WITW: The Game of Exploits?

[RedLancer]

If this thread continues in the current direction I will lock it.  No personal attacks.
 
That said....
 
No-one designs a game so it can be exploited but in a game this complex there are always un-intended loopholes that we endeavour to address - however locking down everything into a history or bust approach is not the answer: look at the discussions on bombing VPs for V-Weapons and U-Boats.
 
I add my thanks to the Beta Testers to those of Pavel although I sit with a foot in both the Tester and Dev camps.  Alpha / Beta Testing found almost 1000 bugs and prompted hundreds of tasks.  I think that about 150+ volunteered for testing and those 60 odd that made it into the credits provided some feedback - and not all of it extensive or complementary.  I'm always surprised with the impression that some have that the 2by3 Dev Team is some major corporation. The core team (ie. provide product that is then tested) is less than 10 and almost all of us have day jobs.  Most of the work is done by 3 people - Gary, Joel and Pavel.  
 
As to Dev feedback Gary never posts on the forums but Joel and Pavel do - as do I, Trey and Dennis.  Time is finite and we post when we need to but we are all busy.  Strangely Joel and I have found time to actually play an almost normal game recently - a pleasant experience and much better than replaying the same turn ten times hunting for a bug. 

[DTomato]

I don't mean to attack Pelton (I've played him, and he was a gentleman). But it's peculiar to be criticized for poo Allied play from someone who has never played the Allies. I've had my butt kicked as both Allied and German, so I can at least speak to both sides from painful experience.

My original point was almost philosophical. Finding loopholes to smack your opponent is an old wargaming tradition, and I've never been a stickler for historical accuracy because it's subjective and because in the end, most of us will sacrifice history for fun or victory. Still, it seems very easy to rationalize some ahistorical move like massed nightfighter escorts in 1943.

One thing I have noticed with Grigsby/2By3 games is that they (or at least the forums) tend to be dominated by a dozen or so players with lots of time and/or caffeine, and they tend to control the evolution of the game. It may be that a strategy like massive strat bombing can be countered. But a full game of WITW can take 300+ hours to finish, which means that many players won't have the time to find that counter. That may not be a problem, but it is a factor.

DT

[Peltonx]

ORIGINAL: DicedT

Pelton, you have a lot of nerve to tell people that they don't know to play the Allies,
when you have NEVER played the Allies against a German opponent.
Just like in WITE, you play the Germans over...and over...and over. It's almost creepy.

Maybe the Allied players are incompetent crybabies.
So why don't you play the Allies, and I'll take the Germans, and then you can show us how it's done?
In fact, I'm sure there are a dozen WITW players who would love to play against you if you took the Allies.

How about it?

DT

I have never claimed to know what I am doing as allied, but I can clearly see how WA play or Russians play.
I have played Russia once just to show how screwed up 1.06/1.07 were to prove a point a complete green moron like myself playing Russia could win vs anyone.
Again 1.08 has made the game all things being equal based on player skills. Skills = knowing the game mechanics/rulesets.

Almost everyone I play are good in some areas and poor in others. Several are good in most areas and a few poor in all areas. I see no need to play as WA as the game over all is balanced.
Sure I like to see VP tweaked a little and others have voised a few other possible tweaks, but the game is really good over all and about finished alrdy unlike WitE and WitP which took yrs to get to 99%.

I am not going to get into the personal name calling ( almost creepy ), I leave that to others I will stick to the data.

Your a good person and one I consider to be a good player no matter what game you play.

I am guessing if you keep playing and we play again come next fall you would possibly kick my ass.

[Joel Billings]

ORIGINAL: Seminole

I'll be onboard with this comment when they fix the air supply bug. Right now it undoes much that the sophisticated logistics engine tries to accomplish.

If by that you mean this item, it has been fixed in the latest version in test (as has the nightfighter escorts shooting down 100+ fighters):

5. Airdropped freight is triggering units to be resupplied from other depots than the one in the hex where the supplies are dropped. Fixed.

[LiquidSky]

Well..I have never played the Germans..until now. And I strongly think I am going to need a good night (day) of sleep before I can seriously tackle this mess. My hat is off to anybody who has managed it. Win or lose.

The game does have some problems....I haven't played enough yet to give a serious post but I have informed them of the more exploitable exploits. I liked the one in my very first game against the AI when I could 'fly' some of my transports for free to drop supplies. (they dropped the supplies but didn't actually fly, which meant they could do it over and over and ...)

They fixed that.

I don't consider it an exploit if somebody parks a bunch of aircraft in an area and they get shot up because the other guy flew a mission. Those sort of things are just balance issues...and are probably easily fixed. Personally I think there is a lot of that in the game. I found it easy to kill tanks with aircraft. Probably a lot easier then historical.

I found it easy to use a taskforce to take a coastal hex. Reading a book on the Juno landings now (and a couple on some Pacific landings) leads me to believe that shore bombardment does a lot less then what the navy may think. Probably too strong in the game. Definitely too mobile.

There is also the super secret game winning exploit that I emailed them about....getting fixed.

Invading Europe instead of Italy..not an exploit. It's a strategy. Mostly a dumb one unless your opponent is completely focused on Italy. But nobody would do that, would they...not anybody here. [:D]

Strategic bombing for vps....I don't consider anything written as a rule to be an exploit. I mean page 208 clearly states how vps from bombing work. Eastern Forces box...same thing. Its a rule. You can read it. Just take it into consideration if you are playing the other side.

Well..I am clearly tired, and have a lot of thinking to do about the Germans. Whats with all these forts in northern Italy? Do they think the Russians are coming?

[Numdydar]

The forts in N. Italy were from WWI when they had to worry about the Austrians [:)]