[GJS_BA] Invasion

[GottaLove88s]

Hi Granfali, I see you like tests, so I thought screw it, let's show you with a test...

In your example, a perfectly targeted Typhoon might kill a Panther 55% or a Tiger 27% of the time.
Allies would get 4-6 Typhoons per game, 1-2 would be shot down, so 3-5 would hit something PER GAME.
On those survival statistics, Allied Typhoons might kill zero to 1 Tiger or 1-3 Panthers PER GAME.
So not much of an impact really?

Against this, here is the result of 10 Panthers vs 10 Fireflies.
I lined up 10 Panthers directly opposite 10 Fireflies, to simulate realistic battle conditions in GJS.
3 spaces between them to give the Allies a chance; further apart than that and the results are 10-nil to the Germans.
The attacking tank must also accept response fire (which is painfully common in GJS).
10 Fireflies killed 3 Panthers, so a 30% success rate.
10 Panthers killed 9 Fireflies, so a 90% success rate (and to be honest the last one only had 52% morale and told me he felt lucky, lol! ).
In this simple encounter each Allied tank fired once manually (the Germans fired in response only), 4 Panthers still got promoted once, 1 Panther even became elite.

So, when you think about it, are we really asking too much for a Typhoon that might kill zero to 1 Tiger or 1-3 Panthers PER GAME.
Versus Panthers that will kill 90% of our Fireflies during their response turns? Probably 100% during their own turn, lol...

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[k9mike]

This sounds like the NHL Lockout...lol
I played vs Al and he is a good player. He knocked out some of my units, to include some Panthers...But, in the end He lost...and I did my share of stupid moves...Its like Jon is trying to say...This is not going to be a good experience if we cant get some kind of balancing done here. It is starting to get tough even with the regular units...(look at last round) We lost 3 out of 5 Battles. We are all good players and this should give you an idea...Once the testing with the Waffen SS Units...we are screwed. It doesnt matter how you play as the Germans...You will win, you can afford to make all kinds of errs and still come out on top. We need that Typhoon Bonus to be KILLER...We can not field the actual advantage the allies had in tanks(ie..we only get to field 20 or 26 Units per game).
If thats the case give us double the amount of units (40-52...lol)
We all know what the Historical outcome was...and we know for the most part why....So, why is it so hard to make this a balance that can give the Germans the chance to alter History, but make it a balanced BA Campaign. This should be very tough for the Germans...as it was in really life. But, yet we are stuck in a position that makes the Germans way too powerful and the outcome is already pretty much a guarentee. I like a challange and in the end I just want to play, but I just dont see what the big deal is to have this balanced. This is basically a Beta so we need to experiment to see what works and what doesnt. LETS JUST PLAY ALREADY...

[GottaLove88s]

PS. I've just noticed you've surrendered our Lebisey game down 6 Fireflies for 1 Panther. Was it accidental? We can start again? It was brave to come into a trap where I could surround you, but Panthers are so fast, that it's easy to move them around an enemy attacker...

That's my only question. The Allies need a way to make games versus many Panthers and Tigers fun... We can't surrender games in GJS when we're losing badly... Effective Brit Typhoons would be one method to make games fun and fair for the Allies (and more realistic for WW2 Normandy)... But if you can think of another way, then we are very open to reasonable suggestions?

We want to get playing again!!

[Granfali]

I assume all of these points:

-Panther is the best armor in BA (impossible to defeat frontally)... no more test needed.

-Three Panther BGs (and Tiger BG) will win most of battles (probably all). Question is "how much have to pay in every victory?". This is a strategic campaign. With 28 german BGs 3 panther + 1 tiger... (no problems for me to eliminate 10 tigers of II/130/Lehr). There are 24 more BGs that don't have them!!! Reading the last 30 messages it seems all BGs have busy of panthers and tigers. Maps are very closed, with few long range duels (except for Lebisey... hehehe, we tested there... and with panthers defending, with german artillery and none plane for british side. I think results can not be extrapolated. Defending, with artillery and typhoon support, in a "normal" map (Bretteville, Buron, Cagny, Collombeles, Bayeux, etc) the final result probably should be the same, but the german price would be much higher that in our test. Just there is the game, german have to take care of them, but is the only offensive weapon they have. British have to yield terrain very probably but trying germans pay a high price.

-A Typhoon is a Typhoon... not a A10-TB!!! If we give 200 APAttack value in every battle german player will lose 5 tanks, probably more if during an attack two tanks are adjacent. That means in 4 battles (2 days if weather is clear), independently of result or how the battle was played (well, bad, risky, reserved, assault, probe...) a german BG can be completely depleted (5 kills x 4 battles = 20 casualities). German player have to be a possibility (and a say "a" not "all") to finish the battle without armor casualities. That is the reason why not is possible to give Typhoon a value of 200. Sorry guys.

-We are talking (writing) trying to find a balance mixing realism and playability, This is not about a business where a side give anything but the other side have to compensate. Yes, the artillery delay was a meaningless, can anybody give me a reason why germans have to delay 2 turns instead of 1??? I can understand that if you are talking about US artillery, and even then I won't have very clear. Modifying the artillery delay for german doesn't mean germans have to give something back. We can touch Piat values and make it more similar to PzSchrecks or raise charges ATvalue yes, but there are changes that can be done and changes that we can not accept if we want convert this campaign in a interesting (for both sides) challenge. I say this for last time (it seems the opposite althoug) I DO NOT MIND TO WIN OR LOSE. If any of you think I am trying to beneficiate german side because I am the german player you are wrong mates. To avoid that precisely I proposed to swap sides, and finish with all of this "ping-pong" messages.

[Granfali]

Proposed solutions
1. We would say, yes please make infantry tougher, if you can make only infantry tougher. Under no circumstances, make tanks even more difficult to kill. They're going to kick our butts as it is. Making tanks harder to suppress/kill is a very bad idea.
2. Increase the AP accuracy of Piats... Right now AP accuracy for PzShrek is 150 for 1-space, 100 for 2-space; in contrast, the AP accuracy for Piat is 150 for 1-space, 80 for 2-spaces... Bump that up for both Piats and PzShreks to 150 and 125... Make the APAttack the same as PzShrek. Will make it harder for tanks to hide just one space away.
3. Not sure what to do about regular infantry, if it will make tanks harder too, so I'd say let's make Piats more equal, and see how it works out?

1. What do you think about this. For all units, suppression at 0, surrender at 150. To avoid tanks issues we lower initial moral of tanks to 50. It would be same that now, a range of 50 to be supressed. Good?
2. Locked!!!

[GottaLove88s]

Granfali... Yup, the Typhoon isn't the A10A, but it isn't a neutered biplane that only suppresses 1-2 units per game either...

"In the days before the closing of the Falaise gap, the 2 TAF averaged 1,200 sorties per day. The air war was particularly violent from August 15 through the 21st. Typhoons and Spitfires attacked the roads leading from the gap to the Seine, strafing columns of densely packed vehicles and men. Under repeated attack, some of the columns actually displayed white flags of surrender, but the RAF took "no notice" of this since Allied ground forces were not in the vicinity, and "to cease fire would merely have allowed the enemy to move unmolested to the Seine." Typhoons typically would destroy the vehicles at the head of a road column, then leisurely shoot up the rest of the vehicles with their rockets and cannon. When they finished, Spitfires would dive down to strafe the remains.

Because the Luftwaffe was absent over the battlefield, Broadhurst directed 2 TAF wings to operate their aircraft in pairs. Thus, a "two ship" of Spitfires or Typhoons could return to the gap after being refueled and rearmed without waiting for a larger formation to be ready to return. This maximized the number of support sorties that could be flown, and, indeed, pilots of one Canadian Spitfire wing averaged six sorties per day. Nothing that moved was immune from what one Typhoon pilot recollected as "the biggest shoot-up ever experienced by a rocket Typhoon pilot." Another recalled the flavor of attack operations:

The show starts like a well-planned ballet: the Typhoons go into echelon while turning, then dive on their prey at full throttle. Rockets whistle, guns bark, engines roar and pilots sweat without noticing it as our missiles smash the Tigers. Petrol tanks explode amid torrents of black smoke. A Typhoon skids away to avoid machine fire. Some horses frightened by the noise gallop wildly in a nearby field.

Nor was Falaise strictly a 2 TAF operation; the AAF was also heavily committed. Over the duration of the Falaise fighting, air strikes gradually moved from west of Argentan to north, to east, and finally to east of the Dives River. One strike by P47s on August 13 gives a graphic indication of the sizes of German forces open to attack

That morning 37 P-47 pilots of the 36th Group found 800 to 1,000 enemy vehicles of all types milling about in the pocket west of Argentan. They could see American and British forces racing to choke off the gap. They went to work. Within an hour the Thunderbolts had blown up or burned out between 400 and 500 enemy vehicles. The fighter-bombers kept at it until they ran out of bombs and ammunition. One pilot, with empty gun chambers and bomb shackles, dropped his belly tank on 12 trucks and left them all in flames.

All told, on 13 August, XIX TAC fighter-bombers destroyed or damaged more than 1,000 road and rail vehicles, 45 tanks and armored vehicles, and 12 locomotives. Inside the pocket they reduced 10 enemy delaying-action strong points to rubble.

Four days later another Thunderbolt squadron, below-strength, flew over a huge traffic jam, radioed for assistance, "and soon the sky was so full of British and American fighter-bombers that they had to form up in queues to make their bomb runs." The next day, 36th Group Thunderbolts spotted another large German formation, marked out by yellow artillery smoke. Since the vehicles were in a zone designated as a British responsibility, XIX TAC sat back "disconsolately" while 2 TAF launched a series of strikes that claimed almost 3,000 vehicles damaged or destroyed. On August 19, one Spitfire wing put in a claim for 500 vehicles destroyed or damaged in a single day; that same day, another Spitfire wing claimed 700."

For sure, this isn't a business negotiation Granfali. We've shown you that nobody can win versus one of your 4 Panther/Tiger BGs (you surrendered as Brits, Random surrendered, Al surrendered, Mike surrendered). 4 Panther/Tiger BGs could easily hold a 7-sector wide frontline in GJS. You've taken away the only advantage that the Allies had in earlier firing Arty. You've taken away the only minor disadvantage that the Germans had in that in GJS Tigers never breakdown.

So let me ask two simple questions:

1. Do you sincerely feel that GJS correctly/fairly replicates Allied airpower? (the reason that German armour could not move during daylight)

2. Why did you surrender your Lebisey game when you were only down 6 Fireflies to 1 Panther? Will you accept that Allied commanders surrender halfway through GJS games and can freely withdraw with all of their remaining forces? Or will you expect us to complete our losing games?

This is very, very frustrating... For someone who says he doesn't mind if he wins or loses, you are determined to load the dice very heavily... To be honest, I understand why you wanted to take away the Allied advantage in Arty (doh!)... But I don't understand why you don't want to play fair in every other factor...

[k9mike]

Like I said before....This is a Beta. This is a work in progress....If we are not willing to work with each other to come to some kind of balance factor to make this something even greater....
Then we might as well just give up on it. We ALL know the ins and outs of this game. There are means to make this what it can be...Make the typhoon tough enough to take out atleast one tank a sortie is not that big of a deal...but will help add to allies so they can make up what would have been a dramatic (amount of tanks) advantage. Either do this...Or, there is really no point in playing anymore. WE NEED TO TRY DIFFERENT THINGS TO MAKE THIS WORK!!!! Stop all this bickering, make changes....play....see what works and what doesnt...try other things. THIS IS A BETA!!!! We need to work on it, not treat it like its the real deal. Enough said....Fix it...play...or I'm out....
MIke

[Granfali]

This is very, very frustrating... For someone who says he doesn't mind if he wins or loses, you are determined to load the dice very heavily... To be honest, I understand why you wanted to take away the Allied advantage in Arty (doh!)... But I don't understand why you don't want to play fair in every other factor...

Fair play??? I play fair so much that I offered you the "invincible" side.

No way gentlemen... It is clear we can not reach an agreement with this. Time goes and we don't play (that is the interesting) so we have to decide:

a-Continue "ping-pong" messages
b-Meet John proposals. One player (or more) takes german side and campaign continues. (I leave the campaign, and I said this without remorse, and understanding that if five players wants another way of play they have all the right to do it... no hard feelings all right? I would give all the help needed to the new game master, vassal module, maps, doubts, etc
c-Meet my proposals (withthe changes I indicated in previous messages) and if anybody wants to continue or not is free to decide...

Gottalove88, Gort, Random, k9mike, morge? Please opt for one (a. not allowed)

[Granfali]

Enough said....Fix it...play...or I'm out....

I second your words one by one Mike.

[GottaLove88s]

Funnily enough Granfali, that's where you & I totally agree... Mike is very wise

This is a work in progress.... If we are not willing to work with each other to come to some kind of balance factor... then we might as well just give up on it... Make the typhoon tough enough to take out at least one tank a sortie is not that big of a deal... Stop all this bickering, make changes.... Fix it... Play...or I'm out....
MIke

[k9mike]

Funnily enough Granfali, that's where you & I totally agree... Mike is very wise

This is a work in progress.... If we are not willing to work with each other to come to some kind of balance factor... then we might as well just give up on it... Make the typhoon tough enough to take out at least one tank a sortie is not that big of a deal... Stop all this bickering, make changes.... Fix it... Play...or I'm out....
MIke

I might add...that losing 6 fireflys to kill one panther should have been enough to realize that something needs to be done. Hell...Jon, you lost a bunch to Mark IV's...
and its not like we have a shitload of Fireflys either...At this poing I dont care anymore. I just want to play already....There will be an understanding when the smoke clears...Believe me...

[GottaLove88s]

Granfali, as I said before, it's your football, and what you're saying is Granfali makes the rules; nobody else can input. We must accept that.

Ok, if you insist to play it that way, give the Allies back their Arty advantage (it's the only advantage that they have) and let's get on with it.

BUT... if we do discover that the four Panther/Tiger BGs are controlling the map and games become boring for the Allies, please be gentleman enough to permit us to balance GJS at that point... I promise you that if the Panther/Tiger BGs do not unbalance the campaign then I will happily confess that you were right.

Basta!

[gortwillsaveus]

Granfali: Thank you so much for making this a very interesting set of games. I really do appreciate the hard work you've put into these games.

I have to agree with Granfali here. He created these maps,..and the whole design.
If he wants to play as is,...he should have the right.
I don't think I could even come close to producing anything like what he's done.
The Canadians are ready and willing to fight, and don't see the battle as a lost cause.

GL88s: I think it totally unfair to line up Panthers right across Firefly and use that as a comparison.
There are so many other factors, such as morale,..terrain,..side/back shots,..suppression fire,...luck,...as well as many others.
Above all,..I think Granfali has used great tactics. I beat him in the first 2 games because I had the advantage and some good tactics,..and a lot of luck.
My second game,..I should have lost,..since I used pretty lame tactics.
The 3rd game,...I lost,..why,...well,..I deserved to lose. I stuck my neck out and deserved to lose.

Gentlemen: Please let this go,..let's play on as is,..and keep this civil.

Let's stop the criticism or accusations,..and just play.
And with that said,..I will not reply further except to give my AARs.

[morge4]

Granfali: Thank you so much for making this a very interesting set of games. I really do appreciate the hard work you've put into these games.

I have to agree with Granfali here. He created these maps,..and the whole design.
If he wants to play as is,...he should have the right.
I don't think I could even come close to producing anything like what he's done.
The Canadians are ready and willing to fight, and don't see the battle as a lost cause.

GL88s: I think it totally unfair to line up Panthers right across Firefly and use that as a comparison.
There are so many other factors, such as morale,..terrain,..side/back shots,..suppression fire,...luck,...as well as many others.
Above all,..I think Granfali has used great tactics. I beat him in the first 2 games because I had the advantage and some good tactics,..and a lot of luck.
My second game,..I should have lost,..since I used pretty lame tactics.
The 3rd game,...I lost,..why,...well,..I deserved to lose. I stuck my neck out and deserved to lose.

Gentlemen: Please let this go,..let's play on as is,..and keep this civil.

Let's stop the criticism or accusations,..and just play.
And with that said,..I will not reply further except to give my AARs.

+1

I too am ready to move forward and play.

[GottaLove88s]

Gents,

Individually most of you (all Allied players except Random, who's been happy with everything from day 1 ) asked me to persuade Granfali to give us Resupply, Medic & Rally bonuses, and each of you (except Random) said don't change the Arty. Some of you also asked for smokey mortars, unit swap and wider deployment areas. So, hopefully, you're happy with what you've got now...

Sorry guys. My fault is when I've been asked to represent folks and they ask/tell me stuff, then I'll stand their corner to explain why my guys are right. If somebody tries to convince me of something with data that is wrong, I want to provide a balanced picture. But yes, to be honest, I too am frustrated that we're not getting anywhere and GJS hasn't progressed since Gort finished Hermanville 2 or 3 days ago...

I think it's wise for me to stand down as Allied Commander (hey, when you lose your troops' confidence it's better to head for the hills, before they mutiny and string you up, lol )... but, of course, I'm happy to play this wonderful campaign (something I've always stressed throughout)... so I accept Granfali's original offer to be a German... I expect that means that Granfali & I will play together versus the Allied team (where it has long made sense for the Germans to have more than 1 player)... so G & I will learn to play as mates pretty darned quickly...

Good luck gentlemen... It's been an enormous pleasure... As Granfali writes, it won't be a picnic as the Germans, but I hope to give you guys some fun challenges in the coming battles... and, I promise, you won't hear a peep out of me on any further mods to GJS... I accept whatever Granfali wants...

Let the games continue!!

[k9mike]

Wow..... A lot of shots fired....I myself am proud of the way Jon has handled things. I don't want to see him leave to the Germans. He brought up all valid points an stand behind him as my commander.
In the end.....We all just want to play. There are things in the end that are going to end up needing tweaking an we all know it.
That being said....Are we going to start playing???? Who is going to assume command??
Mike

[johntindall]

Kudos to all for resolving this in a friendly way.

I thought it was going to become something ugly but you guys pulled it back.

Good sportsmanship gents.

[GottaLove88s]

Hehe, thanks JT... As the clever people say, don't sweat the small stuff...
GJS is an awesome campaign and we're all missing our fix, lol...
To misquote Bogie, "This war's bigger than the both [all] of us".
I think we'll get the June 8th AM map soon, and then it's back to our brens and panzers.
Are you wanting in? There's a plan to take on alex0809 too...

[k9mike]

Jon, do you or G have an up to date status of the forces and there current locations?? So, we can plan our moves for coming turn??
Mike

[GottaLove88s]

Sorry M, I lost track with BdB and Hermanville. I believe G will have a new map out soon, when he gets some free time...