Stalingrad: Nightmare on The Volga

[BletchleyGeek]

Hi bcgames,

It's been a while since my last visit,and I am happy to see you are still having a go at it.

I think it's brilliant to borrow a page from Atomic's visitation to that theatre. IIRC they used three different hex scales: for the city fighting, the Don to Volga push and Uranus.

I have a bunch of materials for a game I was preparing for the Command Ops engine. I would be happy to put those materials to use some day, and unless the crazy bug of making games bites me [:'(], Desert War is the best engine out to do those battles.

You should also drop a line to Chris Maiorana, he rans the blog Sharp End Gaming, and he has been creating great stuff for Tiller's Panzer Battles and much more.

DW may have a small following, but I can't only see it growing if you go East or start making scenarios covering Korea, the Vietnamese wars, Burma 42-44, Malaya 42. Hard to compete with variety and unique gameplay, imo.

[bcgames]

ORIGINAL: BletchleyGeek

I think it's brilliant to borrow a page from Atomic's visitation to that theatre. IIRC they used three different hex scales: for the city fighting, the Don to Volga push and Uranus.

I love Desert War.  It works well for me as a game and a simulation.  I'm not loving Stalingrad right now.  It does not work as an interesting game and simulations are not my bottom line.  The homogenization that has occurred since basing the game system at the regimental level provides a simpler--and boring--game play.  I don't enjoy playing it.

This game engine centers best at the battalion level when it enjoys the full range of unique unit type capabilities. I think the ground scale to support a battalion system is to be found somewhere between 1000-1600 meters per hex. Panzer Campaigns uses 1000 meters per hex. Tiller may have it right when it comes to covering all WWII theaters of war. I think his maps at that scale are too big for me; I find it hard to "discover the big picture" when I play. Could be the interface; could be the scale. Dunno. Multi-scale is an interesting re-approach to game play and this is the path I'm on at this point.

Bottomline: If I'm not having fun playing the game--I'm not playing it. Working...

[BletchleyGeek]

I agree with you that DW works best at Bn level... my understanding was that counter numbers were a bit much.

My suggestion would be that many Soviet Rifle divisions were usually very understrength, and Regiments rarely fielded all three battalions at full strength. So one heuristic to set force levels (besides the actual data which I am not sure is preserved at this level of detail) would be to estimate strength level on the basis of a 5% (conservative) loss on infantry units per day of high intensity operations. So a fresh unit would be after 10 day of operations be pretty mauled, probably not fielding all Bns.

This analysis can be done on a per unit basis, from the sources showing oob's and trying to figure out how long since last refit, specific data points etc.. It is not a small work, but gives hope.

For the Germans, I would say that fielding all three Bns at full strength happened for newly created divisions or transfers from France.

[Piteas]

ORIGINAL: bcgames

Stalingrad ALPHA has demonstrated success with the 2500 meter ground scale. The 500 meter per hex version of the Stalingrad city fight is unsatisfactory...a dumb slog. We're going to try a 200 meter ground scale. This will allow the stacking of a battalion and three platoons (tanks, assault guns, engineers, whatever...). Artillery & NKVD will be represented as a ground asset. Snipers, sewer movement, etc. will be represented by special operations assets. We'll see how that goes.

I think the 200 meter ground scale and the special operations assets are good ideas. Stalingrad city needs a very "special system".

[benpark]

A smaller scale would be great, and preferable (to me at least). WEGO company scale combat would be ideal here, but battalion could work.

When most wargamers think "Stalingrad", they mean the fight for the city itself. Most games for the computer have been the fight up until, or after that.

I'd have it at a scale where pertinent landmarks are in, and important- rather than a generic "city" look. Maybe 200m will do that. Look at L2's "Streets of Stalingrad" for inspiration. I'd also make the map as specific as possible. lots of good aerial stuff to help with that.

[Okayrun3254]

ORIGINAL: bcgames

ORIGINAL: BletchleyGeek

I think it's brilliant to borrow a page from Atomic's visitation to that theatre. IIRC they used three different hex scales: for the city fighting, the Don to Volga push and Uranus.

I love Desert War.  It works well for me as a game and a simulation.  I'm not loving Stalingrad right now.  It does not work as an interesting game and simulations are not my bottom line.  The homogenization that has occurred since basing the game system at the regimental level provides a simpler--and boring--game play.  I don't enjoy playing it.

This game engine centers best at the battalion level when it enjoys the full range of unique unit type capabilities. I think the ground scale to support a battalion system is to be found somewhere between 1000-1600 meters per hex. Panzer Campaigns uses 1000 meters per hex. Tiller may have it right when it comes to covering all WWII theaters of war. I think his maps at that scale are too big for me; I find it hard to "discover the big picture" when I play. Could be the interface; could be the scale. Dunno. Multi-scale is an interesting re-approach to game play and this is the path I'm on at this point.

Bottomline: If I'm not having fun playing the game--I'm not playing it. Working...

I think I have always been more of a fan for the 1,000 - 1,600 meter scale. The 2500 scale seems to take to game a different direction with larger formations and such. The 1,000-1,600 meter seems closer to the Desert War scale. I too like the battalion sized units with a variety of capabilities. I had hoped there would be a scenario for Winter Storm, which has the right amount of formations, is good for 1,000 - 1,600 meter scale, and would be great with battalion sized units. Winter Storm could also include a few what if variants, like adding the Viking division for one.

[bcgames]

ORIGINAL: BletchleyGeek

My suggestion would be that many Soviet Rifle divisions were usually very understrength, and Regiments rarely fielded all three battalions at full strength. So one heuristic to set force levels (besides the actual data which I am not sure is preserved at this level of detail) would be to estimate strength level on the basis of a 5% (conservative) loss on infantry units per day of high intensity operations. So a fresh unit would be after 10 day of operations be pretty mauled, probably not fielding all Bns.

This analysis can be done on a per unit basis, from the sources showing oob's and trying to figure out how long since last refit, specific data points etc.. It is not a small work, but gives hope.

For the Germans, I would say that fielding all three Bns at full strength happened for newly created divisions or transfers from France.

Good and learned advice. Thanks.

[bcgames]

ORIGINAL: Piteas

I think the 200 meter ground scale and the special operations assets are good ideas. Stalingrad city needs a very "special system".

Thanks for your support. We'll give it a test.

[bcgames]

ORIGINAL: benpark

I'd have it at a scale where pertinent landmarks are in, and important- rather than a generic "city" look. Maybe 200m will do that. Look at L2's "Streets of Stalingrad" for inspiration. I'd also make the map as specific as possible. lots of good aerial stuff to help with that.

Exactly!

[bcgames]

ORIGINAL: Okayrun3254

I think I have always been more of a fan for the 1,000 - 1,600 meter scale. The 2500 scale seems to take to game a different direction with larger formations and such. The 1,000-1,600 meter seems closer to the Desert War scale. I too like the battalion sized units with a variety of capabilities. I had hoped there would be a scenario for Winter Storm, which has the right amount of formations, is good for 1,000 - 1,600 meter scale, and would be great with battalion sized units. Winter Storm could also include a few what if variants, like adding the Viking division for one.

Good points. I agree with your assessment. Winter Storm is not an option--it's a requirement!

[BletchleyGeek]

A recent game from Dan Verssen's Games which may give some ideas to add flavour via the assets mechanic to a hypohtetical 200m scenario

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/219 ... lovs-house

Some observations after thinking about it for a little while:

- City hexes should definitely prevent LOS.
- Battlefield compartimentalization is crucial to get the feeling right. A good Stalingrad game about the battle on Stalingrad itself (as @benpark rightly points out) cannot have ZOCs, or units should only have ZOCs over very special hexes (parks, really wide avenues, big squares).
- There should be a way for infiltrating through the enemy lines. This could be achieved just with modeling forces in such a way that it is impossible to create a "counter wall", or via some special rule/WEGO mechanic that allows movement through enemy held hexes under specific circumstances.
- Heavily entrenched combat units should not be very mobile, or not mobile at all. This should account for the need to assemble forces, and the difficulty to do so when troops are scattered in squad-size penny packets all over the place (and communications can be difficult or only possible at night due to enemy fires and snipers).

[bcgames]

A smaller scale per hex better represents the city fight. All of it needs to fit together with the battalion scale of the game system.

[BletchleyGeek]

At 200m per hex, and hexes modelling a ruined city, I can't see how you would be able to deploy a battalion as a cohesive entity in any formation other than column. So the footprint of a battalion could well cover 2 or 3 hexes.

200m frontage is what would be covered by two German platoons in linear formation (following their field manuals as if they were miniatures on a sandtable rather than men actively avoiding being killed).

In a constricted environment is too easy for the attacker to be funneled into a kill zone, negating numerical, firepower or training advantages. So an attacking battalion would not be able to fight "as a battalion" either.

[bcgames]

ORIGINAL: BletchleyGeek

At 200m per hex, and hexes modelling a ruined city, I can't see how you would be able to deploy a battalion as a cohesive entity in any formation other than column. So the footprint of a battalion could well cover 2 or 3 hexes.

200m frontage is what would be covered by two German platoons in linear formation (following their field manuals as if they were miniatures on a sandtable rather than men actively avoiding being killed).

In a constricted environment is too easy for the attacker to be funneled into a kill zone, negating numerical, firepower or training advantages. So an attacking battalion would not be able to fight "as a battalion" either.

200m per hex for the city fight is the current path we are pursuing. The infantry and tank battalion (with the potential to breakdown into companies) continues to be the echelon around which the game system orbits.

[bcgames]

I think we're going in a different direction now...call it a U-Turn.

[bcgames]

Original post updated.

[wodin]

So is it 200m or 500m?

[bcgames]

Dunno yet.

[bcgames]

OK. Our current approach is...to go back to our original approach (i.e.2500/500 meters)...BUT expand the breakdown capability to all unit types except HQs, Ski Troops, Engineers, Security and Partisans. Generally speaking, the default for a scenario will be for all units to start COMBINED. There will be exceptions of course--but combined-at-start will be the general rule.

So what does this mean? Let's use an example to illustrate. A typical German Infantry Division consists of an HQ, three infantry regiments, an artillery regiment, a reconnaissance battalion, an antitank battalion, and an engineer battalion. In our current approach, this division will start a scenario configured as one division HQ unit, three regimental-sized infantry units, one regimental-sized artillery unit and three other battalion-sized units (for eight unit icons/counters total on the map). The regiments and battalions will have the capability to breakdown to the next lowest level--regiments to battalions, battalions to companies/batteries (with the exception of the engineers in this example--they can't break down). If you--The Player--decide to break EVERYTHING down in the division, you would have a division HQs, nine infantry battalions, three artillery battalions, three reconnaissance companies, three antitank companies, and an engineer battalion...or 20 unit counters on the map. That high level of stacking is now totally up to the player.

Our goal in taking this approach is to keep the stacking low while re-introducing the various unit capabilities that made Desert War interesting to play.

[BletchleyGeek]

Our goal in taking this approach is to keep the stacking low while re-introducing the various unit capabilities that made Desert War interesting to play.

This sounds like a plan - you will never really get rid of the problem of representing stacks on a hex and counter game. I keep checking this forum regularly (like once every fortnight or so). Looking forward to future updates [:)]