3 sides WW2

[Legun]

I like Clash of Steel, but there is basic assumption, which is neglected by documents available from Soviet archives. WW2 wasn't two-sides game. Soviet Union should be independent power, with own victory conditions. Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact and Barbarossa couldn't be simulated correctly, if sophisticated game of Stalin is ignored. I understand, that there is no rational base for simulation of eventually SU-West conflict. But full identity of Great Coalition existed only in Roosvelt's imaginations.

[Hubert Cater]

Essentially you're correct, but for this game it was just a design decision and for the most part I would say that they do play as separate powers with a common goal in mind kind of thing. They each have their own sphere of influence and thus their own problems dealing with the Axis powers.

Now purely dependant on the type of game you decide to play, but in most cases it really won't be until the end of the war (if they've got the Axis on the run) that their strategies become more coordinated as they probably should be.

[Legun]

Originally posted by Hubert Cater:

Essentially you're correct, but for this game it was just a design decision and for the most part I would say that they do play as separate powers with a common goal in mind kind of thing. They each have their own sphere of influence and thus their own problems dealing with the Axis powers.

Not exactly. I've played many times COS with Western Allies supporting Russia after occupation of Iraq. Montgomery defending Stalingrad etc. Any connection with reality.

Spheres of influance is Anglo-Saxon conception. Stalin's sphere of influance was the Europe as a whole. Do you imagine that Soviets just leaves "liberated" Denmark the same way like Americans left Czechoslovakia?

Originally posted by Hubert Cater:

Now purely dependant on the type of game you decide to play, but in most cases it really won't be until the end of the war (if they've got the Axis on the run) that their strategies become more coordinated as they probably should be.

What means "should"? Do you want to say that "Stalin should be carefully democratic leader" or "Soviets should support Warsaw uprising even it causes lost of chance for communist Poland?" . The same way you could tell that "Hitler shouldn't start WW2 but create United Nations".

Positive solution:

There are 3 different allied victories:

- Soviet victory - SU capture whole Germany

- Western victory - Western Allies capture whole Germany

- Coalition victory - each of final objectives is captured by one side.

What about?

Try to look at WW2 from other point of view than Roosvelt. Try Churchill at least.

[ May 08, 2002, 08:17 AM: Message edited by: Legun ]

[vonManstein39]

If player is playing both Allies and Soviets as one side, then victory objectives should be joint. But if playing only one or the other, then objectives should be separate.

[Hubert Cater]

Ok let me clarify, by geography the three Allied powers are separated and this is what I meant by spheres of influence.

Now you're right that the UK and Russia can both have interests in the mideast and well so can the US, but this is entirely up to you and how you decide to play since you control all three sides at once. They may also have vested interests together in other areas and as vonManstein alluded to, you can play them independantly or collectively, it's up to you.

What I meant by "should" is that if for example you have all three sides knocking on Germany's front door it may be to your advantage to coordinate your attacks, but if you choose not to, again that's up to you.

Hope that helps,

Hubert

[Funker Vertinox]

War In Europe had a unique system...

Most of the time you had just two people and one played both the allies and soviets...

And you did have the option for PBEM with a third person as the Soviets, but it was qute a pain so no one did it.

In theory with a 3 person pbem game the soviets could actually attack the Allies. They had two different types of supply as it is so they couldn't support each other, but I tried to pull off an interesting tactic once (didn't really work out too well though since it was in the winter of 1942)

I basically declared war on Turkey and the Allies attacked from the south which and the soviets took the northern route.

The goal was to have the allies be in Amphibious assault range of Greece adn the soviets could just break through the defenders at Istanbul with sheer artilary power, but the germans had other plans with moscow and "bad things" happened that just stalled the entire plan as the Allies just sat around in the winter while the Soviets had to dispearse troops not only in Turky now but all up and down the eastern front.

[Straha]

As I said in some other thread long gone: it would be really very sensible if the Allies and Russia could be played seperately. With this, I don't mean that they should not end up in the same alliance, but just that one could leave either one to the computer (like it was introduced in the last patch for COS).

The main reason for this is that, if the player takes over both the Russians and the (rest of the) Allies, the coordination between Russia and the Allies *inevitably* becomes too tight. Playing COS long ago, the games where I left either the Allies or Russia to the computer turned out to be the most interesting games I had ("Will the allies finally put up that second front?" etc... ).

I always dreamt of being able to do the same with Germany/Italy ... but I would already be happy if Russians and Allies were optionally separable. This is obviously also an issue with regard to PBEM, which would be greatly enhanced by the option of having more than two players (and this was mentioned, too, somewhere in the beginnings of this board).

Straha

[BloodyBucket]

Three or four player option would be great. I don't expect it. Perhaps SC2, or a SuperPatch waaayyy down the road...