Something I hope will not happen in SC2

[MasterGoodale]

Also, how does the game determine which units you can produce at any given time and in any given location? :mad:

Are there tech research/advancements?

[Jim Boggs]

Originally posted by MasterGoodale:

I am considering buying Strategic Command and I'm looking for some input from somebody who has played it extensively to tell me the basics of how you play. I have a few angry questions :mad:

1. How do you make units? (where do you get money?)

MPP's are generated by cities and resource locations shown on the map. Each city and resource center is individually added to come up with each nation's MPPs. When conquering a country you receive "Plunder" of various amounts as a one shot reward. Thereafter their cities and resource locations add up to 50% of their original value to you MPPs.

2. Can you conquer the whole world?

Not in SC. Map is limited to Ural mountains in the east, eastern coast of North America to west, southern tip of Scandinavia in north and northern bit of Africa in the south.

3. What benefits/advantages do you get from conquering a specific territory?

You can gain their city resources and resource location MPPs. The conquered MPPs are deducted from the original owning power as well.

4. Is the combat between units shown up clsoe when battle takes place? How is combat resolved?

Thanks! :mad:

No. Battles are resolved one unit at a time. You move a unit and attack. After casualties are taken, you move another unit and attack. You may continue to move units until all units have been moved. Attacking must be done as part of move or else attack opportunity is lost. No stacking of units is allowed.

Try the demo! :mad:

[ June 07, 2004, 04:39 PM: Message edited by: Jim Boggs ]

[MasterGoodale]

You're going down MAGGOT!!!!!! :mad: :mad:

[Jim Boggs]

Originally posted by MasterGoodale:

Also, how does the game determine which units you can produce at any given time and in any given location? :mad:

You may build infantry corps or armies, tank groups, air fleets, strategic bombers, subs, naval ships, rockets.

Units are placed in or within one hex of a city in home country. They may also be placed in occupied cities, but not adjacent.

Are there tech research/advancements?

Yes. Cost is 250 MMP to buy one research point.

I cannot remember all tecj available but from memory:

Heavy armor-tanks

Improved AT-infantry

Jets-air units

Industrial Capacity-Reduces unit purchas costs

Subs-Subs

Heavy Bombers-Bombers

Rocket Tech-Rockets

Gun laying radar-naval units

Improved Sonar-naval units

TRY THE DEMO!! :mad:

[Jim Boggs]

Originally posted by MasterGoodale:

You're going down MAGGOT!!!!!! :mad: :mad:

1) TRY THE DEMO!!! :mad:

2) BUY THE GAME!!! :mad:

3) PLAY PBEM WITH A MAGGOT OF YOUR CHOICE!!! :mad:

[MasterGoodale]

oh trust me that little maggot will be you :mad:

Thanks for the info. I'll get the demo. GGAAARGRAGRAGRAGRA!!!! :mad:

[ev]

Hi Blashy.

It seems most of us agree air power was too powerfull in SC1. I have been thinking quite a bit about it. I have some ideas. During WWII:

1. airpower was more effective against tanks than against infantry.

2. airpower was more effective against units on the move (not entrenched) than against entrenched units.

3. airpower was much more effective against units on the front ...when directed by ground spotters.

4. weather...

SC can simulte each of these.

With regards to #1, Infantry should have a higher air defense while tanks should have a lower air defense. Smart players should keep their tanks behind the lines, safe from enemy air attacks, until they are ready to use them. When they move their tanks to the front, they should either make sure they have local air cover, or really bad weather.

I have the feeling #2 was already incorporated into the SC combat engine. In any event, airdefense could be raised by entrenchment.

Regarding #3, a combat multiplier could increase air attack when there is a friendly ground unit adjacent to the enemy unit receiving the air attack. This combat multiplier could vary with the readiness of the "ground controlling unit". A "ground controlling unit" in top readiness (either because it is elite or because it is attached to a top HQ or for what ever other reason) should provide better target info.

I am not sure how Hubert will play the weather in SC2, so I dare not make suggestions here. But remember Germans got away with their Ardennes counteroffensive in 1944 because they waited for bad weather to ground the Allied Air Fleet.

Airpower was too good to be true in SC1 because it was always good without regard to the factors that made airpower effective or ineffective in combat. I may be missing some of those factors; I would appreciate all of your thoughts.

[ev]

...one more thought. Research in engine technology made for better fighters... but did not do much to improve tactical air bombing. Tactical air bombing remained pretty much unchanged through the war. My inclination would be to leave unchanged the air to land attack capabilities of airplanes as engine tech increases.

[ev]

On the devastating capabilities of dive bombers on tanks, check this out:

In the russian front, a new version of the Stuka was developed, the Ju-87 G was no longer a dive bomber. Instead it was equipped with two 37mm anti-tank guns. Although these guns were no longer effective in ground use against the front thick armor of the modern russian tanks, they were still very lethal against the much thinner rear and top armor of those tanks. This was basically the german equivalent of the russian Sturmovik which also used to attack german tanks from the rear. The Stuka excelled in this new dedicated anti-tank role too, although it remained easy prey for fighters.

...the highest level german war hero, the only recipient of nazi germany's highest level of the knights cross medal, was a Stuka pilot, Hans Ulrich Rudel, who personally destroyed 519 russian tanks, a russian battleship, and a huge number of other targets in over 2500 combat missions in the russian front.

This is a quote from:

http://www.2worldwar2.com/stuka.htm

[Retributar]

'ev'...i like the idea of Weather being a gaming factor,...we need METEOROLOGICAL CAPABILITY...so that attacks can be planned by knowing what the weather forcast will be!.

'ev' quote:

"I am not sure how Hubert will play the weather in SC2, so I dare not make suggestions here. But remember Germans got away with their Ardennes counteroffensive in 1944 because they waited for bad weather to ground the Allied Air Fleet."

[Shaka of Carthage]

I'll point this out, just to be consistent. The discussion regarding Air units and there effects is something that has been going on since SC was released. Alot of the old timers on here, won't respond to some of this, as responding to the same question over and over gets to be boring after awhile.

ev, while those are good points that you have listed about Aircraft in WWII, those are not the critical points that are necessary to make a decision about the effects of a unit in a game with the scale of SC2. So lets summarize the game problems with the Air units in SC.

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• Initial range</font>
• Ability to eliminate a unit</font>
• No limit to its numbers</font>

The first and third issues can be addressed by the editor, so its more or less solved. That leaves us with the second issue... the ability to eliminate a unit.

While no one will argue that an aircraft can't eliminate an armored vehicle, or a truck or even infantry... no one should believe that by adding more aircraft, you can get the same results on a larger scale. Even our contemporary example(s) in the Persian Gulf Wars (I and II), with equipment that is generations beyond what anyone in WWII dreamed off, showed that alone, aircraft cannot eliminate a Corp or Army sized unit.

So the combat model in SC, that allows a Air unit to kill the enemy unit has something wrong with it. I personnaly think it can be solved by having the Air only effect the readiness of the target, but others have made suggestions along the line of reducing or removing the ability to eliminate a units last SP.

Either way, something has to be done, either in the combat model or the application of the combat factors (ie thru the editor) to fix it.

That still leaves work to be done on fixing the problems with Anti-Air Radar as a technology, but fixing this won't matter if the above isn't addressed.

[With Clusters]

It would be nice if you could stage 'simultaneous' attacks, meaning, you could select several units to attack a single enemy unit at the same time, with the hope that the sum of all attacking forces would be greater than several individual attacks.

But I'm assuming that SC2 will still have the 'one at a time' movement and attacking feature of SC1.

If it did have this 'simultaneous' feature though, it would solve a good part of this air vs ground problem - you could have it that an air unit could only cause 'physical' damage (as opposed to 'readiness' damage and such) if it attacked in conjunction with a ground unit. This would be a more realistic implementation of ev's idea # 3 above. Maybe an idea for the next game...

[With Clusters]

Here's another alternative (sorry if someone has already come up with this):

Make air to ground damage a percentage based on the strenght of the enemy unit, with fractions being rounded down, potentially to zero. This means that an air unit would be able to inflict more damage on full or nearly full strength units (consider them a 'target rich' environment), than against already weakened units. When a defending unit reaches one or two strength points left, it should be impossible to cause any more appreciable (at least in game terms) strength damage (consider that the defending unit is being very careful to protect/hide its remaining assets from air attack). This would force an attacker to use at least one ground unit to 'finnish off' the defending unit. No longer could a player with massive air superiority simply blow tunnels right thrugh the enemy's lines, allowing his ground units to dash through completely unoposed and unengaged.

[Retributar]

Makes Good Sense 'With Clusters'.

[SeaMonkey]

Ok, for the sake of posterity, I'll say this one more time. Units should not be considered as destroyed, ie. when did corps or army size units ever really get completely destroyed? Someone always survives, so the remnants are just returned for rebuilding and reorganizing requiring MPPs. Since there will be force pool limits, the units rendered "ineffective" should be returned to the rebuilding cadre to be re-established at a later date by the owning player. This should also require a reduction in the man pool levels of the owning player based upon the population potential available to him in this time period.

[ June 09, 2004, 09:53 AM: Message edited by: SeaMonkey ]

[Blashy]

Well some units did get obliterated and if we just keep re-inforcing it over and over it get less and less experienced fighters, if the enemy attacks a corp with 2 armies , 1 tank and 1 airfleet, it could be gonners.

[SeaMonkey]

One more thing, in Operation Cobra the Panzer Lehr division was carpet bombed into "ineffectiveness". So much for the historical premise that air units can't render ground units "ineffective".

[ev]

Originally posted by With Clusters:

Here's another alternative (sorry if someone has already come up with this):

Make air to ground damage a percentage based on the strenght of the enemy unit, with fractions being rounded down, potentially to zero. This means that an air unit would be able to inflict more damage on full or nearly full strength units (consider them a 'target rich' environment), than against already weakened units. When a defending unit reaches one or two strength points left, it should be impossible to cause any more appreciable (at least in game terms) strength damage (consider that the defending unit is being very careful to protect/hide its remaining assets from air attack). This would force an attacker to use at least one ground unit to 'finnish off' the defending unit. No longer could a player with massive air superiority simply blow tunnels right thrugh the enemy's lines, allowing his ground units to dash through completely unoposed and unengaged.

I like this idea. I would add that tanks should suffer heavier losses from air attacks than infantryy. Tanks and other vehicles make good fat targets. So I would apply a higher loss percentage to tanks, a lower loss percentage to infantry. Infantry should have a better survival rate than tanks.

And, I insist, infantry should have a higher Air Defense than Tanks. Infantry was pretty good at surviving air attacks. Tanks only fared well against air attacks when they were camouflaged (hidden), covered by trees, buildings or other terrain features, or off the frontline. Advancing tanks out in the open were dead meat if the enemy gained local air superiority.

SC2 game mechanics should punnish a player that does not provide air cover for his advancing armor.

[Blashy]

I agree, armies did a lot better vs. air attacks.

Both sides concentrated on Tank units and artillery for air attacks.

[With Clusters]

Originally posted by SeaMonkey:

One more thing, in Operation Cobra the Panzer Lehr division was carpet bombed into "ineffectiveness". So much for the historical premise that air units can't render ground units "ineffective".

OK, I've heard this story about Cobra too, so perhaps overwhelming airpower can be devestating to a ground unit (although I still think at least one offensive ground unit shoul make at least a token attack, to mop up the broken rabble). But this can bring us back to ev's point #3. Think of an air attack as a flanking type maneuver - the key is that the enemy must be 'fixed' in position by a ground unit for the air attack to be most effective, otherwise the attacked unit has the option to disperse or hide. It seemed unfair (and unrealistic) in SC1 that air units could repeatedly pound rear area ground units (especially those precious HQs) into oblivion.

To bring up 3R again (yeah, I know, sorry ) you could only use air units to attack ground units if it was in conjunction with a ground attack, and the amount of air 'factors' that could attack was limited by the number of ground 'factors' (I think it was capped at 3x as many air as ground factors - the idea being that you couldn't just use some puny ground unit supported by tons of air). Since I doubt we'll be seeing 'simultanious' attacks (as mentioned above), we should at least require a ground unit to be next to the target unit (thus 'fixing' its position) for there to be 'strength point' damage. After all, I think air units were most effecting in attacking enemy ground units in co-operation with friendly ground units (even in Cobra).

[Blashy]

Sea Monkey, I give you D-Day as a prime example of how enemy air could be resisted very well in WW2.

After shelling and bombing the place to hell. The Germans have virtually NO casualties. They mainly consisted of army troops, they kept the panzer units back so they would not get blown away.

[ev]

And, if we look at the other side of the coin, we may find some interesting results:

Say we give infantry a pretty good air defense, but give tanks a pretty week air defense. Players will try to form most of the frontline with infantry - unless they have air superiority. When preparing an armored push, players would concentrate available air fleets to escort their armor.

Furthermore, if your tanks have very low air defense (as they should), a player mounting an armored push will be hard pressed to spare his airfleets to provide air cover for his tanks. It would be foolhardy for that to weaken your air units against Infantry with strong Air Defense, when the player knows those air fleets have to defend the Tank Speaheads from enemy air attacks.

There are very many good ideas that can be brought in to improve on the Air-to-Ground game mechanics. However. simply strengthening Infantry's Air Defense while weakening Tank's Air Defense would go a long way into changing the manner Air Power is used in SC.

[ev]

...one more thought I would like to share with you all.

Many of you probably know that the battle of Kursk is the largest tank battle ever fought. While the battle of Kursk was raging in the ground, a battle just as big was raging in the air. Hundreds of German and Russian pilots were battling it out for air superiority. Witness account speak of huge air armadas fighting it out as far as the eye could see. It probably is was one of the largest air battles in history, perhaps the largest, overshadowed only by the enormity of the armored battle below.

The enormous air effort put up by Russians and Germans speak volumes as to the need to achieve air superiority over the battlefield, or, at the very least, the need deny air superiority to the enemy. Loosing air superiority to an enemy in the middle of an armored combat would be disastrous.

[SeaMonkey]

Look guys, I believe y'all have brought up some valid points and I'm inclined to go with the idea that air shouldn't simply destroy a groung unit. But you have to remember on this scale and SC being the abstraction it is, you can't represent every combat effect specifically, you must think in terms of generalities. Air power may be a bit too omnipotent in SC, but it is a very formidable force never the less. Think of all the interdiction of supplies, mobile 3d artillery, restriction of movement, not to mention the disruption of communications that air power represents to the combat infrastructure and I have to agree that HC generally got its effect pretty close. Perhaps it does need a small tweaking and I believe we will see this in SC2, but be careful how far this is evolved as it will have a tremendous effect on gameplay which so far has been pretty accurate on this abstracted strategic scale.

[ev]

Originally posted by Blashy:

Sea Monkey, I give you D-Day as a prime example of how enemy air could be resisted very well in WW2.

After shelling and bombing the place to hell. The Germans have virtually NO casualties. They mainly consisted of army troops, they kept the panzer units back so they would not get blown away.

D-Day is a very good example well entrenched infantry resisting an air attack.

The Battle of the Bulge in 1944 is a good example of exposed (German) armored formations routed by an air attack.

The contrast between these two examples is further dramatized when you consider that the D-day air attacks were much larger and the German units targeted were smaller, less equipped, less experienced, and generally speaking less combat worthy than the German units in the Ardennes. Nevertheless, the German Panzer Formations in the Ardennes were routed as soon as the weather cleared and the Allied planes were able to attack them.

Entrenched Infantry could resist an air attack in WWII. But, exposed armored was slaughtered by air attacks. The game should draw that distinction.