OP artillery and disputable values compared to infantry

[UncleYar]

Arty seems to defend pretty strongly VS light armor, I'd expect them to be overrun instead:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2556537560

Save for reference:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ysgMlzCxKHz_CpohqecIexguHhdzivQB/view?usp=sharing

I mean, how do you justify this historically? Artillery might be "entrenched", they're pretty much sitting ducks once attacked at close range, and their lightly armed crews won't pose much of a threat.

Digging deeper in the values, I find some things that don't make sense to me:
British '39 infantry:
- max entrenchment: 4
- attack vs infantry: 11
- defense vs infantry: 6

QF 25-pounder artillery
- max entrenchment: 4
- attack vs infantry: 15
- defense vs infantry: 7

Questions:
- Why do both infantry and artillery have equivalent max entrenchment? You can't "dig in" big artillery pieces the way you can infantry, and those aren't the kind of guns you can flip to the horizontal like 88 AA's and expect to do anything useful.
- Why does infantry have stronger offense than defense vs infantry? Infantry is supposed to be the queen of defense.
- Why does artillery have stronger defense vs infantry than infantry vs infantry??? This makes no sense to me, dug in infantry absolutely wrecks attacking infantry (cf. 1st World War), whereas artillery with its slow aiming, high shell arc and dependency on spotters would only be able to defend effectively when the enemy is far enough away, and when shielded by other units.

Overall I realize that this kind of game has a high level of abstraction and doesn't claim to be the most realistic ever (especially with the one unit per tile thing), but the values and in-game results seem very surprising to me from both a historical point of view, and from a comparison with Panzer General gameplay from which this game claims to draw inspiration.

See also this discussion where someone was surprised at assault engineers getting wrecked when attacking artillery.

BTW unrelated note, in english PDF manual, description for Sparse Enemies is not translated:

Sparse enemies
Verringerter Schaden wenn der Gegner weniger als 50% seiner maximalen Stärkepunkte hat.

[wendt]

Hi UncleYar,

thanks for your input and the hint with the missing translation.

You raise some good points and i will look into these values as soon as i can and either justify or adjust them. Might take a bit though as i am busy with another project.

[UncleYar]

Originally posted by wendt:

Hi UncleYar,

thanks for your input and the hint with the missing translation.

You raise some good points and i will look into these values as soon as i can and either justify or adjust them. Might take a bit though as i am busy with another project.

Thanks. I'm interested to see what you come up with either way. Good luck with your project in the meanwhile.

[wendt]

Thanks for the wishes, can use all the luck i get.

It's been five (?) years since i really dug into the Army General values so i need a certain time window to get into it again. But as the current project heads towards release that is very difficult.

[wendt]

Hi UncleYar,

sorry for the delay.
My new game is released now and several other private things are more or less under control so time to do some AG discussion.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

I mean, how do you justify this historically? Artillery might be "entrenched", they're pretty much sitting ducks once attacked at close range, and their lightly armed crews won't pose much of a threat.

Digging deeper in the values, I find some things that don't make sense to me:
British '39 infantry:
- max entrenchment: 4
- attack vs infantry: 11
- defense vs infantry: 6

QF 25-pounder artillery
- max entrenchment: 4
- attack vs infantry: 15
- defense vs infantry: 7

Questions:
- Why do both infantry and artillery have equivalent max entrenchment? You can't "dig in" big artillery pieces the way you can infantry, and those aren't the kind of guns you can flip to the horizontal like 88 AA's and expect to do anything useful.

What you are describing is the situation if it is a close combat. So if the hexes would 500 -1000 metres i would have to agree with you.
Look at the maps and think of the areas they are covering and what dimension a battle situation could have.

What could entrenchment mean in the desert:

Minefields and barbed wire areas would slow down light armor considerably while artillery could shell them as they try to overcome the distance in open desert.

In cities rubble, sandbags and houses would do the same for a armored unit under artillery fire if they are in a different quarter or even further away.

So it is not unrealistic as such. Still you touched on one thing that is not related to this battle, but in general. Some artillery has a too high maximum entrenchment level.

Some go up to 4 (as they are rather small), but that could be considered too much. I will revisit those.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

- Why does infantry have stronger offense than defense vs infantry? Infantry is supposed to be the queen of defense.

I see your point. If we imagine two units on a plain field, not advantage on any side by the other factors like officers, entrenchment etc.

Both sides would be roughly equally strong. So you could argue the values should be at least about the same.

But let me ask you this: is infantry not the queen of defense in Army General, if it is entrenched and under a decent commander ?

Do you feel advancement is too fast and unrealistic if infantry defends ? Because defense can be boosted immensly and the base value will be amplified. So increasing it will make all defended positions way harder to take.

That is the question: Yes - the values are not per se defensable, but are they defensable in the greater context ?

Originally posted by UncleYar:

- Why does artillery have stronger defense vs infantry than infantry vs infantry??? This makes no sense to me, dug in infantry absolutely wrecks attacking infantry (cf. 1st World War), whereas artillery with its slow aiming, high shell arc and dependency on spotters would only be able to defend effectively when the enemy is far enough away, and when shielded by other units.

Stating World War I is odd as tactics and weapons have changed and improved. Trenches were still a mighty thing i World War II itself so no need to bring up the stories of old ;-)

Let me also remark that you compare a base value (artillery defense) with a modified one (infantry in trenches).

Still I agree this should be lowered for some to make them more vulnerable to infantry.

We have to keep in mind that this is very much depending on each piece - some are more agile and flexible in angle than others.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

Overall I realize that this kind of game has a high level of abstraction and doesn't claim to be the most realistic ever (especially with the one unit per tile thing), but the values and in-game results seem very surprising to me from both a historical point of view, and from a comparison with Panzer General gameplay from which this game claims to draw inspiration.
See also this discussion where someone was surprised at assault engineers getting wrecked when attacking artillery.

On a side note i want to say that being inspired does not mean you copy it 1:1, you just like the general direction.
In fact both GaW and AG are quite different from Panzer General in my view.

That being said the results should still be valid when it comes to combat result. They need to feel like they could happen.

Then again results may sound strange but are really not.

If the wrong commander with a disorganized unit attacks a strong position with highly motivated troops under excellent command things may happen.
And this is not unhistorically. I have read about many such situations in which better equipment and numbers were not decisive.

That does not mean there couldn't be wrong values though, but the battles can be tricky with all those factors.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

BTW unrelated note, in english PDF manual, description for Sparse Enemies is not translated:

Thanks for that report! I noted this and will fix it when there is time.

[UncleYar]

Hi, congrats on the release of your new game. I'm not playing Army General anymore and don't intend to go back to it for extended play sessions, so don't make changes on my account. I'm only continuing the discussion in case you're interested in improving your game or future designs.

Originally posted by wendt:

Originally posted by UncleYar:

- Why do both infantry and artillery have equivalent max entrenchment? You can't "dig in" big artillery pieces the way you can infantry, and those aren't the kind of guns you can flip to the horizontal like 88 AA's and expect to do anything useful.

What you are describing is the situation if it is a close combat. So if the hexes would 500 -1000 metres i would have to agree with you.

Look at the maps and think of the areas they are covering and what dimension a battle situation could have.

When considering the large hex, there's the difference in manpower to take into account. The artillery crews are only a few men, unable to dig or place barbed wire, sandbags or other defenses in a large area. So there would not be anything significant to slow down the advance of the enemy, making the artillery spotters extremely vulnerable and the time frame to shoot at the enemy very short. Sure they could take a few potshots, but that's pretty much zero damage compared to the complete overrun that's coming for them.

Then there's the fact that artillery is generally considered efficient at disorganizing the enemy (i.e. temporary damage to combat values that disappears over time), but pretty bad at actually causing casualties. Or at least it's how I've seen represented in pretty much every military game I've played at any scale. Here IIRC it causes more raw damage than infantry, which doesn't make sense.

Lastly, there's a gameplay consideration here. Artilly pieces are more interesting as glass cannons that need to be protected, and as a good target for infantry or armor breakthroughs. The game is less tactical if you can just use them to defend a hex more effectively than an infantry division.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

- Why does infantry have stronger offense than defense vs infantry? Infantry is supposed to be the queen of defense.

I see your point. If we imagine two units on a plain field, not advantage on any side by the other factors like officers, entrenchment etc.

Both sides would be roughly equally strong. So you could argue the values should be at least about the same.

Even in an open field (and I'm talking perfectly flat football field here) defending infantry would have an advantage because they'd be prone and pre-aimed in the approximate direction where the enemy is attacking from, while the attacker would be walking.
As realistically no battlefield is as flat and cover-less as that, the defender always has the advantage of knowing the terrain in advance and being in cover and able to set up repeated ambushes as the attacker advances. That's even if you don't have time to actually dig in.

If you compare infantry in trenches with semi-automatic weapons, grenades, flamethrowers and machine gun nests to just artillery alone in trenches, I think the latter would be a laughable obstacle in comparison for an attacking infantry platoon. And it would be a near-instant overrun by armor.
But that's kind of a moot point, since artillery alone couldn't dig the trenches in the first place. Honestly, I would give artillery zero entrenchment points and would make them only benefit from the entrenchment of a supporting infantry division.

In a scenario like the Germans defending Sicily, where attackers progress on very difficult terrain, I could see artillery be more effective without support: progress is slow on narrow paths, spotters can easily stay hidden and out of reach. But in that scenario the terrain pretty much acts as natural fortifications, which an infantry division would be able to use a lot more effectively than artillery by digging in.

Do you feel advancement is too fast and unrealistic if infantry defends ? Because defense can be boosted immensly and the base value will be amplified. So increasing it will make all defended positions way harder to take.

Now we're talking gameplay balance and not realism. Overall I think it's fine if given two equal infantry units (same leadership and all that) and no entrenchment, the defender should have a slight edge. It's normal to have to attack from multiple directions and bring in artillery support to break through a defended position. The only time I'd expect defending infantry to be easy to break through is if they're demoralized, disorganized, out of supply, completely green or conscripts, or with leadership so atrocious it's actually harmful (those infamous +1 leaders in Squad Leader). I don't remember which of these mechanics are modeled in your game.

Stating World War I is odd as tactics and weapons have changed and improved. Trenches were still a mighty thing i World War II itself so no need to bring up the stories of old ;-)

WWI is a textbook example of what happens to infantry that tries to attack entrenched infantry without armor support, I'm not sure why you'd object to it as an example, as if I was citing the stone age or something. Infantry weapons didn't change enough between the world wars to make this example obsolete: the main game-changer was tanks supported by motorized infantry, and we're not discussin armor here.

If the wrong commander with a disorganized unit attacks a strong position with highly motivated troops under excellent command things may happen.
And this is not unhistorically. I have read about many such situations in which better equipment and numbers were not decisive.

I mean sure, it could happen, but as a general rule if you have numbers, equipment, terrain and logistics on your side, you win. Not to mention that the most important command wouldn't be at hex level, but on the upper echelons which are all represented by the player.
As a gameplay mechanic, if you make local leadership too powerful it means you can just pair a unit with a great leader and roflstomp around the map ignoring tactics. Good for a laugh when you're the one benefitting, but won't be interesting for long. (And if you really wanted to make leadership that powerful, then the UI should show leadership values more prominently than unit strength.)
So design-wise you're left with the choice of making leadership only give a small, marginal advantage, or giving a large part to RNG so that great leaders can sometimes have a big effect on the battle.

[wendt]

Hi UncleYar,

just a week this time, i am getting real fast in my replies

Originally posted by UncleYar:

Hi, congrats on the release of your new game. I'm not playing Army General anymore and don't intend to go back to it for extended play sessions, so don't make changes on my account. I'm only continuing the discussion in case you're interested in improving your game or future designs.

Thanks. For anyone who is interested my new game can be found here:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1333280/Klomanager__Hochgewrgt/

I am always interested in improving my games, but opinions may differ on what is such a thing.

As i have little time for a major test, grave changes are not possble without risking putting the existing maps/campaigns off rail. The content needs to be tested to make sure it all can still be solved etc.

So i do not intent to change things dramatically.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

When considering the large hex, there's the difference in manpower to take into account. The artillery crews are only a few men, unable to dig or place barbed wire, sandbags or other defenses in a large area. So there would not be anything significant to slow down the advance of the enemy, making the artillery spotters extremely vulnerable and the time frame to shoot at the enemy very short. Sure they could take a few potshots, but that's pretty much zero damage compared to the complete overrun that's coming for them.

No, the regiments could not produce an El Alamein situation.

I was not suggesting they filled up 50 square km with mines.

But that is not neccessary. If you have a weapon like th 25-Pdr and have to situate it in the open desert, you would do so with the use of the landscape. So if there was a little ridge you would go there, place obstacles where they are most effective to slow enemies etc.

The 25-Pdr could be used at long distance (13400 yards) and as AT weapen at <1200 yards.

So distance + disorganizing, sometimes killing shots at long and mid range and an AT ability close up in relativly open terrain without cover.

A charge on that position sounds not like an easy job to me.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

Then there's the fact that artillery is generally considered efficient at disorganizing the enemy (i.e. temporary damage to combat values that disappears over time), but pretty bad at actually causing casualties. Or at least it's how I've seen represented in pretty much every military game I've played at any scale. Here IIRC it causes more raw damage than infantry, which doesn't make sense.

Lastly, there's a gameplay consideration here. Artilly pieces are more interesting as glass cannons that need to be protected, and as a good target for infantry or armor breakthroughs. The game is less tactical if you can just use them to defend a hex more effectively than an infantry division.

Artillery could cause terrible damage in addition to disorganize. In my games this is shifted depending on the strength of an enemy. So full strength units get much more damage than thinned out once.

Maybe other games 'say' it could not inflict damage, but i refer to combat reports and i remember several where tanks and infantry were butchered alike by a well positioned artillery unit, especially in open terrain.

If you insist i could dig into some of my literature and quote the reports.

They were from the desert as well as from the Eastern Front.

Yes gameplay, that is what it is about in the end. I guess i do prefer the units to feel like what i read in the books as much as possible. And this is also different for many players. I am happy if players appreaciate my approach, but many don't.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

Even in an open field (and I'm talking perfectly flat football field here) defending infantry would have an advantage because they'd be prone and pre-aimed in the approximate direction where the enemy is attacking from, while the attacker would be walking.
As realistically no battlefield is as flat and cover-less as that, the defender always has the advantage of knowing the terrain in advance and being in cover and able to set up repeated ambushes as the attacker advances. That's even if you don't have time to actually dig in.

In a very lab-like idea of a battle it would also depend on the tactics. If you blindly charge across a field, well you are doomed. If the attacker would crawl slowly still many other factors would have to be considered.

But i do not doubt that defense (if done right) is mightier in most cases if things are close to being equal.

There is a reason why superiorty in men and equipment and special tactics were used to attack.

So we do not really differ on this point

Originally posted by UncleYar:

If you compare infantry in trenches with semi-automatic weapons, grenades, flamethrowers and machine gun nests to just artillery alone in trenches, I think the latter would be a laughable obstacle in comparison for an attacking infantry platoon. And it would be a near-instant overrun by armor.
But that's kind of a moot point, since artillery alone couldn't dig the trenches in the first place. Honestly, I would give artillery zero entrenchment points and would make them only benefit from the entrenchment of a supporting infantry division.

In a scenario like the Germans defending Sicily, where attackers progress on very difficult terrain, I could see artillery be more effective without support: progress is slow on narrow paths, spotters can easily stay hidden and out of reach. But in that scenario the terrain pretty much acts as natural fortifications, which an infantry division would be able to use a lot more effectively than artillery by digging in.

Again i have to disagree. There are many accounts were artillery was the problem which stopped attacks. Also consider the units had a few hundred men, not only artillery. There were battles on the Eastern Front in 1942 i remember were cooks and postmen helped the Germans to fend off Soviet attacks in desperate melees.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

Now we're talking gameplay balance and not realism. Overall I think it's fine if given two equal infantry units (same leadership and all that) and no entrenchment, the defender should have a slight edge. It's normal to have to attack from multiple directions and bring in artillery support to break through a defended position. The only time I'd expect defending infantry to be easy to break through is if they're demoralized, disorganized, out of supply, completely green or conscripts, or with leadership so atrocious it's actually harmful (those infamous +1 leaders in Squad Leader). I don't remember which of these mechanics are modeled in your game.

Yes, that's the current gameplay we are talking as i suspected this was what is is about. I see how a single value might look not right, but in the end the game has to work as one expects it to.

In AG there is leadership, experience and readiness which play a major role. Officers also may provide bonusses for certain situation (he can be specialized in AT tacttics for example).

Originally posted by UncleYar:

WWI is a textbook example of what happens to infantry that tries to attack entrenched infantry without armor support, I'm not sure why you'd object to it as an example, as if I was citing the stone age or something. Infantry weapons didn't change enough between the world wars to make this example obsolete: the main game-changer was tanks supported by motorized infantry, and we're not discussin armor here.

It is not a bad example, but an unneccessary one as in WW II is enough of that and up-to-date.
That's all i was saying.

Originally posted by UncleYar:

I mean sure, it could happen, but as a general rule if you have numbers, equipment, terrain and logistics on your side, you win. Not to mention that the most important command wouldn't be at hex level, but on the upper echelons which are all represented by the player.
As a gameplay mechanic, if you make local leadership too powerful it means you can just pair a unit with a great leader and roflstomp around the map ignoring tactics. Good for a laugh when you're the one benefitting, but won't be interesting for long. (And if you really wanted to make leadership that powerful, then the UI should show leadership values more prominently than unit strength.)
So design-wise you're left with the choice of making leadership only give a small, marginal advantage, or giving a large part to RNG so that great leaders can sometimes have a big effect on the battle.

For me the role of the officers in AG is important but they are no super heroes. E.g. they differ in leadership which influences readiness. Which can have a huge impact over 15-20 turns but little in just a few.

Many choices depend on the battle you are facing, too.

If we discuss these single skirmishes i miss putting them into perspecitve. Because while all i was stating is true - all these things and situations can happen- the main question is different.

It is, are these happening all the time or are they just a curiosity in a combination of weired values ?

Is every attack on artillery a disaster ? Is infantry too weak in defense overall ? Because singular tactical situtions may influence a whole operations, but usually they do not.
What does, is the overall composition of your forces and their leaders.

So as long as it is not the rule but the exeption these things should be fine.

[publishing]

As to the role of artillery in general i found a nice quote on Wikipedia that might change some minds:

...tended to underestimate the punishing effect of German artillery on Polish units. Mobile and available in significant quantity, artillery shattered as many units as any other branch of the Wehrmacht. – Zaloga and Madej in 'The Polish Campaign 1939'