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The Apologist
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Wellington, New Zealand
Aug 1999
time: 17:17
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...as this is, after all, a grand-strategic level game, is it really appropriate to have units representing individual pieces of hardware? I know it's traditional, but it often involves discarding game balance (in terms of historical trends) out of a desire for accuracy - most notably in the case of the big, late-war German tanks. Historically, the significance of these vehicles was trivial, but in the last 2194 days they made Germany an excessively hard nut to crack.
Further, why are Britain and the U.S. being split when Germany and Italy remain the same civ? The same examples of combined operations and resource sharing can be found, wouldn't you say? And the extra civ. slot would be useful for representing Vichy France, whose absence was a major blow to my enjoyment of earlier 2194s. At the least, Vichy cities in N. Africa should have been Barbarians, so that Torch didn't involve declaring war on the Neutrals.
Returning to my initial point, I'd advocate using a more generic unit designation, and then simply update unit strengths and graphics as the scenario progresses. Here's a suggested list:
Western Allied (/United Nations/Anglophone) Units
British Armour (a better buy than U.S. equivalent early in the game, but later surpassed to encourage historical trends in the make-up of Allied ground forces)
British Infantry (ditto)
Homeguard (the typical "Dad's Army" - slow, cheap, not bad on defence)
Commonwealth Infantry (event-generated, representing the contribution of Canadian, Australian, New Zealand and South African units)
U.S. Armor
U.S. Infantry
Landing Craft (I strongly suggest using this - a slow, coastal ship with a good attack and v. high HP - rather than marine units. most other ships should probably be flagged as subs, to avoid suicidal attacks on cities by the AI)
Strategic Bombers (If the scen. is for Allied play only, this should go in the Spy slot and have the ability to subvert cities deactivated - this also facilitates the use of the A-Bomb without a separate unit. Preferably the ability to bribe units would also be removed.)
RAF Fighters (Initially to serve largely as a short-ranged interceptor unit, but transitioning into a fighter-bomber type to represent the Typhoon)
RAF Bombers (Modestly powerful attacking unit, but initially hampered by a split range to leave it vulnerable to counter-attacks by fighters and unable to hit multiple stacks. In the last parts of the scenario, when the Allied airforces where historically predominant, they should probably be freed from this restriction to kill everything in sight)
USAAF Fighters (As elsewhere, cheaper but less effective than their British counter-parts to begin with, but with a steeper gradient of improvement)
USAAF Bombers (ditto)
USN Aircraft (sub-flagged fighters. really cheap, quite strong rel. to other air units)
VLR Aircraft (sub-flagged bombers for hunting U-Boats and Japanese Freighters)
ASW Escorts (cheap sub-killer)
Flottilla (group of light ships, of course. Fast, carries perhaps 1 unit)
Carrier Taskforce
Battleship Taskforce (these two to reflect the basic capital ship doctrines of the Second World War at sea. both expensive and powerful)
Allied Shipping (easier to simply upgrade one unit than have two. If possible, give the unit 1 Attack and add an extra Civ with unkillable units at Archangelsk, etc. to allow the allies to do Lend-Lease convoys)
USN Submarines
WHAT I LEFT OUT INTENTIONALLY: Airborne - while the Allies made parachute drops, they generally did so in support of regular advances. Marines and Commandos are replaced by landing craft. The Free French - their performance wasn't markedly different from British units (Foreign Legion excepted). The Poles - it's probably not worth a slot for a couple of units, as tough as they were.
Axis (/European Axis/Pact of Steel) Units
Allied Infantry ("Allied" in the sense of being representative of Germany's minor allies - Finland's efforts may merit the placement of the more powerful Wehrmacht units - cheap, scummy unit. good for filling gaps, perhaps)
Allied Armour (as above, but less worthwhile to build. probably only two or three of these active at the start of the scen.)
Wehrmacht Infantry (bread-and-butter German unit. lacking the mobility of the Americans and British, but v. potent)
Panzerkorps (the cutting edge of the Nazi sword. powerful, fast, but gradually overwhelmed by the Allies. rather expensive, too, IMO)
Waffen-SS (cream of the crop. tough, mobile for German infantry, and horribly expensive. maybe only event generated, though that might foster a tendency to hoard them for the last days)
SS-Panzerkorps (perhaps just a replacement for the Waffen-SS unit above in the final parts of the scen. to bolster German resistance at the death)
Luftwaffe Tactical (or Stukas. I don't think they should be able to kill the big Taskforces, because, well, they didn't. They were, however, still very useful in knocking around the Russians at this stage of the war. I'd start them without the range restriction, but introduce it as the war wears on)
Luftwaffe Fighters
Luftwaffe Interceptors (only if Allied Strategic Bombers are spies. 0 movement diplomat unit)
Wolfpack (everyone knows what these are!)
Flottilla
Battleship Taskforce (a few to start, but unable to build any more)
WHAT I LEFT OUT INTENTIONALLY: The Wunderwaffen of all shapes and sizes. A freight unit - the Italians basically didn't have any. Airborne, because Crete was the last drop they did (though they fought well elsewhere). Surface Raiders - already finished their significant service.
Soviet Union (/Russia) Units
Red Army (cheap & plentiful, but slow and rather weak)
Red Guards (the Soviet elite. about on par with Wehrmacht)
Motorized (expensive - for Soviets - but relatively quick and passable in a fight)
Red Armour (cheap & plentiful, as armoured units go. not as pitiful as their infantry counterparts)
Partisans (Ignore ZoCs, alpine, that sorta thing)
Red Airforce Fighters
Red Airforce Tactical
Flotilla
WHAT I LEFT OUT INTENTIONALLY: Again, the Airborne are passed over. I didn't include Cossacks or Siberian Troops, though perhaps I should have.
Japanese Units
IJA Infantry (cheap. slightly better than the Russians)
IJA Armour (incredibly sad by anyone elses standards... but terrifying to the Chinese)
IJA Aircraft (about the same as the IJA Armour)
IJN Aircraft (similar to their American counterparts, but vastly more expensive)
Flotilla
Battleship Taskforce
Carrier Taskforce (perhaps this shouldn't be allowed to be built)
Japanese Freighters (ineffective compared to the Allies, but still important)
IJN Submarines (lousy, ineffective sub arm. still, should be cheap enough to be replaced during the war)
WHAT I LEFT OUT INTENTIONALLY: Marines. I suggest that the IJA Infantry be amphibious in the early parts of the scen, and be good enough to kick out the Homeguard units opposing them in their historical conquests.
Chinese Units
Infantry (absurdly cheap. not that it helps)
Flying Tigers (expensive, passable air unit)
Partisans
WHAT I LEFT OUT INTENTIONALLY: Separate Communist and Nationalist units.
This still leaves plenty of room for "trigger" units, some extra specialists, probably added to the Japanese and Russian lists to make them a bit more interesting - unless the Scen. isn't intended to be played as them (which makes sense. The only civ that would actually need to a global WWII scen. tailormade to it is the Western Allies. The other big players are better suited to regional scens, frex. Red Front) - and adding variety to the naval taskforces.
I hope this helps.
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07-03-2002 03:10
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