Stalin's Organ

Well for a couple of hours on a good day.......but I'm not sure that's an appropriate subject for discussion on this forum!! Oh - hang on - you said pARis!! :eek:

A lot of immobilisations ARE bogging in, and who's to say "track hit - immobilised" isn't KO'ing a whole transmission? There are also "track hit" results that do not immobilise - does anyone know whether they alter max speed at all?? I'd suggest the Panther you mention got one of them - as it was clearly not immobilised!!

A lot of immobilisations ARE bogging in, and who's to say "track hit - immobilised" isn't KO'ing a whole transmission? There are also "track hit" results that do not immobilise - does anyone know whether they alter max speed at all?? I'd suggest the Panther you mention got one of them - as it was clearly not immobilised!!

Hmmm....well I think you'll find that teh problem was the refugees, not an over-reliance on roads. all armies of the era relied on roads where there were any. Mot German artillery was horse-drawn, for example, and going any significant distance off-road wasn't an option! where there were not roads all armies slowed down, unless they were completely mechanised. In some cases the unimproved landscape was flat enough and hard enough so roads weer not such a requirement (parts of the desert and steppe), but they were exceptions. Russians did not solely use frontal attacks either. and when they did it was generally because the troops were hastily mobilised reserves with little training and inexperienced commanders. Most of the reasonably trained Russian "regulars" were sewn up in surrender pockets in het firs t6 mths of the war, so their replacements made do with whatever leadership and training they could get - which was often inadequate. In SC I think this is reasonably well simulated by the Sov's raising lots of Corps rather than armies when first invaded. To my way of thinking the Russian Corps can be thought of as about army sized but under-equipped and hastily trained - hence cheap. But consequently not as effective.

How many fighters are you guys leaving in France?? I usually leave 2 - 1 just below Antwerp to cover it and Western Germany and Paris, and one over by Cherbourg. They get lots of combat, but after a while the Brits seem to stop attacking for some reason! IMO the early war bombers should have negligible effect on ports - an occasional loss of 1 would suffice. The bombers main effectiveness was mainly mine-layers at this stage - acctual damage with iron bombs being rare and minor. As someone pointout out above tho - casualties from fighters were appaling, and daylight raids were abandoned by the end of 1940 (possibly earlier??). I wonder however how much of a land garrison ppl leave in France to?? I usualy have none - it's all fighting in Yugo and/or Russia. Against a human opponent I'd expect a counter-invasion of France or Western Germany by about the end of 1940 if the Brits are up to it!!

I think your examples are way beow teh scale of SC, and also are stereotypical rather than factual. There's plenty of evidence that Soviet infantry in 1941 were brave adn tactically skilled - they just couldn't march as fast as panzers could drive and couldn't fight when they weer surrounded - much like, say, the german 6th army at Stalingrad. russian armour similarly was occasionally skillfully handled. And since there are no roads and France is a fairly small area anyway (comepared to say Russia in hte game!!) I'm not sure what you'd achieve by simulating any perceived reluctance to move off-road (which IMO all armies had wherever thre weer roads to move on!). Nah - sorry, the effcts are unsubstantiated myths rather than anything real AFAIK.

Good idea! Another thing putting Portsmouth in would do would be to pull some Brit units down from Fortress Manchester to defend the coastline, which seems a little more historical!!

Good idea! Another thing putting Portsmouth in would do would be to pull some Brit units down from Fortress Manchester to defend the coastline, which seems a little more historical!!

Last night I tried invading Russia for the first time, as a result of discussions on this board. It was quite fun - I hadn't reached Moscow by the time teh game ended, but hey..... I was pleased to see the Finns joining, but not so pleased to see that they can't be reinforced or new units built in Finland. That doesn't seem reasonable given the historical context. A number of German units fought in Finland, which I guess can be simulated by shipping a Corps there, but I really think ther Finns should at least be able to reinforce their own units. Also as an aside - please ditch the Russain fleet!! Sure they had a couple of old battleships, etc., but to make them useful seaworthy units in SC is a joke!! The main russian naval effort in the Baltic area was submarines, and they may have lsot as many subs as they sank ships - 186 of each. The Gulf of Finland was a brick wall once the Germans controled the southern coast, and major surface operations by the Russian fleet were never a serious consideration. IMO a better soultion would be to make Leningrad a fortification (if it isn't already - I didn't notice), and consider them included in the effects of that fortification. Sevastopol as well - I didn't notice any Russian naval units down there tho' - ditch any ships if they exist and consider them included in the fortification.

Thanks Hubert - indeed a little patience showed you aer correct!

IMO the removal of the BEF at Dunkirk is best simulated by disbanding it, not removing the unit. The BEF no longer existed as a fighting force after Dunkirk - rather it's survivors were a lot of poorly equipped soldiers who needed lots of rest, recovery and confidence rebuilding!! Also Pawbroon - IMO moving hte French capital would unbalance the game unless it did not affect the chances of the French surrender. All defeated countries moved their Govts - usually to London - but that didn't stop them being defeated. Having the French fight on in 1940 would not be a reasonable option. And I also note that the French do get to move their Govt - to Vichy!!

I load SC from an icon in Win 98 - the first time I load it I get the music & the menu and it freezes solid. I ctrl-alt-dlt to end the task and load it again - this time it works OK but there's no music at all. Happens every time - any ideas??

Thanks for that - yeah I get the impression that hte invasion system is seriously broken - it's simply unbelievable that the Germans couple put so man ytroops into England. I did a paper on Sealion - did you know that hte Germans had to butcher the Rhine traffic toge the barges, making a HUGE dent in the internal commerce for all of Europe, AND the transport for the 2nd wave was going to be the transports from the 1st wave sent back to France!! The survivors that is of course - the Germans had somethign like 25 or 30 DD's and Torpedo boats and 20 submarines for their "small fleet" - the Brits had 85 DD's and 60 submarines IIRC. Plus the Transports would have to raodstead of the English coast for a couple of nights, and the brits had an effective torpedo bomber force in Beauforts and Swordfish that would ahve jsut massacred the lot. The Germans were b----dy lucky they didn't try to invade - it would have been a massacre on the high seas!! Definitely something not right about SC in that area!!

Another thought on this - the invasion mechanism requires empty hexes to get troops ashore. How will it affect game balance if naval can't help clear the hexes? I think the game would have to change to allow units to assault "from ship", or allow disembarkation onto partial land/sea hexes? IMO either would be more realistic than the current system.

Well both of them commanded only a single unit at SC's scale, rather than an army group/front which the named commanders get. If you want to include them I'd recommend you rename the 2 Armies involved with their monikers. Or can you rename leaders???

I find the "Free French" option can be quiet unbalancing - "giving" the Brits several "ready for action" units seesm way over teh top - especially if one of them is the airforce. It occurs to me that the FF might be best represented by a slow release of a reserve of "FF" MPP's, so eventually there can be a couple of FF Corps, maybe an air unit, perhaps some of the fleet can be reconstructed, etc. Naval - seems to be a bit of a side show, using eth same combat mechanisms for land just don't work for me I'm afraid!! It either needs to be abstracted, or more detailed. About the only thing that I think works is the attrition of UK MPP's by subs - that seems pretty good. Also the use of "transport" to send an invasion fleet doesn't sem too bad, but what's with Battle-ship groups acting as Submarine hunter-killer groups?? I guess that's supposed to be an abstraction too, but yuck - it's a damned ugly way of doing it!! I'd prefer teh naval war, especially the battle of teh atlantic to be abstracted into a "sub points" vs "Escort points" & maybe "Air patrol points" or something similar (ref Hitler's War by Avalon Hill??) battle and then we can get on with the rest of the war instead of having to worry about detailed tactics for naval battle groups.

FYI the New Zealand division in the Desert was originally posted to the UK in 1940, and went to Egypt via Sth Africa. I'm not sure whether or not the Aussie Division (I think there was only the 1??) did the same. Certainly one the NZ division was IN Egypt reinforcements came via the Indian ocean and the Suez canal. The brits maintained several corps in the desert after a while, and I don't ercall any of them being decimated during transit of the Med. I wouldn't be surprised if the troops ALL transited via Sth Africa to avoid casualties. AFAIK the only convoys that actually tried to transit the Med were pretty much emergency supplies/reinforcements (such as the Crusader tanks) and for Malta. So it occurs to me that there should be provision to raise troop in Egypt - perhaps there could be a MPP surchrge to represent the cost of sending them around the Cape? Or a dealy - buy now get in 1 months time? But you should NOT have to send them through the Med - it didn't work like that.

Heck - what game are you guys playing?? Successive shore bombardments can certainly destroy a unit in a single turn - had it done to me and done it to teh computer myself. But I do think it is over-rated. I'd like to see shore bombarment affecting ONLY fortification and entrenchment levels. There is no doubt that shore bombardment could cause huge amounts of actual damage (panzers ripped apaprt and tossed up-side-down spring to mind post D-Day), but realistically that was not all that much in the SC scale of things IMO.

probably because the game is programmed to reflect the Ribbentrop/Molotov pact by which the Baltic States were recognised as being in the Soviet "sphere" by the Germans!! So you're breaking your peace traty with them!!!!! On a related note tho - I'm fairly conservative, so my games usually involve trying to invade England (which can be done - although I haven't managed to take Manchester yet!), and if the Sov's declare war then I'm toast, so I always set them to neutral.

probably because the game is programmed to reflect the Ribbentrop/Molotov pact by which the Baltic States were recognised as being in the Soviet "sphere" by the Germans!! So you're breaking your peace traty with them!!!!! On a related note tho - I'm fairly conservative, so my games usually involve trying to invade England (which can be done - although I haven't managed to take Manchester yet!), and if the Sov's declare war then I'm toast, so I always set them to neutral.

I believe teh Stosstruppen ida was taken from a pamphlet on the subject from the French but never put into use by them......

Yes - the Italians used their little Cv8 (I think it is), and IIRC the Hungarians and roumanians also had tankettes of various types. Of course the Russian T-38's and T-40's will be there, maybe T-26A's too - with 2 MG turrets, Komsomlets artillery tractors sometimes used as "armour" support.

Yes - the Italians used their little Cv8 (I think it is), and IIRC the Hungarians and roumanians also had tankettes of various types. Of course the Russian T-38's and T-40's will be there, maybe T-26A's too - with 2 MG turrets, Komsomlets artillery tractors sometimes used as "armour" support.

Oops - I nearly forgot the poor old French, who arguably had the world's best tanks in service in any numbers in 1940, but F-ed it up with their 1 man turrets - the S.35 of course having good armour and a better gun than average (47mm). And some of their infantry tanks weer a bit odd - the H35 and R39 (or is it the other way around??) with fairly good armour, and the venerable and vulnerable F17 - all a bit useless really - although dangerous enough given the generally poor state of AT assets in most armies of the time. But even they had the Char 2B and it's predecessors in teh traditional "infantry" role - with the 75mm hull mounted cannon providing HE support.

The 75L24 did not have poor AT capacity for it's time. Remember that it was introduced when all nations split their tanks into cruisers and infantry tanks (to use the British parlance), and armour was usually in the order of 20-30mm. Infantry tanks in most armies had a 75mm or equivalent gun firing a decent HE charge (German 75/L24, Brit 3" CS howitzer, Russian 76mm L16 and L26??), while cruisers had 37-50mm guns often without any HE rounds at all early on (such as the Brit 2 pdr, German 37, Russian 45). The 2 pdr in the Matilda 2 was an odity in the "normal" scheme of things, as was the combination of armour and large calibre long gun in he KV-1 and T34. The short 75 only came to grief when faced by the thicker armour on T34's, KV's and Matilda's - it was perfectly capable of defeating the vast majority of allied tanks up until 1942 at normal battle ranges - Crusaders, A-9's and A-10's and A-13's, BT-5's and -7's, T-60's, T-26's, etc.