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This is a question for everyone playing the Soviet side with v. 3.1. Tamas and I are playing with the 3.0 wirhack version, starting with 1942. One of the key issues I am seeing as the Soviets is that even Soviet units in combat are not gaining much experience, let alone the known reduction in experience without combat. Part of the problem is most likely related to Tamas doing such a great job of shattering units, but even without shattering most units stay around 60 for experience, period. The result is very few conversions to guard status. About the only conversions I have seen have been tank units that started out with very large numbers of tanks and so did not get replacements to bring their level down, or if I cranked the replacement level down to 60 or so for the HQ. The low replacement level has not helped with rifle divisions, though.

If anybody is playing long enough in the 1941 campaign, maybe against the AI, are you seeing similar experience problems? It used to be that you could get fair numbers of Guard units in 1942, but I cannot find any rifle divisions even above 64 (it takes 80 to convert). I believe I got one or two early on, but I don't think there have been any in the past year or more, except the tanks. This won't help the 1941 problems, but it could have a large impact on 1942 and later if it is a problem. As we started in 1942, I would expect a little better conversion rate than I am seeing, and this part may need tweaked along with the 1941 issues.

Please let me know! Thanks.

Hello RickyB
As an observation, the 12 computer vs computer games I ran last weekend, (with WIR 3.101) I noticed that by the end of each game, the Soviet army was at least 50% Guards formations. With many, if not most, of the formations in combat being composed exclusivly of Guards units.
Unfortunately, I did not take note of the state of the Soviet army during 1942, 1943 while running these games, as I was more interested in seeing how my new OBWIR performed late war.

Hi Rick,

I have find this information about 3 old games I played with russians with V.3101 (PBEM). Its not too much but I hope can help you :

- 11/30/41 : only one Guard div./ average exp. infantry 48%/ armor 0/ average exp. 46%. This would be increased greatly when bizzard ends.

- 12/28/41 : 12 Guard div/ aver.exp. 60%/ armor 3 guard units/average.exp. 60%. More fighting and more losses gave me this Guard div.

- 3/22/42 : 71 Guard Div./ aver.exp. 69%/ armor, art,at guns 60 Guard units/ aver.exp. 67%. Here I was able to preserve my army and the blizzard maked the rest.

Josan.

Thanks for the data, guys. I don't know if there is a problem to dig into or not based on this, but I will be watching.

Regards

[QUOTE]Originally posted by RickyB:
This is a question for everyone playing the Soviet side with v. 3.1. Tamas and I are playing with the 3.0 wirhack version, starting with 1942. One of the key issues I am seeing as the Soviets is that even Soviet units in combat are not gaining much experience, let alone the known reduction in experience without combat. Part of the problem is most likely related to Tamas doing such a great job of shattering units, but even without shattering most units stay around 60 for experience, period. The result is very few conversions to guard status. About the only conversions I have seen have been tank units that started out with very large numbers of tanks and so did not get replacements to bring their level down, or if I cranked the replacement level down to 60 or so for the HQ. The low replacement level has not helped with rifle divisions, though.

If anybody is playing long enough in the 1941 campaign, maybe against the AI, are you seeing similar experience problems? It used to be that you could get fair numbers of Guard units in 1942, but I cannot find any rifle divisions even above 64 (it takes 80 to convert). I believe I got one or two early on, but I don't think there have been any in the past year or more, except the tanks. This won't help the 1941 problems, but it could have a large impact on 1942 and later if it is a problem. As we started in 1942, I would expect a little better conversion rate than I am seeing, and this part may need tweaked along with the 1941 issues.

Please let me know! Thanks.[/QUOTE

Ricky

Lets just say that soviet experience has little to do with the abillity of axis forces. Hey my 20th div went guards!! Dos'nt help much when German Pz Kps just took moscow. Maybe if soviet orders were followed as per plan in '41 the axis superiority would not be so total. Yes training helps but ... well being a bit stonger when you are trashed could be some consolation.......

Nick

Originally posted by Lokioftheaesir:
Ricky

Lets just say that soviet experience has little to do with the abillity of axis forces. Hey my 20th div went guards!! Dos'nt help much when German Pz Kps just took moscow. Maybe if soviet orders were followed as per plan in '41 the axis superiority would not be so total. Yes training helps but ... well being a bit stonger when you are trashed could be some consolation.......

Nick

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Hi Nick,

You are right, I don't see this as an issue in 1941, which has its own issues that we will try to address with experience upgrades and minor troop realignments. However, if there is also an issue with being able to get experience up through battle, then we need to squash that also and might as well do it at the same time. However, it sounds like that may not be an issue.

What I have been seeing may just be an issue of my 1942 reverse Barbarossa scenario and Tamas' play, in which case it does not matter. He suggested reducing replacement rates, which will work, but then ops points are low making attacks tough (and probably why I have had so many shatters when the odds haven't been bad?). I have been trying at 60% replacements in some front line HQs and it does not matter (at least in 1943). Just about any replacements consistently drop the experience down to 60% or so, so I would guess it would take a replacement rate of 20-40 to get it to work. Some of the ops points issues could be related to the reduced Soviet output I setup. That is why I am trying to track it to the game or the situation. Also, early in 1944 it may be getting better, or maybe something else is happening, as I am consistently out of replacement infantry each turn for awhile now. We shall see.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by RickyB:
[QB]
Hi Nick,

He suggested reducing replacement rates, which will work, but then ops points are low making attacks tough (and probably why I have had so many shatters when the odds haven't been bad?).

Yes, the shatter is a problem. The soviet armies shattering were in 95 percent encircled troops which couldn't retreat anywhere so shattered. But I do think encircled troops which are forced to retreat but cannot should surrender. In a large pocket (3-4 armies) only one surrenders if I destroy them on the same turn I encircled them. Or not even one if one attack fails (frequently the case). Now if we take the "this happens in one week" arguement it might be alright. But I would be happier if defeated encircled troops would surrender (higher losses <img src="smile.gif" border="0"> ). I'm not good at all with programing at all, but I'm afraid that it would be very hard to make the game differentiate between retreating in several lines of defence, and the long retreat in a pocket until shattering. I think the game handles this two cases all the same as the small minority of shatters in our game with Rick happened when I retreated an army which had to retreat several hexes in very deep soviet defense. So the question is : is it possible to make the game surrender encircled troops in big pocket's if they are destroyed on the turn of encirclement?

Originally posted by Tom1939:
So the question is : is it possible to make the game surrender encircled troops in big pocket's if they are destroyed on the turn of encirclement?

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Its possible, but the only way I can see this working is for supply recalculation to be done *during* the combat phase, and that would be a difficult thing to program I believe. At the very least it would require a major alteration of the games's combat and supply code.

Originally posted by RickyB:

You are right, I don't see this as an issue in 1941, which has its own issues that we will try to address with experience upgrades and minor troop realignments.

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Rick, have you made a campaign '41 scenario with the experience bumped up? Being lazy, and without Excel, I can't make this change easily. If you've got a scenario with updated experience and other adjustments you mentioned, I'd like to try it out.

Originally posted by Ed Cogburn:
Rick, have you made a campaign '41 scenario with the experience bumped up? Being lazy, and without Excel, I can't make this change easily. If you've got a scenario with updated experience and other adjustments you mentioned, I'd like to try it out.

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As soon as I finish it up I will send it to the entire group. I am close, but need to make a few more tweaks after trying it out. Its all a time issue.