Please vote: Changes to Free France, Vichy France and Italy

Peter Stauffenberg · Post by **Peter Stauffenberg** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 10:53 am

Please read the thread about possible changes to make Torch more attractive before voting.

I suggested some changes there to make Torch become more attractive and want you to vote here.

1. The Free French also gets the leader Leclerc (in addition to de Gaulle) when Vichy is DoW'ed

2. Vichy French hexes in southern France and Corsica will turn to core French control if the Allies invade Vichy France.

This means the Germans get only half production from the Vichy hexes in France. The hexes will also be hexes where partisans can spawn. Hex control will change to German for these hexes because we can see this as Germany moving into all of southern France as a response to Torch.

3. Vichy garrisons in Toulouse and Lyons are removed if the Allies DoW Vichy.

The garrisons in Marseilles, Nice and Ajaccio are kept because the Allies might want to initiate Torch by invading southern France and they shouldn't be able to get ports with no opposition.

4. Italian max efficiency is affected by key cities captured by the Allies

Each Italian city + Tunis + Tripoli being Allied controlled will drop the Italian max efficiency by 5. Italian units already above the new max efficiency will not lose efficiency, but if dropped from bombardment it can't be regenerated past the new max. Newly produced Italian units will have a lower efficiency as well. So this means it won't be a good idea to spawn hordes of Italian garrisons after Husky because these garrisons will have such a low efficiency.

pk867 · Post by **pk867** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 11:41 am

Hi,
I vote yes to the first 3
1, 2, 3

For now I will abstain from voting for number 4 not sure about this one.

pk867

schwerpunkt · Post by **schwerpunkt** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 11:59 am

pk867 wrote:Hi,
I vote yes to the first 3
1, 2, 3

For now I will abstain from voting for number 4 not sure about this one.

pk867

I agree - there will be enough play balance changes with the first 3 and I'm not convinced of the justification for 4.

JimR · Post by **JimR** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 1:35 pm

I also vote yes to the first three, and no to #4 because it could have wider play-balance ramifications.

gerones · Post by **gerones** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 2:12 pm

I also vote yes to the first 3.

About number 4, I also vote yes but excluding Tripoli since it is far from Italy mainland and efficiency morale loss in italian units makes less sense than Tunisia (that is close to Sicily) or italian cities.
I vote yes to 4 because it is an additional incentive for launching Torch by capturing Tunis and also because this will help to make Italian campaign less harder for the allies. Effectively, italian scenario was well balanced in GS 1.00 but with the addition of the para units plus weather changes in rough mountains in Med zone my thoughts were that Italy was becoming a hard campaing for the allies. This efficiency drop in italian units would be a good tweak that would compensate for the changes mentioned above in weather in Med zone and in para units.

zechi · Post by **zechi** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 2:18 pm

1-3 yes

4 no, seems to complicated, but I have another suggestion.

I think the Italian surrender conditions are not really historical in the game. In the real war the Italian surrendered after the Allies were ready to launch an Invasion of the Italian mainland, i.e. after the Allies had done succesfully Torch and Husky and destroyed the Italian Armies in North Africa and captured Libya. In GS Italy surrenders only after three Italian cities are captured by the Allies, one of these cities has to be on the Italian mainland. This is ahistorical as the Italian agreed to an armistice before the Allies set a foot on the Italian mainland and not one major Italian mainland city has beend captured by the Allies before the armistice.

Therefore I suggest the following change. If the Allies control all North African cities (or perhaps only Tunis and all Libyan cities) and Messina and Palermo Italy surrenders. I think this would result in a more historical development as the Allies will have a real reason to do Torch and the Axis will have a real reason to defend Libya and later Tunis to the last men. In the real war the Axis sent a big Army to Tunisia and as Tunis surrendered this was nearly such a disaster for the Axis as Stalingrad (300000 casualities). However, in none of my GS games I had experienced a "Tunisian campaign" comparable to what happened in the real war.

Battles at the Mareth line or Kasserine pass never happened in any of my games as the Axis never challenged the Allies in North Africa if they do Torch, as it happened in the real war.

However, to make an Axis last stand in Tunisia possible, I think that the Axis should be able to enter Tunisia before the Allies do Torch, i.e. as the Allies can attack Syria/Libanon without a DOW against Vichy France, the Axis should be able to occupy Tunisia in advance to prepare defensive positions. I think this would lead to a much more interesting North Africa theater as it is now.

Furthermore, as it would be easier to force an Italian surrender, we could perhaps include the Italian Social Republic as a minor Axis ally after Italy surrendered (using the same mechanism for creating Vichy France), i.e. after Italy surrenders, Mussolini is freed by the Germans and the Italian Social Republic is created in northern Italy with a small Army (we would have to take a close look which Italian units remained there after the armistice).

What do you think about this proposal? My only concern is, that this will again to be playtested "carefully" or that it is to complicated.

Cheers Zechi

pk867 · Post by **pk867** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 2:35 pm

Axis forces did not enter Tunisia until after Torch landed. In the game now if the German player has forces ready they can land at Tunis port and unload troops and fly in air units. You just have to be ready to do it. We added the 3 city requirement to fulfill the Italian surrender. It usually is Palermo, Messina and Taranto or the city south of Rome which is near Anzio. This mimics the Italian surrender rather well.

gerones · Post by **gerones** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 3:41 pm

Point 4 suggested by Borger would help much the allies to progress faster than actually can do in Italy. And people that refuses to include this for game balance reasons should keep in mind that weather changes in Med zone (rough hexes have now also bad weather) much favour the defender in Italy.

Has anyone test italian campaign as the allies with the new changes in weather and with many para upgraded units well entrenched in this mountainous territory now also affected by mud and winter weather? Surely, without having played it we can figure that for the allies now italian campaing is harder than before with more problems to progress because of the weather. So this morale loss in italian units would compensate for this weather change. Some changes are not needed to be tested since we can estimate more or less their effects in the game.

Zechi´s suggestion also sounds good to me for this would force the Axis player to pay even more attention to North Africa scenario, but in this case, testing would be needed and also more changes in code.

DukeOfLight · Post by **DukeOfLight** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 3:55 pm

vote yes for all 4

pk867 · Post by **pk867** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 4:04 pm

Hi,

I did not vote for 4 either way because a) I have not had a game go that far yet with the new changes.

I do understand that it is harder because of the new weather conditions and Reggio at the tip of the boot.

I wanted the matter discussed before casting a vote on number 4. The first 3 are fairly straight forward.

metolius · Post by **metolius** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 5:01 pm

zechi wrote:
However, in none of my GS games I had experienced a "Tunisian campaign" comparable to what happened in the real war.

Battles at the Mareth line or Kasserine pass never happened in any of my games as the Axis never challenged the Allies in North Africa if they do Torch, as it happened in the real war.

However, to make an Axis last stand in Tunisia possible, I think that the Axis should be able to enter Tunisia before the Allies do Torch, i.e. as the Allies can attack Syria/Libanon without a DOW against Vichy France, the Axis should be able to occupy Tunisia in advance to prepare defensive positions. I think this would lead to a much more interesting North Africa theater as it is now.

I'm having an interesting game with JimR right now where I did not accept the armistice. With some difficulty, the Germans occupied Tunisia and Mareth (just) before the English could arrive from Egypt. The Germans are now well entrenched in Tunisia and fighting back furiously.

My point is simply that making it easier and more desirable for the Axis to defend North Africa is interesting, as you suggest.

Peter Stauffenberg · Post by **Peter Stauffenberg** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 6:23 pm

I want to change suggestion 4 to the following:

4. Tunis is added to the Italian surrender cities

Peter Stauffenberg · Post by **Peter Stauffenberg** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 6:29 pm

I just wanted to mention that my experience with GS v2.00 at the moment is that taking out Italy can be a pain and last a long time, even after Sicily has fallen. Since you can't remove all entrenchments with shore bombardments and airstrikes it means the defenders often inflict quite a bit of damage on the initial attacker. Since the mobility for the Allies is poor in Italy before they get Rome it means that they can't attack so often because depleted units at the front has to be swapped with fresh units in the rear line.

So if the Allies do Torch I think it's a good idea allow the fall of Italy to occur soon after the fall of Sicily. To not make a too big difference between Torch / not-Torch we could include Reggio in the Italian surrender cities. That means Italy will surrender once Reggio or Taranto or Naples fall after Sicily fell. Taking Reggio is a bit easier because you can land behind the tip and cut-off rail supply to Reggio.

pk867 · Post by **pk867** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 6:39 pm

So the surrender city count stays at 3?

We add Tunis to the pool of cities for Italian surrender?

I would vote yes for number 4.

Peter Stauffenberg · Post by **Peter Stauffenberg** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 6:47 pm

pk867 wrote:So the surrender city count stays at 3?

We add Tunis to the pool of cities for Italian surrender?

I would vote yes for number 4.

Yes it remains at 3. So if you don't do Torch there will be no difference. If you do Torch then Italy will surrender at the historial time (just a few days after Messina fell).

Do you want to add Reggio to the surrender cities so non-Torch players only has to take Reggio on mainland Italy to force a surrender?

pk867 · Post by **pk867** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 7:09 pm

I would say no to adding Reggio as a surrender city.

I do not believe it was considered to be that important to the Italians.

We added Reggio to help the Axis in moving troops down to Sicily for reinforcement.

I think that would be too easy to force a surrender. Adding Tunis helps bring a historical goals to the game.

dagtwo · Post by **dagtwo** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 8:19 pm

Ill vote yest to all four, but will miss stalling the Allies at Taranto.

gerones · Post by **gerones** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 9:18 pm

Stauffenberg wrote:I want to change suggestion 4 to the following:

4. Tunis is added to the Italian surrender cities

I vote yes to this.

No to add Reggio as a surrender city.

NotaPacifist · Post by **NotaPacifist** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 9:38 pm

I vote yes to the first three and no to 4. There's no real point in investing in research if it's just going to be taken away.

Peter Stauffenberg · Post by **Peter Stauffenberg** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 9:59 pm

What do you mean about research being taken away. You don't lose any research if Tunis is checked for Italian surrender city. You need to have ALLIED control of Tunis (Vichy neutral is not enough). And you won't surrender until Palermo and Messina fall too. If the Axis player knows that Torch started he needs to build a defense in Tunisia and Sicily to keep Italy in the war. This is what happened historically. Italy surrendered less than 12 weeks after the Allies entered Messina. So we didn't see the Italians fight at the tip of Italy trying to keep the Allies from Taranto.

With a German presence in Tunisia and Sicily then it's not a walkover for the Allies. Try putting a German mech in Messina and see how the Allies struggle to kill it. If you add a leader with +1 defense it's even harder.