Not really, Mark. They'll be shipped over in perfect health, but I'm telling you, about 2 turns or so after the start of war in Africa, *all* the units are at 33/0, Allied and Axis alike. As James is fond of stating, "I consider 33/0 to be the normal state of affairs for my troops". I concur. To be honest, I of course never complain about having 40 or 50 for a supply level, but it is meaningless to me overall. I never ask what is the supply level; rather 'IS there supply?' If the answer is yes, we're good to go. A level of 1 is sufficient in my mind to see me take all of Africa as the Axis, every single game.Mark Stevens said:I'd like to see what effect, if any, making the only Axis supply point Tripoli (+ Benghazi following the capture of Malta) has on the Axis ability to swamp the Middle East with troops before trying Shane's suggestion of limiting the number of German units that can serve there. Surely their operating at the lowest level of supply (unless Malta falls) must have an effect?
Keep in mind that a decent amount of those 'losses' are finding their way back into your replacement pool.Karri said:Actually, the problem is that a single attack can burn anything between 100 to 300 squads. Even attacking partisans can take 50-100 squads. If you go for full scale offensive, you will lose several thousand per turn. For example my recent game as Axis, my enemy made a fortified line out of HQ units, border regiments and militia units. I have been quite careful attacking them, and still I lose more troops than what I receive as replacements. And those are just trash units against half of my army.
Actually, to pick a nit here, I say 33/1 should be considered the normal state of a unit. You can't get to 0%.Mantis said:Not really, Mark. They'll be shipped over in perfect health, but I'm telling you, about 2 turns or so after the start of war in Africa, *all* the units are at 33/0, Allied and Axis alike. As James is fond of stating, "I consider 33/0 to be the normal state of affairs for my troops"...
Assuming the unit is supplied, approximately 1/3 of your ground units disabled results go back into the on hand pool. Still, Karri's point is generally true. Often, a single corps, making a single attack, burns out an entire turn's worth of HRS, even accounting for equipment going back into the on hand column. Multiply this over the course of several turns for an offensive, and a few dozen units, and you can see that losses at this level versus the replacement rate are skewed.Mantis said:Keep in mind that a decent amount of those 'losses' are finding their way back into your replacement pool.
Oops! My bad, I meant 33/1... :laugh: (Leave it to Jam to catch me up on this! )JAMiAM said:Actually, to pick a nit here, I say 33/1 should be considered the normal state of a unit. You can't get to 0%.
This is what I'm hoping to demonstrate to Mark, if he's willing.JAMiAM said:But, like Mantis says, whether there is any supply is always more important, by several orders of magnitude, than how much supply there is. Undoubtedly, higher supply is helpful, but against numbers, and the ability - especially with positive shock values - to wear down a defender over the course of several rounds, it is not crucial. Aggressive players, willing to sacrifice a few men, can readily level the playing field between two sides that start with significantly divergent supply levels.
If you were attacking any of the US/UK armored divisions, then I can see why. Those units are pure armored targets, and take no losses from any high level bombers, or artillery fire, during the course of battle. Even when you attack them with Pz Korps, you end up taking significantly more losses, because all of the soft targets in your unit soak up losses, often causing your unit to break off the attack before your armored assets can engage long enough to cause the numbers of casualties necessary to force it to fail its morale checks and retreat.Karri said:Regarding Africa, I tried attacking the british(who were fortified in two hexes near El Alamein) with italians but ended up losing a bunch of units and loads of equipment. I then brought up air forces, again no progress at all, isntead just loads of losses. I then brough in two Axis Infantry Korps, again just loads of losses and no progress. As a final measure I brought in a panzer korps. It lost a good number of tanks but made no progress.
All this time, the british were suffering minimal losses...The forces they had there were quite small(I'd say about 300 squads of different kind), except for one thing they had 1000 jeeps there. I can't figure any othe reasons why my forces are doing so badly. Majority of these jeeps are in the supply column....
I find this a bit ridicilous....
Well, that depends.JAMiAM said:These units really need to be made into more "balanced" units.
I think this houserule is 110% necessary to balance the African theatre.Mensch said:Mantis poked his head in the righht direction IMO suggesting an honor rule.