wpurdom
Posts: 476
Joined: 10/27/2000 From: Decatur, GA, USA Status: offline
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I'm all in favor of avoiding snowballing. The game engine overestimates the value of experience in combat after initial exposure. (But gamers love this because success makes better units so they can improve their units by cleverness). A well-trained soldier picks up most of the advantage of experience in actual combat in the first couple of weeks or so of being under fire. There certainly is some support that many units also had a initial sub-par (short) period - look at the 79th and 90th divisions in Normandy. Not much evidence of pick-up thereafter for the individual or individual unit, and at the individual level combat fatigue is going to limit effectiveness after a while. And success is not a block to combat fatigue. (Clear-cut defeat, I'm sure, can add to combat fatigue). Some examples to think about: in the Civil War fresh units were often more effective than experienced ones on attack, during the 1864 both armies in the East became combat ineffective for offensive operations. Does anybody think the Stonewall brigade was better man for man in July 1863 than they were in the Valley campaign? Much of the advantage in experience goes to the units that aren't actually in combat. Think of the 104th Timberwolf division - it started out as a superior division on its first day of combat because it absorbed the lessons of those before it. The 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th Marine Divisions didn't need experience to excel either. More specific to the Germans, if they want to have a higher morale, they need to draft fewer people in 1944. They were scraping the bottom of the barrel. there is no real evidence that the Germans lost morale to anything other than combat fatigue, they diluted their officer corps, had inferior training as compared to before, and were scraping the bottom going with oldersters, youngsters, and foriegners - older folk just aren't as good on the front line - at Guadalcanal, for instance, some of the best Marines, certainly the most experienced, over 25-30 just couldn't handle the physical and mental strain. If there were to be any variable input into national morale it should not be "success" or casualties inflicted, but only overall theater casualties incurred.
< Message edited by wpurdom -- 1/25/2017 5:24:19 PM >
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