Morale Tests

[ComradeP]

As you don't seem to read what I post, I'm not sure why I'm actually trying to debate anything with you as you're immune to believing in any other "truth" than your own.

Example: you say there's a hard cap at a certain morale level. wmcalpine proves you're wrong (after others have already stated that you are wrong). You applaud them for his contributions but completely ignore him as on the next page you post that there is a hard cap at the national morale level. You go from saying something, to acknowledging and at the same time ignoring someone's point and then continue to repeat the point that as proven to be false. It's like you have a coating of Teflon around your mind. Nothing sticks for more than a split second.

[Peltonx]

ORIGINAL: ComradeP

As you don't seem to read what I post, I'm not sure why I'm actually trying to debate anything with you as you're immune to believing in any other "truth" than your own.

Example: you say there's a hard cap at a certain morale level. wmcalpine proves you're wrong (after others have already stated that you are wrong). You applaud them for his contributions but completely ignore him as on the next page you post that there is a hard cap at the national morale level. You go from saying something, to acknowledging and at the same time ignoring someone's point and then continue to repeat the point that as proven to be false. It's like you have a coating of Teflon around your mind. Nothing sticks for more than a split second.

if you look at his data there is a "hard cap" where chances of gaining moral are about zero, sitting or winning battles.

I am not the only one that has tested that to be true. If you read other poeple posts they say that same thing. Flaviusx, Qball ect ect support this in there replys.

sigh, if you don't beleive me simply read what they have writen them selfs.

Flaviusx " The infantry division in this example could have gotten some morale gains if it were lucky (and that's the only way it could get them as it was over cap.)" 0 for 5 thats really unlucky, heheh
JAMiAM " As the unit is an infantry division, it gets no boosts beyond the NM level, and unless it's getting lucky morale rolls from its chain of command, you shouldn't see much, if any, of a morale increase."
JAMiAM " Actually, your screenshots show that the morale aspect of the game is working as designed."
Q-Ball "The Germans, on the other hand, if they are in the 60s in Morale after Blizzard, don't really gain it back. There is a die roll to make Morale gains, but you have to get very lucky to gain even a point through rest, once you are in the 60s."
Q-Ball " You are also right I think on the down-side; units above National Morale always lose morale when they lose a combat. Units under it, do not necessarily. This also means that no matter how you baby the Wehrmacht infantry, it is bound to lose Morale over the long-haul. Slowly, but that's as it should be, as it's ground into dust.That is probably the real point of national morale"

If your tired of debating me, now go tell them(Q-ball, Flaviusx,Jamiam to name a few) they are wrong and you are right.

Pelton

[glvaca]

ORIGINAL: elmo3

ORIGINAL: Pelton

... If the German player is doing far better then historical then why is the German armys moral forsed down by a time line?

This was debated a long time ago in the tester forum during alpha testing. As best I can recall the thinking was that the Germans expected to conquer the Soviet Union in a matter of months. So the longer the fight drags out the worse it is for the Germans and the better for the Soviets. This is reflected in German national morale falling over time and Soviet morale improving. People are free to disagree with that decision but it's not going to change at this point. There may be tweaks to the current system if the designers feel it is not working as they intended but don't expect major changes.

Hold on a minute, so now NM is actually the mood of the people, the real morale (the belief in the cause and victory). Wasn't it proficiency? Didn't it have nothing to do with morale?

Personally, I could live with the rules as they are right now if not for one important bit. First, WE, the players are the leaders, not Stalin, not Hitler. This arguement has been used quite often to explain the Soviet Runaway defence.
Secondly, 90% of the reason why the Germans got into trouble as they did in december 1941, is because they didn't stop offensive operations when they could and launched Typhoon. They thought about it hard, then decided the Russian bear was almost finished and given 1 more push, he would fall. If they would have stopped in a timely fashion, the supply crisis wouldn't have happened or at least nowhere near the actual event.

My point is, the German will lose morale in the first winter negating to a large extent what he won during the summer. That is fixed. No matter what he does he will lose some. He can save a few percious 86+ units and camp them in Germany. But it's very uinlikely (if not just impossible, to get back to 86+ after you lost it for the majority of units). Why? Is the reason now that the home front is dissapointed and doesn't believe in victory any more? In 1942? Shouldn't this "then" be handled more intelligent in a game that allows players to re-write their own history?

It's simply absurd.
Don't take this personal, it's not directed at you.

Set morale free like it was in the first installment. Leave it up to the players. Even if this means you'll will see some extreemes either way. IF that happens, you have an unbalanced match. In a balanced match, equal skilled players, with both players aware of morale and it's effects, you'll see that things will be much more closely. Certainly, if I would see a 99 morale Guards unit, I'll go after it with everything I've got [;)]

ComradeP: the data is this, before 1.04 somewhere, the morale gaining potential of the German troops was CHANGED and was not included in the readme for the patch. Before that change, it was virtually IMPOSSIBLE to gain morale for the German units, even in 1941. OTOH, is was guarenteed that you would lose morale -2 even for a failed hasty attack with 0 casualties. And this alone was the reason why the Germans couldn't attack or hold the line in 1943+

Now a simple question, with all the testing and testing that has gone into this game and all gratitude to all those who have spend their free time on this, how can such a thing be missed? I mean, it took me just a couple of turns to see the extreeme difference between the first and later installments of the game and their effects. And I'm nowhere as knowledgeable of this game than many out there. How? But it was.

So, clearly, could it be possible that something was missed again with the current morale rules? That perhaps some finetuning would be appropriate? All the Pelton bashing might be ammusing to some but interestingly, all change is first rediculed, secondly it is strongly argued against, thirdly, everybody pretends it was their idea all along. We're at phase 2 right now [:'(]

[glvaca]

ORIGINAL: ComradeP

As you don't seem to read what I post, I'm not sure why I'm actually trying to debate anything with you as you're immune to believing in any other "truth" than your own.

Example: you say there's a hard cap at a certain morale level. wmcalpine proves you're wrong (after others have already stated that you are wrong). You applaud them for his contributions but completely ignore him as on the next page you post that there is a hard cap at the national morale level. You go from saying something, to acknowledging and at the same time ignoring someone's point and then continue to repeat the point that as proven to be false. It's like you have a coating of Teflon around your mind. Nothing sticks for more than a split second.

There is a hardcap (or a point where it becomes extreemly unlikely for any more morale gain through combat) and this has been said by JB at some point after the patch that saw the morale changes. I'm trying to remember exactlyt what he said then but my memory won't cooperate.

That cap is below the magic 86+. For infantry, it's certainly (much?) less. Panzers can probably climb more but not beyond 85.

Lastly, you need to nbe able to _make_ successful attacks in the first place. And we all know how unpredictable attacks are and how HIGH the chance of losing morale when you make that 1 failed attack and some stupid ant that goes bezerk.

[pzgndr]

Hold on a minute, so now NM is actually the mood of the people, the real morale (the belief in the cause and victory). Wasn't it proficiency? Didn't it have nothing to do with morale?

It's simply absurd.

Set morale free like it was in the first installment. Leave it up to the players.

Good point. It's one thing to have unit experience/proficiency or whatever tied to its specific victories and defeats, plus some recovery potential during rest& refit. But it's something entirely different to inject some sort of nebulous "national morale" mood swings into a wargame. It's silly.

[jzardos]

ORIGINAL: elmo3

ORIGINAL: Pelton

... If the German player is doing far better then historical then why is the German armys moral forsed down by a time line?

This was debated a long time ago in the tester forum during alpha testing. As best I can recall the thinking was that the Germans expected to conquer the Soviet Union in a matter of months. So the longer the fight drags out the worse it is for the Germans and the better for the Soviets. This is reflected in German national morale falling over time and Soviet morale improving. People are free to disagree with that decision but it's not going to change at this point. There may be tweaks to the current system if the designers feel it is not working as they intended but don't expect major changes.

Sorry, but IMO I very much disagree with directly relating German and Soviet 'morale' to a timeline like this:

"So the longer the fight drags out the worse it is for the Germans and the better for the Soviets."

Yes, sure in the case of the historical war it turned out to be close to the truth, but only because of the debacles that Hitler caused and the strain that was placed on the German army because of them. However, I don't want to be compared to Hitler or any moronic leader when I play a game and happen to do better than historical.

What I have found almost 'idiotic' (sorry but entitled to opinion as I bought game and now critique) is the blind trend in the game to attempt to force the Axis side to lose even if they seem to be doing better and gaining a non-historical path. Here's my proof of this:

- Blizzard: morale lose is absurd and not even a way to stop it for units. Should be a check to see if a unit loses morale based on fort level, leadership, supply line distance, etc. The game has so many ways to track stuff unlike a board game, so why not put this to use??? It's silly to just assume ALL Axis units should ALWAYS lose morale in blizzard if in certain region(13 turns!).

- inability for Axis side to really 'gain' anything from taking massive territory from Soviets. The Germans did gain many valuable resources in their vast expansion into Soviet territory. I don't see any ability for this to occur in WitE, thus an almost trend to not push hard for the Axis in the Oil regions as it gains absolutely nothing. Sure, the Soviets destroyed Miakop to such an extend it would have taken a year to get it producing oil effectively, but that doesn't have to always be the case they would have had time to destroy it so completely.

- game prevents Axis side from effectively using all war material and production after that start of a campaign. Think it's almost a sick joke that I can play games and have pools of Tigers and other tanks, yet I'm fighting for my life on eastern front. Why can't the Germans make some units? Make uses of extra tanks and arty? I know the '2by3' answer and Gary's decision to make it based on what units fought on eastern front. But I think some limited ability for the Germans to make units (su or whatever) should be allowed. Or at least swap out old tanks for good ones sitting in the pool.

For myself, I don't really want to play games as a simulation (i.e. basically just watching what historically happened with no ability to change the final outcome). I buy war games to allow me as leader of either faction/side to give me the ability/tools based on a historical premise to decide my own fate. If that follows an unhistorical path of events, so be it.

Also, let me just add that the air engine with WitE is in need of more tweaks and fixes. Too many bizarre and unexplainable result. I've posted these before and so have others, so not going into detail unless requested. I would never buy WitW if the air engine was still so lacking, especially since the air war in the west will be more critical. I have a feeling it will be much better as 2by3 knows to do better for WitW. Hopefully those improvements will be retro-fitted back to WitE later on.

Just my 2 cents.

[ComradeP]

As a disclaimer: the testers also have a very limited idea of why a certain feature is there. Most if not all of us have never communicated directly with Gary, nor has Gary personally explained any of his ideas (at least not in the last year), so the reasoning behind some parts of the game is also a mystery to many of us. That also means testing it month after month can be frustrating when things are not changed, just like playing it can be frustrating if you run into the same things over and over. 2by3 is aware that there are numerous issues, but has also stated that aside from non-complex solutions, the remaining more complex issues (logistics, combat and so on) won't be looked at/fixed until after WitW.

If your tired of debating me, now go tell them(Q-ball, Flaviusx,Jamiam to name a few) they are wrong and you are right.

I believe the quotes from Q-Ball were pre-patch, as he refers to automatically losing morale, which should no longer be the case.

The quotes from my fellow testers refer to the soft cap, which you insist is a hard cap. They are right, you are wrong.

ComradeP: the data is this, before 1.04 somewhere, the morale gaining potential of the German troops was CHANGED and was not included in the readme for the patch. Before that change, it was virtually IMPOSSIBLE to gain morale for the German units, even in 1941. OTOH, is was guarenteed that you would lose morale -2 even for a failed hasty attack with 0 casualties. And this alone was the reason why the Germans couldn't attack or hold the line in 1943+

Now a simple question, with all the testing and testing that has gone into this game and all gratitude to all those who have spend their free time on this, how can such a thing be missed? I mean, it took me just a couple of turns to see the extreeme difference between the first and later installments of the game and their effects. And I'm nowhere as knowledgeable of this game than many out there. How? But it was.

The change was documented in our patch notes and as far as I know those are more or less copied to the changelist for the version you get, so I'd be surprised if it really wasn't there, assuming you're talking about the change to the likeliness of losing morale when around the national morale and losing a battle and some tweaks to national morale bonuses for certain unit types.

As such, I don't think it was "missed." I've not witnessed a major difference in any case.

There is a hardcap (or a point where it becomes extreemly unlikely for any more morale gain through combat) and this has been said by JB at some point after the patch that saw the morale changes. I'm trying to remember exactlyt what he said then but my memory won't cooperate.

That cap is below the magic 86+. For infantry, it's certainly (much?) less. Panzers can probably climb more but not beyond 85.

Lastly, you need to nbe able to _make_ successful attacks in the first place. And we all know how unpredictable attacks are and how HIGH the chance of losing morale when you make that 1 failed attack and some stupid ant that goes bezerk.

Think about it for a moment: why would a German unit "need" 86+ morale? I'm talking about a historical reason, not about an in-game reason. The difference between a 71-85 morale unit and a 86-99 morale unit is also way overhyped. It's just 1 MP per enemy hex. There's no difference for friendly hexes. It makes the kind of huge pincers you see in 1941 less likely to happen, but then again: those simply didn't happen post-1941 on that scale in the real war either. Also: those penetrations are more likely to be dangerous to you than they are dangerous to the Soviets on the long term post-1941 due to increased Soviet unit quantity and quality.

Regardless of how well the Axis are going to perform, a situation where the men in a division have worked together in several low casualty campaigns to the point where they're well trained and can perform much better than a division that hasn't been battle hardened isn't likely to happen on the Eastern Front due to the casualties you take. Replacement quality from Germany also drops per default, which is natural as they're getting closer and closer to the bottom of the barrel. Even if victories would inspire national morale in a literal sense, they would not fix the issues of degrading replacement quality and degrading unit quality through attrition/combat.

[Flaviusx]

At one point it was possible for the Sovs to come out of the blizzard with 80 morale guards. So some of you Axis players ought to be careful what you wish for. The normalization of morale works on both sides. If we just throw this stuff to the winds and don't regulate it, morale goes nuts, and it can go nuts for either side. As it is, I'm not sure we've gone far enough here, or rather, I'm not sure the basic runaway problem can ever really be resolved because to a large extent it's inherent in the morale system.

If it were up to me, I'd throw the whole thing out the window and start from scratch and not put in a proficiency system of this sort at all. It's dynamic...a little too dynamic. Maybe it ought to be more static.

Pelton: there is no hard cap. Pieter is right and you are wrong. Am baffled why you insist on using me in support of your baseless claim, which I have never agreed with.

[janh]

ORIGINAL: pzgndr

Hold on a minute, so now NM is actually the mood of the people, the real morale (the belief in the cause and victory). Wasn't it proficiency? Didn't it have nothing to do with morale?

It's simply absurd.

Set morale free like it was in the first installment. Leave it up to the players.

Good point. It's one thing to have unit experience/proficiency or whatever tied to its specific victories and defeats, plus some recovery potential during rest& refit. But it's something entirely different to inject some sort of nebulous "national morale" mood swings into a wargame. It's silly.

It is unfortunate to have morale and experience mixed at this point because both are essentially different things.

The reason for the NM trends on both sides are NOT silly, though. Although they are used to direct the course of the struggle to connect somewhat loosely to the historical course, they are based on soft factors that would otherwise not be present in game, but were surely present in real life:

NM does not represent the moral or will of Hitler, Stalin, and also not the Generals (not directly in the leader stats), but the will of the individual soldiers and officers in combat formations. The German population and the soldiers were used to really quick and overwhelming Blitzkrieg victories, at low cost. That was how Barbarossa was also sold in the initial summer and autumn months to the German public, for example in the "Wochenschau" newsreel broadcasts and other propaganda. By mid November, just a few weeks before Typhoon stalled, and the Soviet Winter offensive started out in earnest (numerous and even powerful counterattacks and harassment by the Soviets had been the norm throughout summer already, but not this scale at such a critical moment), the expectation of the population was that the war was basically already won, just a matter of time since anything the Soviets still pulled out of their hat ended up in another "Kessel".

Winter 1941 changed that dramatically. Despite huge propagandistic efforts, and censoring, news from the front about a fierce and desperate struggle reached home, as did many more wounded and death messages than people probably expected after Poland or France and the picture painted by the Nazi's at the start of Barbarossa. Then came Hitler's speeches at the "Winterhilfswerk", similar to that of other Nazi officials asking for winter clothing and stuff, also for their Wehrmacht? I can imagine that not only a few must have wondered... Spring and Summer 1942 started over spectacular, not as much as 41, but still. However, no sign of a victory at all? Still ever more Reds? After each goal declared in public that being taken would end the war, there just followed another? And still the telegrams with casualties lists and trains loaded with wounded kept coming home?

You can see were that goes, and that it must have had effects. Effects on the NM at the home front (= production efficiency, support at home, civil state of things; indirect effects on volunteer numbers, soldiers moral/will to fight & suffer and discipline/desertion...) and direct effects at the young soldiers serving in the East (soldiers moral/will to fight & suffer and discipline/desertion...), who might have expected to be back home with families and wives by Christmas 1941.

Many other effects on the NM morale are not explicitly treated in game, as they are assumed to happen anyways unchanged at this point (Bombing of the Reich, the lost war in North Africa, Sicily, Italy, France, Atlantic, the breaking away if Axis allies etc. etc.) -- perhaps some of them can be treated explicitly if we ever get an War in Europe, and NM is purely morale affected by progress, success and failure (if all combat theaters and forms are of course also present, including the naval and U-Boot warfare).

However, neglecting the effect that home propaganda had in the war, setting expectations or affecting peoples opinions, would be sort of like making a production system without having any limits to resources, or being unlimited in speed and size of expansion. Better to have some at least crude representation of that aspect of the war, it was as much reality as was the fuel capacity of a truck -- it is just much harder to quali- and quantify than any "engineering problem".

[abulbulian]

Janh,

WitE 'morale' is not just the 'emotional or mental condition' of the troops as would be the dictionary definition of morale.  It's more about the fighting ability of the unit from what I understand.

From section 9.1

The morale of a unit impacts its combat value and thus its ability to win in combat. It also
determines the amount of retreat attrition taken by its ground elements if the unit is forced to
retreat as well as whether the unit will rout, shatter or surrender as a result of being forced to
retreat (see section 15.9).


Personally I like the changes made over time with WitE morale.  I do still think the blizzard conditions are a bit artificially too high with regard to it's impact on Axis units and would prefer a mixture of checks to determine if a unit actually loses WitE morale during the 41-42 blizzard turns.

I'm still struggling to understand what Pelton is really arguing for and his underlying basis.

[janh]

ORIGINAL: abulbulian
WitE 'morale' is not just the 'emotional or mental condition' of the troops as would be the dictionary definition of morale.  It's more about the fighting ability of the unit from what I understand.

Yes, that was what I was saying (or trying to say) with my first sentence. You could add that over the course of the war also the training of the average German recruits grew worse and that replacements reaching the units in 39/40 were no longer of the same standard than those past 41/42. So in a sense both aspects that are presently modeled by the single factor (national) moral are affected in a fashion that would make both go down.
One could envision also an explicit training component much like pilot training in AE, for which the time spent before being forwarded could be adjusted, and would have to be adjusted down over time to satisfy the need for replacements. But that would probably be merely micromanagement burden.

[pzgndr]

The reason for the NM trends on both sides are NOT silly, though. Although they are used to direct the course of the struggle to connect somewhat loosely to the historical course, they are based on soft factors that would otherwise not be present in game, but were surely present in real life

janh, with all due respect, you just validated my point about silliness by linking game with real life in the same sentence. An abstract wargame with fairly realistic and historically accurate parameters and game victory conditions is one thing. A pseudo-perfect simulation of the WWII war experience based on extrapolations of woulda/coulda/shoulda interpretations of history is something else, which this game is NOT, which leads to all this silly bickering about the minutiae in the game. As if anyone really knows for sure? Right. It is just a game; it is not real life. Carry on. [;)]

[glvaca]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

At one point it was possible for the Sovs to come out of the blizzard with 80 morale guards. So some of you Axis players ought to be careful what you wish for. The normalization of morale works on both sides. If we just throw this stuff to the winds and don't regulate it, morale goes nuts, and it can go nuts for either side. As it is, I'm not sure we've gone far enough here, or rather, I'm not sure the basic runaway problem can ever really be resolved because to a large extent it's inherent in the morale system.

If it were up to me, I'd throw the whole thing out the window and start from scratch and not put in a proficiency system of this sort at all. It's dynamic...a little too dynamic. Maybe it ought to be more static.

Pelton: there is no hard cap. Pieter is right and you are wrong. Am baffled why you insist on using me in support of your baseless claim, which I have never agreed with.

But Flaviusx, if a Soviet manages to get units in such a high morale state after the first winter, would in your opinion, that Soviet player have played very well to excellent? And conversly, would you consider his opponent of the same calliber?
My answer is yes and NO. It clearly was an unequal match AND the winter effects have since then been finetuned and are less severe.
Can morale decisively influence the game, we all agree it can. So then, how come the Soviets have such problems in 1942 now? Even with good to very good winter offensives? Is it all just because it takes to long to dig in? Or could, perhaps, morale have something to do with it?

Anyway, how about this compromise, why not make the original morale rules optional? And to make it extra interesting, make the 2 point morale loss during first winter for the Germans also optional, or include it in the first option.

IT shouldn't be to hard to program and would make a lot of people happy and would certainly prove, either way, which option is best.

[glvaca]

And nobody is blaming testers for the issues under discussion. However, it's mostly you guys who are in to the front lines to interact with costumers/players.

The morale likelyness to improve through combat WAS, CERTAINLY improved at some point. Before then it was virtually impossible to keep you panzers in any shape above 86+. That is fact, disputing it further will necessitate some digging in the forum on the numerous post we exchanged during that time about it.

I'm not talking about German units only *needing* 86+ morale, I have no problem with Russians benifiting from it too. That 1 movement point less for infantry is extreemly important. It's 1/3rd difference when moving and as a result you often can get an extra 2 hasty attacks per turn. 86+ morale infantry ROCKS. It's a vicious mean killer. This is all the more important because tanks are rather under powered.
Besides, if you find the effects negliable, then why deny this advantage to the side who manages his forces well?

Well, in Von Mansteins memoirs he mention at several occasions that providing replacements to existing, experienced divisions was far more efficient in terms of loss of life and performance than creating new divisions from scratch as was preferred and done so often by Hitler. In my mind the proficiency of a division is not only the riflemen but the whole cadre, the personal relations that exist, to staff officers, etc...

As mentioned in the war room on the subject, if unit morale or NM declines because of the losses taken, then why isn't there a system that is based on losses instead of a year, regardless of how well or how bad it goes?

Leaves these things to the players, it will change this game completely and only for the better.
And if this means we'll see a 99% Rumian division or a 99% Guards unit popping up because someone found it entertaining to spend his afternoon doing that, is it really a problem? Seriously, which player fighting for his life in pbem is going to spend his time on that?

Please make it an option, that would satisfy everyone.

[Flaviusx]

Glvaca, the idea of post blizzard 80+ morale Soviet units clocking in CVs approximating or even exceeding their historical 1944 strengths is palpably absurd. I don't care how good the blizzard offensive was. This kind of result shouldn't be possible at all, and if it is possible, it's a flaw in game mechanics.

You're looking at this from a purely game standpoint; I'm saying it is flatly ahistorical. In its original iteration, morale allowed these kinds of runaways, and it was tamed to prevent that. (I'm not sure if it was tamed enough.)

[Jeffrey H.]

ORIGINAL: elmo3

ORIGINAL: Pelton

... If the German player is doing far better then historical then why is the German armys moral forsed down by a time line?

This was debated a long time ago in the tester forum during alpha testing. As best I can recall the thinking was that the Germans expected to conquer the Soviet Union in a matter of months. So the longer the fight drags out the worse it is for the Germans and the better for the Soviets. This is reflected in German national morale falling over time and Soviet morale improving. People are free to disagree with that decision but it's not going to change at this point. There may be tweaks to the current system if the designers feel it is not working as they intended but don't expect major changes.

Bingo. No game here, move along.

[janh]

ORIGINAL: pzgndr

The reason for the NM trends on both sides are NOT silly, though. Although they are used to direct the course of the struggle to connect somewhat loosely to the historical course, they are based on soft factors that would otherwise not be present in game, but were surely present in real life

janh, with all due respect, you just validated my point about silliness by linking game with real life in the same sentence. An abstract wargame with fairly realistic and historically accurate parameters and game victory conditions is one thing. A pseudo-perfect simulation of the WWII war experience based on extrapolations of woulda/coulda/shoulda interpretations of history is something else, which this game is NOT, which leads to all this silly bickering about the minutiae in the game. As if anyone really knows for sure? Right. It is just a game; it is not real life. Carry on. [;)]

No worries, disagreement is part of the game, so to speak. Would be boring discussions if everyone just agreed, and wouldn't lead to new insights or correction of wrong thoughts either.

I see your point between connection game and real life. I think we both may be looking for different things here. You seem to be more interested in a purely "technical" game of the war, without any soft factors being present. Almost as if the war in the West wouldn't occur simultaneously. Right?
I am looking for a simulation that puts me into the mood and situation of the War in the East, i.e. capturing all the essentials that gave this struggle its special character. Else, one could put the same units on a fictional map/context, and not need to call it "War in the East" anymore.

As such, my taking is that all characteristic factors should be represent in some way, ideally explicit and dynamically affected by in-game progress, but if that isn't possible, it may be better to have a reasonably good approximate representation of it rather than none. And I think that German training programs got shortened more and more (reducing the experience component convoluted into the NM), or that war weariness and disappointment of failing a quick success instead of becoming bombing targets became eye-openers at home, are sufficiently well-established facts that did influence this conflict. In my opinion they are important factors to recreate a "War in the East" and not some "War sampling of WW2 era large scale ops". Hence, the design decision for the NM seems sound, but that is again my opinion.

A bit strange about this feature is the implementation, though: That it jumps at fixed dates, rather than following a continuous trend. But that seems still good enough; there are definitely things I would care more about (like giving the defender some tools to truly react, other than just having to guess routes of approaches and set up ambushes...). Or a better supply system, that would probably make a lot of discussion the forum saw in the past months obsolete. Or a more explicit and useful air war component.

[pzgndr]

You seem to be more interested in a purely "technical" game of the war, without any soft factors being present. Almost as if the war in the West wouldn't occur simultaneously. Right?

Not quite. A Russian Front game would be a total joke if it did NOT account for the shifting tides of war outside the theater; i.e., withdrawal of German units in 1943 to Italy and in 1944 to France, the increase in Russian logistics due to Lend Lease, etc.

I think what bothers me most is this unnatural linking of specific unit experience/proficiency (a valid soft factor, yes?) to some additional fuzziness related to national morale dependent upon a lot of unnecessarily subjective and questionable factors. Thus, endless bickering ensues between Pelton et al on one side and Flaviusx et al on the other side and it's just downright silly. And then ComradeP notes above that some of this fuzzy stuff is still(!) a mystery because Gary hasn't explained it in sufficient detail. So frankly the whole thing is nuts (IMHO) and is an unnecessary distraction to what should be a great game.

At the specific unit level, it should be possible to adequately model decreasing German unit proficiency and increasing Russian unit proficiency over time without using silly gimmicks. In a way that all players can understand. That's the goal, yes? In other various Russian Front games I've played over the years, the simple decrease in German replacements and increase in Russian replacements naturally led to fairly historically accurate results, and did so in a way that players found acceptable and thus could concentrate on playing and enjoying the game. So, is all this extra "national morale" stuff an asset to the game? I don't think so. My 2 cents.

[vaned74]

It seems a simple way to model changes in proficiency would be to use the current National Morale base as a cap for non-combat increases in experience from training.

Eg - if base NM is 65; then any elements whose experience is less than 65 can train (outside of combat) to this level - they currently train to the morale level of the unit.

Thus, as German units absorb replacements from losses, these replacements naturally pull down the experience of say rifle squads in an infantry division - training outside of combat will bring it up to the National Morale (aka National Proficiency Rating). But, this proficiency reduces over time for Germany and increases for the Soviet Union into the later war.

In this way, if a German player does well early in the war and does not need to incorporate so many manpower replacements into his front line units, his unit experience stays high. If he burns out his forces trying to lunge to Moscow and Stalingrad then he will be scrapping up manpower to maintain his front troops and thus average unit experience declines.

Alternatively, you could say the max training level is some combination of national morale and unit morale - ie if unit morale is higher than base NM, then you could train fractionally higher in experience than simply base NM. This would reflect the value combat veterans in existing units helping the replacements learn.

[mmarquo]

For the sake of a balanced discussion, I searched and collated all of the rule changes concering moral in the updates:

Of the many rule and formula changes, 11 are neutral and affect both sides, 8 changes favors Axis (blue); 3 favor the Soviet player (red). Draw your own conclusions about whether or not the morale rules have been adjusted to with a pro-Soviet slant or not; for me the answer is very clear.


V1.03 Beta 3 –

3. New Rule – Each turn there is a chance that a unit’s morale will be lowered by 1 or 2 points if its morale exceeds its national morale by 30 points or more.
19. Formula Change – Lowered the chance of a unit getting morale increases from combat if the unit’s morale already exceeds its national morale.
23. Formula Change – The chance and amount of morale reduction incurred by isolated units in the logistics phase has been reduced.

V1.04.10

5) Rules Changes to First Winter rules (Section 22.3):
(d) (Section 22.3.3) The Morale drop for exposed units was reduced from 2 to 1.
(e) (Section 22.3.3) Removed the automatic pre-combat morale reduction of 2 when morale was greater than 60.
(f) (Section 22.3.3) Added a loss of 1 morale for non-Finnish Axis units whenever they are attacked and the final end of combat odds are greater than 1:2.

7) Rule Changes to Refit rules (Section 18.3) – Units set to refit (and those automatically considered in refit) will no longer receive the following benefits from refit if they are adjacent to an enemy controlled hex during their logistics phase:
(a) (Section 9.1.1) Morale bonus if under 50 morale
(c) (Section 9.3.1) The refit experience (training) benefit when their experience is lower than their morale (previously not clearly documented).

11) Rule Change – Adjusted the amount of morale a unit loses after a battle. Now units are not guaranteed to lose a morale point when a battle is lost. The higher a unit’s morale is over its national morale, the greater the chance the morale will be reduced when it loses a battle.

36) Formula change - There is a slightly higher chance than previously for high national morale units to gain morale during the logistics phase (didn’t change for those with morale less than 60).


V1.04.22

3) New Rules – (Section 9.2.4) – Soviet non-guards units that are directly attached to a Guards Army HQ will receive a five point bonus to their national morale. Shock Army HQs do not provide a morale benefit to guards units. Guards Army and Shock Army HQs do not provide their +5 bonus to non-guards units if their command limit is exceeded (they must be within their command limit for any units under their command to receive a benefit).


V1.05.18

19) Changes to Morale Rules
a. The following units receive bonuses to their National Morale: All Cavalry, Mountain Airborne and Air Landing units, and Axis Allied motorized units +5, German Motorized Units +10, Soviet Motorized Units (from Sept 1942-August 1943) +5, Soviet Motorized Units (Sept 1943-end of war) +10.
b. Soviet National Morale has been changed to 50 in June 1941. One point is subtracted each month after this in 1941 (so it is 44 in Dec 41). In 1942 it is set to 40, with one point being added each month starting in September 1942 (so 44 in Dec 42). This continues in 1943 and 1944 until the Soviet National Morale reaches its maximum of 60 in April 1944.
c. Build morale now equals national morale in all cases (there is no separate build morale table anymore.
d. Changed rule so that the morale gain from refit when under 50 morale is only gained when the unit in refit is at least 10 hexes from a supplied enemy unit (similar to the current gain if less than morale 50 and 10 or more hexes from enemy unit).
f. Shock Armies provide their +5 bonus for non-guards units which don’t already have a specialty bonus. Guards Armies provide their +5 bonus for Guards units which don’t already have a specialty bonus.


V1.05.23


8) Morale adjustments across all scenarios to keep them in line with the adjusted morale rule changes
9) 1942 Campaign morale changes. Soviet regular units dropped about 5 morale points to an average of 50 while Guards units were dropped about 10-20 points to an average of 50.
German units unchanged.
10) 1943 Morale changes. Decreased German average morale to 70 (was 75). Decreased Average Soviet morale to 50 (was 55). Decreased Average Guards Soviet morale to 55 (was 60). Soviet and German motorized units (and motorized Guards) stayed about the same.
11) 1944 Morale Changes. German average morale increased to 67 (was 60). Increased German motorized morale to 77 (was 60). Soviet morale reduced to 60 (was 65). Soviet motorized morale reduced to 70 (was 75). Soviet Guards morale reduced to 65 (was 70).

V1.05.28

New Rule – Poorly supplied units can lose morale. If at the end of the logistics phase a unit has less than 20% of needed supplies, it has a chance of losing 1 morale point. If the value is less than 10% there is a chance of losing 2 morale points.