[WarInEur] France 1940

Fri Jan 11 17:10:06 EST 2008

If I understand you correctly, you are playing CWIE1 (so there are no 
historic rules coded) and are playing with Allied production.  The result is 
that not only do you not get a historic result, but that the Axis player 
often fails to force Vichy or the French Surrender.  If this is true, then 
it is further evidence that the early game is skewed in the Allied favor and 
that it is effecting the timing of the invasion of Russia and the Axis 
strength when it occurs as well.

 As I wrote earlier, I think the France scenario is that place to 
experiment, but that the WiE and WitW have to be capable of duplicating 
historic result most of the time or we derail the simulation.

Not to sound to much like a panzer pusher but most Allied/Soviet players 
want the freedom of 20/20 hindsight for their side but want to force the 
Axis player to comply with historic imperatives.  When I say this I'm not 
talking about the no retreat rule or something like that, but the ability to 
increase their production when the game departs from reality.  Everyone 
agrees that the Germans were not on a Total War enconomy in 40 and 41 and 
maybe not even 42.  However, both the Soviets and Allies were thrust into 
immediate threat of annilation and they immediately were at total war levels 
and producing everything they could.

SPI recognized this problem in their design notes, but weren't ready to 
address it.  They did suggest that the production multiple be increased 
whenever, the Germans suffered a military disaster, but then begged the 
question of how to define a military disaster and cautioned that any rule 
they came up with might be gamed.  My gut feeling is that if France had not 
won quickly in France that the Germany economy would have been increased in 
reasction to the prospect of a long war.  How would this look in the game, 
maybe if France doesn't surrender within 20 turns then the German PM is 
increased by one.  However, personally I could game this type of rule fairly 
easily.

So in the final analysis the only real option if we want a reasonably 
historic game is to insure that France falls within 8-10 turns maximum with 
a 10 division BEF commitment.

Kent

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "drew" <drewkirste at yahoo.com>
To: "Hansen" <ultrasoundimages at sbcglobal.net>; "war" 
<warineur at mailman.halisp.net>
Sent: Friday, January 11, 2008 3:22 PM
Subject: Re: [WarInEur] France 1940

> aloha,
> i usally play as the axis but as i've played the
> allies and with the option 'allied production', i've
> had difficulty playing past '40 as the axis player
> retires after failing to defeat france. and all this
> without an allied invasion of the low contries. it's
> more of 'defending the country, not the capital'.
>
> drew
> --- Hansen <ultrasoundimages at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>
>> Steve wrote:
>> In a straight frontal clash, would the allies
>> nonetheless lost control
>> of the battle and been doomed to defeat in detail as
>> the line
>> disintegrated into a piecemeal shambles somewhere
>> along the point of
>> decision?
>>
>>
>> In game terms...
>>
>> If the onslought is indeed nearly unstoppable,
>>
>> does that detract from a good game?
>>
>> Or does this badly affect the experience of newbies
>> faced with endless
>> certain defeats through 1939 to 1941?
>>
>> The question of how much of a 'run for their money'
>> the French should
>> give the Germans is an issue that affects both the
>> simulation, and the
>> appeal of the game.
>>
>>
>> John replied:
>>
>> I think what we see (at least without attrition) is
>> the "straight frontal
>> clash". In short, the French do their best
>> (reinforce the line between the
>> Maginot and the channel). We will often see fewer UK
>> deployed, but they
>> really don't change things by more than a week or
>> two. French units retreat
>> in semi-random directions letting the Germans kill
>> some and others fall back
>> to the next line a hex south. Eventually the loses
>> and the line stretching
>> tends to snap and France falls.
>>
>> So given that we already have a simulation for the
>> French do as well as they
>> could, I would like to see a simulation that would
>> be more likely to produce
>> the 9 week historical result. Perhaps requirements
>> that certain number of
>> divisions/BG must be deployed by the UK to France, a
>> certain number of
>> divisions/BG must enter Belgium after it's
>> neutrality is violated, a certain
>> number of allied attacks have to occur and a certain
>> number of French
>> divisions have to be in the Maginot. If enough
>> troops don't do as required,
>> the computer randomly selects allied units in France
>> to neither move nor
>> attack (so one division short in Belgium means one
>> division in France but
>> not in the Maginot can not move). Perhaps even
>> political points added for
>> failure to achieve the goals which can cause
>> Spain/Turkey to join the axis.
>> Forcing the allies to do what they did historically
>> should get you back to
>> the 9 weeks. Then you can play on to the "meat" of
>> the game, Russia.
>>
>> As to the newbies, they are faced with a dilemma. If
>> they play the allies,
>> they get the snot beat out of them for a 3 years. If
>> they play the Germans
>> they miss opportunities so aren't as far as they
>> would like in 3 years. But
>> then other than missing opportunities (at least on a
>> large scale), this
>> describes the grognard's game as well. My solution,
>> and one I would
>> recommend to the newbie, is to play two games
>> simultaneously against the
>> same opponent. One where you are the Germans and one
>> as the allies. The
>> amount of time spent will be much less than 2x
>> (probably closer to 1.1 x or
>> 1.2x as it tends to be that while one side has lots
>> of opportunities (and
>> thus needs time to decide on the opportunities to
>> exploit), the other side
>> has limited opportunities so their turns take less
>> time. The newbie will
>> still make newbie mistakes on both sides, but they
>> will get real time
>> feedback by the other side on what they could have
>> done and will likely get
>> a better appreciation of what their opponent is
>> seeing since they will be
>> experiencing that at the same time. This also has
>> the advantage of being a
>> better feel for the position vs the player. If you
>> win as both allies and
>> Germans, then you out played your opponent. If you
>> split with the same side
>> winning in each game, then you are probably even
>> with your opponent in skill
>> and the game was slanted towards that side.
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> WarInEur mailing list
>> WarInEur at mailman.halisp.net
>> http://mailman.halisp.net/mailman/listinfo/warineur
>>
>
>
>
> 
> ____________________________________________________________________________________
> Never miss a thing.  Make Yahoo your home page.
> http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs
> _______________________________________________
> WarInEur mailing list
> WarInEur at mailman.halisp.net
> http://mailman.halisp.net/mailman/listinfo/warineur
> 