War in the East

[Tribesman]

Anyone played it?
Is it any good?

http://www.matrixgames.com/store/372/Gary.Grigsby's.War.in.the.East:.The.German-Soviet.War.1941-1945

Half price at the moment.

[eddie]

Pretty good game, but its huge! (in game scale that is) lots to do each turn, takes a bit to learn. They are working on War in the West right now, plus some other theaters are in the works also. Going to cover most of the ETO and Med by the time they are through. WiTE will look small by then,lol

[Tribesman]

Thanks.

[eddie]

Check out the various parts of the forum for this sim Tribesman, get a feel for what's going on with it, good and bad. From problesm with it, to AAR's and tactics. Its a good place to look around before you think about getting it. Its a heck of a good deal for it!:)

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tt.asp?forumid=695

I downloaded a different looking map mod for it, was only a 270 MB file,lol
This game is over 1 GB in size once its installed and updated! You don't have to do the whole Russian front, you can command Army Group North, Center or South. Or you can command the Russians.

[Flamebatter90]

Yes, definitely worth it. Especially at that price!

[Tribesman]

Eddie, on scale, time per turn, learning and micromanagement how does it compare with War in the Pacific for example?
For comparison I mean I recently started my first attempt at Japan in WitP, over two weeks it took about 30 hours on the initial setup before hitting end turn button for turn 1.

Its a heck of a good deal for it!
Yes, definitely worth it. Especially at that price!
I was pretty much 90% sold on getting it eventually even at full price, the sale has pushed it up to 95%.
I just need to convince myself the on final 5%:D

[Dread Knot]

Eddie, on scale, time per turn, learning and micromanagement how does it compare with War in the Pacific for example?
For comparison I mean I recently started my first attempt at Japan in WitP, over two weeks it took about 30 hours on the initial setup before hitting end turn button for turn 1.


Compared to War in the Pacific, War in the East is greatly streamlined. There is no managing the training of thousands of individual pilots. No setting of air squadron altitudes. No tweaking of individual heavy industry and armament centers. No airframe or engine research (for Japan) of which mediocre bomber you want to have in six months. The naval aspect of the game is very abstract. No ships or convoys, full stop. Supply is taken care of for you. No need to pull it from one point to another (although you can set certain HQs to build up a reserve). No setting of objectives or preparation points for HQs. The turns are one week as opposed to one to three days as in WitP.

Most mercifully, there is no shared 'execution phase'. No hours spent setting up a turn and hitting the button, just to groan because you overlooked the CAP on a task force and it gets plastered. Units move as you order them to. Attacks take place in the order you wish them to. The user interface is a vast improvement. War in the East makes it very easy to perform the basic actions necessary to play the game.

That being said, the game does present some management challenges. By the time the Soviet colossus reaches full strength there can be up to 400 divisions and brigades you have to figure out a use for. Happily, at some point you can start consolidating these into corps and tank armies. The movement of support units is another challenge. Unless you attach them directly to combat units, you are at the mercy of the programming gods as to how many and what type you receive in each battle. The Russians can't start attaching support units until they start forming proper corps in 1942, so it makes matters dicey for them in the first part of the game.

Air doctrine is another aspect of the game that is a head scratcher for me as it takes complete control of the air war out of your hands, but maybe that's a good thing. Generally I would leave air missions up to the AI, which, as far as I can tell, performed competently. Unlike the ground combat, I found control of air units to be unintuitive. This resulted in me relying on my HQs to assign the air force to close air support missions, which seemed effective enough.

[Flamebatter90]

Yes, WitP is way more complex than WitE, but I myself prefer the latter. It doesn't take me two weeks to end the first turn in WitE and I can concentrate on the strategy and tactics.

[eddie]

WiTE is definitely more streamlined then WiTP like they have said. Keeping your units supplied is a big thing in WITE, becuase partisans can play havoc with cutting rail lines. There's a lot ot it, but not even close to WiTP. I get beat fairly often but its still fun!

I ask myself sometimes, why I expect to win in this game, you roll over the Russians at the beginning, but you know whats coming when the Russian hordes show up in 42 and 43. I guess we have the same desire to win just like we do when we play the Battle of the Bulge from the German side. Have never won that game either,lol But its fun to try!

Take the leap on the last 5%, you won't be disappointed until the Russian hordes are knocking at your door. :D

[eddie]

I like what you can do with the editer for the game too. Like adding in new units like this guy does for the "Maus" Except I would add it in in 1941 instead of 44-45, and give it the speed of a Porsche 917!:haha:

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2639590

[Tribesman]

Eddie & flamebatter. Its the complexity I like about WitP, the nightmare of making the logistics work.
That being said I made the plunge. I will fire it up tomorrow once works out of the way and see what its like:up:

[eddie]

I hope you enjoy it! You'll have plenty of decisions to work with when you get it up and running!

[TorpX]

Two questions:

Do you guys play against the AI?


and


Is the AI any good?

[Dread Knot]

Two questions: Do you guys play against the AI?


and


Is the AI any good?


I'd rate the AI about a C+. It will occasionally surprise you and shift it's main efforts to areas you don't expect. I've seen far worse. Set it to challenging and it will give you a good game. It does move it's forces around a lot. I've seen Rumanian and Hungarians units spread far and wide when they usually operated as their own army group historically. However, a lot depends on which side it plays. As a clever human Russian, you'll likely avoid the pockets that ate up most of the standing Red Army in 1941 ( except for the first turn encirclements which are impossible to avoid) Between saving your army this way and the August reinforcements, you'll likely have a wall of units two deep in place by September 1941 which will slow the Axis AI advance to a crawl.

Playing as German side is a bit more challenging. If you don't do better than they did historically, Soviet manpower and General Winter will eat you up. The winter and blizzard rules have been criticized for being too brutal. A lot of German players have complained that their units end up too battered and chewed up to conduct any sort of offensive Summer 1942 campaign.

[eddie]

Well Tribesman, what do you think of it so far?

[Tribesman]

Well Tribesman, what do you think of it so far?
Too early to say. Good so far.
One question though. Is downgrading a few squadrons to the E-4 to use up that pool a good idea?

[eddie]

I don't know, never tried something like that. That's one of the decisions you have to make, and see if it works!

[eddie]

Did it work Tribesman?:hmmm:

[Tribesman]

Did it work Tribesman?:hmmm:
I didn't do it yet once I noticed that those and the He111H-3 start getting exported to the Romanian pools on turn 2.
When I get more of a hang on the production and attrition rates I will reconsider.
Good game though, but daily turns rather than weekly would make it an absolutely amazing game.

[eddie]

I'm glad you are enjoying it!