Russian Steel 1.4 Now Available at Tankhead's!!

[darroch]

Jim1954:

Thanks! I'll check it out. Heaven knows when I'll have time but Christmas is coming!!!

Sitting Duck:

Let me know what version of SPWAW you are playing. These battles are set up for 7.1. If you have an earlier version there may be considerable differences....I cannot figure out what might be going wrong with your KV-2s....

I'll be happy to help but I will need some information - let me know version and settings please. As for sorties there should be about 6 aircraft by my recollection (it has been awhile since I played Battle 1)...some of them may come back for a second run...


Battle 1 can be very frustrating - the Germans are powerful and the Soviets are nearly ineffective due to poor experience and morale...consider it a victory if you preserve your core force more or less intact so they can gain experience....

Anytime a lot of units are packed near a tank or truck it is bad news - aircraft go for trucks and tanks and the bombs simply erase infantry and crews nearby....

It is good insurance to disperse your forces and avoid staying near trucks if at all possible...

Battle 1 (and most of the first 30) are very big and busy - the new battles will be smaller and shorter. Fortunately, the raids in the first set are sized about right to my tastes so they are not all massive slugfests...

Believe it or not, I scaled Battle 1 back about 33% and A_B (the original designer) removed the largest bombs from the Stukas....

All I can say is that Russian Steel began as the Campaign Collective with a vast scope that proved to be impossible to execute....

The original set of forces totalled 400 units - the player's core force was well over 100 units alone!!!

This proved to be impossible to execute with volunteer designers and testers....we scaled back as much as possible.

In hindsight, I might have set a 30 unit limit to the core, small maps, battles of 18 turns or less, and small amounts of AUX units....

But we didn't discover this until we had half the battles already designed...the decision was to press forward and complete what we had and then rethink any new battles.

I appreciate your constructive feedback because at the moment I am the only designer for RS...I'd like to make battles people enjoy so let me know what doesn't work. Penetrator has shown some interest in doing the Kursk battles and that is good news...

Finally, we never intended this to be a romp for the Russian - you can use the game's Long Campaign generator for that.

RS should provide some insight into the historical situation while retaining some entertainment value....

Until late 1943 the Luftwaffe was devastating - wherever they showed up in strength, the Russians faltered...

1941 Soviet tank losses were so severe they simply disbanded the surviving tank divisions (few survived) and produced only tank brigades (of 40-60 tanks or so) until things got a little better...

So, we felt we needed to make 1941 and 1942 tough with the focus on building your force's experience for the 1943 campaigns where you will need elite crews to triumph over Tigers and Panthers...

Let me know how things go.

Brad

[SittingDuck]

Playing v7.1, pref all ON w/ limited ammo.

I had one turn where over 10 planes (no joke) took strafing runs. I hit F9 and counted the planes - 6 Bf110's and 8 Stukas. I have no clue on the KVs & T28s. I think I'll delete the Pref file and start over again.

Too bad on the sizing thing. In retrospect (yeah, how easy, eh?) it should have been geared to the size you are shooting for from the get-go. Not easy to do when you have guys who have that megalomanical need to control every footsoldier in Stalin's or Hitler's army, and then they start producing scenarios.

My concern would be that at later stages as you gear down the core force not only does it have the huge experience factor (well, you can comp with the German exp), but it also becomes a numerical monster force. Unless you scale down rebuild points sharply, in which case guys just lose units for good. I don't have any answers. I guess you've got this figured out.

Keep up the good work!

[SittingDuck]

OK, I deleted the steel.prf file and it works fine (or whatever that file is called).

When in doubt, throw that thing out.

[SittingDuck]

Well, starting with a fresh preferences file makes the KV2s work properly.

However, the T28s still come on as infantry. And it doesn't matter that I've deleted my pref file (right after they appear). They stay infantry. This can't just be me.

[SittingDuck]

Brad,

What is the area and projected end-point of the campaign? Basically time and location.

Thanks,
SD

[darroch]

Sitting Duck:

Thanks for calling my attention to battle 1. There are way too many planes there. I was sure I'd reduced them to 6 or so. My apologies.

Since the T28s are misbehaving I will check the battle once again and re-issue it with RS 1.5 in a week or three.

If you'd like a re-issue of Battle 1 before then let me know and I'll expedite it to you.

As far as battle size, by the time we realized that the battles were scoped too big, we had over a dozen built. The designers had built and left so it was a matter of rebuilding from scratch or using what we had.

As far as experience - the main problem occurs if the player takes more than 55 core units....playtesting of all RS battles was with a core force of 59 units to ensure that crews appeared when tanks were damaged (if too many units then no crews..)

So, yes, if a player has 65 or more units and upgrades them, then by 1942 the campaign will have lost its sense of challenge and most battles will be a romp...

But, I have noticed that in 1943, the German gunnery has become so deadly that a combined arms attack is usually the only way to avoid horrendous casualties...

Elite crews are actually no protection against 75s and 88s...

In playtesting the Kuma battle, I made a small change (added 2 AGs and subtracted 2 Strumoviks) and my core force got creamed - 75% losses and objective not attained....these are elite and veteran crews and I know where the Germans are hiding...!!!

So, if the player adheres to the 55 unit limit, their core force's experience will be necessary and will not enable a walkover....

As far as when does the campaign end....

with RS 1.4 , it ends at Battle 32 in December 1942...

RS 1.5 will take you to Battle 42 and February 1943

RS 1.6 should take you to Battle 45 and late March 1943...

RS 1.7 will cover four battles from Kursk....

There is no planned end to these things - I will just get tired or distracted and they will stop getting released...

We spoke grandiosely about getting to Berlin and I'm crazy enough to try...if I get that far, we will have to do some what-if battles and assume the war drags on just so we can see some elite JS-3s go up against a company of Maus tanks (mice?)

Anyways, these are primarily for enjoyment and entertainment and to see just how far I can push things....

Cheers,

Brad

[SittingDuck]

Well, to me it's awesome. You are doing a great job.

I am going to do Battle One like it is - I think I can work things out. Regardless of the outcome you go to the same battle with the same points. It's just a matter of not getting your core creamed.

[SittingDuck]

Odd. I restarted the game with a different core and they worked.

Hmmm. Wait, I had done something odd to my Soviet OOB... (eep!)

[darroch]

Sitting Duck:


1) I have found that trucks attract the Luftwaffe like horse manure attracts flies....

two observations:

- Avoid being near trucks if at all possible when the Luftwaffe is around

- Hide tanks and leave trucks in the open (maybe with some AA nearby in woods)...

2) Glad to hear that the T-28 thing might be a custom OOB effect - let me know - I'll be looking over Bat 1 this weekend....


The actual objective of Battle 1 is to keep your core alive and gain experience....

Cheers,

B

[SittingDuck]

The t28 thing was for sure on my end. The game is fine. I played it with the OEM OOB and it was good.

Wagons - I tell ya, circle the wagons and the Stukas just go crazy. Not real sporting, I should say. But effective. I won the game with a 2-1 VP ratio.

[darroch]

2:1 is good for these battles - feel free to ignore the computer's assessment - we have not had the time to playbalance the points - judge your own victory based on your interpretation of the intro text...


I have found there are several battles where you simply cannot get a DV if you play straight...



Battle 2 will give you a breather - you are attacking....

Battle 3 you are on the run again....


I don't think you'll see the Luftwaffe in anything like those numbers for many battles - I think - keep about 4 x AA weapons handy - once those AA weapons turn veteran they will start knocking planes down before they bomb....until then you can at least damage them and keep them from coming back for second (and third) runs...


Cheers,

B

[SittingDuck]

Was just thinking about this victory level thing the other day. It's a big crapout in this game, even with the parameters that SPWAW extends to you. Simply because of their ridiculous ratios. But....

In reality it's more a matter of victory, draw, or loss. And I think that scenarios can be properly balanced for that. Forget the decisive levels and just assume both marginal and decisive render same result.

This is important in the campaign branching. Since decisives are quite often not mathematically possible, the designers should arrange their battle flowchart upon the marginal loss, marginal victory, and draw results, making the decisive victory/loss results be the same as marginal victory/loss results (for the next branching battle).

The other thing is this - how often do you get 100+ points for smoking a tank and just 50 points for holding a spot of terrain? That's ridiculous (this is in all SPWAW games so don't feel I am even highlighting the campaign). The only way to deal with this, IMO, is by reducing the values of both sides forces so that VP objectives actually ARE valuable.

Easier said than done, because you have to factor the value of each entire force, what a player may (or probably) would lose in the process, and so on. Not an easy issue to deal with. And probably the most underworked area of scenario development, according to what I've seen in the history of the game.

Nonetheless, we carry on!

[SittingDuck]

Brad,

I am going into the editor and altering A_B's Dubno Defend scenario. I found out there are actually 16 planes for the Germans (not 14 as I had originally thought). I am cutting it down to 8 planes. That, and I am also changing one of the Soviet AUX units into the proper formation (it is a AT gun attached improperly to a wagon detail, not the rifle platoon I assume it should have been in).

I need to know how to forward these files to you.

-SittingDuck

[varjager]

I would like to know where i can get a hold of the complete version of this campaign?
It sound intresting with a long Campaign from the russian side.

[SittingDuck]

http://www.tankhead.ca/SPWaW/spwaw.html

Go to that link and search around, perhaps under Campaigns or something.

There are three files currently that you need to get: (RS2, RS3, and RS4). These have all the files that exist at this point.

It's an ambitious project.