Latest Beta thoughts

[boredatwork]

I had the time/enthusiasm to play the "small" campaign and generally I think the game is moving in the right direction (aside from the size!). I'm working on Ardennes atm and I'll comment more fully once I've finished however a few small issues:

- The strategic map is great

- The new animations in general look good.

- Artillery is starting to feel more right.

- As mentioned elsewhere AD units are impotent. More kills wouldn't be the solution but more suppression would be desirable, IMO.

- For the 47563 time I will say that PG2 Recon movement is a better choice for recon movement because it takes skill to use - you have to make a choice send it further in 1 move and risk ambush or move it in multiple steps, albeit not as far. With the current rule set you just send it wherever without a worry of ambush.

- When over-strengthing there is a noticeable lag between "clicks". Unlike PG2 where it overstrengthed as fast as you could click, in PzC there is a notice pause between clicking before it will let you add the next point. I have an i7 processor and 6GB of RAM so I doubt it's a PC issue.

- Ideally I would remove the planes crashing when out of fuel, in favour of simply not being able to attack (as discussed ~a month ago) however failing that I would like a warning when you click on next turn if any planes are in their "point of no return" zone. It seems easier to overlook a plane in PzC than it was in PG, especially if you have several consecutive bad weather turns.

- A warning during deployment if you try to exit while there are still understrength units would likewise be appreciated.

- The Gustav Railroad gun in Stalingrad is a nice touch but it should NOT have railroad movement - it may have travelled to it's firing spot on rails but once there it took 6 weeks to construct the special twin firing tracks and assemble the weapon. Having it zip around like artillery mounted on a sportscar stretches belief beyond acceptability.

- Air units, especially early allied ones cause too much damage - Their effects would be better modelled with long term suppression than direct damage.

- It seems too easy to neutralize heavily entrenched infantry with a single artillery strike, followed by infantry assault in a single turn.

- 4-5star overstrength Panthers chew through T-34(76)s even easier than in PG.

- The Belgians are a race of supermen... Bomb them, bombard them, assault them, overrun them, they just don't die.

- IMO the experience penalty for upgrading equipment frequently is too steep. Specifically the loosing 100exp to upgrade from a PzIIIJ to PzIVG in Stalingrad is fine, but then loosing an additional 100exp to upgrade that PzIVG to a Panther in Kursk is excessive, especially considering there are usually months between battles to retrain. I would suggest keeping negative experience as it's own behind the scenes stat with a cap of 100: If my 450 exp PzIII upgrades to a PzIV in Stalingrad if suffers a -100 experience modifier for an effective experience of 350. If it earns 55exp in the scenario it would end with 450exp+(-100+55)=405 effective. If it upgrades to a Panther the negative experience is reset to the -100 cap -> 450exp+(-100)=350 effective.

- As mentioned in a much earlier thread the problem with using a prestige solution to control core strength is it is impossible to know how much to budget beforehand for upgrades/overstrength/elite replacements while still having enough for basic repairs. Having a considerable surplus between Norway and Kursk I blew the budget on upgrading all my tanks to Panthers, only to discover at the end of the scenario that far from having prestige to upgrade my infantry and fighters, I didn't have enough to repair half my units.

I managed to eek out a decisive victory in Bagration with 9str Panthers, 6str JagdPanthers and half my infantry 10str. The rest of the infantry, along with my heavy tank and my two armored cars sat out the battle on the western edge at <half strength, and 3 core slots sat unused for lack of resources. It was a fun challenge, but IMO it would be far more enjoyable if the computer/scenario conditions were buffed to present a challenge without the necessity of crippling an already small core (or the player having to have forsight to know exactly how much not to spend at the start of one scenario so he'll still have prestige 3 scenarios later.)

- Again with the "small" campaign criticism having scenarios without even 1 extra core slot is dissapointing.

[uran21]

- Again with the "small" campaign criticism having scenarios without even 1 extra core slot is dissapointing.

If you do not speak about Greece and Kiev this is a bug. Where did you encounter it? In Greece and Kiev idea is not to allow deployment of whole core so core slots are lower than what you have.

[boredatwork]

It was indeed Greece and Kiev.

For the record I don't think that not being able to deploy the full core force is a good idea. If the average campaign path was very long (60+ scenarios) the being able to rest units by sitting them out battles would be a cool feature. Or if you could split you core force to fight 2 simultaneous battles - Kharkov 1942 & Sevastopool simultaneously it would be likewise a cool feature.

But forcing units to sit out in a campaign that's only ~15 scenarios long max, reduces the RPG-like core development addiction around which the campaign should revolve.

[skarczew]

- For the 47563 time I will say that PG2 Recon movement is a better choice for recon movement because it takes skill to use - you have to make a choice send it further in 1 move and risk ambush or move it in multiple steps, albeit not as far. With the current rule set you just send it wherever without a worry of ambush.

Can you explain PG2 Recon model for people like me? I haven't played PG2 yet .

- Ideally I would remove the planes crashing when out of fuel, in favour of simply not being able to attack (as discussed ~a month ago) however failing that I would like a warning when you click on next turn if any planes are in their "point of no return" zone. It seems easier to overlook a plane in PzC than it was in PG, especially if you have several consecutive bad weather turns.

Allowing planes to fly forever is stupid imho. I would just add a message with a warning for a player. And he could decide if he wants to risk losing unit, or get back to airfield.

- It seems too easy to neutralize heavily entrenched infantry with a single artillery strike, followed by infantry assault in a single turn.

I agree there, suppression caused by artilery may be too high, and the damage may be a bit too low.

- 4-5star overstrength Panthers chew through T-34(76)s even easier than in PG.

T-34(76) was no wonder in 41, and by the end of 1943, the T-34 was not longer suitable for the given tasks. After detailed examination, a special commission stated "the T-34 is no longer match to the current war conditions. It become permeable for Germans guns at all ranges".

T-34(76) could be compared in efficiency to Panzer 3, T-34/85 could be compared to Panzer 4. Comparing it to Panther or Tiger is like comparing Lada to Mercedes.

[boredatwork]

Can you explain PG2 Recon model for people like me? I haven't played PG2 yet .

Essentially the only difference between a recon unit and every other unit in the game was you could break a recon unit's movement down into several phases at the cost of losing movement between phases. So you had a choice to move aggressively to the full 8 hex movement limit risking an ambush as you went. Or move more cautiously - moving forward 3 hexes (at the cost of 5(?) hexes movement) revealing more of the map, then deciding how to use your remaining 3 hexes of movement (for a total of 6 hexes moved).

Allowing planes to fly forever is stupid imho. I would just add a message with a warning for a player. And he could decide if he wants to risk losing unit, or get back to airfield.

So allowing planes to fly forever is stupid, but allowing them to fly for 1 week at ~5mph makes sense? Given that the game already compromises in realism I think revisiting mechanics so that they serve their purpose without excessively distracting from gameplay is entirely valid for discussion. As discussed in the other thread halving the fuel allowance but the consequences of running out of fuel are limited to not being able to attack/spot achieve the primary purpose of having fuel (to differentiate the relative effective ranges of different aircraft models) without excessively penalizing the player for what is essentially already a gamey mechanic to begin with.

T-34(76) was no wonder in 41, and by the end of 1943, the T-34 was not longer suitable for the given tasks. After detailed examination, a special commission stated "the T-34 is no longer match to the current war conditions. It become permeable for Germans guns at all ranges".

At long range, 1 on 1 yes - but 5 to 1 at point blank? The Panther's sides were hardly immune to the T-34's nor was it's suspension. I'm not saying they should suffer equal losses - I'm saying a unit of Panther Ds should not be able to take on 2or3 times the number of T-34s and vaporise them all without a scratch.

[skarczew]

Essentially the only difference between a recon unit and every other unit in the game was you could break a recon unit's movement down into several phases at the cost of losing movement between phases. So you had a choice to move aggressively to the full 8 hex movement limit risking an ambush as you went. Or move more cautiously - moving forward 3 hexes (at the cost of 5(?) hexes movement) revealing more of the map, then deciding how to use your remaining 3 hexes of movement (for a total of 6 hexes moved).

Hmm, may work, though I woul dneed to test it earlier.
What concerns me more now, is that I cannot UNDO recon movement - even if I moved 1 hex in the middle of my own (and revealed) territory.

So allowing planes to fly forever is stupid, but allowing them to fly for 1 week at ~5mph makes sense? Given that the game already compromises in realism I think revisiting mechanics so that they serve their purpose without excessively distracting from gameplay is entirely valid for discussion. As discussed in the other thread halving the fuel allowance but the consequences of running out of fuel are limited to not being able to attack/spot achieve the primary purpose of having fuel (to differentiate the relative effective ranges of different aircraft models) without excessively penalizing the player for what is essentially already a gamey mechanic to begin with.

Well, I have better solution: define fuel capacity as the number of turns that allows planes to stay in air (for example: 6). And it won't matter if you are staying on the same hex for 4 turns, or flying far away - you would have to return to airfield before you run out of turns.

At long range, 1 on 1 yes - but 5 to 1 at point blank? The Panther's sides were hardly immune to the T-34's nor was it's suspension. I'm not saying they should suffer equal losses - I'm saying a unit of Panther Ds should not be able to take on 2or3 times the number of T-34s and vaporise them all without a scratch.

Oh, this legendary over-engineered suspension of Panther. On a related note, T-34 were prone to technical breakdowns (engine, transmission), and a lot of them broke before reaching front line (T-34 from best series were breaking just after 300km). This was especially visible during Barbarossa. You can include "technical problems" into weaker stats of this wonderful tank, I think .

And i think you don't get the feeling of Red Army, where the technical quality is not the thing you are supposed to expect. Numbers matter, do you remember?

And btw, there is no point blank range at strategical map, is it?
I tested it out and 5 T-34/76 are able to kill Panther D via mass assault and boxing it. No T-34 was lost in the progress, though some received some heavy losses.
4 T-34/76 are also able to take out Panther D. 1-2 units may be lost, but eventually Nazis will run out of ammo and Red Army will prevail.

[boredatwork]

Well, I have better solution: define fuel capacity as the number of turns that allows planes to stay in air (for example: 6). And it won't matter if you are staying on the same hex for 4 turns, or flying far away - you would have to return to airfield before you run out of turns.

How is that 'better?' You still wind up with the cheesy problem of planes crashing en mass because you overlook landing them after a week. I lost a Bf110 in my last campaign to running out of fuel. The turn before it said I was still "safe" to stay over the target for 1 more turn, so I did. The next turn after moving a bunch of units I come back to move it and discover that "safe" meant there was ONE hex ajacent to ONE airfield that it could return to, and I had already occupied it with another plane. There were 5 other empty hexes at that airfield, all of which were *just* out of range.

That's neither realistic nor good game play.

Oh, this legendary over-engineered suspension of Panther. On a related note, T-34 were prone to technical breakdowns (engine, transmission), and a lot of them broke before reaching front line (T-34 from best series were breaking just after 300km). This was especially visible during Barbarossa. You can include "technical problems" into weaker stats of this wonderful tank, I think .

Who said anything about technical problems? I'm merely pointing out that the suspension of (almost) any tank including both Panther and T-34 is poorly protected and vulnerable to immobilizing damage regardless of how strong their armor is. Any tank unit involved in combat is going to suffer attrition from tanks becoming disabled and having to be abandoned regardless of weather or not it brews up.

(BTW technical problems of all models of tank were included in the stats in PG simulated by woefully low fuel capacities - representing unreliability. Such stat differences don't exist in PzC at the moment.)

And i think you don't get the feeling of Red Army, where the technical quality is not the thing you are supposed to expect. Numbers matter, do you remember?

Technical quality =/= weapon effectiveness. Just because they were crudely manufactured and were lost in droves by poorly trained and poorly led soldiers doesn't mean all Soviet arms were inherently less effective than their German counterparts.

And btw, there is no point blank range at strategical map, is it?

There's no "flanking fire" on a strategic map either is there? That doesn't mean we should make German tank near invulnerable because it's assumed *every* combat being abstractly represented happens at the best case for the Germans.

I tested it out and 5 T-34/76 are able to kill Panther D via mass assault and boxing it. No T-34 was lost in the progress, though some received some heavy losses.
4 T-34/76 are also able to take out Panther D. 1-2 units may be lost, but eventually Nazis will run out of ammo and Red Army will prevail.

What was your relative experience level? At 0 star/0s tar I threw 3 T-34s at a Panther sitting on a river and inflicted 1 damage on it, for the loss of 15pts of T-34. Again this is at equal 0 star experience.

At 3+ star my Panthers were able to 1 shot multiple T-34s without suffering any loss.

[Razz1]

I don't see a problem with planes.

Look at your fuel and count the number of hexes away you are from the airport.

You need to plan.
If you zoom out it will show you red hexes. That means your low.

[skarczew]

How is that 'better?' You still wind up with the cheesy problem of planes crashing en mass because you overlook landing them after a week. I lost a Bf110 in my last campaign to running out of fuel. The turn before it said I was still "safe" to stay over the target for 1 more turn, so I did. The next turn after moving a bunch of units I come back to move it and discover that "safe" meant there was ONE hex ajacent to ONE airfield that it could return to, and I had already occupied it with another plane. There were 5 other empty hexes at that airfield, all of which were *just* out of range.

That's neither realistic nor good game play.

It is better the way that the planes won't float. They will have to get back after a certain amount of turns. currently they can reduce fuel usage if they float over hex without movement.

And btw, making planes indestructible the way you propose will lead to events like:
"OK, I will float another 10 turns over that enemy airfield and wait for my tanks to come here, then I will take it over, refuel and kick the enemies straight from here."
or
"I will block enemy airfields with swarm of my useless obsolete fighters. After some time the Me-262 will run out of fuel and not be able to do anything to my prehistoric fighters made out of stone or to my land forcess."

VERY realistic

I'm merely pointing out that the suspension of (almost) any tank including both Panther and T-34 is poorly protected and vulnerable to immobilizing damage regardless of how strong their armor is. Any tank unit involved in combat is going to suffer attrition from tanks becoming disabled and having to be abandoned regardless of weather or not it brews up.

Well, I have to agree that German tanks seem too strong in PzC atm. But on the other side - Russian ones are incredibly cheap, and it is possible to prevail using hordes of them. Too bad AI does not know how to do it.

(BTW technical problems of all models of tank were included in the stats in PG simulated by woefully low fuel capacities - representing unreliability. Such stat differences don't exist in PzC at the moment.)

Should also affect movement speed. I cannot understand why early T-34 has the movement of 6. There were historical, official records of German - or American tanks being as fast - or even faster than T-34.
When coupled with known mechanical problems of T-34, it is really hard to understand.

Technical quality =/= weapon effectiveness. Just because they were crudely manufactured and were lost in droves by poorly trained and poorly led soldiers doesn't mean all Soviet arms were inherently less effective than their German counterparts.

If non-combat loses in equipment are like 20-30% within a few days, then it doesn't look good.
"We have the best tanks in the world, too bad most of them broke before they were able to get into action." How does that sound?

There's no "flanking fire" on a strategic map either is there? That doesn't mean we should make German tank near invulnerable because it's assumed *every* combat being abstractly represented happens at the best case for the Germans.

I agree .

What was your relative experience level? At 0 star/0s tar I threw 3 T-34s at a Panther sitting on a river and inflicted 1 damage on it, for the loss of 15pts of T-34. Again this is at equal 0 star experience.

All tanks were taken from Kursk scenario, I believe 0-star experience for them all.

[Kerensky]

A lot of thoughts here mirrored in the Balance Units thread.
viewtopic.php?t=23645

[boredatwork]

It is better the way that the planes won't float. They will have to get back after a certain amount of turns. currently they can reduce fuel usage if they float over hex without movement.

And btw, making planes indestructible the way you propose will lead to events like:
"OK, I will float another 10 turns over that enemy airfield and wait for my tanks to come here, then I will take it over, refuel and kick the enemies straight from here."
or
"I will block enemy airfields with swarm of my useless obsolete fighters. After some time the Me-262 will run out of fuel and not be able to do anything to my prehistoric fighters made out of stone or to my land forcess."

VERY realistic

If you're waiting 10 turns over an enemy airfield waiting for your tanks to come instead of taking 2 turns to fly home, refuel/rearm and fly back more power to you.

And again you're a tactical genius if you use 7 (SEVEN!) unit slots PER AIRFIELD (plus extras to soak up the Me262's ammo), not to mention the oodles of prestige even cheap air units costs just to prevent an Me262 from refuelling.

I don't say it's more realistic - I say that the original PG system wasn't realistic to begin with. My preference would for a Civ4 style air system where planes are based on airfields and fly missions. Failing that a system that doesn't require you to actively check each and every air unit each turn, regardless if you're using them would be prefferable.

Well, I have to agree that German tanks seem too strong in PzC atm. But on the other side - Russian ones are incredibly cheap, and it is possible to prevail using hordes of them. Too bad AI does not know how to do it.

I would be in favour of the base strength for allied units increasing beyond 10 to simulate larger allied formations without placing a premium on the AI's ability to move more actual units. Like the chinese infantry in PeG that started at 15 and overstrengthed to 20.

If non-combat loses in equipment are like 20-30% within a few days, then it doesn't look good.
"We have the best tanks in the world, too bad most of them broke before they were able to get back into action." How does that sound?

If you placed russian conscripts in PzIVs and sent them into battle after a couples days training supported by 1941 Russian logistics backing them up vs. some veteran German Panzer Crews on T-34s with proper mechanics instead of officers armed with sledge hammers and at least a semblence of spare parts what do you think the relative strength of the 2 units would be after a few days?

Again I'm not claiming that the T-34 was a flawless super weapon. In many respects it was inferior to contemporary german tanks.

What I am arguing is that the war performance of any given weapon system is the result of it's actual technical capabilities and the skill of the people who use it - represented in game by equipment stats and unit experience. My point being that when evaluating the historical performance of a given piece of hardware the question should be "is that performance better simulated by ajustments to the former, or to the latter?"

[skarczew]

If you're waiting 10 turns over an enemy airfield waiting for your tanks to come instead of taking 2 turns to fly home, refuel/rearm and fly back more power to you.

Change wait time to 3 turns and 4 turns to get to your own airfield and back. How does it sound?

And again you're a tactical genius if you use 7 (SEVEN!) unit slots PER AIRFIELD (plus extras to soak up the Me262's ammo), not to mention the oodles of prestige even cheap air units costs just to prevent an Me262 from refuelling.

I am genius and I would use only 6, I hope you know why. And enemy can have more flying units, don't you think? Blocking enemy tac bombers from rearming may save your ground units from heavy loses.

I don't say it's more realistic - I say that the original PG system wasn't realistic to begin with. My preference would for a Civ4 style air system where planes are based on airfields and fly missions. Failing that a system that doesn't require you to actively check each and every air unit each turn, regardless if you're using them would be prefferable.

Games are not very realistic and neither of choices is good.
Talking about Civ games ...Civ1 and Civ2 had fuel model and people did not complain much (maybe except for bugs).

If you placed russian conscripts in PzIVs and sent them into battle after a couples days training supported by 1941 Russian logistics backing them up vs. some veteran German Panzer Crews on T-34s with proper mechanics instead of officers armed with sledge hammers and at least a semblence of spare parts what do you think the relative strength of the 2 units would be after a few days?

T-34 were breaking everywhere, even during technical evaluations, when being driven by qualified drivers.
(text taken from http://www.battlefield.ru/)
"After the 250 km run, the first A-34 suffered from a malfunctioning engine, with only 25 hours of operation, which had to be replaced. By February 26th this machine had traveled only 650 km, and the second one — only 350. It became obvious that it will be impossible to conclude all of the testing — 2000 km worth — before the government showing, scheduled for March, and without the completion of the testing, the tanks could not take part in the demonstration.
(...)
On the morning of March 5th (according to other sources, on the night of March 5th-6th), a procession of two A-34s and two tractors «Voroshilovets,» one of which was outfitted as living quarters and the other — fully stocked with spare parts, started out down the road to Moscow. To keep the journey secret, the rout circumvented all major towns and roads. The use of bridges was permitted only if it was impossible to cross a river by ice at night. The schedule of the journey took into account not just the time needed for travel and rest, but also the schedule of trains at railway intersections and the predicted weather conditions along the route. The average speed had to be no greater than 30 km/hour. Unfortunately, trouble started fairly soon, not far from Belgorod. While traversing a snow field, one of the tanks lost its main friction clutch. In a number of publications this is attributed to the inexperience of one of the drivers.

However, this seems unlikely because the driving was entrusted to the best test drivers at the Factory, with hundreds of kilometers of experience."

The similar things happened during evaluation of the T-34 and KV Tanks by engineers of the Aberdeen Proving Grounds.

The reliability of Russian tanks got better at the end of war, the German ones got worse - but it was never as bad as with the Russian ones.

What I am arguing is that the war performance of any given weapon system is the result of it's actual technical capabilities and the skill of the people who use it - represented in game by equipment stats and unit experience. My point being that when evaluating the historical performance of a given piece of hardware the question should be "is that performance better simulated by ajustments to the former, or to the latter?"

Well, the balance in game still needs adjustments, there is no doubt after it.

[boredatwork]

I am genius and I would use only 6, I hope you know why. And enemy can have more flying units, don't you think? Blocking enemy tac bombers from rearming may save your ground units from heavy loses.

Do air units actually block movement now? There were some wonky pathfinding issues in early Beta. Regardless 6 is little better off than 7. Yes the enemy can have more air units but if you give him more units that's more "cheap" air units per fighter you need to provide fodder before he runs out of ammo.

Saving your ground units from heavy losses? What ground units - you've spent all your prestige and unit slots on cheap aircraft - your opponent would be laughing all the way to victory.

Games are not very realistic and neither of choices is good.
Talking about Civ games ...Civ1 and Civ2 had fuel model and people did not complain much (maybe except for bugs).

While Civ2 especially is remembered fondly by many vets of the series I would venture a guess that if we did a poll over at Civ Fanatics which features in 2 were preffered compared to later sequals air units would not be one. Moving 20 Air units 10+(?) squares per turn each was tedious micro. Not to mention air units could block land movement IIRC.

T-34 were breaking everywhere, even during technical evaluations, when being driven by qualified drivers.
(text taken from http://www.battlefield.ru/)
"After the 250 km run, the first A-34 suffered from a malfunctioning engine, with only 25 hours of operation, which had to be replaced. By February 26th this machine had traveled only 650 km, and the second one — only 350. It became obvious that it will be impossible to conclude all of the testing — 2000 km worth — before the government showing, scheduled for March, and without the completion of the testing, the tanks could not take part in the demonstration.
(...)

Throughout its career, the weakest parts were its final drive units. The problems were from a combination of factors. The original MAN proposal had called for the Panther to have an epicyclic/planetary (hollow spur) gear system in the final drive, similar to that used in the Tiger. However, Germany at the time suffered from a shortage of gear-cutting machine tools and, unlike the Tiger tanks, the Panther was intended to be produced in large numbers. To achieve the goal of higher production rates, numerous simplifications were made to the design and its manufacture. This process was aggressively pushed forward, sometimes against the wishes of designers and army officers, by the Chief Director of Armament and War Production, Karl-Otto Saur (who worked under, and later succeeded, Reichminister Speer). Consequently, the final drive was changed to a double spur system. Although much simpler to produce, the double spur gears had inherently higher internal impact and stress loads, making them prone to failure under the high torque requirements of the heavy Panther tank. In contrast, both the Tiger II and the US M4 Sherman tank had double helical (herringbone) gears in their final drives, a system that reduced internal stress loads and was less complex than epicyclic/planetary gears.

Germany had a wartime shortage of key alloying agents for high strength steels. To reach the desired high production rates a more readily available, but lower-quality steel had to be substituted in the production of the double spur gears. Compounding these problems was the fact that the final drive's housing and gear mountings were too weak, because of the type of steel used and/or the tight space allotted for the final drive; the gear mountings thus deformed easily under the high torque and stress loads, pushing the gears out of alignment and resulting in failure. The final drives of the Panther were so weak that their average fatigue life was only 150 km. In Normandy, about half of the abandoned Panthers were found by the French to have broken final drives.

Plans were made to replace the final drive, either with a version of the original epicyclic/planetary gears planned by MAN, or with the final drive of the Tiger II. These plans were intertwined with the planning for the Panther II, and never came to fruition. It was estimated that building the epicyclic/planetary gear final drive would have required 2.2 times more machining work, and this would have affected manufacturing output.

[skarczew]

Do air units actually block movement now? There were some wonky pathfinding issues in early Beta.

Tell me then how it is possible to get into central hex when all hexes around are occupied.

Saving your ground units from heavy losses? What ground units - you've spent all your prestige and unit slots on cheap aircraft - your opponent would be laughing all the way to victory.

"The one laughs, that still teeth has."

Tell about laughing all the way to victory to the Wehrmacht which suddenly lacks air support. Blitzkrieg was made of tandem tank & aircraft. When one was stopped, the Blitzkrieg ceased to exist.

Moving 20 Air units 10+(?) squares per turn each was tedious micro. Not to mention air units could block land movement IIRC.

In Civ 2 there was a lot of micro, but moving units was usually taking 10-20% of time and it was pleasurable for me. Micromanagement of dozens / hundreds of cities was the thing I would call tedious.

Throughout its career, the weakest parts were its final drive units. The problems were from a combination of factors. The original MAN proposal had called for the Panther to have an epicyclic/planetary (hollow spur) gear system in the final drive, similar to that used in the Tiger. However, Germany at the time suffered from a shortage of gear-cutting machine tools and, unlike the Tiger tanks, the Panther was intended to be produced in large numbers. To achieve the goal of higher production rates, numerous simplifications were made to the design and its manufacture. This process was aggressively pushed forward, sometimes against the wishes of designers and army officers, by the Chief Director of Armament and War Production, Karl-Otto Saur (who worked under, and later succeeded, Reichminister Speer). Consequently, the final drive was changed to a double spur system. Although much simpler to produce, the double spur gears had inherently higher internal impact and stress loads, making them prone to failure under the high torque requirements of the heavy Panther tank. In contrast, both the Tiger II and the US M4 Sherman tank had double helical (herringbone) gears in their final drives, a system that reduced internal stress loads and was less complex than epicyclic/planetary gears.

Germany had a wartime shortage of key alloying agents for high strength steels. To reach the desired high production rates a more readily available, but lower-quality steel had to be substituted in the production of the double spur gears. Compounding these problems was the fact that the final drive's housing and gear mountings were too weak, because of the type of steel used and/or the tight space allotted for the final drive; the gear mountings thus deformed easily under the high torque and stress loads, pushing the gears out of alignment and resulting in failure. The final drives of the Panther were so weak that their average fatigue life was only 150 km. In Normandy, about half of the abandoned Panthers were found by the French to have broken final drives.

Plans were made to replace the final drive, either with a version of the original epicyclic/planetary gears planned by MAN, or with the final drive of the Tiger II. These plans were intertwined with the planning for the Panther II, and never came to fruition. It was estimated that building the epicyclic/planetary gear final drive would have required 2.2 times more machining work, and this would have affected manufacturing output.

Nice. Same situation as with Russian equipment - especially at the beginning of Barbarossa. Source?

[Razz1]

If I remember correctly most of the airfields have AA at them so your going to get hacked to pieces.

[boredatwork]

Tell me then how it is possible to get into central hex when all hexes around are occupied.

I haven't tested recently but at the start of beta it was possible under certain circumstances to stack multiple air units in a single hex. If the bug is fixed then yes, 6 units plus extra to account for attrition are 'all' you need to block ONE fighter from ONE airfield for ONE turn.

Tell about laughing all the way to victory to the Wehrmacht which suddenly lacks air support. Blitzkrieg was made of tandem tank & aircraft. When one was stopped, the Blitzkrieg ceased to exist.

Because we're not talking about history here were talking about a game, and you're going to great lengths to argue against my solution using strategy which if you put thought into you would see is completely impractical.

For a start most scenarios have at least 2, if not more airfields per side. That's a minimum of 12 aircraft you need to begin with, just to block them. You also have a finite number of unit slots. Especially in the early scenarios when you only have 20-30 units are you seriously going to use half of them just to deny the ability of 3-6 of my air units the ability to rearm? If I have or can capture more airfields your plane requirements increase without making actually increasing their impact on the game. (it takes you more aircraft just to deny the same 3-6 air units the ability to rearm.)

Second - all you're doing is denying the ability to re-arm - my air units are still effective for 5+ turns which, given so much of your force is unproductively sitting around my airfields could be all the time I'll need to gain ascendancy over your disprotionately smaller ground forces.

Third - Even the cheapest fighter will still set you back ~377 prestige. That's 4524 prestige just to deny 2 airfields to me. I could buy 6 Me-262s for less than that price. You have to cover both airfields. I can concentrate my 6 fighters at an airfield of my choosing. Even if I accept that it on average takes 2 Me262 attacks to kill a single "cheap" fighter (given how one sided tank battles are atm that's likely a bit of a stretch) I can still kill half your fighters on a given airfield in a single turn and move 3 Me262s into fueling position in the process.

An airfield denial strategy, even supposing you have the resources to pull it off is at best a massively ineffecient strategy compared to using those same resources aggressively - if you have sufficient airpower to make such a strategy work the axiom is you would do FAR more for your war effort using your numerical superiority to bomb the crap out of everything that moves than you will passively waiting around to deprive me of doing the same.

Nice. Same situation as with Russian equipment - especially at the beginning of Barbarossa. Source?

I copied and pasted the text from the Panther Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panther_ta ... ansmission

If you want the sources that was based on check out

Panther & Its Variants - http://www.amazon.com/Panther-Its-Varia ... 0887403972

Germany's Panther Tank: The Quest for Combat Supremacy - http://www.schifferbooks.com/newschiffe ... 0887408125

Both of which I own and would recommend but, given the wikepedia article is a reasonable sumary (and could be copied/pasted instead of typed =P ) it is entirely adequate.


Again my original comment was not to imply the T-34(76) was or should be an even match for the Panther. Nor do I have anything against the Panther - it and the Comet were my favorite tanks of WW2. I'm just saying that losing 15pts worth of T-34 for inflicting 1 pt of damage to a 0 experience panther sitting on a river OR a 14str Panther destroying 40pts of T-34 without a scratch is tipping the balance too far in the other direction.

[skarczew]

I haven't tested recently but at the start of beta it was possible under certain circumstances to stack multiple air units in a single hex. If the bug is fixed then yes, 6 units plus extra to account for attrition are 'all' you need to block ONE fighter from ONE airfield for ONE turn.

I like it.

An airfield denial strategy, even supposing you have the resources to pull it off is at best a massively ineffecient strategy compared to using those same resources aggressively - if you have sufficient airpower to make such a strategy work the axiom is you would do FAR more for your war effort using your numerical superiority to bomb the crap out of everything that moves than you will passively waiting around to deprive me of doing the same.

My strategy may be working in places where the player is not limited by the amount of units (quite realistic taken the nearly unlimited human resources in USRR back then).
I agree in PzC it would most probably fail.

And all this ramble was about the fuel model for planes ...and so far I don't see how it could be done realistic enough.

Again my original comment was not to imply the T-34(76) was or should be an even match for the Panther. Nor do I have anything against the Panther - it and the Comet were my favorite tanks of WW2. I'm just saying that losing 15pts worth of T-34 for inflicting 1 pt of damage to a 0 experience panther sitting on a river OR a 14str Panther destroying 40pts of T-34 without a scratch is tipping the balance too far in the other direction.

I have experienced the same against Russian water dragons called KV and JS, which love to jump into river and kill my tank destroyers while in water. Either units need some balance, or battle model some adjustments.

[Razz1]

Take a look at statistics. They are very weak. Balance is ok for tank destroyers.

[skarczew]

Take a look at statistics. They are very weak. Balance is ok for tank destroyers.

Which statistics? And who is very weak?

[Razz1]

Tank destroyers. Look at the purchase menu. It tells you the statistics or use the information button on the right and hover / click on unit.