Warplan is a World War 2 simulation engine. It is a balance of realism and playability incorporating the best from 50 years of World War 2 board wargaming.
As already stated - but no answer was given - this time I provide a screenshot.
Checked with opponent, the unit started the turn at 1/20.
As you can see (Had to resize) all bombers were spent to bomb Gibraltar. There were 16 or 18 hits total... but certainly more than 1 (Stated strength at start of the opponent turn!)
So how I am supposed to take Gibraltar if I cannot invade or Para the hex, and the unit cannot be bombed away? (That without having to go through Spain, that's it).
Yes, one of the big plusses of Warplan is that air power is more realistic. Units cannot be destroyed by air power alone. Air power mostly affects effectiveness, thus reducing the current strength of a unit.
You'll have to get Spain on your side one way or another.
Then it should be known - officially - that air units cannot destroy the last health.point of 1 unit.
I've wasted trillions of oil and turns trying to obliterate Gibraltar that way - and then - if it is intended to go that way then why at the '39 start you get ... that description below, which is certainly misleading and would be true only in the case the UK leaves Gibraltar vacant / empty. (That's then the -only- way Axis could take it without going through Spain)
I'd be perfectly fine with the fact the unit cannot be destroyed by airpower alone.
But then give me a beach to invade Gibraltar with. (And if the Royal Navy shows up I can bomb it).
Lack of information to players (Weather Table, Combat Table, etc) is really frustrating.
If game rules allow for such a Luftwaffe bomber force deployed in Morocco, then something should be done about it. As an CEAW GS Community member, I remember that one of the things that we tried to avoid were stuff like this.
There does not seem to be carpet bombing which is the only time total obliteration came close and some dispute that. Monte Cassino, Operation Goodwood bombing, heck the aerial bombing on D-Day over Omaha beach In June was a total miss. Now before Cobra - well Panzer Lehr was hurt and its General Bayerlein thought his division was wiped out. Psychologically, i.e. effectiveness. The many bombardments by US Navy in the Pacific - holy shit look a the Marine casualities - could have been worse. When defenders prep tough to wipe out due to physical defenses but also use of trip lines, defense in depth to reduce target profile. But the Germans were very wary of Allied Air and Naval power. The Germans never had that kind of psychological dominance after France. Did they?
By the way have you looked the geography of Gibraltar? I haven't. Can it be invaded. A paradrop maybe after the Germans took Eben Emil and Crete and the British paras took Fort Ranville overlooking Sword Beach.
Then it should be known - officially - that air units cannot destroy the last health.point of 1 unit.
...
It is known, page 90 of the manual:
Air Strike Military Units – Players may use an air unit to attack another unit.Air units damage the effectiveness of other units. Some hits damage the strength of a unit. An air unit can’t destroy another unit except a naval unit or a unit that is being transported by sea.
RTM.
Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty & well preserved body,
but rather to skid in broadside, totally worn out & proclaiming "WOW, what a ride!"
ORIGINAL: TrogusP96
well Panzer Lehr was hurt and its General Bayerlein thought his division was wiped out.
The bombing of the Pz Lehr was probably the most intense bombardment of a single combat unit during the entire war. Even so, the Pz Lehr division only lost about 38% of its operational strength in the regiment most heavily hit, and it had recovered to only about 15% permanent losses within a week, but those losses include troops lost in the fighting on the ground as well. The rest of the division was well under 10% losses. Air power simply did not destroy ground troops in vast numbers, what it did was cause shock and awe which allowed attacking troops to overcome them on the ground.
Niklas Zetterling's book: Normandy 1944 German Military Organization, Combat Power and Organizational Effectiveness, is an awesome resource for detailed statistics covering the Cobra bombings and anything else that occurred in Normandy between June-August 1944.
There will be a beach location for Gibraltar in the next update. It is the only hex on the map that currently can't be invaded. I found a way to do it without adding to the rules.
Most air strips in WWII were dirt fields unless weather conditions got very wet for large parts of the year. Only large bombers regularly needed concrete or steel (Marsten mats) runways. Your case has merit for tac bombers, but fighters and CAS wouldn't need much beyond maintenance crews and fuel/munition stocks.
I find unrealistic the possibility of building such huge Axis air fleets in Morocco and Algeria.
Those countries, by that time, lacked the infrastructure needed for doing so.
The limitation on supply, from ports in North Africa, mean that all those air units are under-supplied, and thus less effective. The player can pack any number of units into a given area, but if the only source of supply is from a port, that's a real limitation.
One way to fight this could be to require a minimal supply for the air units to form air bases.
That way most of Europe hexes would be eligible for air bases.
In Africa and the Middle East would be another matter. As only decent supply could be get from cities with ports, then air bases would only be possible in city hexes.
Supply was not a problem since there is a rail that connects all the French North Africa ports - which are not always small.
We're talking of a French Colony with rail - not of Lybia that just had a road.
Unfortunately, the French railways in North Africa were all single-track and had limited rolling stock ... and were in a poor state of repair prior to the allied invasion.
The US threw huge resources (including locomotives and rolling stock as well as rails, signals and switching gear) and got the capacity up to 90,000 tons per day ... however, the Axis experience in North Africa is more daunting.
The Italians shipped ~66 miles of track during at the start of the war and no more, ever. The Germans shipped none. Both shipped inadequate amounts of other track and maintenance related equipment and the Italians shipped a limited amount of locomotives and rolling stock. As with most anything to do with Axis logistical planning, to ship any more would have meant eschewing shipments of such fripperies as, oh, POL, Tanks, Ammunition and the like.
The armistice between Vichy and the Germans ripped the guts out of the French economy and left their armed forces and even civilian infrastructure in North Africa to basically wither on the vine.
Realistically, there was limited rail supply capacity in existence before the US infusion of gear ... and no Axis capacity to do the same.
Phil McGregor
Author, Space Opera (FGU); RBB #1 (FASA); Road to Armageddon; Farm, Forge and Steam; Orbis Mundi; Displaced (PGD)
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Email: aspqrz@tpg.com.au
Very interesting, Phil. This raises the question can tactical and strat bomb French national railways as Allies did pre Overlord? The German rail capacity is pretty good. Able to move three corps plus per two weeks
Yes Jim you make a good point. Great book by Zetterling. Yes. I believe Zetterling criticizes Bayerlein for overstating the damage to his Panzer Lehr. From the visual descriptions of the bombing I don't blame Bayerlein. I think Dev here has done a good job by having effectiveness decline separately from strength (via movement and combat also) but there are no tables or I didn't see anything in manual to show the magnitude of those air attacks on effectiveness. Do we know what air does?
The Allied strategic bombing campaign in France immediately prior to Overlord dropped every rail bridge for 200 miles around the beaches, severely slowing down German reinforcements ... effectively forcing them to road march towards the allies.
If they marched during the day, Allied TacAir cruelled them severely.
The Allied air campaign also targetted the French rail net in general and there were severe casualties amongst the French RR crews.
At a minimum (for D-Day), the bridges over the Seine and Loire should be shown as destroyed (only just bought the game, so I have no idea whether this is possible) and all the rail lines west and south of the Somme and north of the Loire should be interdicted severely. In fact, the whole of the area west/south of the Somme and north of the Loire should be interdicted severely.
Either that or German rail capacity in Western Europe as a whole should probably be reduced to 1 Corps per turn, if that.
From late 44 the German rail net was increasingly interdicted and effectively destroyed by Allied air ... the average distance that German trains could travel without being forced to stop by Allied destruction of bridges, switching gear, other trains and the like was reduced to ~10 miles. It was so bad by early January 45 that the only way the Germans could put together new consists (i.e. organise a train with new rolling stock) was to push existing rolling stock off the tracks as the switching and loading yards were all destroyed. In effect this reduced German rail capacity to close to zero, probably less than a corps per turn in the whole of western Europe.
That's what happens when a third rate industrial power with a delusional dictator takes on first rate industrial powers ... though it may take a while for the effects to be obvious.
German planners (yes, Hitler, Goering and others) *knew* they couldn't match the West in a long drawn out war ... their delusional planning was based on a quick, overwhelming, victory ... and that ... failed ...
Phil McGregor
Author, Space Opera (FGU); RBB #1 (FASA); Road to Armageddon; Farm, Forge and Steam; Orbis Mundi; Displaced (PGD)
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Email: aspqrz@tpg.com.au
A realistic model to a degree is okay as part of the gaming factory.
But if one is to pratically script back WW2 as it has happened, you'll make a game where no one will play the Axis to be the incapacitated underdog.
That is part of game design. Unless you want the unsatisfactory experience of gaming against the AI.
Right now there is already a problem like "Axis cannot get into Egypt because of supplies". That by itself is a game crippling feature. Is it realistic? Maybe. Do the Axis were that idiotic to push to El Alamein with awareness they could not push any further? Don't think so.
But let's just look at the game perspective. - How does it work?
Answer: UK ships 1 big corp to Alexandria, and digs in. That will hold the line from '39 to '42 pretty much, with the existing HQ and Tank. Axis player knows they cannot do anything. They will sit in Tobruk (maybe sending a fat corp from Germany to hold Tobruk). Then they play stare for a -long- time. So, what game aspect is that of the Afrika war? I think it'd be pretty boring. But as it is now, it seems that it is exactly how it will pan out. Til, maybe, at some point later, UK+USA can push. But until then, Axis in Tobruk, Allies in Alexandria.
So player can elaborate as much as they want about 'history'. Do a perfect repeat of WW2 history and no one will want to be the side that takes the beating from late '42 to mid '45, no matter what they may achieve (or not achieve) in the early years.
Yes/ "It's a game" ... but there is no reason why it shouldn't be accurate historically or it simply becomes computerised 'Risk' ...
Historically the Germans did as well as they did because they mortgaged their economy for rearmament from 1933 onwards ... the allies only from 1937/38 or so. There is a reason for this ... the Allies (yes, the Brits, French, Yanks and even the Russians) did their sums, the western Allies came to the (realistic) conclusion that the only way they could match the Germans was to, effectively, become a command (i.e. dictatorial) economy *in peacetime* ... the Russians (aka Stalin) did his sums and found he could gut their economy to match the Germans and decided it was too big an ask.
The Germans never had enough raw materials (especially steel and oil) or industry to compete once the allies got under way ... but they managed to stave things off by taking France and Western Europe in 1940 quite unexpectedly ... stripping those economies to keep their own afloat. Russia, however, was a step too far.
I actually like the card system they have in Totaller Krieg where the Germans have to play cards that represent the gradual stripping of Poland, then Western Europe, the western USSR and, finally, their own home economy to get progressively fewer blitz attack rewards ... this is actually fairly realistic. If the Germans can't win quick, well, they'll lose in any real world sense ... which is where Victory Conditions come in ... can you hang on past May 8 1945?
Unfortunately too many alleged "WW2" computer games are fantasies as they allow the Germans to 'win' and conquer all of western Europe, the UK, the Middle East and, in some cases, the rest of the Western Hemisphere.
If that sort of fantasy suits you, fine ... I have no problem with it ... but it doesn't suit me. I prefer to see if I can hang on longer than May 8 1945!
Historically, of course, the DAK couldn't have taken Egypt ... or not the delta ... for the simple reason they lacked the logistic support to do so. High Command recognised this and told Rommel he was there for a purely spoiling mission, but he disobeyed orders and seemed to be successful, lulling Hitler into believing that victory in the Med was possible on a shoestring ... and then finding out, gradually, that not only wasn't it, that Germany couldn't support much more than a shoestring anyway.
Arguably the resources committed to the North Africa campaign ... enough trucks to support another Panzer ARMY in the East and an ENTIRE Luftflotte that could, equally, have been better used in the East ... would have been better used elsewhere. Committing more resources would only have been possible if they were stripped from, well, Russia.
YMMV.
Phil McGregor
Author, Space Opera (FGU); RBB #1 (FASA); Road to Armageddon; Farm, Forge and Steam; Orbis Mundi; Displaced (PGD)
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Email: aspqrz@tpg.com.au
Good commentary on the rail situation, Phil. I don't know that giving the Allies their historic options or capabilities is not an acceptable alternative. My point is that the war for the Western Allies was primarily air and naval with only a few divisions committed compared to the Soviets. So why not give them their capabilities. Comparing GDPs and populations would seem to determine the outcome. I have seen this before the eternal dilemma. With computers I suppose one can create a variety of capabilities from the historic to the more fun? Our Developer here at least touches on it with the Detection and Electronics. So if I apply our friend Cohen slith's criterion for it to be fun for the Allies they should have their full array of naval and air capabilities before they join the Soviets in smearing the Nazis, Italians and their minions. I mean I'vewondered why no game ever puts the death camps on the map and give points for their liberation or let he Nazis choose to not waste rail resources on moving Jews and others to the death camps. The dev has provided map modding so I suppose that could be done. And I get Cohen's point. I get tired of limiting the US to 99 divisions because FDR chose only 8 million for the Army. I hope that modding and the base game can allow for a good range of parameters.
