Micromanagement

[Skuderian]

I am not a total newbie, as I played War in Russia when it was released in 1993 and I was a betatester for War in the East 1. However, I figured out that WitE 2 is much more time and micromanagement demanding than the previous versions. Generally I want to play only against the AI, so I don't want to be competitive or play minmaxing. However, my question is what kind of micromanagement do I have to do on my own to be successful?

HQ management?
Railroad repair?
Air war?
Depot management?
Support Units?
Theatre boxes?

The first two ones are not to time intensive, but the other ones seem to be very time consuming at the first glance.

[mikael333]

HQ management is a must. Keep HQs in range, use good leaders and exchange them as points allow. It is also important to rest (or even refit when necessary) your units to rebuild combat power and use administrative movement as much possible. Railroad repair is also very important to have the rail as close as possible, especially where you attack, ideally everywhere, also important for defense in winter. Regarding Support units, pioneers and heavy artillery is especially important for city attack. In general they are very powerful in shifting combat power fast to the right place. So micromanagement pays off. Theatre boxes in particular and air war you can automate against the AI. Set the air fleets to follow the HQs, which need attack support and set them to adcance, hold or retreat. I recommend to trigger the AI for air manually so that you can still intervene from time to time. Depot management you can also automate, but keep an eye on, where your important depots are and understand your logistics situation. All in all war in the east 2 can be played with a lot less micromanagement than 1. This is because of the automation options, and also because partisans are abstracted and airfields are at fixed places. I am not the minmax player myself and happy to win the great campaign on normal against the AI. In this regard I can tell you that war in the east 2 to is a fantastic game for the a bit more casual and a bit less hardcore player. Enjoy.

[Rosseau]

I was also wondering about those things.

Great post, and thank you!

[Skuderian]

Thank you for all the hints, I will try them in my next game.

[exalted]

Might get yelled at for saying it but you can comfortably use AI management of AIR against the AI, or simply send it all to the west and ignore that the air war exist. As the germans at least they rarely do anything worthwhile except for shooting down soviet planes that don't really do much. The only crucial moves for the luftwaffe is blocking odessa and sevastropol, unless you want to ship freight to do ridiculous stuff with your panzers.

Personally I manage it as little as possible because it's insanely fiddly.

If there is one thing to do on that list its HQ management. It can be made slightly easier if your germans and select one army group to house your assault armies, since that army group must be kept within limit. While you could play a bit loose and fast with others.

If two do Railroad repair, this is insanely important. You could probably write entire treaties on the best way to accomplish this both using the controllable and the RAD units but securing double tracks is certainly important.

If three do Support Units, you will accomplish wonders with especially pioneers and larger brigade sized support units. Learning how to convert brigades / regiments and then using them as reserves for special operations is very very useful. Also getting the heavy artillery to participate in your large fortress asssaults (lenningrad, odessa, sevastropol and moscow) seems to help but it could be an illusion (pioneers help more for sure).

The AI can kind of handle Air and Depots. If you use AI to manage the Air think about what HQ you want it to support thats about it and see to that you don't run it into the ground, sometimes not flying is a good idea. As the germans in 41 your supply situation is dire, bombers eat up supply so don't move them too far forward before spring 42 you won't need them anyway. After 42 it is usually prudent to mass the luftwaffe in one location as it is way to small to face soviet airpower.

Theaterboxes is mostly fun and not necessary at all. I'd turn it off for my first few games. If your thinking about the garrison just throw most axis allies in it they aren't much good and eat up your supplies While you can make an argument for using some rumanians and hungarians, most of them and all italians belong in the garrison.

[MarkShot]

Well, originally, I thought:

"Oh, cool, I don't need to do depots, SU, TBs, reserves, and the air war."

But what I realized after playing a while, once you stopped feeling overwhelmed, it is part of the fun of having the game. The total gestalt or immersion. Although I think, it is essential to limit large areas of complexity for noobs get up to speed.

[ringhloth]

Against players, as it was true in wite1, the more time you spend in the turn, looking at hqs, commanders reports, pour over the air war, plan offensives, position units, etc. the better you will be at the game. A newbie who spends 10+ hours looking at a turn and results will easily outplay a vet who spends 30min a turn and sends it off, at least over the course of the gc.

[ShaggyHiK]

Might get yelled at for saying it but you can comfortably use AI management of AIR against the AI, or simply send it all to the west and ignore that the air war exist. As the germans at least they rarely do anything worthwhile except for shooting down soviet planes that don't really do much. The only crucial moves for the luftwaffe is blocking odessa and sevastropol, unless you want to ship freight to do ridiculous stuff with your panzers.

Personally I manage it as little as possible because it's insanely fiddly.

If there is one thing to do on that list its HQ management. It can be made slightly easier if your germans and select one army group to house your assault armies, since that army group must be kept within limit. While you could play a bit loose and fast with others.

If two do Railroad repair, this is insanely important. You could probably write entire treaties on the best way to accomplish this both using the controllable and the RAD units but securing double tracks is certainly important.

If three do Support Units, you will accomplish wonders with especially pioneers and larger brigade sized support units. Learning how to convert brigades / regiments and then using them as reserves for special operations is very very useful. Also getting the heavy artillery to participate in your large fortress asssaults (lenningrad, odessa, sevastropol and moscow) seems to help but it could be an illusion (pioneers help more for sure).

The AI can kind of handle Air and Depots. If you use AI to manage the Air think about what HQ you want it to support thats about it and see to that you don't run it into the ground, sometimes not flying is a good idea. As the germans in 41 your supply situation is dire, bombers eat up supply so don't move them too far forward before spring 42 you won't need them anyway. After 42 it is usually prudent to mass the luftwaffe in one location as it is way to small to face soviet airpower.

Theaterboxes is mostly fun and not necessary at all. I'd turn it off for my first few games. If your thinking about the garrison just throw most axis allies in it they aren't much good and eat up your supplies While you can make an argument for using some rumanians and hungarians, most of them and all italians belong in the garrison.

Wite2 doesn't look like a 1v1 game, it looks more like a 2v2 or 4v4 game.

It then takes less time and you can dive deeper into a particular aspect.

But the comment about what is important for Germany is only Odessa and Sevastopol in the air war, so I invite you to play 4 on 4 as the commander of the Luftwaffe against me as the commander of the USSR Air Force and let's see how you will not have tasks other than those described above.

[exalted]

Wite2 doesn't look like a 1v1 game, it looks more like a 2v2 or 4v4 game.

It then takes less time and you can dive deeper into a particular aspect.

But the comment about what is important for Germany is only Odessa and Sevastopol in the air war, so I invite you to play 4 on 4 as the commander of the Luftwaffe against me as the commander of the USSR Air Force and let's see how you will not have tasks other than those described above.

The topic creator was mostly thinking about an AI game, so my answer is mostly about AI games, where the Soviet Air AI is totally ineffectual, you can basically send all the german air assets to france and not notice much of a difference (I've done it and it works...it isn't optimal but you can do it )

Of course competently managed it does better but is it worth putting your time into Air compared to other aspects, probably not unless you intend to take several hours per turn.

And I'll freely admit that each time I deep dive into the Air War in WitE2 I get frustrated by the interface and end up doing the least I can get away with