Date: Sun Sep 19 20:40:19 2004
Sender: Andy Dolphin
The general way for nations to move units, supplies, and resources across land
is by rail. This can be handled various ways in Axis Tide.
The most complex (and realistic) is to print rail lines on the map and give
each nation rail units. Each rail unit will act something like a naval unit,
with a carrying capacity that it can use to transport units from one railhead
to another. Rail units would be built and treated just like other ground
units, except of course that they are limited to moving along rail lines. Rail
lines could themselves be subject to attacks by partisans, depending on how we
choose to handle them, as well as bombing attacks.
The first simplification we can make is to eliminate rail units and instead
give each nation a "rail capacity" that can be increased by spending
production. I think this makes sense. Given that locomotives can cross Europe
in days - not months - I think we can safely eliminate clutter on the board by
just giving each alliance a certain amount of rail capacity in each region.
The second simplification we could make is to eliminate rail lines from the
map, and assume that all cities are connected by rail. There is something of a
complex issue underneath this. While rail lines had strategic importance
during the war - many campaigns were fought to secure or cut rail lines - the
cutting of a rail line didn't cut communications and transport in the way that
it would in Axis Tide. So perhaps rather than turning this into a game of
trying to cut rail lines, assuming that transport convoys can travel between
any cities linked by friendly hexes may be the better option.
--
So my question is which of the three options you'd prefer, or if you have other
ideas for handling this.
Date: Mon Sep 20 21:21:36 2004
Sender: Karim Cheaib
I like the first option, since the rail ways were often being targeted by
enemnyplanes, or groung forces. I beleive that the most realistic way, like you
mentioned, is to draw those rails across the map. The enemy will have to
concider one more factor in this war, and it only makes it more realistic
Date: Thu Sep 23 08:00:43 2004
Sender: Phil Bradley
I guess I lean more towards option 2 or 3. If option 1 is used then are we to
be restricted to just the printed rails or will there be the possibility to
build new rail lines? And if so, we will need counters to portray the new
lines.. etc.. etc.. I fear playability will suffer with option 1 even if it is
the most realistic.
Date: Fri Sep 24 17:39:49 2004
Sender: Andy Dolphin
Phil, both options 1 and 2 would involve printed rail lines on the map. I
suppose construction would be necessary, seeing as the limited range of
railways was a major factor in SE Asia and N Africa. You're right that this
would get ugly in a hurry -- perhaps another reason to go with option #3.
Karim, using "virtual" railways rather than printing them on the map won't make
them immune from partisan activity and bombing. In fact, perhaps it's easier
to do it with option 3, where rail capacity can be temporarily decreased by
enemy activity the same way that oil can be.
The bigger question is writing the rules so that rail movement isn't totally
unrealistic under option 3. For the most part, I think that allowing cities to
serve as railheads (as long as a path can be traced between them over land)
should work reasonably well.
For parts of the map where transportation was tough (the middle east, north
Africa, SE Asia), we could simply state that only specific cities (such as
those in Egypt) serve as railheads.
Date: Mon Oct 4 08:25:22 2004
Sender: Stephen Thompson
There are a couple of complex issues here.
The USSR used a different gauge of rail from Western Europe. To this day, if
you try to take a train from, say, Berlin to Moscow, when you reach the former
border between Germany and USSR in Poland, they life the train off the tracks
(with people still inside) and change the wheels under the trains to ones with
a narrower axle.
While Stalin was able to effectively use trains to move troops from the eastern
theater to the West in 1941, there was no way he could have used those same
trains to go all the way to Germany. Neither could Hitler move troops by rail
any closer than the borders of Central Government.
Date: Tue Oct 5 01:30:00 2004
Sender: Andy Dolphin
Well, it's not quite that simple. There were major construction projects --
first by the Germans and then by the Sovieets -- to convert the railroads in
the captured territories to their gauge.
This is something I've seen in a Eastern campaign game, but I'm not sure if we
want to have to deal with this in a global game.
Date: Tue Oct 5 04:53:46 2004
Sender: Stephen Thompson
Well, we're trying to be historically accurate, right? There is a very real
effect on the ability of the nation to supply its troops once they get far away
from trains.
I'm just speculating here, but do you think if the trains had all been the same
gauge (allowing supplies to reach the front much more rapidly) that three
divisions of Germans would have frozen to death outside Moscow in the winter of
41/42 from lack of adequate winter clothing?
Date: Tue Oct 12 01:21:12 2004
Sender: Andy Dolphin
There will always be a tradeoff between realism and playability...
I'd be skeptical of claims that the rail gauge was responsible for the German
collapse in the 1941-1942 winter. The Germans were able to get gas, bullets,
and whatever else to the troops. The problem was that they simply refused to
plan for the winter ahead of time, and made little effort to get winter
supplies to the troops until it was too late.
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