Pareameter Data Unit Recovery levels Minsk 44

[Elxaime]

The recovery rate game mechanic, IMHO, should be judged on a game-by-game basis to determine whether it is helping create historical conditions for the player decision makers.

I think the recovery rates in M44 work well, since the designers need to model the historic ability of the greatly outnumbered Germans to resist Operation Bagration and also the imperative of the Soviets to keep attacking once the order by Stalin was given.

I have only played M44 as Soviets, and only to about turn 30 so far, but in the back of my mind as I play is the fact that I cannot afford to slow the attack. If a pause occurs anywhere along the front, the superior quality (for the most part) of the Germans and their higher recovery rate will make a renewed offensive all that harder. As a result, the game itself is much tenser - the Soviets simply have to keep moving and not let the Germans catch their breath.

I would use K43 as an example of where the recovery rates, in the stock scenario, have the opposite effect. The Germans have such high rates compared to the Soviets in K43 that, even if they don't adopt ahistoric lines of advances to take advantage of known fixed Soviet units and thin defense lines (which leads to an early and easy win), a good German player also can simply win a head on battle of attrition through his recovery rate advantage. This makes no sense in the context of July 1943 at Kursk - the Germans knew they had to breakthrough quickly since, if they got bogged down, the Soviets would win an attritional battle of men and material.

These rates can be adjusted if players wish. But my vote so far is that M44 seems about right.