The Problem With Knowing History

[OzHawkeye2]

I've seen a few discussions going on, both on and off the BJR mod (excellent mod by the way) about the game balance. Personally, I think the current balance, in both plain and BJR mods, favours the Allies somewhat, but for a reason that I'm not sure can be overcome.

I recently had the opportunity to play my first LAN game of CEAW and it was very enjoyable. We quickly found however, that we had to turn our sound off, lest the various noises give away the units we were moving. I played Allies, my opponent being the Axis. Compressing the game into a much more fluid affair than the usual PBEM style, it occurred to me how easy it is for the Allies for one simple reason: I know history - and so does the game

Unlike the French or British, or Germans for that matter, I know that Germany and Russia will be at war by the end of 1941 if not sooner. I also know that the US will join the Allies in early 1942 (not sure why it's not December 10, but anyway). Likewise, I know that Germany will absolutely attack Holland and Belgium, using the later to bypass the Maginot Line. I know that Italy will join the war around May 1940, and I know that Italian forces will push into Egypt and strive for the Suez.

In reality, I know a very great deal about the Axis warplans for the first full two years of the game, and there's not a whole lot the Axis player can do about that. As a result, with the benefits of this knowledge, that was most definitely not available to the British or French in 1939/40, the Allies can craft a strategy of, not attempting to actually defeat Germany, but merely to slow her down so that she loses the absolutely set-in-stone clash with the USSR.

In the LAN game I played, France didn't fall until December of 1940, and I knew, as did my opponent, that the game was essentially won (for me) and lost (for him) at that point.

As a keen student of history, I'm not trying to suggest that Germany really could have won the war. Ultimately, she had no capacity for defeating the US, and realistically no hope of conquering the USSR, most especially after Japan settled on an eastwards expansion and attack upon the US.

The "end in 1945" is a great illustrator of this as well. In our LAN game, we did not use that option - Germany was out to win - and I have to admit I dislike using it PBEM games to, because of much the same reason. It's radically changes the nature of what Germany is setting out to achieve. If the "end in 45" option is on, then holding on to Paris, Berlin and Rome is a win, and there isn't actually any need to conquer the USSR, merely damage it enough that it cannot recover in time for the set end-date.

About the only thing I can think of to get around some of this "hindsight" advantage the Allied player has, is to randomize the entry of the USSR, either by date or even perhaps her very entry into the war (which was by no means a foregone conclusion, and definitely not on the cards for 1941).

This isn't a complaint about the game really, since any WW2 game is going to have the same drawback, I merely offer up the post for discussion.

[joerock22]

I've seen a few discussions going on, both on and off the BJR mod (excellent mod by the way) about the game balance. Personally, I think the current balance, in both plain and BJR mods, favours the Allies somewhat, but for a reason that I'm not sure can be overcome.

My personal view is that the vanilla game favors the Axis, while the BJR mod gives both sides a more even chance at victory (though not necessarily perfectly so -- nothing ever is). Just so you know that this part of your point is very debatable.

[JyriErik]

Depending on how you look at the events, Germany did "defeat" Russia by August of 1941. The Red army was in tatters in every sector of the front except by Kiev and if Hitler hadn't decided to go for Kiev and had instead continued the drive for Moscow, the USSR could have collapsed at that point. Note I didn't say surrender, it might have fought on, but it would have been severely damaged. While the fall of Moscow may or may not have caused a surrender, it would have crippled the chances of Russian success. First off, rthe Russian roads were mostly dirt or gravel at the time (the Moscow-Minsk "highway" was a mixture of dirt, gravel and some paved sections, and that was the major roadway in pre-war Russia, the rest of the road net was far worse, thus most major movement was via rail. West of the Urals ALL north-south rail went through Moscow, the loss of which would have required adding several weeks to any sort of strategic movement of forces since they had to go east of the Urals to get from north to south. Also, approximately 15-20% of the heavy industry of the Soviet Union was concentrated around Moscow due to it being the largest population center in the country. This also explains who, no matter how bad things were in 1941-43 Stalin kept 10-20% of the Red Army as a strategic reserve in the Moscow area at all times. Moscow was the one zone he felt the USSR couldn't survive without.

Whether Germany could have won the war itself had Russia collapsed really depends on one question. Would the US have had the stomach for the casualties required to defeat Germany? By late 1944 the American population was akready questioning exactly why the US was fighting Germany at all. Even the troops fighting Germany weren't sure as to why they were fighting Germans. Japan was considered the real enemy and most Americans wanted to see a greater effort go against it. Also, historically, after Japan's surrender most of the American people wanted US forces out of Europe "yesterday" and it took a LOT of political willpower for several presidents to keep them there in large numbers for as long as they have been there.

Jyri

[MrsWargamer]

Welcome to the hell of grand strategy wargaming.

Plenty of gamers can tell you of how they landed Germans in Atlantic Canada all because the game couldn't see it coming, or because another player thought it couldn't be possible.

Typically as a possible result, many would cry foul over such a blatant attack on historical credibility.

The alternative though is a game where the war merely plays out with the player unable to remove seemingly idiotic but historical actions.

I wish a game made it possible for the German player to 'liberate' the Ukrainians from the opression of Stalin as a possible political option, thus ensuring a massive collaspe of Russia's defenses.

Wouldn't it be grand if militarily the British could lose so horribly on the mainland, that they sued for peace even before the 'Battle of Britain' happened thus ensuring the US have only the option of invading direct from North America if they do so at all.

But as much as most games of grand strategy try, there is really little in the way of real politics in most games.

For all it's flaky sameness combat model, Civilization IV actually does politics rather well in comparison.

[rkr1958]

I've seen a few discussions going on, both on and off the BJR mod (excellent mod by the way) about the game balance. Personally, I think the current balance, in both plain and BJR mods, favours the Allies somewhat, but for a reason that I'm not sure can be overcome.

My personal view is that the vanilla game favors the Axis, while the BJR mod gives both sides a more even chance at victory (though not necessarily perfectly so -- nothing ever is). Just so you know that this part of your point is very debatable.

The BJR mod seems to give my opponent a better chance of winning than me. I quite haven't figured that one out yet.