Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (Full Version)

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blackcloud6 -> Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/22/2021 7:44:39 PM)

I have WitE & WitW and have played them off and on. They do seem to be a micro-manager's game. i did try to go deep into WitW once but found the air campaign tough to manage.

Is WitE2 easier to play? Is it still a micromanager's game or can you get the computer to the detailed stuff anf youy, the player gets to be a general?

I have my anniversary coupon and now CM: Cold War delayed again, I need to use my coupon.




loki100 -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/22/2021 8:53:40 PM)

The game comes with 3 major AI assists, one handles the bulk of the logistics, you can handle SUs as you do in WiTE1 and reduce air war management to setting priorities, which HQs receive the support and how the air groups move on the map.

At that stage you are left essentially with an on-map divisional/brigade game.

All these function 'well enough', so esp vs the AI won't trip you up.

Of course you can fuss with the loadout of individual air groups, try to wring every bit out of the logistics system by ultra-obsessed local control etc [:)]



blackcloud6 -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/22/2021 9:01:37 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: loki100

The game comes with 3 major AI assists, one handles the bulk of the logistics, you can handle SUs as you do in WiTE1 and reduce air war management to setting priorities, which HQs receive the support and how the air groups move on the map.

At that stage you are left essentially with an on-map divisional/brigade game.

All these function 'well enough', so esp vs the AI won't trip you up.

Of course you can fuss with the loadout of individual air groups, try to wring every bit out of the logistics system by ultra-obsessed local control etc [:)]



Ah good. In Wite/WitW I felt like, at times, I needed a staff. So WitE2 has the staff built in.



AlbertN -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/22/2021 9:37:23 PM)

The level of micromanagement is pratically the same. The AI assistants will escort you while you're a newbye and average player - but they're not fully reliable for pro / master play.
They're definitely a good assist to learn the game step by step.

I believe the UI for Air Missions can be simplified though further to reduce the clicks (Or maybe I've not learnt how!) - but I've good hopes there, unless one expects real top notch results and thus invest relative time for ...

What denies some micromanagement if you play Axis is the Partisan stuff - that for me was a real seller. A more realistic approach to Partisans in an abstract way that still impacts the game.

If you play against the AI probably you can live with the AI Assistants (at normal level at least).

I suggest you upgrade. I quite enjoy the WITE2 experience even if I have the first impressions that the game is pretty one sided. But I'll see over time better once I've more turns and PvP games in the bag!



blackcloud6 -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/23/2021 2:35:21 PM)

Thanks everyone. I couldn't decide between the Warplan Bundle or WitE2 so I was indecisive and bought them both.



heliodorus04 -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/23/2021 3:06:59 PM)

I myself remain unconvinced.
I think these GG games are over-modeled with vast quantities of insignificant data such that black box of combat fails to reflect the second world war in a realistic way. Right now, it's 50mm mortars. Next patch it will be something else.
I also think it will be years before WitE 2 is balanced to be fun to play as either side. One side or the other always has a distinct advantage in knowing how to avoid historical mistakes and the engine will favor that side until patched.
History repeats itself.
History repeats itself...



GloriousRuse -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/23/2021 11:03:11 PM)

As a reply to the above, it’s true that in a system as extensively detailed at as a GG game, there is an inevitable issue somewhere. And while there is room for improvement in any product or database - always - it is worth noting that many times attention to a picayune micro-tactical detail derails the perception of realism unfairly.

It is true, for instance, that 37mm ATG crews should probably not fire their pistols during an attack. And if this were Combat Mission, or Steel Panthers, et al, this would be an egregious issue if it were occurring. But it’s not. The combat model exists to determine “did we take/hold this hex” and to provide an extremely graduates set of discrete measurements that will reflect in the larger operational layer. If the occasional pistol hero makes it through, but the net effect is realistic outcomes for large unit fights and to create a highly realistic system for tracking, supplying, replacing, refitting, and generating readiness that drives those large unit battles…do we really, truly care about that pistol, or are we just screaming about something recognizable because it’s an easy shot to take, while ignoring that the game basically gets right the stuff that truly drives war at this scale. The last being particularly notable given how many games treat the actual essential parts of the operational level as little more than abstraction to outright fantasy?



AlbertN -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/24/2021 12:35:54 AM)

Ideally it can be fixed, I mean, if every crew of artillery pieces gets to fire their own hand weapons there is a massive multiplier of riflemen all around the place.
It is not a MINOR thing!

But in general most of the strategy games of some depth requires an amount of balancing. And in general that happens through player-vs-player game.



GloriousRuse -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/24/2021 1:40:23 AM)

I mean, let’s run some numbers. Say, 150 “guns” per battle end up shooting their pistols - a lot of the gun numbers rep other supporting fire elements than artillery and ATGs - times say 20 battles a week, by a clean 213 turns. 639,000 pistol engagements, with a hit per fire of around 0.05, of which maybe one fifth are “destroyed” with a rough average of 6 men an element. So…38k losses combined between two sides over four years?

It’s not zero, but in a scale where you’ll rack up 5M losses in the opening 30 weeks…



heliodorus04 -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/24/2021 4:14:26 PM)

Like most people who grew up in the 70s and 80s, I came to computer games from historical war board games.
The greatest and also the most complex tabletop wargames (because those can be distinctly separate) do not waste time and resources modeling things that don't matter. For some reason, GG design took all the data from Steel Panthers (a squad-level, tactical game) and included it in WitE (I'm speaking of WitE 1 unless specified with '2').

I'm not a computer programmer but I do understand statistics, and the amount of data in WitE defies the principle of simple engineering being superior to complex engineering when both accomplish the same tasks. I know enough about black box data algorithms to know that the input for the WitE combat engine was never good. Then strap atop that another over-engineered system for aircraft, and you have what we saw in WitE early design (trench warfare beginning in 1942 with German players abandoning multi-player until patches and patches started to bring things back to 'fun' (I speak not of realism without prejudice).

By the time I looked under the hood with War in the West, the design engine struck me as a 'Railroad Tycoon'-style supply distribution system, with an hyper-detailed (read: no-fun) air/anti-aircraft engine interacting with the supply system as the primary factor determining combat strength of units; generalship, equipment, most terrain, and the quality of troops played walk-on roles in that complex ballet and in the end, I went back to playing wargames on tables...

For whatever faults it had, WitE was fun to play solitaire for years, and I still dink around with an old save from time to time. I couldn't bear the data over-load on myself as player of WitW. And I play one of the most complicate wargames in the world in Advanced Squad Leader...



AlbertN -> RE: Convince me to upgrade to WitE2 (7/24/2021 7:13:07 PM)

I admit I skipped WITW entirely and barely scratched WITE exactly due to the huge amount of fluff that is there.
I am with Heliodurus that 'excess of data' spoils the game, but ultimately unless one goes down the route of the 'pro-league' one can play WITE serie to some lightweight extent.

On the other hand - still with the premise that one does not go play with the Pro-League - mild data and all are nice to have and pleasant.

Nonetheless, I accounted in the game will need balancing and I expect somehow it will have a year or so where the Soviets will dominate the fields as I see already in most AARs. It happened in WITE and it will probably repeat here. The issue is that in the while a good part of the gaming audience will move on (as it happened for me in WITE1).



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