Please fix Soviet morale in 1941, its broken.

[Peltonx]

ORIGINAL: SigUp




As for the main discussion, I think all in all getting morale increases above NM should be much harder. I just noticed 78th Infantry Division back in East Prussia has experienced a bump of morale from 97 to 99 from turn 24 to 25. Then the distance should be increased. As has been stated before 10 hexes for the Soviets basically can serve as a reserve defensive line.

So super star what your saying is NM is really STILL BROKEN?

Morale should NOT be increasing above 50 10 hexes from the front or 75 if in supply.

It should only increase to 50 10 hexes from the front.

And here we go testing this out.

[Peltonx]

tm.asp?m=3364022

[Denniss]

Another example of the borked soviet morale: the two soviet garrisons and one infantry brigade between Helsinki and Turku. They start with 40 morale and at turn 4 they are already at ~53, one turn later after two defensive wins they are at 57, 58 and 60.
Detailed, Bde-fort-fort:
T2: 46-53(!)-46
T3: 47-53-53(!)
T3: 52-53-53
T4: 52-53-53

I have no idea why the one fort received this 13pt boost in T2 - maybe combination of below 50 morale + below NM + in good supply?
Without a boost for the Axis AI it's usually not able to break these Bde+Forts. I have seen it trying for some turn then starting to ignore them, leaving the Bde free hand to move in Finland, eventually leading to early Fin surrender.

[mktours]

on the topic:
my suggestion is keeping the soviet morale but making the evacuation of industry more costly, that would force the red army to fight forward. in my PBEM game as the Russian side, my beginner opponent made many mistakes but he is till able to capture Kiev and cross the river( i defended it in full force) well before the history date, while i have a lot of rail capacity left(i don't need to evacuate a lot of industry). the red army is still too weak if fight forward.

[Ron]

It seems again some are intent on obfuscating the orignal issue and mixing up historical versus game, so much so I doubt the designers are willing to do anything with such schizophrenic responses. It's no wonder this game has such muddled design ideas. No question currently the Russians in '41 are overpowered, and omitting the reasons why for now, I have read suggestions of increasing the Germans morale to 110 or Germans to 105 and Russians to 95 for more balanced H-H play. I tried a few turns against the German AI at 120 but the Russian opposition still seems a little too strong, so I am leaning towards the 105/95 settings for a new H-H match. I am wondering if anyone else has tried these settings or has any feedback?

[janh]

Ron, the Soviets are not overpowered at this point, nor is the op-tempo usually too slow, but the way the game allows the Soviet player to use his forces can create a lot of trouble for the Axis. Naturally, if a Soviet player ignores the South after a Lvov (or because he knows he will win the war there) sends all reinforcement and the good-quality survivors to the gate of LG, or Moscow, essentially focusing everything on only 2 AG's, this must have consequences. This raises the question on whether Axis should actually reinforce AGS, or better to the opposite, though.
The Axis window of opportunity is kind of small, and two or three turns delay may seriously derail Barbarossa unless the Soviet player fails to make use of that, or gets poor dice rolls.

Axis, though it can improve on historic performance (e.g. because it today knows the opponent much better as well as his reinforcement and production capabilities, knowing when and where to strike), it seems apparent that the potential that the Soviet player can squeeze out of game with hindsight is bigger. Yet the Soviets could and should fight forward much better with this patch now. A couple of months would be required now to let things settle and both sides adapt to the new standard with fixed morale rules. If it proves to be devastating and Axis get stuck before Smolensk and Kiev too often, more often then LG or Moscow fall, then there shouldn't be any more need for discussion agree on reducing to 45 or so.

Nonetheless I think for one setting the threshold of the rear area "benefits" to >> 10 is quite sensible. The morale issue might better wait a few months to conclude on that. The catch remains that it now puts other parameters (fort building, rear area range, reserve reaction tables, routing losses as fct. of morale etc.) into question as well as the game's freedom with chose when and where to fight with what.

Since no quick or complex change is going to happen, there could be simple house-rules:
- Either adjust moral difficulty settings at player's desire, but allow Soviet and Axis to transfer large formations north and south at will or, what I consider much more sensible in the context or realism:
- reducing fort building rates to ca 70% to adapt to the new morale standard (delays will not cause such quick trouble, as well as breakthrus would get easier and the situation remain more fluid), and agreeing on limits of force transfers (e.g. Soviet only move say max 4 division belonging to Southern Army fronts per turn north of the Axis minor's line unless a Lvov renders contesting AGS forward hopeless/Axis sends >=1 Panzer Corps from AGN or AGC south/or LG falls before say turn 12). If you'd even want a more realistic, slower op-tempo, top it off with what players are now doing against AI in the context of the forgiving logistics: reduce the Logistics setting to 70% for both sides.

If anything, more than "breaking" the fixed morale mechanics again, the blizzard now needs toning down so Axis can survive it better. It has the single most negative effect on the Axis, more so than the fixed morale now -- yet of course only as long as you try to repeat what the Germans did, i.e. hardly give ground. However, as long as Axis is allowed to send numerous units back to Poland and winter them in towns well behind the front, enabled by disengaging and conducting a slow but safe Sir Robin, fixing blizzard won't get a major topic since all this allows the German Ostheer to remain high-morale, and high-strength for a death blow in 42 anyway. If you are all about winning but dislike the >=43 part, this is as much the route to go as not wasting your troops fighting forward of the Djenpr is for the Soviets.

Worse, now only eying the morale change could keep the focus on a small part of the whole GC and game, and not the whole. It would be much better if the Axis would as much as Soviets (be able to) fight forward, and a serious Soviet blizzard offensive only develop naturally and locally with an overexposed Axis front (a matter of player's aggression and events), some winter logistic penalties (we have, just on morale and combat scaling factors are a little too much), and better Soviet troops (we can perhaps have now with the fixed morale rule). I think there isn't so much to change there except a few floats in the modifiers, and perhaps could be a doable thing to consider that would very greatly improve the game...

[darbycmcd]

Why do you believe that is 'no doubt' the Soviets are too strong? I have heard it asserted by a few players, but what is missing is a clear statement of what expected outcomes for the early war are, in order to judge if the Soviets are too strong or not. The problem I have with this line of reasoning is that it is not obvious to me that the German players are failing to make historical progress in more than half the games... of course we have a very small sample of AARs, and they are mostly done by a handful of the same players, but I have the feeling that in more than half the Germans do better than historical for the Barbarossa period. So how do we KNOW there is a problem?

Or how about this, lets compile data on the date when Berlin fell in campaign games. If there is a significant deviation from distribution around the historical date, there is probably a problem.

[darbycmcd]

Just to be clear, I was responding to Ron. Janh, I totally agree with you. It is the main problem of any East front game, it is like trying to recreate an instance of a game in which one of the players was excellent and one sucked! So it is very hard to do better than the excellent player, but easy to do better than super suck.

I really think the big problem in the game is one of the first ones noticed, supply throughput is way way too high. It allows continuous offensive operations where such were not possible. This means that the soviets can attack almost without stop along almost all the front once they transition to the offense. I suspect that this isn't a bigger complaint because lets be honest, the biggest source of complaints are things that limit the German offensive power in the Barbarossa period. Limiting supply to an historical level would impact the Germans here, so little grumbling, although it actually hurt the German player in the long run (but how many games actually get played to completion?). I mean, really the biggest "Middle Earth" (to borrow a peltonism) feature going in the game now is air supply of panzer divisions conducting week-long combat operations... but there doesn't seem to be a lot of hand-wringing over that.

[Walloc]

ORIGINAL: Denniss

Another example of the borked soviet morale: the two soviet garrisons and one infantry brigade between Helsinki and Turku. They start with 40 morale and at turn 4 they are already at ~53, one turn later after two defensive wins they are at 57, 58 and 60.
Detailed, Bde-fort-fort:
T2: 46-53(!)-46
T3: 47-53-53(!)
T3: 52-53-53
T4: 52-53-53

I have no idea why the one fort received this 13pt boost in T2 - maybe combination of below 50 morale + below NM + in good supply?
Without a boost for the Axis AI it's usually not able to break these Bde+Forts. I have seen it trying for some turn then starting to ignore them, leaving the Bde free hand to move in Finland, eventually leading to early Fin surrender.

U prolly know more about the inner workings than me Dennis, but seeing ur examples my line of thinking would be.
50 Start NM, going down to presumably 49 by turn 3. They bde gets a +5 to NM so the limit could be at 54.
As i read the rules Forts/garrsions sholdnt get the bonus, but ur example makes me wonder if there is a bug and they get it too. I means it wouldnt be the first time sub divisional units gets bugged. As in the case of FDB brigades movement and the sub divisional units recieving the wrong movement bonus in the surprise bonus. At leased this is some thing i would ask Joel about what is the intend and possibly test then.

Now there is some thing i always wondered, but actually never checked. It states in the rules regarding to the +10 hex refit moral units units need to be 10 hexes away from enemy supplied units. Well the finns starts as frozen. Do frozen units count as enemy units or not for this purpose?
If they dont u could get up too +5(4.9) from the below NM increase rule and what ever u get from the refit bonus. 13 seems more than a stretch, but the 6-7 that is given per turn seems within the possible, tho not that likely. As per post 1.07.06 rules. Odd thing is that it stops at 52/53 and not 54 tho.

The moral increase for the won battles seems very unlike in the pre 1.07.06 world. Im starting to see a pattern tho.

U have what seem unusally high(fast) increases in moral between turn(thats known), but more interresting is the high increase from the battles/ how fast it goes up.

ORIGINAL: SigUp
As for the main discussion, I think all in all getting morale increases above NM should be much harder. I just noticed 78th Infantry Division back in East Prussia has experienced a bump of morale from 97 to 99 from turn 24 to 25. Then the distance should be increased. As has been stated before 10 hexes for the Soviets basically can serve as a reserve defensive line.

2 issues in this. 78th ID starts at 80 moral and is now 97. How the f.. do u get up to 97 in 24 turns. Sure u could pre 1.07.06 get higher than NM in moral from wins, but getting to 97 from 80 was damn near impossible less it was a SS unit, starting at higher moral and having a higher NM. How ever the first 17 increase in moral has happen it seems to go much faster than what was seen in pre 1.07.06

2ndly is that there is no provision in the rules of getting from 97 to 99 moral less from wins, not the case here. There are rules about less than NN, not the case, the good supply rule capped at 75, not the case here and then the refit bonus 10+ hexes away from the enemy. Well according to the rules its supposedly capped at 50, but i would say my experience is that this is some what not working as the rules states and ppl could pre 1.07.06 get units higher than 50 with refit bonsus but it was slooow see Carls charts)and 97-99 moral in 1 turn is certain far from the norm. Again the moral workings of this seems to go faster than in pre 1.07.06.

Then there is:

ORIGINAL: SigUp
The morale rise since 1.07 is really quick. I just discovered that with my Rumanien units. On turn 15 I railed a Rumanian division back to Rumania with morale 41 to refit. Two turns later it is already on morale 49. Another Rumanian infantry division was sent to Odessa as garrison. On turn 10 when the rails reached Odessa it was on morale 40. Turn 17 it was on morale 50, without refit.

Well, we 2 issues here. First the 2 divs on refit goes from 41 to 49 in 2 turns. Well since 41 is over the rumenian NM the increase can only per post 1.07.06 rules come from the refit bonus, the "The unit's morale is below 50, and it is more than 10 hexes away from the nearest enemy unit" with out refit and possibly from the "good supply bonus". Thats 8 in moral increased in refit in 2 turns. Much fast than what I experienced pre 1.07.06.

Then there is the issue of the units at Odessa. Since it was moral 40 over NM the increase "cant" come from that. It wasnt on refit so the increase cant come from there. Then there is only two possible explantion for the 10 moral increase and that is "good supply" rules and the +10 hexes away from enemy rule. 10 moral increase in 7 turns. Again much higher than i experienced in the pre 1.07.06 situasion.

Not to talk about lots of ppls general observation noted in this thread and naturally has fouces on the effect on russian side but its apprent it happens on both sides.


Well, supposedly the bug fix in 1.07.06 only a dealth with a specific part of moral increase:

V1.07.06– April 12, 2013

• New Features and Rule Changes

• Bug Fixes

1. Fixed a bug that prevented a part of rule 9.1.1 from functioning correctly. Units that were below their national morale were not getting the chance to gain morale simply due to the fact that they were below the national morale. Now they get the chance, and if they go up (they must pass various checks), they will receive an increase of die(10% of their national morale), but not to exceed the national morale.

Well the pattern i speak off is that it seems that post 1.07.06. That its moral increases across the board that is much faster than pre 1.07.06 not only those that can possibly be related to the stated changes.

Am i crazy or ppl see the same pattern?

Has the fix unintentionaly(i asssume) not only made the stated changes, but has some how bugged moral increases in general? so every thing related to moral increases happens much faster than pre 1.07.06

Ppl got any other observasion that either supports or dispells this?


Kind regards,

Rasmus

[SigUp]

ORIGINAL: Walloc

ORIGINAL: SigUp
As for the main discussion, I think all in all getting morale increases above NM should be much harder. I just noticed 78th Infantry Division back in East Prussia has experienced a bump of morale from 97 to 99 from turn 24 to 25. Then the distance should be increased. As has been stated before 10 hexes for the Soviets basically can serve as a reserve defensive line.

2 issues in this. 78th ID starts at 80 moral and is now 97. How the f.. do u get up to 97 in 24 turns. Sure u could pre 1.07.06 get higher than NM in moral from wins, but getting to 97 from 80 was damn near impossible less it was a SS unit, starting at higher moral and having a higher NM. How ever the first 17 increase in moral has happen it seems to go much faster than what was seen in pre 1.07.06

When you mentioned it, it is certainly true. And in truth it is even scarier than that. 78th Infantry Division was pulled out of the front on turn 18 (10-16-1941). So basically it achieved 17 morale in 18 turns. Now, I think I did launch many attacks with that division, and as far as I know it was practically never involved in a losing battle.

[Walloc]

Was it some thing i said...

No one, observed any thing related to this either way?


Rasmus

[morvael]

The brigades do not get +5 but rather have a minimum NM of 50, even if main Soviet morale is below 50.

I have noticed my units going up 3-4 morale points per turn, from winning battles. Sometimes those units have higher CV (on counter) after the battle, than before - even with fatigue and casualties suffered.

[Peltonx]

ORIGINAL: Walloc

ORIGINAL: Denniss

Another example of the borked soviet morale: the two soviet garrisons and one infantry brigade between Helsinki and Turku. They start with 40 morale and at turn 4 they are already at ~53, one turn later after two defensive wins they are at 57, 58 and 60.
Detailed, Bde-fort-fort:
T2: 46-53(!)-46
T3: 47-53-53(!)
T3: 52-53-53
T4: 52-53-53

I have no idea why the one fort received this 13pt boost in T2 - maybe combination of below 50 morale + below NM + in good supply?
Without a boost for the Axis AI it's usually not able to break these Bde+Forts. I have seen it trying for some turn then starting to ignore them, leaving the Bde free hand to move in Finland, eventually leading to early Fin surrender.

U prolly know more about the inner workings than me Dennis, but seeing ur examples my line of thinking would be.
50 Start NM, going down to presumably 49 by turn 3. They bde gets a +5 to NM so the limit could be at 54.
As i read the rules Forts/garrsions sholdnt get the bonus, but ur example makes me wonder if there is a bug and they get it too. I means it wouldnt be the first time sub divisional units gets bugged. As in the case of FDB brigades movement and the sub divisional units recieving the wrong movement bonus in the surprise bonus. At leased this is some thing i would ask Joel about what is the intend and possibly test then.

Now there is some thing i always wondered, but actually never checked. It states in the rules regarding to the +10 hex refit moral units units need to be 10 hexes away from enemy supplied units. Well the finns starts as frozen. Do frozen units count as enemy units or not for this purpose?
If they dont u could get up too +5(4.9) from the below NM increase rule and what ever u get from the refit bonus. 13 seems more than a stretch, but the 6-7 that is given per turn seems within the possible, tho not that likely. As per post 1.07.06 rules. Odd thing is that it stops at 52/53 and not 54 tho.

The moral increase for the won battles seems very unlike in the pre 1.07.06 world. Im starting to see a pattern tho.

U have what seem unusally high(fast) increases in moral between turn(thats known), but more interresting is the high increase from the battles/ how fast it goes up.

ORIGINAL: SigUp
As for the main discussion, I think all in all getting morale increases above NM should be much harder. I just noticed 78th Infantry Division back in East Prussia has experienced a bump of morale from 97 to 99 from turn 24 to 25. Then the distance should be increased. As has been stated before 10 hexes for the Soviets basically can serve as a reserve defensive line.

2 issues in this. 78th ID starts at 80 moral and is now 97. How the f.. do u get up to 97 in 24 turns. Sure u could pre 1.07.06 get higher than NM in moral from wins, but getting to 97 from 80 was damn near impossible less it was a SS unit, starting at higher moral and having a higher NM. How ever the first 17 increase in moral has happen it seems to go much faster than what was seen in pre 1.07.06

2ndly is that there is no provision in the rules of getting from 97 to 99 moral less from wins, not the case here. There are rules about less than NN, not the case, the good supply rule capped at 75, not the case here and then the refit bonus 10+ hexes away from the enemy. Well according to the rules its supposedly capped at 50, but i would say my experience is that this is some what not working as the rules states and ppl could pre 1.07.06 get units higher than 50 with refit bonsus but it was slooow see Carls charts)and 97-99 moral in 1 turn is certain far from the norm. Again the moral workings of this seems to go faster than in pre 1.07.06.

Then there is:

ORIGINAL: SigUp
The morale rise since 1.07 is really quick. I just discovered that with my Rumanien units. On turn 15 I railed a Rumanian division back to Rumania with morale 41 to refit. Two turns later it is already on morale 49. Another Rumanian infantry division was sent to Odessa as garrison. On turn 10 when the rails reached Odessa it was on morale 40. Turn 17 it was on morale 50, without refit.

Well, we 2 issues here. First the 2 divs on refit goes from 41 to 49 in 2 turns. Well since 41 is over the rumenian NM the increase can only per post 1.07.06 rules come from the refit bonus, the "The unit's morale is below 50, and it is more than 10 hexes away from the nearest enemy unit" with out refit and possibly from the "good supply bonus". Thats 8 in moral increased in refit in 2 turns. Much fast than what I experienced pre 1.07.06.

Then there is the issue of the units at Odessa. Since it was moral 40 over NM the increase "cant" come from that. It wasnt on refit so the increase cant come from there. Then there is only two possible explantion for the 10 moral increase and that is "good supply" rules and the +10 hexes away from enemy rule. 10 moral increase in 7 turns. Again much higher than i experienced in the pre 1.07.06 situasion.

Not to talk about lots of ppls general observation noted in this thread and naturally has fouces on the effect on russian side but its apprent it happens on both sides.


Well, supposedly the bug fix in 1.07.06 only a dealth with a specific part of moral increase:

V1.07.06– April 12, 2013

• New Features and Rule Changes

• Bug Fixes

1. Fixed a bug that prevented a part of rule 9.1.1 from functioning correctly. Units that were below their national morale were not getting the chance to gain morale simply due to the fact that they were below the national morale. Now they get the chance, and if they go up (they must pass various checks), they will receive an increase of die(10% of their national morale), but not to exceed the national morale.

Well the pattern i speak off is that it seems that post 1.07.06. That its moral increases across the board that is much faster than pre 1.07.06 not only those that can possibly be related to the stated changes.

Am i crazy or ppl see the same pattern?

Has the fix unintentionaly(i asssume) not only made the stated changes, but has some how bugged moral increases in general? so every thing related to moral increases happens much faster than pre 1.07.06

Ppl got any other observasion that either supports or dispells this?


Kind regards,

Rasmus

Yes morale is now completely screwed up.

Girl gone wild, now its

Morale gone wild!!

[Denniss]

No need for drama, all we need is some official information what they intend to change to fix these morale issues.
Would also be nice to get some info how the TOE change issue are going to be resolved (the german 75mm ATG issue amongst others).

[Walloc]

ORIGINAL: Denniss

No need for drama, all we need is some official information what they intend to change to fix these morale issues.
Would also be nice to get some info how the TOE change issue are going to be resolved (the german 75mm ATG issue amongst others).

I agree Dennis, the above post doesnt help. It would help if we can help identify the issue. If, underlining if the fix has changed the pace of increase and possibly decrease in moral in general. From win/losses and such. It wont necesarrily help only fixing the soviet moral limit. If its much easier in combat/win to gain moral see the 97 moral german infs unit in 17 turns and what u got with ur wins for the russian side. That has an effect out over what the NM level should be, how and if the refit bonus should be Applied and what chnages to that will do to the balance. Hench my asking for other ppls observations on this.

Any how Joel isnt avaible for some time so there wont be any official looking at this here and now.


Kind regards,

Rasmus

[fbs]

bump.

[Aurelian]

ORIGINAL: fbs

I think that the important question around this is: if Germany uses historical strategy/tactics, it will lose. So, could Germany use non-historical strategy/tactics against a historical USSR and win? - I believe it could.

The flaw is that you assume that as the Germans lost doing A while the Russians did B, if they do C, the Russians will still do B.

The game already allows the Axis to C, or anything else.

[fbs]

and bump.

[Flaviusx]

ORIGINAL: fbs

Those that believe that the USSR should necessarily win the war against Germany forget the other cases where a smaller, better equipped or better led nation, or a nation willing to fight to win instead of fight to compromise, won against bigger enemies:

Alexander vs. Persians
Napoleon vs. Italy/Austria-Hungary
Rome vs. Gauls
Mongols vs Everybody
North Vietname vs. South Vietnam/USA
UK vs. Indian Kingdoms
UK vs. China (Opium wars)
Mughals vs. India
UK vs. Napoleon
Israel vs. Arabs
etc...

I think that the important question around this is: if Germany uses historical strategy/tactics, it will lose. So, could Germany use non-historical strategy/tactics against a historical USSR and win? - I believe it could. Also, if Germany used non-historical strategy/tactics against non-historical Soviet strategy/tactics, what would be the result? - I think that's a big unknown.

If people think a fair game is one that allows 50/50 chance of winning, then I think that the best position for WiTE would be to allow for greater flexibility for non-historical strategy/tactics for the German player.

But, as I'm a big fan of keeping historical perspective, I believe in a different definition of a fair game: assuming Germany is going to lose, then the German Player should win if he achieves better than historical results for Germany, even if at the end he loses the war, and the best way to do that is by adding VPs per turn - that gives incentive to move deeper into the USSR, and gives incentive for the Soviet player to hold to territory even if that means losing soldiers.

None of these examples are particularly persuasive or much resemble the conflict on the Eastern Front.

But if you want a good classical reference, I have already mentioned the 2nd Punic War. Here the parallel is much more instructive, with Rome anticipating the Soviets and Carthage the Germans in many respects.

All of Hannibal's genius in the end wasn't enough. Rome took an incredible beating but stubbornly refused to fall apart.

[elmo3]

Off we go into the wild blue yonder again. It looks like a few people are determined to derail this thread for whatever reason. Just so everyone knows, I'm probably going to start nuking irrelevant posts to force this on-topic for when Joel gets back. Please stay on topic or take your discussion elsewhere.