PZC System not much being said

[Ricky B]

[CptCav]

The problem with the alternate fire rules is that it doesn't address overstacking in the traditional sense of having too many men, vehicles or guns in a hex. They punish the player with the smaller units. For example, let us look at the 900-man German infantry battalion versus the three 300-man Russian infantry battalions. The Russia player has to stack his three battalion in a hex to equal the firepower of the single German battalion. When the German fires, his full power is directed a one battalion and, then, each of the remaining two battalions also get wacked at a percentage of that fire. So, the German battalion gets OVER 100% of its firepower applied. Whereas, the Russian battalions can only apply 100%. Hence, as Napoleon said, "victory goes to the bigger battalions"; even though, the relative firepower should be equal.

However, I do like the alternate rules when both sides have somewhat the same size battalions; as it does force player to pay the consequences of massing to many forces in a single hex.

I think a better rule for punishing the massing of forces would based on the number of men, vehicles and guns in a hex; not the number of units.

Regards,
CptCav

[Sgt Fury]

I for one cannot stand the alternate fire and airstrike rules. Have you guys ever tried to kill off the last 20 men in a swamp with direct fire? It's a joke, yet they continue to exert their ZOC. How about trying to take out an 8 gun battery in the open with stukas? fatigue, fatigue!

Alternate assault is the only good rule of the bunch, and I like to play it in all my games. Infantry should have to think twice before assaulting armor. They did in WW2.

So it just goes to show you, that everyone's different wrt to these rules :-)

Fury

[Peter Szabo]

On a different angle, I would welcome an option to reverse the encryption of a game. Under such an option, an unencrypted battle file would be generated, given both players' passwords.

By making the battle file editable, this would allow players to fix scenario errors without the need to restart the game. The fix could be done by a trusted third party (most likely the designer).

Some time ago I recognised a killer error in a large custom scenario only after the start of the game: it was embarrassing enough to ask my opponent to restart. Fortunately it was only turn 1; imagine the frustration if it is noticed on turn 90. Although less likely than in custom scenarios, regardless of systematic testing errors are sometimes reported even in stock games.

Peter

[cavalry corps]

I was going to add .

The alt fire rule is the solution but it leads to slaughter on scale you cannot imagine unless in T41 maybe EA42 . It needs to be adjustable .

Michael

[Smedley]

This is an interesting debate. It seems that you are damned if you do and damned if you don't! The alt rules create as many problems as they solve.
It is my opinion that they should only be used in scenarios designed around them. Players must change tactics based on which rules are being used. I know this is common sense, but if you insist on creating killer stacks when using the alt rules, you will suffer. If you pound a tiny unit with direct fire you will suffer! On the other hand, when using the regular rules, if you try and hit a high value target stacked with 1200 infantry, you will lose planes.
I wish there was a best of both worlds!

Rob

[jonnymacbrown]

How about trying to take out an 8 gun battery in the open with stukas? fatigue, fatigue!

Stukas have a high attack value. But not high enough perhaps. Can you say why you think this is?

Alternate assault is the only good rule of the bunch, and I like to play it in all my games. Infantry should have to think twice before assaulting armor. They did in WW2.

Yes, thanks for the info. I sometimes try this, although I know it's not realistic. Why do the alt assault rules disuade this tactic? von eges :cool:

[Sgt Fury]

Prinz von Egan: The point I was trying to make with the airpower vs artillery was that, due to the small unit size, the scaling that the alternate air strikes rule uses makes it very difficult to harm artillery units like this. This is very frustrating to me. I think it would be for everyone.

I think the alternate assault rule is realistic, or at least more so than the default rule. Infantry had a pretty healthy respect for armor, esecially early war before the development of LATW's.

Fury

[Al]

Interesting range of opinions, which is what I expected. Seems that one of the more contentious issues is the effect of artillery on large groups of infantry out in the open. From my reading of military history massing troops at just the right time & in just the right place was one of the more difficult things to do. Mass too much too soon & you pay the consequences. Maybe at Tillercon-II I can bring up the issue & get a bit more insight into the why's & how's from some of the designers.

[Jazman]

Here's a point about victory objectives. I remember in the old days of boardgaming there were many objectives that were general in nature. For example, in Market Garden you might have something like, "Have a bridge over the Rhine, with X units of 30th Corps north of the Rhine, in supply: xxx points." Etc. etc. etc. If you managed to do that while not capturing Arhnem, well, so what? The Rhine was crossed, and Monty looks brilliant. The PzC way is to capture specific objectives (plus kill enemy).

Note in that above victory condition there is serious motive for the Germans to cut the lifeline on the highway, and for the Allies to keep it open.

I just finished a MG44 campaign as the German, and won (minor) despite 30th corps being in strength across the Rhine. I had Arnhem, but another day and I was finished. It seemed a strange end to both of us.

Maybe the objectives just need to be expanded and victory levels tweaked.

Another point is the "fight to the death" nature of surrounded isolated doomed troops. Always. There are no mass surrenders possible. In other words, the Russian must grind the Stalingrad pocket into fine dust, there is no "surrender level" at which resistance ends.