Game Suggestions:

[morvael]

Maybe you have very little on the frontlines? Players should take note of surplus equipment (and equipment with shortages) and adjust their unit composition accordingly.

[thedoctorking]

The common experience is that you have piles of medium tanks in the pool because your units can't absorb them for lack of light tanks. My argument is that medium tank production is probably OK, at least into 1942, but there needs to be more light tank production.

Actually, for historical verisimilitude, I'd put a bunch of little T-60/70 factories around all over the place. The reason the USSR kept on making light tanks after the T-34 design was proven in combat was that they could make them in smaller automobile factories that couldn't handle full-sized tanks. And once they got the idea of putting the long 76mm gun on them, they were useful infantry support tanks and could kill older German designs (PzIII or IV). If only they'd thought to put a mg on the thing (says the Advanced Squad Leader player).

[chaos45]

From looking at the 1942 start and doing some quick math on soviet light tanks.

According to Wikipedia-

T-60s- approx 6,290 built
T-70s- approx 8,200 built

My quick math showed the game is about right on T-60 production- maybe abit to low depending on how quick to they get to max 50 and damage from moving an such.

On the T-70 production seems alittle low--quick math put it about 1,000 tanks to low....so seems either a new T70 factory needs added or the max capacity on the 3 in game needs increased.

Again was really quick math but if its accurate does seem the soviets are owed some T70s---but even 1,000 more T70s doesnt really fix the game ToE shortfall in soviet light tanks.

[Denniss]

The T-70 production may need some fine adjustments, taking 2 months off the end date and increasing build limit instead plus adding a minor production buffer for the damage allegedly caused by Luftwaffe bombings of Gorki in 1943.

[56ajax]

ORIGINAL: morvael

Maybe you have very little on the frontlines? Players should take note of surplus equipment (and equipment with shortages) and adjust their unit composition accordingly.

I do take note of surplus equipment and create units that use them. I have started to build Tank Corps which use less tanks than 3 tank brigades, thus adding more to the pool, and in the process destroying the experience. Great.

I try and keep a unit adjacent to an Axis unit for attrition purposes. As the Axis can drive through anything I try to keep many units well back.

I have kept the TOEs of my art too low as I now have lots of armaments. What I am lacking is manpower, and i am going to have to retreat in 42, which will make it worse.

Still, what a Magnificent problem I have. [:)]

[thedoctorking]

ORIGINAL: chaos45

From looking at the 1942 start and doing some quick math on soviet light tanks.

According to Wikipedia-

T-60s- approx 6,290 built
T-70s- approx 8,200 built

My quick math showed the game is about right on T-60 production- maybe abit to low depending on how quick to they get to max 50 and damage from moving an such.

On the T-70 production seems alittle low--quick math put it about 1,000 tanks to low....so seems either a new T70 factory needs added or the max capacity on the 3 in game needs increased.

Again was really quick math but if its accurate does seem the soviets are owed some T70s---but even 1,000 more T70s doesnt really fix the game ToE shortfall in soviet light tanks.

I think the issue is that players know the T-34 is the best medium tank in the early war and so they make sure to preserve production. Then, they end up with huge pools. Historically, the Soviets switched over to a medium tank heavy TOE in 1943 as they began to get large numbers of them being produced. My original suggestion was essentially to allow the game to effectively adopt that TOE change early, by treating surplus T-34's as if they were light tanks for replacement purposes, if there were large numbers of medium tanks in the pool undeployed. Alternatively, the game could distribute light tank production more widely and thus make it more resilient to Axis conquest/bombing, similarly addressing the current in-game shortage of light tanks that many players have reported in 1942.

[thedoctorking]

It would be nice if you could select a bunch of units from the Commander's Report and take some action with all of them. Like sending air groups to Reserve, or setting them to manual upgrades, or to night missions. I imagine there'd be some uses for this for ground units as well.

First turn of Barbarossa, I spent almost an hour just repetitively clicking on the commander's report screen to send air groups to reserve.

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: thedoctorking

It would be nice if you could select a bunch of units from the Commander's Report and take some action with all of them. Like sending air groups to Reserve, or setting them to manual upgrades, or to night missions. I imagine there'd be some uses for this for ground units as well.

First turn of Barbarossa, I spent almost an hour just repetitively clicking on the commander's report screen to send air groups to reserve.

If you filter the list so it just has the ones you want to act on there are such batch commands such as send all to reserve in the top right hand corner.

[thedoctorking]

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

ORIGINAL: thedoctorking

It would be nice if you could select a bunch of units from the Commander's Report and take some action with all of them. Like sending air groups to Reserve, or setting them to manual upgrades, or to night missions. I imagine there'd be some uses for this for ground units as well.

First turn of Barbarossa, I spent almost an hour just repetitively clicking on the commander's report screen to send air groups to reserve.

If you filter the list so it just has the ones you want to act on there are such batch commands such as send all to reserve in the top right hand corner.

Thanks! Learn something new every day.

[Stelteck]

I have a suggestion for the Merge feature.

The merge feature is a really interesting function. It is also an historic one as many formation were merged during the war especially soviet side who do not often reinforced divisions at fronts, preferring creating new units and merging old and battered formations together.

The problem is that the merge unit also have an huge political point cost, as the old formation is permanently destroyed.
For example, if you merge two divisions together, you will loose 10 political point, the cost of a fresh division.

So the merge feature is only used in rare case.

It would be very interesting if the merge feature would allow the "return" of the destroyed formation some weeks later. As if the formation was destroyed by the enemy.

[morvael]

Good idea.

[thedoctorking]

ORIGINAL: tyronec

The point I was making was specifically about growth of experience relative to losses. As I understand it Soviet air units can get increased experience even if they are taking such losses that you might expect them to be losing experience. I don't think the same is going to apply to ground forces as losses are at nothing like the same level. However have not done an analysis of this and don't know exactly how the game works it.
This was not a criticism of your taking advantage of it - I trust we are both working the engine to the best of our ability.

I have been following this discussion and I would like to offer some thoughts regarding the increase of experience for air units. Remember, loss of an aircraft in combat does not necessarily imply the loss of the pilot. Soviet planes, especially the very commonly used American lend-lease P-39's and P-40's, had armored cockpits and self-sealing gas tanks, meaning that pilots were more likely than not to survive the loss of their aircraft. Also, the Soviets were fighting in their own national air space. Even if a pilot bailed out over territory nominally controlled by the Axis, he was likely to find friendly civilians and even members of the Red Army on the ground to welcome him. So a pilot could certainly gain useful experience (at least about what not to do) from a mission in which his aircraft is lost. Also, as long as an air unit retains a cadre of its experienced pilots, the inexperienced newcomers will learn from their more experienced comrades.

And, especially with the contribution of the Americans, the USSR had no shortage of aircraft. So they could tolerate more losses than the Germans in the interests of gaining experience.

Therefore, I think the current system rewards a very proper and historical aggressiveness by the Soviet air force in the early part of the war. What I think of as an "exploit" is the habit that some Soviet players have of moving units wholesale into the National Reserve and keeping them there for many months. National Reserve is fine for a couple of weeks for retraining and perhaps reequipping with modern aircraft, but I can't imagine Stalin sitting still for his air force commanders basing the entire inventory in Chelyabinsk while the Luftwaffe bombs the Red Army at will.

[Aufklaerungs]

Thanks, guys. Good thread. Let's be careful about drawing definitive conclusions from speculation and fragmentary data.

[thedoctorking]

And loss of an aircraft on the ground will almost never mean loss of the pilot. And at least in the games I've played (through early 1942 only, though), the vast majority of USSR aircraft losses come on the ground. That should cause minimal to no experience loss.

[thedoctorking]

How about a random leader stats option? Maybe when combined with a system so that you don't know or can't know exactly what a leader's true abilities are until you have used him in combat.

This would be especially appropriate for the Russians since it had been quite some time since the Civil War and few senior Red Army officers had survived the period of purges from that earlier conflict. And even fewer of them had held high command before.

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: thedoctorking
How about a random leader stats option? Maybe when combined with a system so that you don't know or can't know exactly what a leader's true abilities are until you have used him in combat.

I really like this idea. A new interesting part of the game would be finding out which one of your leaders is actually very good. Which is pretty historical. I wonder also would there be a Peter's principle involved? Could good corps commanders turn out to be not very good army commanders, so more randomness at promotions.

I suppose you could have some historical well knowns fixed like Zhukov - there would be too many complaints if Zhukov got a bad rating. But some randomness among all the generals who died early historically but could survive and become military geniuses in your game?

[thedoctorking]

And maybe those guys the NKVD shot on turn 3 historically actually were just unlucky and would have been good had they survived? After all, trusting some Chekist to be able to tell if a general is qualified or not is a little random.

Maybe what you could say is that leaders who have commanded large forces in combat before have fixed and known stats - so Zhukov, for example, was a proven quantity after the Khalkhin Gol campaign, and Timoshenko and Budenny had shown their skills, such as they were, in the Civil War. Most of the Germans would be known by this standard. But most Soviet leaders would be unknown at start. You would have a "det level" on each leader based on how many battles they had been in that would give you a closer and closer approximation of that leader's actual stats.

[Crackaces]

ORIGINAL: thedoctorking

How about a random leader stats option? Maybe when combined with a system so that you don't know or can't know exactly what a leader's true abilities are until you have used him in combat.

This would be especially appropriate for the Russians since it had been quite some time since the Civil War and few senior Red Army officers had survived the period of purges from that earlier conflict. And even fewer of them had held high command before.

This option makes War Between the States interesting .. in the American Civil war the problem was finding the better leaders ...
Not totally random . I think there are constraints ..

[thedoctorking]

ORIGINAL: Crackaces

ORIGINAL: thedoctorking

How about a random leader stats option? Maybe when combined with a system so that you don't know or can't know exactly what a leader's true abilities are until you have used him in combat.

This would be especially appropriate for the Russians since it had been quite some time since the Civil War and few senior Red Army officers had survived the period of purges from that earlier conflict. And even fewer of them had held high command before.

This option makes War Between the States interesting .. in the American Civil war the problem was finding the better leaders ...
Not totally random . I think there are constraints ..

In the American Civil War, none of the leaders had ever commanded more than a few companies in battle. Some of the most highly respected leaders - Bragg, Halleck, McClellan - turned out to be useless, while Grant and Sherman had both left the army before the war as not too highly respected junior officers.

There's a board game I played, I think it was Victory Games' Civil War, where all your generals are hidden at start. That is, you draw 3-star general ??? and you assign him to command an army, only finding out later whether you got Lee or Van Dorn.

That game also has a promotion system where some generals get better as their experience and rank increases and others get worse. I notice that there's a little of that in War in the East, but there could be more.

[thedoctorking]

How about semi-free deployment? Say 50% of Soviet units must be within 5 hexes of the border and another 25% within 15 hexes. Air bases could be fixed or required to be in specific regions or some such.

There's a kind of a seam in the Russian deployment in the south that permits a near-automatic isolation of a huge bunch of Soviet units around Lvov right off the bat. At a minimum it would be good to shuffle some units around to make this move less straightforward for the Germans on turn 1.