EP '14 mechanics/balance

[jim pfleck]

A second line of thought refers to Comrade P's comments on recovery of losses and I would be interested in other people's thoughts and experiences about this.

Personally, I tend to focus more on fatigue level and disorder than raw troop numbers. And when I do count, I am more concerned with the number of battalions than their size (as long as they are over 500 men each or so). So I am more concerned with the fragile morale than with the recovery of men. Am I wrong? Going too far in disregard of numbers? At one point in my campaign game with Doctor (minor Russian defeat for me), I was thinking that with the low morale and bad command range he would be slaughtering me without fragile morale (two corps got caught in a river bend by Francois. It was ugly, likely avoidable, and horrible)!

Maybe against another German opponent who is a little less organized I will do better, but it seems, at least with my playing style, that the Campaign will largely involve the Germans chasing the Russians around and my Russians hoping to catch a break and win a battle by dumb luck.

Tactically, I find that the Russians can do ok as long as they give ground as needed and attack slowly and methodically (which means the Germans can almost always get away). Most of the German infantry is not rated super high, so they disrupt on the attack, especially when facing Russians in good order (not disrupted). Of course, it is hard to keep good order as the Russians but I think that for small chunks of time- maybe 2-4 turns- the Russians can perform like they do in the history books---standing their ground and dishing out a lot of damage. But after more than a few turns the the low morale and command range issues make that sort of firepower unsustainable.....