Project: Intensive Multiplayer Balance Adjustment

[stockwellpete]

No, as I commented to you in another thread, the British Army was the exception because it has no universal conscription system in the prewar years, so there was no reserve echelons like in the other countries. That was a big problem for the British army after 1915, as you pointed, especially the lack of trained officers.
In game terms, we should have a very strong BEF unit, and then much weaker replacements for the rest of the game until they get some experience.

So you are saying that the other powers had a better quality of conscripts than Britain once the initial volunteer BEF force had taken heavy casualties? So British were better infantry only in 1914 really, from 1915 onwards the continental powers tended to have better troops. That's very interesting then. So would you be happy to use the quality and efficiency stats to show these differences, or does it need something more than that? Do you have an idea about the relative values of these stats and how this might be modded?

[Umeu]

a way to represent this is to have the BEF start out in the harbour of calais and brest (i think?), 2 infantry convoys. they start out at lvl 2. the brits will have to train any aditional armies that they want to send to the western front, these new units just start out at tech 1, just like the french units. this way the BEF will be better than the newer brit units and also the brits will be in france faster, now it just takes too long imo. this should help stabilize the french front a bit more without having to do make things impossible for the germans.

[Aryaman]

No, as I commented to you in another thread, the British Army was the exception because it has no universal conscription system in the prewar years, so there was no reserve echelons like in the other countries. That was a big problem for the British army after 1915, as you pointed, especially the lack of trained officers.
In game terms, we should have a very strong BEF unit, and then much weaker replacements for the rest of the game until they get some experience.

So you are saying that the other powers had a better quality of conscripts than Britain once the initial volunteer BEF force had taken heavy casualties? So British were better infantry only in 1914 really, from 1915 onwards the continental powers tended to have better troops. That's very interesting then. So would you be happy to use the quality and efficiency stats to show these differences, or does it need something more than that? Do you have an idea about the relative values of these stats and how this might be modded?

I asked for the use of quality and efficiency to show that in the beta testing but developers thought it better to use tech level for that. I would like to use them in a mod but I don´t know how to make it.
As for quality in general, I woud consider it all the non material elements, not just training, but morale, leadership, combat experience, staff work and organization...All those combined should represent the quality of a force.

[Aryaman]

In the issue of comparative quality, some notes
The BEF was a force of long standing , highly trained professionals, experienced and with high morale, the best all around in the war. Replacements were of much lower quality, but as a volunteer force until 1916 morale was high, and with a good education level that made training , especially of officers, easier. Organization improved quickly during the war, and the supply system was by 1916 the best of all armies.
The German army was the best quality of conscription armies, because of the large cadre of well trained officers and the quality of staff work. The French standing army was a match for the Germans, but the Reserve system was of lower quality. French also experienced many supply and organizative problems as the most industrialized regions of the country had been taken by the Germans.
The Austrians had a good standing army, but the morale of non Germanic reserves was very low. The Russians had a very poor officer corps and were short of educated recruits. The Italians, despite one year to prepare for war, suffered from poor organization ann morale, the best troops had been commited to Libia and the army was short of everything. The Ottoman army was in very weak in artillery, but had a strong morale and an excellent officer corps, with many young officers trained in German academies in high command positions, since elder officers were removed from position after the desaster of the 1st Balcanic War.
If armies could be rated by quality, I would make a classification something like this
BEF 14 (British replacements 8, increasing with experience)
Germany 13, Reserve 12
France 13, Reserve 9
Austria 11, Reserve 6
Russia 9, Reserve 7
Italy 9, Reserve 7
Turkey 11, Reserve 9

[Umeu]

i agree that efficiency would be a better way to show unit quality and have tech as an addition besides that, also to create more difference between the armies than is now. but i doubt this is something that can be done in a mod. however, id like to incorperate what youve been telling us here, but we have to make do with the means we have at our disposal.

so what would you say to my idea of the position and tech distribution of the british army i posted just a few posts ago?

and could you perhaps make a similar list for artillery?

[Aryaman]

i agree that efficiency would be a better way to show unit quality and have tech as an addition besides that, also to create more difference between the armies than is now. but i doubt this is something that can be done in a mod. however, id like to incorperate what youve been telling us here, but we have to make do with the means we have at our disposal.

so what would you say to my idea of the position and tech distribution of the british army i posted just a few posts ago?

and could you perhaps make a similar list for artillery?

I think that 2 units historically are one too much, the BEF was just 110.000 strong, 1/10 of the strength of the French Standing Army. The BEF was in the frontline and ready for action on August 20, that is turn 5, so probably you need to have the British already in Calais by turn 4, when Briatin enter the war, soi it can face the Germans already in turn 5.

As for artillery units, they should represent the large concentrations of howitzers of 150mm+ and heavy mortars used for offensives. The first problem I see with artillery units is that it is not just producing the guns, it took considerable more time to train artillery crews than infantry, yet in the game it is just one more turn.

[Aryaman]

Regarding artillery units and countries, only Britain, France, Germany and Austria should have the capability to produce them the rest of the countries didn´t have the technological and industrial power to produce large quantities of heavy guns. For instance while France produced 6.700 during the war, Italy produced less than 500, aproximately the same number of heavy howitzers in service in Germany at the start of the war, and of lower quality.

[Umeu]

i agree that efficiency would be a better way to show unit quality and have tech as an addition besides that, also to create more difference between the armies than is now. but i doubt this is something that can be done in a mod. however, id like to incorperate what youve been telling us here, but we have to make do with the means we have at our disposal.

so what would you say to my idea of the position and tech distribution of the british army i posted just a few posts ago?

and could you perhaps make a similar list for artillery?

I think that 2 units historically are one too much, the BEF was just 110.000 strong, 1/10 of the strength of the French Standing Army. The BEF was in the frontline and ready for action on August 20, that is turn 5, so probably you need to have the British already in Calais by turn 4, when Briatin enter the war, soi it can face the Germans already in turn 5.

As for artillery units, they should represent the large concentrations of howitzers of 150mm+ and heavy mortars used for offensives. The first problem I see with artillery units is that it is not just producing the guns, it took considerable more time to train artillery crews than infantry, yet in the game it is just one more turn.

im not really sure what the scale is, but for game purpose i think 2 inf units is fine.

[Umeu]

Regarding artillery units and countries, only Britain, France, Germany and Austria should have the capability to produce them the rest of the countries didn´t have the technological and industrial power to produce large quantities of heavy guns. For instance while France produced 6.700 during the war, Italy produced less than 500, aproximately the same number of heavy howitzers in service in Germany at the start of the war, and of lower quality.

what about russia? didnt they have good howitzers? and the usa too?

[Aryaman]

Regarding artillery units and countries, only Britain, France, Germany and Austria should have the capability to produce them the rest of the countries didn´t have the technological and industrial power to produce large quantities of heavy guns. For instance while France produced 6.700 during the war, Italy produced less than 500, aproximately the same number of heavy howitzers in service in Germany at the start of the war, and of lower quality.

what about russia? didnt they have good howitzers? and the usa too?

The basic Russian heavy Howitzer in WW1 was the 152mm ml1910, a French design by Schneider produced under license by Putilov. It was an excellent design, and the base for the French 155mm howitzer ml1915, but it was produced at a very slow rate in Russia, in 1914 therre werre 164 available, and 184 more were produced until the end of the war.
USA have no production of heavy artillery in 1917. The US army arrived to France without artillery, and were supplied with French guns. The US army adopted the French 155mm m1917 Howitzer and the French 155mm GPF gun for home production, but they arrived in short numbers before the war was over.

[Umeu]

ok, well i think russia should still have artillery for the game's sake (or do you suppose that only bombers is enough? they have quality bombers), im fine to scrap them for USA and Italy, and happy that there is historical basis for that.

[Aryaman]

ok, well i think russia should still have artillery for the game's sake (or do you suppose that only bombers is enough? they have quality bombers), im fine to scrap them for USA and Italy, and happy that there is historical basis for that.

No, certainly not. Russia produced the first 4 engine bomber, the Ilya Murometz, and I imagine that is why it has that tech level in the game, but only 73 units were produced during the war. For a comparison, Britain produced 6.000 Bombers of the DH 4 model only.
Russia in all produced about 5.000 planes of all models during the war, almost all fighters, and most of French design, while Germany produced 45.000, for instance.

[stockwellpete]

ok, well i think russia should still have artillery for the game's sake (or do you suppose that only bombers is enough? they have quality bombers), im fine to scrap them for USA and Italy, and happy that there is historical basis for that.

I don't know enough about it all to say whether Russia should have artillery in the game or not - but this article suggests that artillery developments were not neglected by the Russian military . . .

http://www.artillery-museum.ru/en/schema-2.html

Maybe one way to mod this is to set upper limits for the numbers of artillery units (and bombers) that powers are able to build. So just to give an example, if we said Russia could only build 1 or 2 artillery units during the war then they would have to be extremely careful how they used them because they would not be able to replace them. This inhibiting element would also render them less effective in the game than, say, German artillery, which would seem to be historically accurate too.

[Umeu]

that is a possibility though i havent seen any indication that this is possible. i was thinking about making the upkeep for artillery like 5 or perhaps more (it will have to be tested for the right balance) so that producing artillery really something you will feel in your wallet of pp.

[Umeu]

ok, well i think russia should still have artillery for the game's sake (or do you suppose that only bombers is enough? they have quality bombers), im fine to scrap them for USA and Italy, and happy that there is historical basis for that.

No, certainly not. Russia produced the first 4 engine bomber, the Ilya Murometz, and I imagine that is why it has that tech level in the game, but only 73 units were produced during the war. For a comparison, Britain produced 6.000 Bombers of the DH 4 model only.
Russia in all produced about 5.000 planes of all models during the war, almost all fighters, and most of French design, while Germany produced 45.000, for instance.

it would be nice if the devs could slightly change the mechanics for how aerial warfare works too. it would be nice to see a fight for air domincance. the winner of that airwar will have safe spotting for artillery while the loser will not have the benefit of the additional fighter line of sight, also it will be hard to perform bomber runs etc etc. right now only 1 fighter in range will escort offensively or defensively, i would like to see it that all airplanes in range will go on the escort, this way air dominance will become a factor of importance in the war having effects positive effects for the winner (more accurate artillery, more LOS etc) and negative effects for the loser (less LOS, less accurate artillery, cities open for aerial attacks)

[Umeu]

my ideas for better artillery balance

the upgrades should not increase ground attack but instead (greatly) increase shock and bombard. and subsequent barrages should become less effective than the previous one (as opposed to subsequent ground attacks) and should also be less effective against already weaker units (in terms of strength points)

germany should not start with a normal artillery piece but with a railroad gun (to also more accurately depict the big bertha gun which destroyed the defenses around liege and antwerp). this should limit the tactical freedom the germans currently have to use artillery (also because the 2nd upgrade for artillery currently is just too strong sometimes scoring as much as 3 strength points on an infantry unit, this is just ridiculous) but at the same time allow them to quickly destroy the forts of liege and antwerp if they make the right moves.

[derekarogers]

Something also need to be done with the Netherlands entry tech level. In multi-player games the allies will automatically take Amsterdam in one round if they have a few of the border hexes because the Dutch units come in at level I regardless of the year. This makes for an automatically successful flanking maneuver with no diplomatic implication to boot.

[Jonathan_Pollard]

If armies could be rated by quality, I would make a classification something like this
BEF 14 (British replacements 8, increasing with experience)
Germany 13, Reserve 12
France 13, Reserve 9
Austria 11, Reserve 6
Russia 9, Reserve 7
Italy 9, Reserve 7
Turkey 11, Reserve 9

The 1914 board game by Avalon Hill had the strengths of the corps units as follows (defense strengths for infantry):

Germany 12, Reserve 8, artillery 8 The Germans also had Landwehr units with a strength of 4
France 10, Reserve 9, artillery 6
BEF 14 (no reserve units and no independent artillery)
Belgium 8

The game also had German Landwehr corps with a strength of 4 and French Territorial corps with a strength of 6.

The boardgame also had cavalry units that were not allowed to attack infantry units. A british cavalry division (half a corps) had a defense strength of 4, Germany 3, and France 1.

The original Tannenberg test-series boardgame by SSI had units of the following strengths:
Germany 9, Reserve 6, Landwehr 4
Russia and Austria 6, reserve 4

http://boardgamegeek.com/image/82101/1914
http://boardgamegeek.com/image/1307020/1914

[Samhain]

According to this there are nowhere near enough cavalry at the start of the game; http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWcavalry.htm .