ORIGINAL: Panama
There is no doubt the Soviets were successful in moving large numbers of troops and supplies during the war. The problem is how extensive the rail net is in the game. There should be no bridge over the Volga at Stalingrad. Many of the rails portrayed on the map were practically useless. In 1943 a single rail led from Kastornoe to Kursk. Some track along this line was so poor that horses pulled the freight cars because the rails could not support a locomotive. That was not unusual for much of the single track lines. In the game you can just choo choo along this rail with no problems.
Much of the rail in the Soviet Union used dirt and sand for ballast and there were no tie plates holding the rail to the ties. They simple drove the spikes into the ties. If any of you know anything about rail then you know dirt and sand provide no drainage and do a very poor job of distributing weight over the rail. Lack of plates also creates problems. All of this ends up with spikes pulled out of rails, rapid rotting of ties and track failure. Trains have to move much slower and stop more frequently for derailment. Weight of cars and locomotives become limited.
No one has ever bothered to research the state of the different railroad lines depicted in the game. There are so many misrepresentations of the rail net in the game as to be ludicrous. If you've played as the Soviet you know how important rail movement is. That is why it should be modeled properly.
+1.
It is a stain on the souls of the design team especially Pavel from whom we have learned to expect so much better.
The proper solution is to have every hexside with a rail line to have its own MP vaue to reflect this, each of which then needs to be modified for various weather conditions as that effect will also differ depending on railway type /quality in each hex.
Certain vehicles should be prevented from using certain types of railhex ( car weight restrictions) which would stop units with heavy tanks from being railed willy-nilly.
I think, however that the values above should be fixed because to make in-game adjustments to allow for effects of wear and tear based on levels use use would just be over complicating things unecessarily but I do accept the rights of others to disagree with me on this.
I dream that Sid Meier could be persuaded to do a suitable mod.
