Matrix Games Forums

Hi all,

Im new to WIR, although I did play Second Front on the Amiga back in the day quite a lot. After trying to find SF as abandonware i came across Matrix Games, and I just love what has been done to improve the game! Great Work!

A friend and I have been playing a game by email since october, and I have a couple of issues that I'd like cleared up. Hope anyone could help on these:

1. Desertions?
While playing the Russians, winter 42, I suddenly get heavy losses in units that have not seen combat last round (no battlereport). Big divisions fall sometimes below 50, with no explanation why. Could this be desertions caused by low readiness or the like, or is there something else here that I am missing? Is it in the manual?

2. Tank/plane Rating
How is tank/plane ratings calculated into the results during combat execution? I cannot see it mentioned in the calculations at the end of the manual. Does it matter at all? If not, would it not for example be best to have many low-quality tanks instead of fewer high quality ones, since only the number of units count, not their attack/defence rating?

Of course, I have no plans of using this in my planning, since I think it would greatly reduce the reality of the game...

I hope someone can clear this up.

A Merry Christmas to all,
Stian
( stian.lund@operamail.com )

Originally posted by Stian:
Hi all,

Im new to WIR, although I did play Second Front on the Amiga back in the day quite a lot. After trying to find SF as abandonware i came across Matrix Games, and I just love what has been done to improve the game! Great Work!

A friend and I have been playing a game by email since october, and I have a couple of issues that I'd like cleared up. Hope anyone could help on these:

1. Desertions?
While playing the Russians, winter 42, I suddenly get heavy losses in units that have not seen combat last round (no battlereport). Big divisions fall sometimes below 50, with no explanation why. Could this be desertions caused by low readiness or the like, or is there something else here that I am missing? Is it in the manual?

2. Tank/plane Rating
How is tank/plane ratings calculated into the results during combat execution? I cannot see it mentioned in the calculations at the end of the manual. Does it matter at all? If not, would it not for example be best to have many low-quality tanks instead of fewer high quality ones, since only the number of units count, not their attack/defence rating?

Of course, I have no plans of using this in my planning, since I think it would greatly reduce the reality of the game...

I hope someone can clear this up.

A Merry Christmas to all,
Stian
( stian.lund@operamail.com )

---

Stian

The reason could be..
If your opponent does some of his turn then saves it and returns latter, reopens game and contines to end of turn he will get a free turns supply plus aircraft repair and 'you will not see the battle reports for that turn'
This is a bug. All pbem gamers must do the turn in one go or it really is considered cheating.
Just ask him if he is saving the game mid turn and point out the bug. Not much else you can do.


I dont know the formula for the vehicle ratings.
But from what iv'e seen posted before they look to be relatively accurate.

Originally posted by Stian:
Hi all,

Im new to WIR, although I did play Second Front on the Amiga back in the day quite a lot. After trying to find SF as abandonware i came across Matrix Games, and I just love what has been done to improve the game! Great Work!

A friend and I have been playing a game by email since october, and I have a couple of issues that I'd like cleared up. Hope anyone could help on these:

1. Desertions?
While playing the Russians, winter 42, I suddenly get heavy losses in units that have not seen combat last round (no battlereport). Big divisions fall sometimes below 50, with no explanation why. Could this be desertions caused by low readiness or the like, or is there something else here that I am missing? Is it in the manual?

2. Tank/plane Rating
How is tank/plane ratings calculated into the results during combat execution? I cannot see it mentioned in the calculations at the end of the manual. Does it matter at all? If not, would it not for example be best to have many low-quality tanks instead of fewer high quality ones, since only the number of units count, not their attack/defence rating?

Of course, I have no plans of using this in my planning, since I think it would greatly reduce the reality of the game...

I hope someone can clear this up.

A Merry Christmas to all,
Stian
( stian.lund@operamail.com )

---

1. I don't know if this is in the latest release, but I believe it is. There is a problem, with replacements set higher than 70% or so, with the squads rolling over past 256 back to 1. Set the replacements down and you should be okay, if that is the cause of the low strength.

2. For tanks, the ratings are used when being fired at by or firing at tanks. Thus, the better tank will cause much higher losses compared to what is lost, with the result being a major shift in odds, possibly. Anyway, a weaker tank type could be completely destroyed during the fire phases, contributing nothing to the CV calculation for the odds determination, which is done after all fire is carried out.

Originally posted by RickyB:

1. I don't know if this is in the latest release, but I believe it is. There is a problem, with replacements set higher than 70% or so, with the squads rolling over past 256 back to 1. Set the replacements down and you should be okay, if that is the cause of the low strength.

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I think the security level is 85%. When the soviet has a lot of squads in the pool (i dont know if over 5000 or over 10000), reinforcements come as a pack of 60 squads. If the level is set to 100%, every division under 225 can receive the reinforcements. If that division is between 196 and 224 squads, it will overflow. But when the level is set to 85%, the reinforcements will be only added if the division is under 225*0.85=191 squads, and in that case you arrive at 251 squads and no overflow happens. This is what i once read in another thread and i have also experienced myself.

Hi, thanks for the info, I was starting to be afraid that my sturdy russians were running madly from their trenches - or even worse, that my opponent was exploiting the 'PBEM save' bug...

I had read about the 'overflow' thing, I'd just forgotten all about it <img src="rolleyes.gif" border="0"> . No wonder they overflowed, since I had several 300+ divisons in those armies, and they had a replacement level of 95. And now they are gone forever ... ah well <img src="frown.gif" border="0">

Btw, does anyone know when we can expect a new version after 3.101, and if the above bugs will be fixed in this?

Thanks again guys,

Stian
--
Hard pounding this, gentlemen. Let's see who will pound longest.
- The Duke of Wellington (at Waterloo)

your divisions arent gone forever <img src="biggrin.gif" border="0">

Originally posted by french fries:
your divisions arent gone forever <img src="biggrin.gif" border="0">

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Hi french,

I didn't mean that the divisions as such were gone, but that the number of squads were gone down from 250 to about 50. Which is a lot of men to lose...

By your answer, do you mean that the lost squads end up as reinforcements sooner or later? That would be good news indeed, as my troops would be coming back to their trenches again in a while.
<img src="biggrin.gif" border="0">

Regards,
Stian

Originally posted by Stian:
By your answer, do you mean that the lost squads end up as reinforcements sooner or later? That would be good news indeed, as my troops would be coming back to their trenches again in a while.

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No, Fries was talking about getting the divisions back, but the squads lost to the overflow bug are gone forever. How early are you into the game? Maybe your opponent won't mind starting again so you can avoid that bug?

The next version will fix this. It was coming Real Soon Now(tm), but the programmer had a little accident with his hand, so how quickly the next version gets out is hard to say now.