Combat and SC2

[arby]

It seems to me that there are four major aspects of a grand strategic WWII simulation: the economic model, the combat model, the research model, and the diplomatic model. I think SC does a reasonably good job with some of these aspects, and a relatively poor job with others. One of the problems we've run into is that often people will look at one aspect or the other, without really examining how they interrelate. Over the next couple of days, I'm going to be starting threads on each of those topics, with the hope of stimulating discussion not only on each aspect, but how they all can be improved in order to make SC2 what I think it has the potential to be: the true heir to A3R. In other words, the classic grand strategic simulation of WWII.

This thread will be about combat, and for now, we'll stick to land and air combat. This is actually going to be three notes. This one will discuss combat in general and WWII combat in particular, and what key elements a computer game should attempt to simulate. The next will take a closer look at the SC combat engine, and I think some of the things there will surprise you: the keys to many of the problems with the game lie in the combat formulas. The last will contain my suggestions on how combat should be handled, which incorporates a lot of of what other people have suggested.

The first thing a computer game should simulate is the variety of factors that effect the results of combat. Some of us probably remember the old Avalon Hill board games, which usually resolved combat according to a matrix which consisted of nothing more than comparing the attacker's strength with the defender's strength; once the attacker reached 3:1 odds, he was usually guaranteed success. Comparative trength as the sole factor affecting the outcome of combat is not historically valid; from Arabella to Agincourt and beyond there are innumerable examples of smaller forces defeating larger ones. While hardly an exhaustive list, factors such as experience, leadership, and technology all play significant roles in determining how a battle will play out. And for all its simplicity, SC does an excellent job of capturing most of the key factors. Some external ones are missing, mainly weather, but I don't think there's any real problem here.

Now, let's take a look at WWII combat, which I think is noteworthy in two respects. First, it was exceedingly bloody. Germany started Barbarossa with 3 million men and 3100 tanks. When General Winter closed down the campaign six months later -- a campaign that is generally regarded as one of the most successful in the history of warfare -- the Germans had lost 900,000 men and all but 160 of the tanks. When you have a successful campaign that costs you a third of your army and 95% of your armor, you can't afford many unsuccessful campaigns.

Second, it was very fluid. There are military historians who claim that the panzer division was the greatest advance in warfare since the invention of gunpowder, and they may well be right. The generals who enjoyed the most success and received the greatest fame during the war -- Guderian, Rommel, and Patton -- owed their success to their instinctive grasp of the fact that the tank had vaulted mobility and manuever to the top of the top of the list of the key principles of military strategy.

So a computer simulation of WWII should reflect the variety of factors that produce a particular combat result, it should result in heavy losses, and it should be fluid. SC does the first quite well. It doesn't do the latter very well at all, and, as we'll see when we look at how the combat formula actually works, it really doesn't handle the second one that well, either, at least not in one key sense. That, I think, is the key to one of the main problems with the game, and that's where we'll go next.

[arby]

The first thing to understand about the combat tables is that there is no inherent benefit to defending: assuming all things are equal, an attacking unit and a defending unit will suffer the same loss. If a tank at 10 strength attacks another tank at 10 strength, both have supply of 8 and no commanders or experience, they will each sustain a loss of three strength points. (The formulas don't indicate the inclusion of any random number in their calculation, so I'm assuming there isn't one.)

If you've taken a close look at the combat value tables, this should raise a red flag. An army has a soft attack strength of 4, and a soft defense strenth of 2. Thus, when one army attacks another, assuming all things are equal, the defender is going to lose twice as many points as the attacker. I don't think there's much historical basis for that.

Now, let's see how the other factors affect the results. In all of the following examples, I'll assume a 10-strenth army (A) attacking a 10-strenth corps ©, which is rather common on the Eastern Front. We'll further assume that each is in supply level 7. In that setting, A would lose .6 points, and C would lose 2.3. Now let's add some other variables.

Effect of Command: If we give A an HQ with an 8 rating, its losses remain the same; however, it raises C's loss by an additional entire point. Experience of the HQ, however, isn't that big a deal; an HQ with 4 XP will inflict about a half point more of damage than an HQ with no XP.

The effect isn't nearly as pronounced on defense. Is that French HQ really worth the three corps you could otherwise build? Doubtful; giving a French corps an HQ doesn't affect the corps' losses at all, and increases the attacking armies losses by a whopping one-tenth of a point. Even giving that Russian corps Zhukov only increases the German's loss by 1/3 of a point.

Effect of Experience: As those who've played the game a lot have probably figured out, this is a biggie: each level of experience lowers the attackers losses and increases the defenders losses by about 1/3 of a point, making a net effect of 2/3 of a point for each level of experience. It works the exact same way, in reverse, on defense.

So don't be so quick to reinforce your units, especially if they're experienced. A 5-strength army with 3 XP's will outperform a 10-strength army with none.

Effect of entrenchment and terrain: This is somewhat odd again. Each level of entrenchment or terrain benefit will reduce C's loss by half a point; if C is maximally entrenched in a forest, it will suffer no losses. But neither entrenchment nor terrain has any effect on the attacker's losses. So don't be afraid to attack those cities. You may not cause much damage, but you're not going to suffer any more than you otherwise would, either.

Effect of supply: Again, somewhat of an oddity. It doesn't have much effect on the losses you inflict, and it has no effect on the losses you suffer. If A attacks C while both are at supply level 7, A will suffer a loss of .6, while C's loss will be 2.3. If C is surrounded and then attacked on the next turn(supply level 0), A's loss will drop to .3, but C's loss will be the same as it was when fully supplied.

One of the things I've consistently harped on since this game came out is the lack of realism of combat on the Eastern Front. There is no ebb and flow there. The Germans start on the offensive, and stay there throughout the rest of the game. A successful strategy for the Allied player does not include mounting a Russian counteroffensive, because it's virtually impossible to do so.

And the reason is right there in the combat formulas. It's also the reason for the game imbalance toward the Axis, and the reason for the "endless manpower" problem, and the reason the Germans can build 20 airfleets. Infantry combat, at least, heavily favors the attacker. And once a German army gets 2 XP's, it can attack with impunity. It will not suffer any losses, at least not while it's attacking corps, it's most common opponent. I never kept track of my losses in any Barbarossa I've done, but I'll bet that it doesn't come anywhere close to 30%. This is why.

So while the Russians have to replace about 4 or 5 corps a turn, the Germans don't have to do anything, except build more units. If the Germans had to replace 1/3 of their army in the first six months of the war with Russia, they wouldn't be able to stack the marshes with corps, or build an airfleet every turn.

It's late now, so I'll let everybody chew on this til tomorrow, when I'll post some ideas on what I think might be done.

[ March 05, 2003, 09:57 PM: Message edited by: arby ]

[JerseyJohn]

Arby

Great posts. I'll hold off till you've finished. Sounds like the you've found the key everyone's been looking for.

[ March 06, 2003, 01:52 AM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

[SeaWolf_48]

Wow Arby, your the first person to point out the atvantage of the offensive attack!

The German Wehrmacht did attack with less men than the Russians because of their coordination of conbined arms (Panzer, Grenidier/Infantry and Stuka's). Some war games give the attacker a bonus if they attack with combined arms, I wish SC did.

Your also right about the losses for the Germans in 1941 (900,000), they never made good those losses, and the flower of their youth were pushing up daisies. Russia could make up their losses however, the first two years they lost 4.5 mil men, and still had more reserves for 1944. How to get this into the game would take some real thought.

The game is tied to MPP's, so somehow Russia needs to recieve more MPP's even though she looses the resource points in the western part of Russia.

Looking forward to your next postings.

[Minotaur]

Well... My jaw is on the floor :eek: ...

I've never, ever though about the 'Combat Algorithms' being so wrong... At the very least I though they need a little tweak here and there (like lowering Air Fleet attack, etc...)...

But if your theories are correct (and it seems you have done your homework)... Then yes, it needs a major overhaul...

Perhaps my ol' boardgames charts & dice weren't so bad after all ...

[arby]

Originally posted by Minotaur:

Well... My jaw is on the floor :eek: ...

I've never, ever though about the 'Combat Algorithms' being so wrong... At the very least I though they need a little tweak here and there (like lowering Air Fleet attack, etc...)...

But if your theories are correct (and it seems you have done your homework)... Then yes, it needs a major overhaul...

Perhaps my ol' boardgames charts & dice weren't so bad after all ...

I don't necessarily think that the algorithms are "so wrong." In fact, Hubert gets a lot of it very right. The effect of experience and command is probably accurately modeled. What's out of whack is the overwhelming benefit to the attacker. And that isn't really necessarily a bad thing, when you consider that the attacker does have several disadvantages: he cannot combine attacks from separate units, and he has to rely on completely eliminating the defending unit. What you have to resist here is the temptation to conclude that the attacker suffers too little loss, and change that. You also need to address how combat works.

I'll make some suggestions in a minute. First, a couple of clarifications. I said that supply doesn't affect the losses a defender suffers, that a defender at 7 supply will suffer the same losses, all other things being equal, that a defender at 0 supply will suffer. Went back and checked, and that's not correct, in a limited set of circumstances. It is correct if the defender has no experience, is not entrenched, and is in clear terrain. A change to any of those will reduce the defender's losses. (Note that the first and third are the usual situations on the Eastern Front, and any attack, including air, will reduce entrenchment. Thus, my statement was true for probably the substantial majority of combat situations on the Eastern Front: a unit with 0 supply will not suffer any greater losses than if it were in supply.)

Secondly, I didn't tell you how strength points affected combat. Interestingly enough, they don't have much effect at all. Without factoring in command and experience, strength has no effect on an attacker's losses, and in army/corps combat, the effect is only about .13 points for every strength point; e.g., an army at strength 5 will inflict about .7 of a point less damage than it would at strength 10. Factoring in command and experience doesn't change the situation all that much. In the same combat, if the army has 2 XP's and an HQ of 8 with a combat morale bonus of 2, the difference will be slightly over .8. You don't get to a full point difference unless you max everything out: 4 XP's, and an HQ of 9 with a combat morale bonus of 4.

[arby]

So what do we do about all this. Well, let's start with what we want to do, which I think is:

1. Reduce the impact of air.

2. Increase the attacker's losses.

3. Increase the effectiveness of armor.

All of those would reflect a much more historical situation than the game does now.

How to do it?

1. Change the combat formula so that results are dependent upon three factors: experience, readiness (supply and command), and strength. (As it stands now, strength is folded into readiness.) As far as the relative weighing of them, I'd probably be tempted to give them pretty much equal weight.

2. Have air attacks affect strength loss much less, but have a substantial effect on readiness.

3. Boost the soft attack rating for armor from 4 to 5, and maybe even to 6, and have it increase (along with the tank attack and tank defense rating) with each increase in tank tech. On the other hand, terrain bonuses against tank attacks should probably be increased; from 1 to 2 in forests, 2 to 4 in marshes and cities, and 4 to 6 in mountains. Tanks against infantry in clear terrain were deadly, but tanks were pretty much useless to varying degrees in other terrain.

4. Increase soft defense rating of an army from 2 to at least 3, probably 4, and maybe even 5. (Although probably top out at 2 for a corps.)

5. Introduce the concept of retreat; once a unit reaches a certain depth of readiness or strength, it retreats.

6. Introduce the concept of overruns by armor: if an armored unit encounters a defending unit which is below a certain readiness or strength, it simply brushes it aside (the defending unit retreats) and continues on its way.

7. Change the rockets tech to rockets and artillery. In addition to increasing the effectiveness of rockets, each level increases the soft defense and attack ratings of armies and tanks. (Not sure how this, or any other tech increase, should affect corps.)

Now, despite what you may think based on my post about the combat algorithms, one of the reasons I went to law school is they promised there wouldn't be any math. I'm not about to get into the nitty-gritty of actually writing formulas. Some of my ideas may be good, some may be bad. Some will require a major overhaul of the combat engine. (And thankfully, I'm not a computer programmer, so I'm not going to get my hands dirty with that, either.) At the least, I hope I've stimulated some discussion. I also want to address some of the questions raised by Sea Wolf about MPP's, and I'll do that in a new thread I'll start on the Economic Model for SC2.

[pzgndr]

Thus, when one army attacks another, assuming all things are equal, the defender is going to lose twice as many points as the attacker. I don't think there's much historical basis for that.

Arby, great post. This is stuff we all need to absorb and think about. I do have one comment about the quote above. While the basis for any single unit-unit battle may be questionable, SC battles are fought sequentially so the overall effect should be considered. The 1st attack affects the 2nd, which affects the 3rd, etc.

Unlike games of old, it's hard to analyze the total forces involved and simply look at a CRT. SC is different, so we should focus on the overall results and not the specifics of a single battle. And we must remember the scale of this game. No single turn is going to look like what happened historically. But campaigns over several turns should produce realistic results, and how well SC does that deserves some discussion.

[arby]

Originally posted by Bill Macon:

I do have one comment about the quote above. While the basis for any single unit-unit battle may be questionable, SC battles are fought sequentially so the overall effect should be considered. The 1st attack affects the 2nd, which affects the 3rd, etc.

Excellent point, but I think it only exacerbates the problem. It would be one thing if the initial attacker received undue losses, and then subsequent attacks balanced things out. But the exact reverse happens. The initial attacker suffers half the losses the defender does (1/4 if its army v. corps), and then each subsequent attacker suffers even fewer losses! The actual loss ratio to the attacker starts at 1:2 and goes down from there.

Unlike games of old, it's hard to analyze the total forces involved and simply look at a CRT. SC is different, so we should focus on the overall results and not the specifics of a single battle. And we must remember the scale of this game. No single turn is going to look like what happened historically. But campaigns over several turns should produce realistic results, and how well SC does that deserves some discussion.

And to me, that's the problem: it doesn't. Have you ever seen the Russian Front resemble anything close to what actually happened? I haven't. Invariably, the Germans attack and push the Soviets two-thirds of the way across Russia, and then the Russians sit there clinging for dear life, hoping that the Allies can invade France (in 1942!) so that they can gain some breathing room. And when I've won as Allies, it has invariably been the Western Front, not the Eastern, that is decisive. In reality, by the time the Allies waded ashore on the Normandy beaches, the Russians were at the borders of Poland. In this game, the Russians are usually hunkered down in the Urals.

Same thing, for that matter, on the Western Front, both in 1940 and 1944. It is not without irony that the best plan in the game for blitzing France is the one the Germans used in WWI, not the one they used in WWII. As for 1944, same thing: you're much more likely to see a recreation of the Battle of the Somme than of Operation Cobra.

[ March 06, 2003, 09:40 AM: Message edited by: arby ]

[Iron Ranger]

And to me, that's the problem: it doesn't. Have you ever seen the Russian Front resemble anything close to what actually happened? I haven't. Invariably, the Germans attack and push the Soviets two-thirds of the way across Russia, and then the Russians sit there clinging for dear life,

Perhaps I havn't played enough games HvsH but I have seen the russian front act acording to history and it become the decisive battle ground, at times. But what your getting into is players game play. I know your going to hit on this later but two quick points on this.

1) The unlimited man power issue. This is due to the lack political consiquences of attacking all the minors and the gain in MPPs of controling these countrys. If you play a game and Germany only controls the areas historical they entered, by 42-43 they will be streched thin and unable to build units every turn. As it stands now, most good players will control every main land minor and most is not all the med BEFORE the attack on Russia in the fall of 41, at this point they can't be stoped, thier getting more MPPS then the allies combined. Game over.

2) Peoples game play in Russia. Most players try to hold as much ground as possiable. They won't trade space for time and end up in the middle of the board getting pounded on by a well supplied German Army(s) while thier low readness corps are eaten alive. Sure they can plug the holes for a year with more cheap corps but the Germans are gaining exp and by early 42 don't even need to reinforce thier units - then they build 10 more air fleets and Eroupe is a true fortress. Game over.

I think what I'm trying to say is the Allies need to play a near perfect game to match the axis. I didn't know why untill now. Your bringing to light the advantage of the Attacker over the Defender is why its easier for player to 'handle' the axis side and why everyone (outside of Terif) has such a hard time 'handling the allied forces.

That was rather long winded, sorry. What I'm saying is the Game play for the grey guy is easy and the allied game play takes alot of skill.

[KDG]

First, great analysis. I checked the numbers in my excel spreadsheet and they are correct.

Now the rebuttle.

This is a turn based game. Each player has a chance to attack, thus causing damage to the other player. You can also move units to minimize damage. Usually only get two attacks at a unit using armies.

Thus anything that reduces damage to the defender is an effective defense. Thus having good supply, entrenchment, an HQ, etc, all make it more difficult for the attacker to remove that unit. If he isn't removed, he gets reinforced, and the attacker must start over.

Secondly, after defending, the player has a chance to attack himself if he choses, causing damage, or can move his men to better defensive positions to lessen the upcoming attack.

You mentioned that supply didn't have much effect. You were only half correct. Supply doesn't affect the defender to any great lengths, but it greatly affects the attacker. In the same example you had given, reducing the attackers supply to 0 drops damage from 2.4 to 1.33. This is a huge drop.

HQ's have more effect then you mentioned also, since they also give supply besides command, thus a twofold effect.

Strength points are more correlated to a units life.

Experience is where the greatest problems begin to arise. A unit that has 2 experience is almost twice as good as a the same unit with no experience.

This differential, in my opinion, is too great, which leads to the axis advantage. This formula has been modified once(kill exp dropped from .5 to .3, thus Hubert knows this was a problem), and may need an additional modification.

You start to see tactics to increase the experience of units, such as ships with Malta, planes attacking every turn vs low level resource just to gain more experience. It becomes the experience game.

Here is how I would modify the game. Very simple, and would affect all aspects of the game.

Reduce exp gain by .1 for all attacks, either kill or non-kills, and make it that planes and ships can't get kills.

This will slow the push into Russia since the armies won't be as strong, as well as reduce the effectiveness of planes in the attack; this would allow Russia to try a counter attack since all it's resources won't be lost so quickly. It will also increase the damage that players take from attacks, which will require more reinforcement, thus reducing the total units a side could muster.

Everything solved by a minor tweek (don't I wish that was the case)

Thats it for now.

[ March 06, 2003, 04:18 PM: Message edited by: KDG ]

[Shaka of Carthage]

Just glanced at a few of the posts. Looks interesting. Of course I have comments, but these posts deserve dedicated time for reading and response.

Glad to see the topic.

[gengisjon]

Great analysis. Just wanted to clarify one item. Even though it is not mentioned in the formulas there is a random component to the calculation of damage. I ran a number of test using the invasion of Poland and all results were +/-1 of the damage from the formulas.

Doesn't change the argument of the post but I thought it was worth mentioning

[ March 06, 2003, 07:09 PM: Message edited by: gengisjon ]

[arby]

Originally posted by KDG:

You mentioned that supply didn't have much effect. You were only half correct. Supply doesn't affect the defender to any great lengths, but it greatly affects the attacker. In the same example you had given, reducing the attackers supply to 0 drops damage from 2.4 to 1.33. This is a huge drop.

Well, it is, but having attacking units at 0 supply is very unusual, especially for the Germans on the Eastern Front. Usually, they'll be somewhere between 5 and 8. Rather than use the extremes, I figured I'd do it by steps: each reduction in supply level reduces the opposing losses by .13 strength points.

HQ's have more effect then you mentioned also, since they also give supply besides command, thus a twofold effect.

True, and that's one of the things I like. I think Hubert did a very good job of including the appropriate variables in combat.

Experience is where the greatest problems begin to arise. A unit that has 2 experience is almost twice as good as a the same unit with no experience.

This differential, in my opinion, is too great, which leads to the axis advantage. This formula has been modified once(kill exp dropped from .5 to .3, thus Hubert knows this was a problem), and may need an additional modification.

.

See, this is where I think you need to look at it more holistically. The problem isn't that the Germans develop more experience. Historically, they did. That (and superior command) was the reason they were able to do as well as they did, and to hold out as long as they did. There is no question that in 1942, man for man the German soldier was the best in the world, and you can probably extend that out into mid-1944. The reason that wasn't enough was because those experienced soldiers got killed off, and because in the end the Russians just put so many men and tanks in the field that it overwhelmed them. Neither of those things happen in this game because (a) the combat rules don't require the attacker to sustain much damage, and thus the Germans never have to leaven their experienced with reinforcements, and ( the Russians don't have enough manpower to overcome the experienced units. The Russians can never mount a counterattack because they can't afford to replace the losses. In the present combat structure, a Russian 10-point army attacking a German 7-point army that has 3 Xp's and an HQ with an 8 rating and 2 combat bonus is going to suffer almost three times as much damage as it inflicts. If it's paying half as much for an army as the Germans are, that might be an acceptable strategy, but not if it's paying more. Which, until the latter stages of the war, if even then, it usually is.

Increase the costs of attacking to the attacker, and the Germans aren't going to have as much experience, and they're not going to have as many units. (They'll have to use MPP's for reinforcing, rather than building units.) Lower the costs of building Russian infantry and the Russians will be more able to mount counterattacks. You've solved the problem, without doing anything with experience.

You start to see tactics to increase the experience of units, such as ships with Malta, planes attacking every turn vs low level resource just to gain more experience. It becomes the experience game.

That's a problem, and I'm not sure how to handle the ships part. Air fleets, in my opinion, should have no strategic attack value. That should be up to the bombers.

[ March 06, 2003, 07:24 PM: Message edited by: arby ]

[arby]

Originally posted by gengisjon:

Great analysis. Just wanted to clarify one item. Even though it is not mentioned in the formulas there is a random component to the calculation of damage. I ran a number of test using the invasion of Poland and all results were +/-1 of the damage from the formulas.

I kind of suspected it, too, and that shows some perspicacity on Hubert's part. Some randomization should be present. After all, anyone who's studied military history knows that one of the variables affecting the results of combat is simple luck.

[KDG]

(The Russians can never mount a counterattack because they can't afford to replace the losses. In the present combat structure, a Russian 10-point army attacking a German 7-point army that has 3 Xp's and an HQ with an 8 rating and 2 combat bonus is going to suffer almost three times as much damage as it inflicts.)

If you add an HQ, plus if the Germans only had 1 Xp's(due to my exp. gain change) then the outcome is about even in an exchange. Throw in the fact that the Russians would always be attacking at higher supply than the Germans (defending as well) this would make counter attacks even more effective.

This is also a change that could be made with the existing system (Hubert has already modified this once) and could also be used in SC2 without programming modificiations.

Here is a question for all you WW2 historians:

How much better, pct. wise, was a experienced German unit?

In our game now, exp. 2 gives 35% more damage to a corps and receives 100% less damage. It is also too easy to have multiple exp. 2 units going into Russia.

I say tweak experience gain, and make a possible minor change to the damage received back equation from attacks(maybe have a min. dam received of .5 on any attack - with random you would then get either get 1 dam., or 0 dam).

[arby]

Originally posted by KDG:

If you add an HQ, plus if the Germans only had 1 Xp's(due to my exp. gain change) then the outcome is about even in an exchange. Throw in the fact that the Russians would always be attacking at higher supply than the Germans (defending as well) this would make counter attacks even more effective.

This is also a change that could be made with the existing system (Hubert has already modified this once) and could also be used in SC2 without programming modificiations.

In our game now, exp. 2 gives 35% more damage to a corps and receives 100% less damage. It is also too easy to have multiple exp. 2 units going into Russia.

I say tweak experience gain, and make a possible minor change to the damage received back equation from attacks(maybe have a min. dam received of .5 on any attack - with random you would then get either get 1 dam., or 0 dam).

But Hubert already tweaked the experience formulas once, and what effect did it have? No more than a marginal one. I really don't think it affected what happens on the Eastern Front at all.

See, what I've been trying to get across here is that you have to look at the whole picture, not just one factor, like experience. You could eliminate experience entirely and the Russians still wouldn't be able to mount a counterattack. Why? Because there would be too many German units, and because the Germans would still have overwhelming air superiority. Why? Because the Barbarossa campaign cost the Germans a fraction of what it should, and instead of replacing their losses, they could build new units, including air. Why? Because the game doesn't accurately model the costs of combat, especially on the attack. Of course, if you do model the costs correctly, you've got to do some other things to compensate for that, like allowing retreat and giving armor a more significant role.

And, of course, if you're going to make it more costly to attack, that's going to cost the Russians when they go on the offensive. Which is as it should be; the Russians lost nearly four times as many men on the Eastern Front, and tank losses, even after 1941, were even worse. The thing is, they could replace those losses, and the Germans couldn't. So you make Russian infantry much cheaper to buy, and tanks marginally cheaper.

The major problem with the Eastern Front is that there are too damned many units. Look at any game you play: by 1942 there's unbroken gray line down the map from Leningrad to Rostov. This is not historical; in reality, you had regiments being responsible for 50-km fronts, and by 1943 you had companies manning them. There should be gaps in the German line which can be exploited, the German player should be forced to keep a mobile reserve to plug them up, the Russian player forced to keep a mobile reserve to exploit them. And then you have WWII combat on a strategic level that actually resembles what happened in 1941-1945, instead of what happened in 1914-1918.

[Kuniworth]

Originally posted by arby:

In reality, by the time the Allies waded ashore on the Normandy beaches, the Russians were at the borders of Poland.

Not quite, Operation Bagration was launched on june the 22nd 1944.

Otherwise great great topic Arby. Excellent.

[pzgndr]

Have you ever seen the Russian Front resemble anything close to what actually happened? I haven't. Invariably, the Germans attack and push the Soviets two-thirds of the way across Russia, and then the Russians sit there clinging for dear life, hoping that the Allies can invade France (in 1942!) so that they can gain some breathing room.

The problem in SC is more with the economic model than with the combat model. Once the Germans push deep enough into Russia where they tip the MPP balance, the Germans can afford to build and reinforce more units while the Russians continue to decline. In contrast, 3R offers a more realistic simulation. Germany is eventually limited by their force pool and can not adequately cover the vast gains they achieve, while Russia continues to receive their BRP base each YSS plus economic aid from the western allies. It's possible to hold together a defense in 3R and eventually strike back. That's a problem in SC.

Attacker losses could be a little higher, and that should be looked at. Experience is also something that should be looked. All of these things will have to be considered for SC2. There are plenty of good ideas on the table for tweaking everything. It is very difficult to assess how they all interrelate and ultimately affect gameplay until Hubert decides to put something together and try it. Considering that SC plays remarkably well at this point, subtle changes here and there should be all that's necessary.

[Codename Condor]

Good analysis in this post, but the main problem in SC is:

-the experience of the fleet:

the carriers are unbeatable, they can earn cheap experience by means of no real combat, bombardement, wtf, bombardement cant give any experience at all!, instead in real fleet combat they should gain extra-experience, so killin' a french 2-points battleship makes no sense if in return u get 2 of damage, no experience, if u make a bombardement over a poor troop u get experience over and over again till u reach the four stars. The airfleet cant do that, they lose points even attackin' a mine. No way to defend france, belgium or norway, wherever the allies want to attack they will win, destroying averything with the carriers and fleet. So the best thing to withdraw and return to germany and make a massive attack in russia, with tanks, quickly before the allies reach germany...Or u reach level 5 in planes before 1942 and the carriers are still low (unprobably).

U'd probably say, well the axis can do that too, nope, only italy, if italy had 2 carriers from the begining...Or if the subs could counterattack...

Hope SC2 will solve this.

Would be nice to see also the assault option, like in COS. Even some aditional advantages like Russian infiltration, blitzkrieg, german Kampgruppe...(implemented in COS to try to reproduce history), and above all to allow troops to retreat. I liked also teh production system in COS.

Anyway, this is the best game ever about WWII and the game those who played COS wopuld always like its sucessor.

[arby]

Originally posted by Bill Macon:

The problem in SC is more with the economic model than with the combat model.

I think the two are related. Because the combat model does not inflict the level of losses that Germany historically sustained while being on the offensive during the first two years of the war, instead of having to reinforce its units to recover from those losses, it can build additional units. And because the game does not accurately model the Allied economies, and especially the deep manpower pools the Soviets had, nobody's ever really able to mount an effective counterattack.

Once the Germans push deep enough into Russia where they tip the MPP balance, the Germans can afford to build and reinforce more units while the Russians continue to decline. In contrast, 3R offers a more realistic simulation. Germany is eventually limited by their force pool and can not adequately cover the vast gains they achieve, while Russia continues to receive their BRP base each YSS plus economic aid from the western allies. It's possible to hold together a defense in 3R and eventually strike back. That's a problem in SC.

Good points, except I'd be a bit stronger: that's not a problem in SC, that's virtually impossible. In all the games I've played, I can count on the fingers of one hand the times that the Russian player has ever mounted an effective counterattack during the course of the entire war. And have fingers left over.

Attacker losses could be a little higher, and that should be looked at. Experience is also something that should be looked. All of these things will have to be considered for SC2. There are plenty of good ideas on the table for tweaking everything. It is very difficult to assess how they all interrelate and ultimately affect gameplay until Hubert decides to put something together and try it. Considering that SC plays remarkably well at this point, subtle changes here and there should be all that's necessary.

I disagree with that. We've been through six patches of this game now, (not including the beta which may have been released by now, I don't know), and while each has been improvement, none have substantially altered the way the game is played. Go back on the board and you'll find notes in September and October complaining that air power is too strong, that the Allied economies are too weak, that the Russian front bogs down in trench warfare... pretty much the same complaints you hear now.

Don't get me wrong. I love this game and I think it's a magnificent achievement. I'm not suggesting a rewrite from the ground up. Frankly, some minor tinkering with the combat formulas (and some more substantial tinkering with combat values) would probably do the trick there, and changing the IT values and purchase costs of various units so that it reflects the different countries, rather trying to impose a "one-size fits all," would take care of the economic problems. I'd certainly prefer that to having to calculate oil and manpower and a whole bunch of other stuff.

In other respects, though, I do think there have to be substantial modifications. The effectiveness of airpower should be reduced, retreat and overrun should be introduced, tech and strategic and naval warfare (which I'll talk about sometime soon) have to be pretty much reworked, to varying degrees.

This is not SC 1.07 or 1.08 or whatever we're talking about. It's SC2. Think big.

[Shaka of Carthage]

Arby

Read the topic when I was relaxed. Some good stuff in here. So here goes.

KDG did a excellent job on the rebuttal. So no need of me having to repeat it. gengisjon pointed out there is a random factor.

Now, I know am I going come off sounding like an a**hole when I say this, but I am just trying to make a point. When any of us talk about how combat was in WWII, it is our interpertation of what it was like, based on the games we have played and what we have read. I don't believe any of us were there. So different viewpoints on how to acheive the effect are valid.

And if any of us are making statements based on what we've seen in the movies, well there are places you can go to get help.

Some general assumptions that I believe everyone can agree to:

</font>

• Experience is key, and is SC's way of reflecting leadership and training as well.</font>
• German units should have more experience than opponents in early years of war.</font>
• Combat on the Eastern Front bled Germany of its experienced manpower in the early period.</font>
• Compared to history, the Greys get more units than the Germans did.</font>

Arby's correction for this is to "fix" the combat model, by making the attacker suffer more losses.

Does the SC combat model need to be changed? I don't believe we have offerred enough of a reason to Hubert to develop a new model or tweak the one he has. Until the other issues are solved, wheter or not the attacker should be suffering more losses thru the combat results is a minor issue.

(Before you flame me, take a deep breath, get a drink of water, then please continue reading)

Personally I believe there is more a problem with the fact that the readiness of a unit is not reduced by movement, combat, and normal "friction". But its a minor one compared to the other issues.

There are three (3) major issues that arby is trying to address.
</font>

• Reduce impact of air</font>
• Increase attackers losses</font>
• Increase effectivness of armor</font>

Air units are an issue, including Carriers. Especially if you are faced with ten (10) of them. While it has been discussed many times, the SC fix (not SC Future) is to only allow it to reduce a targets readiness.

Attacker losses should be increased? Maybe, maybe not. But it is not the solution since combat is not the cause of the SC problem.

Increase effectivness armor is not needed. The fact that Armor has the additional Action Points and ignores enemy ZOC's is an accurate reflection of what armor did. Allow armor to overrun a unit? That is another topic in itself on wheter it is valid or not. But it still doesn't address the SC problem.

SC problems, in my opinion:

</font>

1. No constraints on number or type of units or the speed at which they are produced.</font>
2. Air attacks on ground and naval units is unrealistic.</font>
3. Generic units. We don't have Germans, Russians, etc; we have Greys, Reds, etc.</font>
4. Peripheral areas of the map (Atlantic, North Africa, Finland/Iceland, etc).</font>

[ March 07, 2003, 04:16 PM: Message edited by: Shaka of Carthage ]

[arby]

Originally posted by Shaka of Carthage:

Arby Now, I know am I going come off sounding like an a**hole when I say this, but I am just trying to make a point. When any of us talk about how combat was in WWII, it is our interpertation of what it was like, based on the games we have played and what we have read. I don't believe any of us were there. So different viewpoints on how to acheive the effect are valid.

I don't dispute the latter point. But we're not talking about combat on the tactical level. The closest those of us who haven't been in combat come to understanding what that was like was watching the first twenty minutes of Saving Private Ryan. And I thank God that's the closest I ever came.

We're talking about what happened in WWII on the strategic level, though. I don't think there's much dispute about that. I don't think there are any history books on it that will tell you that six months after Barbarossa there was a solid line of two armies facing each other along the width of Russia, and that massed German airfleets bombed Russian corps into oblivion to open up gaps in the line.

Now, there are different interpretations of how that can be achieved in the game. And maybe even different views on whether it should be achieved. There may be some people, maybe lots of people, who are perfectly happy about how the game plays out now. My guess is that there isn't; certainly, the number of threads about how to cure the "unlimited manpower" problem and how to tone down air power, etc.

But, hey, I could be wrong about that, too, so a show of hands: Who thinks the game accurately reflects combat at the strategic level on the Eastern Front?

[Shaka of Carthage]

We're talking about what happened in WWII on the strategic level, though. I don't think there's much dispute about that. I don't think there are any history books on it that will tell you that six months after Barbarossa there was a solid line of two armies facing each other along the width of Russia, and that massed German airfleets bombed Russian corps into oblivion to open up gaps in the line.

Exactly correct. The problem is the coast to coast line of Grey and Red units facing each other. And the solution to breaking the lines being the use of airpower.

And why? No limit on the units you can build. Fix that and come much closer to a historical version of the Eastern Front.

Arby... tell you what. I am shortly (I hope) from completing my National Charactericts and Manpower scenario, where I am testing out how it can be addressed in SC. How about we arrange a time and you can see what I am talking about? It is setup for TCP right now.

[JerseyJohn]

The unlimited manpower Forum discussed retreat in various postings. That obviously wasn't the appropriate place for the subject and, though this Forum is concerned more with resolution formulae, it's a better place to house retreat ideas than the former -- so I'm copying my posting to this spot.

RETREAT

I'd have Four categories with an advance/retreat after combat addition.

One would be overrun , where a hopeless defender is simply removed and it costs 1 movement point for the attacking unit with no loss.

Two would be Tactical retreat which would be a reasonable withdrawl if a unit drops to 50% or less.

Three would be a route, where a unit is badly defeated and goes several hexes away from the fighting with a consequent drop in both strength and experience.

Fourth would be units that receive the No Retreat order. Such units would remain in place unless routed. A successful defense would also and always result in higher losses, otherwise the order would always be issued. Defenders of Fortifications -- many of which are no retreat positions like Sevastopol, Malta and Gibraltar -- would always fight in this mode. Their heavier mandatory losses would represent the use of siege guns and/or engineer/sapper units against their fixed defenses.

Advance/Retreat after Combat.

As a natural conclusion to normal combat, a defeated defending unit that is not in the No Retreat mode, withraws to a neighboring hex; if one is not available it is withdrawn to the nearest unoccupied friendly hex; if no such hex is available it remains where it is and it's losses are doubled.

The victorious attacking unit immediately and automatically occupies the hex vacated by the defender. The attacking player has no choice in the matter, automatically occurs as a result of tactical combat on the field level.

This last option would help avoid the reoccupation of captured cites and resources, and would help break the perennial deadlocks, adding a limited Blitzkrieg factor.

[ March 09, 2003, 01:01 AM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]