Strength of DEI (Full Version)

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IanShaw -> Strength of DEI (2/12/2022 6:15:15 PM)

I played 6 games (Allies vs AI Axis, Historical balance) with the original release of WPP, and in all 6 cases the DEI fell very quickly. Could be argued a bit too quickly, but no matter. I then upgraded to Zero-Five and in all 3 games I played the DEI survived. The Japanese landed at Surabaya, slowly made their way across to Batavia, but at no stage did they land in Sumatra (which is what they did historically?). Given the paramount importance of the Batavia hex, I withdrew otherwise unoccupied Dutch forces to that hex and created a full corps, and although in 2 of the 3 games the Japanese attacked at low odds, they soon gave up. I did nothing else to bolster the defence (de Ruyter CL immediately withdrew to Ceylon, no US or UK intervention). Eventually in late 1942 the Australians landed unopposed at Surabaya and that was the end of the Axis on Java. Without the DEI oil (the Japanese having taken just the Northern Borneo oil) the IJN seemed to spend most of the game in port.
Furthermore the DEI AF seems too strong - 20 SPs? Most of the other at-start Allied AFs are down at about 5. In one game it got 4 hits on the Yamato, in my most recent one it sank the Haruna which was cruising off Batavia.
Perhaps I should increase the play balance, but as it stands it appears that the DEI can always survive against the AI with historical balance, whereas surely they had no chance in reality?



*Lava* -> RE: Strength of DEI (2/12/2022 6:33:35 PM)

Did you bump up the difficulty level at all?



IanShaw -> RE: Strength of DEI (2/12/2022 7:10:02 PM)

Good point - not yet, though I should give that a go. But will that make a difference to how the AI decides its strategy - will it actually invade Sumatra with the increased balance setting? Or is this random and in the three games I've played with Zero-Five the AI decided not to? In the 3 games I've played with Zero-Five I've used the Random AI strategy, though with limited oil (DEI surviving each time) it was never clear what strategy it was actually following.
I gather that there may be a new release soon? I thought I'd delay my next game until that appears. WPP is certainly an excellent game (congrats to Alvaro).



generalfdog -> RE: Strength of DEI (2/12/2022 8:50:16 PM)

The AI is just not that good if you want a challenge you have to bump them up 1 or 2 levels on both logistics and experience. Playing WPE a descent player can easily hold France vs a historical AI and Germany doesn't stand a chance either, original release was balanced for AI to be able to easily accomplish historical objectives, but human players were having a run away and it was too easy for Japan so it was rebalanced now it plays pretty well vs 2 evenly matched human players, if you want the AI to keep up they need a boost



*Lava* -> RE: Strength of DEI (2/12/2022 11:21:44 PM)

Even with the boost, I let the Japanese AI run riot in the DEI. If they don't take the oil objectives there, it's game over. So not much fun. After that, if you have given a bump to the AI, the game is really fun and it is no holds barred.

Personally I believe that strategy games of this nature need to be based for single players. Single player strategy games, IMO, is where the sales are. I, for one, am not really interested in PBEM centric games.

For PBEM, house rules can always be implemented to even things out.



generalfdog -> RE: Strength of DEI (2/13/2022 2:22:52 PM)

I don't hardly play the AI any more so I would disagree because of that but also because the AI is never as good as a human and I think it should be balanced for somewhat equal playing skills, but it should be fun for all glad you enjoy playing AI it should work for that also, that is why you can turn up the difficulty right?



*Lava* -> RE: Strength of DEI (2/13/2022 3:28:05 PM)

We'll have to beg to differ, I guess.

I think if you look at gaming in general, you still have lots of competitive titles, but the number of Coop games have been increasing each year.

I personally prefer single player.



GiveWarAchance -> RE: Strength of DEI (2/14/2022 3:24:15 AM)

I prefer single player too. These games tend to be balanced which favors PBEM games but is bad for single player. Ideally there should be two versions of a scenario for single player so it gives the AI side more units and other advantages to help them. A good example is the Gary Grisby game 'World at War: A world divided" which has two beefed up campaigns Axis Power and Allied Arsenal or something like that so the player goes against the beefed up AI side. As the axis, it took me 6 or 8 tries to finally overcome the brutal allies, and I tried the allied side against the Axis Power and couldn't really survive except one hotseat game I did with another human helping me to fight against the fiendish AI.



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