Slitherine

Hi McGuba! So far, so good. Here are my thoughts on my first 1.4 playthrough (playing on General and in Jan. '42).

• 1. Assaulting Leningrad with the Finns is much harder, but I am making steady progress and hope to capture it this summer--that's probably 6 mos. longer than it took previously. But maybe more surprises are in store when I reach the city proper?
  2. The central and southern thrusts into Russia have pretty much reached the Winter '41 historical realities. However, I've been upgrading my panzers and conserving my forces so that in the summer I can make larger gains than were achieved historically--ideally both isolating/capturing Moscow and creating a strong defensive perimeter on the outskirts of Stalingrad to withstand the winter offensives. My plan is to take and hold the three major cities and the Caucasus by mid '43 so that I can begin transferring units for the Allied landings. So far, I feel on track to achieve this goal, but perhaps the lack of those four fighter units will begin to be felt...
  3. The convoy wars are going better than ever before. Having the Condor start the scenario over the Atlantic actually enticed me to use it rather than just transfer it to the Med like I normally do. Now I am racking up the prestige with a host of subs. Is each sub generating 50 per turn or is it capped like penalties at 150? I can't find this answer in the literature.
  4. Defending Germany has been easy... so far. With the three BF-109s and one 190, I've overstrengthed each to 12 and don't attack anything until they're already weakened by AA. Seems to keep me from losing any precious (and expensive) strength points and the skies relatively clear. Also, I've upgraded all AA to 88s. The German AA seems a little stronger, too. I now routinely can knock Spitfires down by 2-3 points per attack whereas 0-2 seemed to be the previous norm. Did you make a change here? Maybe increased starting AA experience?
  5. Malta seems a little trickier to capture than before. Did you remove an air unit down there? The Allies' air force seems a bit more put together, too.
  6. The North Africa advance is still rather easy. With the ample armies scattered across Italy and the Balkans, it's possible to use the Regina Marina to assume control of the transport routes and then transfer so many forces down there so as to create a powerful "Afrika Korps" that vastly outnumbers Allied reinforcements. When they attack, I have just surrounded, suppressed, and force-surrendered their units--even Matildas. I am already at the gates of Alamein by Jan. '42... This feels a far cry from what I thought was a crack force of desert forces facing dramatic odds against them. I still feel this element of the scenario is too easy and that the Allies would have taken this front more seriously if they thought they would actually be in danger of losing the canal and/or the M.E. oil fields...
  7. Finally (and related to #6), the sheer number of troops you can transfer with relative ease across the Med also allows you to simultaneously set up a plausible defense against Torch landings by '42. Even with 1.4's upgraded cost for Italian infantry, it's still worth it to turn them all into Alpini and Bergs. With a couple of AA, AT, arty support, and their Alps' mountain movement and Bergs' higher hard attacks, you can have a field day w/ the Allies' heavy equipment in the hills and mountains around Kasserine (this is based on 1.3 experience, where about ten total units and minimal air support took out the entire Torch invasion force in the hills and spared Italy and Southern France from Allied assault (I was really surprised by the paucity of Allied air power in support of Torch--just a couple of fighters and fighter bombers, if I recall. One option (in addition to bulking up the Torch invasion force) to prevent this massive transfer of forces from mainland Italy would be to make them "mobilize" (spawn) only after invasion events. I just don't think it's entirely plausible that the Italians ever gave the Germans that much freedom to requisition and transfer basically the entirety of the Italian armed forces off the mainland without repercussion or oversight. Another would be to up the partisan presence in Southeastern Europe even higher than it is. As it stands, I can still leave less than half of the starting forces there and have no problems maintaining control.)

OK, hope that helps you in the beta-testing process. And thanks for all your work! As I hope is evident, I love this scenario!

1) Do the naval mines and strongpoints count towards your 215 unit limit?

2) the vichy french units in N africa seem to be stuck on thier starting positions in 1.4, is this correct/deliberate? (in 1.3 i would fly them over to use as canon fodder in el alamein)

thanks for info

Ceek, why don't you play it on Rommel? Thrust me: it will be hard enough...

Ceek wrote:Defending Germany has been easy...

I played it almost through (I'm at turn 89) in the weekend - I want to sleep! - so here are my expressions on 1.4 beta with the bomber war.

- The Allied bombers are coming, but they don't target the German cities. I first got penalty in turn 70 (apr. 1944.), when a bomber - surely accidentally - visited an important city. Since then, I got 1 another penalty.
On the other hand, I'm satisfied with this. I don't know, how I could handle, if all bombers would target the cities. At winter, it would be anyway unfair, because I could do nothing against them... Another question, that would not the AI from the Soviet side send it's Soviet bombers to cross Europe to attack the major cities? I had some cases, when Anglosaxon bombers showed up in Russia - and that was before the D-Day landing!
But the predicted bomber assaults had it's effect: I stationed a strong airforce in NW Europe and after defeating Torch, I even sent the most aircraft from there to Normandy.
- I put most of the AA defenses around the major cities in the west. Upgraded all 20mm's to 36 (I couldn' afford to upgrade on 88's - maybe one 20mm was upgraded). I set 3x88's south of Kiel in a triangle to protect all of the surroudings. Only 3 German AA's were in Russia and the AA units of the minor nations in Russia or in the Mediterrean. Later all of the 88's were updated to 128mm AA's. So, with the AA's on the ground , I had a strong force, which could not only weaken enemy units, but in some cases, completely destroy them! I have not to say, that they were badly missed - as the fighter force too - in Russia from 1943...

Now, about the active air defenses:
- You must know, that, when I played the first 3 scenarios, I sold part of my core and bought 2 additional fighters (plus 2 additional arty). That makes some differences.
- In the beginning, I left 2 Bf 109Fs to guard the sky in the west. One was assaulted and suffered some modest damage.
- From 1942, I sent two Fw 190A (upgraded from Bf 109E's) to the west, while the Bf 109's were sent to Russia.
- With the 2 additonal "gift" units, I had 3x Fw190A's (2 with strong heroes), and the Bf 109G int the sky.
- Later, another 2 Fw 190A's (one again with strong hero talents) from the Mediterrean joined the party.
Still, with this strong force, in 1944, I could do nothing, if the bombers would have moved to the major cities... on the other hand, some excitement would be nice, to have not only the monotonic hunting of undefended bombers/weakened fighters ins 1942/43.

Maybe I will post a picture, how I stationed the AA defenses.

I encountered only one bug:
- Units, which have horse transport, cannot enter fortification/trench hexes - even not on foot! I experienced this at winter, I don't know, if it happens also in summer.
- One issue should be fixed, if it possible: the Volksturm conception is really good. The only problem is, that in 1945, I not only cannot buy regular German inf units, but I cannot rearm the existing one to 1944 standards. I don't know the solution, but there should be one, because Panzerfausts were handed out in great numbers to units, so I should have this option. Why I don't upgrade them earlier? Because, I need the prestige for important things and the units are in the fights, so they also do not have the time to go on vacation.

Now, the other experiences, outside the bomber war with 1.4 beta:

- warning: some *SPOILERS* can show up!!!
- I don't played 1.3, so some features were already implemented there.
- U-Boat war functions almost flawless and it is fun. Some minor issues I encountered: dived submarine encircled with non-U-boat hunter units (capital ships, merchants) on the convoy route. After some time it hadn't even ammo. I anticipate, I could get from it the bonus prestige forever... For realistic playstyle, I looked it as captured/destroyed and disbanded it. I think, it is also unrealistic to get bonus prestige from subs, which are standing on the convoy routes without ammo. But this are game mechanic situations, like the possibility to airdrop Fallschirmjägers in bad weather, which I - again for realistic playstyle - do not make. So I moved the depleted subs out of convoy routes back to the harbors.
- I played historically in the Stalingrad region too. I put the given nation's units on the shores of the Don river and let also some units in Stalingrad to get encircled and slaughtered. I could just barely withdrawn my precious units (arty, German units) back to the Kursk-Mariupol line. The cost was the sacrifice of many of the minor nation's units...
On the other hand, I built a strong second defense line at the Orel-Kursk-Voronezh-Mariupol line. Althrough with some loss (mostly minor nations units), I could hold it, and with the start of the good weather in 1943, I could go back in offensive. The problem was, that I attacked everywhere...
- At Moscow: a slaughtery happened there - I lost many my good units Around turn 80-85, I got the breakthrough, but for a cost of terrible casualties.
- At Voronezh: also, as my right flank wasn't protected, I also suffered a lot of casualties and eventualy I was forced back to Voronezh, plus a few strong Soviet armor got through at the open flank between Voronezh and Stalingrad and tied down major powers of me to find and hunt them down...
- At Stalingrad: with succes, but later the Soviet counter attacks is 1944 were also very strong, so I were at turn 89 already weakend and in the possibly of the loss of the city
- At the Caucasus: with full success - at turn 89, I could capture even the oil fields from the Brits. Hmm, maybe it would have been nice, to capture them earlier, but it is phisycaly simply not possible to get there earlier, if I play still end of 1942 historically.
- In the Mediterrean: annihillated almost fuly the El-Alamein line, but was forced back than to Tunesia. It was for historical reasons, but I also needed many of the units there. I stationed my 2 Fallschirmjägers at Corsica and 2 Gebirgsjäger at southern France, so they could be transported relatively fast to Tunesia after the Torch landings. But without arty (it cost time time to get back from El-Alamein,) they suffered moderate losses. Later, both of the attacking Allied forces could be annihillated - where the strong Italian navy played a major part!! - and my survived units could be transported to Normandy.
- ...where the landings already happend in late May 1944.! So, it was the typical case, when to few units face the enemy and they get therefore slaughtered and the reinforcements are only enough to stop the attackers for a short time and get slaughered too... So, at turn 89 I was already almost out of France. Some bitter defens fights were yet at the foot of the French Alps and the enemy got already in the vicinity of most western of the major German cities. The Volksturm "reinforcement" was a nice help. Maybe not big, but still useful to man the fortified points (cities, forests).

So, the summary: maybe, with extreme great luck, I can still beat the Sovietunion, but there is little chance for that, specially to capture Arhangelsk and Leningrad. With moderate luck, I can hold line in the west. Altrough, time to time, always strong Allied reserves show up, when I think, I destroyed/stopped enough of them.

So, I have to replay it from the start of the "Defending the Reich" - historical style, turning point: from turn 36, the Nov. 1942.

Many thanks for all the feedback!

Delta66 wrote:I wonder if you should start a new thread for v1.4 (or change the title of this one).

v1.4 is in beta testing phase, so as I wrote, the recommended stable version for new players is still v1.3. Once I get enough feedback and I have the time to test play 1.4 at least once, and I am pleased with it, I will change the name of the topic and the download links at page 1.

I cannot switch the at start StuG IIIB to AT mode. The later StuH 42 switch properly.

Which is weird. Are you sure you are using v1.4? Also, make sure that in order to get the changes and new features you have to restart a scenario after you have installed v1.4. PzC only reads the equipment file between the scenarios, which means if you have already started the big scenario and then install 1.4 and continue the scenario from there, the game will still use the old 1.3 equipment (and scenario) files for the duration of that scenario.

Some typos in the Library (F1) texts:

Thanks for these, I will fix them. However, I think there must be a lot more just than those...

Ze translator at ze German Highe Kommand must have made mohe mistaken.

Ceek wrote:1. Assaulting Leningrad with the Finns is much harder, but I am making steady progress and hope to capture it this summer--that's probably 6 mos. longer than it took previously. But maybe more surprises are in store when I reach the city proper?

I have absolutely no clue.

My plan is to take and hold the three major cities and the Caucasus by mid '43 so that I can begin transferring units for the Allied landings.

Well, to be honest, I am not sure you can take all those cities by mid 43 AND the Caucasus, but let's hope for the best. I think you need to start Sealion in early 44 the latest, otherwise you run out of time. When I made DV in v1.3 I started the invasion much earier, in 1942, when the conquest of the USSR was still under way. At that time England is more lightly defended (e.g. no American troops yet), and thus it is not really the ground units you need, but the support of the Luftwaffe and the Kriegsmarine.

Is each sub generating 50 per turn or is it capped like penalties at 150? I can't find this answer in the literature.

It is capped at 250. The message box says: "... The main convoy routes are marked on the map with "$". You will get 50 prestige points (up to a maximum of 250) for every Axis naval unit placed on these convoy routes. "

I now routinely can knock Spitfires down by 2-3 points per attack whereas 0-2 seemed to be the previous norm. Did you make a change here? Maybe increased starting AA experience?

Yeah, I did increase the starting exp of the AAs a bit, but just a bit. Which might have been a mistake.

5. Malta seems a little trickier to capture than before. Did you remove an air unit down there? The Allies' air force seems a bit more put together, too.

An Italian CR.42 fighter was removed from the map. Now the Italians start with 3 fighters and they get another one at around turn 8. Previously they had 4+1, but I felt that the Italians should have less fighters compared to the Germans to better represent the quantitative difference. Germany produced tens of thousands of fighters, while Italy produced "only" a few thousand. So there should be even less Italian air units at this scale, but then there would be no air units at all for the other Minor Axis nations which I do not want.

the sheer number of troops you can transfer with relative ease across the Med also allows you to simultaneously set up a plausible defense against Torch landings by '42. Even with 1.4's upgraded cost for Italian infantry, it's still worth it to turn them all into Alpini and Bergs.

I do not really like the idea of turning ordinary Italian infanty to Alpini and Bersaglieri. I have never done like that during my test plays. These were the elite units, and were not numerous at all. And I belive that making all weak infantry to elite ones could really change the balance in favour of the Italians, quite unrealistically. Thus I think I should make them "noupgrade", just as I did with the German Fallschirmjager units, as I did so to prevent the player from building a massive army of paratroopers capable of taking far corners of the map with ease.

If I had another free AI zone, I would also designate it as Tunisia and the other Vichy French territories, and I would give the player a penalty for moving units to these areas prior to the Allied landings. From a historical point of view it would definitely make sense. Unfortunately I do not have more zones for this.

I was really surprised by the paucity of Allied air power in support of Torch--just a couple of fighters and fighter bombers, if I recall.

For some unknonwn reason, the AI Airmarshal is not very cooperative when it comes to bring the air war to N Africa. It tends to take all the aircraft up to the north, e.g. to the USSR, instead of supporting the ground forces in Africa. I have been unable to find the reason why.

One option (in addition to bulking up the Torch invasion force) to prevent this massive transfer of forces from mainland Italy would be to make them "mobilize" (spawn) only after invasion events.

On the one hand it does make sense, but it would also limit the freedom of the player in the beginning. Those Italian units can also be used on the Eastern Front or in a possible invasion of the Middle East or England. So without those units achieving a DV would be much harder. Historically Italy deployed a whole army, consisting of some 200 000 men to the Eastern Front in 1942. What I can imagine is that some of those units would appear in early 42 and then the player can decide where to use them.

Another would be to up the partisan presence in Southeastern Europe even higher than it is.

I like this more. Or the combination of this and the previous ones.

Uhu wrote:- The Allied bombers are coming, but they don't target the German cities. I first got penalty in turn 70 (apr. 1944.), when a bomber - surely accidentally - visited an important city. Since then, I got 1 another penalty.

Hm, well they are set to attack, so I do not really no why they are disobeying orders. I think the AI Airmarshal shold be court martialed.
I am only at turn 7-8 in my testplay, so I am yet to see what is happening.

At winter, it would be anyway unfair, because I could do nothing against them...

At winter the player do not get penalty for Allied bombers over German victory cities. It would be unfair, indeed, so I set the scripts like that already in the beta.

Another question, that would not the AI from the Soviet side send it's Soviet bombers to cross Europe to attack the major cities?

As I know the Soviets did not have many strategic bombers which could penetrate deep into enemy territory. So for now it is only the Western Allies. However, if a Soviet strategic bomber happens to wander over a German objective city, the player would get the penalty, anyway.

I had some cases, when Anglosaxon bombers showed up in Russia - and that was before the D-Day landing!

Historically, the term "Shuttle Bombing" was used for such missions. American bombers did in fact land in the USSR after attacking targets in Germany and then attacked again on their way back to England or Italy. I think this part of the mod is just all right, given the restrictions of the game engine.

- Units, which have horse transport, cannot enter fortification/trench hexes - even not on foot! I experienced this at winter, I don't know, if it happens also in summer.

I though I have fixed it, but it seems, that I did not. I will check the movement tables again.

- One issue should be fixed, if it possible: the Volksturm conception is really good. The only problem is, that in 1945, I not only cannot buy regular German inf units, but I cannot rearm the existing one to 1944 standards. I don't know the solution, but there should be one, because Panzerfausts were handed out in great numbers to units, so I should have this option. Why I don't upgrade them earlier? Because, I need the prestige for important things and the units are in the fights, so they also do not have the time to go on vacation.

I think it is because you are using your own edited equipment file. In the new equipment file for v1.4 I made most late German infantry availble for purchase till 1946.

hugh2711 wrote:1) Do the naval mines and strongpoints count towards your 215 unit limit?

No, in v1.4 only core units. Naval units, structures (forts and strongpoints) and radars do not count in the 215 max core unit cap. So, there is no point in disbanding them any more to get more core slots.

2) the vichy french units in N africa seem to be stuck on thier starting positions in 1.4, is this correct/deliberate? (in 1.3 i would fly them over to use as canon fodder in el alamein)

It is intentional. Historically Vichy French units were not used on the Eastern Front or anywhere else by the Germans in numbers. The Legion of French Volunteers Against Bolshevism, numbering some 6500 men, was one of the few French units made up of volunteers, which was used against the Soviets. And it is just a bit too small to be represented in the current scale of the mod. Those Vichy French colonial troops in North Africa spent 1941-42 in their bases, and most became prisoners or defected after the Allied invasion. So, no, from v1.4 it is no longer possible to use them as cannon fodders at Alamein.

Ceek wrote:Another would be to up the partisan presence in Southeastern Europe even higher than it is.

In 1943/44, almost the whole Balkan was occupied by the "bandits"... - so you wll encounter enough partisans there, thrust me! Althrough, sometimes, the situation gets uggly, because I simply forget to activate me in the given turn, because I focus on other, more important regions...

McGuba wrote:An Italian CR.42 fighter was removed from the map. Now the Italians start with 3 fighters and they get another one at around turn 8. Previously they had 4+1, but I felt that the Italians should have less fighters compared to the Germans to better represent the quantitative difference. Germany produced tens of thousands of fighters, while Italy produced "only" a few thousand

I feel, that the mod improved at this point too: Italian airforce play still a second line, but it's more fun with the MC.200-202-205 to use them.
The Romanian Bf 109E is also quite helpful

McGuba wrote:

I cannot switch the at start StuG IIIB to AT mode. The later StuH 42 switch properly.

Which is weird. Are you sure you are using v1.4? Also, make sure that in order to get the changes and new features you have to restart a scenario after you have installed v1.4. PzC only reads the equipment file between the scenarios, which means if you have already started the big scenario and then install 1.4 and continue the scenario from there, the game will still use the old 1.3 equipment (and scenario) files for the duration of that scenario.

Spot on, I started with a previous saved game at Barbarossa setup phase, hence I had some 1.4 features like new gfx and library comments, but not all.
I was a bit confused as I didn't see all features we had been talking about in this thread.

I'll have to restart it all over.

1) whats the trick to taking or preferably interdicting malta, parking a strat bomber over doesnt seem to stop it spawning fighters for which the italian ones seem no match.

2) where are the oil field hexes? i cant see any icons that would mark them out.

3) 1.4 seems alot more agressive than 1.3

4) about turn 6 a fighter, tac bomber and sub appear in the middle of the black sea and in the SAME TURN attack my convoy to the caucasus, seems a bit unplausable unless they have a tardis

Awesome mod

thanks

I wondered why/how a new American fleet appeared about turn 95 from nowhere at the Mediterrean south of Sardinia. I destroyed all of them, which where present at the Torch battles. After that, I put a sub to guard the strait between Tunis and Sardinia to see, if anybody comes, but nobody came - it's smells like a spawning situation. Or did I overlooked something?

1., With "parking" over an island to prevent Allied planes to emerge in the sky would unrealistic and therefore McGuba wouldn't like it.
I make this so: attack on the first-second turn with all (3) Italian fighters the Hurricane and destroy it. After that you have about 7-9 turn calm, when you can attack with the 2 SM.79's the fort. Meanwhile send a Bf 109F there and in winter 1941 send 2 Fw 190A's (you can send the Bf 109F to Russia). These 2 will mostly easy destroy any appearing Allied planes around Malta.

2., They look like the same as the Axis one at Ploiesti/Romania. Look for them in the Caucasus: (Grozny, Baku) and in the Middle East.

3., What do mean with more agressive? 1.4 is much-much harder (bomber war in NW Europe, more expensive truck prices, Leningrad harder to capture, etc.)
Uhu (The unofficial voice of McGuba )

hugh2711 wrote:1) whats the trick to taking or preferably interdicting malta, parking a strat bomber over doesnt seem to stop it spawning fighters for which the italian ones seem no match.

2) where are the oil field hexes? i cant see any icons that would mark them out.

3) 1.4 seems alot more agressive than 1.3

4) about turn 6 a fighter, tac bomber and sub appear in the middle of the black sea and in the SAME TURN attack my convoy to the caucasus, seems a bit unplausable unless they have a tardis

Awesome mod

thanks

McGuba wrote:

I cannot switch the at start StuG IIIB to AT mode. The later StuH 42 switch properly.

Which is weird. Are you sure you are using v1.4? Also, make sure that in order to get the changes and new features you have to restart a scenario after you have installed v1.4. PzC only reads the equipment file between the scenarios, which means if you have already started the big scenario and then install 1.4 and continue the scenario from there, the game will still use the old 1.3 equipment (and scenario) files for the duration of that scenario.

Spot on, I started with a previous saved game at Barbarossa setup phase, hence I had some 1.4 features like new gfx and library comments, but not all.
I was a bit confused as I didn't see all features we had been talking about in this thread.

I'll have to restart it all over.

sorry to be a bit dense about this: by core units you mean every one with the gold border around its number strength? including all the italians, bulgarians etc thanks

Delta66 wrote:Spot on, I started with a previous saved game at Barbarossa setup phase, hence I had some 1.4 features like new gfx and library comments, but not all.
I was a bit confused as I didn't see all features we had been talking about in this thread.

I'll have to restart it all over.

Sorry about it, I should have been more explicit about the installation.
Every time you install a new version of this mod (or any other mod or even the base game), you have to wait until the next scenario for all new features to take effect. In the case of this mod, you are required to load at least the previous, "Mediterranean" scenario and finish it to get all the new features in the next "Barbarossa 1941-45" scenario.

hugh2711 wrote:1) whats the trick to taking or preferably interdicting malta, parking a strat bomber over doesnt seem to stop it spawning fighters for which the italian ones seem no match.

Historically, the Allies managed to transfer more and more aircraft to Malta, either by air (from aircraft carriers) or by sea (from merchant ships). And the Luftwaffe also transfered aircraft to Sicily time after time as the Italians were indeed unable to counter the British planes on their own. So, as Uhu suggested, it is a good idea to send some German planes there if you want to destroy that fort and capture Malta.

By the way, even in the base game, you cannot stop an enemy held city to spawn new enemy units only by placing an air unit over it. To do so, you have to place a ground unit in an adjacent hex.

4) about turn 6 a fighter, tac bomber and sub appear in the middle of the black sea and in the SAME TURN attack my convoy to the caucasus, seems a bit unplausable unless they have a tardis

That's true, I also hate to get AI spawns in the middle of the map, but in a few cases it cannot be avoided. I did find the sub, which is set to spawn there any time after turn 3, but I did not find any aircraft set to spawn there. I think they just moved there from somewhere else, probably from the Sevastopol airfield or the Caucasus, as there are some aircraft spawning there around that time. I think it is not that bad to get submarines spawning in the middle of the sea as it can simulate that they are just being surfacing after hiding in the deep.

Uhu wrote:
I wondered why/how a new American fleet appeared about turn 95 from nowhere at the Mediterrean south of Sardinia. I destroyed all of them, which where present at the Torch battles. After that, I put a sub to guard the strait between Tunis and Sardinia to see, if anybody comes, but nobody came - it's smells like a spawning situation. Or did I overlooked something?

I think those are the ones which appear right after both Tunis AND Sicily is lost. But I am not 100% sure. As I wrote I do not like AI spawning in the middle of the map, but since I do not have enough AI zones, I just cannot make those units to move where they should. For example, in this case I would need to assign another AI zone to which they could be set to move from the edge of the map to make it less annoying.

3., What do mean with more agressive? 1.4 is much-much harder (bomber war in NW Europe, more expensive truck prices, Leningrad harder to capture, etc.)
Uhu (The unofficial voice of McGuba )

Thanks. v1.4 is indeed somewhat harder, especially if played more historically, and it is harder to play it "unhistorically", whatever it means, for example Vichy French units can no longer be used actively by the Axis. However, a few things make it somewhat easier as a compensation:
- more versions for the Fw-190A means the later versions of this fighter are better in 1943-44 than the generic "A" version of v1.3
- unit transfers are faster by train means less time to send reinforcements
- the StuG IIIB is now much better with the AT switch, and the later assault howitzers (StuH 42, Italian M43 105/25, Hungarian Zrinyi II) are also better
- the player gets a number of radars for free

hugh2711 wrote:sorry to be a bit dense about this: by core units you mean every one with the gold border around its number strength? including all the italians, bulgarians etc thanks

No problem. I also found it hard to differentiate between the core and aux units, so I made a little submod. You are right, core units are the ones with the golden frame/border and auxiliary units are the ones with the silver border/frame. But on my screen I can hardly see the difference at a glance. That's why I made the submod as can be seen in the first post of this topic:

PG Style Strenght Plates
Another optional submod which will make core and auxiliary units easier to tell apart:
http://www.mediafire.com/download/0r78x ... Plates.zip

Maybe it is only me but I often had a problem differentiating core and aux units in the vanilla game. So with this submod core units have black strenght plate and auxiliary units have a light grey one, like in good old PG. The simplest is always the best. This submod can be used with most other mods or with the vanilla campaigns.

McGuba wrote:

Uhu wrote:
I wondered why/how a new American fleet appeared about turn 95 from nowhere at the Mediterrean south of Sardinia...

I think those are the ones which appear right after both Tunis AND Sicily is lost. But I am not 100% sure. As I wrote I do not like AI spawning in the middle of the map, but since I do not have enough AI zones, I just cannot make those units to move where they should. For example, in this case I would need to assign another AI zone to which they could be set to move from the edge of the map to make it less annoying.

I was so curious, I searched for that battleship (USS Arkansas) in the editor. I wondered, because it is set outside the Mediterranean Sea, so it traveled from a long distance and from unknown reason, probably it choose the path north of Sardinia, that is the cause, why it not met my sub.

more comparisons with v.13,

1.4:

If those vichy north africa units dont move and change sides @turn 34 when invaded then i would just disband them immediately anyway (well one only - casablanca - does get attacked a bit) as if you dont have strat bombers over there by the time of the invasion you are stuffed anyway.

The much larger naval distance moving makes the north atlantic much harder and in general makes sneaky flanking moves much harder and the whole north atlantic battle less rewarding revenue-wise.

The larger naval distance moving in addition to the more agressive airforce makes it very dificult to convoy across the black sea to the caucasus hence not as much progress there and (although i havent finished it yet) that seems to be a much better route to oil field resources than doing a stalingrad.

hugh2711 wrote:
If those vichy north africa units dont move and change sides @turn 34 when invaded then i would just disband them immediately anyway (well one only - casablanca - does get attacked a bit) as if you dont have strat bombers over there by the time of the invasion you are stuffed anyway.

Right, do so. However, would you do the same if you did not know that there would be an invasion in November 1942? Historically the Germans did not know it either, and probably that's why they did not do anything beforehand in the first place.

While there is nothing against it, IMO this mod gives more fun if one plays it in a "suspension of knowledge" way (after the so-called suspension of disbelief by me, sorry bout that), i.e. if one tries not to make use of the knowledge of history.

The much larger naval distance moving makes the north atlantic much harder and in general makes sneaky flanking moves much harder and the whole north atlantic battle less rewarding revenue-wise.

Naval movement speed was not increased in v1.4, it has been the same (vanilla x2) since v1.0. Naval battle is indeed harder than in the vanilla game, but at least U-boats can reach their area of operation much faster in this way. Otherwise it would take ages for them to move there and then the Battle of the North Atlantic would be even less rewarding.

The larger naval distance moving in addition to the more agressive airforce makes it very dificult to convoy across the black sea to the caucasus hence not as much progress there and (although i havent finished it yet) that seems to be a much better route to oil field resources than doing a stalingrad.

Again, yes, it might be very difficult with the increased moving speed, but at least it is two times faster. I am not against finding new ways to beat the mod and win the war, by the way. Reaching the Caucasus via the Black Sea might be a good alternative. Honestly, I do not really know why the Germans did not try something like that historically. Probably because the Soviet Navy was much stronger than the only considerable Axis navy in the area: the Romanian. As wiki claims (HINT!): "Although the Soviets enjoyed an overwhelming superiority in surface ships over the Axis, this was effectively negated by German air superiority and most of the Soviet ships sunk were destroyed by bombing."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Sea_ ... 80%9344%29

Here is my update (writing from Dec. '43)...

Victory on the Eastern Front! The Bear has once again been slain. After taking Leningrad in April of '42, I upgraded and rerouted Army Group North's panzers to assist in the capture of Moscow from the North. At the same time, I was able to launch the invasion of the Caucasus. I very nearly found myself in danger of having my armies encircled in Stalingrad (I know this is not new in 1.4, but I have to commend you excellent simulation of Zhukov's winter offensives); the Russian winter offensives nearly broke my lines, but I was able to hold them off with a combination of AT guns and artillery along the Don directed toward breaking the armor. At the same time, I continued slowly tightening the noose around Moscow and Stalingrad--and both fell in the early months of '43. The summer of '43 saw the advance towards and capture of the oil fields and the final destruction of the Russians main army groups east of Kursk. Since this victory, I have transferred the bulk of my army groups to France for upgrades and preparation for the Allied landings this summer. The Allies are going have a rough go of it when they hit the beaches!

Ups and downs in North Africa. the situation has been mostly positive. I conquered El Alamein ahead of schedule (early '42) and was across the Suez by the summer. Unfortunately, I allocated too many forces for this front and did not properly divert material to Vichy North Africa. The Torch landings were better managed by the AI then in times past and my Alpini and Bergs have been slowly overwhelmed and forced back to the area immediately surrounding Tunis where we are fighting a last ditch stand on the African mainland. Even worse, a lone transport unit bypassed the other landing zones and appeared next to and captured Tunis while my armies were defending Kasserine! This triggered the Sicily landings, which I was unprepared for. A combination of strategic bombers and cagey action by the Regina Marina have kept the Allied navies at bay, but the situation is touch and go. While I have lost Sicily and may lose North Africa in the next month, a bolstered air force, a still intact Regina Marina, and fresh reinforcements arriving every turn from the East should keep the Allies off the Italian mainland.

The air war that wasn't. While three fighters have been kept from assisting the Eastern front, they have not been significantly taxed by the Allied air force. For the most part, their bombers are not interested in the cities, but attack fortifications and radar stations. I have only had three allied bombers ever end their turns above objective cities. I chew them up with my increasingly efficient AA corps of 88 guns and my fighters do the rest to prune the Allied air fleets. I think the issue is, as you have noted, the incompetent AI that doesn't know how to manage its forces.

The convoy difference. Until the appearance of the U.S. navy in '43, I ruled the seas with a rebuilt Kriegsmarine and my Condor bomber. The extra 250 prestige per turn made a huge difference in being able to upgrade my armies in the East--not only in equipment but with elite units that made the difference in holding back the Russian winter attacks in '42 and early '43.

Here is my report for McGuba as he finalizes 1.4 (ordered by priority).

• 1. Prestige bonuses for capturing Stalingrad and the Caucasus Oil Fields never fired! (I gifted myself the 1,500 prestige awards via cheats). Could this be because I seized these objectives with Axis minor nation units (Hungarians and Romanians)? The good news is that while I never received prestige bonuses or victory messages, the game still seems to be acting correctly and not generating new units in the Soviet Union. Since capturing those objectives, I have not seen any new units spawn and my forces have reached the Urals.
  2. Victory objectives in the Middle East currently only award 50 prestige. There are a couple of other places where I have noticed this, too (i.e., the Russian hinterland victory objectives). You are clear that the new "victory objectives" in the Caucasus behave this way (only giving 50 prestige), but you never explain if there's a reason why Middle Eastern victory objectives do not count for 150.
  3. Did you elect against giving the player a fighter reinforcement? I lost one early on in the West and didn't get a replacement.

My observations (and requests). (I make these without regard to programming limits in the game engine, so I understand if they're not possible.)

• 1. Taking Leningrad is still too easy and determines the rest of the campaign. Once the USSR loses that reinforcement batch and you're able to transfer reserve units to Moscow, the entire war in the east becomes much, much easier. While I don't think it should be impossible to capture Leningrad, I do think the Russians shouldn't give up immediately after it's captured. I don't think they would cede this front historically (which is basically what it feels like when you take the city). Instead of losing all their reinforcements in the north, maybe it's just reduced to infantry and artillery and they have to come from further north (Archangelsk)?
  2. I understand why the El Alamein reinforcements don't fire if you capture Tobruk quickly enough. However, rather than make these reinforcements disappear, I think they should simply be moved to Cairo and the Suez. As it is, I find it very easy to penetrate the Alamein defenses--especially since there's nothing waiting for me on the other side, and then march across the desert and face a defense that basically waits for me at each objective. Losing the Middle East oilfields would have been crushing for the British and I am convinced the U.S. and Brits would have done something to significantly bolster those defenses had Rommel ever crossed the Suez.
  3. The Torch landings were harder to defend this time. I am not sure if this is because of some changes that you made, or just some chance decision making by the AI that worked in its favor. The Sherman transport ship sneaking around my defenses and seizing Tunis was inspired. Another way to improve the effectiveness of this invasion (especially given that the air force is not cooperating) is to give them more mobile artillery and recon units. My favorite strategy right now is to keep my Alpini just beyond their sight lines, rotating them in and out, and watch as I get free ambushes when their AI "forgets" where I am and blunders into me, turn after turn.
  4. Russian reinforcements are pretty predictable in how they get vectored to the front. They never come from the northern or southern extremes of the front, making it easy to concentrate my forces in the center. I don't know if this is something you can control, but having some random infantry units always harassing the extremes would be one way of making sure the player has to deal w/ garrisoning a massive front (a historical reality). You do this really well with how submarines and capital ships "appear" in the Med, making the player cautious when moving units around and simulating the Royal Navy's constant menacing of the area; could you do the same in the East?
  5. The partisan battles are, as Uhu warned, a much more serious threat by '43 and really require a concentrated effort on the player's part to keep them under control. I think this is modeled very well in its potential danger, the penalty for not taking it seriously, and its unpredictability. Well done! My only suggestion is to make this level of managed randomness a part of the Middle East and Eastern Front battles as well (see above for specifics).
  6. I think there should be "last ditch" defense triggers that should fire if/when the Axis player captures a major objective in the East (e.g., Leningrad, Moscow, and Stalingrad). This could even be accompanied by a message to this effect. I find it a bit anticlimactic, especially when capturing Moscow, that I take out poorly trained infantry units that have been sitting there since the beginning of the scenario and Soviets basically sit around and watch me do it. I think when you capture part of a city, an AI trigger would send elite units (a couple 2 star Guards units, a hero T-34, KV-1, and an artillery piece, for example) to try to rally the defenders). It would make the final battle for the city feel like a real life-and-death struggle.

As always, thanks for all your work on this mod. 1.4 is a definite step up from 1.3, and it's very exciting to see how you have integrated all our suggestions in ways that keep the core gameplay intact but add interesting and important wrinkles that enhance the entire experience. You have really breathed new life into an old game, and I hope the Lordz are taking notice of your work!