Kill Points or VP Points

[Volcano Man]

The system is also better at set piece battles where both sides have clearly defined roles. The reason we didn't initially release an overall campaign game in Kharkov '43 was that both sides swapped roles over time and we couldn't make the existing victory system work - something that Marquo struggled with in his mod of the same campaign. We have no idea how our alternate system of victory point locations will work in the newly released Kharkov '43 campaign, but we are following Larsonney's AAR with interest!

David

I think the Kharkov '43 Campaign is the way to go...losses are irrelevant (at least directly) in determining victory. Obviously, if you lose an army or two there won't be much left to defend the VP hexes anyway

Well, just a little Devil's Advocate here:

FWIW, that approach has its own problems as well, such as the "race against the clock syndrome" potentially being much worse than with standard scoring. What I mean is, we all know everyone rushes to or holds fast at objectives near the final turns of the scenario. However, if losses are not taken into account into victory conditions then it can potentially make it worse, with whole divisions being sacrificed so that X number of objectives are unobtainable by the end of the scenario. It may also serve to trigger an escalating tempo to the point of all out destruction in the last 2/3rds of the campaign as both sides are throwing everything they have at it, disregarding all losses. At least with the current scoring mechanisms recklessness during the final race against the close stages can be severely punished.

I do very much like the Kh43 Grand Campaign and the creativeness behind it however, and there is no better way to represent the complex nature of Kh43's Grand Campaign at the moment; do not misunderstand the intent in this post (I am not picking on it in any way). I am only saying that every approach has its own warts in different areas, and they also have their own potential abuses and gameplay influences. I think the key here is that more VP determination methods would be nice, albeit it would probably confuse the community from title to title. Now if only more people would show up at the Tillercons to suggest ideas... ;)

edited: typos