KamilS wrote: Thu Jul 23, 2026 3:45 pm
When I was planning my general strategy I wanted to push as fast as possible to create dillema for Soviet player - defend industry or face threat of encirclement.
Unfortunatelly it is really not dillema as all major industrial centers will just relocate and after after brief period produce again. There is no realy incentive to defend anything else than Leningrad and Moscow. I have learned it around turn 8-9.
It really annoyed me to the extend that I have decided that after finishing this game I won't be playing WitE 2. (I apologise for small rant, but it really made me angry ...)
Not sure what the big issue is with the factory evacuations. The IRL Soviets managed to get pretty much everything out before the Axis reached the cities. But it wasn't like one day the industry was there and the next day it had left - it was a gradual process. So if the Axis player outperforms their real life counterpart then more industry will be lost than historical but at least some of the industry will already have been moved (plus the Soviets obviously had the capability to rebuild anything they lost given time). So the in game situation (capturing cities ahead of the evacuation date will cause a delay in the factories getting back online compared to historical) matches the real life situation.
In terms of the separate wider issue of the Soviet player not being under pressure to defend forward...
1) A human player is very unlikely to make the same mistakes as the historical STAVKA and keep huge numbers of forces forwards to be inevitably encircled. A rule system that basically handcuffs the Soviet player and forces them to suicide their troops is not going to be enjoyable to play.
2) In terms of the victory rules a Soviet player that just retreats and does not attack is only saving themselves from the 1941 auto-victory and potentially the 1942 one. But in the long term it is a losing strategy. If the Soviet player gives up too many bonus points by losing too many cities ahead of their historical capture date they will allow the Axis player to set a High Watermark that might not auto win the game in 1942 but will be impossible for the Soviet player to match by the end of 1944, resulting in an Axis victory.
3) In terms of the balance of forces, again a Soviet player that just retreats and does not fight will face longer terms consequences that outweigh the short term benefits. If they don't fight, the Axis forces will remain in good condition right up to the winter and so will be at no risk of collapsing if they do not retreat. In order to put them in that crisis situation the Soviet player needs to be defending aggressively enough to wear the Axis forces down before winter hits. Being able to put the Axis player under pressure in the winter is important not just from the perspective of causing damage to the Axis forces but also from the perspective of getting experience/morale and in particular Guards promotions.
