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[Ratel]

I have also considered retiring from SP recently, but decided to stay on. The reason why I considered it was not because of boredom with the game. It was due to time constraints in real life. I went through a patch where it was difficult to play more than one turn per week with 5 games going on at the same time. Luckily I decided to push through and am now still hanging in there.
Looking at SP itself, it remains a great game after 16 (?) years. I bet none of the most popular games of 2011 will be around after such a long period. But then none of the mainstream games of 2011 is turn based anymore and I think that is where SP's and other turn based games' secret lies. In my opinion you can have much more control on individual units in turn based (TB) games than in real time strategy (RTS) games. Nowadays, RTS games are about being able to build units as fast and as much as possible and purely swamping the opponent with numbers. Individual strenghts of units are much more limited on the outcome of the battle than what it is in SP for instance. Take a 1000m dual between a Tiger and a Matilda for instance. In RTS games the Matilda would have to hit the Tiger a few more times than the other way round, but it would still be able to kill a Tiger with it's 2 pounder. In SP, the Tiger's crew would have time to make coffee, play a hand of poker and just out of pure boredom nail the Matilda in one shot to have a bit of peace and quiet to carry on with their poker hands.
The only concern I have with SP's declining (is it?) player base is that we tend to focus too much on the same type of battles. I can't remember how many of the PBEM's I have played since I joined has been a battle between the Germans and the Russians. Most of these German - Russian games have been around the 1942's where Tigers and Panthers are not yet available for the Germans, while the T-34's and KV1's are running around already. I suggest we start playing more UK vs German, USA vs German or even France vs German (early war). If you still feel like German vs Russian games, go for it, but consider late war years where both sides has some serious tanks and other weapons. What about USA/UK vs Japan? Japan vs China? Heck guys we canb be much more creative than what we currently are in terms of the sides we choose. And no, choosing Japan vs USA/UK does not mean that you will necessarily lose. You just need to play better to your strenghts and if you still lose, ....well somebody has to lose you know. LOL.