W3C Goals (Little Upsilon)

Though this would probably belong in the suggestions section, I think in this case the theme of the topic transcends the subject.

W3C has long stated that that monetary levels and military forces are unrealistically high in proportion to population. Most of their efforts that get players up in arms are the direct result of attempts to bring down those factors. This has been a continuous process since SC has been around.

What W3C needs to realize are 3 things in my estimation.

1. The use of extra-economic means to reduce game cash are exremely unsatisfactory to players: namely, Enterprise Tax and Financial Fees for game cash levels.
Both represent a form of deus ex machina that are not realistic.
Who is the Enterprise Tax paid to?
A soverneign nation pays fees to banks for having cash reserves?

2. The only means to reduce game cash and profitability in relation to population, while adhering to any noti

Estimation of point 1, Unknown
point 2, incorrect.
point 3, incorrect.

It is possible to train and field more pilots than W3C has players who know the answers. ;)

Dunno Bob, seems to me with incentives you could vastly increase or decrease the number of available pilots or military specialists of any kind.
I agree with your principle line of thought though.

The availability of astronauts (crucial for your space program) would also be another example.

Reducing the number of weapons in general is an old issue.
this applies not only to aircraft but to all weapons.

Today, the numbers are much smaller than they used to be. we had wars with millions of weapons.
we have reduced and want to reduce more.

when we reduced the size of mil. units by 10% there was a lot of shouting. but we want to do so again and again.
this will reduce the cost of war. just smaller numbers of weapons and smaller numbers destroyed in each attack.

this will also reduce shortages.

Your view on this might be correct but in Simcountry, it will be hard to implement while we have good alternatives to achieve the same.

Actually, Tom, that was the point of this conversation: to perhaps come up with some ways to acomplish that goal while adding some realism to the war game.

@CC. I was preparing another one of my Master's theses responses, but I know that you don't need to be spoon fed.

So let me respond with a hypothetical question.

If you were take your average 18 year old British male and train him at football, how long would it take until he was ready to play for Manchester United?

Think your answer through and I believe you will see what I'm getting at.

The same would apply to combat pilots, spec ops troops, divisional commanders, submarine skippers, or any other elite group of warriors.

CC?
Time is exactly what I'm not getting about it. In WWII time was critical ie; America sacrificing bomber crews for German fighter kills, and Japan not using combined forces, then sacrificing pilots.

Time is relative in war, in peace you can train what you want to afford for your airforce, each pilot has to have several mechanics and other support.

In SC you can buy 1 million people and toss them in high quality aircraft. It doesn't seem realistic to tie a limit based on a % of the total pop, when the total can unrealisticly be manipulated.

Combat experience is missing, it should be an added feature rather than a simulated nerf. I would aslo review pay scales for officers, add high level worker officers and re-adjust who supports what unit.

Population limit can be done by adding soldiers and officers to the employment lists (change profesion and priorities) seperating them from workers. This could

Make Soldiers and Officers their own worker groups with their own education priorities?

CC as in Crafty Cockney.

The answer to the hypothetical: an average 18 year old British male could be trained forever and would never be able to play for Manchester United. He simply does not possess the abilities to perform at that level. No amount of training is going to turn him into a professional athlete.

The rest should be self explanatory.

@John: What I was thinking about was an attempt to have military units reflect actual military professions translated into SimCountry terms. The notion that soldiers, marines, airmen, and sailors are low level workers doesn't make sense even in SC.

A LLW would represent what in real life terms?
A worker whose training propably consists of a few hours or days of supervised OJT.
"You want fries with that?"
That isn't meant to be derogatory to those who work is such positions. A person is not their occupation, however, how does the game translate

Synicus, it occurs to me that you probably aren't going to get what I was talking about in regards to pilots, so I'll give you the long version.

Most people do not have the physical and mental attributes to pilot aircraft in combat. Simple fact.

Sure, many more could trained to get off the ground, fly from here to there, and set in down without killing themselves, but that is a far, far cry from being a combat pilot.

The WWII examples I'm using are due to the fact that it was the most documented conflict in which extensive records were kept and then later analyzed by sholars whose findings where publicly published. The trends noted actually continued through later conflicts as well, and were documented and analyzed, but the findings were not so publicly aired.

The shortage of skilled pilots was a major issue for every major combatant in WWII. It not a question of training, but rather some rather umexplainable

How about the Malta's of the world?

How many troops can a nation station on the tiny island of Malta? Apply this to Simcountry.

Population size and armed forces size should have a direct relationship.

Large Population country = Large armed forces potential size

Malta popultation size country = Small size armed forces

Linebacker

What about line of supply? Any ideas in this area?

That's my point, Maestro.

Given any size population, it's only going to have so many of the individuals that have proven to be chokepoints to miltary expansion.

Combat pilots are a huge one, but so are competent senior commanders. Put a crack division under the command of an idiot and its loses effectiveness dramatically.

If you want a really dramatic example of that. Do a little research on Goring's Luftwaffefelddivisionen. They were some of the most lavishly equipped divsions the 3rd Reich ever fielded and disintegrated on contact with regular Soviet forces.

What W3C is doing now in terms of LOSC is interesting, but probably making things more complicated for their servers than they need to be.

Supply units simulate lines of supply and communication and attacking them would theoretically shut down field units, but the time scale is a little off for that to be truly effective. Furthermore, simply creating masses of these units negates that tactic.

It does soak up bodies and move in the direction of getting to that 10-15:1 ratio of support to combat personnel that is a halmark of modern miltaries.

For now, of all the changes the war game is begging for to get up to par with the econ model, supply units are probably one of last things I would change.

They aren't terribly realistic, but a step in the right direction.

I was thinking line of supply on a more global basis. Country to country.

Supplying your troops in an adjacent country vs supply your troops in a country several countries away. Perhaps there should be some kind of morale modifier for distance from home base. (Distance from secure main country)

I look at the German/Soviet campaign in sheer numbers. The Germans and their allies were spread to thin. Their supply lines were spread too thin.

Play Hearts of Iron and see how difficult it is to beat the Soviets.

Ok Maestro. First point.

Getting supplies in theater is by ship or rail( if possible). Once in theater, they move my truck unless we are lucky enough to have rail available.

Trying to supply modern armored forces by air is like trying to kill flies with lawsuits.

That's the real world.

Until/ unless W3C makes some major changes like seaborne invasion, this probably the only supply system we're going to have.

Morale can be factored into a wargame.

Second point.

Yes and no. Yes. That's where the real European part of WWII was fought. No. It wasn't so much a lack of mass or combat power on any particular front. Yes. Those long supply line didn't help the Axis powers, but since Germany captured the Soviet rail system pretty much intact, it wasn't too big of a factor.

The Eastern Front was a complicated situation as there were really three separate campaign

Well, to add to LineBacker's point on supply by rail, look on the bright side.


We already have train tracks, we only need the trains that operate on them.

Glass half full.

lol L6,
The long version proved my point, thanks.

The Malta's of the world, often also have island size economies, just sayin. Hawaii for instance could field more military than an independant island of simular size and population. We have to consider transfers from empires.

L6

Should have taken out Turkey, Iraq, split Iran before the big show. (A 12 month delay)

India would get there independence and Australia would have fallen.

Take Suez from 2 sides.

Saudi Arabia falls to Axis powers.

Great Britian sues for "Bitter Piece"

The world would be a different place today.

You half way re-inforced my point Linebacker. An electrician (high level worker) in general would be more than happy to have his salary, free-time, perks etc doubled or trebled to work on Tornados, radar systems or working 6 months a time at sea, with an ever bigger bonus for being in a combat zone, guaranteed death/injury compensation etc.
This applies from the bottom rung to the top EXCEPT you say there are only a certain percentage of the population that could actually make a combat pilot as opposed to an aviator.
I have to bow to your much greater knowledge and experience in this area. The only thing I would have you consider is that your data and stats come from many years ago. ALOT has changed since then. Fighters are fly-by-wire, focusing the pilots skill set somewhat differently, for example, weaponry is self aiming, point shoot and forget stuff. I'm sure you could make a far longer list than me.

Oh, and dont forget

CC. a solid point about the expansion of females into the pool.

However, as counter-intuitive as it may be, with advance in technology, the demands on the pilot increase, not decrease. The pool is continuously shrinking, not growing.

Crafty, I have to come back to the sports anaolgies. How many Beckhams or players of caliber are there in a given population?

Civilians might thinkt its arrogant to compare underpayed, anonymous servicemen to the rich, elite athletes of the world; however, the numbers of each are comparable.

I completed both the US Army's Ranger Course and Special Forces Q course. However, I know with 100% certainty that I would not have survived SEAL training or the courses to become a resue swimmer. How do I know that? I have learned through my experience that I lack that certain type of stamina to function while hypothermic. That single limitation would have prevented me serving in either role.

At Maestro, the historical What If's are fun theoretical exercises, but we should probably take that discussion to another thread.

Start one, and I'd be happy to trade BS with you.
;:

Dawn of dog fighting, wash out rates of wash outs, civilians in desert war zones...

The intent of the discussion is to rephrase the question: How do we reduce military forces in game to realisticly reflect on population and economics?

Your making progress considering your decloration is now a question. ;)