RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (Full Version)

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brian brian -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/13/2013 6:03:36 PM)

OK, here ya go:


I'll give it a try. I won't have the rule # correct, so I'll skip the #. I'm still preparing my laptop for a major Windows update and backup before I download the game pretty soon now.

I'll just work through the list posted in the Optional Rules thread which is a few pages back.

These are one player's opinions only and as I went along more and more opinion crept in.

Divisions - pro-Axis in that it allows for lesser casualties on the attack, and makes it easier to launch overseas adventures.

Artillery - neutral - both sides have them

Ski Troops - neutral - " "

Engineers, Combat - neutral - " "

Engineers, Construction - pro-Allied. If the Axis engineers have to run around fixing all the broken things they conquer, they can use them in combat less. Not usually played as we didn't sign up for Quartermasters in Flames.

Territorials - slightly pro-Allied. Another 'both sides have them'. The Allies have more of them, but they are very weak combat units and generally a poor investment of BPs. They help the Japanese vs Partisans, but then they help the CW in India on that too.

Partisans - very, very pro-Allied. I would note that this rule is considered so essential to the game that it is required to be included at USA WiFCon tournaments. Letting an Axis player command WWII without suffering at least a little from Axis ideology really would make this game into a generic "game" not far removed from Axis & Allies. I feel the same about playing without any Oil rule.

Chinese Warlords - pro-Allied. China can use all the troops it can get. Japan gets a few as well though, again useful for a rear area garrison.

Siberians - pro-Allied. The Russians can also use all the troops they can get. With the Guards Banner Armies optional rule not coded yet, the Russians really really need these few extra units, which are quite good.

Pilots - neutral or a bit pro-Axis. More planes on the board when using the Pilots rule, as total aircraft costs are slightly cheaper. The Axis air forces are generally better than the Allies at the start of the game though.

Carrier Planes - not using this one is pro-Allied. Making a CV unit have a single basic factor for all roles makes CVs very powerful. And the Allies have far more carriers. I would comment that the sub-optional allowing a CV unit to have 2 plane counters on-board somewhat makes a mockery of land-based air in the game on one hand - but the necessary abstraction of placing land-based air into a sea box allowing them to then influence things far beyond their range (see: US air assets in the Marshalls covering landing forces assaulting the Bonins) is also quite strange. I usually play without the 2 CV planes per CV possibility. The biggest carriers held up towards 75 combat planes each...a land-based air counter represents hundreds of combat aircraft. I digress, sorry.

Cruisers - not sure. The CL units make the Axis navies much larger. But the Allies also have an easier time of their world-wide escort duties. I would not suggest playing with this rule in MWiF. Naval unit density goes way, way up. One thing I don't like about MWiF is that all naval units are stacked in a port. On paper, you can make little stacks of units around a major port. Spain holds all of the Royal Navy in Gibraltar, Sweden serves as Kiel, Turkey can be La Spezia for Italy, etc. This makes it quite a bit easier to manage fleets I think. There was a lot of work put into helping with this unavoidable problem in the coding of MWiF, but there is a lot going on in World in Flames already without adding scores of Light Cruisers. On paper I like the CL units most when using the German Commerce Raider units (CX), which aren't ready for MWiF. I enjoy a detailed naval game and look forward to it's further development in future editions, as there are still some major playability fudges I hope to see removed some day.

The Queens - pro-Allied obviously.

Carpet Bombing - pro-Allied as in all but fantastical games only the Allies can realistically do this. A controversial rule easily skipped.

Night Missions - pro-Allied, as they have the bombers and ATRs to take advantage of it. When playing without fractional odds, the Russians can really abuse this rule.

Fighter Bombers - I would say pro-Axis actually, as the Allies have excellent Fighter-Bombers later in the war, and this at least reduces their air combat effectiveness.

Twin-Engined Fighters - neutral. Some of these on each side.

Backup Fighters - probably also neutral, not positive, don't care. I always use it, but I would caution against thinking about World in Flames too much as some sort of tactical air combat game, though some players do get hung up on such things. The air units are still somewhat abstract, despite the pretty plane pictures on the counters.

Tank Busters - pro-Allied. The Germans can only wish they could pull more of these for themselves.

Flying Boats - neutral. Possibly a tiny bit pro-Axis; not significant.

Large ATR - neutral or pro-Allied a little. The Axis can rarely afford these though the USA can. I see no reason to not ever use it.

Bomber ATR - neutral. Italy and Russia mostly get to enjoy these, with a rare CW bomber as well.

Extended Aircraft Rebasing - hmmm. Keeps the focus on playing the game rather than administering the game. pro-Axis I guess as it helps them expand into Russia and move aircraft into the South Pacific.

Amphibious Rules - pro-Allied, as the Allies can afford AMPH units better.

Defensive Shore Bombardment - a controversial rule sometimes considered pro-Allied, as the Royal Navy generally rules the seas. But a rule that can really help the Japanese and even Italians with smart Axis play.

Extended Game - not applicable. If you can still move all the pieces on the board in 1945 around some more, go for it, have fun.

Breaking the Nazi-Soviet Neutrality Pact - A rule for experienced players really. A lot of World in Flames games are played with an honorable agreement about this rule made in advance. Always lots of discussion about this one; it will change some more as game development moves along.

Add Chinese Cities - pro-Allied. I argued for this being optional during MWiF development. Some say the Chinese are doomed on the new Matrix map, and even in all games of World in Flames. I say it is the action-limited Japanese who are doomed but then most players are terrible at playing the quite fantastical WiF Chinese. A city is an incredible, powerful construct in World in Flames and I don't think any more should be given to the Chinese, who were a 19th century army fighting in a 20th century war. Both sides should be forced to use their HQ units to deliver logistics to their armies, not just be given them free on the map via additional cities and ports. Nor should new ones be placed in Siberia for that matter.

Scrap Units - not applicable. Only a brand new player would want to skip scrapping units.

Unlimited Breakdown - probably pro-Allied. What!?!?!? Yes, pro-Allied. The Russians could use this to launch even more 1:1 attacks on the Panzers, for example, as MWiF lacks a common first-loss-must-be-Corps House Rule. Russian cavalry divisions could likely make any Japanese adventure into non-coastal Siberia rather pointless. Fortunately for the Japanese, the Chinese can only increase their cavalry division total by a little bit. Sure, the Japanese can invade more places on their super-combined to launch the Pacific War……big deal. They won't be able to hold them all, and they really need all the Army sized units their force pool gives them, more than a bunch of weak divisions all over the place. The regular Japanese force pool gives them a good amount of divisions already.

Fortifications - probably pro-Allied. It's not easy for any power to afford these, or deploy them well, and they can generally be broken by an Offensive Chit anyway. Nice to see your enemy use an O-Chit, yes, but you just lost your key hex anyway. A well placed Fort can really snag your enemy though.

Offensive Chits - neutral. Hard to afford early in the game, but can really help the Axis achieve their desired strategy. Indispensable for the Allies in the 2nd half of the game. Another rule considered so core to the game that use of it is mandatory at WiFCon USA.

Supply Units - superfluous generally, as the supply rules are already very loose. Pro-Axis IF they try a Sea Lion.

Synthetic Oil Plants - pro-Axis, but historical. The Axis should build them just before the middle of the game, in my opinion. Too early reduces your combat power to expand. Too late and, well, it's too late.

Motorized Movement Rates - pro-Allied. Helps keep the Panzers from running around too much. Can't imagine playing without it actually; don't expect it to remain an optional in future editions.

Railway Movement Bonus - pro-Axis. Really helps the Axis expand, comically so at times. Fuel? We don't need no stinking fuel, we're driving this Panther to the Pacific! On the train tracks! Horses? Infantry? Don't need them either! We're playing a game here!

HQ Movement - pro-Allied. Keeps the Axis a little more grounded in reality, also in China, not just Russia. The historical Japanese couldn't advance into China because they couldn't even feed their own soldiers very well.

HQ Support - with 1d10, neutral, as it only works sometimes. With 2d10, pro-Axis as it is pro-attacker, which helps the Axis expand. The Allies need this less on the attack as they have excellent air forces, support units (ART), and Offensive Chits when they are on the offensive.

2d10 Land Combat - probably pro-Axis as it is attacker friendly. With divisions in play the game is a fair amount less bloody as units stay on the board.

Blitz Bonus - not using this with 1d10 (it's built into 2d10 already) would have to be considered pro-Allied, as the Panzers get less benefits when they are the best tank force on the board in the first half.

Internment - pro-Allied in a tiny degree. I would like to someday see this happen somewhere besides Poland, but I'm never that creative to figure it out. Occasionally Belgium too I guess. I like messing around with the Belgian Congo Air Force though, I'm a sucker for micro wars in Africa.

In The Presence Of The Enemy - considered pro-Allied at times as it slows down Kriegsmarine surface raids into the Atlantic (which historically sank about 1 or 2 Convoy Points though these raids loom large in western histories of the war). But it is also very helpful to the Japanese. Generally controversial rule. I hope to see it improved in the future, to reflect In The Presence Of Enemy Submarines, but that's just me.

Variable CV Plane Searching - neutral to slightly pro-Axis as the Japanese have an excellent CV plane force pool, but the CW can put this to use with smart force pool management.

SCS Transport - pro-Axis as without it their overseas adventures are very curtailed. A little silly at times when an infantry division can only be "sunk" if you can manage to crack the armor on the Bismarck or the Yamamoto. But a good rule to represent smaller scale naval transport assets.

Bottomed Ships - pro-Allied as only Uncle Sugar can ever afford to re-float a bottomed ship.

Food in Flames - pro-Allied in the MWiF version. Very much so.

Saving Oil Resources and Build Points - I would say not using it would be a bit pro-Axis actually. Neither side would enjoy using an Oil rule without it and I have a hard time deciding which it would impact more. Probably the biggest impact would be on the Russians I think, which is a strange result.

Factory Destruction and Construction - neutral? Only the USA can generally invest in brand-new factories in all but fantasy games. Helpful to the Axis on the defense at times (factory repair).

Oil - pro-Allied. However without it, you might want to just go back to Axis & Allies.

Allied Combat Friction - pro-Axis, though the name does not apply only to the capitalized Allies. Smart Axis players only combine German and Italian air OR ground assets anyway. The Western Allies do the same with the Free French all manning transports and aircraft, without usually many boots on the ground. Mean Allies. It does help keep the seam between the British and American armies a little safer for the western front Germans. Unless the Allies are being extra mean and flying a super-RAF over an exclusively olive drab army invading France, and then this rule doesn't matter at all, which is too bad.

Chinese Attack Weakness - pro-Axis, but pro-reality in my opinion, and we usually extend it to the ChiComms too, though you can't do that in MWiF. Both Chinese factions just sat around in WWII waiting for the USA to beat the Japanese so the real war in China could begin. Sometimes paired with Japanese Command Conflict, though I could see that never being implemented on the computer. Which is OK, as hardly anyone ever plays it, even with Attack Weakness in play. Command Conflict actually perversely helps the Japanese player by putting all MAR units on the board and their seemingly weak LND bombers actually turn out to be quite useful. Perhaps the MWiF:2025 edition will finally allow Japan to be played simultaneously by an IJN commander and an IJA commander. That would be a hoot.

Fractional Odds - pro-sanity. Can't imagine playing without this one. If your OCD won't allow you to break from old-time, perfect 3-1 war-game attacks, I don't want to play against you anyway.

Limited Overseas Supply - pro-Allied. Axis merchant shipping necessarily runs scared in WiF, as it should.

Limited Supply Across Straits - who knows? Who cares? There aren't all that many straits in the game to start with. Sicily has built-in supply (even for German artillery shells and wienerschnitzel) and reinforcement centers anyway.

Variable Re-Org Costs - another who knows, who cares? Although I have been slightly mocking the highly playable logistics rules in WiF, this one is too much fine detail for most people anyway. And we still don't have Air or Naval HQs anyway, yet.


Of the Optional Rules not implemented yet, I would say that the Guards Banner Armies rule is the most important to game balance and I hope that is at the top of the list to add to the game, as those really give the Russians the combat power to drive back west.

I am also having a hard time imagining life without the USSR-Japan Compulsory Peace rule, but then I can't determine how that works in a 2 player game anyway. In a multi-player game, USSR<>Japanese relations, which can include actual diplomacy, trade agreements, and neutrality Pacts, are one of the more fascinating angles to the game of WWII as a whole. I have never agreed with the WiFCon USA rule that disallows these interactions and I really look forward to all of that being part of a computerized edition of WiF. I know it will be challenging to include but I hope it is not deemed impossible.

The Surprised ZoC rule is a controversial one. Newer players can conclude that the historical Axis gains aren't possible without it, though I would disagree. It can be a useful balancing mechanism for a less-experienced Axis player, though most people won't use it in any case.

Most of the rest are fun chrome that will be fun eventually but not all that essential to the World in Flames experience.



paulderynck -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/13/2013 6:42:18 PM)

Fractional Odds - pro-sanity.

LOL



Jimm -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/13/2013 7:41:10 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: brian brian

OK, here ya go:


I'll give it a try. I won't have the rule # correct, so I'll skip the #. I'm still preparing my laptop for a major Windows update and backup before I download the game pretty soon now.

I'll just work through the list posted in the Optional Rules thread which is a few pages back.



Good summary BB

I'd differ on a couple of items but not much.

Cruisers I think are very pro allied. Apart from enabling the allies to patrol every possible convoy sea area several times over, it also unbalances fleet actions imho. As Italy you maybe get a couple of opportunities early game to bloody the Royal Navy's nose in the Med, and with cruisers, you see all those juicy hits get soaked up by ablative light cruiser armour.

The benefit is in theory both ways but the Euro axis dont have as many CLs, can't spare the oil to use them all, and have fewer naval actions to use them all as they are busy marching on land and in the air.

quote:


Add Chinese Cities - pro-Allied. I argued for this being optional during MWiF development. Some say the Chinese are doomed on the new Matrix map, and even in all games of World in Flames. I say it is the action-limited Japanese who are doomed but then most players are terrible at playing the quite fantastical WiF Chinese. A city is an incredible, powerful construct in World in Flames and I don't think any more should be given to the Chinese, who were a 19th century army fighting in a 20th century war. Both sides should be forced to use their HQ units to deliver logistics to their armies, not just be given them free on the map via additional cities and ports. Nor should new ones be placed in Siberia for that matter.


+1



aspqrz02 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/13/2013 10:01:01 PM)

Its always hard to guesstimate what would happen in 'what if' scenarios, but there's been a *lot* of oil and blood spilled (metaphorically speaking) on 'soc.history.what-if' and 'soc.history.war.world-war-ii' (Usenet groups) about this issue and, apart from Nazi fantasists and the completely clewless and unread, the general consensus is that the Germans simply couldn't have gotten anything significant out of the Caucasus ... even if the oilfields themselves had been captured largely intact, the transport problems would have then been decisive - the aforementioned issue of rail Tanker Car shortages, for example, but also the problems the Axis had in converting 5'3" Russian Gauge rail to Western European 4'8.5" gauge (moving the rails 6.5" closer was easy - the real problem was that the Germans couldn't produce enough locomotives and rolling stock to replace the now useless, and mostly destroyed anyway, Russian ones, and, even more so, that the maintenance and refuelling facilities were (since the Russian Locos were twice as big) twice as far apart ... even if they weren't destroyed by the Russians (and they mostly were ... the Russians prioritized moving RR personnel out of the line of advance even over moving military personnel historically) ... and these had to be provided by the Germans.

All this was special order, long lead time stuff ... and the Germans had, surprisingly to us in hindsight, made absolutely no plans at all for it ... of course, Barbarossa was going to be over in 6 months, so they presumably didn't see the need [;)]

This gives rise to something else that really doesn't get a look in in any game on WW2, except, maybe, very indirectly - the Germans suffered from a severe shortage of iron and steel, and this was at least as limiting as the shortage of oil. It's also why Swedish and Norwegian iron ore was so important (and still not enough). What this shortage boils down to is that the Germans can produce about as many tanks, trucks, artillery, planes and naval vessels as they did historically or they can swap tanks for planes, or tanks for subs, or subs for tanks ... or build more RR units, or repair more oilfields ... they can't build the historical limits *and* build more RR tankers and locos, repair more Russian rail lines, or repair any oilfields.

It is all very much an either/or proposition for the Axis ... or was, historically.

I do not know if RAW or RAC represent this limitation, either, but, really, if the Germans want to repair those oilfields or more Russian RR lines, then they need to build fewer planes, subs and tanks ...

The larger problem is that, yes, there were lots of resources in Russia and some of the other places that the Germans attacked, but the shape they were in when the Germans 'took' them was usually so poor that the required repairs to make them fully productive either never happened or happened slowly enough that they had little impact in the real world. The rate of repair that the Germans could realistically have managed, with real world constraints, was such that they could only have been back on line by the time the war was well and truly over ...

The Japanese were, of course, in much the same pickle, especially with oil. The Dutch damaged much of their wells and refineries and the Japanese, who were slightly more prepared for this than the Germans were, were only ever able to get them back to 70% of peacetime production, and that by 1944, when they needed about twice peacetime production from them to replace what they lost with the US and Allied embargo. Then there was the problem of shipping it home ... ever wonder why a large chunk of the IJN and the KB mostly hung around the DEI? It was because they couldn't transport the fuel back to Truck or the Home Islands.

Again, this aspect of the Japanese logistics problem is not, in real world terms, solvable ...

The reason both Japan and Germany did so well was a combination of early preparation that the Allies took time to catch up with and surprise. It wasn't better weapons, wasn't necessarily better tactics, and certainly wasn't because of superior weapons and organisation ... just surprise and early prep.

Again, in both cases, the assumption was that the 'war' would be over quickly - the Germans knew, for example, that they couldn't fight and win a long war. In fact, a number of senior German army planners committed suicide over the Barbarossa plans (!) because they were based on so much wishful thinking and they realised that Hitler and his clique were going to ignore their advice and go through with it anyway.

AIUI WiF (and, presumably, CWiF) does and overall acceptable job of representing this (which is what I remember from 1st Edition, lo these many years ago!).

Phil



warspite1 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 6:05:49 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: aspqrz

I do not know if RAW or RAC represent this limitation, either, but, really, if the Germans want to repair those oilfields or more Russian RR lines, then they need to build fewer planes, subs and tanks ...

warspite1

The day WIF gets into that level of complexity and micro management is the day I stop playing.....



aspqrz02 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 7:15:11 AM)

Reality doesn't necessarily equal complexity. I would suspect that the counter mix and force pools partly represent the problems the Germans had in respect of steel ... but I also suspect that their evident ability to repair oil fields is way way too cheap and easy. It really should be a case of a choice between foregoing multiple Panzers (or Subs or Planes) OR having the resources to repair oilfields ... I am waiting for the printed rulebooks to arrive before I delve into the complexities of the rules, however, so I don't know how much reality is reflected.

On reading the suggestions for a German strategy in the excellent WiF 98 Annual, however, what can evidently be attempted and with some expectation of success is purely ludicrous fantasy on the order of Hearts of Iron, which is one of the reasons why I gave up on 1st Edition WiF way back. Since the article was written 15 years ago, I suspect that changes between then and now have made some difference, and I am anticipating seeing how much.

I don't mind a game with 'what if' elements, don't get me wrong ... I've had a lot of fun playing HoI I and 2 (3, not so much), despite it being a fantasy game set on a map vaguely resembling the earth a la 1939 or so ... but I've really been looking for a grand strategy game covering WW2 globally that at least gives some semblance of real world constraints. WiF 1st Edition didn't (though, as I said, there have been developments since then that seem to have changed some things that should make a difference - the 'Days of Decision' pre-game political game, for example). I am reserving my opinion about CWiF until I can read through the RAW and RAC.

It would be nice if it somewhat resembles reality without going to the level of WitE or WitP:AE (which, of course, have their own reality problems).

Even if it doesn't, I still expect to have a lot of fun playing it ...

Any comments I make are purely about the real world, and about how it should impact on the game if the intent was for the game to resemble the real world very closely. I recognise, however, that this is not necessarily the case.

Phil



paulderynck -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 7:20:29 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: warspite1


quote:

ORIGINAL: aspqrz

I do not know if RAW or RAC represent this limitation, either, but, really, if the Germans want to repair those oilfields or more Russian RR lines, then they need to build fewer planes, subs and tanks ...

warspite1

The day WIF gets into that level of complexity and micro management is the day I stop playing.....


It's not really micro-managing to spend 4 BPs during production to repair an oil well and living with the fact you have 4 less to spend on something else.



Neilster -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 11:46:33 AM)

Thanks for the analysis. Just a small point. I'm not sure planes should be included in an discussion about iron and steel shortages. Apart from the engines, which are a pretty small proportion of their mass and volume, they're made from aluminium (or wood...thankyou de Havilland Mosquito).

Cheers, Neilster



aspqrz02 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 12:46:20 PM)

Ah, aeroplanes.

Which need, strangely enough, Aero Engines.

Which, unfortunately for the Axis, were made from steel, and not aluminium, as you so rightly note. Unfortunately, that was exactly where the shortcomings were ... read on ...

Goering et al had seen (or seen reports by trusted observers) of the US aircraft industry and it is fairly accurate to say they were terrified . They knew that they could not match the potential output - they knew it - the best they could do was to plan a massive aero engine complex to try and let them achieve initial superiority for a short war ... and Fat Herman was the Nazi resources Supremo, in charge of allocation, so the Luftwaffe got first choice, the Heer most of the rest and the Kriegsmarine got the scraps. Yet, despite the massive effort, the plan ... failed ... and failed miserably. It didn’t even match Commonwealth production levels!

US Production: 300000+ aircraft
UK Production: 131000+ aircraft
USSR Production: 158000+ aircraft
German Production: 119,000+ aircraft

Note that the above figures are misleadingly weighted towards the Soviets and Germans. The vast majority of German and Russian aircraft produced were single engine models, and the majority of the rest were twin engined types. The UK and USA produced many tens of thousands of four engine aircraft ... so, in terms of the number of engines produced, the US (and even the UK) far far outproduced Germany.

And that was with the Luftwaffe getting all the resources it wanted out of what was available ... which is sorta what I’ve been saying ... Herman and Hitler et al wished really really hard, but couldn’t overcome the objective fact that they didn’t have the resources.

(Why? You ask - fair enough. The problem was that Germany was desperately short of good quality iron ore - the vast majority of what the military required for their buildup and, later on, to expand further and, of course, to replace losses, was sourced overseas. The outbreak of war meant that all those sources were lost, except for Norway and Sweden. And don't let modern mining production figures fool you, the majority of German iron ore is 'sour' ... has excessive amounts of sulphates and other nasties in it ... and the technology of the time couldn't turn it into anything usable. The Germans even tried. Hard. Really really hard. They built another massive complex to process it, based on the assumption that they'd be able to develop a way of cleaning it up and, guess what? They failed ... miserably ... again. They never did have enough steel for all their needs ...)

So, yes, aircraft *should* be included.

Phil



Neilster -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 12:58:58 PM)

Did you actually read my post? I already stated that engines made up a small proportion of a WW2 aircraft's mass and volume. WW2 piston aeroengines look reasonably big but they are mostly empty space. I know a bit about this as I am an aerospace maintenance engineer and have worked on them.

Compared to a tank or even a truck, the amout of steel in an aircraft is trivial. It's all about aluminium, which is another problem entirely.

Cheers, Neilster



Neilster -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 1:07:13 PM)

I think German aeroengine production was much lower than with the Allies due to other factors, such as a lack of skilled workers, tungsten for cutting tools and long-term planning. If, as you seem to be suggesting, it was actually due to a lack of steel, then please provide the evidence.

Even in a WW2 engine, there is a lot of aluminium used. The Rolls Royce Merlin, for example, used cylinder blocks of "R.R.50" aluminium alloy and the Daimler-Benz DB 601 used cast Silium-Gamma-alloy cylinder blocks.

I've read many times that aluminium shortages and a lack of skilled labour hampered German aircraft production but never a lack of steel. Hence my request above.

Edit: To add the last two paragraphs.

Cheers, Neilster



brian brian -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 1:36:47 PM)

Let's face it: World in Flames IS a fantasy game. The Axis can do lots of things in the game they had little hope of achieving in the real war.

But overall, the very real constraints of logistics are just simply left in the background to a large degree. And not just for the Axis. The western Allies aren't required to deploy shipping assets on the board to support a few million soldiers an ocean away from home in NW Europe in 1945. There is no question the USA could and did build enough Liberty ships for that to happen....it's just not part of the game.

Personally, I hope the design continues to evolve in this area, and the power of the computer is harnessed to increase realism without losing playability, all while staying in the basic decision-making framework of the World in Flames design.

In the short run however, most suggestions to increase realism by increasing the logistical and economic constraints on the Axis will be resisted heartily .... by the players themselves. Even the players who laugh at Hearts of Iron. A majority of players accept the use of an Oil rule, but that is as far as many will go in this area.

One thing I have always respected about the game is that it does lead the players to continue to learn about WWII. And I think discussing the game and the level of simulation in it is perfectly fine, and any electronic forum about the game has always allowed and encouraged such discussion. So I think there is a place for a meta-discussion on WWII and how World in Flames represents it, right here on this forum even - but it needs to be in another thread.

Consider just one of the optional rules - HQ Movement. I would wager that less than 50% of players of the paper game use that one. "Who cares, let's just play," and "How do you expect me to remember to use that one when I move an HQ?" are two common sentiments about it. Perhaps computer enforced rules will make it easier to use at least, but I expect it to remain an unpopular option.

Overall though, let's consider Optional Rules in this thread please. Any other questions on them?



Neilster -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 1:52:04 PM)

I think that wargames in general and WiF in particular have really taught me a tremendous amount about why things happened as they did in WW2. The effect of terrain, for example, is something that is often hard to grasp when just reading history.

I also feel that impulses are actually a pretty good analouge for the pulsing flow of real WW2 operations, where one side expended themselves after a while and the other had a chance to counter, after perhaps being resupplied or falling back on interior lines of communications.

Cheers, Neilster




brian brian -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 1:54:05 PM)

I would also like to note that in consideration of a request from a new player, up above there I described all the optionals in the game as pro-Axis, neutral, or pro-Allied.

I did not generally note the degree to which they influence the game, and I would like to amend that. Most of the optionals have just a slight impact on the balance of the game. You could perhaps select optional rules based totally on that pro-side list and have a less experienced player take the advantageous side - and it still might not make much difference to the outcome.

Experience and the basic wargaming skills of multi-turn advance planning (rather than playing impulse by impulse) and not leaving units sitting around the map doing nothing (quite common), and the basic ability to foresee likely outcomes of your own and your enemy's decisions will still generate the outcome far more than the mix of optional rules selected. Some would disagree as it is of course easier for a losing player to suggest the winning side just had a crutch of key optional rules to lean on.

The one optional rule in the list that I see as a significant balance changer is the Food in Flames option, which can add 3 production points per turn to the CW. That's potentially 5 build points per turn in the second half of the game, perhaps 30 build points a year in 1943 and 1944, depending on CW factory totals and rounding results. This does make a very large difference over time. So if you are looking for an option to help balance the game for an inexperienced Allied player taking on a grizzled Axis veteran, that is a place to start. The idea is even in Harry Rowland's original Designers Notes for the game, which suggests balancing the game to the players' tastes by adding or subtracting resources from the USA. Alternative political dealings on the American Home Front, if you will.

Other optional rules that makes a large difference in play are the combination of Divisions, and SCS Transport. Without those two rules, there will be quite a bit less chance the Axis can do anything in terms of seizing new overseas territory via amphibious invasion. It's not so much of a balance issue as the Allies can also take advantage of division invasions in the game, but I think it does create a different game with a bit less possibilities for dynamic changes to what areas of the world might see combat forces appear.



Neilster -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 2:04:47 PM)

quote:

...but I think it does create a different game with a bit less possibilities for dynamic changes to what areas of the world might see combat forces appear.


Can you elaborate on this? Why is this the case? Is it that if one can't do little invasions around the place that one is likely to try some other large scale strategic option?

Cheers, Neilster



Lingering Frey -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 2:21:14 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Neilster

quote:

...but I think it does create a different game with a bit less possibilities for dynamic changes to what areas of the world might see combat forces appear.


Can you elaborate on this? Why is this the case? Is it that if one can't do little invasions around the place that one is likely to try some other large scale strategic option?

Cheers, Neilster



Range of SCS versus amph is somewhat important. More significant are the simple limitations on the number of units that can be used to invade anywhere. Add a handful of little semi-disposable units on highly mobile semi-disposable transportation devices that can pull off invasions on empty hexes and you get a game that is much more dynamic in terms of little surprise invasions all over the map.



Neilster -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 2:46:22 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Lingering Frey


quote:

ORIGINAL: Neilster

quote:

...but I think it does create a different game with a bit less possibilities for dynamic changes to what areas of the world might see combat forces appear.


Can you elaborate on this? Why is this the case? Is it that if one can't do little invasions around the place that one is likely to try some other large scale strategic option?

Cheers, Neilster



Range of SCS versus amph is somewhat important. More significant are the simple limitations on the number of units that can be used to invade anywhere. Add a handful of little semi-disposable units on highly mobile semi-disposable transportation devices that can pull off invasions on empty hexes and you get a game that is much more dynamic in terms of little surprise invasions all over the map.

Yes. I think I took the opposite meaning from what was intended in brian brian's post.

Cheers, Neilster



brian brian -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 4:32:10 PM)

Actually I was thinking what both of you have mentioned. Without division invasion capabilities, the Axis are unlikely to attempt a campaign around Oran, Narvik, or Aden, for example. They might, and they could, build MARine corps units to try for one of those areas, but I wouldn't expect that to happen.

Perhaps without AMPHs, Divisions, nor SCS Transport a bit more over-the-beach attacks might occur. But not using the SCS Transport optional changes the range at which you can move troops over the oceans, and that changes the game somewhat, and even for the Allies as well.



warspite1 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 6:20:32 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: paulderynck


quote:

ORIGINAL: warspite1


quote:

ORIGINAL: aspqrz

I do not know if RAW or RAC represent this limitation, either, but, really, if the Germans want to repair those oilfields or more Russian RR lines, then they need to build fewer planes, subs and tanks ...

warspite1

The day WIF gets into that level of complexity and micro management is the day I stop playing.....


It's not really micro-managing to spend 4 BPs during production to repair an oil well and living with the fact you have 4 less to spend on something else.
warspite1

It depends on how many such rules are introduced in the name of this realism. Where do you draw the line? If you are going to build railroads and worry about gauges then that gets into Europa Series territory. No thanks.



ACMW -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 8:16:42 PM)

Steel was less of a constraint than might generally be thought. High-strength steels were more worrying for Germany (vital for a/c production, inter alia) with the concern being the loss of Manganese mines in Nikopol & Krivoi Rog. [Source: Speer, 'Inside the 3rd Reich'.] However, when Speer analyzed the problem (usage / stocks / production / holdings within the supply chain) he found that even Manganese was not critical. Rather Chromium, Molybdenum and Silicon. According to Speer (Nov 43), if Chromium source was turned off, the production of almost all advanced materiel would stop 7 to 9 months afterwards.



aspqrz02 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 10:03:45 PM)

Yes. I actually did read your post.

Did you read mine?

Where I actually said you were right ... but only to a point ... and then pointed out where the shortcomings in your logic were?

The point is that the Germans were simply unable to produce as many aircraft as they wanted because, largely, of their shortage of steel, not because of a shortage of aluminium (though that probably contributed as well, just not as much). Things were that close to the bone.

So, yes, aero-engines should be included.

It's like arguments by people on the aforementioned newsgroups that surely the Kriegsmarine could have built more submarines if only they'd tried harder ... and then you have to point out, sadly, that submarines use diesel engines. And therefore compete with things like tanks and other heavy vehicles. Given that there was no slack in the way of resources, in this case iron and steel (which is the point), if you want more submarines then the resources have to be diverted from elsewhere ... so, do you want fewer tanks>

I have pointed out that the Germans wanted to, but simply couldn't, produce a whole lot of vital things during WW2 because of this overall shortage of iron and steel ... they couldn't produce enough RR tanker cars to move all the POL they produced themselves (and, believe me, they wanted to), let alone expand their capacity to move oil from the Caucasus; they wanted to expand their RR network into Russia more effectively, but couldn't produce enough maintenance, fueling and signalling equipment, and not enough extra Locos and Rolling stock, even though they desperately needed to; they wanted to produce more warships, including submarines, but didn't have the resources to do it ... in this case, both factories and steel ... unless they stripped it from elsewhere; they tried to produce enough aero engines, and set up a huge plant to do so, but failed ... both because the plant was unsuccessful as well as because they didn't have the iron and steel to divert, even though the Luftwaffe got first choice of whatever resources were available; they wanted to expand their own munitions and war related manufacturing plants much more than they did, but found that they couldn't ... because the raw materials, largely iron and steel, were not available in the quantities available.

Sure, aero engines may take, relatively, less iron and steel than, say, a Tank, or Sub, or Truck, but the problem was that the Germans had a limited amount of iron and steel available that was suitable, lost access to most of it (as it was imported) when the war broke out, and never managed to expand access elsewhere enough to make a difference ... so, they actually butted heads against the brick wall (so to speak) of 'no more iron and steel' and had to make choices.

Which means, if you want more tanks, you have to take the iron and steel from somewhere else (and not from the Kriegsmarine, which got damn all, relatively speaking ... the slack just isn't there) ... ditto more aeroplanes or more submarines.

The Allies, on the other hand, never reached the limit of their resources, except, arguably, manpower - and even there they did better than the Germans because they more readily (for example) employed women in non-traditional roles in massive numbers whereas the Nazis had to be dragged kicking and screaming into doing a tenth as much, because of their 'Kinder, Kuche, Kirche' policies - they were certainly never short of iron and steel.

For that matter, Germany was short of lots of other raw materials, shortages that they had no realistic way of making up ... tungsten, for example. Makes the best AP penetrators. Germans had to stop producing them in late 1942 because their entire stocks of tungsten were bought pre-war from sources that were no longer available ... and the remaining tungsten was needed for other, more important, things, like high speed precision machine tools ... the very tools needed to make, for example, aero engines efficiently.

And, yes, they were short of aluminium as well. A lot of the supposed 'production' of aircraft in the last 18 months of the war, after Speer took over, was actually false accounting by Speer and his staff ... a lot of 'production' counted as 'new' was actually remanufacturing and repairing of shot down or otherwise destroyed airframes and engines ... no one knows for sure how much, except that the percentage was very very high. Likewise, a lot of the later war production figures for aircraft, generally included without comment in the overall German totals, were a carefully constructed lie ... Speer boosted monthly production numbers by including numbers from the last week of the previous month and the next week of the following month, then including them (double counting, in effect) all over again the next month.

Or note the fact that the last years of the war saw the German soldiers, sailors and airmen being clothed in uniforms made out of nettles ... for the simple reason that sources of other fabrics were overstretched.

I could go on and on.

The point being, the Germans faced absolute hard and, in many cases, unchangeable, limits as to how much they could produce of a whole range of things because they simply didn't have the access to the resources needed to increase those limits. All they could do was shuffle things around ... like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, in a way.

Under the circumstances, could the Germans have won WW2? A valid question.

The German planners themselves didn't think so.

Or, to be more accurate, they didn't think they could win a war like WW1 ... or even one that proved to be significantly different, as evidenced by the Polish and Western European campaigns ... with a proviso. They believed, and Hitler told them they could, win a short, sharp, war ... which is what the Polish and Western European campaigns were.

In effect, what Hitler and the Nazis believed was that they could build up their limited resources, expend them all on a short, sharp, campaign, then rest, rinse and repeat. And it worked ... up until Barbarossa.

So, it's not actually impossible to win as the Germans, you just need to do better at the Blitz than they actually did. This minimises the resource shortage problems.

However, it also assumes you won't be fighting a two front war, supporting a feckless and incompetent Italian ally, facing a UK that simply won't be logical and make peace, and then, when the Japs (assuming they do) attack the US, face off against the US as well ... then you're in a whole world of hurt because you simply cannot compete in an extended world war.

But it can be done.

I'd rate it as a very low order probability, except against incompetent or inexperienced Allied players, but, hey, it's not impossible!

Phil



aspqrz02 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 10:16:33 PM)

Yes, tungsten was a problem, but not as limiting as the basic lack of iron and steel. As for evidence, I would suggest reading Tooze's "Wages of Destruction', which goes into Germany's problems in great detail, though it isn't as ground breaking in academic circles as it has been for more general readership ... a lot of what he puts all together in the one spot has been known for a long time, in some cases even during the war, but was often not put together in a coherent whole, as he has.

I would recommend it as a start.

For the Air War aspect of things, supplement it with Overy's works, the older ones as well as the more recent 'The Bombing War'.

Maiolo's excellent 'Cry Havoc: The Arms Race and the Second World War, 1931-1941' is also a valuable summation of the strengths and weaknesses of all the major powers in the period.

And, of course, the relevant chapters of Van Creveld's 'Supplying War' give some useful insights as well.

THere's lots more, but those are the ones that I have handy in my personal library, and which are the most focussed on the relevant issues. Reading them, then following through their Bibliographies, especially Tooze's, are a must if you wish to get a comprehensive idea of where the Germans were according to the latest scholarship.

Phil



aspqrz02 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 10:21:38 PM)

Take anything that Speer said with several trainloads worth of salt sprinkled liberally.

Not to put to fine a point on it, Speer lied. Consistently. Repeatedly. About almost everything. Though not about everything all the time.

And, like a good liar, he based his lies in the truth.

However, in some things he was truthful ... and, more or less, his comments about Molybdenum are, IIRC, correct ... just not the whole truth, as often as not.

Read the relevant chapters of Tooze's 'Wages of Destruction' to get an overview of just how much Speer lied and misled.

Phil



henri51 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 11:01:38 PM)

There is realistic and then there is realistic. Take the pilot rule: it seems to make the game more realistic, but then one of the decisive factors in the Pacific War was the ability of the US to rapidly train a large number of new pilots, and the inability of the Japanese to replace their pilots (Japanese pilot training took about 2 years!). So whether or not the pilot rule is turned on, the pilot replacement in the game will be unrealistic, unless the game makes it more difficult for the Japanese. In the War in the West, the Allies generally removed their pilots from combat after a number of missions and used them for training, whereas German pilots generally flew until they died (some German aces shot down over 200 planes). So the Germans had more experienced pilots, but were hampered by lack of planes the the time of D-day.

The good news (for me) is that I don't care very much if the game is very realistic. After all, if I want to see an accurate recreation of WW2 I will watch a movie (not a John Wayne one [:'(]or read a book. However I understand and respect those who enjoy the ILLUSION of recreating the war as it was.



henri51 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 11:10:49 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: aspqrz

quote:

Not to put to fine a point on it, Speer lied. Consistently. Repeatedly. About almost everything. Though not about everything all the time.

And, like a good liar, he based his lies in the truth.


Well he was not the only one! Due to the Cold War, Westerners were fed an unending series of lies about the war. How long did it take before most Westerners realized that most of the WW2 German casualties were on the Eastern front, and even the most recent movies and TV programs still claim that the D-day invasion changed the course of the war and that at that point the Germans were winning. (By that time the Soviets were in Poland, and the Germans had not launched a major offensive since Kursk!).

=====================
"History will be kind to me - because I shall write it!" (Winston Churchill).



aspqrz02 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/14/2013 11:43:25 PM)

Indeed, you are 1000% correct!

Some of what we always 'knew' was the result of cold war paranoia (relying on German assessments of Russian performance in the East, with no balancing Russian information, for example - or the Russians deliberately classifying things like population and casualty figures as 'state secrets, as another) and as big a chunk of the rest was because no-one had actually looked critically at the information that was available.

Of course, a chunk of both areas was known, or at least strongly suspected, before the collapse of communism, but only in the academic and military communities ... you had to dig into specialist books and publications to find it (I know, I did, for some things) ... it's only been in the last decade or so that a lot of it has started to penetrate into the wider realm of the general public, and you still have many 'general' books on the war repeating now known to be wrong factoids as if they were true for the simple reason that their authors are simply regurgitating material from generalist works rather than doing the hard work of mining the increasing wealth of evidence from more academic sources.

Speer was always known to be a liar by anyone in the serious know ... but, I suspect, even they didn't always know how big a liar he was. The 'general public', however, still read his books and older books based on his lies as if they are the whole truth and nothing but the truth, and the real truth is only impinging on their consciousness slowly.

Actually, in many respects, WiF has always done a fair job of modelling the main things about WW2 in Europe - the land war in Western Europe and in Russia - quite well. It's only when you get to the peripheries - Sealion, Gibraltar, North Africa, the Middle East in general - that it starts to seriously fall apart. And, I suspect, those areas are the ones disproportionately affected by many of the Optional Rules.

As I said elsewhere, I don't mind a pure fantasy game either, but I would at least like the option of something resembling reality - and Optional Rules seem to me to be the place where this desire can, or could, be fulfilled.

I think that an Axis player could 'win' - for carefully defined versions of 'winning' - even with something resembling reality imposed through Optional Rules.

How?

Well, forget about Germany conquering all of Europe, or even all of Russia - and certainly forget about them getting the Middle East oil - but could she have managed to force some sort of war-weariness peace on the Russians and Commonwealth?

Hitler and the Nazis couldn't have, as their whole world view was so nasty that fighting them to the end was really the lesser of two evils (which is why Stalin wasn't overthrown, I guess). However, that doesn't mean that you the player can't be a 'kinder, gentler' Germany ... and force a more palatable, but still pro-German, peace on Europe.

I mean, there are special rules for Vichy France, and that could be a template for something similar forced on Russia - a Trans-Ural Republic when Moscow, Leningrad and Stalingrad are taken, perhaps. That would be impossible for the Nazis, but not, necessarily, for a player. Sure, it would merely be a pause ... like with the UK, as suggested below, but it would be a 'win' in that Germany would dominate continental Europe.

Forget getting the UK onside. Napoleon tried for 16 odd years and failed, I doubt even a kinder, gentler, German player could manage that in real life ... but that doesn't mean that you couldn't achieve something like the real Cold War ... Commonwealth and US against a German dominated Europe.

In the Pacific?

Really, unless you massage reality out of all resemblance to reality, Japan hasn't got a snowball's chance in hell. The only thing they can realistically do is hang on longer than the Japs did historically. But that's a form of victory as well ... doing better than that clot Tojo and his original team of players [:D]

Phil



brian brian -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/15/2013 12:50:27 AM)

No, the optional rules do not reign in the fantasy; they generally just dial up the detail. A rule that does that I have mentioned a few times already, merely costs HQs an extra movement point when they leave a rail line. And it is usually voted down by a majority of players. The Axis success-on-a-shoestring model is used consistently. If it might have worked with a couple of well tied shoestrings, that's good enough for World in Flames.

I would like to see the 2 optional rules in the Original Post (Oil and Pilots) a bit more linked. I think a bigger problem for the Axis than producing airframes and airplane engines was having enough fuel to train their pilots enough to make the investment in a new airframe worthwhile. As the war progressed, the Axis could train pilots less and their air force combat effectiveness went down. Then they could less well defend their transportation and oil assets, so they had less oil to train pilots and their air force combat effectiveness....

But that's not in the game either. Nor are any kind of alternative Peace victory conditions. You bid for how many objectives you can hold, as compared to history, after a set amount of turns, and that's that.

The game might evolve on some of these issues some day, but not this day.

I don't find using the Pilot rule to add or subtract realism really. As was noted, realism with pilots would be reflected more in pilot skill being a reflection of training hours. The World in Flames Pilot rule has nothing to do with such questions. It is simply a mechanism that changes the amount of Build Points spent to field an air force, with a slight influence from which hexes you are generally fighting over, and the possibility to change the composition of your air forces some. Use the Pilots rule, and there are generally more planes on the board. Don't use it, see less. Since the # of planes in an airplane counter is a flexible construct to start with, all that matters is your taste for how many planes are used, and how much time that takes in playing the game.



Neilster -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/15/2013 1:36:23 AM)

@aspqrz...Cool. I asked for evidence and you have provided it.

But I have a question. If the Luftwaffe had first use of materials, fighters were desperately needed to stave off the ruinous bombing of the Reich and, as you say, aircraft production was being hampered by a lack of steel, why were the Germans still using steel for other stuff?

Edit to add the question

Cheers, Neilster



aspqrz02 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/15/2013 4:10:58 AM)

Oh. Indeed!

I believe that, from memory, before the war, pre-commitment to squadron training for Luftwaffe pilots was c.200 hours of flight time. The US and Commonwealth had similar (but slightly higher, I think, flight hours) regimes.

By the middle of the war, again, from memory, training time was down to 75-100 hours (say mid-to-late 1943) and, by the end (mid 1944) it was down to 25 hours.

In the meantime, allied pre-squadron commitment flight time had doubled, or close to it.

Worse, however, was the fact that the Germans (like the Japnese, who were actually worse than the Germans) left their aces in the saddle until they were shot down ... the Allies pulled them out and made them instructors for the newbies.

The result was that Allied flight training hours were actually worth much more than Axis ones because they were being done by the best combat pilots passing on hard won expertise directly.

Actually, something that most people don't realise is that, certainly from 1944 onwards, the Germans had nowhere safe left in which to train their replacement pilots ... the Allied air forces were roaming the skies of what was left of the Reich more or less at will and that meant that even training flights could be bounced at any time, more or less without warning.

Actually, for Oil, I would suggest that reality would be more closely modelled if the repair of captured oil resources were treated more like constructing Battleships ... 4 BRP, an Oil Engineer Unit, and 12 months (with the Oil unit having to be there continuously during that period) to get back to zero, then 4 BRP and another 12 months (but no oil unit) to get back into production ... and even that is, based on the reality of what the Axis historically achieved, far too fast I would think. Oh. And the Axis would get exactly ONE Oil Engineer unit (as would the Japs) ... so they could have only one Oilfield being repaired to zero at a time.

But, as you say, WiF doesn't really do that all that well (and neither does any other computer wargame I have ever seen - and darn few Paper ones ... Totaller Krieg comes closest [I haven't seen Dai Senso, but I presume it does as well], though WiE/WitE (SPI) comes close in some areas, such as self destructing German AMPH points and gradually declining German CRTs as the war progresses).

Phil



aspqrz02 -> RE: Let's Talk Optional Rules (11/15/2013 4:36:19 AM)

They were, quite simply, in a bind.

Remember I pointed out that a number of their top military/logistics planners suicided when they found out Barbarossa was going ahead?

Did you know that when the attack on Russia was announced, crowds watching the soldiers marching off to the front stood silent, knowing what a two front war had meant in WW1? And it was only when the initial smashing successes of Barbarossa were obvious that this glum attitude changed ... and lasted until 1943 when even the civilians were getting the message that things were increasingly dicey. By then, of course, they also knew from their sons, husbands, fathers and friends pretty much exactly how the Russians had been being treated on the eastern front, and what was, therefore, likely to happen if/when they finally forced their way into Germany. Which left them with no real choice but to continue to support the war.

By the time it was obvious to the rest of the military that the was was, effectively, lost (1943 at the latest) and that they were merely prolonging the agony, what could they do? The Allies were demanding "Unconditional Surrender" and more or less stuck to it - pretty much everyone (in the Regular military, anyway) recognised that Hitler's beliefs that the Western Allies would somehow decide to stab their Russian co-belligerents in the back and ally with their Nazi enemy as pure fantasy ... but they also recognised that surrender was probably a riskier option for them, personally.

So, they were faced with choices - none palatable - they could produce more fighters (and less tactical and strategic bombers, affecting ground and naval combat options significantly and negatively) and fewer AA guns (which meant less artillery and tank guns, as the optics for the AA guns stripped those requisites from Field Artillery and Tank Gun rangefinders, another bottleneck that they never overcame) and fewer tanks or artillery or trucks, and that meant that they would be less able to combat the advancing Russians, or even the advancing western Allies ... or they could produce fewer Submarines, and make it easier for the Western Allies to supply the Russians and themselves (and the Russians absolutely depended on Lend Lease, despite what revisionists will increasingly tell you, for key elements that made their eventual victory in Berlin and East Germany rather than in the Ukraine or Poland possible), or they could produce fewer aircraft and more tanks, but, then, those tanks would be more likely to be destroyed by Soviet and Allied tactical airpower (as it was, it was increasingly suicidal for the Germans to move vehicles, even armoured vehicles, by daylight, even on the Eastern Front).

Basically, there *were* no good choices.

For example, they dispersed industry as much as possible, to limit the number of choice multiple aspect target areas, but that had the blowback that, from 1944 when the Allies basically started roaming all of Western Europe and shooting up trains, blowing up railroad switching yards and bridges etc. that, according to the Strategic Bombing Survey at the end of the war the Germans were able to transport goods by rail an average of only 12 miles before they ran into severe damage that prevented further progress. As a result, for example, the Ruhr basically shut down over a fortnight at Christmas 1944 - factories completely idle - for the simple reason that the Germans found themselves almost completely unable to move in significant quantities of the raw materials to power or operate them and, equally, mostly unable to move out most of the banked up finished products.

By 1945 the Deutsche Reichsbahn found that so many of its switching yards were destroyed that they could no rearrange the consists on their trains (the 'consist' is simply whatever desired mix of different types of rolling stock you need - box cars, POL tankers, bulk cars, passenger cars, flat cars etc., and can only be done, or only done efficiently, in a switching yard) by pushing cars over on their sides off the tracks (effectively destroying them) to get unwanted ones off and allow new ones to be hitched up ... a sure sign of desperation.

They also built Synthetic Oil plants, and these did stirling service ... and they found that anything short of a direct hit merely sprung seams and the like, easily repaired stuff ... to begin with ... but, as the war progressed, and the Strategic Bombing raids came back again and again and again those seams were patches on patches on patches ... and increasingly distant 'misses' were springing them and putting the plant out of action, partly or completely, for increasing lengths of time.

Basically, they were organised for a short war and couldn't cope with the demands of a long one ... and surrender wasn't an option, especially for the higher ups.

Remember, Churchill simply wanted to line up Hitler and the top Nazis and shoot them all, only Stalin (!) managed to join with Roosevelt to reign him in, demanding trials (of course, Stalin wanted Show Trials, not real ones)!

Phil



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