of land [:)]

Marquo/TD 8)

I hear you, but that is not the point I'm trying to make. Hopefully there is more than one way to play this game "optimally." In fact I would argue that anyone who is playing and enjoying themselves and taking the time to share it with the public is exactly the "optimum" that a publisher should want to see. Like 76mm said, the game was not very well balanced at release. Thats not a slam on anyone, its just the way it went down. The game has gotten better and better since then. Leo says that it is impossible to test everything 100 percent and I agree. There is so much going on in WITE that nobody can KNOW the optimum move at every step in the game. Every die roll can make a little differance that adds up to every game, every turn is a little different from any other. That is the strength of this game. Seeing so many people say "well guys im not playing anymore" saddens me. Telling them that their concerns about the game are not warranted, because they don't play "right", is rude to the point of arrogance, and I just plain don't like it.

ORIGINAL: Baelfiin

Marquo/TD 8)
The game has gotten better and better since then. Leo says that it is impossible to test everything 100 percent and I agree. There is so much going on in WITE that nobody can KNOW the optimum move at every step in the game.

Well, here I have something to tell. From my own experience. The current state of WitP (now AE) is simply amazing. If you haven't put your hands on this game you cannot even imagine the sophistication, complexity of such game. And the game as it is right now has little to do with the one we bought (most of us) back in 2004... Patches, new features...

Given Matrix (and 2by3) reputation (in fact, what they DID with WitP -they released an official patch few days ago, almost 8 years after the release), I am pretty certain WitE will march exactly along this same road. Because after all never forget these two games have a large fan base.

Now it's true that I am not that impatient. Not saying that is wrong per se.

Yeah I have been wanting to get that one, but I don't think I will ever find time 8(

ORIGINAL: Baelfiin
Telling them that their concerns about the game are not warranted, because they don't play "right", is rude to the point of arrogance, and I just plain don't like it.

Scott, I think that you're taking Leo's comment a bit too seriously. I can't speak with any certainty on Leo's exact intent, but the way I read it was that given that the game's balance is largely dependent on player skill levels, and the disparity of those skill levels between one another, as is often evidenced in the various AARs, it is difficult to balance a game with so many uncertain data points, as measured in game results, when so many of them are from obvious skill mismatches.

Philosophically speaking, as long as two players are having fun, you can't say that one, or both of them, is playing "wrong". However, if you're measuring success by any type of objective criteria, such as where the lines lie at point X in the game, and the relative OOB strengths of the antagonists, then you can, with some reservations, say whether a player is playing well, or not. Whether you feel it's rude, depends, I suppose, on how it is said, and in what context. In Leo's case, I don't think it was meant out of any malice, or rudeness. Rather, it was a simple observation that some players are not showing a high level of skill, at this stage.

James, I did not consider that point RE: player skill levels. Maybe I'm just being over sensitive, but if someone is referring to mismatches in player skill then thats what they should put in the post 8) I just think its the wrong thing to say when somebody puts out that "most players are still learning how to play the game." And maybe it wasn't meant to be rude, but it comes across that way.

ORIGINAL: Apollo11
The problem is that we still don't see good player practice in many many AARs for both sides - this shows that most players are still learning the WitE...

Actually, I don't understand this statement at all. Surely best practice depends on the rules. When the rules are constantly changing, how do you expect best practice to develop? Frankly, I would argue that Pelton has developed some very effective techniques under many of the successive patches (even if they are not what the devs would call "best practice"), and Sov players were gradually learning to counter his methods. And then the rules changed again, and again...

And moreover, if the "problem" is that most players are not playing well, are the rule changes intended to assist poor players? [&:]

I don't get it...

And I generally agree that most of the patches have been improvements, it is just that I wish the game design had included them from the beginning. I say most patches have been good because I get the distinct impression that some of them are just hacks intended to achieve balance through unrealistic mechanisms rather than an attempt to reflect "reality" (the whole 1:1->2:1 saga is Exhibit A here).

Finally, maybe the solution is simply not to buy any more games like this until they have been out for at least five years?

>I totally agree with that. Count me among those guys. Marquo can vouch for me: he is a) massacring many of my red hordes and b) grabbing a lot of land

I am not doing anything special in our game and you are playing well. I am sure there will be quid pro quo. [X(]

ORIGINAL: 76mm
Finally, maybe the solution is simply not to buy any more games like this until they have been out for at least five years?

It is true that when you buy a car it is a finished product. You can do some tuning but that's it. Same with the wine. Producers won't tell you "don't open the bottle until next year, keep it in your cellar". I don't think this applies to computer games software though (patches). Software companies are not Toyota, with lots of ressources and people working on x project. I think we have to understand this. Still, a playable game is the minimum (less than that, yes, it's shabby). And this one indeed it is. Both you and I are playing after all.

Said this, the customer is always right... [:D]

Apollo11


The game was tested a lot - believe me!




Then the bias of the play testers and the design of the game should be examined.

The game should never had been released with the original blizzard. It was completely unhistorical and severe in the extreme. That is when all the first AAR's ended. Right then and there. What was told to the players was that they were not playing the game right. However hard that is to fathom. To be smashed up in 4 to 12 turns and that was put on Axis play and not game design. How could play testers play through that first blizzard and sign off on it? That is not player problem, but designer and tester problems. Eventually finally the blizzard was changed. Even now I don't think the 41 blizzard is modeled properly.

The game doesn't model supply very well. Instead CVs are manipulated and messed with. The Axis supply situation during and after the blizzard of 41 is an example. If the Axis player preserves his forces during the blizzard he still shouldn't be able to launch March Madness. Not because he doesn't have the CV's, but because he shouldn't have the supply for a major offensive. Smaller offensives yes, that should be possible. After the blizzard supply should improve and build ups possible. This should be the same for the Soviets. To be able to maintain pushes during the blizzard along the entire front and for many many miles doesn't seem right to me also. Historically theymade big pushes, I don't have any problem with that. I have the problem that the game will allow for pushes of past 200 miles along the entire front.

The link that was posted recently on the forums told a story that the Soviet troops who went into battle at Rzhev only had 7 bullets each.

There used to be a lot of talk about German super men then the blizzard and then the change to Soviet supermen. I always thought that was funny, but in a way it shows how CVs are manipulated and the game doesn't model very well.

As another player has pointed out, the "what ifs" for the German side are nonexistent. They are going to get steam rolled and better take it smiling.


If the Axis are not held to history and the Axis player prepares for the blizzard and does not throw forces away like an entire army at Stalingrad, then war on the eastern front should be quit different from history.

You would have several situations like Kharkov. Offenses and counter attacks. There will be places where the lines are static and places where the action is fluid. If the Axis player takes care of his troops, I don't see a Soviet steamroller. This is historically plausible. I think the game prefers a Soviet steamroller after 42 regardless.

In the end, the weight of a two front war with limited supplies and manpower decides the war.

If you can get Hitler out of this game it could be a pretty enjoyable game for everyone.

In the days of cardboard, when SPI released WITE (in the mid-seventies), I wonder truly how well playtested it was? Who would have ever known? There were no forums to gripe about the balance. I guess if you even got past the first winter in the game (my brother and I played for hours on end but I really don't remember how far we got in the game) and had concerns, you could write SPI a letter and complain, and maybe a few did. Point is, for this WITE, while it may be true mistakes were made and the game released without proper play testing- I think we do not appreciate what we have. There is this vibrant community here that was able to point balance concerns out, and changes were made. And continue to be made.
 
If you don't remember cardboard, then likely you will read this and say "so what?".