RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (Full Version)

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JocMeister -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 2:44:48 PM)

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Surrender
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Over night the entire political situation suddenly changes. The politicians suddenly believe the war is lost. The military staff tries to explain that nothing has changed. In fact the allied situation looks very promising. The weather has cleared and 9 Infantry and 8 Armored division are poised to strike the German lines and cut off the Cotentin peninsula.

But alas the politicians stand firm in their belief. "If we had only secured 2 more hexes the entire war would be different they say. Military advisers are baffled. Two hexes? Why does they matter? We have the worst behind us already. We are expanding each week and growing stronger and stronger.

But no. The politicians have made up their mind. Those 2 hexes are vital to the war. Without them we must seek peace. The war can no longer be won.

What has changed the military ask? Isnīt it obvious the politicians answer.

-"Its now July the first! If we donīt have 10 hexes before July the 1st the war is lost. Everybody knows that!"

But we have 8 hexes the military answers. It makes no sense at all to give up now. We can reach Berlin before the Soviets. The politicians look at their military advisory with contempt in their eye.

-"You know, winning the war has NOTHING to do with winning the game. Silly Generals! You donīt go to war to win the war. You go to war to win against the VP system!"


[image]local://upfiles/32406/2A4C5633DD924304B903C852037D7BA9.jpg[/image]



Peltonx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 3:07:48 PM)

Thanks for the game.

The tactical side of the air war your the best I have played easly to date.



Flaviusx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 3:32:11 PM)

What an idiotic end to a perfectly good game. For want of a nail a kingdom was lost, etc.

Honestly, I would just go ahead and play on and say the hell with the silly VP system. Ignore it. This was shaping up to be one of the better AARs. You were well positioned to break the Germans and achieve something like a historical result.

Bah.



NotOneStepBack -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 4:07:37 PM)

Loved the ending.



Seminole -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 4:08:03 PM)

quote:

What an idiotic end to a perfectly good game. For want of a nail a kingdom was lost, etc.
Honestly, I would just go ahead and play on and say the hell with the silly VP system. Ignore it. This was shaping up to be one of the better AARs. You were well positioned to break the Germans and achieve something like a historical result.
Bah.


I don't understand not playing it out either.
I think of the VP bonus as reward to Germany for holding the WA to less than the area they achieved by Op. Cobra.
I think Joc is conflating the game's measure of his progress against history with whether or not he is 'winning' the war.
Would have also been interesting to see how the final score played out as well as final front lines.



JocMeister -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 4:21:31 PM)

Because if I play on disregarding the silly VP system Iīm pretty certain I could bludgeon the Germans to death in a couple of months. You donīt really believe the negative VP modifier is there to "reflect the political situation" do you? [8|] Its there to prevent exactly that from happening. Instead of doing things properly the devs came up with some glorious VP penalties.

And thank you Pelton for a good game! Always fast to get the turn back and no bitching. Perfect opponent. [:)]



sven6345789 -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 4:52:33 PM)

Actually You have a victory Point system in War in the Pacific too. As much as i know many players ignore it.
Is this a sudden death VP-system?
If not why don't ignore it?



Peltonx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 5:00:48 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

Because if I play on disregarding the silly VP system Iīm pretty certain I could bludgeon the Germans to death in a couple of months.



You Sir have discovered what LiquidSky did.

This release is very much like WitE in many respects.

When game is first released ( WitE and now WitW ) and OMG the Germans are over powered lol Allies need help, but after a
while people started to figure out that Russia had allot of tools in the tool box. Players were not using all the tools, so
then after people figured out how to play Russia it became crystal clear that Russia was way way over powered and were winning
(all things being equal with player skills) in mid 1944. The game before 1.08 was boring, but with 1.08.02 the game is finally in question.

I can see the HUGE weakness that is Germany, but so few Western Allied players have figured it out yet as they are just now looking under the hood and seeing the engine for what it is, which is great. WitE and WitW are amazing games of which none have come close to matching and probably never will.

What will happen as it did with WitE, people will start to see the weakeness and more and more players will zero in on those weakness.

People are just now starting to figure out the WA side of things.

Liquidsky won the game as WA turn 20 aka if we played it out Berlin would have fallen by May 44 and not May 45.

In other words WA players need to ignore the VP system over all and get to Berlin asap.





JocMeister -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 5:00:59 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: sven6345789

Actually You have a victory Point system in War in the Pacific too. As much as i know many players ignore it.
Is this a sudden death VP-system?
If not why don't ignore it?


Iīve been down that route in AE (playing for fun). The difference between AE and WitW is that AE is fun enough to play without the VPs. This game is not. [:)]

If you take away the VPs in this game you take away the motivation to win. And without it there is nothing left to motivate me to continue playing WitW.



JocMeister -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 6:10:08 PM)

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Thoughts on the Game (Conclusion)
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Besides the D-day landing which was quite fun and tense the rest of the game lacked the kind of excitement I usually get from playing MP games. It never hooked me even the slightest. Not even the air war which I truly like. Mainly its because I donīt feel like Iīm playing a human. And in a sense Iīm actually not...

..I am playing against the VP system. The greatest enemy for the Allies are not the Germans or their allies but rather the atrocious VP system. This intrusive, hideous being that blankets the game smothering all sense of enjoyment and freedom. It sits there governing every move you make. Always there to punish you. Not because you do something stupid or clumsy. But as to mock you it will punish you even in your most successful moments.

But now comes the biggest irony of the game. If you remove the VP system (or ignore it) the game becomes absolutely unplayable because behind it there are no proper mechanics. Instead the VP system was used as a lazy design tool. Something to hard/costly to do properly? Let the VP system take care of that with rules and penalties. That works well in the beginning... Until people start to poke though the hard crust that is the VP system and gets into the real mechanics of things. Then it starts to fall apart quickly and all the time gained by using the VP system as a lazy design tool is soon eaten up by trying to patch things up.

Iīm not going to repeat the specifics on why the VP system and with that the game is a failure. For those interested Iīve already done that in this AAR in several locations.

Besides the problems with the VP system the game also suffers from some critical problems nothing can fix. IgoUgo, scale and one week turns makes this game feel rather clumsy at certain situations and especially so during amphibious operations. The naval interdiction system is an absolute joke. Its so abstract no one can really tell what is happening. This engine should have stayed where it belongs: On the Eastern Front where it can shine. But in their urge to make a "War in Europe" they decided to release this game despite the fact that the engine is unsuited for it. That gave us a game that even in its finest moments are mediocre at best. All fine if this wasnīt supposed to be Matrixgames flagship for the coming year(s). Mediocre isnīt good enough for that. Not by far. Definitively not so with the extremely hefty price tag that came with the game. This game simply isnīt up to Matrix usual standard, not even close to it.

Prediction: They will release the Tunisia addon in a couple month. It will come with a big price tag and it will sell horrible. Then they will quickly go back to the Eastern Front and never come back. In 4-6 months no one will play WitW and it will be remembered as the game that shouldnīt have been. There is already a worrying lack of activity on the forum for a game of this magnitude. Logging into the game looking for an opponent is equally depressing. Sadly WitW has the word failure written all over it.

I hope Iīm wrong though. I wanted to love this game so badly and Iīll continue to monitor AARs and the forum in the hopes a miracle will happen.

In the meantime Iīll be where this engine truly come to life. On the Eastern Front. I can only hope now that the failures WitW doesnīt undo a WitE 2.0...




Lowpe -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 8:14:09 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: sven6345789

Actually You have a victory Point system in War in the Pacific too. As much as i know many players ignore it.
Is this a sudden death VP-system?
If not why don't ignore it?


At least in his most recent WITP AE games Jocke has used the VP system, and aggressively. He plays to win the game...that is his motivation. Not hard to understand, and consistent from one game to the next.

For those that avoid the VP rules in WITP AE they are usually doing it so they get a chance to play with some late war toys, plans or strategies.

Apples to oranges comparison.

One of the neat things of WITW is its relatively short time frame...heck that is pretty appealing!

I am sorry to see the game conclude, and I hope and think the developers will examine the fun factor a little more and tweak the game some. I want to buy, but I am holding off for now and will live vicariously thru some AARs. Really liked LiquidSky's![:)]

Good game Jocke and congratulations to Pelton.[sm=happy0065.gif]



NotOneStepBack -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 8:51:14 PM)

The problem is that the Allies never took Berlin in real life, so there really isn't an objective way to measure results without some arbitrary VP system.



loki100 -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 8:54:42 PM)

real pity this has ended, especially this way.

I realise you have become irritated with the VP system and this 1000pt penalty is a bit of the final straw but you are playing someone who plays the game with the narrow mindset of winning regardless. Pelton will have spent an age looking at the accumulation of VP and how to maximise that, which can be a wee bit frustrating for his opponents.

I guess the 1000pt issue is designed to force an allied player to carry on attacking even at low/marginal odds (and thus run up losses) till the landings can be declared a clear success. The term limit and the size of the required terrain are both pretty arbitrary, so should be modifiable if there are enough instances of clearly successful landings running up against the current time/space rules.

thanks for the AAR, really learnt a lot from your description and discussions



british exil -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 9:10:51 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: NotOneStepBack

The problem is that the Allies never took Berlin in real life, so there really isn't an objective way to measure results without some arbitrary VP system.


NotOneStepBack if I am not mistaken, and I know I am not, the Soviets took Berlin. The Soviet flag flew from the Reichstag. The cost of lives on both sides was horrific, when one considers the war was nearly over. Civilians committed suicide due to fear of reprisal, being in the Nazi Party or females fearing multiple rape. SS fighting in the sewers and underground tunnels to the last man.

The Soviets were not western but were coming from the east, but were Allies. Talks with Churchill and Roosevelt in Yalta!? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yalta_Conference

Mat



NotOneStepBack -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 9:24:11 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: british exil


quote:

ORIGINAL: NotOneStepBack

The problem is that the Allies never took Berlin in real life, so there really isn't an objective way to measure results without some arbitrary VP system.


NotOneStepBack if I am not mistaken, and I know I am not, the Soviets took Berlin. The Soviet flag flew from the Reichstag. The cost of lives on both sides was horrific, when one considers the war was nearly over. Civilians committed suicide due to fear of reprisal, being in the Nazi Party or females fearing multiple rape. SS fighting in the sewers and underground tunnels to the last man.

The Soviets were not western but were coming from the east, but were Allies. Talks with Churchill and Roosevelt in Yalta!? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yalta_Conference

Mat



Uh, I'm not ignorant of history, I know what occurred. The Soviets were "allied" yeah, but my post was obviously directed at the western allies, which the game is focused on.



Seminole -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 9:39:02 PM)

quote:

I am playing against the VP system. The greatest enemy for the Allies are not the Germans or their allies but rather the atrocious VP system. This intrusive, hideous being that blankets the game smothering all sense of enjoyment and freedom.


Should you be 'free' to never invade Europe?
The VP system rewards the German player for containing Allied advances beyond historical, and by this your feel punished.

Your kvetching is rooted in admitted ignorance of the rules at the outset. I have a feeling if you give them game another go with a better sense for the abilities you have at your disposal you won't find those 'milestones' of historical advance so daunting.

Other people aren't having the problem you are generating bombing VP, so it's hard for me to blame the 'system' for your results here.

quote:

It sits there governing every move you make. Always there to punish you. Not because you do something stupid or clumsy. But as to mock you it will punish you even in your most successful moments.


You don't like the fact that the Western Allies do not seek a Pyrrhic victory?
I think when you get a better handle on your airpower you'll find as the Allies did that its easier to win with explosives than blood.

quote:

Besides the problems with the VP system the game also suffers from some critical problems nothing can fix. IgoUgo, scale and one week turns makes this game feel rather clumsy at certain situations and especially so during amphibious operations. The naval interdiction system is an absolute joke. Its so abstract no one can really tell what is happening.


I still want to see competency on both sides before making any declarations about naval interdiction. It can be difficult to separate something being 'broken' from individual inexperience and ineptitude. Knee jerk compensations for the latter can unbalance the game as WA player experience develops.

So far the only thing that has really disappointed me in this game is people quitting.
The outcome - the Allies winning the war - shouldn't really be in doubt. The measure is how well you do versus historical results, and the VP system tries to make sure you have some of the historical constraints (e.g. focusing some air assets on u-boats or v-weapons).
But I'm the kind of guy who accepts a WitE '44 as the Axis just to see how I can do...



Peltonx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 10:10:44 PM)

There is always an exception to every rule even with all things being equal.

Russia in Berlin is not always the case for sure in WitE.

Stalin moved to East of the Urals never to return [sm=happy0029.gif]

[image]local://upfiles/20387/19AF6AB4B343463EAB47C61483F0F322.jpg[/image]



british exil -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 10:19:59 PM)

Just how many divs have you got contained in that pocket? The mini map is just a massive red blotch.


Mat



Flaviusx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/1/2015 11:58:01 PM)

Joc, you are giving up on this game way too easily, and taking the admitted shortcoming of the VP system way too seriously. You are so determined to find fault with this thing that you are practicing the gamer form of coitus interruptus. This game in particular you dumped just as it was about to get interesting.

In the immortal words of Sgt. Hulka: lighten up, Francis.



Seminole -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 1:03:59 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Pelton
There is always an exception to every rule even with all things being equal.
Russia in Berlin is not always the case for sure in WitE.


In my view the VP penalty in response to lack of activity by the WA in Europe is in some small part a reaction to how you 'turtled up' against MichaelT, retreating in the fall of '41 back to the original Reich frontier so you could avoid blizzard penalties. There was a call then for 'sudden death' VP rules so that people would try to fight something more akin to WW2 than just exploit game mechanics.



Flaviusx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 2:08:25 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Seminole


quote:

ORIGINAL: Pelton
There is always an exception to every rule even with all things being equal.
Russia in Berlin is not always the case for sure in WitE.


In my view the VP penalty in response to lack of activity by the WA in Europe is in some small part a reaction to how you 'turtled up' against MichaelT, retreating in the fall of '41 back to the original Reich frontier so you could avoid blizzard penalties. There was a call then for 'sudden death' VP rules so that people would try to fight something more akin to WW2 than just exploit game mechanics.


Possibly true, that.

If so, this was unnecessary. MichaelT demonstrated that turtling up doesn't help the Axis cause. Rather the opposite.



Seminole -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 3:03:39 AM)

quote:

If so, this was unnecessary. MichaelT demonstrated that turtling up doesn't help the Axis cause. Rather the opposite.


IIRC MichaelT resigned in frustration because of a bug (teleporting HQs, or SUs or something like that). Pelton expressed confidence to the end in his gambit.



LiquidSky -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 4:00:52 AM)



Sadly, those two islands would have made the difference. Oh well...

Games are meant to be fun....to divert one's life from its usual drudgery.

At work, I like to be able to think and plan since I have a manual job. And then executing those plans is fun. If the game was no longer 'fun', and I don't mean losing.... I find trying to come back from a losing scenario to be fun [;)]

Winning easily is [>:] and I wouldn't find fun. Which is why I wouldn't complain if somebody who was losing decided they weren't having fun either.

All in all, I did enjoy reading the AAR, and learnt quite a bit about different strategies...and I want to thank you for making the effort to post them up for us to read.

I look at the -1000 vp as a milestone. It's a mini goal you have to reach. Failure to reach it shows an indication that you may, or may not reach the final goal, and gives a chance for a stagnant game to end early. It's not perfect, and to be honest...if I was a german player and thought that some sort of extrodinary circumstance prevented you from reaching it, I would probably wave it. (Say a long string of bad weather...or a misunderstanding of rules...or a miss-click on a stack of units in a port when in transport mode [I've done it]...that sort of thing)

In the end, decide if you actually like playing the game...if so..make your next one a game where you ignore the vp's. Just play. Do crazy fun things..like invade Greece (can you invade Greece? Hmm..) Play a bombing only campaign....taking terrain only to gain new airbases. Have fun.

If you didn't like playing the game, then no amount of changing of vp's will probably satisfy you.




JeffroK -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 5:44:26 AM)

Bad Luck Joc, I think that you were learning how the system worked while playing an experienced opponent.

To those who believe the game should continue, can you explain how Joc can recover.

Those 1000 pts will take a lot of bombing to claw back.

The VP system is broken, apart from a few who have managed to work out the system Allied players are constantly in the negative. Tome it seems you either get behind the ball and stay there or get in front and stay there, very few stay in the middle or have a major turnaround.

The devs have introduced a penalty rather than providing an incentive.
The Allies should get points for achieving objectives, hand out points for every dot city rather than a dozen major cities map-wide. Make it a Production task for the Germans to build UBoats to be placed in an "Atlantic Convoy" box (maybe at the cost of more fighters or Armour) Allies then commit Airpower and Convoy escorts PLUS have an incentive to attack UBoat Pens and shipyards.
Give the Germans a new toy, V1 & V2 to plan attacks on Population centres (affect morale) Ports (affect Shipping) which in turn creates a reaction of increasing ADGB forces, 2TAF attacks against launchers and Heavy Bombers against VW Factories.
Negative points for losses should go, replaced by an Allied manpower pool so that drawing too many replacements to replenish after bad offensives starts to hurt. You could also fiddle with their morale/experience to replicate shortened training periods. Special pools for NZ, Canadian, Brazilian et al to make them even more fragile.

Germany also gets a breather, get rid of Garrison VP's and make them really garrison the Occupied countries, more garrison cities required but fewer CP per city (make them fragment, an SS Pz Div in Dreux will have minimal effect 100 miles away, but an SS Kampfgruppe 25 miles away might.) Again, penalty isnt points but damage to the railnet, and if too much is given away, the ability for the Allies to land "SAS/Jedburgh" teams to aid the Maquis.

I would kill the EF Box, we are playing the Western Front.

Overall, make the system REWARD good play, not penalize players to force them down the track that the Devs decide should be followed.

Another area for review, is the numbers used to assign Experience & Morale levels. Axis forces already get the advantage of defending in Mountains & Bocage, behind Rivers and in Cities & Ports and in Mud, Rain and Snow. They then get a good/great morale/experience value because they defended so well in this terrain. In this time period, German forces would not have recaptured more than 1 hex except at The Bulge, but in game they have plenty of power to clear Allied Bridgeheads off the map. IRL, even the botched Anzio landings held off the German counterattacks.

Hopefully, what has been provided can make a solid base for making a truly fantastic game, some parts cant change but some areas like VP should be easy and knowing the involvement of some of the programming team hope that as time passes, some of the "impossible" areas can be worked on.



Peltonx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 8:55:44 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Seminole


quote:

ORIGINAL: Pelton
There is always an exception to every rule even with all things being equal.
Russia in Berlin is not always the case for sure in WitE.


In my view the VP penalty in response to lack of activity by the WA in Europe is in some small part a reaction to how you 'turtled up' against MichaelT, retreating in the fall of '41 back to the original Reich frontier so you could avoid blizzard penalties. There was a call then for 'sudden death' VP rules so that people would try to fight something more akin to WW2 than just exploit game mechanics.


The game at the time was completely broken and I had posted in what areas and was ignored completely ignored.

1. a manpower crunch caused by a bug.
2. an armament crunch caused by 100's of swapping bugs.
3. an ammo bug which made taking any hex with hardly any Russian troops
4. broken intercept system
5. national morale completey broken.

ect ect

So the ONLY WAY I could prove I was right and everyone else wrong was by making an example of how broken sht was in an completely insane game play.

I was by the end of that game proven to be right and everyone else including 2by3 to be wrong with the help of morveal and his 2 friends and to their credit they have fixed all the issues and WitE is now played based on player skills and not bugs and exploits.

The VP system is in place because that is what the player based wanted not because of a game I shovel down 2by3's throat.

To 2by3's credit WitW was released basicly 99% finished with out boat loads of bugs and exploits.

Get your history straight bro.



Peltonx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 9:06:58 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx


quote:

ORIGINAL: Seminole


quote:

ORIGINAL: Pelton
There is always an exception to every rule even with all things being equal.
Russia in Berlin is not always the case for sure in WitE.


In my view the VP penalty in response to lack of activity by the WA in Europe is in some small part a reaction to how you 'turtled up' against MichaelT, retreating in the fall of '41 back to the original Reich frontier so you could avoid blizzard penalties. There was a call then for 'sudden death' VP rules so that people would try to fight something more akin to WW2 than just exploit game mechanics.


Possibly true, that.

If so, this was unnecessary. MichaelT demonstrated that turtling up doesn't help the Axis cause. Rather the opposite.


Not true also at the time the German OOB collapsed because of swapping bugs aka 1 million men in manpower pools and 200,000+ armament pts in the AP pool.
The only reason MT took any hexes was because of the ammo bug.

turtling was and never has been proven to work or not work.

Game play before 1.08 based on player skills is questionable as there were so many bugs that it caused the german army to collapse GET YOUR FACTS right or have you forgotten

With an open mind read this: The wolf and the Bear.

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2792361

I predicted that GHC would lose the game and you did not, I was right.
The only way Tarhunnas (GHC) hung on was because of a massive dump of armament points into GHC pools by 2by3 and then he hardly won.

It was not long after that I got baned for 2 weeks for speaking the true and being dumped on over and over for being a moron.

That is why I played the way I played vs MT who better to prove my points of the bugs and exploits then the best player to ever play WitE?

I stated why to MT I played the way I did and in the thread.

Some time you have to house train a dog by rubbing his nose in his own sht bro and that what I had to do to prove that the game was broken.




Peltonx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 9:09:12 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Seminole

quote:

If so, this was unnecessary. MichaelT demonstrated that turtling up doesn't help the Axis cause. Rather the opposite.


IIRC MichaelT resigned in frustration because of a bug (teleporting HQs, or SUs or something like that). Pelton expressed confidence to the end in his gambit.


Again not true,

I RESIGNED and told MT why I played the game the way I did.

MT was at the time the best player to play WitE and still is if he wanted to play.

That game was the best thing that happened to WitE as it caused 2by3 to finally admit to themselves all the errors that needed to be fixed.

Pelton vs MT = morveal and 1.08



Peltonx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 9:19:43 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: JeffK

Bad Luck Joc, I think that you were learning how the system worked while playing an experienced opponent.

To those who believe the game should continue, can you explain how Joc can recover.

Those 1000 pts will take a lot of bombing to claw back.

The VP system is broken, apart from a few who have managed to work out the system Allied players are constantly in the negative. Tome it seems you either get behind the ball and stay there or get in front and stay there, very few stay in the middle or have a major turnaround.

The devs have introduced a penalty rather than providing an incentive.
The Allies should get points for achieving objectives, hand out points for every dot city rather than a dozen major cities map-wide. Make it a Production task for the Germans to build UBoats to be placed in an "Atlantic Convoy" box (maybe at the cost of more fighters or Armour) Allies then commit Airpower and Convoy escorts PLUS have an incentive to attack UBoat Pens and shipyards.
Give the Germans a new toy, V1 & V2 to plan attacks on Population centres (affect morale) Ports (affect Shipping) which in turn creates a reaction of increasing ADGB forces, 2TAF attacks against launchers and Heavy Bombers against VW Factories.
Negative points for losses should go, replaced by an Allied manpower pool so that drawing too many replacements to replenish after bad offensives starts to hurt. You could also fiddle with their morale/experience to replicate shortened training periods. Special pools for NZ, Canadian, Brazilian et al to make them even more fragile.

Germany also gets a breather, get rid of Garrison VP's and make them really garrison the Occupied countries, more garrison cities required but fewer CP per city (make them fragment, an SS Pz Div in Dreux will have minimal effect 100 miles away, but an SS Kampfgruppe 25 miles away might.) Again, penalty isnt points but damage to the railnet, and if too much is given away, the ability for the Allies to land "SAS/Jedburgh" teams to aid the Maquis.

I would kill the EF Box, we are playing the Western Front.

Overall, make the system REWARD good play, not penalize players to force them down the track that the Devs decide should be followed.

Another area for review, is the numbers used to assign Experience & Morale levels. Axis forces already get the advantage of defending in Mountains & Bocage, behind Rivers and in Cities & Ports and in Mud, Rain and Snow. They then get a good/great morale/experience value because they defended so well in this terrain. In this time period, German forces would not have recaptured more than 1 hex except at The Bulge, but in game they have plenty of power to clear Allied Bridgeheads off the map. IRL, even the botched Anzio landings held off the German counterattacks.

Hopefully, what has been provided can make a solid base for making a truly fantastic game, some parts cant change but some areas like VP should be easy and knowing the involvement of some of the programming team hope that as time passes, some of the "impossible" areas can be worked on.


As Liquadsky has proven the only thing wrong with WA's is that players simply don't fully understand what they are not doing.

I have and am playing more the 12+ games and the mistakes by WA players is kind of amazing high.

I see almost all players being able to master some areas but not all.

The VP system might need a tweak but over all it feels right and I am sorry but WA players right now simply are playing crappy over all.

Whining about losing because of a lack of skills or understanding the rules proves nothing able the VP system

Liqudsky proved that WA can win by mid 44 if things are done right.



JocMeister -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 10:28:06 AM)

After reading some replies here I think I have to clarify a few things.

Iīm a very competitive player. My online MP experience started with BF 1942 over 15 years ago and carried over to BF:Vietnam and BF2. In fact I was even semi-professional at one time. I was getting paid but not enough for me to quit my day job. I played in the Swedish National team in both BF42 and BF2 and won the Nations Cup three times (Europe Championship). I donīt play games "for fun". I play them for the competition. The reason I surrendered this game is because Pelton won. I have no interest to disregard the VP system and play on to "see what happens". I donīt care what happens. Iīve already lost the game. I have nothing but respect for my opponent who plays exactly like I do. To defeat the opponent using the tools available. So hats of to Pelton. He played perfectly and I messed things up so he won. No problem in that. It is as it should be.

I will say this though regarding the VP system as some people seem to have misunderstood me. I donīt a grudge with a VP system. In fact in a asymmetrical game like this its a requirement. A must have in any MP game. But I do have a grudge with this VP system. In all my years of gaming I have never came across such as poorly designed system. Iīve already explained earlier in several places why its a horrible, horrible system and Iīm not going to repeat myself here. Some of you may not agree with me and that is fine. You are entitled to your opinion as am I to mine. Quite possible the disagreement lies in different perceptions on how the game should be played. But I bet you any professional game designer would agree with me.

I also want to clarify something regarding the 1000 VP penalty. I donīt have a problem or issue with the penalty per see. But rather with the reasons its there. If the game was properly designed there wouldnīt have been a reason for it in the first place. Do you understand the difference? The fundamental design of the game is faulty. And instead of fixing the real issue they came up with the penalty. Its lazy and a poor design. Same goes for the ground losses penalty. Its just there to stop the WAs from steamrolling the Germans in 43. So we make up a penalty instead of actually fixing the problem with proper and solid mechanics. Its lazy and it will come back to bite them. And its an insult considering the very hefty price they set for the game.

That being said its also a rather clumsy and inflexible penalty which pretty clearly shows the designers lack of experience/inability to come up with a proper VP system. A much better system would have been to start out with a smaller penalty given each turn. Say -20VPs and then increased it exponentially as time pass by. This to avoid situations where a single happening will decide the outcome of the entire game.

In essence a good solid VP system sits in the background. It gives you some flexibility, it awards success and it punishes mistakes. It can be manipulated to a degree by both players. Its a reflection of what happens/have happened in a game. The system should be closely tied to the game being played. In WitW the system instead exists outside the game and for the most part has absolutely nothing to do with the game. This causes a feeling of disconnect from the actual game. It also creates a feeling of "fighting the system" rather then the opponent. Especially true for the WA player in WitW.

Can anyone here mention a single game with a similar VP system as WitW? No? Why is that you think...

Is it playable? Yes. Do some people enjoy it? Yes. Do I enjoy it? No. Is it possible I will enjoy it in the future? Yes. But right now the only thing feasible for the WAs is to land in Northern Europe ASAP and bludgeon their way to Berlin as fast as possible as LiquidSky did or was about to do. That is a complete failure both for the game design and the VP system. Does anyone here believe that makes for a good, interesting and fun game? To remove 70% of the map and shorten the game by a year?

No, the devs failed on this one. Given the price tag this game should have been so much more then it is. Look at the forum activity and tell me Iīm wrong. 3 months after the game is released the forum is already pretty much dead and people canīt find opponents to play.

That is not a successful game.





Flaviusx -> RE: Spanking of the Sheep! - JocMeister(WA) vs Pelton(Axis) (3/2/2015 11:14:00 AM)

I got the Tarhunnas game wrong, but MichaelT was grinding you to powder in that game, Pelton. Pretty much everybody looking at that game thought so except you. I won't bother linking the thread. I can't believe you are still contesting this.

The turtle failed. Too clever by half.

Joc, I my recommendation is trying the game again with somebody other than Pelton who is perhaps less interested in finding ways to break the game. You've had a frustrating experience here playing against a tester who has chosen to optimize the game to the nth degree and gave you absolutely no handicaps; this will almost inevitably result in absurdities in a design this complex. It becomes a race to the bottom to see who can do the most ridiculous thing. And I'm going to call out Pelton here for taking advantage of rookies.

I don't agree with you that this design is fundamentally broken, although it can surely be improved.






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