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ColinWright -> RE: Pre-WWI Possibilities? (9/28/2007 10:29:56 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay
quote:
ORIGINAL: ColinWright
However, I distinctly recall you noting that it was adviseable to reduce the density before making attacks -- and the successes you managed to achieve largely stemmed from taking advantage of the 'overcrowding' among the defenders. So whilst you can achieve Napoleonic densities in OPART, the results of attempting to fight a battle with such densities would seem to be disastrous.
Try actually looking at the AAR. Unit densities remain more or less the same as at the start throughout the game. Take the Attack Planner for the attack on Ligny: All the French units that started around Ligny attack it. 10 French divisions supported by three corps artillery units are attacking the three Allied divisions, 1 regiment, and 1 corps artillery in Ligny. It takes multiple rounds, but they are eventually successful. Not because they have a density advantage, but because of the weight of their combat strength, and their flanking advantage.
quote:
It's really pretty simple. You can attempt to simulate almost any conflict you want with OPART. However, it's designed for the World War Two era -- and the further away you get from that, the more limitations and problems your simulation will have. Stridently insisting otherwise won't change the truth of this.
Things can seem simple if you don't ever test them. Every theory is always correct by the Colin Wright scientific method:
1. Postulate Theory.
2. It's Miller time!
But for real scientists, it's:
1. Postulate Theory.
2. Test Theory.
3. Adjust Theory based upon results.
4. Repeat until results match Theory.
For that reason, I prefer to test things out before I leap to conclusions.
And the success of Waterloo 1815 as an operational scenario suggests that some pre-20th century subjects can be simulated in TOAW.
What 'real scientists' would do is neither here nor there. The Curtis LeMay method would seem to be more along the lines of
1. Postulate theory.
2. Find a 'test case' that is most likely to yield results validating the theory.
3. Adjust perception of the results thus obtained until they appear to vindicate theory.
4. Leave (1) and (2) untouched. Repeat (3) until perception seems real.
Note what exactly you're fulminating against. My insistence that TOAW is designed to simulate World War Two and later, and that the further you move away from this period, the less satisfactory and the more occasional the successes will be. What could be more obvious?
Your position is largely that your pick-up is the ideal vehicle for all occasions. It's true that you can attempt to use it for all kinds of things besides picking up the gardening supplies from Home Depot -- and even enjoy partial success. You can indeed make your daughter take it to the Prom. You can eventually move your three bedroom house to the next state -- it'll take fifty trips, but you can do it. You can even mount a machine gun on it and take on the US Army -- people have done this.
You'll have some partial success. I don't deny it. I just refuse to agree you've got the ideal vehicle for all these occasions. I think it would be more useful to discuss what a good pre-modern engine should have. I'm open to the likelihood that not all my ideas would necessarily turn out to be the best ones -- but I am certain that your effective insistence that OPART is just the thing for this task is not constructive.
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