When countries surrender . . .

[stockwellpete]

In a game against the AI I beat up France quite badly and they surrendered mid 1915. A number of things about it . . .

i) the French virtually fought to the last city - they just had Calais left. They wouldn't really though, would they? If they had lost Paris and then their "reserve" capital, Bordeaux (not Marseilles as in the game) as well, then they would have thrown in the towel by that time, if not before.
ii) after France surrendered, French territory was just the enclave around Calais and some mountain hexes in eastern France. But in reality there would have been "peace" negotiations with Germany, France would largely have been disarmed and then would probably have operated as a client state of the Germans - but it wouldn't have just existed as two separate bits of territory with only one city, would it?
iii) a French infantry unit at 8 strength points was two hexes away from Calais and it just stayed there for over 2 years once France had surrendered! Really they would just have had some "garrison" units in their major cities, wouldn't they?

So I think the surrender of nations is a bit under-developed in the game at the moment.

[Umeu]

you are nitpicking now

[Samhain]

He has some points. If the French Army entirely ruled out attacking* with the Germans occupying not much of France then they would hardly keep fighting if the Germans took double the ground, which wouldn't even come to half of France so certainly not most of it. Also there's no point in having full strength infantry if you haven't got the industrial capacity for it or anyone to use them on. With nobody to attack the only thing to do is defend so there wouldn't be a point to building any ground units except for garrisons.
* From after the Nivelle Offensive until the Great Offensive the next year.

[avoran]

I agree, the way surrender is handled is unrealistic. Countries end up with bizarre fragments of territory in a way that never would have happened in real life. I even had a game where Romania surrendered, then after Germany surrendered it got back a mishmash of hexes that had been German-controlled - they would certainly have been taken over by the Austrians and Bulgarians if they were behind the lines. And once the Russians started arriving the country would have been liberated, not occupied, and rejoined the Allies.

Maybe there could be two levels of defeat: armistice and surrender at different morale levels. With an armistice, if it is accepted by the other side, the country remains alive and retains a sensible chunk of territory, regardless of the actual front line (perhaps predetermined, as with Vichy in CEAW). In the case of a surrender, ALL territory is taken over by the victors.

[stockwellpete]

Maybe there could be two levels of defeat: armistice and surrender at different morale levels. With an armistice, if it is accepted by the other side, the country remains alive and retains a sensible chunk of territory, regardless of the actual front line (perhaps predetermined, as with Vichy in CEAW). In the case of a surrender, ALL territory is taken over by the victors.

Yes, that would be a very tidy way of dealing with this issue. I think how it is handled in the various situations that could occur in the game does need to relate to the stated war aims of the various powers. I know for sure that Germany was keen to expand its power in central Europe ("Mitteleuropa") and that it intended to treat Belgium as a vassal state. I am not so clear what its attitude to France was other than French power was to be "broken" so that it could not challenge Germany again. Whether it intended to occupy more French territory, or whether the French would be required to de-militarise part of its own territory next to Germany - I don't know at the moment.

So If Germany conquers France (and Belguim) in the game it seems to me that they should still exist as separate countries; maybe Germany should get some of their PP's (Germany would certainly take advantage of French agriculture to feed its population rendering the Allied blockade much less effective); and maybe French military units would then defend their country against any incursions from other Entente powers for the rest of the game? Maybe military units of the Central Powers would also need to have military access in France too?

[stockwellpete]

For my own clarification, as much as anything else, I have started to research the "war aims" of the various powers. If you have more suggestions then I can update this list . . .

Central Powers

Austria-Hungary - extend power in the Balkans by defeating Serbia and blocking pan-Slavic aspirations (Russian influence)

Bulgaria - recovery of lands lost to neighbours in second Balkan War

Germany - extend power in central Europe ("Mitteleuropa"); weaken France; turn Belgium into a client state; gain colonial territories from Britain, France etc

Turkey - regain territories in the Balkans and Caucasus; take control of Egypt and Cyprus


Entente

Arabia - independence

Belguim - independence

Britain - defending status quo, did not want Germany to dominate Europe and threaten her security; gain more colonies

France - recover Alsace-Lorraine, weaken Germany so France could be dominant power in Europe

Italy - gain Tyrol and territory on Dalmatian coast; gain islands in the Aegean from Turkey

Portugal - protect African colonies from Germany

Romania - gain Transylvania

Serbia - extend power in the Balkans (pan-Slavism)

Tsarist Russia - extend influence in the Balkans (pan-Slavism); capture Constantinople and the Dardanelles to secure major trade route