Game Balance - Giving Germany a chance

[sillyflower]

ORIGINAL: pat.casey


I'm not claiming the game is unwinnable as the axis, especially in a scenario where player skills are mismatched. What I am claiming is that with equally skilled players the game heavily favors the soviets.

If you assume, for sake of arguement, that a "balanced game" should result in roughly:

15% axis major victory
25% axis minor victory
20% draw
25% soviet minor victory
15% soviet major victory

Then we'd expect to see roughly this distribution of results in PBEM games being discussed in AARs. As far as I can tell there's a grand total of one Axis major victory in the AAR section and that's Emir Agic's game, and even that only made it onto the AARs because it was so unusual.

The only way of knowing this is to play to the end (for my opponent and me winning is doing better than historically). Then swap sides and see who wins then.
That said I think beta 3/5 will make a big difference but I'm only on T2 as german so a little early to tell. We've also agreed to start parallel game soon swapping sides so it will be intersting to see how the 2 compare. So far ( turn 1 my opponent's tactics are different from what I would do so we shall see.

[Panama]

This is the same question I see in about every East Front game that covers the entire campaign. First heard it way back when SPI released War in the East in 1974. Still hear it today. Only way is to allow the Axis to do things that are not historical. It's funny how some things in Grigsby's WitE are exactly the same as in SPI's WitE. For instance, the checkerboard defence. Worked wonders for the Soviets in '74.

Perhaps if Soviet production was historical instead of player controlled. I still have the reinforcement schedule if anyone is interested. Since I've not done production in GG's game I don't know how well everything would cross over. Of course much has changed in the real world since 1974. Like the Russians opening up the archives.

[heliodorus04]

ORIGINAL: Panama



Perhaps if Soviet production was historical instead of player controlled. I still have the reinforcement schedule if anyone is interested. Since I've not done production in GG's game I don't know how well everything would cross over. Of course much has changed in the real world since 1974. Like the Russians opening up the archives.

I'm curious of everyone involved in this discussion's opinion on how game balance would change if the only change we made was to have the Soviet OOB match its historical counterpart, just as the Germans are scripted to do.

I imagine that would go a long way toward making a-historic (i.e. player derived) early German successes profitable up until the late 42/43 time period. You could even script in a safe-guard level, i.e, when the Soviet player's Stavka has less than X attached units, the Soviet player can make units as normal.

I dunno - it was just something I was curious about recently. I'm neither a historian of much weight nor a game designer of anything more than armchair credibility.

[Skanvak]

ORIGINAL: Panama

This is the same question I see in about every East Front game that covers the entire campaign. First heard it way back when SPI released War in the East in 1974. Still hear it today. Only way is to allow the Axis to do things that are not historical. It's funny how some things in Grigsby's WitE are exactly the same as in SPI's WitE. For instance, the checkerboard defence. Worked wonders for the Soviets in '74.

Perhaps if Soviet production was historical instead of player controlled. I still have the reinforcement schedule if anyone is interested. Since I've not done production in GG's game I don't know how well everything would cross over. Of course much has changed in the real world since 1974. Like the Russians opening up the archives.

(i.e. player derived) early German successes profitable up until the late 42/43 time period. You could even script in a safe-guard level, i.e, when the Soviet player's Stavka has less than X attached units, the Soviet player can make units as normal.

Panama you are perfectly right, but still thinking we are still debating of an issue older than me make me fill strange, are we beating a dead horse?

I'd like a scenario with historical reinforcement for both side, that could be fun and less micromanagement.

[Commanderski]

I would if it wasn't so boring! To me the winner of any game is the player who has the most fun, and I understand many people don't find being on the defensive the most fun. Fortunately I am not one of those, and am having a fantastic time in my 1943 campaign with Flavio, desperately trying to rebuild my lines each time he smashes them into tiny pieces. Will he get to Berlin? Probably, but he will have to fight for every hex on the way.

Big A is absolutely right. This is a game and you should be having fun with it.

[marty_01]

Out of curiosity, how much play testing of the grand campaign – 41 to 45 – actually occurred during game development?

[karonagames]

Full 41-45 AIvsAI games were run more or less each time a major new update was issued, but head to head games often had to be aborted due to code and data changes. Trey and I ran a blizzard test with a late version of the code, and this didn't get beyond the first 12 months. Most testing was done as human vs AI, but most testers were beating the AI well before 45.

The AIvsAI tests produced some remarkable results - mostly draws with the Sovs 3-4 hexes from Berlin.

[PeeDeeAitch]

ORIGINAL: Panama

This is the same question I see in about every East Front game that covers the entire campaign. First heard it way back when SPI released War in the East in 1974.

So you are saying to make this game great we need the 6-3 security divisions flip to 1-5 kgs that can be rebuilt to 6-5 infantry? I like it!

[Panama]

ORIGINAL: PeeDeeAitch

ORIGINAL: Panama

This is the same question I see in about every East Front game that covers the entire campaign. First heard it way back when SPI released War in the East in 1974.

So you are saying to make this game great we need the 6-3 security divisions flip to 1-5 kgs that can be rebuilt to 6-5 infantry? I like it!

[:D], that's a good one.

If you play the game with historical Soviet reinforcements the results probably won't be different. When people play as the Axis they can attempt to knock the Soviets out of the war in the first or second year. But IMO, with two equal players, that would be a rarity. The Axis, after 1942, is playing to prevent being obliterated. That in itself would be a win. The UK and the US will probably march into Berlin anyway.

Face it, when Hitler declared war on the US the war was lost. The Soviets called the US a "land of machines". When Hitler declared war against the US a high ranking Soviet was heard to say, "We have won the war". And indeed, they had.

I like playing the Axis in East Front games just to see how far I can get and if I can out perform what was done historically. That should be everyone's goal. Have fun with it and if you knock the Soviets out, good for you. [;)]

[bdtj1815]

My main problem with WITE, as it was with GDW's "Drang nach Osten" and FITE 30 years ago, is that its reinforcement/replacement/re-organisation schedule for the Germans is so historically accurate and based on historic events. For example 9th and 10th SS Panzer Divisions arrive in early spring 1944 to help break out "The Hube Pocket" even if such an event does not happen in game.

Up to mid/late 1942, when the Axis Powers still had the initiative, this is probably acceptable but as the war continues, whether to their advantage or the Soviets, it becomes a failure of the game system. If things had been going well in the East in 1944 for the Germans, or even less badly, 9th and 10th SS Panzer Divisions, which were being readied to face the Allies in the West, would never have been sent East.

As has already been expressed very well in another thread the restructuring of German divisions (TOE changes) was as a result of what was happening in the real campaign which might not be happening in a game.

Might be incredibly difficult to programme changes to NOT replicate history for the Axis but at the moment WITE is not getting it right.

[Panama]

ORIGINAL: bdtj1815

My main problem with WITE, as it was with GDW's "Drang nach Osten" and FITE 30 years ago, is that its reinforcement/replacement/re-organisation schedule for the Germans is so historically accurate and based on historic events. For example 9th and 10th SS Panzer Divisions arrive in early spring 1944 to help break out "The Hube Pocket" even if such an event does not happen in game.

Up to mid/late 1942, when the Axis Powers still had the initiative, this is probably acceptable but as the war continues, whether to their advantage or the Soviets, it becomes a failure of the game system. If things had been going well in the East in 1944 for the Germans, or even less badly, 9th and 10th SS Panzer Divisions, which were being readied to face the Allies in the West, would never have been sent East.

As has already been expressed very well in another thread the restructuring of German divisions (TOE changes) was as a result of what was happening in the real campaign which might not be happening in a game.

Might be incredibly difficult to programme changes to NOT replicate history for the Axis but at the moment WITE is not getting it right.

To be honest, the only way you could do what you seem to be suggesting is to play a global world war. Because I can think of many things that happened in the Pacific that could possibly affect US forces in North Africa or Europe that could possibly affect Axis units on the East Front or Japanese events that could affect Soviet forces in front of Moscow in 1941.

While it would be physically possible to create such a game, given the computing power and storage space we have now, it would be insanity for anyone to do it at 10 miles per hex. Anyone attempting to play such a game would need to check into the nearest nut ward to have their mental stability verified before starting. [:D]

The game or scenario designer has to draw the line some place don't you think?

[bevans]

Panama: would one need to pass or fail that mental stability test before being allowed to play WWII on a 10 mile per hex scale?

But the overall point is valid: WitE accurately reflects what the Germans had and did on OB, TOE and production limits; the issue is that one doesn't play the game to repeat history so the rigid adherence to history, e.g. those darned late war TOEs and reinforcement/withdrawal schedules is deeply flawed. However, it is a highly defensible deeply flawed approach for the designers to take. And they gave us the editor (sadly without instructions on how to use it) to give us a chance to do our own what if's. My own what if's are a better Axis TOE and the Germans going to a war economy earlier (upgraded the SU economy as well, just to be fair). Well into T1 so still a bit early to tell how this will turn out.

[EntropyAvatar]

I don't think you need to run the whole war to have a more flexible approach here. For instance, perhaps you could have a pool of points that simulates Germany's ability to dedicate reinforcement divisions to the eastern front. When demands on other fronts are not high, you accumulate points that allow you to select reinforcement divisions from a list of those available. The political cost of getting these reinforcements reflects the overall quality of the division. At some random point (within a certain range) out-of-theatre events will occur that lower your reinforcement pool and you will have to withdraw some units to get back to zero or the game will do it for you.

You could tie TOE into this as well. Make the default ToE fairly stable, but you have the option of lowering your target mechanized or infantry ToE percentage to get yourself some reinforcement points. Essentially choosing more, smaller divisions.

I'm sure there's problems with this, but the overall point is that there's a whole universe of game mechanisms you might employ to simulate a more flexible approach.  

[Panama]

If Mussolini hadn't invaded Greece and totally screwed up the Balkans Germany may not have had to help them. Then perhaps the Soviet invasion would have gone off on schedule in May instead of late June. Four to six weeks of fair weather may have made a difference. And the Soviet divisions would have been in that much worse shape.

I don't see anything yet about the Soviet command control problems as they happened historically. The Soviet high command had no communications with the units at the frontier. First off, STAVKA had ordered the Front commands forward from their peacetime locations to their wartime locations that were closer to the frontier. This just happened to take place on the night of June 21/22. So the peacetime HQ had skeleton crews while everyone else was moving forward. This fairly rendered the Front HQs incapcitated at a crucial time. Also, coms were screwed even without German intervention. The coms were run through the public phone lines and the Germans bombed them into oblivion so it was extremely difficult if not impossible to have reliable contact with the armies at the frontier. That's why STAVKA sent staff officers out in aircraft to the different HQs to see what the heck was going on.

So, no coms with units at the frontier left those units with only their prewar deployment orders with which to react to the German invasion. These orders invariably ordered units forward. These orders were hard wired. Without STAVKA direction the divisions moved to their prewar deployment location.

I don't think it would be unreasonable to force the Soviet player to keep units near the frontier on turn one and to move those towards the rear to the front at least some of their movement allowance. But never back.

[randallw]

The Axis turn 1 has lower ZOC movement penalties, and goes before the Soviet turn 1; this effectively allows the Axis player to bring thunder and lightning onto the Soviet units near the border with no chance for the Soviet player to react.  Unlike other games there is no mechanism here where units are out of command control.

[heliodorus04]

ORIGINAL: randallw

The Axis turn 1 has lower ZOC movement penalties, and goes before the Soviet turn 1; this effectively allows the Axis player to bring thunder and lightning onto the Soviet units near the border with no chance for the Soviet player to react.  Unlike other games there is no mechanism here where units are out of command control.

In support of that, as much as I want a plausible 42 (emphasis) axis victory condition, I don't want to restrict Soviets too much to the historic yet tedious reality of no command and control early.

Because of the nature of the game, week-long, turns, and the fact that info on 'best moves' is available to anyone (see this thread as example of perfect Axis Turn 1), the benefits of perfect awareness of where Soviet units are, how best to isolate them, and complete mastery of game mechanics (at least for Turn 1!), the maximization Germany can achieve cancels out the command freedom the Soviets receive.

Fair is fair.

That's my opinion.

/edit
That Q-ball opener is REALLY powerful. It's a ball-buster for the Soviets. I think it puts them more than adequately in the "Oh shit what are we going to do now" position that Soviet commanders faced

Q-ball

[Klydon]

Part of the issue with the "if Hitler had not needed to invade the Balkans and lost 4-6 weeks, the campaign would have been a lot different" is that it ignores the historical weather during that time period. Essentially, spring was late in 1941 and it was a wet spring on top of that. The ground conditions absolutely sucked in May and it was well into June before they dried out enough for reliable mobile operations along most of the front (still some issues on AGS front). Now, that is not to say things would have been different with no Balkans side show. The Germans would have had other forces available from the start of the campaign including 2nd and 5th panzer and the mobile units of AGS would have been available from turn one. On top of these units, another mountain division (the one used for Crete) and also the parachute division would have been available from the start (or in the case of the paratroopers; something else interesting like invading Malta could have taken place). What impact all this would have had on Africa would be up for speculation/debate as the British really had the Italians on the ropes in Libya and it was the need to send units to Greece that really saved the Italians and allowed the Germans to send help in time although it could also be argued that the British just didn't have the logistics to support getting to Tripoli either. 

[Tarhunnas]

Another aspect of the German invasion of the Balkans is that it had the effect of lulling the Soviets into a sense of security, not that that was the intention. It seemed a bit unlikely that the Germans would commit major forces to invading several countries in the Balkans and then almost immediately invade the Soviet Union, so without the Balkans, maybe the element of surprise that the Germans achieved against the Soviets would have been less.

In fact, the first two years of WW2 seem almost unreal in their pace. I mean, if someone had suggested that this year we invade Denmark, Norway, Holland, Belgium and France and send a Panzer army to Africa, next year we take Yugoslavia, Greece, mount an airborne assault of a major mediterranean island and then invade the Soviet Union, that does seem a rather overambitious plan! [X(] Today it probably simply couldn't have been done even if someone wanted to. The US needed 6 months of preparation before evicting the Iraqis from Kuwait in the first gulf war for example, which was a tiny operation by WW2 standards.

[randallw]

It has been written that Stalin hoped that the Balkan adventure for the Germans would take months of time, eliminating a 1941 summer adventure into Russia.

[Skanvak]

Two remarks :

1/ No balkans means a neutral Greece that could switch to Western Allied resulting in an unopposed landing far closer to Berlin than Normandy or Sicily : Axis lose in 43-44 in this scenario.

2/ Panama, I think a great game like this is possible IF a true multiplayer for on country is developped.