Glabro

Well on the tabletop, "my" system is Chain of Command for WW2 platoon level. Bolt Action is popular everywhere, including here, and Flames of War for company scale, but I care less about them but will play if a scenario for these is organized. I am yet to find the higher command level game of my choice for WW2 but am thinking about something based on the Black Powder horse & musket set! The Battlegroup series (BG Normandy etc.) look very nice too. Maybe I'll take you up on your forum invitstion when I'm back at the desktop! My favou

Yes, I'm interested in this, and will pay money to see a universal operation app on my devices. This will enable campaigns on both digital AND tabletop games, and I play and want to see campaigns on both. Don't forget to market the tabletop side of it!

Good to hear about the improvements. I feel it's a bit of shame that what I thought was a bit of thinking outside the box with East First (without rail) turned out to be a gamey strategy. I just thought that if the Schlieffen plan was made in the belief that France can be knocked out of the war quickly, if that actually can't realistically be done, why even try it?

Yeah, but it's weird...you say you have to commit to an offensive which does more harm than good. Won't that just lead to half-hearted, conservative "attacks"? Why is it necessary? Is there some sort of obligatory guideline to follow when going through the motions to attack (ie. can't stop before the Meuse, can't retreat back to the Belgian border)? Also, is it feasible now to invade Italy? The mountain defense drop enables the Germans and A-H to actually make headway? My standard choice is to keep the Italians out. Well, in any case, glad it's going to be history.

Really? No-one used it? Had I not dropped out before the quarterfinals due to burn-out with the game, I for sure would've used it had nobody told me otherwise. Has anyone actually beaten France and won early using Schlieffen (against a human who knows how to play)? Anyway, as long as the changes are backed by history, there should be no problem strengthening Russia.

As a player yet undefeated using the East First strategy, it's interesting to see how the Russians will have to be strengthened in order to withstand an immediate assault from the Germans as opposed to one where I force march the troops from the west to the east, and what ramifications that will have on a war that starts in the west.

Alas, my experience in the tournament was not so great. I burned out during the prelims (didn't really enjoy the multiple games and scenarios vs. playing one big game), then when the semis came I was simultaneously having less playing time and more real life stuff going on, and having two of my most anticipated titles (Old Republic and Mass Effect 3) come out, which totally sucked me in. After several failed attempts I was able to get the turn sent a month late, but never received a reply from Walter, which I guess would have been at least nice. So, unfortunately I'll have to retire with not so much fun had, but I'm still undefeated, so maybe I'll challenge the champion to get what's coming to me! Shame, I was looking forward to SC2:Gold. But the rest of you, have fun! These are the scenarios I entered the tournament to play....

It's curious about that "slow reactions" thing as SC2 is the ONLY 2d wargame I've ever seen where you literally have to wait for seconds for anything to happen after clicking on a unit / submenu etc. It makes playing the game much, much more of a chore than it really should be. But I'm sure this will be taken care of in the next iteration, that goes without saying. Somehow the SC2 engine is just borked (disclaimer: at least on a great variety of computers)

Ah, excellent. For the future of SC!

I'm a bit confused. Just to be sure, are you being sarcastic or praising me? Because if that was sarcasm, then you misread my post. The tone of your text suggests that.

It's all a question of adding as many meaningful improvements and upgrades without overly increasing playtime. Naturally, the aforementioned simplicity is something that the developer needs to take into account (at least marketing wise) for the strategy game-buying semi-casual crowd that never shows up on the forums, but I'm not too worried about that myself, as I don't belong into that crowd. I'm just saying that I don't think SC3 will ever become even a third as complicated as GGWIR or even TOAW, so we should be safe even if a lot of cool stuff is implemented which gives us a better simulation and game.

But Finland already got its independence from Lenin before there ever was a civil war, and the German intervention really did not do anything for the outcome of that war by the stage it arrived...I suppose as a gameplay choice it works, though.

That certainly is a much needed major boost to the allied industrial capacity. Now, I wonder how on earth we're going to go about updating those to our mod - or was I correct and basically we have to start over? Because that's what it seems like.

With or without stacking implemented, I would also suggest some form of combined attacking / outflanking attempts being possible. As it is, poorer quality units cannot effectively attack higher quality units in even conditions, even with a numerical superiority. This is demonstrable in the Near East in every game - the Turks cannot attack, not really.

Actually there is no treaty since the Brest-Litovsk DE only appears if you send Lenin, but in either case, you lose all your conquered territories except Poland. The Ukraine does send 50-ish MPP to you at least (not sure if that happens if you sign the treaty), and Bill said you are supposed to get the Baltic Countries automatically in the next patch too (not that you can't just go and capture them again). We've talked about this before, and I can understand that Germany couldn't conquer Russia proper in WW1, but however, I think that if you don't sign the treaty and Russia surrenders (due to NM), you could keep the independent countries you have conquered already (the Baltics, Ukraine, Crimea, even Transcaucasus if you've gotten it - not sure about Belarus but possible), some automatically, some perhaps with a DE with pros and cons? Note you can already reconquer everything but Belarus, so it isn't too bad. Also, why doesn't Russia pay any war reparations if it surrenders?

I understand now. The NM value of each resource is subtracted from the original owner's NM pool EACH turn, not just when captured. Furthermore, apparently it adds to the conqueror's NM pool! I am not sending Lenin anywhere. Why would I? He just causes them to surrender faster and I get some negative morale effects either. I lose income from the Brest-Litovsk treaty because I lose all the resources conquered in Russia. Therefore I don't want them to surrender, but stay in the war longer so I am allowed to keep the mines etc. for longer. Plus by doing this I was able to deliver a killing strike in the West. Bill wasn't ready for it and the results were very severe! The Russians aren't a threat to the Germans in their beaten state, they cannot really recapture their lost areas once beaten thoroughly in Poland. But I can see how this would differ from game to game, depending on Russian teching and reserves.

Can someone tell me how Russian National Morale works in detail? I'm playing a game against Bill, and I'm interested in knowing how it falls. Of course I know that in general, if you just crush them, kill units and take locations, it falls (I should know, I do Russia first usually) but this time I'm not being aggressive in the East after the initial "crushing" phase in Poland / Minsk and taking the Ukraine. Will the NM just keep falling? I noticed that one turn it actually rose, when the Tzar fell! I assumed the fall of the Tzar would cause the NM to drop, but it actually rose 4% - which is somewhat alarming, I don't want a resurgent Russia. Don't really have a great motivation to crush Russia ever since I learned of the surrender conditions that actually make you lose a lot of income as the CP, so that affects my decision not to be very aggressive this time and concentrate on the west.

Yes, I admit politicians use it to "foist" things on us. However, there are a number of key differences in SC3 that make it incompatible with the slippery slope argument: 1) Fury soft are not (I hope!) greedy, self-centered persons trying to take advantage of us or try to diminish us. 2) Fury soft alone has the full power on decision making. They don't need our approval for things. As the name suggests, the Slippery Slope argument works from the top down, but not from the bottom up. 3) Either we are able to influence them with our "minority opinion", and not just our ideas and being a think tank for them, or we can't. If we can't influence them, we can't bring about a slippery slope danger. If we can, we can also stop it just as easily because I don't think anyone of us wants the game to get bogged down in unnecessary detail - just appropriate and strategic detail.

Very well, it's a slippery slope argument. But since when has that been a good argument for anything? It's simply fallacious alarmism in my mind that wants to assume that A will lead to B which will lead to C which will lead to D somehow automatically without each of those being judged on their own. Frankly I think it's insulting towards Hubert and Bill to suggest that they'd implement anything in their game "just because something else like that was already done". Remember, this is a suggestions thread. We are not here to decide, but to suggest. Therefore I fail to see the need to oppose suggestions purely from a "comfort zone" standpoint, and not a logical one. It doesn't really provide any meaningful feedback beyond "I don't like that idea". Now then, I challenge you to present an argument for why you think your slippery slope argument would be valid in this case, and not fallacious, as it usually is. You are very technically knowledgeable about WW2 materials, so I'm sure you can also weigh in if you honestly feel like any of the aforementioned carry anything like the weight oil did. Besides, "oil" wouldn't mean JUST oil, it would represent all the raw materiel needed to create mechanised units, but in a simplified and understandable form. It's just the easiest to call it oil. However, after all this ranting, I am not adamant about "oil". Manpower is more important to me. All I'm asking for is some sort of relevance between capturing the oil fields that currently exist in the game and the mechanized unit build limits that also already exist. "Oil" could just as easily make your unit cap for tanks, planes etc. go up by one if you capture a field, and that's it, without having an "oil" counter.

Agreed on all counts, but as a special note on n. 4 I really don't understand what "anti-tank" units are supposed to represent on a corps / army scale. Corps strength anti-tank units? Or is it just an "Axis & Allies" beer & pretzels unit?

It's good that we have an understanding. I can be insensitive, this is true - or at the very least I can come across like that, as I am quite blunt! But the older I get, the more I agree with you - I just want to get out of Internet arguments that go on and on and on...very rare to actually find an accord, instead people just get more entrenched about their position.

Bah humbug! That is hyperbole, pure and simple, says I! Instead of arguing with hyperbole and alarmism about over-complicating the game with completely irrelevant details like gearboxes, I want people to argue against the arguments themselves. Really, oil and manpower are nothing that the player needs to worry about - except by the most logical of ways - don't get your guys killed. Take care of your oil (clearly marked on the map with the oil graphic as now) and aim to take your enemy's oil. There's a mile between going to the level of detail that HOI lets you do with your industry, and simply representing at a very basic level the two most basic resources of WW2 (and I) - to replace the hard unit cap with one based on your resources. I am certain that these would be additions that would not make it harder to play the game, but would greatly deepen the WW2 feel and strategy. However, don't take this the wrong way - I can understand the desire to keep it simple and conserve the game - we're just in different camps - conservate vs liberal (I know, "bloody liberals are at fault again, oh, not corporatism or big media, it's the liberals' fault!) Hoi is a real time game. Therefore unplayable as a proper relaxed turn-based multiplayer game at your own pace. It is not even close to an option as an alternative.

Oh, I didn't address this - what exactly is my current "proposal" that you don't agree with? What am I supposed to send to Kommandant? I already agreed with NM. What relevance is your disagreement with my former suggestion if I already agreed to your suggestion that you need to keep "disagreeing" with it? I think you're used to people being obstinate and childish on the Internet, and I for one don't blame you for that. Sorry to disappoint you if you wanted a "revanche".

Well, it's the secondary tiebreaker anyway. Not much importance. I have a habit of not going out of my way to finish off units in supply if it'd cost me. In a war of attrition where neither side is going to have a breakthrough in the near future, it doesn't matter to me that much, especially since I learned destroyed but supplied units not only rebuild at half price, but also half the time.(unless I am ignorant of some side effects of complete unit destruction, like NM. I thought NM was based on strength points lost) . So I'm glad it's not the primary tiebreaker.

Another thing I'd want: manpower and oil along with MPPs! Replace the artificial unit build limits that resemble boardgame component limits with more appropriate limits. This means that too much attrition can cripple you - which is impossible in the current game as you can just keep on rebuilding infinitely. Also, oil is a good abstraction for all the things required for mechanized units, and would highlight the strategic value of oil locations much better. Both are, again, simple and intuitive concepts for every player to understand: you mostly need just men to build (foot) infantry, and mostly oil to build aircraft. Both require MPPs of course. Tank units require all three.