Naval Interdiction in land war

vypuero · Post by **vypuero** » Mon Sep 17, 2007 4:29 pm

You killed my fighter, though, and defeated the invasion. How do you get so many damn units? At least I achieved my goal of getting lots of units deployed in the West, where they can't invade Russia.

James Taylor · Post by **James Taylor** » Tue Sep 18, 2007 3:08 am

I think Boerwar1 is making a good case.

stalins_organ · Post by **stalins_organ** » Tue Sep 18, 2007 5:08 am

Certainly he has...I completely agree with him.....but sadly it's irrelevant, because his view of how a game should work is not shared by the developers - they want a simplistic game, that's easy to play and "accuracy" and "realism" are firmly put in the rear seat.

so basically you have to enjoy CEAW for what it is, not what you wish a good WW2 game would be.

vypuero · Post by **vypuero** » Tue Sep 18, 2007 1:29 pm

I would like to see CV air value drop to 2 and the naval attack increase by 1

firepowerjohan · Post by **firepowerjohan** » Tue Sep 18, 2007 3:49 pm

We could drop carriers and other naval units to "ground attack 0" so that they do not inflict anything but only use shock value to reduce enemy effectiveness.

This could also mean that the D-Day would be very difficult to pull of. Vypuero has changed the scenario 1.03 beta so that one of the UK carriers now start in Egypt so no early carrier strategy is possible anymore for Allies. Furtermore, Carriers now have -1 range so are less flexible.

We are putting the incentive up for Egypt and Iraq with some new changes that will be ready soon so Iraq will mean more oil and Iraq join Allies in the late phase. Allies will also start with slightly more forces in Egypt and it will be even more important to stop Axis from getting to Iraq now. The carriers and their decent air fighting ability is one help for them to be able to defend Egypt which should be good?
since it is very hard to transport air units by Sea back and forth especially once you realise you need them it is already too late sending them.

Boerwar1 · Post by **Boerwar1** » Wed Sep 19, 2007 1:45 am

firepowerjohan wrote:We could drop carriers and other naval units to "ground attack 0" so that they do not inflict anything but only use shock value to reduce enemy effectiveness.

This could also mean that the D-Day would be very difficult to pull of. Vypuero has changed the scenario 1.03 beta so that one of the UK carriers now start in Egypt so no early carrier strategy is possible anymore for Allies. Furtermore, Carriers now have -1 range so are less flexible.

We are putting the incentive up for Egypt and Iraq with some new changes that will be ready soon so Iraq will mean more oil and Iraq join Allies in the late phase. Allies will also start with slightly more forces in Egypt and it will be even more important to stop Axis from getting to Iraq now. The carriers and their decent air fighting ability is one help for them to be able to defend Egypt which should be good?
since it is very hard to transport air units by Sea back and forth especially once you realise you need them it is already too late sending them.

After looking into this and thinking about the discussion that has gone on here my recommendation would be to decrease the Survivability rating of naval units by 1-2 and increase the build time for CVs and BBs. Finally, if possible within the game system, I'd recommend limiting the number of levels that can be repaired on CVs and BBs to 1-2 levels per turn. That would make it take between 2.5 to 4.5 months to repair a CV or BB with 90% damage. Those changes would induce players to handle their naval forces in a more realist manner while still allowing them to be effective in amphibious situations where air superiority has been achieved.

firepowerjohan · Post by **firepowerjohan** » Wed Sep 19, 2007 8:36 am

Thats a good point and in the beta patch we have increased the building times for all naval units. As is now, repair is dependant on supply so suplpy 5 means 5 points of repair. For naval units might be better to halve the repair rate to 2.5 instead of 5, either could be rounded down to 2 or rounded up to 3.

The weakness with navy is that if you withstand them they need to go back to port and repair and lose tempo unlike for example air units that repair instantly so you just have to bring enough air to be able to neutralise them.

davetheroad · Post by **davetheroad** » Wed Sep 19, 2007 4:29 pm

rounding up to 3 looks reasonable to start with, just in case there are unforseen circumstances.

Dave

stalins_organ · Post by **stalins_organ** » Wed Sep 19, 2007 9:53 pm

this is all very well from a realism pov, but there are parts of the game that are not all that realistic, and putting these limitations on naval (predominantly a western allies resource) means the Axis has less to worry about from that direction, and is a little bit freer to direct resources to over-running the Sov union.....what counter-balancing "realism" mods are in train to keep things on an even keel?

Redpossum · Post by **Redpossum** » Wed Sep 19, 2007 11:03 pm

I really don't like the sound of these changes. Not at all.

It sounds to me like the squeaky wheels are getting the grease, at the cost of the original vision for the game. We have one or two people agitating for these changes. Why should they get their way at the expense of all those who are happy with the game as it is now?

And I emphatically do not agree that boerwar is making a good case. I am not convinced at all by anything he has said.

stalins_organ · Post by **stalins_organ** » Wed Sep 19, 2007 11:15 pm

I sort of agree with Possum, event though I'm one who's not particularly happy with this game as it game out - I'd prefer a much more "realistic" game of WW2.

BUT....given that this game was designed and built for simplicty and "playability" above everythign else, including realism, trying to graft "realism" onto it is probably goign to result in an abortion that is neitehr simple nor realistic

IMO if you want a realistic game then Slitherine shoudl take the excellent features that are in CEAW (such as the concept of shock, oil, manpower, research) and ditch the rest - construct a completely new game that does actually do a good job.

EG IMO no wargame using a 10-pt strength system is ever going to be more than marginally "realistic", nor is any naval system using hexes and treating the ocean as just another terrain type where pieces move and fight like they are on land can ever be better than poor - such characteristics are fine for "playability", but they ignore the fundamental characteristics of the real life things they are trying to simulate, so will never be good at it.

Redpossum · Post by **Redpossum** » Wed Sep 19, 2007 11:38 pm

stalins_organ wrote:
BUT....given that this game was designed and built for simplicity and "playability" above everything else, including realism, trying to graft "realism" onto it is probably going to result in an abortion that is neither simple nor realistic.

Thank you, S-O. Once again, you state my point more eloquently than I could. My own post seems whiny and pouty by comparison

Oh, and I took the liberty of correcting the typos in the quote above

Boerwar1 · Post by **Boerwar1** » Thu Sep 20, 2007 10:37 am

possum wrote:I really don't like the sound of these changes. Not at all.

It sounds to me like the squeaky wheels are getting the grease, at the cost of the original vision for the game. We have one or two people agitating for these changes. Why should they get their way at the expense of all those who are happy with the game as it is now?

And I emphatically do not agree that boerwar is making a good case. I am not convinced at all by anything he has said.

Which part don't you agree with, the facts or the eloquence with which they are delivered?

S-O, I don't think my proposed changes undermine WA naval power at all. They would just force it to operate outside the orbit of Axis air power which is realistic. Gain air superiority and you will be able to bring your navy back in closer to shore. Until you do so you shouldn't be able to park off the coast of Denmark, the Low Coutries and France conducting harrassment attacks without suffering potentially devasting results. Read the accounts of the Royal Navy during 1939-1942. They whenever they tried to conduct prolonged operations near Axis air power they took heavy losses both to the Luftwaffe and to u-boats.

The title chosen wasn't Fantasy General: Europe at War, it was marketed as a wargame which implies some effort at a realistic simulation of the period depicted.

stalins_organ · Post by **stalins_organ** » Thu Sep 20, 2007 11:30 am

Boer of course it undermines it - it makes it worse than it is now so what else could it be doing?

I agree that it's more realistic, but that's not the issue - Slitherine have said many times in this forum they are after a balanced game and that they deliberately chose to make it balanced rather than realistic where there was a conflict between the 2 - if you change that balance then you change the nature of the game.

Redpossum · Post by **Redpossum** » Thu Sep 20, 2007 6:08 pm

Boerwar1 wrote: The title chosen wasn't Fantasy General: Europe at War, it was marketed as a wargame which implies some effort at a realistic simulation of the period depicted.

Now you're just being gratuitously snotty.

Boerwar1 · Post by **Boerwar1** » Thu Sep 20, 2007 9:07 pm

possum wrote:
Boerwar1 wrote: The title chosen wasn't Fantasy General: Europe at War, it was marketed as a wargame which implies some effort at a realistic simulation of the period depicted.
Now you're just being gratuitously snotty.

Actually no, I'm giving the reason why I believe the game's designers want to work in as much realism as possible. I keep being informed what the game's designers want by posters who are not the game designers. Happily, the designers appear to be engaging in a positive manor.

OBTW, I happen to like FG and would love it if they did a FG II. That isn't what I bought here though. I think this game has potential to stand with some of the classic WW II wargames with a few tweaks.

stalins_organ · Post by **stalins_organ** » Thu Sep 20, 2007 11:28 pm

Firepowerjohn wrote this in teh Matrix forums at http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.as ... m&#1504200

However, our setups were a design decision rather than lack of historical realism because we want the game in 1939 to be playable, competetive and pretty even with chances for both sides.

Historically, the Allies and USSR would have a BIG economic lead while we instead chose to even it out abit.

and at http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.as ... m&#1544330

We believe that if we make the game too realistic with 4:1 economic advantages in favour of the Allies then some ppl would be happy but also alot of others that like the competetive side of gaming would not like it.

there are more, but now you have the game designers comments from his own keyboard and you dont' ahve to worry that someone might be misrepresenting them...if yuo want more go search for terms like "playabilty", "balance", etc. around the various fora.

James Taylor · Post by **James Taylor** » Fri Sep 21, 2007 6:18 pm

Why not have both, balance and realism?

You know there will have to be another edition to approach the concept, this is the entry level test bed.

You players are to perfect the mechanics with your ideas and testing of the current engine. Everyone is on the same page, to increase the game's acceptance.

I would imagine that for a moddable game as CEaW presents, the focus is on the realism of the mechanics in which later a scenario of balance can be incorporated. Obviously many parameters exist to create the default scenario's balance, but the game must play out in a reasonable situation of what existed in the era of simulation.

I'm counting on you guys, so continue your quibbling and eventually a classic may be hammered out. The developers need your guidance, just remember all are in pursuit of the same goal.