HMSWarspite
Posts: 1401
Joined: 4/13/2002
From: Bristol, UK
Status: offline
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I think the debate about victory conditions is an important one. I will say to begin with that I am only interested in playing historical scenarios, or ones based on small what ifs around historical ones. I might go as far as a 'Speer hits Japan in 1936' type varient, however the change would have to reflect the real situation. In other words this mythical guru might be able to increase merchant shipping out put by say 10%, but there would be a cost (either money/economic) etc, because more steel is used etc. This would effect say supply output or something. He might even manage to rationalise IJN/IJA rivalry, although I think that would be pushing it. Say Army standardises on a version of the Zero, but still limited to a different version from the navy, limited production rates etc. Turning Japan into a mini US does not interest me.
The point of the ramble above is that victory conditions should be able to cope with a very unbalenced game, and should give the Japanese player realistic chances to 'win' (the game, NOT the war!). I do not want ahistorical changes to Japan to 'balance' the game (UV scen 19 I hate!). I usually think that, for reasonable length strategic games, history acts as a good bench mark. Given the advantages a player has (knowledge of what happened, 'eye in the sky', unified plans etc) not doing as well as history is a loss. Historical results are a draw. To win, you really need to beat history.
I like the casualties VP ramp up system (as PACWAR). It allows the Allies to fight hard to begin with, but subtly puts constraints on the use of the overwhelming strenght later (you need to use the strenght to minimise the casualties, rather than some manic multiple front logistical nightmare of an advance). The only point I would make, is why step it up in big steps? How's about ramping it (x%/month). Or better yet, do it on total casualties (if casualties are less than x, score mutliplier 1.0, x to y score 1.1, and so on up to 2, 3 or even 4 times.) You could also do it by nationality, e.g. Dutch casualties go above a level, their multiplier goes up (assuming VP for cas is the sum of all the national cas, just like PW). Thus giving the Japanese incentive to 'knock' countries enough to take them out of the war. A big issue I had with PW was the monolithic Allies (no problem with ships, troops, etc all mixing freely). Any constraint on this has to be good in my book.
The national levels thing could also be used as a multiplier on effectiveness, i.e. at a level of casualties, all units suffer 5% effectiveness loss, etc (level break points representing significant fractions of total forces present?). You could even make them reversable - say UK defends Malaya to the last, and takes lots of losses, suffers a hit of 5, 10% etc in effectiveness (morale). Then as reinforcements come in, (and presumably the troops aren't used as much) the losses drop as a proportion, and the effectiveness loss decreases.
This sort of thing could also be applied to the Japanese, but with probably high thresholds and small effectiveness losses, to address some of the 'how do I stop the historical decline of the troops/airmen quality'? discussions...answer do better. This would then replace some (not all) of the hardwired decline in quality.
This counts as a random brain dump, and shows how disordered my brain is on average!
:D
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I have a cunning plan, My Lord
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