Slitherine

quote:

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

I am going to repeat this one more time for the latecomers to this thread (and also because I want to emphasize the point, since it is glaringly crucial in my opinion)... The game design model handycaps the Russian player entirely too much in the 6/41-6/42 time period of the campaign.
To whit:

1) The "Lvov Pocket" was and is an historically impossible event as I have explained in detail in other threads on this forum.
Players who use it are playing a fantasy version of wargaming the East Front.
I have suggested a house rule to correct it that is simple and only affects the first two turns of the game in the south.
(Wheat and I used that HR in our current game and he has still reached Stalingrad by July 42.
The difference the HR has made though is that the whole Russian front didn't just collapse on turn 2 and leave the Russian with no troops to defend with.

vs a good to expert SHC player the Lvov pocket is a speed bump. You are wrong, the SHC players that can not recover are not that good or playing an expert GHC player and they are average to poor SHC player.

2) Because of the ridiculously overgenerous German logistics and morale levels, combined with the equally ridiculous isolation "pocket" effects, the Russian cannot afford to stand and fight literally anywhere west of Moskow until mid 42, when he can begin to form Corp sized units capable of combating the Germans. Due to the initially low CV, low morale, and low command rating penalties enforced upon the Russian side from 6/41-6/42, attempting a forward defense is simply not practical, given the way the combat resolution sytem is designed. This could be solved by increasing the Russian reinforcements to historical levels (as some have pointed out, the game levels are low by historic comparison) to enable them to afford massive casualties and still maintain sufficent numbers to carry the war into 43 and beyond.
This would also give the Russian an incentive to fight a forward defense in order to extract casualties out of the German Army with a long term view of attrition.

The logistics system has been nerfed to the point it is easy as pie even with a mega Lvov pocket to set-up a wall of steel by turn 7 from Leningrad to the Oka. Play Katza, Flaviusx,MT, Saper, Bomazz, Kamil or Hoooper and you will have zero chance of getting past the wall.


3) The Commander "Win-Loss" mechanism is more appropriate to a game of "Chutes and Ladders"... I don't mind reasonable variability in combat results, but completely negating my command appointments is a non-starter. This mechanism should be removed or we need an option switch to turn it off. Grigsby was drunk when he included it.

Has little effect to war over all and SHC commanders did learn from their mistakes and got better dispite losing 1000's of battles. As long as they did not get shot they improved.

4) The Victory Conditions are not consistent with the historical imperatives that drove the event. The VP should vary year by year and be won by both sides on a piecemeal basis over time, while playing out the the entire span of the war. Victory or defeat should be something measured against historic reality benchmarks. For example, if the Germans can succeed in stabilizing the front before the historic collapse in the war time frame, adding perhaps something like they did in WITP/AE where points are awarded for destroyed units and points awarded for certain positions controlled over time. As everything else, balance is the key.

Your wrong about pts 1, 2 and 3, but 100% right about the VP system it simply sucks to be honest.

quote:

ORIGINAL: SigUp

I don't know why you keep insisting on that point when enough players show it to be untrue. Just watch how sapper manages to stifle Pelton's assault. And Pelton's one of the best German players out there. I don't want to sound like I'm disrespecting your opponent Wheat, but I doubt he is in the same category as Pelton.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Wheat

quote:

ORIGINAL: SigUp

I don't know why you keep insisting on that point when enough players show it to be untrue. Just watch how sapper manages to stifle Pelton's assault. And Pelton's one of the best German players out there. I don't want to sound like I'm disrespecting your opponent Wheat, but I doubt he is in the same category as Pelton.

I'm not remotely in the upper echelon of German players so as Michael T, Pelton, MK tours and others, so no disrespect inferred. I'm having fun.

Gamesaurus just needs more experience, and playing as the Germans would help him to see your points. I do think some of the absolutely crazy openings hurt the game though. But I"M HAVING FUN AND AM GLAD I PURCHASED THE GAME.

Along those lines, we need to remember to support that which we enjoy, even if imperfect. Otherwise it all goes away....just like the running russians.

quote:

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

There is no reason I can see that the combat/morale/logistics/reinforcements can't be adjusted and refined to allow that to happen, without stalling out the German advance. The balancing may be tricky, but I think it can be done with the right tweaks.

quote:

ORIGINAL: gingerbread

quote:

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

There is no reason I can see that the combat/morale/logistics/reinforcements can't be adjusted and refined to allow that to happen, without stalling out the German advance. The balancing may be tricky, but I think it can be done with the right tweaks.

It would take considerably more than some tweaks.

quote:

ORIGINAL: SigUp

quote:

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

2) Because of the ridiculously overgenerous German logistics and morale levels, combined with the equally ridiculous isolation "pocket" effects, the Russian cannot afford to stand and fight literally anywhere west of Moskow until mid 42, when he can begin to form Corp sized units capable of combating the Germans.

I don't know why you keep insisting on that point when enough players show it to be untrue. Just watch how sapper manages to stifle Pelton's assault. And Pelton's one of the best German players out there. I don't want to sound like I'm disrespecting your opponent Wheat, but I doubt he is in the same category as Pelton.

See this AAR: http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3492242&mpage=3

quote:

ORIGINAL: SigUp

I have yet to see any evidence that sapper is cheating. It would be helpful if Pelton posted a list of all the battles with units involved, unmodified and modified CV. Then we can see if something is really amiss. Right now you are just accusing somebody with no proof but your gut feeling, which isn't really a solid basis.

quote:

ORIGINAL: SigUp

I just repost what I've written in the other thread:

You don't need to repeat attacks to get consistent success in counterattacking as the Soviets. Morvael has confirmed this long ago, the combat engine benefits the side with the more elements, resulting in higher CV modifications. Flav has also done his tests about Soviet CV modification (obviously they benefit more, as the Soviet side has a much easier time throwing hordes of units into the battle) and it can be stated as a fact that getting beyond x2 on the modified CV is easy stuff for the Soviets on the attack. Even x3 isn't a rare occurence. So with that in mind to counterattack you simple need to roughly equalize German displayed CV to get a near guaranteed victory (actually due to the Germans often getting reduced modified CV on defence less than 100% is needed). With the +1 odds ruling you can slice that percentage nearly in half. So in effect in 1941 the Soviets can beat German units on a regular basis by bringing in 50-60% of the German CV. And that isn't hard to do. A single German infantry division in the open has on average perhaps some 8 to 9 CVs at best, so you can get good chances by bringing in 6 CV. That is 3-4 divisions.

quote:

ORIGINAL: SigUp

Manufactured BS, what, are you now accusing loki of cheating?

quote:

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

The combat system won't return those results without rerolling battles.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

For those who are curious: after running the Soviet AI for 1 turn on the 44 GC I obtained a total of 7 deliberate attacks in excess of 3x initial CV out of a total of 23 attacks. The Sovs got 11 hasty attacks over 3x initial CV out of at total of 23 hasty attacks. Of 46 total attacks there was only 1 hold.

There were a handful of cases where the final CV was inflated by 5x (!) or more.

STAVKA starts off this GC under the direction of Zhukov. (Vasilevsky gets no respect, lol.)

This wasn't even a very good opening turn by the AI as it failed to pocket anything. I know I could do much better than this.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

Grex, the trick to doing this is imposing static conditions on a sector of the front, and forcing meeting engagements on unfortified and probably fatigued Axis units inadequately supported by defensive reserves.

This can be done, and we have several AARs showing how. Not just Pelton's, btw.

The Soviet has to plan things out from the getgo to make it happen and understand exactly what his line will look like 4-5 turns in advance. And build a wall on at least a portion of the front -- basically from the Smolensk corridor up north, or north of Vitebsk, depending on how much emphasis you put on Leningrad. Once you build that wall, then you can start launching counterattacks in significant numbers and with some security. The south gets by with odds and sods and zocs and the supply problems that arise once the Axis crosses the Dnepr and is deemphasized in favor of this northern concentration.

Try this in your next game.

quote:

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

Sorry Flav:

That might work against the AI... but it is useless against a competent human player because he is not going to leave his troops out on a limb in vulnerable positions. Against reasonably secure positions, a Russian player will have to reroll each battle numerous times to achieve a "continuous string of 10 to 20 retreat results".

I am on turn 69 now with Wheat and even with multiple stacks of Corps I get "holds" at least half the time on 2:1 and above attacks. The last one I recall showed 2.7:1... so I can only conclude that when players claim achieving "strings of retreat results" 20 times in a row, somebody isn't giving all the details.

quote:

BS

quote:

ORIGINAL: GamesaurusRex

Flav:

I'm not disputing the fact that the Soviet can find an occasional battle that will net him a German retreat... but neither you, nor any of the snake oil salesman, can show me any legitimate evidence that a Soviet player can achieve "10 to 20 1:1 once-rolled battles that sequentially result in retreats per turn" against a reasonably competent German player who is cognizant of the potential and does not leave his troops hung out in vulnerable positions at the end of moves.

It is statistically impossible to legitimately achieve this. It could only be achieved by rerolling combat results until the string of retreats was arrived at. That is illegitimate.

The 1:1 = 2:1 rule can be manipulated to do this very thing (and apparently it is being exploited), but it is still an illegitimate exploit of the rule.