Factory Raiding Nonsense

[abulbulian]

Ok, just have to post my 2cents on what I think is ridiculous and becoming very annoying. I've lost some respect recently for players that have employed this tactic against their Soviet foes.

Let's just think about this for a minute. So in one example a weakened Panzer Div was able to slip into a Moscow hex and proceed to effectively demolish all factory structures in a few days(?). Wow, really? So they had enough demo charges to pull this off. Deep inside hostile territory the troops had nothing better to do than demolish factory structures? This is so laughable it's almost embarrassing something hasn't been done yet to model this more appropriately. In this case it was a division that wiped out all structures, but in reality any size combat unit could have done the same thing.

I have some suggestions (quick thoughts) that could help put to rest this gamey and unrealistic situation.

A percentage of factories will be destroyed based on the following.
- size of the occupying unit
- amount of pioneers (sappers) in the hex
- duration hex under enemy control
- enemy factory hex is in friendly controll and completely behind friendly lines

This will make most raiding situations very unappetizing for many players and put some more reality back in WitE. I understand this would not be easy to code, due to the concept of controlled hex, but something should be done.

[Flaviusx]

Or Soviet players could just garrison stuff in the rear?

[Klydon]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

Or Soviet players could just garrison stuff in the rear?

+1

[abulbulian]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

Or Soviet players could just garrison stuff in the rear?

Sure, that too. But it's still a fantasy world to have any size unit demolish the entire production of large factory site.

Let's look at your comment for a second. [:-]

Let's say there was a situation in which attacking an airbase with at least one surviving bomber could wipe out all aircraft on the airbase as long as no flak units were present. So your answer would not be to address the unrealistic destruction of all airbase aircraft, but rather to tell players to always have at least one flak unit present?

Sorry, I just don't see this helping the game at all.

[bwheatley]

I agree with what ara is saying factories should be killed over time based on how many engineers are with a unit. Ara being an axis player it's nice that he sees the silliness of it.
On another topic the idea that any unit of any size in the hex adjacent to a factory will stop it from using rail is something that could probably use an update as well. History does not support that and it should be easy to fix it in the codebase.

[kirkgregerson]

ORIGINAL: bwheatley

I agree with what ara is saying factories should be killed over time based on how many engineers are with a unit. Ara being an axis player it's nice that he sees the silliness of it.
On another topic the idea that any unit of any size in the hex adjacent to a factory will stop it from using rail is something that could probably use an update as well. History does not support that and it should be easy to fix it in the codebase.

+1 Yes, agreed it's shameful that some people do take advantage of this 'raiding'. But in fairness, since the game allows it you can't get on these people too much. At least it exposes a flaw in the mechanics for this aspect of the game. Now that a problem has been identifying, I hope at some point in a future patch a fix can occur.

[Peltonx]

Grow up and garrison your city lol.

And History doesnt support Russian player running like a bunch of hilly billys after turn 2.

Or

deaths under 4 million or the over rated russian rail system.

Russian fanboys want to have there cake and eat it to as always.

Pelton

[JAMiAM]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

Or Soviet players could just garrison stuff in the rear?

That would be too sensible...[:D]

[jzardos]

It appears some of you want to make jokes rather than contribute to thread with something meaningful. It's not really the point to garrison or not garrison. Let's say you garrison and the raider still gets a lucky hasty attack and occupies, the problem has not gone away.

I agree there should be some changes to how factories are destroyed by the enemy. I also agree with abulbulian that the sensible fix will not be easy to code, so I don't foresee anything changing soon. It will come down to house rules for me going forward until some changes occur.

[Tazak]

I was trained as a combat engineer within a british infanty unit so trust me when i say its not hard to stop a factory from being used for long periods as long as you know where/what to go for. you dont need to bring the entire building down (although it does help[:D] )

"But it's still a fantasy world to have any size unit demolish the entire production of large factory site."

All combat divisions had organic engineer support, making a assumation they would have a limited stock of demo charges, coupled with factories own stocks of what could be used to aid their destruction its entirely feasible for larger combat units to destroy factories, even with no demo charges, most divisions in this game have either CS tanks or arty whose shells could do the job, maybe not as effective but still.

[Empire101]

ORIGINAL: jzardos

It appears some of you want to make jokes rather than contribute to thread with something meaningful. It's not really the point to garrison or not garrison. Let's say you garrison and the raider still gets a lucky hasty attack and occupies, the problem has not gone away.

I agree there should be some changes to how factories are destroyed by the enemy. I also agree with abulbulian that the sensible fix will not be easy to code, so I don't foresee anything changing soon. It will come down to house rules for me going forward until some changes occur.

'Lets say you garrison and the raider still gets lucky'............

Lets look at that for a moment. Are you seriously saying that luck is such a fundemental danger that it should be ruled out of the game.?
A gameturn is a week long for both sides. 7 days of intense street fighting in a heavily built up area would be like a lifetime for the troops involved, and the destruction of plant and heavy machinery would be of a consequence not an objective of that horrendeous fight between two sides that would give no quarter in reality, bombs and shells constantly raining down wherever the enemy were or were perceived to be.

The plant would not be targeted by the Germans per se, as anything that was'nt bolted down in the East was immediately transported back to Reich, or fixed in situ. But the Russians did target plant and rolling stock that would have been left behind, to deny it to the invaders.

This raiding business keeps on cropping up and it is not a very constructive topic in my opinion.

FlaviusX I think summed it up with his statement 'Or the Soviet players could just garrison stuff in the rear'. How very true. You can't have your cake and eat it in 41/42, but by 43, a methodical Soviet opponent is deadly.

I have stated before that my regular opponent would just turn my Panzers into scrap if they went driving off into the steppe without adequate support and back up trying to junk a few Arms points.

[abulbulian]

7 days of intense street fighting in a heavily built up area would be like a lifetime for the troops involved, and the destruction of plant and heavy machinery would be of a consequence not an objective of that horrendeous fight between two sides that would give no quarter in reality, bombs and shells constantly raining down wherever the enemy were or were perceived to be.

But you couldn't be more wrong here. It's not 7 days, that's part of the main point. When the these raiders usually arrive their MPs are usually down to nothing. Thus, it might be several hrs not several days. Once again, I stand by my knowledge that it would be impossible for these raiders to demolish a large industrial complex like that of a Moscow hex in that amount of time.

Case an point: look at the destruction that took place at Stalingrad tractor factories, however, they were still churning out tanks. So to believe that you could completely disable some of these factories without razing them to the ground is just being ignorant.

[Encircled]

Another vote here for garrisons in your cities

With everybody who is Soviet concentrating on armament points evacuation, you shouldn't have too much of a problem garrisoning them.

[jzardos]

ORIGINAL: Tazak

I was trained as a combat engineer within a british infanty unit so trust me when i say its not hard to stop a factory from being used for long periods as long as you know where/what to go for. you dont need to bring the entire building down (although it does help[:D] )

"But it's still a fantasy world to have any size unit demolish the entire production of large factory site."

All combat divisions had organic engineer support, making a assumation they would have a limited stock of demo charges, coupled with factories own stocks of what could be used to aid their destruction its entirely feasible for larger combat units to destroy factories, even with no demo charges, most divisions in this game have either CS tanks or arty whose shells could do the job, maybe not as effective but still.

I don't think you understand how vast some of these industrial complexes were. Sure, a unit of decent size could have the means to destroy several buildings, but as abulbulian point out it was not easy to completely destroy some of these factory sites.

Tazak, I have a relative in the 1st Combat Engineer Battalion, USMC which took part in 'Operation Iraqi Freedom'. I did text him a quick question about this and he does own this game. He said the process is possible if the correct supplies of demolishing material was present, but would a timely process to destroy what would be hundreds of buildings, some very large. He also doesn't agree that the army formation would be to key on expending what would probably be limited hvy ammunition (arty and HE rounds) if they were deep into enemy lines. This unit would have to be like a kamikaze unit, but last time I checked this was the axis player in WitE and not the Japs in WitP [:'(]

[jzardos]

ORIGINAL: Encircled

Anyone vote here for garrisons in your cities

With everybody who is Soviet concentrating on armament points evacuation, you shouldn't have too much of a problem garrisoning them.

Don't get this comment? Nobody is saying not to garrison and the thread is not about the logic to garrison a factory hex. The thread is about trying to make the game a bit more realistic towards this concept of factory destruction. Last time I checked most of us here are for improvements to the game. I'll agree there's probably big fish to fry when it comes to things to fix, but let's not sweep this under the carpet with some bogus comment that garrisoning a hex makes this problem go away. As said, a unit can still get unlucky and be displaced. To which the impact of a 'lucky' raider could still have severe consequences to the Soviet player (or axis later?).

[janh]

Somewhat related question for everyone: 
Have the Germans on entering a city with the purpose of permanently occupying it, as in 41 and still in 42, destroyed the industrial and infrastructure components themselves, or did they transport machines and stuff to Germany, or did they just leave it in place to be run by captives?  Strange, but that is rather obvious question that I do not recall to be typically covered in military literature. I recall that the Soviets on abandoning cities themselves sometimes did destroy things of use.  Was that commonly the order?

[Farfarer61]

We can't I capture the factory and churn out my own stuff unless the Sov player hits the "demolish factories" button before I get there? Now that's how it is supposed to work.

Otherwise, and perhaps more doable, when you fight in city, you will note that the factories get damaged each battle - the degradation can be very Stalingrad-like. If the Axis player cannot start rebuilding and using the stuff, an option would be the battle damage model, using a standard result from an average large battle. For example, SS Mot Div enters hex = 50% damage to all the stuff. Next turn 50% of the remaining etc. So this means as a rough guess a raid puts the factories out of commission for a month if the raiding unit leaves or is pushed out on the next Sov turn.

Also, factories are "trained people" too.

[Encircled]

Oh, don't get me wrong, its not right, but its not a priority

Air war needs sorting next

[Ketza]

A few points.

I agree in may be difficult to destroy all the factories within a week of fighting but from another perspective it would be very difficult to move them in a weeks time.

When a city is raided its not just the factories that are destroyed its the cities transportation infrastructure as well as the workers of the factories and civil structure. Those factors would certainly lead to the factories being wrecked for a very long time.

I dont know why more Soviet players do not garrison cities. Maybe its because of my Axis play but when I play as Soviets I have divisions on refit sitting on every city with Industry within 25 hexes of the front and sometimes further back. When they hit a CV of 3 I then send them forward and replace them with other divisions. Doing this I have never been raided in over a dozen Soviet games.

[Erik Rutins]

I have to agree on the point about garrisoning. If you think the raid is not historical, how historical is it to have no garrison in Moscow with German forces close enough to get to it? This raid tactic is fairly easy to thwart with garrisons and Axis players who consider it will think twice if their reconnaissance shows a garrison in place.

Regards,

- Erik