Geographic and Military Flaws in SC

[Liam]

Yugoslavia needs another city, Tirana should have it's port removed. Definitely in this case with Libya having TWO cities! Libya should have 1 city. Portugal needs a port. The very name of the country implies it Spain deserves at least one Port in Barcelona Poland needs a Natural Resource Hex, she has a great amount of coal Germany used to move her war effort. Ploesti is too rich, 1 Oil well would suffice in Romania. Iraq is to rich, the oil there would've been that exploited back in the 1940s, only 1 oil Hex there as well. There should be a city in Palestine, Jerusalem I assume...

Crete should have a land connection to Greece cause it serves 0 purpose now and historically it was the key to the Eastern Med<perhaps a shared port from Athens to there> The USA should have double the Oil, and Minerals and several other major cities and ports. The USSR is missing some key cities that are infamous battlegrounds of WW2.

England should have a Resource hex for it's own coal reserves...

If Germany doesn't attack Sweden/Swizterland/Spain she should recieve MPP bonus each turn. The Swedish Military is too big relative to the military of other nations as is Poland.

Add your own points please

[Liam]

Oh Yes, there should be a blank port like Scapa Flow in Iceland for it's key importance to the N.Seas Battles

[JerseyJohn]

Very good ideas, many of them familiar. In the first instance you'd be dividing the MPP output more evenly between Poland and Romania, which I agree with.

The port question is a bit complicated. In North Africa, for example, Tripoli, Benghazi and Tobruck were all important for the Axis. Tunis is also important. In Crete there should be a port city, of course, otherwise there's no point to the place. Same for Cyprus which, offhand, I'm not even sure is on the SC map!

We've gone through the SC port situation several other times. I thought, in all modesty, that one of the best ideas involved distinguishing between ports with no value other than to be used physically as ports (Benghazi & Tobruck, for example, along with Scapa Flow and Sevastopol) and ports with slipways, which would be the only ones capable of making warships.

Ports like Gibraltar, Scapa Flow, Istanbul, Athens, Tobruck, Alexandria, Tirana, Riga, Sevastopol and if they were created, Bilbao, Valencia, and Lisbon shouldn't be able to build warships. That ought to be limited to Manchester, London, Edinburgh, Hamburg, Konigsburg, Oslo, Stockholm, Leningrad, Rostov, Trieste, Taranto, Palermo, Toulouse, Bordeaux, Brest, Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Canada. There would need to be a distinction between regular ports and warship slipway ports.

Iceland in the North and the Canaries in the South as harbors and airbases would make a fine touch. I think they should also have cities attached so ships or subs can pull into them and receive limited repairs along with partial resupply. Reykavjak (sorry for the spelling) would make a good target for German naval ambitions, but a way of skirting Scapa Flow would also need to be laid out or these fine ideas would have little meaning.

Lisbon should be a port, of course, along with Bilbao and Dublin since people not only enter, but also leave Ireland -- many of them ending up as my neighbors.

A lot of other fine ideas which I'm sure will be explored shortly.

I very much like the bonus idea for Germany not attacking Sweden, Switzerland or Spain. It's a simplified way of achieving what Shaka, myself and Kurt88 were trying so hard for with our neutral economic ideas over the winter. You're method is downright brilliant !!

Glad you introduced some new points while reviving some of the older ones. As always, Liam, you're a great asset.

[ August 03, 2003, 04:43 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

[Panzer39]

Originally posted by Liam:

Oh Yes, there should be a blank port like Scapa Flow in Iceland for it's key importance to the N.Seas Battles

We need a larger map to the north to allow German breakouts, otherwise there are no North Sea battles and iceland is useless

[Liam]

Yes JJ:

read much of the interest in keeping Germany out of Sweden and Swizterland. Most definitely keeping them out of Spain as well!

That's a very unattractive policy to a fellow Fascist regime. Should be huge political punishments to any of those invasions.

I agree about a port to resupply to a degree. Perhaps a 5 value port in this areas as Canada has. Even though Canada as I said before had a Larger navy than Germany at a certian point during the War. She should be represented a bit better at least in that regard. The fact is without a few more hexes and the addition of some sort of Fodder ship like a destroyer detachment it's hard to move Navies without costing yourself a mainline ship. I know ships like the SharnhostSP didn't hany any help on it's way down but it was extremely up to date and very competitive with it's speed to any major British Battleship. I suggest that if you move in Coastal hexes that you get some sort of Destroyer bonus rathern than the superflous design of another ship. This way if you attack units say following the Norwegian Coastline or French Coastline you're likely ot encounter lots of counter measures by Luftwaffe-coastal anti-aircraft heavy artillery batteries<as is Historical>

Cyprus is on the map. I think it changes hands only if you take Britian however and in what capacity for spying on German/Italian shipping I'm not sure. Tunis definitely should be represented in some fashion. A more major city that tobruk and that's where the infamous German reinforcements #ing 150k surrendered... that's not far of Stalingrad as a blunder!

What about the black forest??? Hey!!! It's big enough, compared with the Ardenne. Balancing out some of these key factors and giving Germany Tirpitz at strength 1 in the beginning of the Fall Weis would make a more realistic game engine and less alterations with MPP bids.

There isn't a factor you couldn't change discussed here that would throw the game balance off. Subs are worthless... Subs are too easily hunted, they should have greater capability to hide until the Allied Navies update their technology. This would stop Med Hording attacks against the Italian Navy and redicilious Coastal bombardment of German troops all over France early on.They had a job then, it wasn't getting extra hits on German Occupying forces

[DSEDS]

Originally posted by Panzer39:

We need a larger map...

100% Agree.

[CC Baxter]

I agree with just about everything you say Liam but isn't 1.07 the absolute final version?

[kenfedoroff]

Aircraft Carriers

Aircraft Carriers had a big influence on sea battles in WW II, but because of their limited plane capacity (relative to the size of air fleets in SC), their effect on SC land battles is all out of proportion to their actual historical influence, yet their effect is mis-represented vs. ships.

Proposed:

Carriers suffer no loss when attacking non-adjacent ships. This reflects history in that they are not exposed to gun fire. (Yes, I realize air crews and planes are lost, but for the scale of SC, this will be ignored).

Carriers can only attack land units that they are adjacent to on the coast.

Otherwise, Carriers cannot attack land units. They can only intercept land based air fleets.

Ken

[Panzer39]

I would rather the carrier and their air wing be separate.

[Liam]

Well, in many other popularized games the Fighter that sits on the carrier is a seperate entity. Which in this case would probably be interesting with a Supply and readiness limitation<from a certian amount of time at sea>

That would probably be more realistic, A LOT more realistic vs Land units. Even after the Japs pounded Pearl they would've had to go in on foot to take the Island they couldn't have done that much damage with only air power... especially not carrier based!

I say we make a patch 1.08 and we get charged $15.00 bucks for it. I'll pay for it and I can probably get 100 people here to back me... and it wouldn't take that much work for the alteration!

[Panzer39]

Well I'd rather pay 30$ for a world wide SC2 WITH all the changes made. However, if there are enough improvements I would be happy to pay 15-20 for an "expansion" pack for SC. Especially if it included a better editor. It would still come out cheaper than most new games I buy.

[Shaka of Carthage]

Unless I am mistaken, the other games that have the carriers and the naval air seperate are operational level. There are no strategic games that seperate them.

If you go with the theory that the Air unit has around 1,000 aircraft it causes problems with a seperate naval air unit. I know the super carriers that the US built had 80 or so aircraft on them. The more conventional carriers, which I believe are what the ones' we have represent, have around 50 or so aircraft per carrier. That would be about 20 carriers in a CV unit. Don't think so. I think its more like two (2).

So if I have 100 aircraft per carrier unit, there is something of a disparity. Even if the sortie rate of the carriers were five (5) times more effective than land based aircraft (which it isn't), that still makes the carrier aircraft 50% as effective.

I don't see how any numbers that small should be represented by a seperate unit.

[JerseyJohn]

Yes, another thing that's been wiggled and jibbled but carriers, generally speaking, are still as effective as airfleets. Things like that take a lot out of the game.

[Liam]

Agreed, Carriers are a specialized weapon. Not meant to attack frontline troops in WW2 style wars. The extra unit would be superflous and harder to program.

The mainline changes for a new patch would be the addition of transporting out of Spain. The Cut back of the ability of Jets and defense for HQs. Revamping what Carriers role are as said above and making the US an increased MPP Power to rid the game of any and all Bidding. With this inclusion a more advanced Sub System could be implemented for Germany. Perhaps a starting tech for them to make the Atlantic War at least worthwhile

a lot to throw around. 15 bucks is cheap, editors take too much work

[Shaka of Carthage]

While I don't agree with all of your proposed map changes, between the ones you've outlined and the ones JerseyJohn mentioned, it would add alot to the strategic decisions, not to mention fix some of the geographic problems.

[ August 04, 2003, 08:12 PM: Message edited by: Shaka of Carthage ]

[JerseyJohn]

The Atlantic won't be expanded, so we have to work with what we've got, the following ideas are not geographically proportionate but accurate enough in the present game sense.

As Liam said, Iceland sould be kept small. I'd make it a city with a port in the NW map corner. An airfleet or bomber can be placed on it to represent it's historical role as a naval and air base. It was, and is, independant but British troops garrisoned it and were followed by U. S. Marines. The United States built an air base and a naval base at Hvalfjordur, both for convoy support. Making it a port without a city wouldn't work. For game purposes it should be shown as a UK possession. The extra 10 MPPs would also help Great Britain make up for the shortfall in it's game setup.

Farther south, a land hex should replace the water hex between Canada and the U. S.. Some maps indicate the two nations share a border.

In the SE corner, near the African coast, I'd place another setup like Iceland -- a city with a port -- for the Canary Islands, belonging to Spain. I think two hexes would be a good distance from the coastline.

Farther west could be the Azores. Though owned by neutral Portugal, the British were allowed to use Lagens air field on the Island of Terceira. In 1944 the United States extended it's 6000 foot runway. For game purposes I'd forget that part and make it a city and port to represent all the islands and inactive untill Portugal enters the war.

My view on this is the same as Shaka's and Liam's, though not essential, adding these things would make for a more interesting game.

[Panzer39]

Well I would like a North Sea loop similar to the Suez. The Axis can place a ship on the Hex or hexes by Norway and have it magically transported to the other side of England. There could be a random chance that it takes damage along the way. Subs and ships could also enter the arrows on the other side to make a return trip.

[JerseyJohn]

That's really a basic necessity; additionally, the ships / uboats appearing in the Atlantic should arrive away from waiting Allied vessels.

The original round the Cape route also needs to be usable by warships as it isn't always feasable to move them through the Mediteranean. And that route also needs to run both ways. When a ship ends on an arrow, at the end of that player's turn a message should appear, Continue around Cape? so the hex also remains as a functional ocean area.

[ August 04, 2003, 11:16 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

[Panzer39]

Fully agree

[kurt88]

Well I would like a North Sea loop similar to the Suez

That would be a nice feature.

IMO the 2 axis subs at the beginning of the game sitting near Canada are just sitting ducks now.

A loop like you mentioned would give them a chance to return home unharmed.

[kenfedoroff]

Originally posted by JerseyJohn:

....Farther south, a land hex should replace the water hex between Canada and the U. S.. Some maps indicate the two nations share a border.

Rolling On Floor AND Laughing Out Loud.

JJ, you crack me up.

Thanks,

Ken

[kenfedoroff]

Originally posted by JerseyJohn:

The original round the Cape route also needs to be usable by warships as it isn't always feasable to move them through the Mediteranean. And that route also needs to run both ways. When a ship ends on an arrow, at the end of that player's turn a message should appear, "Continue around Cape?" so the hex also remains as a functional ocean area.

As we sing in MoTown:

"I second the sEa-Motion".

Good idea, JJ.

Ken

[JerseyJohn]

kenfedoroff

Thanks, Glad you enjoyed it, and agree with the ideas.

-- hopefully Hubert will incorporate some the suggested changes and alterations. The majority of them seem like they could go right on this map instead of SC2.

We've been kicking the North Atlantic Loop and Cape Round Trip ideas around since November, along with some of the others discussed here. Two patches have appeared since then and, with other basic improvements made, I don't understand why none of these improvements were also incorporated.

Granted, there are system limitations, but the things Panzer and myself discussed don't seem very demanding on the system, and neither do Liams very basic map revisions. Connecting Canada and the U.S. is only a mater of changing a single hex and adding any of those Atlantic Islands would make the game much better -- I'd opt for the Azores and Canaries as they'd make Portugal and Spain more important and add a lot more strategy.

< Nov 25 Thread with Many Current Suggestions! >

[ August 05, 2003, 02:08 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

[Liam]

JJ:

The truth is that to incorporate any extra hexes on the map may require a whole alteration in the programmers agenda. Require too much! Even an arrow transportation system like the Suez must've been too difficult for him to incorporate easy. A system would be nice or a house rule about Atlantic entry of subs into the Greater Atlantic. There should be 10 hexes extra going North into the Artic Circle to sneak around Ice-GreenLand from Norway.

I purpose the idea though that that we could have Baltic sea ships transfered via a Port hex to Archon in France to give free passage of Axis Combat ships only... This would represent both. Sadly I would love an extended N.Atlantic War and with at least the inclusion of several ports from Spain to Greenland to allow for a more diverse game if a player choices to dedicate to Sub and Naval technology on the Axis Side of the Fence. Making it more difficult to get into the Rock would be required to balance game play so you'd have to make Spain hiked up in Price to take for Axis.<should include Port in a DOW>

The patch though if included a lot of Ports and supply centers discussed would be an upgrade along the lines of Strategic Command<The Battle of North Atlantic Patch>

[Liam]

BTW: This would take away from British hording the French Coastline with superflous transports and add volumes to the strategy and diversity of the game...There would be a true 3rd front before you could perform D-day as was 100% historical

Not just train air units to be super dogfighters and unit killers when you have an enemy to worry about at sea