GS v2.2 Blitzkrieg turn 2 attack modified

[timrt]

I know that I am beating a lone drum but honestly, is this really where such a fine game is being driven. I want to ensure the best chance of an Axis victory, Fortress Europe gives me one of the best chances to gain that vistory, in order to do that I must get Belguim in 1939. I know, lets change the game mechanics to achieve that, after all, its not a historicaly based game we can claim so anything can change. Game it is but Germany was not prepared for a two front war in 1939, militarily or politically. Give the option, by all means but give a PP penalty or something else to reflect the risks involved. after all, as has been said before in the thread above, if you follow the correct strategy you have a 90% chance of success in taking Belguim. Thats not enjoying the game, thats setting out a high probability of achieving what I want and after all if I fail, I can restart the game! That is changing this game completely and too far.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

Just for the record. It's actually HARDER to do a blitzkrieg in GS 3.0 compared to 2.1 due to the map changes in Belgium.

The -10 morale change on the Allies if Brussels falls in 2 turns is added to reduce the risk of people quitting the game if they fail to take Brussels in 1 turn.

It's not a given that Fortress Europe is the best Axis strategy. The subs are more powerful so the Battle of the Atlantic will last longer. That means a delayed Overlord etc.

I think it's better to try a new game version before making conclusions

[timrt]

If it is actually harder to conquer Belguim on GS 3.0 then the probability of success would have to be 100% in 2.1 as from the recorded testing abnove it is now 90%. I am basing this on the discussion above. Hence my question remains.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

In GS v2.1 you had an almost 100% chance to take Belgium if you transferred enough units to the west. That means Poland will take longer to conquer.

Even the real Germans could have transferred their forces to the west in August 1939 and launch an attack upon Belgium and Holland in September 1939 with a decent chance of conquering these countries within a few weeks.

The reason many Axis players do NOT launch a blitzkrieg is not that they fear they can't take Belgium or Holland, but that they will be bogged down in a war of attrition in northern France while the weather is not fair. The end result is that you take Paris maybe in April / May 1940 instead of June. The price is much higher losses and a huge rail overuse cost.

If the Allied player doesn't send a BEF into France in September 1939 then maybe a blitzkrieg can force a French surrender during the winter of 1939/1940 so you get all fair turns of 1940 for Sealion.

The fact is that in GS v2.1 you don't see that many Blitzkrieg attacks. Most are sitzkrieg. In GS v3.0 you will probably see even fewer blitzkrieg attacks.

To do what I described above you need to spend a lot of PP's on rail overuse to get forces from Poland to the west and you might not even take Warsaw before the mud begins.

This is a game that gives players opportunities to deviate from the historical path. Players would be annoyed if blitzkrieg would be almost impossible to do. So in a strategic wargame you have to ensure ahistorical options are possible. E. g. the in renowned World In Flames you often saw the Axis player blitz into France in sep/oct 1939.

The real Germans could surely have done a blitzkrieg of Belgium / Holland in 1939 if they wanted to. Remember why it did NOT happen. Germany didn't have ambitions about a war with France and Britain in August 1939. They expected they could get away with an invasion of Poland. So the offensive forces were in the east. It came to a big surprise to Hitler that the Allies actually went to war over Poland. At that time his best forces were deep into Poland and couldn't easily withdraw until Warsaw had fallen.

As a player of GS you're NOT forced to repeat the mistakes made by the real leaders in WW2. So you can actually anticipate a war in the west and relocate your forces from the east. Do you doubt that the real Germans could have got their forces to the west to take Belgium in 1939 if they had wanted to?

Remember that Hitler's goal was to go to war with Russia. In order to do so he needed a common border with them. Therefore he needed to conquer Poland. You as the Axis player can have a different goal. It can be to conquer Britain and France, go against Spain, take Iraq or whatever.

Do you think the players should have such opportunities?

[Cybvep]

Thats not enjoying the game, thats setting out a high probability of achieving what I want and after all if I fail, I can restart the game!

That would be cheating. I can say the same thing about any risky endeavour. Don't like the results? Restart the game.

The real Germans could surely have done a blitzkrieg of Belgium / Holland in 1939 if they wanted to.

If they didn't attack Poland, sure. However, a simultaneous attack on Belgium/Holland and Poland in Sep 1939 probably wasn't feasible, especially considering the fact that the Germans had to protect the Siegfried Line, too. I doubt that they would willingly start a two-front war so early on. Memories of 1914-1918 were still fresh. Let us not mistake RL possibilities with in-game possibilities.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

No, the real Germans expected to get away with invading Poland. So they didn't anticipate a war with France and Britain over Poland.

If they had known they would have a war on their hand if they went after Poland then I think Germany would have done differently. The German High Command had doubts whether it was possible to blitz into France and take Paris. They feared the repeat of WW1.

It was after the blitz of Poland they started to get believe they could actually blitz France too.

It's not the conquest of France we're talking about here, but the conquest of Holland and Belgium. I believe that if the Germans really wanted to they would easily get to Hague and Brussels within a few weeks.

Would they have done so in September 1939? Probably not because it would serve no purpose taking these two countries without also taking France and threatening Britain.

But this doesn't mean we should steer the Germans in GS into having to follow the historical path. In GS you can invade Russia in 1940 or wait until 1942 if you like. That's your choice.

All ahistorical operations will be what if and we can only speculate on the outcome. A game can never completely simulate the real life situations. What actually matters more is that the game is FUN and the players feel the simulation is not bad.

I would have agreed if blitzkrieg had become the de facto way of taking France in GS. If blitzkrieg was superior to sitzkrieg then most players would do use this method instead.

I have tried both and I still prefer the sitzkrieg. With sitzkrieg you get Poland in turn 2 and Norway / Denmark in turn 3-4. France falls in June 1940 and you can prepare for a strong May 1941 Barbarossa, taking Yugoslavia and Greece on the way.

With sitz you keep up with tech research, afford a decent sub force and still build for a strong Barbarossa. With blitzkrieg you put your eggs in one basket and if something goes wrong you will be at a significant disadvantage. So doing blitz is high risk high reward strategy. If you want to ensure you keep the initiative way into 1942 you go for sitzkrieg.

If you play against people who would quit if their blitzkrieg attack fails then you should just find other people to play against. Such players would surely quit if they botched the Sealion invasion or Barbarossa failed to get as far as expected in 1941. If he does it after a failed blitzkrieg you know it so early in the game you haven't lost much. It worse having your opponent quit on you later in the game when you have invested 30+ turns into the game.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

If it is actually harder to conquer Belguim on GS 3.0 then the probability of success would have to be 100% in 2.1 as from the recorded testing abnove it is now 90%. I am basing this on the discussion above. Hence my question remains.

Haven't you actually played GS v2.1 at all? When you say the fine game is going in a bad direction you need some kind of reference to which was the fine game.

You could do blitzkrieg in the vanilla game and GS v1.0 and v2.0 too. Not much has actually changed here.

During beta testing we actually got quite a few complaints from the testers because they felt blitzkrieg was too difficult. The initial post in this thread was actually posted to prove to those critics that you still had a chance to do blitzkrieg if you wanted to. Not to show it was easy.

What the example doesn't tell if how many PP's you waste with rail overuse and how many PP's you lose by taking Poland later. In some test games people failed to take Warsaw on turn 3 and had to struggle in the mud until Warsaw finally fell. All the good units were in the west trying to break into France.

Do a blitzkrieg and look at the casualties and you will see that the Germans pay a big price for doing so. So you really have to succeed with Sealion, invasion of Egypt or get Spain on your side to compensate.

I'm pretty sure that the average Joe GS v3.0 would have less than a 50% chance to take Brussels in 1 turn if attacking on turn 2. It takes time to find out how to place your units in an optimal way to get to Brussels. Look at the map and you see the Albert canal and the Liege fortress makes it hard to break through. You need armor and mech units in the exact right location to get 2 units on Brussels. In addition you need to take out Antwerp. If you try to go after Hague you will surely fail Brussels and so on.

This is not unique to Case Yellow. Earlier we have had articles about how to be sure to take Poland in 2 turns and with a shot at taking Poland in 1 turn. We have had articles about how to take Scandinavia in 1939 and so on. Clever players find ways to get results that most players won't think it possible. These articles were made after players complained they often needed 3 turns to take Poland after we added Lodz on the map and that Norway / Denmark was impossible to capture before August 1940.

Regardless of what I say we see that many players fear doing blitzkrieg when they're the Axis. These players like the overwhelming odds by attacking in March 1940. If the majority of the players follow the historical path then I don't see a problem.

[Cybvep]

In GS you can invade Russia in 1940 (...)

Nice try. Show me one serious game when someone invaded Russia in 1940 and was successful against someone that wasn't a total noob .

Anyway, I don't see the issue with Blitzkrieg ATM. It may actually be a bit harder than in 2.1, so what's the problem? It's not that everyone was using Blitzkrieg in 2.1. Note that Dyle is less effective now, too, because the Canadians don't spawn immediately.

[Morris]

In GS you can invade Russia in 1940 (...)

Nice try. Show me one serious game when someone invaded Russia in 1940 and was successful against someone that wasn't a total noob .

Anyway, I don't see the issue with Blitzkrieg ATM. It may actually be a bit harder than in 2.1, so what's the problem? It's not that everyone was using Blitzkrieg in 2.1. Note that Dyle is less effective now, too, because the Canadians don't spawn immediately.

No one will sucess to invade USSR in 1940 unless the opponent is AI .