The Hinge of Fate - Development Thread

Late May, 1943...

The battle in Italy is going very poorly - the units in Verona are nearly cut off and will need to break out to the three red circles... The Luftwaffe is getting chewed to shreds given they can't train veteran units due to the low (less than 30k) fuel stores... However, I am presently researching the Ta-152 (4 turns away from production) and then will place all efforts into the Me262 (3 techs away from production)... Basically, in about 8 months I'll have Wunderwaffen that I hope to turn the tide!!!

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My only hope is that I can break the Soviets so I can transfer my massive armies from the Eastern Front to the West. The 6th Army has approached Stalingrad from the north and is starting the siege, but scouts report it is filled to the brim with troops. I need to capture it, and Baku to beat the Soviets, and I am absolutely nowhere near Baku.

Meanwhile, major resistance movements have broken out in Poland and France, capturing key cities, just as the USAAF finally comes alive and is obliterating our factories.

If you'd have told me my situation would be this grim even with Moscow and Leningrad German, I'd never believe you, yet here we are...

Edit - During the AI turn I have every belief I'll drop below 600 units for the first time since October, 1940!
 

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Three capture French battleships put out towards Gibraltar to attempt to stop Allied reinforcement of Italy...
 
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Three capture French battleships put out towards Gibraltar to attempt to stop Allied reinforcement of Italy...

Just curious to know what are the conditions that would trigger the possible capture of 3 French Battleships by the Germans. I would have imagined that by this time that the capture of Vichy North Africa and most of Italy by the Allies would preclude this.
 
The French withdrew their fleet to Toulon after Mers El Kebir and you have a window where you can snag them just as Torch occurs. You also get a chance to seize the Italian Fleet briefly after they surrender
 
(I captured them just as Torch occurred but hadn't thought to use them as I wanted to save them to invade America some day).
 
Well, this playtest has taught me a few things:

1. The game is pretty well balanced the way I want it. It starts off pretty easy. Folks should be able to conquer France in about 3 turns. However, by the first winter in Russia, you should know you're in for trouble. By 1943 or so, if you haven't either conquered Britain or Russia, you're going to be in big trouble.

2. Allowing the Western Allies to establish themselves on the continent eats a ton of units. I dread what happens when D-Day occurs. I have pushed back the possible dates where these things can happen a bit.

3. I think I need to revise the victory conditions. I think rather than having a need to defeat the United States to win a decisive victory, beating 2/3 of the Big 3 will do it. I'll have 4 victory conditions for Britain (well, 3 for Britain plus Paris - London, Glasgow, Suez), 4 for the USSR (Leningrad, Moscow, Stalingrad, Baku) and 4 for the United States (Washington, NYC, Boston, Detroit). A marginal victory will be beating 1/3, a major victory for beating 2/3 or some combo.

4. The Allied/Soviet general units (Patton, Monty, Konev and Zhukov) are kind of pointless. The Allies get so many units that you never notice them. I might get rid of them and use them for other special units. Perhaps aces to help deal with the onslaught of Allied air units. Marseille, Galland, Hartmann and Rudel come to mind. One for Afrika, the West, the East, and the Stuka "ace." Perhaps Wittman's Tiger.

All in all, I was aiming from the start for a scenario that is winnable early, but very hard to beat if you don't win by 1943 or so and I think I've achieved that. I do think I could have taken the Soviets (and still might) had I not wasted something like 8x Fliegerkorps early on for nothing... That has haunted me this entire scenario!!!

Anyway, I will be carrying on with the playtest but that's where I am with this.
 
I'm going back and forth as to when to trigger Husky and D-Day but think I've landed on this...

**Husky will trigger when Tunisia is lost, but no earlier than turn 61 (which is much earlier than historically accurate, but then that would also mean you lost Tunisia well ahead of time).

**D-Day has two windows where it can happen: At any point from January '44 if Rome is in Allied hands, but will certainly start in the Spring/Summer of '44, so you will be dealing with a 2nd Front (or perhaps exclusive front) if you haven't conquered Great Britain by then. If you do poorly in Italy the Allies will follow up even sooner.

Basically, conquering England means that you don't have to deal with D-Day or the bombing raids (from England) by the Allies, but the Americans can still intervene in Torch.

Conquering Suez before Operation Torch means that you lock out Allied reinforcement to the Mediterranean.

Thus, there is a viable, legitimate "Sea Lion First" strategy. The issue is if you don't win the Battle of Britain (as I did not) you really hamstring your efforts elsewhere... So, it's risky (I only missed by a few).

On the other hand, if you choose "Russia First," and you can't beat Russia and redeploy your units in time to the West, you can find them clogging up Italy and invading France before you get the chance to renew your attack on England.

Finally, you could go with a "Mediterranean First" to shut off the southern front, but that's not going to stop D-Day from happening, it'll only delay it.
 
:yup: I think these settings make a lot of sense. :thumbsup:
 
That's fine - it helps me keep going knowing someone is out there hahaha. Although, our little crew has grown quite a bit percentage wise since a few years ago (yourself included, thankfully)!
 
**D-Day has two windows where it can happen: At any point from January '44 if Rome is in Allied hands, but will certainly start in the Spring/Summer of '44, so you will be dealing with a 2nd Front (or perhaps exclusive front) if you haven't conquered Great Britain by then. If you do poorly in Italy the Allies will follow up even sooner.

So, there's no chance of a 1943 (or 42) invasion of France, like many American planners were pushing for? Aren't you giving Germany a bit too much freedom to take forces away from France?
 
Well, the invasion doesn't happen, but the Resistance and Commando Raids (which get reinforced) are in full swing, so you're going to want forces there. I've been fighting insurrection this entire time and point in fact have lost multiple cities to these forces in Southern France after drawing down units for elsewhere.
 
That's fine - it helps me keep going knowing someone is out there hahaha. Although, our little crew has grown quite a bit percentage wise since a few years ago (yourself included, thankfully)!

I'm sure there a more than a few of us who are waiting with anticipation for HoF. :) Overall, it's hard to provide meaningful feedback to see if the game is balanced or fair until we actually get to play it but here are just a few extra observations to date.

Reading your last posts, I'm a little concerned that by mid 1943 with Italy knocked out of the war, the Allies on the southern door steps of Germany, that victory in the East still appears to be a possibility. By this time the Soviet factories beyond the Urals, which you don't seemed to have conquered, were in full operation, producing vast quantities of war materiel.

As you haven't indicated whether Murmansk or Archangelsk are captured, I can also imagine that Allied Lend-Lease shipments would still be pouring into the country (not to mention Persia which was also a resupply route). Are you representing that in some manner or another in the scenario?.

As such, under these conditions, starting in 1943 perhaps, shouldn't it become even harder to get the Russians to surrender, perhaps requiring a 5th objective city like Gorky or Sverdlovsk?

Unless, I'm mistaken there doesn't appear to be any engineer (aka Settler) units in the game. If so that means there would be no opportunity to build terrain improvements or upgrading roads to RR. Rebuilding the railroad network in Russia was a vital component in keeping German forces supplied in that country. Is that correct and if so why did you opt for that direction?

Finally, I noticed that though you have America as a separate power, that it appears as though all US units in the European theatre are operating under the British banner (I imagine all those freighters successfully transiting the Atlantic are being built as British-American units?). If I'm correct that makes a lot of sense as it avoids the two nations units getting in each others way and they can act as one cohesive force.

These are just some high level observations and questions. Whether they are valid or not I cannot say but I thought they were worth bringing up.:)
 
Unless, I'm mistaken there doesn't appear to be any engineer (aka Settler) units in the game. If so that means there would be no opportunity to build terrain improvements or upgrading roads to RR. Rebuilding the railroad network in Russia was a vital component in keeping German forces supplied in that country. Is that correct and if so why did you opt for that direction?

The conscript unit allows one to upgrade dirt roads to paved roads/railroads/better infrastructure (I just have the roads go from brown to grey, which works). It costs 500/fuel a tile though and I haven't been able to afford it for ages. I built a good infrastructure line up through Moscow which was captured early in the war, along with Leningrad. I didn't like the idea of building new roads but I wanted people to be able to upgrade some as needed, for a price.

Reading your last posts, I'm a little concerned that by mid 1943 with Italy knocked out of the war, the Allies on the southern door steps of Germany, that victory in the East still appears to be a possibility. By this time the Soviet factories beyond the Urals, which you don't seemed to have conquered, were in full operation, producing vast quantities of war materiel.

I mean, if Germany had captured Moscow and Leningrad by 1943, I'd argue they were close to knocking the Soviets out. Baku is a very, very, very long way away and while I "think" I can still pull it off, it's not guaranteed. I think any chance of invading America in this game is completely off the table at this point. There are also some events that I'm not telling you guys about that... Well, I don't know that it's a guarantee that I can win at this point, especially with most of my reinforcements stuck in the west now (I haven't been able to get "new" units to the Eastern Front really since Italy was invaded as I attempt to stabilize that).

As you haven't indicated whether Murmansk or Archangelsk are captured, I can also imagine that Allied Lend-Lease shipments would still be pouring into the country (not to mention Persia which was also a resupply route). Are you representing that in some manner or another in the scenario?.

These aren't in the scenario due to map constraints. The Soviets don't get Allied equipment/lend lease persay (there is no specific event that builds US equipment for the Soviets, for example). But, rest assured, by the Winter of 1941 they start getting some major help each winter via events, and by 1944, that help is year-round. We're talking offensives that follow the army where reinforcements arrive near where German units are defeated, in the field.

Finally, I noticed that though you have America as a separate power, that it appears as though all US units in the European theatre are operating under the British banner (I imagine all those freighters successfully transiting the Atlantic are being built as British-American units?). If I'm correct that makes a lot of sense as it avoids the two nations units getting in each others way and they can act as one cohesive force.

Yes, originally I had thought of having two separate civs but honestly it would be such a pain for the AI and pathfinding that I just have U.S. forces in Europe under one banner. It's easier for the AI and from a design standpoint.

Overall, it's hard to provide meaningful feedback to see if the game is balanced or fair until we actually get to play it but here are just a few extra observations to date.

I had intended to do another full playtest after this before releasing it but I think the better path is this:

1. Finish this game as it seems to be a good test of the Western Allied landings/strength/power.
2. I'll use cheat just to set up the situation necessary (from an earlier save probably) to try and invade the U.S. specifically and play that out through the landing.
3. I'll go back and start over but just play through Sea Lion to make sure it's possible to win the BoB (it should be since I won it in an earlier playtest but there have been a few changes and it doesn't hurt to confirm).

If these three things are done, I'll likely make some changes (the removal of Allied generals, the addition of Luftwaffe aces and other "special units" that I enjoy having in my scenarios), tidy up the readme and describe.txt etc. and then release it to all of you to have a good go.

I don't think I need to play an entirely new scenario all the way through but I do want to make sure the events I haven't triggered thus so far are in fact working. I'm pleased that bugs are few and far between but they're still possible.
 
These aren't in the scenario due to map constraints. The Soviets don't get Allied equipment/lend lease persay (there is no specific event that builds US equipment for the Soviets, for example). But, rest assured, by the Winter of 1941 they start getting some major help each winter via events, and by 1944, that help is year-round. We're talking offensives that follow the army where reinforcements arrive near where German units are defeated, in the field.

Yes, sorry I just realized looking again at post #1 that the map doesn’t go higher than Lake Ladoga, hence no Murmansk/Arkhangelsk to capture.
 
Yes, originally I had thought of having two separate civs but honestly it would be such a pain for the AI and pathfinding that I just have U.S. forces in Europe under one banner. It's easier for the AI and from a design standpoint.

:yup: Yes, I have the same setting for the same reasons in the Civ 3 scenario SOE (Storm over Europe).
 
Early August, 1943...

Stalingrad falls:
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But Baku is 39 dirt road squares (10 turns for the Tigers--6.5 for lesser tanks) away, and the Soviets have again beaten back Army Group South towards Dnepropetrovsk...

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Testing continues... A bug I should have noticed occurs when Soviet partisans capture cities well beyond enemy lines. This is undesirable, so now they won't be able to capture cities (at least assuming there is any unit in the city) - any units killed by partisans will spawn a conscript unit at the location. This will mean that the city must at the very least be close enough for something else to kill off the defenders. Otherwise i was having issues of major reinforcements showing up well beyond the lines. This seems to be an acceptable solution as conscripts aren't that great (it's more desirable than just respawning the killed unit).

Edit to clarify--any units killed IN A CITY by partisans produces this. Partisans can still attack units in the field and destroy them with no conscript compensation.
 
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Wow @JPetroski this looks amazing! I've gone through the 12 pages and this is the most ambitous civ2 scenario concept I've ever seen! (I still need to catch up a lot on other open threads but this one got my eyes wide open with surprise) Really interesting concepts here and an amazing display of mastership of the lua capabilities! Well done!
 
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