Scenario Design Questions

[ComradeP]

Range Modifier/Range Effect:

Direct Fire Range Effect Direct fire is modified by the range from the firing unit to the target in the following ways: • At range 0 (AA fire), fire values are doubled. • At range 1, fire values are nominal. • At ranges greater than 1 is modified by the Range Effect Parameter Data Value. If the range is N and the Range Effect is R, then the fire value is divided by 1 + (N-1) * (R-1).
For example, if the Range Effect value is 1.5, then the fire value of direct fire at a range of 2 hexes is divided by 1.5. At 3 hexes, it is divided by 2, and so on.

The lower the range effect, the more casualties will be caused at ranges of 2 hexes or more by direct fire. There is a problem with this, though, in how the casualties are actually determined.

Panzer Campaigns/Panzer Battles uses a system where vehicle/gun/possibly aircraft casualties are in essence all abstracted casualties in men. This is described in the manual more or less as such: if a certain hit would cause 1 man loss, there's a 10% chance a vehicle or gun would be lost as vehicle/gun loss chances are based on manpower losses from 0 to 10, with 10 being a guaranteed loss of a vehicle or gun.

In my opinion, this is one of the weakest parts of the combat engine. There are several problems with it.

First: it is theoretically possible that 3 hits which would normally cause a loss of 1 man result in 3 destroyed vehicles. If you have an infantry unit firing at an infantry unit, and it inflicts 3 casualties on average, it will on average inflict 9 casualties if it fires three times. The same situation versus a vehicle or gun unit has a 30% chance of knocking out a vehicle, so there's a reasonable chance you lose 3 vehicles (30 men).

This means even weak and puny units have a reasonable chance of knocking out a vehicle or gun, and means even weak units can knock out units which they historically wouldn't be able to do, also because the game doesn't take penetrating power into account.

Second: because in essence it's just a mathematical formula that comes down to a percentage chance, it encourages using artillery against tanks, because you know there's a reasonable chance they will knock something out. I regularly knock out tanks with 82mm mortars in Panzer Battles, for example, and it removes a large part of the immersion.

Third: similarly to the second point, it also encourages using vehicles at ahistorical ranges for the same reason. Panthers knocking out T-34's at 3 kilometres is unrealistic, but the system offers no absolute protection with range to model a decrease in penetrating power.

For those reasons, I prefer lower range effects as higher range effects are basically a lottery where you may or may not knock out a gun or vehicle without much direct input: you're just rolling the dice. With lower range effect values, equipment will perform more or less as advertised in their SA/HA values. The issues are still there, but the outcomes become more predictable.

Keep in mind that casualties per vehicle/gun in vehicle vs. vehicle, vehicle vs. gun or gun vs. gun combat are actually quite low as you generally need 10 vehicles/guns to have a credible chance of inflicting a loss. So not only are the combat results very unpredictable, but it's very difficult to model a small force overcoming a larger force in the current system, keep that in mind when editing the values. You're far more likely to get "fatigue" results than to inflict casualties currently.

The values in the parameter data screen are just the effects for fire (low/high) and assaults for both sides, it's somewhat confusing but it works as described in the Combat Results part of the manual.

Unfortunately, unit VP's are the only part I couldn't find in the editor either. If I recall a recent post correctly, they're set automatically based on quality and other values.