Slitherine

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ORIGINAL: Q-Ball

Speaking purely about the VP conditions in the GC; "DRAW" is going to be the result in 90% of games, IMO.

In order for the Germans to score a Minor Victory, they need to hold 141 VPs or something like that; they need to hold the Soviet Army to basically the June 21, 1941 line, at the end of 1945! This is almost impossible to acheive.

The Soviets victory conditions are more attainable, but I predict will still not be easy under 1.05 (we havent' seen any games get to 1944 without the 1=1 rule taken away, which makes a huge difference)

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Flaviusx: After that he was dogged by an ongoing armaments point shortage. Even after fixing the bug, he was perpetually short on armaments and consistently had more manpower than he could use. This is a real problem. It's hard to judge if that problem is global or the result of a game that went through too many patches, but my suspicion is that it is a global problem and related to quirks in the combat system.

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Harrybanana

In my opinion the game is not balanced in the sense that the Germans do not stand an equal chance to win the game. For those who disagree look at the game between Tarhuannas and Gids. Gids played valiantly and his play improved as the game went on; but even he agrees that Taurannas deserved to be awarded the win. Admittedly the game was played through numerous patches, but it just doesn't seem right to me that the Axis can survive until October, without the Soviets even getting a whiff of Berlin, and still have to settle for a draw.

The war itself was not balanced in the sense that the Axis did not stand anywhere near an equal chance to win the War in Russia. Historically the Axis "outplayed" the Russians for most of the War, particularly in the first 18 months, but they still lost. In my opinion, with equal opponents there should be very little chance of the Axis "Winning the War" in the sense of causing a Russian surrender. Accordingly, I am opposed to any rules that give the Germans an ahistorical chance to win the War. I personally want the game to be as accuarate a simulation (in terms of comabt model, logistics, etc.) as possible.

But I do believe that both sides should stand an equal chance of Winning the Game. To accomplish this the victory conditions need to be changed.

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I think the main problem on the German side is, the game is very very unforgiving and you just can't recover from any major or several minor screw-ups.
All things being equal you can play your best and not screw up and the Russian guy can have some minor screw-ups and you will still lose.

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ORIGINAL: paullus99

It should be very interesting to see how the new patch plays out in the longer games. From what I've seen so far, it does change the dynamic (still getting a handle on the CC restrictions) and the 43 - 45 period will continue to be a challenge. I think we'll see a few items that may need to be tweaked, but I do believe we're still heading in the right direction.

Of course, the proof will be in the pudding.

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ORIGINAL: Michael T

No matter how one sided any game is it can be balanced by the victory conditions. Nothing complicated about it. A game can be completely one sided but the victory conditions can still be designed to accommodate an equal chance of a win for the side getting crushed. It just requires some intelligent unbiased thought and an understanding that the conditions are designed around the idea of players of roughly equal skill. So the player who performs best wins. FWIW my 3 big wishes for WITE are some political constraints, revised victory conditions and some flexibility in the logistical model. 1.Political ramifications for players that simply run away are needed. There was no greater influence on the war than the personalities of Hitler and Stalin. I would like to see players that run away subjected to something like a second Stalin's purge if certain cities fall too soon. Some similar rule for Hitler. How may players will risk giving up too much territory if a bunch of their best leaders might get shot/arrested/disappeared? A realistic scenario I think. 2. End the game in May 1945 and give the Germans a minor win if they still hold Berlin. Reduce the German Auto Win threshold to something in the range of around 260-265. There needs to be some kind of carrot. At the moment there is none as 290 is simply impossible against a competent opponent. At the moment the Soviet player (if he knows his business) walks in to the game knowing he cannot loose outright. He can only loose by not winning quickly enough. If an outright win is a possibility for Germany in 41/42 (as both sides would have thought in 41 for sure) then the extra pressure applied to the Soviets could create some interesting results. Its not hard to perform without pressure.   3. Everyone with any knowledge of the campaign accepts that there were serious logistical problems for both sides at various times in the war. What frustrates me is that I have very little control (nil really) of how my supply network is set up. What I would like to see is the rate of rail conversion increased if the German/Soviet is prepared to risk two rail engineers on one line. And the ability to funnel supply to HQ's that I want supplied at a higher level, whether German or Soviet. A priority system. Its simply a risk versus reward scenario. This is at the heart of any good game. A player who is conservative and never takes a risk consigns himself to mediocrity and a draw, or at least it should be that way. The player who takes a risk takes a step toward victory or defeat. There needs to be more of those risk/reward type decisions available, especially in the logistical frame.

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ORIGINAL: wadortch
I agree with Michael that the incentive for the Germans to make the historically desperate attempt to go for the win is not in the game. As it stands now, German occupation of Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad has little to no bearing on the ultimate outcome of the game, particularly so with the October 45 end date. It really was not there in the beginning at the 292 VP level, is not there now after the recent patches (which may adjust for too much power in a German Spring 42 offensive, but in the method which it was done, further enhances the cushion of the Soviets to get reckless in their 1st blizzard offensive).

So it seems the path being taken is to "balance" the game to make a draw harder to achieve for the Soviets! Why? Because in the absence of any real incentive for "go for it" play on the part of the Germans, we will see more conservative play on the part of the Germans to achieve a draw. What gaming fun is this? I read the forums about coaxing all the little perks out of the engine with micro management (planes, pioneers, moving Thor and Karl to Leningrad, etc)and am increasingly dismayed that such tricks are necessary on a game of this scale to "win" especially since most of these options (now that the German rest the divisions in winter to get em ready for spring 42 option is gone) again are Soviet. I read on another forum a humorous statement about the campaign orders for the Germans being something like, go forward ye host, we are preparing to defend Berlin!

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ORIGINAL: Michael T

No matter how one sided any game is it can be balanced by the victory conditions. Nothing complicated about it. A game can be completely one sided but the victory conditions can still be designed to accommodate an equal chance of a win for the side getting crushed. It just requires some intelligent unbiased thought and an understanding that the conditions are designed around the idea of players of roughly equal skill. So the player who performs best wins.

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 1.Political ramifications for players that simply run away are needed. There was no greater influence on the war than the personalities of Hitler and Stalin. I would like to see players that run away subjected to something like a second Stalin's purge if certain cities fall too soon. Some similar rule for Hitler. How may players will risk giving up too much territory if a bunch of their best leaders might get shot/arrested/disappeared? A realistic scenario I think. 

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2. End the game in May 1945 and give the Germans a minor win if they still hold Berlin. Reduce the German Auto Win threshold to something in the range of around 260-265. There needs to be some kind of carrot. At the moment there is none as 290 is simply impossible against a competent opponent. At the moment the Soviet player (if he knows his business) walks in to the game knowing he cannot loose outright. He can only loose by not winning quickly enough. If an outright win is a possibility for Germany in 41/42 (as both sides would have thought in 41 for sure) then the extra pressure applied to the Soviets could create some interesting results. Its not hard to perform without pressure.   

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. 3. Everyone with any knowledge of the campaign accepts that there were serious logistical problems for both sides at various times in the war. What frustrates me is that I have very little control (nil really) of how my supply network is set up. What I would like to see is the rate of rail conversion increased if the German/Soviet is prepared to risk two rail engineers on one line. And the ability to funnel supply to HQ's that I want supplied at a higher level, whether German or Soviet. A priority system. Its simply a risk versus reward scenario. This is at the heart of any good game. A player who is conservative and never takes a risk consigns himself to mediocrity and a draw, or at least it should be that way. The player who takes a risk takes a step toward victory or defeat. There needs to be more of those risk/reward type decisions available, especially in the logistical frame.

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ORIGINAL: MechFO

quote:

ORIGINAL: wadortch
I agree with Michael that the incentive for the Germans to make the historically desperate attempt to go for the win is not in the game. As it stands now, German occupation of Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad has little to no bearing on the ultimate outcome of the game, particularly so with the October 45 end date. It really was not there in the beginning at the 292 VP level, is not there now after the recent patches (which may adjust for too much power in a German Spring 42 offensive, but in the method which it was done, further enhances the cushion of the Soviets to get reckless in their 1st blizzard offensive).

So it seems the path being taken is to "balance" the game to make a draw harder to achieve for the Soviets! Why? Because in the absence of any real incentive for "go for it" play on the part of the Germans, we will see more conservative play on the part of the Germans to achieve a draw. What gaming fun is this? I read the forums about coaxing all the little perks out of the engine with micro management (planes, pioneers, moving Thor and Karl to Leningrad, etc)and am increasingly dismayed that such tricks are necessary on a game of this scale to "win" especially since most of these options (now that the German rest the divisions in winter to get em ready for spring 42 option is gone) again are Soviet. I read on another forum a humorous statement about the campaign orders for the Germans being something like, go forward ye host, we are preparing to defend Berlin!

Key points and why I think it's actually impossible to expect a "historical" flow if all the hardcoded effects were to be removed. Currently the German Player knows he has to last until 45, has no scope for victory beforehand, and will face an unstoppable juggernaut from late 43 onward. Force preservation is the name of the game and only game in town.

This is fundamentally different from having no choice except to run huge risks on the mere possibility of victory, even if one ends up losing 30-40 divisions in a year when things go wrong. Unless there's an actual in game incentive to run those kind of risks, no sane player will do so.