Newbie planning towards WitE 2

[RobWorham]

Greetings!
Long time lurker who is looking to get back into WitE/WitW with a view to being proficient enough to get stuck straight into full campaigns once WitE 2 is released.

In the past I played a fair bit of WitE up to the 'Road to' level, but never got to play a full campaign. The game has sat idle for a couple of years (or more), so I think I'd have to start over from the beginning and work my way back to that sort of level again before I pushed on further.

I bought WitW on release and dabbled with the Husky scenario but never got much further due to work/spare time issues over the past year.

My question is, if I want to be proficient enough to jump in at the deep end when WitE 2 is released would I be better off playing WitE to better learn the theatre, armies etc, or would it be beneficial for me to play WitW and learn the mechanics of that system, which I presume would be closer to what we'll be dealing with in WitE 2?

I don't think I am going to have the time to learn and play both games as my spare time for wargaming is somewhat limited.

Any help or advice would be very much appreciated on this little conundrum.

[loki100]

I'll try

Problem is there is no answer.

You are right, the core mechanics -esp around logistics and air - for WiTE2 will be derived from those in WiTW. But WiTW simply does not have the scale of WiTE and a lot of the tools for handling those large armies across a vast map are as valid in WiTE2 as they were in WiTE.

So the trade off you have is spend your time trying to get used to the scale and underlying dynamics of WiTE or the newer mechanics of WiTW.

If you play WiTE, what I would suggest is to try to play with not to the full (unrealistic) freedom that the WiTE logistical/supply model gives you. This is more a mindset than anything else and of course near impossible in PBEM but feasible vs the AI - use the at start game options to hamper your own side.

[RobWorham]

Thanks for your reply loki.

If I was to side with WitE, can you please give more details regarding start game options that would better simulate the real world logistical problems that the Axis suffered. Also, are there any good threads/posts that spring to mind that further detail the inaccuracy of the current logistics model?

I'm not too worried about the potential air side to WitE 2 as I would probbaly work my way through that aspect using the development you mentioned in the WitE 2 thread.

A bit more on the airwar - as I suspect this is the single thing that is the most different to WiTE1 - at least from a gameplay perspective.

You can automate it at one of 4 levels:

1) - give it to the AI, the AI will handle setting up missions, allocation of planes, moving air units up to the front etc. In WiTW using this option gives 'ok' results. But if the whole thing reduces you to a quiver of jelly, then do this and concentrate on moving the ground counters

2) - use the AI. Here what you do is to set target priorities for each air command - how much interdiction against ground support and so on. The AI will take these instructions and construct missions. Optionally you can tell it to move your airunits (as above) or do it manually. From WiTW this gives pretty decent results and you can change the mission instructions from turn to turn (obv in WiTW turns with big naval invasions may see a different pattern of missions and so on)

2a) - I like the AI but. You can use (2) to set up the skeleton of your missions and then manually adjust to fit your own exact needs. When I was first learning WiTW I found this very useful as the AI generated missions gave you a framework and then you could change specific elements. Over time you can take more and more control, till ....

3) - who needs the AI. I think this will be the norm as it is no big deal. Here you create your own missions, allocate the planes, select the target zone and other parameters. If moving planes between bases is too much you can still use the AI for this.

4) - I want to micro. Really a variant of the above. Change bomber loads, swap between rockets and bombs, add fuel tanks. As opposed to sending all (or most) of the bombers in an air command on the same mission (and let the AI do the detail of which plane strikes which hex etc), set up 4-6 missions per air group (the number is limited by the competence of your commander). Have your Ju-87s doing something different to your Ju-88s. Send your U2VS' on night harrasment missions etc. In general there may be less gain to doing this as neither side has the range of aircraft types that the Allies do in WiTW, but with the mid-game Soviets I could see the merit of using the Il-2s for front line strikes and the Pe-2/Il-4s for rear area interdiction.

[loki100]

the key difference is that in WiTE, if you are near a functioning rail line that can deliver a limitless amount of supply to any point. In WiTE2, there are two capacities of rail line and single track does not move much freight (and freight is supply/ammo/replacements and fuel). Second you need a rail line and a depot. Many places in the Soviet Union can only support relatively small depots so the few central hubs (places like Minsk. Kiev and Smolensk) become very desirable.

Now this gives a geographical aspect to logistics that you simply do not have in WiTE. Send a Pzr army into the Valdai and you have two problems - only 2 rail lines in any case (at the very best, and in 1941 probably neither available) and almost no close by depots (certainly no large ones). You'll burn off your at start supply quickly and strangle your own offensive etc.

I don't think you can simulate this with the WiTE tools, apart from by self-imposed constraints. What I would play around with are the logistics and transportation settings. Try both at <90%, at the least that will make resupply off the rail net more of a challenge. In an AI game, you can always shift these up or down if you feel its too much/too easy. What you are trying to capture is that major troop commitments away from the main transport networks is a challenge.

But the problem is that WiTE has been balanced around its own logistic model, so with the axis you need that capacity etc.