RED FRONT ROCKS

[Captain Nemo]

A two-player game is not in my plans right now, because I don't really play two-player mode myself, so I can't test it and I don't really know what's involved...
If someone would like to convert Red Front to a two-player game I would be glad to let them do it. Is there any demand for two player games? Do we have a volunteer?

[DarthVeda]

I'd like the job... but I'm just too busy right now

the problem with two player is that they would have to restart the game every time winter and summer came along (!)

[Jim Winchell]

I played through the entire game this weekend--I probably did better than the average bear because I was involved in the playtesting. Narva, Bryansk, Kursk, Kholm, and the Crimea never fell. Smolensk didn't fall until early spring of 42 and then was easily recaptured. The Soviets recaptured the Baltic States and Poland and pushed all the way to the gates of Berlin in Summer of 1943 to Winter 1944. I knocked Finland out of the war in 1943. Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad were never threatened. The south was a tough nut to crack--I held up advancing on Berlin until I had recaptured Kiev and the Ukraine. I didn't retake these cities until the Winter of 1944, and I had to divert most of the Soviet army from advancing Berlin and used up most of the Soviet treasury in speed building units to do this.

I had plenty of naval infantry units in Leningrad and Sevastopol to conduct sea invasions of Finland (and later Denmark) in the north and Odessa and later Rumanian in the south.

I researched the techs giving me the Colossus, SETI, and Hoover Dam wonders first. I set my research/taxes so I was getting an advance every two turns. I ran out of researchable techs (other than future tech) in 1943. I airlifted a freight unit every turn out of the UK to build wonders and/or establish trade routes.

I finally killed off enough units for the Germans to start building--they exclusively built 88 mm flak guns, mobile flak guns, Tiger II, and Karls. My cities were assaulted with wave after wave of mobile flak guns. I hardly saw a German infantry unit outside a city after 1943.

All in all it was a great game. Other than the Crimea and Narva, the Germans reached their 1941 objectives by the Spring of 1942. The German summer 1942 offensive took Rostov, but didn't really threaten Stalingrad. Instead, a swarm of infantry and tanks went into to the Caucasus and almost took Maikop. The Kursk offensive in 1943 didn't take Kursk, although it did run headon into my offensive to liberate Gomel, Rostov, and Kharkov and resulted in a stalemate in the south throughout 1943. However, I was able to march through the Baltic, East Prussia, and Poland north of the Pripet Marshes with ease in 1943. This freed up units in Leningrad to knock Finland out of the war in 1943--I even sent dozens of the armored infantry units into Norway and took out the northern most city (and then ran into a bunch of Karls the Germans had built in Norway). The Soviet offensive stalled in 1944 when the Germans started building 88mm flak guns like crazy in all of their cities.

Suggestions for version 2:

1. Don't let the Germans build Karls.
2. Fix it so that Future Tech 1 is not researchable until all other advances have been researched.
3. Give mobile flak guns a weaker attack strength. They were blowing away tanks with ease.
4. Give the Germans free units in Smolensk/Minsk, and Tallinn/Riga in 1942 and 1943 to keep the Soviets on the defensive until early 1944.
5. The Germans should have a "breaking point"--perhaps give them an advance to make Wehrmacht SG units obsolete after General Paulus is killed (so they can only build regular Wehrmacht infantry). In the summer of 1944 give the Germans an advance which makes their 88 Flak guns obsolete (to simulate the Allied invasion). Dozens of Soviet units were killed off assaulting German cities with 2-3 88mm flak guns (along with a Panther or Tiger II) in them in 1944.
6. I loved the Yugoslavian partisans. At one time they were all over the Balkans. However you stopped producing them in late 1943-1944 and they all were killed. Keep them appearing via events in greater numbers until the end of the game. Build some forts so the barbarians will occupy them.
7. Simulate the Warsaw uprising and Polish Home army the same way as the Yugoslavian partisans.
8. Have the Siberian regiments appear at the start of the winter 1941 events. Have one appear in Stalingrad.
9. Rename all "regiments" to "divisions".

[Jim Winchell]

10. If you have event space left, have German units appear in the Crimea in the Winter of 1941 (Rumanian infantry, artillery, Wehrmacht SG, a panzer unit). Get rid of the fortified battery north of the city (at this scale, the fortifications would be in the city itself). Other than an occasional bomber attack and stray infantry unit, the Crimea was ignored by the computer.

[Captain Nemo]

Jim:

I also finished a complete game early this morning. My game includes the version 2 modifications which fixes several of the problems you encountered.
In my game the Germans achieved their goal for 1941 in November except for Kursk and Demyansk. Moscow took a serious pounding from September on and had all the perimeter fortifications wiped out and re-manned with PzKw IV and SGs
Crimea actually held out historically with Kerch lost and Sevastopol isolated but by July 1942 all troops were wiped out by the 2 Karl units and the Germans got it too. Leningrad held out well because I had mined a "firebreak" all around the city and although there were Germans in Luga, Novgorod and Narva they never got into the city. I kept moving winter troops into the Fortification south of the city which I used to harass the Germans.
The Finns took all the cities North of Leningrad/Tikhvin except for Murmansk which remained isolated until the winter of 1944 when I finally freed up enough units to go on the counter offensive against them. I took back the original cities + Helsinki and two other, they sued for peace and I actually got them to declare war on the Germans (Which is factual!)
In 1942 I lost Rostov and Novorussisk and faced a dual invasion of the Caucasus. Also lost Luga south of Moscow. Maikop was hit by one of the Karl units (I killed off the other one in the minefields at Sevastopol) getting over the Crimean straights and I got load of Panzers attacking Stalingrad from the South.
Only winter gave me some breathing room... I was able to counter-attack from Voronezh and capture Kharkov, clear out the Caucasus though not retake Rostov so the Germans kept coming. I did not win Stalingrad, ie kill Paulus (Actually I only got to him in the winter of 1944 and by then he had turned into a Volksturm unit...)nor did I take Rostov and eliminate the Caucasus offensive that way, but I was able to go on a limited counter-offensive in the central and Northern sectors to retake Kholm, Velukeye Luki, Tula and I held on to Kharkov as a base across the lower Don river.
1943 was a tough slugfest with all the German armor appearing around Kursk but open tank battles are not the AI's strength. By the winter of 1943 all his new Tigers and Panthers were scrap metal!
Also by the winter of 1943 my production build up started giving results. In the spring of 1944 I launched a maasive counter offensive with T34-85s and Katyusha launchers. I pushed the Germans out of the Caucasus and closed both doors (Kerch and Rostov) retook all the Southern cities up to Dnepropetovsk/Gomel. In the Baltics I swept all the way to Konigsberg. Also Kaluga, Bryansk...The AI was starting to run out of armor units and still not building any! My toughest fight was in the winter of 1944 for Perekop which was manned by over 50 SG units with tank support! My technique is using massive concentrated force, large groups of rocket launchers and tanks all fully repaired and all attacking in one turn, then repairing damage and moving on. At one point my armored "spearhead" had about 90 T-34/85s, 85 Katyushas, 60 armored infantry, 15 KV-1s, 55 Su-152s and 40 JS-1 tanks... Even 88s couldn't stop that armada!
The real build-up started in late summer 1944. When spring 1945 broke the Soviets launched into Germany from Konigsberg, Danzig, Minsk, Kiev, Warsaw, Odessa and Lvov. All remaining German pockets had been cleaned out during the winter, the last holdouts being Novgorod and Sevastopol. A new partisan uprising event, but with Soviet controlled partisans, took Warsaw in the winter of 1944-45. I have added automatic help to the Soviets when they knock-out a Tiger II (Tank Guard regiment formed...)and also some special events on capture of specific cities. During the summer of 45 I was able to knock the Germans down to a stalemate, bordering on a marginal defeat (72, I think). With 2-3 extra months it would have been curtains for the Great Reich!
I captured Berlin-Potdam-Rostock-Bucharest-Ploesti-Budapest-All of Poland-Debrecen and a few more...
The Germans started building units like crazy at the end and I saw the 88s and Panzergrenadiers everywhere also lots of Tiger IIs, no mobile AA guns though...
I still just killed them off in droves.
When the game ended I was just resting 4 huge motorized armies in Bucharest, Budapest, Berlin and Krakow readying them for the next blow.

1. Don't let the Germans build Karls.

If they can't build them they refuse to use them, it appears. But in the new rules files
I make the "fancy" German equipment obsolete when they get Volksturm (ie Soviets entering Germany), incl. the Karls and the Elephants what else do you suggest? (Maybe all bombers obsolete too?)

2. Fix it so that Future Tech 1 is not researchable until all other advances have been researched.

Why? Do the Germans research it? I made it of low value so they should go for it last. I also revised the tech tree value so the Germans should research in this order:
Hummels-EinsatzKommando-Waffen SS-Tiger-Panther-Fw190-TigerII-Me262-research labs-air defense-future tech

3. Give mobile flak guns a weaker attack strength. They were blowing away tanks with ease.

OK... Too tough. I saw very few of them

4. Give the Germans free units in Smolensk/Minsk, and Tallinn/Riga in 1942 and 1943 to keep the Soviets on the defensive until early 1944.

I will beef up the winter defenses in 1942

5. The Germans should have a "breaking point"--perhaps give them an advance to make Wehrmacht SG units obsolete after General Paulus is killed (so they can only build regular Wehrmacht infantry). In the summer of 1944 give the Germans an advance which makes their 88 Flak guns obsolete (to simulate the Allied invasion). Dozens of Soviet units were killed off assaulting German cities with 2-3 88mm flak guns (along with a Panther or Tiger II) in them in 1944.

I was thinking of making the SG obsolete with the fall of Berlin ie unwilling to fight, loss of morale. I was also thinking of a way to simulate the Allies entering western Germany in February 1945. The worst unit for me was those nasty Me262s...killing tanks and aircraft everywhere. I think I need to scale down the number generated by events.
My assault on German cities was very realistic, ie I lost tons of units like the Soviets, but at the end I wiped out all the defenders. I think the attack on Berlin alone cost the Soviets 150,000 men.

6. I loved the Yugoslavian partisans. At one time they were all over the Balkans. However you stopped producing them in late 1943-1944 and they all were killed. Keep them appearing via events in greater numbers until the end of the game. Build some forts so the barbarians will occupy them.

Tito was well organized too. How about giving him some heavy artillery, Machine guns and anti-tank guns?

7. Simulate the Warsaw uprising and Polish Home army the same way as the Yugoslavian partisans.

Done but that's in the direct path of the Soviets advance and I don't want a war to break out between the "Polish" barbarians and the Soviets. That insurrection (Soviet controlled) occurs when the Soviets retake Minsk and it's tough enough to capture Warsaw and hold it for a few turns until the Soviets get there but they have to be fast...

8. Have the Siberian regiments appear at the start of the winter 1941 events. Have one appear in Stalingrad.

OK

9. Rename all "regiments" to "divisions".

Is that about the scale of the game? The German casualties in Wehrmacht and SG were both 255+ they lost approx. 200 PzKw IV, around 50 of each type of planes, 100 SS, 40 each Panthers, Tigers, PzKw III etc...
Divisions seemed too big because that would make the losses about 1,000 divisions ie 10,000,000 men. Maybe brigades would be the most appropriate size each unit representing 2,500 men?

10. If you have event space left, have German units appear in the Crimea in the Winter of 1941 (Rumanian infantry, artillery, Wehrmacht SG, a panzer unit). Get rid of the fortified battery north of the city (at this scale, the fortifications would be in the city itself). Other than an occasional bomber attack and stray infantry unit, the Crimea was ignored by the computer.

The new version makes Crimea very tough to hold just through the summer of 1941... The Karl Units appeared in October 1941.

[Captain Nemo]

Jim:
One last question: On what level did you play?

It appears that you got the technologies much faster than me. I only got JS-2 (Last unit researched) in December 1944 and got city air defenses a few turns before the end. The Germans were done a few month before me. They never build the "Fortress Deutchland" wonder and I never build the "NKVD intelligence" wonder, everything else got built.

I played on Deity.

[Jim Winchell]

1. I never saw any Volksturm. Is their appearance dependant upon a tech the Germans receive when the Soviets capture a city? If so, I must have captured the trigger city an event file or two too soon. Have the Germans research the Volksturm tech after Tiger II.

2. Future tech 1 was available for the Soviets to research on the first turn.

5. The German losses in 1942-43 (destruction of the 6th Army at Stalingrad, the loss of the German armies in North Africa, and the attrition of two years of combat on the Russian front) resulted the Wehrmacht reorganizing the structure of their infantry division so it had fewer men. Making the Wehrmacht SG obsolete should be triggered by the destruction of the Paulus unit, not the fall of Berlin. Making the 88mm guns obsolete after June 1944 would help the Soviet advance, the Germans were building them in every city. The Me262 wasn't any more scary than the Ju88 and He111, they all pretty much destroyed whatever they attacked. Fortunately they only got one shot a turn.

6. I don't know about giving the partisans heavy artillery and AT guns. BTW, you ought to "upgrade" the Soviet 54 mm AT gun to a 76 mm AT gun after the Summer of 41 (actually the Russians had these at the start but leave as is to keep in the spirit of "crapifying" the Soviets in 1941).

7. I must have captured Minsk too early because I didn't get the Polish Uprising. Having barbarians as the Polish home army wouldn't be too far off the mark, they had their own agenda and didn't take their orders from Moscow. It is alleged that the Russians armies were held back from advancing on Warsaw until the Germans took care of the uprising--saving Stalin the trouble.

9. The "dead pool" is not an accurate way of determining unit sizes. At this map scale, the number of units in play, and the Soviet productions levels, it should at least be divisions (and probably corps). But why even give them a size, call them "Siberian Troops." It looked kind of silly when a "regiment" wiped out a stack of German tanks and infantry units.

I always play on Diety. You can increase your tax rate on the June turn because the Mass Production tech has almost been completely researched. I utilize every oil field hex in the Caucasus and build Universities in Grozny, Baku, and Maikop on the first turn (and an airport in Baku on the second turn, followed by a superhighway or stock market on the third turn). After the first turn, I set the tax rate so I getting a tech every two turns. I airlifted the first two freight unit from the UK to Baku and Grozny and got a 2000 gold bonus a +42 luxury x2 trade route in both of those cities. I researched the "research" techs first, building the Colossus in Baku. It produced so many trade arrows that the city screen couldn't contain them. I got the SETI wonder next and built it in Baku immediately. After that I was able to research a tech every two turns without a gold deficit. To handle the gold deficit (and speed build units), I was able to sell off a lot of city improvements--Novograd is a good example. It has a factory, but its a small city and only produces 4 or 5 shields per turn. It has a bank, but only produces a handful of gold (at least on my minimal tax levels). It has a university but only produces a handful of beakers. It has a sewer system, but will never grow to a size 12 city. All are sold for the war effort, even if the Germans don't ever threaten the city (it fell in late 1942). Politburos and NKVD headquarters also go. After I got all of the techs, libraries and universities went (along with granaries after I retook Kiev) and I boosted the tax rate so I had about 10,000 gold in the bank at the start of every turn.

I'm certain that if I hadn't messed around with liberating the Ukraine, I probably would have been all over Germany in the summer of 1944. The game definitely got more difficult when the Germans started building their own units.

[Jim Winchell]

Hey, I'm a civer now! How many posts until I'm a senior civer (or Marshal of the Soviet Union Civer)?

[DarthVeda]

Barbarians build whatever unit type that took the city.

ie Taken by T34, will build T34

Plus, the terrain around the city is automatically upgraded (!)

[Jim Winchell]

I never thought of the artillery, they move so slow that I left them in Russia. I was throwing Katyushas, tanks and infantry against cities only to see a slight dip in the power bar on 2 to 3 88mm guns. The airforce was equally useless against them. Rather than making it obsolete, perhaps you could make it so that the 88mm gun can't be built. You have quite a few in key German cities at the start of the game already.

Could the Su152 (or whatever the Soviet SPG is) be adjusted to ignore city walls if it doesn't already? I found that I was exclusively building two types of tanks--JSIIs and T-34/85s (because of their superior movement in the summer and the winter).

There ought to be some benefit to the Soviets from the Allied invasion of France--perhaps make the Ju87s, He111s and Ju88s obsolete. Even when I had Germany on the ropes, air units were still all over the place. Perhaps make TigerIIs and German fighter planes obsolete with the fall of Bucharest?

[Jim Winchell]

[double post]
[This message has been edited by blackclove (edited December 01, 1999).]

[Jim Winchell]

[triple post]
[This message has been edited by blackclove (edited December 01, 1999).]

[Mao]

You need 30 posts for "Civer" status. I'm playing it too, and it is an excellent scenario. However, when I captured Warsaw (forgot the year, sorry) I didn't get any additional units. I might have captured it too late or something.

[Captain Nemo]

Very impressive Jim!
It took me until 1944 to get to the 2 turns per tech rate, but I didn't set the science rate that high, trying to keep the budget balanced without the income from sale of improvements. After I got electrification and SETI, I also had a lot of improvements to sell, especially when I started capturing all the German cities full of research labs and powerplants.
I could probably have set the science rate higher! Also, I built 3 military techs before turning to research (Propellants, Advanced Flight and Mobile Warfare II, I think)
Regarding the Future Tech there is no way to make it "last" because it has to tie to all the tech trees (German, Soviet and Finnish). I could tie it to advanced research so it's not available from the beginning, but it can't be "last". If I don't include it, the game crashes whenever someone (AI or human) reaches the end of their tech tree.
Regarding making the SG obsolete in 1942, I am a little worried that it will tilt the game balance seriously. The AI IMMEDIATELY disbands obsolete units and because he doesn't build anything yet many cities will lose their entire garrisson. My latest events have the SG, Ju87, Ju88, He111 and battleships becoming obsolete when Berlin falls which should really precipitate the collapse (ie get Berlin and the rest of the country falls).
Taking out the 88s goes against my historical grain because they were the last defense units that the Germans had, after all the tanks were out of action, they brought them out and used them as anti-tank weapons! The only truly effective weapon against the 88s in the game is the Soviet heavy artillery which moves 1 and ignores city anti-tank defenses... It also ignores the 88s double defense against 2 x move flag so it kills the 88s as if they were infantry! But it's tedious moving stacks of them up to the front.

How do you simulate the tremedous role of towed artillery in WWII? I could up their move to 2 like the German 150mm in the early turn and give them tremendous killing power but no defense? Kind of a slower moving Katyusha unit...

I will add events to ensure that the Germans get "Volksturm" no matter when you cross into Poland (I already added the trigger to 6-8 cities instead of Warsaw alone)

I know you don't use the sound files, but maybe you should try them for a little while, some day. I just made a series of new tank and MG sounds from movie soundtracks. (That Tiger in Saving Private Ryan sure sounds nasty!)

I will adjust the unit names (Troops is good) when I have time, it's quite tedious finding all the places they appear.

The 57mm to 76mm AT upgrade is a good idea, but also for a later update of the game. I also wanted to add a Yak-3 and the PzKw IVG as automatic upgrades but this takes time.

Right now the Polish uprising is Soviet controlled and the Yugoslav Partisans get heavy artillery and an extra boost in 1943 (They were quite organized and held entire areas of the country in their control, so having artillery is quite accurate, historically. Even the Soviet Partisans in the Pripyat marshes had some artillery and armored vehicles according to my research) With artillery, I think the Yugoslavs may capture a city in Serbia which would be nice historically. I don't know how the Barbarians behave when they hold a city... What units do they build?

Regarding the unit sizes in 1941 133 German divisions took part in Barbarossa, equating to 3.2 million men, ie 25,000 men per division? The German onslaught in the first move of the scenario involves approx. 400 "land" units about 1/3 division per unit maybe 8,000 men = 1 unit?
But the Soviets should have about 300-400 divisions which would mean 900-1200 units at the start of the game... Which is double what they have in the game...

I don't know what the criteria for becoming a "Civer" is in Apolyton's eyes but you have certainly earned the rank of Marshal of the Civ-iet Union with all your playtesting!!

[Overdrive]

I took Berlin in June 45. I operated differently then the Red Army did: My main effort came from Leningrad and Stalingrad Fronts. Minsk was mine and my Tanks were ready to strike into Rumania while the Germans were still trashing in and around Voronezh!
I met quite a few Karl heavy mortars on my way to Germany too...