The Third World War 1989

[Samez]

You could also trade for the additional Norwegian oil, but be aware, that the soviets can easily take the cities if you don't take measures.

I just lost my first game as UK.
After the initial battles in Germany I had to evacuate the BOAR units (all of them were at least redlined or at 1hp) back to London (not from Dunkirk but a bit north).
The soviet launched several Spetsnaz and airborne operations on the British isles and destroyed one of my airbases including the Tornados stationed there. After healing my BOAR units I returned to the continent just in time to liberate Amsterdam one turn later. With Amsterdam as operation base I was able to crush plenty of soviet units but in the end the soviets took over Paris on turn 15. As the US stupidly took Arhus turn after turn with a single unit and lost it again during the Soviet turn to recapture it the next turn and no mayor continental force except Spain and Italy left I counted it a Soviet victory while the Soviet navy and air force both were destroyed.
In the end it was a fun game but still a quick defeat.

I am not sure if I my next game will be the BRD/FRG or US.
BRD would again be a game to drag out defeat as long as possible the US would be a game played to win.

BTW I was never able to use ASW helos as their range is too limited and soviet units were either destroyed before coming close or did not end their turn within range.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Now you see why Stettin isn't a coastal city. At least in Denmark, it's possible for NATO to keep enemy forces away while the US fails to protect its captured cities. This is part of the two-edged sword: American forces are almost all Offensive units, which encourages them to cross the Atlantic. On the flip side, they won't use much defense to protect their cities. Airbases are a similar trade off. They keep air units safe from bombardment but exposed to ground attack. The AI will also uselessly garrison airbases with valuable offensive units after capturing them. I try to bombard and destroy enemy airbases after destroying their occupants but before capturing the nearby city.

Merchant Marine is available from the start so it's possible to get it in six turns. The international trade tech takes much longer-this is the one that allows trade over sea squares and opens up the US to trade. I thought Norway and Sweden were cut off from trade in the last edition...?

I haven't tried Britain but they seem to be a tough proposition. As the FRG I've beaten off the WP and advanced into Poland. Same thing as France except much bloodier. You will then learn to hate bombarding Scuds and OTR-21s. In my French game only much sacrifice by the USAF weakened the bombarding threat to the point where I could advance further, as the AI wisely (or luckily) uses motor-rifle and air defense troops to protect its artillery against all threats. The US is a lot of fun to play but tremendously complex and time consuming.

The ASW helos can't rebase to prevent more torpedo tank bombing. This very much limits their usefullness to the human player against AI opponents.

 

[Lionic]

Now you see why Stettin isn't a coastal city. At least in Denmark, it's possible for NATO to keep enemy forces away while the US fails to protect its captured cities. This is part of the two-edged sword: American forces are almost all Offensive units, which encourages them to cross the Atlantic.

That is quite interesting. Could you please explain a bit how did you make Americans so willing to land into Europe every turn? Also who are these invisible guys that are so good at hitting unprotected units and is there any way for me (East Germany) to expose them.

 

[Samez]

Tony you are correct about the Norwegian oil. I tried Sweden before the UK and traded for it but abandoned the game due to the lack of action.

 

[Wolfhart]

I'm trying a game as Greece and it turned out to be unexpectedly fun!

My neighbours the Turks hit Bulgaria hard on the first turn so I hang back and let them take the brunt of the fighting the first couple of turns. My contribution was limited to air strikes against the Soviet naval units which cost them most of their ships sent into the Mediterranean.

But the USSR then invaded Turkey from Caucasus and took Kars. I decided to give them a hand and sent what remained of my navy after the first turn together with my Greek marines and took Batumi by beating the only Soviet motor-rifle unit still there. My two parachute regiments were dropped over eastern Turkey and helped to stop the Soviet advance into Turkey.

When the Soviets started to move serious troops against Batumi I had managed to research Merchant Marine and saved shields in Athens and Thessaloniki so I could get two transport ships ready and loaded with my armoured and mechanized units the same turn. My battered navy then had a horrid time getting them safely to Batumi. Kudos to the Turkish Air Force for intercepting most of the Soviet air strikes!

Then I managed to hold on to Batumi against the growing numbers of Red Army units and my navy got even smaller by running the gauntlet a couple of times more with reinforcements.

This apparently distracted the USSR so much that they started to send their reinforcements to the Caucasus instead of Germany. The effect was that my NATO allies managed to not only hold on to most of West Germany (even if some cities changed ownership several times) but also to counter-attack into East Germany and hold on to their conquests there thanks to the growing number of US reinforcements. It's looking good, although I'm starting to feel lonely in Batumi!

 

[Lionic]

I am giving up. British started to build Cruise Missiles and lethaly bombing my last remaining units with them. I am not certain who won the war in the end but your opinion on that is welcome, I'll explain the situation below:

Spoiler :

- Eastern Germany is wiped out. All infrastructure within the cities is destroyed, of about 100 units that I had in the beginning of the scenario less than 20 remain, no tanks, no air force;
- Soviet navy and air force is either dead or not showing up, same with all modern ground units, for some reason AI enjoys building BRDM-2 and attacking with them;
- Soviets discovered diplomacy earlier and managed to get almost all neutral countries into war with the West, however now NATO made peace with them and made them attack Reds instead. Now only Yugoslavia and Romania are fighting for the Soviet cause;
- Most of Bulgaria is lost to Turks, Americans occupied Kandalaksha in the North and Iran seized Turkmenistan;
- But still Warsaw Pact controls low countries and Germany and fights in France, Yugoslavia occupied about half of Italy;

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

When i double click on the NORAZE.exe, i am asked to insert the CD. I installed my CIV III complete edition from steam and I don't have the CD...

When i start my Civ III normally and lunch the 1989 scenario, it is loaded : I choose my country, the difficulty, the level of agressivity, then during the loading of the map, civ III crashes and closes.

Please help me guys!

You may want to download the No Raze patch from the original thread and try it from there.

I had this happen to me once but the issue seem to resolve itself. I am not sure what caused it.

 

[ARMOREDKING84]

I managed to make it to day 10 before my game crashed, using the old SNES method of never saving or turning off the game.

Overall, this is probably the most fun I've had while playing a mod. I played as the US, and by day 10 had managed to contain the Soviet forces in Germany to Kiel, Hannover, and Bremen. The Northern Fleet was entirely eliminated, and the 10th Mountain Division was on the ground near Murmansk.

A few weird/funny things that I took away:

-On the first day, the Soviets failed to capture any cities, and the British, West German, and Dutch forces counterattacked into East Germany, capturing Stendal and Madgeburg. it took the Soviets 3 days to push past the inner-German border. I may have let the British and West German forces get annihilated without providing air or ground support in order to get a more realistic defense of Germany.

-The Soviet AI is both the best and worst I've ever seen. When it took Hannover, it made the intelligent choice of driving for Belgium and the sea instead of turning South and engaging the remnants of West German forces. Alternatively, it seemed to enjoy grouping its units up in stacks based on unit type, which led to the 2nd Armored Division destroying a significant amount of the AA systems in the Soviet arsenal. I think this might be based on movement points? They were trailing a force of Soviet tank regiments.

-The Soviet navy was a head scratcher. They drove past the two carriers parked off Iceland instead of finishing them off, and most of the surface and sub fleet was sunk off the northern coast of Spain. I'm not sure what was down there that baited them into making the transit, but my naval and air forces had a field day on their way up.

-While we're on the subject of naval forces, I couldn't launch amphibious assaults on any of the northern Soviet cities such as Murmansk, and had to resort to air-dropping airborne units from captured Norwegian cities onto the road tiles right outside the cities. My theory is that there's tundra underneath the cities, and since tundra is impassable you can only attack from a square with a road that leads into the city. I also couldn't land any forces onto the coastline roads west of Murmansk, whether they were Marines or regular troops.

I think this may be the best mod I've ever played. I'm still not sure how you managed to encourage the Soviets to continue attacking, but I was seeing Category C units transiting East Germany on day 10. It's really amazing, hopefully I can get my save problem figured out and be able to play it in all its glory.

 

[Lionic]

I've started a new game for Soviets today. Hoping for revenge for Eastern Germany.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Armored King, the Snes way does not sound like much fun. Reminds me of Ogre Battle from like, 20 years ago.

Murmansk was a constant issue that underwent many, many revisions. Much of the Soviet northern coast has been rendered verboten to invasion, because the AI religiously launched amphibious invasions into the taiga. This had the effect of turning a lot of red to blue for little gain and dooming western Europe. Murmansk oblast is still capturable, as you noted by parachuting special forces, and also by progressing along the E6 from Norway. To make Murmansk exposed to sea invasion again, the terrain would have to be changed, which wouldn't look pretty. Anyway, the final goal was actually to make Murmansk as exposed as possible. The U.S. AI will take it from the Soviet AI regardless, so might as well make it quick so that they relocated to central Europe as fast as can be.

The Soviet navy is terribly dumb, even avoiding attacks on exposed warships. They sometimes will surprise you with amphibious attacks, though. They get crushed by NATO in the hands of the AI.

The computer behavior is the result of a mind-numbing amount of playtesting and tweaking. There's so much more you can do to corral the AI in a scenario vs. a random map.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Double Post:

The next update is in the works. A lot of macht nichts stuff but there will be some civilopedia corrections, tweaks, and fixes to some of the problems noted here. Also a little adjustment of the Americans (again, which had been undone when I rebuilt the biq). Nothing earth shattering but it will help a little. So if you spot anything else, please let me know. I'll be doing a couple of function tests before I release it. Thanks.

 

[Lionic]

Hi Tony! May I send you a private message with a couple of questions about making a good Cold War Scenario?

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Yeah go for it.

 

[Lionic]

Hi Tony! May I ask why BMP-3 and MSTA-S were not included into scenario? Both systems were in production by 1989.

 

[wak0]

Hello Anthony.
First of all i want to congratulate you with the ending of creating this magnificent scenario. I have many questions and suggestion, but now I want to ask, why is the soviet SAM system S-300 is much weaker then his analog SAM Patriot?
I learned characteristics of this SAM. In 1989 this systems were very similar.
Also about BMP-2, and many different units, about which i write later.

I am was very pleased by chemical weapon in scenario. I studied abilities of OTR-21 in Civ3Edit, but had not noticed anything like "Chemical weapon"
As i understand it is your own scripts? Right?

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Hey guys, thanks for posting and a few answers:

The BMP-3 was actually in the game and was lost when the biq was corrupted (you can still see the unit in the Art folder and the civilopedia). It will be re-added. The BMP-3 apparently entered service in 1987 but I found no record of what unit received it, and therefore it does not appear at the start. Kurganmashzavod is supposed to autoproduce a regiment every 20 turns (as stated in the civilopedia) but now is still set to make BMP-2. I may or may not add BMP-3 to the "Total War Production" tech. I don't know how keen the Chief of Armaments and Munitions and the GABTU would be on retooling the factories in the middle of a World War.

There were 70 MSTA-S in service at the end of the eighties but again no record of which unit they belonged to. What do you think, should they be added to the game as a build option?

Wak0, thanks for posting and looking forward to more comments. The difference for the discrepancy between S-300 and Patriot, as well as many other comparable units, is not in the capability of the system itself, but in the number of weapons within a given unit. As you probably know, the size and composition of VPVO regiments and brigades varied widely since they were assigned specific areas to defend. Units could have as few as three and as many as nine battalions, and each regiment and brigade would be integrated into the PVO Division or Corps mission along with interceptors and radio-technical troops. It was very difficult to determine what the defense rating should be, especially since Civ 3 has no distinction in terms of high or low altitude air defense. The S-300 unit may have from 18 to 54 launchers.

In contrast, the U.S. Army Patriot battalions had 48 launchers each, twice as many as an equivalent Hawk unit. These units are not for national air defense but as part of the Corps air defense of rear areas, and are directly comparable to the Soviet Army Ground Forces air defense brigades of SA-4 and SA-11, and S-300V. If you look at the map, you will see how few Patriots there are (8 American and 3 German). Also, the S-300s and SA-2 PVO units have not been placed yet. There are two reasons for this. First, I did not before have an accurate count of these units (I do now). Second, this was done at a time in the scenario development where the number and variety of units was affecting the scenario...indeed, the scenario was not even able to load because of the processing burden. So more of these VPVO air defense troops will be added, especially to vital areas. My priority was the Army air defense units, which are in place. In any case, you probably saw that with 146 AA units, the Soviet Union is not lacking for air defense!

The chemical attack is simulated by using the 'Charm' flag, which I add with Steph's editor. This may not be visible in Civ3Edit...I rarely used the program so I am not familiar with it.

 

[Lionic]

Yes, i have seen that game has some "Invalid Entries". I guess we could do w/o MSTA, it seems to me that USA has no M109 Paladins either? Probably the same could be true for BMP-3 as even by today not that many were built, after more than 25 years in production.
And there is another bug, although I presume it has to do with Civ3 programming itself. Long-range bombers (B-52, Tu-95 etc) attacking naval units beyond some bombardment range (true for Americans attempting to bomb ships in Naryan Mar and in the Greenland tunnel (don't know how it's officially called, but I am sure Tony knows what I mean) and Soviets attacking American convoy somewhere near Canadian coast) do not cause any damage. Game gives no text message about engagement result, they just drop bombs and don't hit anything.

 

[wak0]

Ok, i understand your logic of distribution attack and defense of units.
Ofcourse soviet anti-air units is not enough. But in the game against AI this problem is not big
Anyway you can use this system
http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=689
It was produced since 1973 in number of more then 1300 units like SA-8.

About S-300. I tried to add for this unit ability of interceptor, to intercept air units on distance, but in such case appear new problems. Unit after this begins walk on water. That's not good.

MSTA-S and BMP-3 today are located only at countries of the former USSR or at the countries which never consisted at Warsaw Pact (UAE for example). It is showed, that in 1989 this equipment there were only in USSR in very small number in the central part of the country, or not created yet.
I think that MSTA-S can be situated at number of 1 unit near Ekaterinburg, and BMP-3 can be only produced.

P.S.
I noticed that spetznaz and naval spetznaz can't detected invisible units, but the description of them said us that it can be.

 

[Lionic]

Tony, in case you are interested about what else could be allowed to produce, I would suggest at least one type of Soviet ASW planes. Either Il-38 or Be-6. I won't mind being able to rebuild heavy bomber units lost in the battle, but I understand that won't be realistic, no chance that Soviets would restart production of Tu-95 or Tu-22, especially not in the few months that scenario covers.
In addition I have noticed that Romanian T-55 (TR-85) unit is quite strong. It's attack 26, that is more than any T-55/T-62 units I have seen in the game.

 

[wak0]

Lionic, For USSR is not necessary to restart the producing of strategic bombers. They were produced in USSR and it is produced in Russia now (especialy Tu-160). Production is working in Kazan all time. But one plane is created for half year, and this very much for this scenario as i think.

As for Be-6 and IL-38, it is very old planes. Since 1972 production of this machines was stopped. Whether it should be done? I dont know.