The core problem with WitE+

[GamesaurusRex]

ORIGINAL: Schmart

With virtually endless Russian unit shells, to prevent a huge army if they run away, what about punishing them through logistics and industry? Historically, Stalin gave the Scorched-Earth order to remove or destroy everything possible. If the Russians run away, they can't have a very effective scorched-earth strategy. They would lose food, supplies, factories, population etc. That should be the trade-off: Stand and fight and you get lots of replacements. Run away and you get fewer replacements/industry, or maybe even give the Axis more, as the captured supplies, farms, industries, population, etc would be less destroyed and more useable. A simple current coding fix might be to reduce Russian Rail capacity. If players can run away and still save most of their industry, then that's wrong and a-historical.

They do have to defend and delay forward just long enough to evacuate the industry. As the game is currently configured, the Russians can just barely evacuate the industry now and are still subject to losing some of it.

The industry, however, is irrelevent, if the Lvov Pocket is still possible.

[Wheat]

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

This has, however, done nothing to improve the Russian attack values and now I am finding that, contrary to all the ficticious claims about massive Russian advantage due to game bias , it is impossible to get a "retreat" against German units dug in "2" level fortified positions, despite using six Corps level units in the attack after air bombardment. (The forum postings about Russians achieving 94% percent victories on 1:1 or 2:1 attacks are just pure fabrication.) The rules say that the German morale is supposed begin declining in 1943... but according to Morvael, that is apparently not functioning and the German national morale levels remain at 70 throughout the game as of the latest patch. I need not explain the consequences of the effect of the Germans maintaining their 1941 morale advantage on the combat resolution results throughout the entire game. That does not bode well for my Russian attempt to ever get as far as Berlin.

I don't honestly believe that many of you have actually played the game beyond 1942. Rather, the German Fanbois have quit if they haven't won by 1942 and the Russians have been defeated by 1942 or won only because the German player didn't know how to play the German side.

Ummm, tsk, tsk. You did NOT attack with 6 corp level units. I told you, USE 6 CORPS, plus air, sappers, artillery, decent commander. But noooooooooo. In went the doomed Russians. More statistics for Stalin. Hell, Zhukov should be dismissed....again. Snicker.

(aside to the forum: I might lose the game but I am winning the psychological war.)

But I agree with Gamesaurus in that not many games go past 42, and thus, it gets really hard to tell how the bug fixes and tweaks will work out for most of us. I fully expect that as some have said, my army will melt away in 44 and beyond. We are using the 11 patch, but it frankly scares me to invest this much time and have the game go screwy cause in essence, we are still playtesting this monstrosity. But, Gamesaurus and I are having fun (he just sounds like he isn't) and that I guess, is what matters most to me in the end.

[RBednar]

What should be the morale, etc. factors for Soviets and Germans be for V1.07.13, for both solitaire and pbem?

[Tom Hunter]

The VP system does not have to be territorial. It’s one of the things that amazes me about the game, that the VP system is so primitive.
A system that added VP every time either side takes a city could lead to a better game.
A system that scored VP for every attack, failed or successful, or that penalized retreating. Or a system that awards VP for holding isolated territory, or for holding the cities in the Lvov pocket, or any one of a number of things.
Giving VP for actions rather than territory could solve a great many problems.

[Aurelian]

ORIGINAL: Wheat

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

This has, however, done nothing to improve the Russian attack values and now I am finding that, contrary to all the ficticious claims about massive Russian advantage due to game bias , it is impossible to get a "retreat" against German units dug in "2" level fortified positions, despite using six Corps level units in the attack after air bombardment. (The forum postings about Russians achieving 94% percent victories on 1:1 or 2:1 attacks are just pure fabrication.) The rules say that the German morale is supposed begin declining in 1943... but according to Morvael, that is apparently not functioning and the German national morale levels remain at 70 throughout the game as of the latest patch. I need not explain the consequences of the effect of the Germans maintaining their 1941 morale advantage on the combat resolution results throughout the entire game. That does not bode well for my Russian attempt to ever get as far as Berlin.

I don't honestly believe that many of you have actually played the game beyond 1942. Rather, the German Fanbois have quit if they haven't won by 1942 and the Russians have been defeated by 1942 or won only because the German player didn't know how to play the German side.

Ummm, tsk, tsk. You did NOT attack with 6 corp level units. I told you, USE 6 CORPS, plus air, sappers, artillery, decent commander. But noooooooooo. In went the doomed Russians. More statistics for Stalin. Hell, Zhukov should be dismissed....again. Snicker.

Yup. 3 Corps per hex, each with sappers, HQs with a combination of artillery/mortars. Plenty of air support. Flatten them with your artillery divisions doing bombardments.

[GamesaurusRex]

ORIGINAL: Wheat

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

This has, however, done nothing to improve the Russian attack values and now I am finding that, contrary to all the ficticious claims about massive Russian advantage due to game bias , it is impossible to get a "retreat" against German units dug in "2" level fortified positions, despite using six Corps level units in the attack after air bombardment. (The forum postings about Russians achieving 94% percent victories on 1:1 or 2:1 attacks are just pure fabrication.) The rules say that the German morale is supposed begin declining in 1943... but according to Morvael, that is apparently not functioning and the German national morale levels remain at 70 throughout the game as of the latest patch. I need not explain the consequences of the effect of the Germans maintaining their 1941 morale advantage on the combat resolution results throughout the entire game. That does not bode well for my Russian attempt to ever get as far as Berlin.

I don't honestly believe that many of you have actually played the game beyond 1942. Rather, the German Fanbois have quit if they haven't won by 1942 and the Russians have been defeated by 1942 or won only because the German player didn't know how to play the German side.

Ummm, tsk, tsk. You did NOT attack with 6 corp level units. I told you, USE 6 CORPS, plus air, sappers, artillery, decent commander. But noooooooooo. In went the doomed Russians. More statistics for Stalin. Hell, Zhukov should be dismissed....again. Snicker.

(aside to the forum: I might lose the game but I am winning the psychological war.)

But I agree with Gamesaurus in that not many games go past 42, and thus, it gets really hard to tell how the bug fixes and tweaks will work out for most of us. I fully expect that as some have said, my army will melt away in 44 and beyond. We are using the 11 patch, but it frankly scares me to invest this much time and have the game go screwy cause in essence, we are still playtesting this monstrosity. But, Gamesaurus and I are having fun (he just sounds like he isn't) and that I guess, is what matters most to me in the end.

Yes Wheat, fear not ! I too am having fun !... and don't worry, because I still think the outcome is in doubt in 43-44-45 because it is a long way back to Berlin and a great deal of reorganization is still necessary to assemble the hammers needed to nail you. (For some reason I don't yet understand, my ability to attach SUs directly to Corps rather than their parent HQs, has been limited by some factor or rule... TOE structures maybe? I don't know, but some of my Corps still have no assign button).

For the record, if it turns out to be a hard crawl back to Berlin and you stall the Russians out of Berlin berfore the deadline, I will be happy with the results because, if it ends that close, then we'll know we are close to game balance. That outcome should be what a German "victory" looks like. Their best hope, failing a crushing blow in 41, was to stall the front on the East early enough and sufficiently enough to make some sort of negotiated settlement pallatable to the Allies so the Germans could avoid total deafeat.

Let the grind continue !!

[swkuh]

"losing assign button" for me playing German occurs when AP's are zero. Next turn it comes back, all other things equal.

The game is very enjoyable and an outcome that matches history is fine with me. Victory playing Axis is in getting some advantage over historical timeline, casualty ratios, & territory.

Regrettable that the code resorts to kludge factors to ensure expected results ( e.g., 2:1/1:1) at certain points. Are there others? It would be nice if player visible factors in some way consistently relate to unit capabilities for movement, strength, casualties, etc. What's an arm chair Field Marshall to do if the troops keep secrets?

[GamesaurusRex]

ORIGINAL: rrbill

"losing assign button" for me playing German occurs when AP's are zero. Next turn it comes back, all other things equal.

The game is very enjoyable and an outcome that matches history is fine with me. Victory playing Axis is in getting some advantage over historical timeline, casualty ratios, & territory.

Regrettable that the code resorts to kludge factors to ensure expected results ( e.g., 2:1/1:1) at certain points. Are there others? It would be nice if player visible factors in some way consistently relate to unit capabilities for movement, strength, casualties, etc. What's an arm chair Field Marshall to do if the troops keep secrets?

You have truly pointed out a major difficulty players have when they are trying to assess overall balance of this game and are trying to choose beginning option adjustments. The relative combat effectiveness of the two sidws are different for each year of the game. It is hard to form a really balanced selection, when the underlying factors controlling combat results (like morale), production rates, and TOE changes are largely hidden from the players and in some cases not functioning as the rules describe. On the other hand, it does really simulate the feel of "fog of war"... (Maybe a little too much "fog", and not enough "war"... LOL [:D] ).

[rmonical]

I am finding that, contrary to all the ficticious claims about massive Russian advantage due to game bias , it is impossible to get a "retreat" against German units dug in "2" level fortified positions, despite using six Corps level units in the attack after air bombardment. (The forum postings about Russians achieving 94% percent victories on 1:1 or 2:1 attacks are just pure fabrication.) The rules say that the German morale is supposed begin declining in 1943... but according to Morvael, that is apparently not functioning and the German national morale levels remain at 70 throughout the game as of the latest patch. I need not explain the consequences of the effect of the Germans maintaining their 1941 morale advantage on the combat resolution results throughout the entire game. That does not bode well for my Russian attempt to ever get as far as Berlin.

I don't honestly believe that many of you have actually played the game beyond 1942. Rather, the German Fanbois have quit if they haven't won by 1942 and the Russians have been defeated by 1942 or won only because the German player didn't know how to play the German side.

I am sorry, but I remain entirely unconvinced that this game has ANY Russian favor bias AT ALL... In fact, using the standard game settings, it is so heavily biased in favor of the German side as it stands now, that I can't see how the Germans could possibly lose. I won't quit playing the game, but if I ever feel like winning it against a human opponent, I will choose the German side to play. (And as soon as Wheat explains to me exactly the methods he uses to run the German side, I will gladly let him play the Russian side so he can "show me how it is done" with all those great Russian advantages.)

Start here and read forward: fb.asp?m=3524482. Hooooper is having no problems and will be in Berlin in 1944.