[WarInEur] More on Ploesti..and some more ideas to play with

[sgminfo]

Kent & Sue Haunschild wrote:
> Well the T hit doesn't actually do anything! It's a Kludge designed 
> to simulate two things.  It directly impacts the production system via 
> the placement of hit markers and indirectly reduces the Axis rail 
> capabilities by blocking rail and supply movement through the hex.  In 
> this secondary capacity it represents the attacks against the 
> marshaling yards.  However, I have always objected to the use of the 
> SB force to attack rail hexes in non-RC/MC hexes for two reasons.
>  
> First, as a design element the rail infrastructure shown on the map 
> was greatly abbreviated.  As SPI wrote in their design comments "There 
> were many more rail lines in Western Europe than are shown on the 
> map.  If we had shown them all there would have been a rail in almost 
> every hex in Western Europe." (I have reworded this last sentence for 
> brevity)
>  
> Since the rail net is abbreviated it has become a branching tree 
> structure with many choke points rather than being a spiderweb of 
> interconnected rail hexes with no choke points.  SB attacks can be 
> devastating against chokes points and have effects in the "game" due 
> to the abbreviated rail net that out weigh any real world capabilities.
As an aside to this I would observe the following...whilst the 
infrastructure is severly abbreviated, so too are the vulnerabilities of 
the rail systen.
Now when the transportation plan was drawn up, the concept was to use  
mix and match packages to progressively wreck the rail network.

The pressure put on Harris, and 8th resulted in the heavies needing 
targets. Initially it was thought that the heavies did not have the 
accuracy from altitude to take out precision trgets so larger target 
were needed, hence their peculiar adaptation to the Marshalling yards. 
Wherever you dropped bombs they were likely to interdict and do damage 
to, a marshalling yard. Missing a single lengh of track in the open 
would result in no effect at all...

 CF the Vulcan bomb effects at Stanley airfield in the Falklands war  
illustrates visually very well the problem...

Make the runway at Stanley 10 times as wide, and the same bomb pattern 
had a different effect upon the target.

But on the other side, the allies had an extensive tactical airforce 
that could, and did, make its presence felt

The weak point (not simulated in the game- which leads to a distortion) 
is the one that the allies eventually hit upon...

There are thousands of infrastructure items, and target locations, a 
hopeless task to cripple without a huge abortive expenditure of effort.

But the allies ignored these...

Initially they went for choke points...bridges, tunnels, and viaducts.

Then they realised there was a more obvious one...theprime movers....

Steam engines are very difficult to hide...they sit on the track...and 
they emit plumes of water vapour and smoke, betraying their presence for 
miles.

Once the fighter bombers started going for these the Germans were in 
serious trouble. Boilers are peculiarly susceptable to damage, and once 
damaged, (any sort of penetrative hit) they rapidly come to a halt and 
block the line...needing another engine to remove from the track, and a 
specialist boliersmith and equipment to repair, taking some time. Start 
large scale wrecking of boilers and locomotives, coupled with attacks on 
roundhouses and repair depots, and the situation starts very rapidly to 
get out ofhand.

Now you are attacking only limited targets on the track, just running 
the lines looking for the tell tale of steam....almost a self fulfilling 
prophecy....but the infrastructure in the widest sense is generally free 
from harm....you end up with miles of great track...and nothing able 
tomove on it.

This sort of effect in the game is completely missing....the stylised T 
hit is a very poor substritute.

If we wanted a more realistic substitute we would need a 'bradshawing' 
crt (after the nickname  of the operation used).

How I might do this...

Use the interdiction markers exactly as we do now....

BUT

Every interdiction marker on a rail line is an AP which has additional 
effects..a new table...this table cross indexes the number of APs 
attacking rail targets and producing a result that affects rail capacity 
in that region..possibly delineated by country....

i.e for every 10 Aps commited you have a 1/6th chance of suppressing a 
rail capacity level of 1

Rail capacity is marked on a table for the area (in each area the rail 
capacity is always set equal to the maximum capacity for that player),
As you destroy that rail capacity,
so the nmber of units that can move by rail decline...

When in a country 50% of rail capacity is destroyed, then the quality of 
supply drops one degree, from major to minor etc etc.
                        at  85% supply becomes beachead
                        at 100% the rail net ceases to provide movement 
but will always provide supply to industry

That sort of effect does simulate much better such effects as there were 
itrw, but the nature of the board game made it very difficult to work up 
a system without counters and extra costs....

The results from such a simulation would , with a little tweaking , 
probably mimic very accurately the real world crisis descending upon the 
Continental rail network...

Where the air interdiction campaign were lifted, the network should 
bounce back to life fairly rapidly (probably about 10% capacity each 
week, as the backlock of engine repairs are worked through.


This is not something we might work in now but later at a 
revision/upgrade point, this could look eminently feasable, as it does 
not rely on vast issues on the map, rather generic off map tables and 
discrete. separate coding.

It has the attraction of dovetailing very nicely with existing systems, 
but the extra chrome need only sit at a level off map and not 
complicating the code except through simple entry points and interface 
points to the game...


>  
> Second, the Flak counters represent another abstraction.  In the game 
> they are placed on MC/RC target hexes to defend a specific 
> hex.   However, a lot of flak was dispersed in belts and attacked 
> anything that flew over them.
>  
> While there are only a few production target hexes in the game, the 
> Axis player is provided with an insufficient number of Flak points to 
> adequately defend them all.  If the Axis player is forced to disperse 
> his flak points to cover rail hexes or see the Allies bomb targets 
> without being first subjected to defending Flak then the SB game 
> starts giving skewed results.
Flak counters in the above sketched out scenario can counter attack the 
bombers by being deployed on a generic off map table, which imposed 
attrition on forces that had attacked the rail net that turn.

Now we have a versatile dilemma, presented to the Germans intrw, 
disperse the flak all over the system, or let some aspects take their 
chances as you concentrate on the defense of production sites and cities...
>  
> ********************
>  
> Related thoughts on SB Campaign.
>  
> I think the Flak table is flawed because there is no incremental rise 
> in damage inflicted until the sixth Flak point is placed.
>  
> I think the application of the Interception rules is flawed because 
> the Allies can overfly the West and South Fronts with impunity and 
> attack targets on the East Fronts without being intercepted.  I 
> believe the same logic that allows multiple Sea Interdictions (one for 
> each Sea Zone) should cover the SB interceptors and that if the Allies 
> fly though a Front containing interceptors they should face attack and 
> if they proceed into another Front they would face a second attack.
>  
> SB bases- The rule allowing the Allied player to have all three SB 
> bases available from the start of the campaign is at odds with the 
> reinforcement chart which shows the availability of the SB Bases.  If 
> the Player uses the reinforcement chart the first SB arrives as a 
> reinforcement on 12/42. Since it takes three months to deploy a base 
> the first attacks cannot occur until 1/43.  He receives a second base 
> on 6/43 which won't be operational until 8/43.  The third base arrives 
> 12/43 and becomes operational 1/44. 
>  
> Making them available from the start accelerates the SB campaign 
> because it allows early placement and activation and the first SB 
> attacks then occur three months earlier than planned for in the game 
> design.  And the proliferation of bases allows the number of attacks 
> to increase beyond the number of interceptors allowed to intercept 
> them. (You will notice the percentage of interceptors allowed to the 
> Axis player is tied to the number of bases available to the Allied 
> player.  When all three bases come on line early the Axis player is 
> unable to respond).

Yes...a very keenly felt criticism. A simple way to add an element to 
this, would be a representational effect of the difficulties and 
distances...


Deployment In the UK...   3cycles to set up and break down...
Deployment on the Southern Front  6cycles to set up and break down


>  
>  
>  

-|steve|-
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