One aspect of the multimap / multi altitude / multi faction model that I find frustrating is getting all of the elements to work together. At the moment I have to work through a program that goes something like this:
1) Go through each night radar station and search the skies, making a paper note of the coordinates of any enemy aircraft found, which direction they appear to be heading & which altitude they are at. I then repeat the same process for day radar sites. I then attack any spotted aircraft that are within range of my flak. This is rather time-consuming and tedious process. It would be much easier if the Luftwaffe controlled the radar so that any spotted aircraft were still visible on the map for my fighters to intercept.
I can have the Luftwaffe command Flak and radar (they did historically control at least the flak, anyway). The German Industry civ (and Allied Industry civ) really only need to exist to be a trading partner for the other players, anyway. This should alleviate the need to keep notes on where bombers are, speed up the game, and make it less tedious. I'll make it so that there really is no "need" for players to do anything with the industry civs (though I'd still recommend keeping them human controlled just to prevent the AI from doing something boneheaded, like moving units onto railtrack and blocking your path--you'd just hit Ctrl+N and wouldn't miss anything).
2) Move the resources and production managers as well as any Wehrmacht units. This is also a rather clunky and tedious task.
I'm not going to be able to remove the resources but I can reduce the amount of them. I had 10 originally per site (so you'd get about 100 units to move each turn--200 when you did a production run), and then reduced to 5, because I was afraid that they would be too vulnerable to air attack. As we've seen, I've barely touched them and having this many is just too many for the game to be fun. I think I could safely reduce them to 2-3 per site which would mean you'd have maybe 20-40 units to move each turn, depending on if there was a production run - I think this is pretty manageable, especially given that this number could/should decrease once the Allies start destroying targets.
3) Move dozens of submarines to probable convoy locations. As my Condors move afterwards this process is a bit hit and miss. I take screenshots of detected enemy sea units to refer to on the Luftwaffe turn.
4) Finally the real action with the Luftwaffe. I can now use my Condor's to spot Convoy's current locations and note where I think they will be by the time my next naval turn comes around. I refer to the screenshots to attack located naval vessels and my notes to locate air formations and attack them.
I know you suggest keeping the Battle of the Atlantic, but I need the unit space and am not sure it will stay. This is probably going to be axed from this scenario, but when/if I create my WW2 in Europe multiplayer scenario (I'm going to have to pick your brain extensively before I break ground on that one), something like this will come back.
With the Luftwaffe, it seems like the most logical idea is to move the vast bulk of aircraft to the north and west. Is this what you envisioned? Most airfields are empty with a smaller number of northern fields containing dozens of aircraft.
That is certainly what I would do in your position, but I'm going to try and compel players to consider spreading them out more by making them more vulnerable / expensive to protect (AA units for the Luftwaffe will be limited, Air Defenses, while available, would be expensive). I'm also strongly considering having a 15th AF base on the south of the map for the USAAF to let some of the south eastern targets have a legitimate threat from the start.
I love the look and concept of this scenario, but at the moment I don't get that feeling of excitement when it comes to playing my turns that I get from other PBEMs such as Techumseh's American Civil War where it is a strategic battle of wits. I just feel like an administrator who is reacting to circumstances. It is a bit too far removed from the traditional Civ2 experience to make it truly enjoyable. There doesn't seem to be any real strategic masterstroke I can make to turn the tide. It's a war of attrition and only diligent management will win the day.
The air war in Europe was a war of attrition, and that is unlikely to stop. There's no way around it with civ's battle model where one unit always must die. I'm not sure I would agree it can't be a strategic battle of wits though. You chose a different strategy than I would have, but that's good because it's worth seeing how it works out.
While I tried to make this a scenario where either side could invade the other, that doesn't work well. At the end of the day, this scenario has one true attacker, and one true defender. The attacker is going to need to carry out strikes deep in enemy territory. The defender is going to need to stop them. The attacker is going to have a numerical advantage that gets greater and greater over time, but the defender will have a technological advantage. My vision for this scenario is for the defense to get more and more desperate if the Allies are successful.
I see this as ultimately becoming a strategic scenario from the Allied perspective, and a tactical scenario from the German one. The Allies, after all, will get to decide what targets to attack.
From my perspective, my great challenge is trying to figure out the best order to strike things to reduce your ability to fight. Do I have enough bombers to get through to a target? Will flak tear them to shreds? Can I lure the Luftwaffe up in enough numbers to shoot them down to let some bombers through? If I strike X target, how does it help me against Y down the road?
If I was playing as the Germans, my challenge would be deciding when and where to attack he bomber force. Are they within range of an important target? How many units can reach it the next turn? Are my fighters in danger of being attacked by escorts? If I wait another turn, will the bombers be unprotected? Etc. And then, in terms of technology, do I double down on conventional fighters that can be mass produced, or do I go after exotic units that will be few and far between but could potentially turn the tide?
That's the vision anyway...
I'm happy to continue with the current test to help you get the data you need to make the improvements, but if I'm being brutally honest I have to say that in its current form the scenario is technically brilliant but lacking on the gameplay (fun) front.
If you can hang tight through turn 20 or so I would truly appreciate it - I need to see if massed bomber formations can get through or not. By about turn 20 it should be pretty clear and we can call it a day until the revised version.