Thoughts; Intelligence, Research and the US in SoE

[AshesFall]

Well, it's been a wild ride in the latest Newbie AAR. From the unstoppable axis juggernaut of 1939-1942, and then the faceplanting of the wall in 1943.

I pondered something all during this game, I'll summarize my questions and musings below.

1. How does the research system work, exactly? Does it work like the manual says? In another AAR (SC:GC gold I think) I read about "changes to the research system in SC:WWI guaranteeing an advance shortly". What is that about? There's nothing about that in the manual.

2. How does the Intelligence tech work, exactly? I've been a bit concerned about it since our call to arms campaign.

Let's use the US as an example here. Let's say the US invests fully into intelligence tech at the earliest opportunity. The US gets a hit. No other nation in the game has a lvl in intelligence. Does this mean that;

a) The US will now get 1% better chance at achieving all other techs every turn, as long as they have at least one chit invested, or do they get 1% better chance -per chit- invested?

Every axis nation will get 1% less chance at achieving a tech hit, in every one of their techs, as long as they have at least one chit invested, or is it 1% chance less for -each chit- invested?

c) Does intelligence only affect the "extra" chance you get for your opponent (or an allied nation) having better tech, or does it affect everything regardless? With that I mean the difference between simply lowering the "others have better tech bonus" to 0 at the lowest, and lowering the chance of getting any/all techs regardless.

3. The US in the SoE campaign seems to be a bit odd. To whit, they are a completely isolated entity that can barely be affected by anything the axis do. Considering that vacuum, there are several thoughts I have regarding them.

A) Depending on how intelligence tech actually works (see above) the US can easily be used to nearly game breaking effect. If they invest fully into intelligence, as I did, they soon get hits. With every hit, each Axis nations chance at research goes down while the allied nations remain the same (they are not, as I understand it, negatively affected by their allies int tech) or even goes up as you research the areas you want hits for USSR and UK with the US to give them extra chance at getting them. If US max out their int tech, or go to lvl 4, relatively quickly, all allied nations should swiftly gain a technological advantage and Germany (and even worse for italy) kept from making critical advances.

The US seem to be a little too strong. Historically, the US entered the war in december 1941. In our game, they entered in early december/late november 1941. Not much of a difference. They invested every possible effort in getting an army as modern and strong as possible into the field, and made their first effort in 1942 (a very small one) with inferior technology in many areas.

In our AAR, I was able to (without even trying very hard, being a total noob) field every single ground unit in the US arsenal, upgraded to nearly maximum tech in most relevant areas (Inf weapons 3, tank 3, anti sub 4, int 5, industry 5, production 3, fighter 4, ground attack 3, LR air 2, amphib 3...) by early 1943. That means that I didnt even have to choose anything, I could both get the super awesome anti sub tech, and upgrade all my other units to awesome levels, and buy them all. And did I mention, ship them all to Europe, no problem.

Historically, that seems... extremely implausible. Any thoughts on this? One solution could be to lower the "maximum research" ceiling for the US, forcing choice and slower advancement. If you want the awesome lvl 3 inf tech by 1943/44, you wont have the best tank tech (shermans were awful at the start of overlord for example). If you want the best anti sub tech there is by 1943, then you will have to sacrifice something (by 43 the sub hunters were not -that- good, hitler didnt invest into "teching" them fully either, so that probably told).

Thanks for your thoughts!

[Will95]

- see other thread

[stormbringer3]

After reading this thread, when playing vs. the AI, is there a limit on how many levels of intelligence research that should be gained so that the AI won't be hindered too much?

Thanks for any opinions.