Soviet Production a bit too much / Major Game play issue?

[MengJiao]

ORIGINAL: ComradeP

In terms of irrecoverable losses, 1941 only amounted to 27.8% of the total losses for the war.

I'm not sure why you're presenting this as a low figure. It's actually a really high percentage out of the total considering that the fighting only lasted a bit over 6 months in 1941.

I believe Bednarre's point is that in terms of getting troops to the front, even with heavy loses, the Russians were not as close to the edge of their personnel pool as the Germans were. Moreover, interestingly, the Russians mobilized women to fight rather than going into the pool of men over 44. The Germans got out the old guys but not the women and lost the war.

[MengJiao]

ORIGINAL: Adnan Meshuggi

true - and this is the main problem from the axis pov.

If the game forces the axis player to reduce his own limited pool, he can´t do anything to reach a line the russian player can´t attack in the necessary strenght.

But - as it seems in the moment - the german numbers get halved by blizzard, the german loose the capability to fight a war in 42. You break the german neck much earlier as it happend historically.

So, the goal of a axis player is to save the own manpower pool and bleed the russian one white. Otherwise the axis can do what he want, it doesen´t matter.

Why play at all, if you can do what you want but it doesen´t matter. Not because the enemy is so superior (he isn´t) but because the weather effects are a balancing system for game-engine-problems
Because, if the axis side is too strong in 41, you can destroy the russian side to easily in 42. this would be wrong,too.

How are there "game-engine problems" if the game not only can duplicate history in terms of inflicting loses on the Russians, but suggests (as does a glance at what would have happened if the Germans had not done so well in 1941) that the Russians could well have done much better given their preponderance in men and machines and utter ruthlessness.

[Adnan Meshuggi]

ORIGINAL: MengJiao

ORIGINAL: Adnan Meshuggi

true - and this is the main problem from the axis pov.

If the game forces the axis player to reduce his own limited pool, he can´t do anything to reach a line the russian player can´t attack in the necessary strenght.

But - as it seems in the moment - the german numbers get halved by blizzard, the german loose the capability to fight a war in 42. You break the german neck much earlier as it happend historically.

So, the goal of a axis player is to save the own manpower pool and bleed the russian one white. Otherwise the axis can do what he want, it doesen´t matter.

Why play at all, if you can do what you want but it doesen´t matter. Not because the enemy is so superior (he isn´t) but because the weather effects are a balancing system for game-engine-problems
Because, if the axis side is too strong in 41, you can destroy the russian side to easily in 42. this would be wrong,too.

How are there "game-engine problems" if the game not only can duplicate history in terms of inflicting loses on the Russians, but suggests (as does a glance at what would have happened if the Germans had not done so well in 1941) that the Russians could well have done much better given their preponderance in men and machines and utter ruthlessness.

Hi,
maybe me english made the mistakes?
My point is:
The game should do this:
a.) an experienced german player can do better as historical in 1941 (as far as i look to the aars, this is true untill Blizzard) - in russian losses, in german losses (lower numbers), if the russian play sir robinsky in ground.
I think we agree, in a game only the starting date/locations are in stone, after that it should be possible to do better/worse as historically. Right?
Now, if the german side do better untill blizzard, so the historical results (high losses by winter and russian attacks) are NOT a baseline for the game in this stage of war, i think the german should also be able to defend better as historically. Why? Because with more troops, better toe, better supportline and and and a defence of the russian winter attacks should be possible (do you agree? Or do you say, it doesn´t matter, if blizzard then germans dead)
In the moment, blizzard penalize the germans in a way that
1.) the german army suffer so extreme (even more if they lost less troops as historical untill dez.41) that their comeback-capability is nullified.
2.) the russian army is so strong, that all troops can push german defenders "at will", even troops that had zero winter capability, too.
I call this a game-problem, because it is HARDCODED.

b.) if the german player make big mistakes, the russian player should be able to push the german army much more as historically (like it is in the moment), but ONLY if the odds are in favour of the russian side.

Now, can you tell me if you think my opinion is wrong? i can´t see any mistake in it.
Because it is a game with historical start dates, after that you and your opponent can do what they want. If one side can do what it want and get kicked because hardcoded "gamebalancer" then the game IS broken.

As i wrote, in the moment the game does NOT duplicate historical results in historical gameplay. That IS the problem.
And you never will achive this. The russian player will avoid a lot russian mistakes, the german player will avoid german mistakes.
If the result of this is ALLWAYS a broken german army, the game is broken.

I never said, that the russian should have no chance to be better as historical results show. In the moment we have this as the 99%-result.
That IS part of the problem - and to be honest, if russian players tell us, that the blizzard is a gamestopper, i think someone should do something serious against this.
why? because the gc 41 is for most players the really important scenario. And with this fact (do you agree?) we have the problem that any german player get kicked in blizzard in a way, that he cannot come back. So, if for gc the axis side ALLWAYS is in a worse situation to the historical results, why should someone play it?

I do belive that 2by3 will change these things, but it needs time. And - equal important - these changes should not lead to "german victory with crushing results, independent what player is doing it (so i am not interested in a switched situation with "only german victories").
Hope you understand that i see it just the way that the game needs more balancing to the axis side for winter. If we find out that in 42 or 43 the russians need more changing to the gameplay i want to fix this, too.

So no fanboyism

But it is true, i belive that the russian war is way different to the pacific war. Here everything was doomed from day 1. In the eastern war, this is not true - esp. with a good german defence (the russians had huge problems with large offensive operations untill bagriation, here they had mostly sucsess because the germans had bled white and the defence was hampered by hitlers "Halt-Befehl".

I also agree that if the germans do better as historically, the russians should get more help (improving production, more lendlease...)
or say, if the germans can crush the russian frontline in 42, the germans have to give more troops to africa, italy (43) france (44)...
why? i doubt that hitler had left so many troops in russia (that are "not necessary" from his pov), if in other locations he needs more troops. Latest in 43 with italy, you could make a multiplicator, say - germans have so much more vp or such level of troop-numbers, they need to give 15%, 50% or even 100% more troops as historically. This could make it difficulty for the axis, but could be explained as "Hitlers Wahnsinn". Sure, these extra troops can given free (not by name), but like in WitP AE it can be very expensive....

[MengJiao]

ORIGINAL: Adnan Meshuggi

ORIGINAL: MengJiao

ORIGINAL: Adnan Meshuggi
why? because the gc 41 is for most players the really important scenario.

Well, that's the problem in a nut shell. The essential problem people seem to have with the game is
that it is too realistic in that it sets the likelihood of knocking out or fatally crippling the USSR
in 1941 at close to zero.
When people blame the blizzard for this, what they are really saying is that given x amount of damage
in 1941, I should be able to finish off the Russians in 1942, which is just another way of saying: I want
to cripple the USSR in 1941. The game works very well because there is no way to lockup a win in 1941,
not even round-about by suggesting the blizzard ought to help the Germans win in 1942.

My suggestion is: Start the game in 1942. The germans get to lock in a very good 1941 and early 1942
and you can make a case for giving the Germans more troops on grounds they get out of Africa
and cut down forces in the West.

[KenchiSulla]

Manpower... You need to kill/capture a lot of russians to "win"...

Honestly, the war was, I believe, unwinnable for the germans... In game terms doing better then historical is a win in my book..

but then again, I play the Japanese in WitP: AE...

[marcpennington]

I'm not certain, but there may be at least a bit of a mechanic in play that models the gradual collapse of the Red Army. In the current GC against the AI I'm playing, random Russian units that are in supply have begun to surrender as a result of combat since early July 1942 (something I had never once seen up until that point, with the obvious exception of fortified regions.) At that point in the game, I had controlled Leningrad and Moscow since the previous year, and had just crossed the Volga north of Stalingrad. The surrenders started out as a trickle (1 or 2 surrenders a turn), but seems to be picking up pace---- in my current turn in late September, around 9-10 supplied Russian units have surrendered, including a couple corps.

I'm not sure the mechanic involved here. I had initially though it might have been a hidden trigger as a result of crossing the Volga as it started almost immediately after-wards, but assume it must be a result of the significant amounts on Soviet manpower and production that I've captured. Nevertheless, the Red Army may have at least something of a breaking point, even if it is one that I highly doubt is reachable against a skilled opponent.

[fbs]

Imho, the issue is not industrial production, but political.

The USSR is just too large to be conquered by military means -- just like China. In these countries, military victory is a way to obtain a political settlement.

Napoleon had a much bigger Army than the Russians, but couldn't win because the Russians didn't surrender. In 1917 they did surrender, but because of political crisis - it had nothing to do with recruitment pools. The Germans could have won in 1941 if the Soviets were politically shaken and a settlement could be reached that they could accept. Clausewitz at his best.

The best analysis I saw about the question "Why the Soviets didn't lose the war" was actually macroeconomic, not military or political. In that study, someone (I never grasped the name) argued that, if X=0 means surrender and X=1 means continues fighting, (and everything in the middle being the will to do one or other), then the expected return from the Soviet population from a decision to surrender or fight, that is f(X), was made of several factors, and because of the fear that both the Germans and Stalin inspired in the Soviet population was very high, the expected return for surrendering or collaborating was very low. It meant vandalism, death, deportation, slavery, loss of property, imprisonment, etc... (either from Hitler and/or Stalin). Meanwhile fighting provided better return (both from Hitler and Stalin), even at high personal risk.

So the Soviets didn't break because of that. That was different than the French surrendering, where they still expected, from the Old Order, that the surrendering side would just pay some money, lose some land and resume with their lives.

So, ...IF... the Germans had capitalized in the hatred that several regional groups had against Stalin (Ukrainians, Baltic peoples, Tartars, religious groups, etc..)... and had promised to give land instead of destroying everything... and had promised local autonomy... and religious freedom... then it might have been a big IF.

[Aurelian]

ORIGINAL: fbs


So, ...IF... the Germans had capitalized in the hatred that several regional groups had against Stalin (Ukrainians, Baltic peoples, Tartars, religious groups, etc..)... and had promised to give land instead of destroying everything... and had promised local autonomy... and religious freedom... then it might have been a big IF.

Which explains why Stalin had many 'autonomous republics' deported east.

And for the Germans to do such a thing would of been contrary to their creed of Aryan superiority.

[Klydon]

ORIGINAL: fbs


Napoleon had a much bigger Army than the Russians, but couldn't win because the Russians didn't surrender. In 1917 they did surrender, but because of political crisis - it had nothing to do with recruitment pools.

I disagree with this. The Russians were at the end of their recruiting pool and could not make good the losses of Brusilov's offensive. The Central Powers had nearly 4 million prisoners and Russian casualties were between 1.3 to 2 million depending on who/what you look at. The Tsarist system was not able to effectively mobilize the country like the Stalinist system was able to. In addition, the Russians took great pains to relocate a lot of industry to the Urals and beyond between WW1 and WW2. This was not really known to anyone and also played a key role in Russia's ability to continue the war despite losing so much territory.

I do agree the German's best bet was a negotiated settlement, but it was basically going to be along the lines of the treaty of Brest-Litvsk of WW1 which was very draconian and the Russians would have never accepted it if they had a choice.

[Panama]

Do not make the mistake of thinking in Western terms when considering the Soviet Union. You will not come to an understanding. The Soviets had planned to turn over the Army, the entire Army, every 8 months during intense campaigning. They had been preparing for a war against someone since 1927.

[pat.casey]

ORIGINAL: Panama

Do not make the mistake of thinking in Western terms when considering the Soviet Union. You will not come to an understanding. The Soviets had planned to turn over the Army, the entire Army, every 8 months during intense campaigning. They had been preparing for a war against someone since 1927.

They were still running low on manpower by 1945. The Germans ran out first, and more catastrophically, but the soviets lost about 35% of their military age manpower in the war (ages 15..49)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_ ... viet_Union

By the time of the battle of Berlin, the size of the red army was already dropping from its 1943 peak as they had serious trouble getting replacements.

If you're curious, losing 35% of your military age males is an amazing high count; the fact that soviet society continued to function at all with losses like that is a tribute (in a disgusting sort of way I suppose) to the stalanist regime.

By contrast, the germans lost about 4.5 million casualties out of a prewar military age population of around 25 million (so they lost maybe 16%) or about half the soviet loss rate, and the Germans ran the barrel dry as well.

Point being I think that, as others have pointed out, the Soviets actually were at the end of their manpower tether in 1945. They had enough to win the war, but not much more. If the Germans had managed, for example, to kill another 4-5 million soviets in 1941-42, the red army would have been that much smaller in 1943-45.

Edit:

Its worth pointing out that, in absolute terms, the soviet population was only about 2.5 times greater than the ethnic german population of the reich (roughly 200m soviets vs 80m ethnic germans in the greater reich). So an overall casualty rate of > 2.5:1 in favor of the germans theoretically favored the axis.

Naturally the germans were taking casualties on other fronts, and arguably had a lower manpower saturation point than the soviets did, but even if you assume the real "break even" point was 3:1 or 3.5:1, those are actually achievable numbers within the game engine.

The soviet population was large, but it was not infinite.

[mmarquo]

This is a significant frustration I have: inability to guage how much I have disrupted my opponent's production capacity; I want to develop more "trust" with the game engine - that is, if I do capture important cities, I would appreciate some degree of assurance, somehow, that it has acheived a purpose.
 
Marquo [:)]

[Klydon]

Look at the Russian OOB by the end of the war and note the number of Baltic state, Polish and even Rumanian units that were serving in the Red army just to mention several. A couple of the German Generals make mention in their books that it was clear the Russians were really scraping the bottom of the barrel towards the end of the war, but by then it was too late for the German side. They also make mention that had a different strategy been pursued with the idea of wearing down the Russians, things may have been different. It will be interesting if it is possible in game to do this or not. Certainly the Germans have more of a uphill battle as they typically can't inflict the losses that the Russians suffered in 1941 simply because the Russians are going to be far smarter about the situation than what actually happen. That extra manpower will have to be dealt with. 

[VictorCharlie]

ORIGINAL: Klydon

Look at the Russian OOB by the end of the war and note the number of Baltic state, Polish and even Rumanian units that were serving in the Red army just to mention several. A couple of the German Generals make mention in their books that it was clear the Russians were really scraping the bottom of the barrel towards the end of the war, but by then it was too late for the German side. They also make mention that had a different strategy been pursued with the idea of wearing down the Russians, things may have been different. It will be interesting if it is possible in game to do this or not. Certainly the Germans have more of a uphill battle as they typically can't inflict the losses that the Russians suffered in 1941 simply because the Russians are going to be far smarter about the situation than what actually happen. That extra manpower will have to be dealt with. 

Well should the Soviets be penalised more in the first few turns of 1941?

Not only were they totally surprised, their command and control was slow to react to the invasion.

[pat.casey]

ORIGINAL: victor charlie

ORIGINAL: Klydon

Look at the Russian OOB by the end of the war and note the number of Baltic state, Polish and even Rumanian units that were serving in the Red army just to mention several. A couple of the German Generals make mention in their books that it was clear the Russians were really scraping the bottom of the barrel towards the end of the war, but by then it was too late for the German side. They also make mention that had a different strategy been pursued with the idea of wearing down the Russians, things may have been different. It will be interesting if it is possible in game to do this or not. Certainly the Germans have more of a uphill battle as they typically can't inflict the losses that the Russians suffered in 1941 simply because the Russians are going to be far smarter about the situation than what actually happen. That extra manpower will have to be dealt with. 

Well should the Soviets be penalised more in the first few turns of 1941?

Not only were they totally surprised, their command and control was slow to react to the invasion.

Personally I wouldn't like to implement anything which removed the soviet player's flexibility. Its absolutely no fun to have to play the first few turns of the game with a "command penalty" or some other artificial stupidity that makes your units do unwise things against your will.

The balance problem you are hinting at though I think is real. To whit, the historical soviets made a series of monumentally stupid decisions and still managed to win the war. The axis, in contrast, generally made intelligent decisions (with noteworthy exceptions), and still managed to lose.

If both sides are played by equally competent humans, I'd reasonably expect the soviets to vastly outperform history.

To balance that out, I'd offer an alternate start scenario which significantly improves axis capabilities in 1941 (so they have a better shot at damaging the red army) and then gives them ahistorical reinforcements through the mid war to make a german offensive into 1943 a legitimate possibility.

I think from a PBEM balance standpoint that'd be the most popular scenario in the same sense that the most popular WITP scenario is the infamous "scenario 2" which gives the Japanese a *lot* of extra help.

My point I suppose is that I don't think this game can be both highly historical and balanced for PBEM. I'd prefer to fix this by leaving the game engine intact (full freedom of action to both sides, historical equipment and combat performance, etc), but altering the start positions looking for more balance.

[Adnan Meshuggi]

You are right about the dump russian decisions... but these had deep impact on the german capability to fight on

Sure - the russians lost so many troops in the beginning, but these guys fought hard and well. They caused the axis troops losses, time losses, material losses.
With the russians loosing less, the germans are stronger. But the blizzard do the damage to any german army... that is one problem

the other is, the germans did a lot mistakes too
So if you say the russians should be better as historically, you ignore the german mistakes in 41 and 42.
That is really unfair and historically just wrong.

That are just my 2 cents...

[BleedingOrange]

I think once you start the historical losses, replacements, etc should be a baseline. If the Germans lose less than they did the first year or conserve men later (no 6th army) then they should get more divisions or keep more for the East front. Having a 100K less losses the first year should allow a couple extra divisions. The game should also check the replacement pool to see if the TOE should be dropped unlike now where you can have plenty of men and machines but the game nerfs your divisions to be historical. The German player should be rewarded for playing better and that includes stopping their offensive and preparing for winter. The reason the Soviets were so successful the first winter is they were hitting tired undersupplied troops out in the open. If the Germans are set up in defensible territory, supplied and not fatigued they should be able to hold and bleed the Soviets. Right now the game punishes the Germans by forcing them into the same strategic mistakes made in history but allows the Soviets to avoid most of theirs. It allows a totally ahistoric retreat which Stalin would never have allowed and doesn't cost anything like it would have if it had been used in real life. They not only get their historical replacements, but can buy more. Seems a double standard to me. Just my two cents

[mmarquo]

I think it is fine as is - looking at the AARs one realizes that players are still making subtle and some not so subtle mistakes; there is a steep learning curve and until "we" collectively have put in more many hours of playing time, IMHO the jury is still out.
 
People are still discussing the pros/cons of disbanding HQs, spending APs on this, that or the other; confusion reigns about supply, production, leaders, SUs - the game is just so deep that it will take time to master.
 
[:)]  Marquo
 
 

[Klydon]

I agree with Pat that the Russians should not have any extra penalties on them to "help" the Germans and to make things geared to produce a more "historical" result. They have a lot of penalties already with a screwed up command structure. (Watch the difference between how well replacements and recovery go for units in good command vs those in bad for one example). Rail issues and bad units are another example. In most cases, the Russians are going to be able to do better than historical territory wise, but that is not always the case and they should do better in the loss department. The Germans will get their opportunities to avoid major mistakes later (avoiding a Stalingrad debacle and Kursk for example to name two). 

Part of all this is going to be an attitude adjustment for many German players. "Winning" is not crushing the Russians in 40% of the games. The Germans should have a chance of an outright win, but it will probably be fairly low across a broad spectrum of games. The other thing that needs to happen after they get the blizzard stuff fixed is to see games that last several years. The Russians have to deal with the German onslaught and it is only fair that the Germans play to the end, even past the point of where they can "win" outright.

I also agree to the concept of German TOE changes being based on losses as that the big reason historically why they were made. Probably pretty hard to implement if you get off a time line however, so I don't know if this idea will ever see the light of day.

[Adnan Meshuggi]

So you and others say basically, the axis side (please do not ignore the other nations) has in 90 (99?)% of the games only the chance to do as they did historically?

In the moment the common axis player (compared with the common russian player) is far behind the historical results.

So, in gameterms, why should this be okay?
Nobody like to answer this easy question.

In 41 untill blizzard, the axis should cause on average as many losses as they did historically. Is it in the game?
no
in the blizzard, in history the germans were exhausted and depleted. Their supply lines were thin, overstretched. In the game the axis side mostly avoid this mistakes, are digged in, prepared and "well supplied"
Still they got crushed by the blizzard - it doesn´t matter how good the russian player is, the game makes it sure.
 
So again, why should someone think that it is worth to play the grand campagin, after beeing much better as historically, he get crushed by blizzard (WAD) and his strength is way behind the historical losses he had.
So not even his gameplay will be nullified (even if loosing less troops (saving strenght))  but he will also be punished more.
 
With this, the game should result in easy russian victories latest in 43. Historically the russians were bled white cause of the losses. How do the game handle the late-war-combats? Do the axis have more casulties as the russians?
 
again i like to say that the gc41 is "the scenario".
I also agree, that the game has big problems if a "1943-1945"-campagin with historical start forces shows significant more sucsessfull axis players. In this case the game needs to be checked, too. Because in this stage of the war, the russians are too strong.
Also i think if both sides plays "historical", the losses should be like they were historically... has someone some tests about it?