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I started working on a new mod for witp with this map:

tm.asp?m=1435880

This mod will take more time that I will be able to spend alone, so I would really like to find someone who wants to join me. Here's what I'm planning ATM:



As I am German and many other Europeans are around, there should really be a mod in Europe. WitM is nice, but the Kriegsmarine isn't in it as well as I am not satisfied with many other details.

As land warfare isn't "the best" in witp and surely won't be extremly better in AE, I thought about how to make the game interesting while having this problems.
To improve the gameplay, there must be a focus on air- and naval wafare, as this is good in witp. But how can the focus be on this, while the war in europe was mostly on land?

To deal with this, I have to get away from history in some parts. I've seen at RHS what happens to the joy of playing, when a mod trys to be exactly like the history was.
Unfortunatly, while data will be added totally correct, the game makes something very different with it. I.e. durability. It doesn't only tell how much a ship can suffer, it also tells how long it takes to be built and how expensive it is. So if you want to add a rescue ship for convois (just an example, such ships don't make sense) which is made of wood, one usually would consider how much it can suffer. As rescue ships often were filled with Cork, there were nearly unsinkable. So let's say, a rescue ship must have a durability of 500 as even 10 torpedo hits may stop it - but as long as the deck isn't brocken and the cork stays under it, the ship won't sink.
But when 500 durability is added, the ship would cost as much as 4-5 CVs and one would have to pay for it the whole game, while IRL the ship may have been built within 10 weeks out of wood that doesn't really cost a thing.

I just gave that example to explain why I intend to make some totally ahistoric things in the game. It isreally important to give naval and air warfare a most important meaning in the game - much more than land warfare, while IRL the war against Russia decided the war - not the war in the Atlantic.... Now I want to explain how the game should work concerning my plannings:



1. Britain

Planes:
Britain won't recieve any replacement, every British and CW plane has to be produced. GB will have plants to produce every plane the get, and if possible the planes will need engines that are produced on the island as well.
Ships:
As it isn't possible to force the allies to produce their ships by paying for them, the ships should arrive with a high sysdamage that doesn't allow to use them within the first weeks or month. This gives the Axis the chance to bomb this ships within their harbours, to simulate the possible bombing of the shipyards.
Squads, Tanks, guns, etc.
As it isn't possible to force the Allies to pay for this things, they come for free. As their "plants" can't be bombed, their arrival "for free" simulates the ressources that britain has itself.
Industry
Britain has all the Industry that is needed to feed the demands of the Aircraft industry.
Oil and Ressources
As this scenario lays it's focus on naval and air warfare, Britain doesn't get a single ressource or oil on its home islands! This forces the allied player to ship EVERYTHING in - and so gives the Axis the possibility to intercept this.
Supplies
Britain MUST be short on supplies to force the player even to ship them in! I don't know yet wheter there shall be "industry forts" like in RHS to eat all the supplies the industry builds, but even without US troops the player will be forced to ship supplies.



2. US:

Planes:
As the production focus will be on GB, the US will get their planes for free via reinforcement. Maybe later we should put it on map as well to avoid obsolete but still good planes to get produced while their production IRL already turned to a later model, but there won't be any managing necessary in general.
Ships:
The US get their ships in full working order.
Squads, Tanks, guns, etc.
All for free to represent the US economy
Industry
There won't be any as the British industry must have it's full importance!
Oil and Ressources
Plenty of both - or not to say endless numbers of both. Most of the ressources to GB will be shiped from the US, but I guess some % - let's say 20% of the need should be from Africa and the middle east to give the medieval area and LR-Subs more importance.
Supplies
The supplies needed will come from the US.
I thought some time what to do to simulate that every single tank, gun, plane an man has to be shipped from the US, even when it arrives as reinforcement in the UK. The only way to simulate this at least a bit, it is needed that the US ship every supply needed from the US. For every upgrade, for every plane assigned from the pool, supplies are spent, so this will be at least a little realism.



3. Russia:

Planes:
I'm still uncertain, what to do here. shall they recieve their planes as reinforcement or shall they have to produce it? I favourite the second option, but this will need HI. But if this HI is produced in Russia, the allied player might stop the production of russian planes to compensate bombed HI in GB.
Ships:
Like in GB
Industry
See planes...
Oil and Ressources
Russia will have a lot to make it worth to conquer for Germany.
Supplies
To give planes and ships more importance, Russia will have far to less supplies to feed their demands. This will force the Allies to send convois that can be intercepted in Indic and the Arctic Sea ore else the Russian army will get that weak that Russia can be conquered fast.
Generaly
It must be simulated to get Russia stronger and stronger with the time. I think about having a lot of industry that starts damaged or about having many ressource centers that produce not only the ressources but also supplies. As long as this bases aren't conquered by germany yet, the have "industry forts" that comsume all the produced supplies but when they get reconquered, the russian will have much mor supplies produced in russia itself.




Axis:
Planes:
Depending on the scenario, the axis can change between the different nations or not. Some planes were used by different sides, some weren't but that's to early to go into details. Generally, the Axis will have to produce everything needed.
Ships:
As usual, the axis have to produce their ships by paying for them. Generally, I want to give the player a maximum free choice for what to produce. Of course, it depends on the scenario, but if we take the usual history, then there'll be (regarding only germany) not only all historical produced subs and ships in the list but also the ships from the Z-Plan. Moreover, there will be several other possible ships added to let the player choice what he wants. The naval yards themselves will (without expanding them) only create enough shipyard points to produce i.e. the subfleet - but no major ship. So one will have to stop much - but may decide freely whether there shall be subs or BBs or perhaps even CVs?
As Germany has a strong economy, there's the possibility to produce much more than IRL if expanding the shipyards - but that will be on the cost of planes, tanks and guns.
Ground Units
The Axis will start with all the historic units at the date of beginning - but after that, I'll change a lot.
It was always disappointing to me, that it doesn't change anything in the game when I expand i.e. the vehicles factories a lot. The game doesn't care whether I've got 10.000 oder 1.000.000 vehicle points in the pool - the pool will only last longer.
On the other hand, the game allowes one to do very stupid things. One may retreat all Japanese units from China to Manchuria and Indochina - which a commander may be executed for only when suggesting that...
So why not allow a player to assign new - own - units?
So in my mod, there'll arrive as many units as possible (the slots set borders, of course) - but all with only 1 support/mozotized support assigned. To get this units, one will have to spend armament and vehicle points. So if you produce more (or don't want to create reserves), you get more units!
Just an example: There may be 30 Panzerdivisions while there were IRL only 10. So when the player doesn't expand it's vehicle factories and has the usual casulties, he'll have 30 Divisions at 1/3 strength or 10 at full strength. If he expands his armement production by the factor 3 - he'll get 30 fully equiped Divisions instead of only 10!
Moreover, a player may to decide whether he wants to make his AAA units stronger or to produce planes instead, etc...
As there's no way to expand manpower (exept some centers to conquer), the maximum stays within some limits.
Ressources
The Axis will have nearly enough ressources and oil what they needed. Germany did have enough oil - as long as Ploieşti wasn't knocked out/occupied by the russians, and as long as the railroads were able to bring coal to the Leunawerke for CtL. Some Ressources will be shipped from Sweden and Norway, but IRL most of the produced Iron was made of continental ore under German occupation / from Germany itself. So if the ressource lines from scandinavia are cut, Germanys economy was still strong.
Yes, there were rare ressources lacking - but even while this was a problem, the german industry managed to produce immense numbers of planes, tanks etc. even in 1944 when most bombs were dropped by the allies and blockade running was absolutly impossible...

BUT, when Germany conquers ressources and oil in russia, it can produce even more, so there should still be the need to gain foreign ressources.
In Addition, I want to make blockade running attractive. For that, the blockade running ships - the only axis merchant ships with enough endurance to reach africa and south america - will have an extreme cargo storage to give their runs a sense which it elseway wouldn't have in this mod.

So the critical tasks and options in this mod will be
for the allies:
- ship enough ressource, oil and supplies to England to get it produce the HI that's needed for the plane production
- protect the British Industry
- protect the convois
- send supplies to russia to keep the russian army in fighting conditions - to avoid a german victory in the east
- intercept axis blockade running
- bomb axis industry which is possible in this mod from the beginning!
- conquer africa to establish a southern fron
- knock out the German industry
- conquer Norway to secure the northern convois and to permit blockade running through the north sea
- open the second front in 43 or 44

for the Axis:
- protect the industry from allied bombing
- bomb England
- maintain a strong garrison in Norway to avoid it getting conquered by the Brits
- intercept convois to russia from norway
- attack allied shipping to England
- protect the southern flank
- decide what to produce as every change make one part of the forces stronger while the others get weaker

Some bases in Africa (spanish) and in South and middle America will be axis to allow blockade braking.


The following scenarios are planned:
1. THS Totally historic.
The game will start in early 41 (I guess it should be possible to let the game start in 1/1/41), russia is still inactive and the axis may choice whether to try an invasion on england, to focus (more) on africa or to attack russia. The Balkan isn't conquered, yet.

2. TEA The Evil Alliacne.
The Soviet Union signed a full alliance pact with Germany. This makes the allied side that weak that the oil embargo against Japan never happens, so PH doesn't take place, too! So nearly all of the allied shipping is in the Atlantic. The USA declare war on Germany in mid 42 and before that no US ship arrives in the theatre (this may be discussed).
So in TEA the Axis are extremely stronger in land forces (but the border to china, amd Japam has to be garrisoned much, so not all russian troops enter the game. On the other hand, the allied naval and air power is even more overwhelming as there's only a hand full of ships in the pacific and the units suffer no losses there.
All the ground reinforcements to his area come to Europe and one may think about letting Japan enter the allied side in 44, when China is conquered and the Japs try to get Siberia, now. In this case, big parts of the Japanese fleet (which hasn't suffered any serious loss yet and which doesn't have any shortages in it's expansion program) enter the theatre soon...

3. AFA Axis Full Alliance
Argenina, Afghanistan, Irak, Persia, Spain and Portugal entered the Axis side, Yugoslavia stays within the Axis and the baltic states formed a full Alliance with Finland to support it in the Winter War. With all the scandinavic aid, the Winter War isn't over, so the Scandinavics join the Axis as well.
This makes the Axis stronger, but there's a looong coast line to protect, now. The Brazilian and Mexican ground forces get bgigger in this mod to level it a bit...

4. RWB Regular War Begining
Hitler told the Chiefs of Army, Navy and AF as well as Mussolini, that the war will not be begun before 42. So in this scenario, there are no losses, yet. Moreover, all expansion plans of the Italien and German Navy went on regulary, as well as the changes in army and Airforce.
But: there's nothing conquered, yet! Poland still exists, France isn't conquered yet...

5. NLY No Losses Yet
The same as THS - but no navy suffered losses, yet. This gives Germany the Admiral Graf Spee, the Blücher, etc. while the Brits get back the Glorious etc.

6. HKD Heil Kaiser Dir!
The most challenging Scenario... The Great War ended in late 1916 or early 1917. The Zsar was told that any more major defeat will cause a revolution - so he sues for peace.
The head of the German Navy tells the Kaiser that the Hochseeflotte isn't able to beat the British navy, nore is it able to break through the blockade. In this scneario, the Brits started the convoi system already in 1915, so subs have also proved to be unable to defeat britain.
After the first tank attacks, the OHL began intensive studies about the importance war tanks. Their result was, that with the expected improvements in reliability, tactics and material itself, they'll get a major threat within the nexttwo years. On the other hand, Germany will be unable to produce enough own tanks to mach this.
Knowing all this, the Kaiserreich accepted the peace offer of russia under the condition, that the Kingdom of Poland is founded... - with it's old dynasty, the saxonians.
After that, the Eastern Front is totally quiet, no troops are put into fight against red army troops, Poland is queit to - so all troops are sent to the western front.
With that strenght, there's made a peace offer to the entende.
The people of Elsaß-Lothringen may decide for themselves to which country they want to belong and one will negotiate about the strength of the navy. About the rest, there'll be a draw.
The Irakis in the Osman Empire manage to get their independance through riots and to calm down the situation in the Balkan, the Kingdom of Yugoslava is founded - under a Prince of the House Habsburg...
After the war, there were Conferences like the one in Washington to decide about the fleet size and to permit a new arms race.
After Lenin managed to get to russia, a civil war brakes out there in 1920. Concerning their own borders, Austria-Hungary and Germany send troops to protect the House Romanow and the Tsar. With this help, the Kommunists are wiped out within one year, but Finland takes its chance to get into independance in summer 1920. At the same time, the Tsar resigns the new Dreikaiserallianz - the Three Emperors Alliance. Finland's independance is guaranteed under the condition that it joins this alliance. Poland joins it too, as it is surrounded by parts of this alliance, as it's king is the king of Saxony - a part of the German Empire - too, and as it expects massive economic advantages from it.
Yugoslavia is formally independant, but there's no question whether it's King of the House Habsburg may attack his cousin...
In 1931, the rest of the Arab people demands it's independance from the Osman Empire, which refuses. In the following civil war, massacres take place and russia intervenes to "protect the christian orthodox brothers in faith" - of course without any own ambitions [;)]. When peace is signed, Russia controls the Bosporus, the Dardanelles and the Armenian areas of todays Turkey, Greece has seized the Western coast of Turkey and the Arabs have their independance.
When the Communists started a civil war in Persia in 1940, the Tsar takes its chance to intervene to fight against communism... - and to get a port in the persian gulf.
Britain it totally surprised by that and sees no other option than to help the communists to push the russians out of Persia again. When the British supplies show their use very effectivly against the Tsarist army, the local high command orders the Russian Airforce to bomb the Communist controlled harbour in eastern Persia to permit further aid. As several British ships end up sunk in the harbour and even a British Destroyer is damaged, Britain declares war. France has to join the war as well, as the old entende was reactivated after the Three Emperors Alliance (TEA). After having failed to conquer the Austrian coast of the adria and Tyrolia, Italy now takes it's chance to get back the once Italien areas of southern France and to get their hand on Tunesia and perhaps even Algeria? The Abessinian Empereror Haile Selassie gets convinced to liberate some british and french controlled African areas...
Japan immediately joins the Entende to gain it's planned Northern Empire: Siberia.
In mid 42, the US will declare themselves to be forced into war as several US freighters will get sunk by German naval and sea power... After having beaten the Russian Far East Fleet once again, the Japs send huge part of their fleet to Europe to help defeating the TEA in Europe.
So in this scenario, this countrys will be on the following sides:
TEA:
Germany, Austria-Hungary, Yugoslavia, Russia, Poland, Finland, Italy, Abessinia and some arab Nationalists

Entende:
Britain, France, Greece, Turkey, Persia, the Republic of Spain (perhaps?), Japan and the USA (in mid 42).

This mod might be interesting as it grants a huge number of major sea battles..

Holy moly, Historiker!  That last scenario sounds like a blast!  [8D]
 
Very ambitious plans.  Best of luck with them!  [&o]

NOTE: this is misplaced - and is a reply to the FOLLOWING item.

A true War in Europe mod requires a different engine - due to number of slots and need for a land combat routine that is better.

But a War in the Atlantic mod might be feasible. I don't think it can be done in a timely way.



REPLY: I agree: I meant to include a potential Operation Sea Lion and D Day - land operations in Norway and Finland and Occupied Northern
USSR - and if you included the Med - of Italy and France - and certainly North Africa. That way naval power is allowed to do what it does - influence events on land. But also - that way - you don't need more slots than we have - which prohibit doing this otherwise if you try to represent most of the forces. There are not enough land or air slots - and the only way to get enough ship slots is to use RHS style combined units - because there are a LOT of units ETO vs PTO.

Yes Sid, you are right. Witp surely isn't the best, but I want to play in Europe with witp...

Simply Atlantic mod is not enough. There must be land combat to take advantege from efforts at sea and in the air.

I already thought about changing sides, but Germany must have the possibility to produce by players choice, as it will be mostly inferior in production numbers. It is already intended to use Army or Navy for Germany and the other "nation" for the axis allies...

Witp atm will be only used to get the needed experience for the mod -of course it's targeting for AE. The slots are (at least for land units) no problem, as I don't intend to add them totaly historical correct. It's just important that the strenght is mostly historical correct.
Of course, it's nice to have every single historical unit - but when the strength in game is historical correct (or like intended in the scenario), it's not needed. So I can easily mix diferent small units to one big.

The problem with War in the Atlantic is that it would be quite boring if you stuck to a strictly historical scenario.

That's what Jim Dunnigan once said - "no one ever wants a logistic game." But he was wrong - and ultimately had to do such games - both commercially and professionally (for military use). One active member of Matrix staff commented that he played the S&T War in the Pacific (mechanical) "a game with occasional battles, after which you got back to the real business of the game - routing convoys." If you are not
routing convoys, or trying to intercept them, you are not playing a historical WWII naval game.

ORIGINAL: el cid again

That's what Jim Dunnigan once said - "no one ever wants a logistic game." But he was wrong - and ultimately had to do such games - both commercially and professionally (for military use). One active member of Matrix staff commented that he played the S&T War in the Pacific (mechanical) "a game with occasional battles, after which you got back to the real business of the game - routing convoys." If you are not
routing convoys, or trying to intercept them, you are not playing a historical WWII naval game.

I'm not a naval guy, but it seems to me that naval warfare ultimately boils down to just that - routing convoys. The only real point of having surface or subsurface combat elements is to allow freedom of action and protection of your own convoys and deny the same to your opponent.

I think for WWII land warfare in WITP you would want to do mostly Corps level (Army for Russia) with some Divisions. You could also have Army and Army Group Troops.

Maybe for merchant ships (as I think Sid was alluding to) you could have one device represent 5 or 10 merchants.

What I meant to say was "The problem with War in the Atlantic is that it would be quite boring if you stuck to a strictly historical scenario and tried to model it in WitP".

ORIGINAL: hueglin

I think for WWII land warfare in WITP you would want to do mostly Corps level (Army for Russia) with some Divisions. You could also have Army and Army Group Troops.

Maybe for merchant ships (as I think Sid was alluding to) you could have one device represent 5 or 10 merchants.

Correct. In RHS small merchant ships - Sea Trucks, junks, dhous, tugs and barges, - are all multiple ship units. If small enough, each
hull is a separate floatation point. If you don't make them too big - they don't take long to build. 2 ship units build in 4 months, 3 ship units in 9 months - and that is about right for small vessels.

ORIGINAL: Terminus

What I meant to say was "The problem with War in the Atlantic is that it would be quite boring if you stuck to a strictly historical scenario and tried to model it in WitP".

I don't think a naval thinker would find it boring - but I don't think WITP is up to it either. Aside from slots, there is not enough sensor slots,
and subs are not really subs - which they should be for a good model. Nor is the aircraft search algorithm very good - the Germans would be swept from the seas with those ultra effective patrol - search algorithms - even for tiny units of 1 or 2 planes.

Plus, the time scale is wrong. On a day-long turn cycle, there would be an absurd amount of sitting around doing nothing.

Due to devices slots limits i think that can be made eventually only in AE.

ORIGINAL: Terminus

Plus, the time scale is wrong. On a day-long turn cycle, there would be an absurd amount of sitting around doing nothing.

Don`t you get the same kind of `sitting around`in WITP on a one day time scale? If you include the Med and not just the Atlantic, which is what Historiker has indicated, there should not be any less action than in the Pacific.

Historiker, I think I am interested in helping you. In fact, these last weeks I have been thinking about this "War in Europe" thing. So now I find out that someone is interested as well. In fact, I see the map is already done! PM or e-mail me. Are you sure this thing can be done though? [8D]

Its an interesting idea I suspect you would have enough land slots in AE if you kept it mostly at Divisional level except possibly the Eastern front where you would need a mix.
 
Couldnt you strecthc the centre of the map to remove the passageways and have a proper battle of the atlantic
 
Not sure how WITP would handle sub warfare may need to give all U Boats high XP and surface radar to make emattack more
 
 

That last one is one of the main reasons why convoy battles in the Atlantic would be so boring...

The code crudely simulates radio coordination of U boats (and surface vessels and shore stations) - if you put many U boats at sea - it will NOT be boring - and if you put them in locations convoys are likely to enter - you will get regular action. The problem is that U boat attrition will be too high - to enemy air - not that the U boats won't find and attack enemy ships. WITP has a poor ASW model - and subs are not even subs - but wierd surface ships. Add to that the air search algorithm is hopelessly efficient. You need to manually use house rules: range of air search = some proportion of number of searching planes.

no matter how witp is suited to handle WITW / poorly IMO /
the amount of work / higher than WITP / knock outs simply speaking
it is full time job for few players for few months
not countng inevitable testing before it will be playable ....

if you put many U boats at sea - it will NOT be boring - and if you put them in locations convoys are likely to enter - you will get regular action.

This is where I think the `passageways` may actually be a benefit, it will canalize the convoys into a limited number of areas.

That is not why I created them on the map to begin with however; the scenario that the map was originally created for is for WPO and I wanted to include India. It was the compromise I preferred for `War in the West 1914`.

The map could be modified relatively easily, but the then more difficult part wold be having to completely redo the wphex.dat file as all of the terrain would change (every hex would be moved from it`s original spot).