Slitherine

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ORIGINAL: bodmerm

If you dont win as Axis in 1941 you are determined to loose. Somehow the game feels "fixed" whether or not you survive blizzard reasonably or not. What is the fun part uf such determinism? I dont know.

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ORIGINAL: Klydon

This is one of the reasons I am not happy with playing against the Russian AI (unlimited command points) because destruction of the Red army in terms of counters can't take place.

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ORIGINAL: Jim D Burns

The way I look at things is the real victory contest begins in 1944 and beyond, the early part of the game is just a setup phase for this final contest.

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ORIGINAL: bodmerm

Agree. Despite 9.1 millions inflicted losses, Soviet union has 80k arty, 23k planes (having destroyed 24k!) and 15k armored vehicles. I am holding Leningrad till Yaroslavl in the north, I held all big southern cities till Voronoezh and I am 5 hexes from Moscow. I encircled 250 k men in the north within 3 turns only to see there are 50k corps coming up there 3 turns afterwards.
I suggest to balance this game out and let the axis player have a chance if he avoids crucial mistakes as happened in the ral conflict (Stalingrad, Crimea, Kuban, Kursk...). It is simply not motivating, thats all.

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ORIGINAL: pompack

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ORIGINAL: bodmerm

Agree. Despite 9.1 millions inflicted losses, Soviet union has 80k arty, 23k planes (having destroyed 24k!) and 15k armored vehicles. I am holding Leningrad till Yaroslavl in the north, I held all big southern cities till Voronoezh and I am 5 hexes from Moscow. I encircled 250 k men in the north within 3 turns only to see there are 50k corps coming up there 3 turns afterwards.
I suggest to balance this game out and let the axis player have a chance if he avoids crucial mistakes as happened in the ral conflict (Stalingrad, Crimea, Kuban, Kursk...). It is simply not motivating, thats all.

Once again, I have to disagree. I got an auto-victory in 43 after inflicting fewer casualties than that. I do agree with the part that says the real contest (usually but not always) is in 44 to see if you can hold out longer than IRL. But that is only after you fail in 41 and 42 to set up for total victory in 43.


Now I think that (at least in 1.03) while it is possible to totally defeat the Russian AI (Challangeing) about two times out of five, I have only seen two AARs for human-human play that did (could have) achieved that. But once again, if you want to get an even game between two perfectly matched human players than all you have to do is adjust the handicap bars to do it.

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ORIGINAL: Jim D Burns

Germany should not be able to win the grand campaign game early unless they literally clear the map of Soviet units, and that should be all but impossible. The way I look at things is the real victory contest begins in 1944 and beyond, the early part of the game is just a setup phase for this final contest. If Germany manages to keep the Russians out of Western Europe all together by game end, it should be a decisive win. Any other result should be weighed against historical progress to settle on what level of victory or defeat Germany achieves.

Ending the game in 1941 or 1942 makes no sense to me. It feels like the German players on the forums arguing for a change simply don't want to game out the second half of the war and want to end the game prematurely before that part of the war even begins. How on earth will you manage to keep Soviet payers interested in the game if you take away the second half of the war by adding in some kind of sudden death rule? Heck I'd even envision German players pointing to their lack of achieving a sudden death as an automatic Soviet victory and resigning their games the way Japanese players tend to resign in WitP if they fail to get their needed 3-1 victory points early in that game.

If the victory goals in game are focused on the end game achievements from the very start of the game, then everyone is looking ahead to that future outcome and planning accordingly. If you bring the mark down to a 1941 or 1942 potential win, then that's where everyone will be looking and they'll do things that hurt their 1944+ prospects in efforts to win early. And when those early wins don't materialize and they've damaged their army beyond repair in the effort to reach it...

If you want to win as the axis in 1941/42, then create some 1 year long campaign scenarios that can give reasoned victory conditions based against historical progress at those times.

Jim

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ORIGINAL: PeeDeeAitch

Screw that, I am just going to end all my games now and declare myself the winner.

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ORIGINAL: Klydon

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ORIGINAL: PeeDeeAitch

Screw that, I am just going to end all my games now and declare myself the winner.

/snicker

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ORIGINAL: Wild

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ORIGINAL: Jim D Burns

Germany should not be able to win the grand campaign game early unless they literally clear the map of Soviet units, and that should be all but impossible. The way I look at things is the real victory contest begins in 1944 and beyond, the early part of the game is just a setup phase for this final contest. If Germany manages to keep the Russians out of Western Europe all together by game end, it should be a decisive win. Any other result should be weighed against historical progress to settle on what level of victory or defeat Germany achieves.

Ending the game in 1941 or 1942 makes no sense to me. It feels like the German players on the forums arguing for a change simply don't want to game out the second half of the war and want to end the game prematurely before that part of the war even begins. How on earth will you manage to keep Soviet payers interested in the game if you take away the second half of the war by adding in some kind of sudden death rule? Heck I'd even envision German players pointing to their lack of achieving a sudden death as an automatic Soviet victory and resigning their games the way Japanese players tend to resign in WitP if they fail to get their needed 3-1 victory points early in that game.

If the victory goals in game are focused on the end game achievements from the very start of the game, then everyone is looking ahead to that future outcome and planning accordingly. If you bring the mark down to a 1941 or 1942 potential win, then that's where everyone will be looking and they'll do things that hurt their 1944+ prospects in efforts to win early. And when those early wins don't materialize and they've damaged their army beyond repair in the effort to reach it...

If you want to win as the axis in 1941/42, then create some 1 year long campaign scenarios that can give reasoned victory conditions based against historical progress at those times.

Jim

Finally, common sense.

I couldn't agree with you more Jim.

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If they limit their advance the first year let them prepare for winter. Or not. Let them decide before turn one and let the Soviet player guess whether or not the Axis will go full throttle in 1941 or hold back and limit the first year advance to a line, say Lake Ladoga/Vyazma/Bryansk/Zaporozhye and prepare for winter. No Typhoon.

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ORIGINAL: Wild

I have no problem with optional rules for people who wish to explore what if's.

I just don't wish to play a game that has been fictionalized by trying to make the sides evenly balanced when in real life they weren't.

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ORIGINAL: bjmorgan

It sure seems that some of you believe that Germany was destined to lose the war on June 23, 1941. Twenty-four hours into the campaign and it was over. Finis. Done. Carve up the Fatherland, start the trials.

Well, I don't. The odds may have been pretty long once the attack began because campaign against the Soviet Union may have been Herr Hitler's largest blunder, but I don't recall all of the Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin patting themselves on the back at their luck, and having conversations about dividing up the spoils. To the contrary, it seems like their general reaction was "oh crap!" They sure seemed to think that they could lose the war. And you know, they may have been right.

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The Soviet side is not bound to it's 1941 mistakes. No player is bound to failed counter stroke after failed counter stroke or failed offensive after failed offensive. Perhaps the Soviet player should have to make X number of attacks consisting of X number of units by type at X date to keep it historical just as the Axis must advance and then suffer uprepared for the Blizzards. But why? Why does the Axis side have to be unprepared for winter? Because that's what happened historically. But why is one side irrevocably bound by history while the other is not? This is the question. The answer repeated over and over is because this is what happened historically

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ORIGINAL: Panama

Many Soviets commented that they had won the war once the U.S. entered the fray. Was no stretch considering the U.S. industry coupled with the Soviet industry equaled no match for any other alliance on the planet. It was only a matter of time. The U.S. knew that. The Soviets knew that.

Only chance Axis had was knocking USSR out of the picture. But the game does not allow this because it focuses on a 1941 historical Axis drive into the USSR. This is the history of East Front campaign games.

The Axis is doomed to suffer the winter of 41/42 because that's what happened historically. They advanced to exhaustion and then the winter offensives which the game faithfully mirrors. There is no way to avoid this even though there were ways to avoid this because this is how history was written.

The Soviet side is not bound to it's 1941 mistakes. No player is bound to failed counter stroke after failed counter stroke or failed offensive after failed offensive. Perhaps the Soviet player should have to make X number of attacks consisting of X number of units by type at X date to keep it historical just as the Axis must advance and then suffer uprepared for the Blizzards. But why? Why does the Axis side have to be unprepared for winter? Because that's what happened historically. But why is one side irrevocably bound by history while the other is not? This is the question. The answer repeated over and over is because this is what happened historically.

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ORIGINAL: mikemcmann

Not sure what the issue is really here. There is no guaranteed loss of men in blizzard. You can actually have zero theoretical losses due to winter if all divisions are in cities and/or west/south of the zone.

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ORIGINAL: mikemcmann

Since "conquering" Russia is effectively not possible given reasonable soviet play, trying to conquer it is a waste. Just wreck a reasonable amount of industry, kill as many troops as possible, then retreat to safety. By the time the soviets reach your lines, winter is over. Then proceed to just kill russians. Most fight in 42 at easily achievable odds will kill 2 or more to one. As long as the soviets total is less than 2.5 times your army, you are fine.

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ORIGINAL: mikemcmann

This line will put you about Riga to Kiev to Odessa depending. Holding that geography results in a German victory in 45. Just hold there in massive forts while doing spoiling attacks with armor. Piece of cake...... Won't ever be decisive, but a wins a win.... ;)

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ORIGINAL: mikemcmann

Just saying.....blizzard whini-ness is tiresome.....