composer99
Posts: 2923
Joined: 6/6/2005 From: Ottawa, Canada Status: offline
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Joseignacio: If memory serves, there were two major groups of constraint on amphibious invasions during the war: - logistical/operational constraints - physical/geographical constraints These constraints are not well represented in (M)WiF - in fact, they are barely present at all, as far as I can see. For example: (1) coastal artillery and mining basically don't show up in the game, with the exception of the restrictions on naval movement in and out of the Med, through the English Channel, and in and out of the Baltic. Weather is also extremely un-granular given how it operates homogenously across huge segments of the Earth all at once. (2) the time and place chosen for the invasion of Normandy occurred within a fairly narrow window of opportunity as regards tides, shoreline conditions, logistical support, and weather. Except for impulse-by-impulse weather, (M)WiF does not represent these kinds of constraints the Allies faced in advance of Overlord at all. The Allies can send their forces to sea to sit around for nearly two months, and then invade when and where they please, and a single convoy point, with no additional investment for the Mulberry ports, can keep the entire invading force in supply from the UK. That being the case, I think it is a reasonable fudge (*) to constrain amphibious invasion in (M)WiF as the rules currently do, by requiring access to an all-sea hexside, as a way of representing the real-world constraints in the game without having to tack on additional modelling or rules complexity. In addition, as far as I can see, the concept of "deep waters" is not a good fit for the (M)WiF map as it is - there is no hex "terrain" of "deep waters", nor a corresponding hexside. I dare say the map scale is too large to support such granularity. (*) Given the way that a turn-based, hex-based wargame distorts time and space for the sake of playability, I'm not even sure it can be called a fudge.
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~ Composer99
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