About the Europe 2021 scenario, I have also more feedback.
As I already said in another post : very fun. But I think that some things can be improved. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe other players have the same opinion, maybe I'm the only one, maybe I do awful suggestions,... Pick ideas if you find interesting, ot not, but I'll at least try to help with my opinions. My own modding skills are awfull, so I can't create a submod to experiment by myself :'(
I consider that the best moment of the scn is the beginning ; but as you advance, there is less challenge. If you have less challenge, you often loose interest.
- When you play as NATO, you face strong assault on every front. Baltic States, Belarus/Poland border (a little less), Ukraine and Georgia are under heavy attack turn 1. Only Finland is mostly safe (and of course around Serbia and Kaliningrad, that are besieged). For the 5 first turns, very hard battles to protect the borders. It is extremely interesting. Russia send many heavy tanks to break the lines and air forces are already here en force while NATO reinforcments are still far. So you suffer, but you can regroup troops quickly enough to begin strong counter-attack in few turns. When you have regrouped enough troops and well hold russians assaults, you can inflict severe casualties and advance toward russians objectives without much opposition. My NATO game was more or less that : Turns 1-5 : Very intense // Turn 6-7 : Stabilization of the front while trying to target russians best assets // Turn 8-10 : Heavy counter-attacks on nearly every front to break the lines (less quick in Ukraine, since reiforcments are further) // Turn 11+ : neverending advance towards objectives with few well protected area to clear (like Moscow). After turn 10, the game was less interesting. It was just advancing toward the 6 objectives while destroying the few russians units left in defense. Victory was already sure.
- When you play as Russia, you have already strong forces at the border and can use them to destroy your opponents one by one. The game is -according to me- more interesting for much more time. NATO defend deeper. But when you achieve to break the lines, you can keep stomping lines after lines with ease. You can destroy NATO armies one by one and, once again, victory is sure at this moment.
In short, when you break the lines and begin to advance, the game already feel over. Still fun, but less than the first 10 turns. It is, for me, a weak point of the scenario. The time limit of 60 turns is also too large to keep the player under pressure.
What I can imagine, to keep the game interesting, is to create events that give units and strategic opportunity to the loosing players (in other words, very often the AI), some chances to balance a game that could feel otherwise over too soon.
2 ideas :
- When one side take one major objective (Paris, London, Moscow, Saratov,...), the other side receive reinforcments on the edge of the map.
For Nato : "Undestanding that their allies are being defeated, the US send additionnal troops to help Europe". A naval group with strong ground army could arrive near the coast of France.
For Russia : "Russia urgently redeploy it's troops that were guarding it's asian borders to save the heart of the country". Strong army with many air units arriving in the easter area of the map. If you want to work more and add a little asian flavor to the mod : "Chinese government agreed to send "peacekeepers" in Russia to protect it's strategic partner against the NATO advance". I especially like the latter
I think it could not unbalance a human vs human game. Every side could have them. And more, it can add a "pseudo-diplomatic" feeling : a player could hesitate to capture Berlin if he knows that huge enemy reinforcment will land in France just 3 or 4 turns later. If he is unsure about his offensive, one good choice would be to wait to have excellent attack positions to be sure to invade every western capitals city in one move. The reverse would be also true with Russia. One good last attack to end the game, or you must face strong reinforcments that can push you back. Or if a player begin to be annoyed by the end-game, he can go for a lone capital city and thus launch new big battles.
- Adding Turkey
But there would be 2 armies on the equipment file, one with Russia, the other with NATO. If one side capture X (not any idea of how many) number of objectives, the Turkish army of the other side spawn (and cancel the event that can create the other Turkish army).
Diplomaticaly, Turkey is in an interesting position : member of NATO but have some strategic interest with Russia. So you can justify your event description according to who is loosing : "Fearing to be encircled by russian troops, Turkey finnaly follow the alliance and mobilize it's soldiers to help NATO" ; or the opposite "Understanding that the fall of Russia could rebalance the whole politic in Eastern Europe, Turkey decide to help Russia ; aiming to achieve it's own objectives".
Adding Turkey could add many strategic threat. If playing a winning Nato, they face a strong navy that suddenly spawn in the Egean sea (with a first wave of marine infantry conveniantly ready to attack Greece), troops go helping Russia to protect Syria (for now, if NATO want Tartus and allocate enough ressources, they can take it with no problem), and can be the death sentence of Georgia (that usualy hold it's ground very well).
If playing a winning Russia, the fleet in the Black Sea is once again challenged, and it's defeat could mean that naval transports can debark heavy units in the rear of the russian lines : in Romania (if the russian advance was good) Ukraine or near Sochi. A whole new front can be oppened like that and disorganize the advance.
Considering that the Turkish army and navy are quite strong, they can be a very good threat to a winning player, that would be forced to adapt it's strategy to counter this new foe.
Obviously, as one side can gain a major advantage for loosing, it would not be ok for a balanced multiplayer game.
I hope this suggestions could help you to add more content to this specific scenario. After all, it is more or less the pinnacle of your mod, so if he could be as intense from the beginning to the end, it would be perfect in my eyes. I think it would be good ideas to resolve what I imagine be it's weak point.
What do you think about it ?
PS : thanks to the moderation for intervening
