Directive 21 playtesters thread

[L`zard]

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson

ORIGINAL: L`zard
Larry......
Link to game appears to not work?

You can't do a 'save link as' because they want you to view their web site and click on a button to download the pig. You actually have to click on the url link and go to their site and click on the button. I tried it just now and it worked for me ( again ). Try that and see what happens.

EDIT: if you can't get it to work for you just send me an email and I'll send you a copy of mine. I'm at
larryfulkerson2002(at)yahoo(dot)com

Works now!

Maybe it was just me, but I tried it 3-4 times.

Oh well........

[larryfulkerson]

It was just waiting for me to masssage it a little before it would put out.

[Panama]

Ok, I keep getting the message that I'm not using the correct .eqp file. Here's where things are:


and



It looks good to me but I'm old, half blind and I forget what else is wrong with me. [:D]

As a side note, all the other scenarios I try with .eqp files and special graphics all work fine. [:(]

[sPzAbt653]

It looks good to me but I'm old, half blind and I forget what else is wrong with me.

You forgot that one of your legs is shorter than the other. [:D]

It looks like you have it proper, you should get the error message the first time, but it should only come up once. Try closing TOAW and restarting just to be sure.

[Panama]

Over the past couple of days I've uninstalled/reinstalled closed/opened shutdown/rebooted so many times I lost count. I've tried running this scenario on my wife's computer that's running XP, I've tried using it on my notebook that has Vista. I tried everything I could. I always got the message about the wrong .eqp file.

Started my computer a few minutes ago and thought I'd give it one more try. And it loaded with the proper .eqp file.

I don't know why it decided to work, I didn't do anything different. My computer is trying to make me nuts. Okay, more nuts than what I am already.

[notenome]

So I think I encountered a bug, or a seriously bizarre design decision. In the latest version, German reinforcements for the early part of the game come in inside Russian territory. I have one division that is due to appear on turn 5 in Minsk, for example, aside from one that has already shown up on turn four in Riga (actually two if you count the SS Polizei division). Is this really WAD???

[sPzAbt653]

... a seriously bizarre design decision ...

Um, thanks!

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: notenome
I have one division that is due to appear on turn 5 in Minsk, for example, aside from one that has already shown up on turn four in Riga (actually two if you count the SS Polizei division). Is this really WAD???

After you capture Minsk, and it's turn 5 or later the division will appear. Same thing for Riga. It's cool. Working like it's supposed to. It's all good. Or do you mean that Riga is still Russian territory and it still appeared there? Maybe I misunderstand. Maybe you could post a pic?

[notenome]

It shows up normally but why should a German division simply appear in a city that was captured one turn ago, instead of in the mainland? Here is why I am against this:

Unrealistic, divisions are getting to the frontline faster than they should.
Makes reinforcement timetable dependent on territorial expansion
Restricts flexibility, now I cant send the panzergren division that used to show up in Romania to help take Odessa as it pops up in the middle of the Ukraine
Eases pressure on German rail capacity.

Another thing I'd like to mention is that the railroad units that start coming (the finnish and romanian ones) don't come with an increase in rail repair capacity, as that is a fixed a number. Shouldn't the rail repair increase by +1 with every new RR unit, as it is now a new unit fixing rail?

And lastly, why is the German RR artillery not, well, RR artillery anymore? This seriously hurts their effectivness and for the most part vastly decreases their effectivness on the long term.

Don't get me wrong, great scenario, this is probably the third version I've played, and I love it.

[sPzAbt653]

Thanks for the thoughts, here are some answers:

Unrealistic, divisions are getting to the frontline faster than they should.

The units involved arrive when and where they did historically, not faster.

Makes reinforcement timetable dependent on territorial expansion

Yes, based on the idea that some divisions were only released to certain areas because they were needed there. If the player doesn't advance, they get less units.

Restricts flexibility, now I cant send the panzergren division that used to show up in Romania to help take Odessa as it pops up in the middle of the Ukraine

You can send any unit anywhere you want, it makes no difference where it arrives.

Eases pressure on German rail capacity.

Yes, maybe we should lower it a little. Maybe we already did, I'd have to check.

Shouldn't the rail repair increase by +1 with every new RR unit

The chance of rail repair increases with each unit, but the maximum number of rail repairs never changes. More units = more possible repairs each turn.


For comments on the German Railroad Artillery, see page 15, starting with post #436.


Thanks again, let us know if anything still seems 'bizarre'!

[larryfulkerson]

Hey dudes: I captured Minsk in turn 6. Just shoved some Soviet arty aside and walked in.

[TPOO]

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson

Hey dudes: I captured Minsk in turn 6. Just shoved some Soviet arty aside and walked in.

Larry,

Historically it was probably not safe for Soviet troops to be located in Minsk as the Luftwaffe destroyed 80% of the city. Gamewise we wanted this area to be loosely defended and not be too much of a bottleneck for the advancing Axis as the Axis historically captured Minsk much faster than can be done in the scenario. However, if an Axis player takes too long to secure the Minsk area Elmer could move more newly deployed units into this area causing a bottleneck for the advancing Axis units.

[larryfulkerson]

Okay...I recognize you now.  Thanks for the info Rick.  You're a walking encyclopedia from what I understand.  Thanks for the update.

There may be some people that don't know that I'm publishing an AAR on my playtest of D21 and I'm already on turn 6. You could find the url's for the download of each turn's AAR but I've organized them for you in the list below:

D21's AAR files:
turn 1:http://www.mediafire.com/?x5zywyzjexz
turn 2:http://www.mediafire.com/?mon1nlyntlm
turn 3:http://www.mediafire.com/?zyzwvdj42dq
turn 4:http://www.mediafire.com/?nmgudmamzdi
turn 5:http://www.filedropper.com/d2122dec2009turn5

EDIT: fixed the links that didn't seem to work. Thanks for the tip James.

[freeboy]

did this new scenario get released? thanks guys

[sPzAbt653]

Not yet Matt. It may be included in the next patch. We're following how Mr. Fulkerson's current playtest goes.

[ralphtricky]

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson

Here's a situation you don't find every day.  During the Soviet turn 14 Elmer moved an embarked construction unit to a 'defensive' position that doesn't quite defend anything.  He had all kinds of units to move instead but chose the construction unit.  This may not be an artifact of the scenario but I thought somebody might be interested to find out what Elmer does sometimes to shoot himself in the foot.

What happened is that Elmer tried to move the unit up as close to the front as possible. In that case he looked at the last objective and the next objective and saw that
1) the last two friendly held objectives were at least 4 or more hexes apart.
2) drawing a line perpendicular to the line between the last two objectives through the destination hex had no enemy units behind that line.

If any unit of the enemy within about 5 hexes had been 'behind' that line, the unit would have not have disembarked on that hex.

If an objective were added less than 3 hexes away, then Elmer would have checked a circle instead of a perpendicular line and noticed that there was an enemy waiting for him.

I've also modified 3.4 so that entrained/enplaned/embarked move last in a given formation which should help as well.

Let me know if that doesn't make sense, or if I'm wrong. I'm going by conjecture from the picture..

Ralph

[sPzAbt653]

I think it makes sense. I don't know about three hexes, four hexes, five hexes, perpendicular lines or circles, but the 'RVGK Construct' units are intended to get in the way at river crossings. Unfortunate that Elmer choose to do it in embarked status, but the unit did manage to get in the way.[:'(]

[TPOO]

Hey everyone. Just to let you know Steve and I are working on having D21 ready with some of the new features in 3.4 when it is released.
This includes having at least 4 of the 5 objective tracks in place as well as updating the new supply rules. Elmer is indeed better in 3.4! [:)]

[Silvanski]

ORIGINAL: TPOO

Hey everyone. Just to let you know Steve and I are working on having D21 ready with some of the new features in 3.4 when it is released.
This includes having at least 4 of the 5 objective tracks in place as well as updating the new supply rules. Elmer is indeed better in 3.4! [:)]

Brilliant![&o]

[Telumar]

ORIGINAL: TPOO

Hey everyone. Just to let you know Steve and I are working on having D21 ready with some of the new features in 3.4 when it is released.
This includes having at least 4 of the 5 objective tracks in place as well as updating the new supply rules. Elmer is indeed better in 3.4! [:)]

Excellent - this is great news indeed! [&o]