sogard

I thought I had seen a response to someone asking about Siberians that Hubert Cater had said that there was no random event possibility -- that the Siberians should show up all the time when certain criteria -- mostly geographic, if I remember correctly, occured.

I am playing a pbem game with a friend and we are in 1944, the Germans are adjacent to Moscow, Sevastopol has fallen and Voronezh has been taken by the Axis. Yet, no Siberian reinforcements have ever appeared. This is a huge hit to the Allies -- no free Soviet HQs and the Siberian Armies and Corps. I had always assumed that as long as the WAR IN SIBERIA was not selected -- given the geographic criteria (not spelled out anywhere; but generally, close to Moscow, loss of Voronozh or close to Rostov,) the Siberians always will appear. But, this is not the case in this game. Now, the Soviets still do hold Rostov; don't know if that is some sort of trigger too -- but it is late in 1944! Can someone please illuminate whether or not it is possible for the Siberians never to appear in the game even when Moscow is threatened (an Axis unit adjacent), the loss of Voronezh and the loss of the Crimea? Again, I have double checked and the WAR IN SIBERIA option is NOT checked.

Thanks for the update for your Scenarios Bill. I just downloaded them and will take a look at them. I have been playing with your last scenario updates for a while and have been enjoying them.

Welcome to the STRATEGIC COMMAND community mutil8! Just patch the game when you get it with the latest patch and enjoy. After you learn how to beat the AI, then get brave and play some pbem or tcp/ip. The game is only sold on the Battlefront.com website so that is why you have not seen it in the store. It is a great game and you will have a good time with it.

Germany is democratic and stable today. That is what Allied victory wrought in 1945. The notion that the Federal Republic of Germany is Bolshevik is simply preposterous. A vision of a right wing loonie. It is obvious that the writer does not know what a Bolshevik is. [ December 17, 2002, 09:47 PM: Message edited by: sogard ]

Methinks he doth protest too much.

Martinov's more transparent hex grid is a real winner. I have updated my game so that the map really does shine through. Nice job!

I very much like what you are doing with the cities; but, it does not look very European. Possibly a more European skyline (whatever that means) would work even better? Even so, I like the city skyline icon better than a simple factory and it is a good idea to implement.

So far, I have to say that I really do like Bill's 1939 Campaign Mod and it will earn a permanent place on my hard drive. It is a way to spice up the game and I very much like the addition of the reduced HQ and units in Egypt as it melds well with the new naval route around Africa in version 1.06. I also like the edge given the Germans in experience and the overall tweaks to tech found at start. Bill has made the U-Boats a more potent threat in the Atlantic through Tech and this again melds well into version 1.06 because it is now more difficult to switch research from one area to another. Nice job Bill.

I downloaded Bill's 1939 Campaign Mod from Otto's Strategic Command HQ site; but, the only Mod there is Bill's original which he has corrected in version 1.01. :confused: Must mean that Otto has too busy to update his site; so, just so everyone knows -- the link that Bill provided to his Mod at the beginning of this thread will only provide you with the original and not updated version of his Mod. [ December 12, 2002, 05:29 PM: Message edited by: sogard ]

I too have just downloaded Bill's mod and will report back after a couple of plays.

Yes, AVALON HILL was the great prime mover in wargaming; but, by the 1970s, its place as an innovator and trend setter was taken over by the rise of SPI and STRATEGY & TACTICS Magazine. My nomination for the best Russian Front tabletop game ever comes from another wargame magazine, the late COMMAND Magazine. COMMAND produced the best Russian Front boardgame, in a magazine nonetheless, with the game PROUD MONSTER. It remains the best take on the Russian campaign in boardgaming. Good news is that the original designer (Ty Bomba) and the current successor to STRATEGY & TACTICS Magazine (DECISION GAMES) are talking about updating PROUD MONSTER (which is out of print and should be snapped up if you ever see it on sale in a gaming store).

Well, WORLD IN FLAMES (WiF) from the very beginning gave you ALL of WW II because THIRD REICH only provided the European Theater. Even now, WiF provides a much better global view of WW II than ADVANCED THIRD REICH. The air and naval componants of WiF are vastly superior and much more realistic than in THIRD REICH. The major difference in people who like one game over the other is their style of gaming. THIRD REICH is more akin to chess in that it rewards play where perfection is the key. WiF is a game which is much more difficult to synthesize and come up with a perfect strategy. Players are required to be much more reactive to game events than in THIRD REICH. Both games have benefited from years of play, updates and reworking. Both games are much improved from when they made initial appearance. Obviously they are both reasonably good wargames; but, my preference has been and remains with WiF. [ December 11, 2002, 05:29 PM: Message edited by: sogard ]

Just to provide a contrary opinion; I thought ADVANCED THIRD REICH or THIRD REICH in any of its iterations was an OK strategic level WW II wargame. I have always thought that WORLD IN FLAMES is a much better game. I know that there are advocates for both games; but, ADVANCED THIRD REICH was/is a game that appeals to those who like to develop perfect strategies and get all their ducks in a row and deliver the perfect blow. WiF is much more problematic and much less susceptable to the perfect planning syndrome. WiF feels more real world to me and it always presented WW II on a global, holistic scale which was not true with THIRD REICH. [ December 10, 2002, 06:25 PM: Message edited by: sogard ]

I don't see what the big deal is over the requirement for stacking. If the scale is appropriate (ie. units are large enough so that it is appropriate that they would/could hold the front (50 miles to the hex), there is no problem. I can see the issue coming up when discussing why Air Units and Land Units can not stack together and I would have no problem with this. But, as long as the basic unit in the game is an Army or Corps, the scale fits. I suppose the Soviet units could also represent Fronts (Army Groups) and some ability to combine a couple of Corps to form an Army and maybe the addition of an Army Group counter (with the appropriate added combat abilities) is worth considering; but, stacking merely because people are familiar with games that permit unit stacks is not a very compelling reason to implement in the STRATEGIC COMMAND (SC) or STRATEGIC COMMAND 2 (SC2). I love WORLD IN FLAMES. I would play WiF over any of the iterations of THRID REICH everytime. But, just because WIF has an identical map scale and permits stacking does not necessarily mean that SC or SC2 must follow the same design decision. I like the fact that SC keeps the game simple. I have been passing out "BUY" recommendations to all my friends and on ConsimWorld now that tcp/ip has implemented. SC is the best little stocking stuffer that I know of for your gaming friends who think they have everything. What would be particularily clever is be sure to give a gamer who has just shelled out $50 for HEARTS OF IRON a little game called STRATEGIC COMMAND and then tell him that he is getting three times the game at half the price of HoI. Ho, Ho, HO.... [ December 10, 2002, 06:15 PM: Message edited by: sogard ]