Is there any way to turn off supply to Russia from the USA?

[wie201]

Or can it be added? In a Head-to-Head game Russia is flush with MPPs and the USA needs to stop sending them, if possible. Thanks!

[sPzAbt653]

Go to the Convoy Map and click on the convoys and see which ones you can adjust. It's in the War Maps tab at the upper left.

[BillRunacre]

Turning off the relevant Decision scripts would do it. The actual scripts will depend on which scripts you want to turn off, e.g. the ones via Vladivostock or the ones via Persia.

There are several US and Soviet Decision scripts controlling the transfer of income:

US:
DE 352, DE 353 and DE 369

USSR:
DE 453, DE 454 and DE 456

[DeriKuk]

It would be nice to turn off the British MPPs to the Soviets in the game; especially late in the campaign when the British really need the points and the Russians are drowning in the stuff, having nothing to spend it on. Could there be some point when Soviet MPP accumulation leads to a suspension in lend-lease? This could also be an issue when a multi-player format is available.

There is an additional, "warped" intent: Let the Axis take Murmansk and Archangelsk ... in order to effect the suspension of British lend-lease.

[wie201]

Thanks guys! I think sPzAbt653's idea is fairly easy to do and should work. You can even increase the amount (no need in my game).

I think I'll cut it from 20% to 10%, see the effect and the timing, and go from there.

Thanks again!

EDIT - Kudos to Hubert to even think of this option.

[FriendlyKomissar]

Not being 100%familiar on the programing side of this game yet, may I suggest that perhaps every 6 months Britain/United States gets an option to either continue lend lease or reduce it (by say half). Then 6 months later the UK gets the option to stop lend lease or put it back up to the full amount. Again 6 months later they can get the option to start it again or stop it.

This would allow the allied player to manage what gets sent lend lease as there were points in the war convoys were suspended.

Perhaps a penalty to soviet morale if they are suspended or stopped

[BillRunacre]

Hi everyone

The convoy from the UK to the USSR is under the UK player's control, so you can set it to send less MPPs to the Soviet Union if you find that the USSR doesn't need them.

To do this go to War Maps at the top of the screen and then click on the Convoy Map.

Only convoys from Majors can be adjusted, and they have an upper limit in MPPs (i.e. you cannot send all of the UK's production to the USSR).

US supplies via Persia and Vladivostock are scripted and can't be adjusted in the same way, the former will run for as long as the conditions permit (i.e. Persia and other places en route are in Allied hands) while the latter will run all game.

But the US can reduce its UK convoy and as the UK can do the same to its USSR one, overall they can retain more MPPs for themselves should the situation warrant it.

[James Taylor]

Now, as the Allies you've got to ask yourself, is it better to control the USSR MPPs through UK and deny the USA script providing 80 MPPs which is worth double to the USSR?

Are those 80 MPPs more versatile in USA hands at the loss of 80 for the USSR?

Tough question.

Since the Allies have a definite advantage anyway, my decision is to let USA keep 80 and give more through the UK if needed.

[Captjohn757]

Is anyone aware of any documentation/discussion that addresses the manner or formula used by the designers to arrive at the MPP distribution from the U.S. to the U.K. and Russia? I ask because this particular facet of the game seems appreciably out of sync with what happened historically. The U.S. provided about $50.1 billion in lend-lease to the allies during WWII, the bulk of which went to the British ($31.4 billion) and considerably less to the Soviets ($11.3 billion). Of the aid provided to the Russions, none, of course, was cash, but included all manner of chemicals, communications equipment, railroad locomotives and freight cars, foodstuffs, industrial equipment, clothing, even lipstick, of all things. Only about 20% of the aid constituted military equipment and munitions. Given this general picture, I really don't understand how, in Strategic Command, the Russians, were they following the historical script, could amass the juggernaut of an army and an overwhelming supply of MPPs that players are reporting. Any insight to this phenomenon would be appreciated.
Thanks!
Captjohn757

[Flaviusx]

ORIGINAL: Captjohn757

Is anyone aware of any documentation/discussion that addresses the manner or formula used by the designers to arrive at the MPP distribution from the U.S. to the U.K. and Russia? I ask because this particular facet of the game seems appreciably out of sync with what happened historically. The U.S. provided about $50.1 billion in lend-lease to the allies during WWII, the bulk of which went to the British ($31.4 billion) and considerably less to the Soviets ($11.3 billion). Of the aid provided to the Russions, none, of course, was cash, but included all manner of chemicals, communications equipment, railroad locomotives and freight cars, foodstuffs, industrial equipment, clothing, even lipstick, of all things. Only about 20% of the aid constituted military equipment and munitions. Given this general picture, I really don't understand how, in Strategic Command, the Russians, were they following the historical script, could amass the juggernaut of an army and an overwhelming supply of MPPs that players are reporting. Any insight to this phenomenon would be appreciated.
Thanks!
Captjohn757

All that stuff you mentioned allowed the Soviets to focus on military production, without it, they wouldn't have been able to produce anywhere near as much. This logistical support punches well above its nominal weight in terms of dollars or equipment. Essentially, the Soviet war economy outsourced much of its logistical underpinnings to the West.

The game simplifies this, but not incorrectly, unless you want to drown in spreadsheets and minutiae and play Soviet War Economy rather than WW2.

(Roughly speaking, in game lend lease increases the Soviet economy by maybe a third, give or take. This isn't crazy imo, if you look at things in GDP terms and MPPs as a rough and ready stand in for GDP.)

[freeboy]

I woulod say that the Lend lease affects are huge for manpower savign alone, then you add the truck etc... I know its not about the material for war as much as food and the underpinnings of the economy but the un interrupted supply really was a big part in the red army simply outgrowing the Wehrmacht.. supper over simplification but not inti historical....

[Captjohn757]

Hi, Flaviusx

There are conflicting views as to what extent U.S. lend-lease aid actually helped the Russians. Some historians claim it was an important boost, the Russians not so much. Nonetheless, a couple of considerations remain: the Russian economy was devastated throughout the war with shortages rampant. This is what happens when you lose 24 million civilians and soldiers combined, have your infrastructure destroyed, and transfer what production capability you have a third of the way across the country. The impact on the GDP is/was quite significant and the Russians did not begin to turn the corner economically until 1947 and later. How does this play out in Strategic Command? Well, it doesn't. In the game, playing as the allies, it's way too easy for the Russians to accumulate 5,000 - 7,000 MMPs by war's end, which, frankly, is not correct. The real-world Russians simply never had the kind of resources or capability at any time during the war to generate those high levels of MMPs. Unfortunately, this aspect of Strategic Command leaves one with a false impression of "how mighty and capable" the Russians were. As they say, history is going to be hard to beat.

Captjohn757

[Flaviusx]

Most of these historians aren't well versed in econ. I'd like to see Adam Tooze take a crack at this, he knows what he's about.

But the trend in the last few years is to upgrade the importance of lend lease. The old Soviet saw of "4%" isn't really cutting it anymore.

Soviet GDP cratered by about a third between 1941-2. They weren't making trucks, or enough aviation fuel, or really enough food, etc. and so forth. The Soviet Union was running a severely austere wartime economy focused exclusively on making armaments. The only way this was possible was lend lease. It couldn't have been sustained otherwise.

That 1/3 of the Soviet economy that they lost was their fat. The West took over that fat, and the food, uniforms, fuel, trucks, trains, comm equipment, etc., was what allowed the Soviet wartime production miracle to happen in the face of what on paper should have been an economic catastrophe for them. It took the rest of the war for them to dig themselves out of that hole, and Soviet GDP only returned to 1941 levels in 1945, but it was a far less balanced economy at that point. Arguably, the Soviets never did quite figure out how to get the balance right here even in peacetime and in due course this caught up to them.

[PJL1973]

Historically, the Eastern route was the most important, accounting for 50% of all aid to the Soviet Union, whereas the other two (Artic & Persian) were 23% & 27% each.

So the game should, for added historical accuracy be giving the Vladivostok convoy from the US about double the Persian route. So, assuming the total MPP from the US is as before (80MP -> 160 MP) the amounts should be divided between 105 MP for Vladivostok and 55 MPP

The max % for convoys from the UK is way out compared to the other two. Personally I think this should be capped at about 15% of UK MPP. Even then it is possible for the Artic convoy to provide as much as 100 MP per turn from the UK.

BTW, SC3 is a great game, the best mid-level easy to learn, hard to master computer WW2 game ever made. I've tried SC2, but the isometric view and squares really put me off.

[Hubert Cater]

Thanks PJL, much appreciated [:)]

[freeboy]

I think using hystory for what levels should be is a mistake.. it should be for POSSIBLE usage, and allow for higher or lower...
I think this applies to production as well..

[wie201]

Thanks for all the responses, but what about from Persia and Eastern Russia? Is there a trick there to do that? Russia has more than they can use, and the excess is running into the multiple thousands. This is still Version 1.0.

[BillRunacre]

ORIGINAL: wie201

Thanks for all the responses, but what about from Persia and Eastern Russia? Is there a trick there to do that? Russia has more than they can use, and the excess is running into the multiple thousands. This is still Version 1.0.

In a game against the AI you could turn off the relevant DECISION events (both US and Soviet) but not in PBEM, as the US supplies via Persia and Vladivostock are scripted and can't be adjusted in the same way that a convoy can