The Germans must have production in WITE2

[rmonical]

The game system is simply not able to correct to years of slightly unexpected results. In my game with hoooooper, I took status as of T108 here and following: fb.asp?m=3524482.

I have 240K compared to 81K trucks and yet the Germans are being "demotorized"

I have 1420 fighters, 770 fighter bombers, 160 night fighters, 400 tactical bombers and 2000 level bombers in the pool. These are of no benefit to me other than to meet the 100 aircraft minimum required for the reinforcement AI to keep on map air units up to strength.

Given the high unused truck and aircraft total, it is not surprising that the fuel store is over 5 million tons compared to 190 thousand tons in the 43 CG.

There are 156 Tigers and growing. These are hard to kill despite being heavily employed. Three heavy panzer battalions would be very helpful given the medium tank shortage I face.

Soviet imbalances are self correcting (air units) or explicitly corrected via control of production. The designers have placed the German player in an untenable position: no control over what is built and no control over whether what is built ever gets used.

With mild blizzard, the .14 production fixes, and the supply fixes which appear to slow the Germans down in '41, I suspect a lot more games will make it into 43 and later when these imbalances become really significant.

In the absence of a production system, scenario designers can give the German's something similar.
- Starting in 6/42 add one depleted airbase every two months (6 per year).
- Starting in 6/42, add one empty fighter, fighter bomber, tactical bomber and level bomber every two months
- Starting in 6/42 add one depleted Stug battalion every two months. When the 43b battalions show up, use these so more Stuh42s make it into the game.
- Starting in 1/43, add one depleted heavy panzer battalion every 3 months
- Starting in 1/43 add one depleted motorized/PG division every 4 months.

The German player can either keep or disband these units depending on how the war went.

The German OOB purists will howl but they have no answer to over 4700 inactive modern aircraft and over 100 thousand extra trucks and over 5 million tons of extra fuel. If for whatever reason, the designers are committed to the historical German OOB down to the battalion level, then there needs to be a way to repurpose excess production to stuff that the historical OOB will use. In the case of my game with hooooper, I need medium tanks and 75mm AT guns. Those aircraft (aircrew or not) represent misallocated production capacity that has been growing since 1941. Plenty of time to re-purpose that production to stuff that would actually be used.

IMHO, historical OOBs are fine for shorter scenarios. They make absolutely no sense in a 5 year campaign game.

[Kel]

+1

Plus : how historical are the myriad of soviet sapper regiments that get generated play after play.
Such ahistoricty should be allowed to both (or neither) side.

[SigUp]

No to manual production. If you go that route than you have to introduce a far better economic model, also incorporating the economic and political factors that stood in the way of optimalization. That said, the production system should be revamped, but the game is an operational wargame and production shouldn't be controlled by the player. But I wish the TOE system would be less rigid. We can switch aircraft at will, so why not tanks as long as they are of the same category?

[STEF78]

The Germans must have production in WITE2

+1

It's very frustating in late war games

I would also limit the number of forts that can be built in a period of time

[rmonical]

If you go that route than you have to introduce a far better economic model, also incorporating the economic and political factors that stood in the way of optimalization.

I do not disagree. In the presence of those economic and political factors, what would the Nazis have done with 4700 extra aircraft with some indeterminate number of associated aircrew, 100 thousand extra trucks, 5 million extra tons of fuel, 156 extra Tiger tanks and 200 extra heavy assault guns? Let's figure that out and ask the designers to accommodate these types of games.

Silly me, I think the Nazis would have used all that stuff. But maybe there are economic and political factors that make them not want to use it.

[SigUp]

These problems call for a better distribution and allocation key, not for manual production. Yes, the number of planes in the pool rise to an absurd amount. But that is partly due to the fixed distribution key for everything. Besides, an aircraft factory can't just convert to producing tanks.

ORIGINAL: rmonical

I do not disagree. In the presence of those economic and political factors, what would the Nazis have done with 4700 extra aircraft with some indeterminate number of associated aircrew, 100 thousand extra trucks, 5 million extra tons of fuel, 156 extra Tiger tanks and 200 extra heavy assault guns? Let's figure that out and ask the designers to accommodate these types of games.

Silly me, I think the Nazis would have used all that stuff. But maybe there are economic and political factors that make them not want to use it.

The thing is, the Germans never had anything in the pools in the first place. Those aircraft? Went to the Luftwaffe in the Reich or in the West. Those tanks? Perhaps losses are too low. Production isn't the only trigger that can be pulled here.

EDIT: You chose to completely misinterpret and misread my statement with economic and political factors. But whatever.

[rmonical]

Besides, an aircraft factory can't just convert to producing tanks.

My point is the imbalance started 20 months ago as air casualties fell behind production. By fal of 1941, my Germans were critically short of medium tanks and have stayed that way ever since. At one point in the summer of 42, the Soviet turn ended up with less than 900 operational German AFVs - probably half of which were medium tanks.

So the aircraft factories continue what they are doing and the skilled labor, machines and resources move to a tank factory or start a new one. 20 months is plenty of time to ramp up new production capability.

[rmonical]

EDIT: You chose to completely misinterpret and misread my statement with economic and political factors. But whatever.

Guilty. But it was a red herring. I am not talking about optimizing what is produced, I am suggesting we give the Germans the same capability to optimize how what is produced is used that the Soviets have.

[SigUp]

ORIGINAL: rmonical

EDIT: You chose to completely misinterpret and misread my statement with economic and political factors. But whatever.

Guilty. But it was a red herring. I am not talking about optimizing what is produced, I am suggesting we give the Germans the same capability to optimize how what is produced is used that the Soviets have.

I'd rather go the route of limiting Soviet optimal construction of support units rather than allowing the Germans to do the same.

[morvael]

A free-for-all production system isn't necessary. What I would like to see is a semi-historical requisition system, where the allowances are decided by history and the player can request (not build) only historical units (giving up units used to build up if necessary), up to the limit of given period, give or take a few % by paying extra prestige (VP) for getting some units a month earlier. So, if the Soviets had 20 Tanks Corps in December 43 (just random example) and I have only 15, I can request 5 more to be put on the map immediately at no VP cost, ask for a 6th by spending extra VP or order only 3 and getting extra VP for every turn under the historical limit. Basically a reinforcement table that a player can strech a little and define order in which units will come, but not their maximum number.

[Tarhunnas]

Yes, IMHO Soviet unit building should be limited somehow or steered to historical. It is not realistic that he Soviets can concentrate on the most effective units. Maybe it should be partly automated so that the Soviets get a number of predetermined new units free each turn, and then can add units at a higher cost than currently. And the cost could rise with the number of units, so it would not be possible to build insane numbers of sapper units for example.

Similarly, it would seem reasonable that the Germans could build a limited number of extra units, perhaps at rather large cost to limit abuses.

[rmonical]

The thing is, the Germans never had anything in the pools in the first place. Those aircraft? Went to the Luftwaffe in the Reich or in the West. Those tanks? Perhaps losses are too low. Production isn't the only trigger that can be pulled here.

Sure, if WITE2 gives the Germans victory points for sending "stuff" West, then that might be a good compromise. The more stuff the Germans send west, the smaller the '44/'45 production hits will be.

[SigUp]

ORIGINAL: rmonical

The thing is, the Germans never had anything in the pools in the first place. Those aircraft? Went to the Luftwaffe in the Reich or in the West. Those tanks? Perhaps losses are too low. Production isn't the only trigger that can be pulled here.

Sure, if WITE2 gives the Germans victory points for sending "stuff" West, then that might be a good compromise. The more stuff the Germans send west, the smaller the '44/'45 production hits will be.

And deduct VPs if material is retained?

[buchand]

A cry from the 'less committed'.
I hope the developers remember not all of us want WITP levels of detail so by all means put a production option in but please give an option for AI production.
Back to my betters for more discussion [;)]

[gradenko2k]

I believe it was mentioned by a developer or a mod previously that the lack of German airbases is not due to the decision to keep German production AI-controlled, but rather as a sop to historical problem of a lack of trained aircrews. Because pilots are tied to planes and any active plane is always assumed to have an active pilot, your 5 000 aircraft are sitting in the pools because the game assumes that there wouldn't have been anyone around to fly them.

ORIGINAL: SigUp

No to manual production. If you go that route than you have to introduce a far better economic model, also incorporating the economic and political factors that stood in the way of optimalization. That said, the production system should be revamped, but the game is an operational wargame and production shouldn't be controlled by the player. But I wish the TOE system would be less rigid. We can switch aircraft at will, so why not tanks as long as they are of the same category?

I think rmonical's suggestion of simply adding airbases, aircraft squadrons and Panzer battalions at a slow trickle is an idea worth examining, as is yours of simply being able to manually designate Panzer TOEs at will.

It may well indeed be too much to ask a game of this size and scope to simply allow production levers to be manhandled with little or no regard for the (Western) strategic, logistical and political pitfalls, but simply adding Battalions at a slow trickle would at least prevent stagnation of units in pools in the event of better-than-historical performance, and being able to adjust Panzer TOEs would seem to be within the war-powers of whatever mishmash of entities the player is supposed to represent: You still have to deal with the minefield that is Speer's industrial Germany, but at least you can redirect the output to your army as you see fit.

[rmonical]

And deduct VPs if material is retained?

Take armaments. If you believe the German armament production figures in WITE are roughly correct, then the production system already sends the following percentages West each year. A large amount of that comes back East in the form of newly formed units. Because of the rounding down by factory logic, each item has a different percentage that is retained in the East. In terms of air production, for example, a total of almost 5000 ME 109s are available to WITE through production through the end of 1943. ME 109 production in '42 and 43 was 10,000 with another 1500 - 2000 in '41. The game (supposedly) already accounts for what was historically sent West and used there. WITE does not give the German's the option to retain anything.

[rmonical]

I believe it was mentioned by a developer or a mod previously that the lack of German airbases is not due to the decision to keep German production AI-controlled, but rather as a sop to historical problem of a lack of trained aircrews. Because pilots are tied to planes and any active plane is always assumed to have an active pilot, your 5 000 aircraft are sitting in the pools because the game assumes that there wouldn't have been anyone around to fly them.

This is actually addressedin WITW to the extent pilots are tracked separately. Notice the Soviets are not similarly constrained as their pool of pilots grows seemingly without limit.

In any event, even with the WITW separate pilot/aircraft system, I guarantee that if the Luftwaffe loses 2000 fewer fighters 1941-1943, there are hundreds of trained pilots that did not get killed. So WITE2 still has to make the decision what to do with them.

One reason my aircraft (and truck) casualties are lower is I never move level bomber airbases off the rail. So my Luftwaffe is better supplied than was historically the case. I keep fighter/tacair bases close to rail. So there are a few weeks in '41 when forward air support is very thin. Similarly, the of the Soviets do will and the Germans never achieve a breakthrough in '42, then supply will be good throughout and casualties will be lower.

[Walloc]

Would just remind that u see some of teh exact same issues on the soviet side, so if u fix it, fix it on both sides, please.
T-34 that wont upgrade cuz enough of old types in poll.
IS/heavy regiments that wont upgrade cuz is has to take a spefic path and there is bottle neck in the middle of the system.
The rifle upgrade causing drop in armamant is a both sided issue.

Some of the issues like tiger and truck not that the same for types on teh other side isnt an issue prolly has more to do with not really showing losses in those types that should. I can recall only one AAR ever where the germans havent had a massive truck surplus tho going far into russia.
As non combat losses isnt really show to a real effect. Had non comabt losses been shown in tis real effects there would have been more losses than we see now on both side. Ofc one of the side generally have more to loss and the hard to kill types that tended to weight the most incured fairly high proportions of non combat losses. If taht isnt shown u dont loss te numbers u should.

Kind regards,

Rasmus

[Wheat]

I agree with rmonical. Either allow the Germans some degree of optimization or limit the Russians in some way.

[rmonical]

Right now it is not clear to me how pilot management will be implemented in WITW. This is the situation at T110 with hooooper. So my question to everyone who thinks the Germans should not see a single staffel more than can be identified historically: how should WITE2 handle this situation given the Germans have 4700 aircraft in the pool.