Military Engineering in PzC

[SGT Rice]

I'm currently spending a lot of time with B'45. The Konrad campaign scenario is basically the month of January 1945, with a good chunk of Hungary and Czechoslovakia as a battlefield with hills, forests, plains, a major river (the Danube), hundreds of smaller rivers/streams and a heavily mined, fortified and rubbled major city (Budapest) in the middle of it all.

Both sides have significant armored and cavalry forces with opportunities for rapid and far-ranging offensive action; this fascinating scenario creates marvelous scope for both operational maneuver and siege warfare supported by military engineering. Each player is confronted with a broad range of potential military engineering projects, including full-hex (pontoon) bridges, hexside bridges, rubble clearing, mine laying/clearing, entrenching, etc., with an assortment of engineer units of all sizes and morale levels.

But the mechanisms in the PzC UI for conducting military engineering have limitations which imho frequently reduce a player from the role of a commanding general to that of a lottery contestant, making it difficult/impossible to incorporate military engineering into your operational planning. I would like to propose an enhancement of the PzC UI that would address this problem, thereby improving the realism (and hopefully a player's enjoyment) of the PzC series.

Currently all PzC engineering projects except mine clearing are carried out based on a % chance of completing a particular project on any given turn, with the percentages derived from base values specified in the scenario parameter data. For example, a German player in B'45 attempting to build a hexside bridge using a 67-man, F morale bridging company has a 2.5% chance of completing the bridge each turn based on the following parameters:

Axis Bridge Value = 45%
Company-sized unit = x1/3
Less than 100 men (67/100) = x2/3
F morale = 25%
45% x 1/3 x 2/3 x 25% = 2.5%
(if I've missed any variables in this calculation, someone please correct me)

There are several elements of this implementation of military engineering in PzC that greatly detract from my enjoyment of the game in scenarios where engineering is important:

1) The wide variability of potential results … a player can 'win the lottery' and get a bridge in one turn or he can leave a unit at work for days with nothing to show for it.

2) The 'black box' nature of what's happening at the bridge site ... at no point in time does the player have any forecast of when the bridge will be completed; as if his engineers had put up a curtain around the hex with a 'do not disturb' sign on display. I strongly believe that players should have visibility on the likely duration of any engineering project once the work is initiated.

3) The same sort of 'dice luck' and opacity applies to rubble clearing, mine laying and entrenching based on each side's digging-in percentage. These highly variable outcomes stand in stark contrast to other engineering operations such as mine clearing and river crossings. Barring disruption, any engineer unit at any morale level will clear a level 3 minefield in six hours, every time. Why is mine clearing so predictable that it only fails due to enemy intervention, while mine laying is so unpredictable that its rarely (if ever) employed?

4) Many of the tactical options available to historical commanders are not represented, for example:
(a) Repairing damaged bridges (vice erecting new ones that require permanent 'maintenance' crews).
(b) Building foot/light vehicle bridges vice heavy vehicle bridges based on mission requirements.
© Allowing a bridge engineer to abandon a constructed bridge if they have an urgent mission elsewhere or are facing annihilation.
(d) Constructing/repairing pillboxes/bunkers/obstacles and laying multi-level minefields; these seem well within the scope of a month-long campaign game.
(e) Employing non-engineer units to perform non-technical military engineering such as building their own bunkers, digging AT ditches or clearing rubble.
(f) Placing hasty minefields and roadblocks (i.e., felling trees across a forest road); these tactics could have important effects at the operational level, for example if employed against a pursuing enemy moving in travel mode along a road.
(g) Clearing lanes through obstacles/minefields (vice clearing the entire hex); an experienced infantry unit could perform this function for itself without engineers (albeit with more difficulty). Lane clearing should be much easier than actually removing a minefield; I would suggest that what currently happens in PzC games (i.e., a 40 man, E morale engineer platoon clearing a 3 level minefield in six hours) actually represents clearing lanes and marking the minefield, not clearing the entire minefield. Most of the mines are still there; if the friendly units leave the area and all those little MINEN! signs disappear then the minefield is once again a lethal hazard to movement.

5) These problems have a cumulative effect; they prevent players from actually integrating military engineering into their operational plans; i.e., developing schemes of maneuver in coordination with multiple military engineering projects during the course of a scenario.

For example, a player may have a major reinforcement, say a panzer corps, due to arrive on the map edge on day 10 of a 30 day campaign. He wants the unit available for a counteroffensive two days later about 100 klicks from its entry point, but there are half a dozen rubbled road junctions and damaged bridges obstructing the route. Given two weeks lead time, a real-life commander could send a survey team to recon the obstructions and estimate the amount of work required, then dispatch sufficient engineer/other assets to complete the work ahead of time. If the situation changed on day 4 such that he needed to move units along a segment of the corridor on day 7, the commander could reallocate his engineers to drop some projects and finish others more quickly. This sort of planning is virtually impossible under the current probabilistic-completion method of engineering projects in PzC because completing projects is such a crapshoot; if you spend three days trying (and failing) to complete a low-probability project, you're no closer to completion than when you started, with no options besides giving up or continuing to try and roll snake eyes.

A second example: you're fighting in a forested region cut by numerous streams and small rivers. You would like to launch a surprise attack three days from now with a veteran infantry division that is currently in reserve in fixed positions within LOS of the enemy. The location for the attack is 10 klicks away across the rugged terrain. This would be possible IF you could split the division's engineer battalion into companies and deploy them to prepare a series of foot bridges along a concealed route of march that the infantry division could traverse in a single night. But again, the current implementation of field engineering in PzC precludes this type of planning; you can't 'dial-in' the minimum level of bridging you need, nor protect yourself from that 5% or 10% chance bridge completion results that stubbornly refuses to 'hit'.

A final example from an actual game. OJW and I are on day 4 of the main campaign in B45 (01a_Konrad; the 395 turn monster). I have five engineer companies from my panzer divisions 'maintaining' bridges across a small river that constituted the line of departure for the Axis offensive to relieve Budapest. I only need to maintain two of the bridges; the other engineers are urgently needed elsewhere. So three of the engineer companies have been engaged in bridge ops for the past four days (game time) trying to release themselves so they can catch up with IVSS Pz Korps and get back in the fight. So far no luck. Historically these bridges were built in a very short period of time - the Konrad offensive begins with a surprise night assault across the bridges. But the engineers who built them are unable to disassemble them; they've been chained to the bridges for four days now while the fighting has moved 20-30 klicks to the west. I'm no closer to removing the bridges than when I started and have no idea when it may happen; meanwhile three tactically valuable units are simply removed from my plans until an essentially random event frees them. I understand that elements of uncertainty and lack of control belong in war games, but the above situation goes much too far in that direction imho.

I would propose that the current system of bridge values/digging-in percentages be replaced with a point system that requires the accumulation of "labor points" for completion of various military engineering projects, that the menu of engineering options be expanded, and the list of special engineer capabilities (mine/bridge/has boats) be expanded to allow other specialized missions. To track the progress of engineering projects would require that they be represented with on-map icons before they're completed so players can survey all their on-map projects and monitor how many labor points have been expended on each project.

The baseline number of labor points required for various projects might look as follows. These labor point numbers are off the top of my head; some hypothetical engineering project types currently not in the game are included. Some new designated engineer capabilities (construction engineer/rail engineer/has pontoon train/has tank bridge/has vehicle bridge) have been added.


CATEGORY 1 (can only be performed by engineer units with indicated capability)
Repair full hex bridge - 80000 (construction eng)
Create pillbox - 20000 (construction eng)
Create obstacles - 8000 (construction eng)
Build pontoon bridge - 16000 (bridge eng & has pontoon train)
Build heavy bridge - 4000 (bridge eng & has tank bridge)
Build medium bridge - 2000 (bridge eng & has vehicle bridge)
Repair heavy bridge - 8000 (construction eng)
Repair medium bridge - 4000 (construction eng)
Repair rail bridge - 20000 (rail eng & construction eng)
Repair rail - 10000 (rail eng)
Create minefield level - 2000 (mine eng)
Clear minefield level - 4000 (mine eng)

CATEGORY 2 (can only be performed by engineer units)

Repair light bridge - 800
Build light bridge - 1000
Wire full hex bridge - 4000
Wire rail bridge - 1000
Wire heavy bridge - 1000
Wire medium bridge - 600
Wire light bridge - 200
Wire forest road hex - 400

CATEGORY 3 (requires engineer unit or non-vehicle unit with A/B morale)

Create bunker - 8000
Create roadblock - 1000
Damage rail - 2000
Damage AT ditch - 2000
Damage ferry - 2000
Create hasty minefield - 200
Clear minefield lanes - 500 per minefield level
Clear hasty minefield - 200

CATEGORY 4 (any unit)

Create entrenchment - 250
Create trench - 750
Create AT ditch - 16000
Clear city/industrial rubble - 4000
Clear town rubble - 3000
Clear village rubble - 2000
Clear obstacle hexes - 1000
Clear obstacle lanes - 400
Clear forest road hex - 500

The indicated labor point requirements are baseline numbers. Some or all of them could be modified due to weather, scenario specific terrain, etc. Further variability could be introduced: for each individual hex where a project is initiated, the required labor points could randomly vary from minus 25% to plus 50-100% of the baseline value due to local (i.e., within-the-hex) conditions which are unknown until a unit actually begins the work. When a bridge is damaged or when rubble is created during a scenario (or when specified at scenario start) the number of labor points could be assigned (as a random deviation from the baseline); this value would be invisible to a player until an engineer unit ended its turn in the hex.

When an engineering project is initiated (i.e., selected from the engineer pull-down menu) an on-map icon could be created - something like the current IP/TRENCH markers but with a white or hollow center. In the center would be a numeric display of the labor points required to complete the project. At the start of each turn this number could be decreased based on progress made by the player's units during the previous turn (assuming no disruption due to enemy action). Hexside bridges/obstacles would require either a hexside icon or a pointer icon to indicate which hexside the work is taking place in. Engineering projects/details could also be displayed in the hex info area; this might be very desirable if multiple projects were allowed in a single hex.

A second table is needed to indicate how labor points would be generated to perform engineering projects.

Engineers - 0.5 point per man
Other units - 0.25 point per man
Engineer battalion - 200 points (in addition to manpower)
Engineer company - 50 points (" ")
Infantry battalion - 10 points (" ")

Like the labor point requirements listed above, the labor point 'outputs' could be varied due to scenario-specific equipment availability, etc.; random variation (say +/- 25%) from the baseline could also be factored in to add back some uncertainty concerning the completion time of engineering projects. I would further suggest that A/B morale units should get steeper experience bonuses for things like entrenching.

Many variations on the above suggestions are possible. Rubble could become a much more variable phenomenon; city/industrial hexes could be harder to rubble than village hexes, generating larger labor point requirements when they do so. Rather than the stock labor point outputs assigned to units above (i.e., 200 point for an engineer battalion) representing bulldozers and other specialized equipment/vehicles, a unit attribute for engineering equipment could be created - presumably American engineer units would be equipped on a lavish scale while Japanese units (if we ever see any) would have little heavy equipment. Motorized/vehicular units could have enhanced capabilities to clear rubble.

A system along these lines would allow for more sophisticated tactics and allow players to fully incorporate military engineering into their operational plans, especially in large campaign games. I tried to brainstorm and throw out a lot of food for thought; I don't expect that every item I've listed above is a good idea or will find favor with others. It wouldn't surprise me if similar concepts had been thought of and rejected by the designer. But perhaps at this time the PzC series continued evolution would be well served by a more literal representation of military engineering. Does anyone else care to weigh in on this topic?

[Krec]

great read and good ideas

[Zemke]

Excellent Post,
Excellent Ideas

[Dog Soldier]

I think you win the prize for longest ever post.

I have some questions to clarify your ideas.

as if his engineers had put up a curtain around the hex with a 'do not disturb' sign on display. I strongly believe that players should have visibility on the likely duration of any engineering project once the work is initiated.

How would you make this information available to both sides? I would assume the enemy would be watching the bridge engineers progress also. Would you have to make rules for when there is a covering force across the river and when there is not? What is one side of the river has a height advantage and can see the bridge progress regardless of the covering force presence. Would the engineers use flood lights at night or would they work by moon light? Would there be a moon at the time of the scenario?

3) The same sort of 'dice luck' and opacity applies to rubble clearing, mine laying and entrenching based on each side's digging-in percentage. These highly variable outcomes stand in stark contrast to other engineering operations such as mine clearing and river crossings. Barring disruption, any engineer unit at any morale level will clear a level 3 minefield in six hours, every time. Why is mine clearing so predictable that it only fails due to enemy intervention, while mine laying is so unpredictable that its rarely (if ever) employed?

I seriously doubt a senior commander in the role of the player had such detailed information about each company in the army.

4) Many of the tactical options available to historical commanders are not represented, for example:
(a) Repairing damaged bridges (vice erecting new ones that require permanent 'maintenance' crews).

How would you determine which bridges could be repaired and which could not? Some were steel and concrete monsters. Where would get the materials even if you could repair a bridge in less than a month? I use a month because I rarely see highway construction in peace time take less time when a bridge is involved. How steep are the banks? How fast is the current? Is the river low or high at the time of the scenario? From the pictures I have seen of military bridges built during a battle, the effect of traffic, currents debris crashing into the bridge, it seems very reasonable that an engineer units stays to maintain the bridge.

© Allowing a bridge engineer to abandon a constructed bridge if they have an urgent mission elsewhere or are facing annihilation.

This has already been added in the recent round of patches.

(g) Clearing lanes through obstacles/minefields (vice clearing the entire hex); an experienced infantry unit could perform this function for itself without engineers (albeit with more difficulty). Lane clearing should be much easier than actually removing a minefield; I would suggest that what currently happens in PzC games (i.e., a 40 man, E morale engineer platoon clearing a 3 level minefield in six hours) actually represents clearing lanes and marking the minefield, not clearing the entire minefield. Most of the mines are still there; if the friendly units leave the area and all those little MINEN! signs disappear then the minefield is once again a lethal hazard to movement.

From my reading of the designer notes in the games in this series, that is exactly why engineers can "clear" a minefield as they do under the rules now. They do not go out to find every mine in the hex.

A final example from an actual game. OJW and I are on day 4 of the main campaign in B45 (01a_Konrad; the 395 turn monster). I have five engineer companies from my panzer divisions 'maintaining' bridges across a small river that constituted the line of departure for the Axis offensive to relieve Budapest. I only need to maintain two of the bridges; the other engineers are urgently needed elsewhere. So three of the engineer companies have been engaged in bridge ops for the past four days (game time) trying to release themselves so they can catch up with IVSS Pz Korps and get back in the fight. So far no luck. Historically these bridges were built in a very short period of time - the Konrad offensive begins with a surprise night assault across the bridges. But the engineers who built them are unable to disassemble them; they've been chained to the bridges for four days now while the fighting has moved 20-30 klicks to the west. I'm no closer to removing the bridges than when I started and have no idea when it may happen; meanwhile three tactically valuable units are simply removed from my plans until an essentially random event frees them. I understand that elements of uncertainty and lack of control belong in war games, but the above situation goes much too far in that direction imho.

Dang river ice floating downstream is so unpredictable. The damage must have caused your engineers to go look for replacement parts. :rolleyes:

Well that is all the ones I have time to address for now. As commanders, we have far more information in the games than the actual commanders ever did. Uncertainty makes these games fun! It causes you to plan contingencies, adapt to quickly changing conditions and anticipate some things just do not work as planned.

Dog Soldier

[HirooOnoda]

I know in M'44 engineers can abandon bridges so they aren't left to die and can retreat with the rest of the Wehrmacht.

Can that happen in B'45

[SGT Rice]

DS; thanks much for your comments. :) Some responses below.

I seriously doubt a senior commander in the role of the player had such detailed information about each company in the army.

True; but then why do players in PzC know the exact strength and morale state of every company under their command? I think its because the player is not only serving as the army commander, but also as the corps and division commanders. Every two hours we determine the precise deployments of companies & battalions; I don't perceive an overall design intent to limit the player's knowledge to what the senior commander would know.

(a) Repairing damaged bridges (vice erecting new ones that require permanent 'maintenance' crews).

How would you determine which bridges could be repaired and which could not? Some were steel and concrete monsters. Where would get the materials even if you could repair a bridge in less than a month? I use a month because I rarely see highway construction in peace time take less time when a bridge is involved. How steep are the banks? How fast is the current? Is the river low or high at the time of the scenario? From the pictures I have seen of military bridges built during a battle, the effect of traffic, currents debris crashing into the bridge, it seems very reasonable

Later in the post I suggest that the labor requirements could vary randomly from one project to the next. Above you're describing many of the reasons why they would vary. Variation is all well and good, however, once an engineer unit is on site and has assessed the bridge site, then the 'degree of difficulty' would be known, would be reported up the chain of command, and could be planned for. The amount of variability from that point forward should be much less, following some sort of normal distribution of results.

Here's a quote from Deutsche Reichsbahn - The German State Railway in WWII by Arvo L. Vecamer

"Damaged bridges took longer to repair. Portable bridges, ferries or other trans-shipment methods were used until the bridges had been repaired. But with few exceptions, most of the bridges destroyed by the Soviets were quickly made operable again by the Germans. Some examples:

The bridge at Kaunas: destroyed on 24 June 1941; repaired on 17 July 1941
The bridge at Riga: destroyed on 02 July 1941; repaired on 12 July 1941
The bridge near Petseri: destroyed on 09 July 1941; repaired on 24 July 1941"

These are rail bridges; much heavier work than a typical road bridge. The source doesn't indicate how long the repair work took; obviously less time than interval the between destruction and repair.

Somehow I don't think comparisons with what we see in peacetime are particularly relevant; military engineers in wartime aren't worried about inspections, lawsuits, unions, getting paid, Miller time, etc. ... their main concern (when they're not under fire) is how pissed off the CG will be if the work isn't finished when he needs it

© Allowing a bridge engineer to abandon a constructed bridge if they have an urgent mission elsewhere or are facing annihilation.

This has already been added in the recent round of patches.

That's very good to hear.

From my reading of the designer notes in the games in this series, that is exactly why engineers can "clear" a minefield as they do under the rules now. They do not go out to find every mine in the hex.

I suspected as much. But if most of the mines are still in the ground, why is the minefield permanently removed from the scenario? It's simply been marked, with some lanes cleared through it, correct? If the unit that did that job moves on, then who is 'maintaining' those markings and lanes so noone else blunders into the minefield? Why couldn't that minefield be restored (i.e., the lanes resown with mines) in much less time than sowing a new minefield?

But my main point was; why is minelaying so slow/random while mine clearing is quick/automatic?

As commanders, we have far more information in the games than the actual commanders ever did. Uncertainty makes these games fun! It causes you to plan contingencies, adapt to quickly changing conditions and anticipate some things just do not work as planned.

I agree. I'm not suggesting that military engineering should be completely predictable; I suggest two ways in which uncertainty should be introduced, (1) by randomly selecting the amount of work required for any given engineering project and (2) in the speed with which that work is completed by the assigned units.

However, implicit in your statement is the fact that some things DO work as planned, and military engineering is one of the more deliberate and calculated things that happens on the battlefield. But under the current implementation, I have a much better idea of what will happen when a company of T-34/85s tangles with a company of Panthers, than I do of what will happen when a company of engineers tangles with a Bailey bridge.

[Metnegomilj]

My opinion is that pillboxes(quality ones) are little bit complicated to built in month or less ,without using constructing equipment and/or bunch of labors.On the other side,allowing bunkers to be built is nothing but welcomed.They will represent both classical bunkers and simpler pillboxes.

[Turner]

Like someone already said. Great post, great ideas!

[Glenn Saunders]

I just wanted to add that the Bridging rules, and tweaks re the quality ect were calibrated with Bulge where we had some really good data on how long it too for several different formations of differing quality (read equipment available to them as well) and then, based on the percentages we applid we subjected the game engine to a battery of tests.

I know it seemed like forever getting those bridges up in game terms but it was still faster more often than not, that it took historically.

A quick chack of the PDT for BULGE and BUDAPEST on the Bridge % values shows they are within 5% of each other with the Bulge values being a little lower, while Bulges is 2 month earlier.

So what I would say is if anything, the Bridge Building in Budpest, given the current rules is statistically better than historical. As the Operational Commander you would know necessarily have al the details about what is happening at each and every bridge site - so the micro information you would really like to have would add more to the GOD LIKE POV players already have with the info they have at their finger tips.

Glenn

[Liquid_Sky]

When I played Konrad, I decided that I would attack that island strip south of Budapest with my cavalry in a sort of mini breakout to distract my opponent. So I set the hungarian/german (cant remember which) to constructing bridges out of LOS. After 2 days of waiting, I broke the battalions down into companies and spread them out everywhere building until one popped up. All in all, it was about 4 days.

I too wanted my SS bridging engineers on the front, so they could use their high assault values. I think it took about a day to get them to all release, although I did release one of them by abandoning his bridge.

On a side note, I have an engineer in Normandy from the 2nd Panzer, who has been attempting to build a bridge for 3 days now. I think of the movie Bridge to Far, when they were standing around waiting for the trucks to show up so they could start work.