glvaca
Posts: 1312
Joined: 6/13/2006 Status: offline
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Well, I never mulled so I'm not even considering that in my reasoning. What hurt more than anything is the changes in the combat engine. It has become so much more unpredictable than before. And this is what basically makes it much more difficult to advance as the German. And by all measures, you are obviously a top notch player. You know how to defend, where to defend and when to defend. So consider this: 1. much harder to attack, meaning less attacks per turn (as you need higher odds than before). 2. Hasties against all but very weak units is simple a crap shoot more likely than not to result in stupid helds and morale loss. 3. Supply/fuel is reduced, meaning less movement for the panzers, and as such less attacks etc... 4. No reason for the Russian to fight beyond the time needed to evac. industry. and short of Moscow & Leningrad. 5. Russian morale recovers to quickly in comparison to German morale. Result: 1. Low overall Russian losses during summer. 2. Very strong army going into blizzard and high chance for the German to get a beating he will not be able to recover from. 3. Add to this the scripted morale loss which, if matched to the above scenario, is almost impossible to recover from even to let's say mid 70-ties for the infantry. 4. Germans run for Poland IS the game out of wack? Difficult to say. But if a very experienced German player decides it's better in the long run to evac to Poland than fight it out in the blizzard, you could say somethings wrong. I'm sure we all agree, even if we disagree with his reasoning, that Pelton thinks he didn't stand a chance by fighting it out in the blizzard. And we know he might have the most expereince as the German beyond 42 of anyone here. So for me it boils donw to this: 1. Does the 1941 game comes closer to what happened historically? Probably yes, it's much harder to capture Leningrad and Moscow. Certainly if the Soviet player doesn't do a forward defence. 2. HAve the Blizzard effects shifted to take this new reality into account? I don't think so. So on the one hand you have a much harder time to get anywhere as the German, compounded by a much lower headcount if the Russian uses space and time to his advantage (like you do) to avoid pockets. But you still end up with the same harsh blizzard effects no matter what you do. As I mentioned before, take the morale penalties out of the equation OR limit them in some way, and you'd take away the main motivation for running to Poland. For example, remove morale penalties when in fort level 2 or 3 or above. This has historical merrit. Army group North, well dugin before the winter didn't suffer nearly as much attrition (and morale loss in game terms) as is now the case. As another example, remove morale penalties for units in any size town. This would also have historical merit as the Germans used these towns to form strong points and protection of the cold. Keep the attrition rate, keep the combat morale loss and so on, just back-off on the scripted loss of 12 morale points and we'd have a much more intertesting game where even if suffering a bad blizzard, the German should still be able to keep enough morale while fighting to actually have a chance of a good 42 summer offensive. As to the summer 41, perhaps some sudden death conditions should also apply to keep the Russian from running to quickly. Your point has always been that it is too easy for the Russian to run and as such avoid high losses. In effect, the game has underscored these reralities by reducing the replacement rate for the Soviets. Force the Russian to fight forward, and turn the replacement rate back up would seem the best of both worlds. But then, what may be balanced between experts may not yield the same results between nocives or average players. It remains a difficult balancing act. I know that our game will be on hold for a while yet. I have only myself to blame. Still, IIRC, I was doing much better than Pelton territory wise. Closing in on Leningrad and getting ready for a big offensive on Mocow in a turn or 2. It's doubtful I would have been able to capture either, but that feels very right. Anyway, my 2 cents.
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