So, it seems the supply system is going to be changed. Opinions?

Dalwin said:

Yes it would be expensive, especially if fuel is well modelled. In the boardgame which allowed such units to be built, they were expensive, costing almost as much as a panzer division to build. In the desert or during Barbarossa they were worth their weight in gold though.

Click to expand...

I guess what you are proposing is something similar to the Red Ball express:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Ball_Express

Even for the USA (with near unlimted fuel and industrail resources), this was an approach that had severe limitations as the difference from the supply head (port in their case, not rail) increased. On russian roads, it would not be much easier...

Hakon said:

I guess what you are proposing is something similar to the Red Ball express:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Ball_Express

Even for the USA (with near unlimted fuel and industrail resources), this was an approach that had severe limitations as the difference from the supply head (port in their case, not rail) increased. On russian roads, it would not be much easier...

Click to expand...

The Red Ball Express is a bit of an extreme example.

The problem with going to a model that was strictly a certain range out from the railhead is that it is not flexible enough for all situations. That simple model works well more than 90% of the time, but it is good for the players to have some ability to take it further. Such extended supply range should also be less efficient than being within normal range of the railhead.

Also, in these discussions, virtually anywhere the word "railhead" appears, the word "port" can be substituted in the right situation.

geogus said:

My biggest concern is about overseas supply lines.

The way it works now is;

1) U need X (lets say, 10) ships to supply an overseas army.

2)So you have a supply line with 10 convoy ships and u also have spares ships not being used in your pool, lets say 100.

3) U get a mensage informing that 3 supply ships of that route were sunk.

4) the overseas depot receive all the supplies u need. The only effect of the convoy raid is that u lose the sunk ships from your pool. It means that the reerve ships auto replace and auto supply the army

Conclusion: Supply raid does not affect the suppky, only makes the enemy loose ships

The way I think it should work

1) U need X (lets say, 10) ships to supply an overseas army.

2)So you have a supply line with 10 convoy ships and u also have spares ships not being used in your pool, lets say 100.

3) To keep an army fully supplied without the local depot redecues its stockpile u need that 10 ships reach its final destination at the local port at a given amount of time (lets say a month).


4) this means every month the capital depot will send 10 supply ships (or more if u assign more), if some of then are sunk in the way the supplies it was convoying will be lost and that month the overseas depot will receive less supply than its needed (which will make the army be undersupllied for some time or will reduce the stockpile

5) this will force the player to assigne more ships than needed for a supply rout, to assure the minium amount is reached.

Click to expand...

In mechanics rule, I think it should work like that.


The game will tell you the minimun number of ships an overseas depot needs in a given amout of time (I would suggest a month) to keep an army fully suplied.

If the minimun number of supplie ships are assigned for the route, the convoy will depart the port with 100% supply efficiency for that month

Convoy raiding should work reducing the efficiency ot the route for the amount of time (the month)

So if 30% of the ships are sunk in the travel, than the destination port with depot will receive 70% of the original supplies.

If u dont want to micromanage, for each supplie line U could set how many % of the minimum number of ships you want to allocate for the route.

So if an depot needs at least 10 ships monthly, you could set 150% and every month 15 ships would be sent.

This would make the convoy depart the port with 150% supply efficency and if, lets say, 3 ships are sunk in the way 120% of minmun amount of supplies would arrive destination

Dalwin said:

The Red Ball Express is a bit of an extreme example.

The problem with going to a model that was strictly a certain range out from the railhead is that it is not flexible enough for all situations. That simple model works well more than 90% of the time, but it is good for the players to have some ability to take it further. Such extended supply range should also be less efficient than being within normal range of the railhead.

Also, in these discussions, virtually anywhere the word "railhead" appears, the word "port" can be substituted in the right situation.

Click to expand...

I guess that a continuation of the HOI 3 system (from the railhead/port) would make the supply range depend on infrastructure, weather and terrain.
B
Beyond that, I have the same hope that you do, ie that the player will have some way to increase the supply range. The Red Ball Express is an example of an organization that allows this, and the organic supply battalions of the German panzer divisions is another example.

In any case, during WW2, the range increase provided by such measures would be limited. In the case of operation Barbarossa, I feel that the appropriate response from German high command would be to plan on somewhat less deep penetrations, and instead focus on destroying or the red army.

Hakon said:

I guess that a continuation of the HOI 3 system (from the railhead/port) would make the supply range depend on infrastructure, weather and terrain.
B
Beyond that, I have the same hope that you do, ie that the player will have some way to increase the supply range. The Red Ball Express is an example of an organization that allows this, and the organic supply battalions of the German panzer divisions is another example.

In any case, during WW2, the range increase provided by such measures would be limited. In the case of operation Barbarossa, I feel that the appropriate response from German high command would be to plan on somewhat less deep penetrations, and instead focus on destroying or the red army.

Click to expand...

I fully agree with those points. I am drawing my vision of what I'd like to see from both SPI's WiE (or WitE) and Grigsby's WitE. In both cases you were only allowed one range extender between the railhead and units (this limit applied to the Russian front. you could chain them together in Africa), effectively doubling the max distance from railhead, but no more. Even with that extension (since both games model similarly the rate at which Soviet rail could be converted) it was easy to outrun your supplies by October or November during Barbarossa.

I have always treated those such that I would only make limited lunges beyond my supply range to form encirclements but would not go for maximum penetration. This is reinforced by the fact that both of those games had fairly brutal winter attrition rules.

I'm not sure about the idea of the "railhead."

I don't think the game should be so micro that we're modelling the locations of switchbacks and spur lines so trains can pass. In that case, anywhere where there is a railroad, there is a railhead, for all intents and purposes. The trick becomes what happens when supply has to transition to the regular infra?

There also needs to be a more diffuse supply model, than "everything comes from the capital." Some of that has to be produced and come from the IC directly. I worry because Japan should be able to take China's rails, which will put the Chinese army off of the rails, which will make it difficult for China to supply (which is fine) but it shouldn't be so difficult that the Chinese army just starves in the absence of Japanese offensives.

That said... if they get the size and equipment disparity between Japanese and Chinese divisions right, then the smaller logistical footprint should make it easier for Chinese divisions to stay in the hinterland without starving.

A simpler but elegant system would be to have the actual supply and the throughput + army logistics separately.

Have a Supply and Fuel level and a Throughput. Each have a scale of 1 to 5 (to simplify the explanation, could be anything):

Level 1 - Critically low supply or really damaged/low supply line
Level 3 - Enough supply, 100% throughput on supply line
Level 5 - Ample stockpile or lots of spare capacity on supply line

We have the usual 10 levels of Infrastructure, but also 3 levels of Railroad.

Throughput of a province is equal to either (Infra / 2) - 1 + Modifiers OR (Rail * 2) + Modifiers (each max 5, round up)

Modifiers could be Occupied Province -1, strike -1, bombed -2, etc.

Each province has a throughput, but only some elements have an actual Supply/Fuel value, lets call them Consumers: Your capital, ports and every tiers of your military org (from theater to corps and divisions).

The capital is a special case, it's Supply and Fuel value is dependant on sliders/resources (or any other system they end up using) and it's effect will trickle down to everything else. Also, this is the only area where the actual number of supply units produced is important. For example, if your whole army consumes 9012.56 unit of supply, you need to produce that at the capital to get Level 3 of Supply. If you produce more you can get to Level 4 and 5, if less you drop to 2 and 1.

For the rest of consumer, it's the best route to another consumer/capital with the maximum throughput possible OR the Supply/Fuel level of that consumer, whichever is lowest, that determines the Supply/Fuel level.

Then, you have the "decay" of "stockpiling". Each consumer has it's current Supply/Fuel level, but if the route's throughput changes (new construction, conquest or loss of territory, etc.), then it will slowly increase or decrease to the new value.

For example, You have a port that is linked to the capital with a route with a throughput of 4. The capital is fully producing at 5, so the Port has a Supply of 4. If you upgrade the railroad and get a throughput of 5, it will take a couple of weeks/month for the Port to get to Supply 5. If then the path is blocked because of conquest, it will slowly drop to 4, then 3, then 3, then 1 unless the link is re-established.

Remote ports are similar, but you need enough convoy ships to have a specific throughput levels between ports.

The speed of stockpiling/decay is dependant on 3 things:
- The current level and the new one it will change to (from 4 to 5 for example), so going from 1 to 3 is fast, but 3 to 5 is slower for example.
- The consumer type. Ports and Theaters takes longer to stockpile and decay than divisions/corps.
- Distance to command HQ. If a division gets too far from it's corps HQ, it will lose levels faster.

This mixes the logistics of your army positioning (where you put your AG and Army will affect supply), stockpiling (without actually stockpiling numbers) and supply lines without having to manage a lot of this - no need to create "depots", no need to manage specific amount of supply units (except producing enough at capital), and individual provinces do not have a Supply or Fuel value, only a throughput.

You can raid supply lines (land or sea) and reduce the throughput temporarily or permanently. If an island's port loses it's convoy route, it will slowly decay depending on current level, so your troops can survive for a while. This means that, before an invasion, you need to make sure your ports, army and such are at their max Supply/Fuel level, if not you might have supply issued during your campaign, so the decision to wait for supply stockpile or not is still present. (ie Barbarossa)

This would be simple but elegant, lots of places to put modifiers and special options. No need to figure out that the divisions on a province consumes 75.3 supply and you only have 54.6 present, etc. No need for depots or setting lines manually (they are always reworked depending on avail throughput), etc. You can then build railroads to the front and put your AG/Army HQ at the end of the line for supply and command to maximize throughput/stockpiling.

You could even make it so that Corps/Division levels do not use infrastructure/railroad, but only distance to Army/Corps HQ to determine supply/fuel, weather and terrain could also affect stuff, and many more.

Porkman said:

I'm not sure about the idea of the "railhead."

I don't think the game should be so micro that we're modelling the locations of switchbacks and spur lines so trains can pass. In that case, anywhere where there is a railroad, there is a railhead, for all intents and purposes. The trick becomes what happens when supply has to transition to the regular infra?

Click to expand...

If rail capacity is infinite, I don't think we need any modelling of the "railhead". Any point where supplies leave the rail network would be the rail head in this case. If the capacity is finite, then one should have som kind of depot at the rail head (or keep letting individual units carry weeks of supplies, like they did in HoI 3).

There also needs to be a more diffuse supply model, than "everything comes from the capital." Some of that has to be produced and come from the IC directly. I worry because Japan should be able to take China's rails, which will put the Chinese army off of the rails, which will make it difficult for China to supply (which is fine) but it shouldn't be so difficult that the Chinese army just starves in the absence of Japanese offensives.

Click to expand...

Again, with infinite railway throughput, I imagine that each rail network will be treated like a separate "continent" in HoI 3 terms, ie have its own stockpile. Since you are free to transfer any amount of supplies within the rail network, the exact location of that stockpile is of no importance (until captured by the enemy). If your rail network is cut in 2, then each part of the network will build up its own stockpile. If one part of the network has consumption exceed production, the AI will try to transfer supply using any logistics network available, or by setting up convoys.

For instance, supplies produced in Indian factories should go directly to the Indian depot, not be sent to London.

I love all the discussions on supply, needing rail, and overseas supply. I would like to see rail/road system implemented and some way of building up supply for an upcoming operation. Overall Paradox if you think this is too complicated or dont have the resources please make sure the community can mod this type of thing. But I think it would be better if it was included from the start.

Hakon said:

If rail capacity is infinite, I don't think we need any modelling of the "railhead". Any point where supplies leave the rail network would be the rail head in this case. If the capacity is finite, then one should have som kind of depot at the rail head (or keep letting individual units carry weeks of supplies, like they did in HoI 3).



Again, with infinite railway throughput, I imagine that each rail network will be treated like a separate "continent" in HoI 3 terms, ie have its own stockpile. Since you are free to transfer any amount of supplies within the rail network, the exact location of that stockpile is of no importance (until captured by the enemy). If your rail network is cut in 2, then each part of the network will build up its own stockpile. If one part of the network has consumption exceed production, the AI will try to transfer supply using any logistics network available, or by setting up convoys.

For instance, supplies produced in Indian factories should go directly to the Indian depot, not be sent to London.

Click to expand...

I think your concept of what the railhead is differs from mine. I am not concerned with some big depot at the end of the rail line or even tracking how many supplies are there. When I say railhead I am referring to the end of the line, the furthest point at which you have functional rail. This can easily be a substantial distance behind the front lines, especially if a decent model for repairing and converting rail is included.

Dalwin said:

I think your concept of what the railhead is differs from mine. I am not concerned with some big depot at the end of the rail line or even tracking how many supplies are there. When I say railhead I am referring to the end of the line, the furthest point at which you have functional rail. This can easily be a substantial distance behind the front lines, especially if a decent model for repairing and converting rail is included.

Click to expand...

I think we have similar concepts, as long as the capacity of rail is infinite. Only when the capacity is finite do I think depots are needed (to allow offensives to happen in bursts, and to make sure that rail capacity is not wasted too much, sending supply back and forth to the capital).

Hakon said:

I think we have similar concepts, as long as the capacity of rail is infinite. Only when the capacity is finite do I think depots are needed (to allow offensives to happen in bursts, and to make sure that rail capacity is not wasted too much, sending supply back and forth to the capital).

Click to expand...

OK I get what you are saying now. This shorter version of it was easier to follow.

The supply system was a mess and could be easily just ignored with air supply.

Searry said:

The supply system was a mess and could be easily just ignored with air supply.

Click to expand...

And this just proved how messed up it was. I actually consider it to be less realistic than turning it off altogether, playing arcade mode. All it did was to add difficulty, but it did so in a way that did not resemble the historical challenges at all. A fleet of transport aircraft should NOT be needed (or able) to replace rail in Germany/France/Poland.

Porkman said:

This was my biggest issue when podcat made a comment about how infra levels 1-7 are roads and 8-10 are rails. The Japanese built a railroad that ran from Bangkok to Rangoon in the span of one year. The game can't have Japan building 8 levels of infrastructure across 5 provinces in that span of time and the final result is ridiculous since it would equate the infrastructure on the Burmese coast with that of Marseilles or something.

But with a separate road and rail system, that railroad is easily modelled by having Japan build a level 1 rail across that distance.

It would really highlight the difficulty in fighting in places like Africa where the rails went from the interior to the coast but tended not to connect to one another. For example, if I'm Italy and I want to hold onto Ethiopia then I'm probably going to want to put rails that lead to where it borders British possessions. Similarly, I'd want to do that for an easier time in North Africa.

It's kind of tragic, but except for South Africa, the rail network in Africa is pretty much the same as it was pre decolonization.

Click to expand...

I think you’ve hit on something very important here. In HoI, “railroads” are part of the infrastructure. This, IMO, doesn’t actually represent them very well. Your example for Africa is good, but let’s take a closer look at North Africa. Along the coast there was an almost continuous rail system, indicative in HoI of a relatively high infrastructure and implying (as you compare the Burmese jungle with Marseilles) a fairly high level of development when, in actual fact there was nothing else in the province. Nothing at all. Maybe a few fishing villages but otherwise nothing to justify an infrastructure above, perhaps 2.

Hakon said:

…
This should be the same in the game. Where rail networks are operational, their capacity should simply be sufficient (at least most of the time), and the pain for the player (and AI) should start when the troops were operating so far from the rail head that they start to run low on supplies.

Click to expand...

Certainly, supplying troops in North Africa wasn’t a problem with the rails. It was a problem getting supplies through the very limited ports available. A level 2 rail link may be easily capable of carrying everything you can put through a level 4 port, for example.

So my thoughts on this would be to split railways out of infrastructure altogether. A railway line doesn’t help you repair aircraft, it doesn’t help you regain org, the only thing it lets you do is move stuff about.

So… perhaps… a rail line in a province would allow triple the movement rate for supplies. Instead of moving one province per day, they move three. How many supplies would, of course, depend upon the “level” of rail development.

For troops, you could also move three provinces per day (or maybe only one would be overkill!) but… it’s a strategic re-deployment so, you both travel and arrive, with a severe Org penalty (as well as an Attack Delay) & near zero supplies.

As for the difficulties imposed by the “quirks” of the supply system. I actually liked that my well-laid plans would get screwed-up through no fault of my own. Granted, it would have been better if they’d been screwed-up by my enemy AIs but still. Shit happens and although it wasn’t representative of the cause or type of logistical problems, it was representative that there were logistical problems.

Obviously, I would like PDS to come up with an even "better" supply system that reflects the historical problems more clearly. Just as I'd like PDS to come up with an AI that isn't so dumb. Not necasarily in that order.

I think the top three "please can we haves" are improved supply system, improved naval system & improved AI. They already know this and I'm 100% sure it's something they want to do too. I can envisage many brainstorming sessions in the coming months (and past months) within podcat's team.

Hopefully someone in here will come up with something PDS hasn't already thought of or PDS has already thought of something brilliant.

All we can really do is wait and see.

Hopefully supply via Allies in Allied territory will be addressed. Right now in HOI3 games I find (as the US) that the other Allies never
try and upgrade or build new facilities (airbases or ports) so I have to 'tag' changeowner of a province and make it US (coastal or ports)
and then turn them into a real US type port by building up all the facilities for my Navy and Air Forces. Otherwise many of my battles
would be incredibly nerfed. I found that doing this in early 1942 in S. England (3 coastal provinces) and making a SHAEF HQ there and
then start assigning it bombers it will supply itself and conduct strategic warfare on Germany and also, when supplied with ground troops
and TRs move them over and prepare for a future invasion without having to control it myself. In past games any theatre like a SHAEF
will no do much of anything. Also you can die in France if you don't set up properly and France is reinstated instead and you will die of
supply shortages as elsewere.

Big Nev said:

I think you’ve hit on something very important here. In HoI, “railroads” are part of the infrastructure. This, IMO, doesn’t actually represent them very well. Your example for Africa is good, but let’s take a closer look at North Africa. Along the coast there was an almost continuous rail system, indicative in HoI of a relatively high infrastructure and implying (as you compare the Burmese jungle with Marseilles) a fairly high level of development when, in actual fact there was nothing else in the province. Nothing at all. Maybe a few fishing villages but otherwise nothing to justify an infrastructure above, perhaps 2.

Click to expand...

You're grasping the basic problem with infrastructure as it is modelled now. "All developed areas had railroads" is not the same as "All areas with railroads were developed."

The original proposal from the first of these threads was very specific.

Railroads help with supply speed, supply capacity, and speed of strategic redeployment.

Roads help a little with those things, but help tactical movement speed and partisan suppression a lot.



For rails, let's say that each level adds it's
+100% to supply capacity/throughput (The amount of supplies that can flow over the rails),
+25% to strategic movement speed, (the speed divisions move when strategically redeploying,
+25% to supply speed (the speed that supplies travel over the rails.)

Make it so there is level 0 to 4.

Next, roads. They help a little bit with everything. So each level would be
+20% to supply capacity,
+10% to strategic movement speed,
+5% to supply speed,
+15% to tactical movement speed (the speed divisions move and attack at),
+10% to partisan suppression. (representing the difficulty of fighting guerillas when it's hard to get from place to place to place.
Roads would have maybe 0 to 6 levels.

I know that sounds complex but it would work very simply in practice and result in a single set of values for each province.

So let's say that Pskov has level 2 rails and and level 3 roads.

So the level 2 railroad gives it

2 x 100% = +200% supply capacity,
2 x 25% = +50% strategic movement speed,
2 x 25% = +50% to supply speed.

It also has level 3 roads, the roads add
3 x 20% = +60% to supply capacity,
3 x 10% = +30% to strategic movement speed,
3 x 5% = +15% to supply speed,
3 x 15% = +45% to tactical movement
3 x 10% = +30% to suppression.

Now both kinds of infra combined result in single set of values like so,
(Effect from rails) + (effect from roads) = (net modifiers for the province)

In this case, Pskov has

200% + 60% = +260% supply capacity,
50% + 30% = +80% strat movement speed,
50% + 15% = +65% supply speed,
0% + 45% = +45% tactical movement speed,
0% + 30% = +30% suppression.

These are all single values according to the game.

The next day it gets muddy. Mud reduces the effect of roads by half and of rails by 10%. (How much could be based on level of the infra as well, representing that Autobahns are less vulnerable to weather than dirt roads. But the important thing is that roads are affected more)

So the new values of the rails under mud which reduces them by 10%.

(.9 from mud) x 2 x 100% = +180% supply capacity,
(.9 from mud) x 2 x 25% = +45% strategic movement speed,
(.9 from mud) x 2 x 25% = +45% to supply speed.
You can see that they are only affected a little.

The roads, on the other hand are reduced by half. So that becomes.

(.5 from mud) x 3 x 20% = 30% supply capacity
(.5 from mud) x 3 x 10% = 15% strategic movement speed.
(.5 from mud) x 3 x 5% = 7.5% supply speed
(.5 from mud) x 3 x 15% = 22.5% tactical movement speed
(.5 from mud) x 3 x 10% = 15% suppression.

Now let's see the combined values again. When it's muddy Pskov would have

180 + 30 = 210% supply capacity
45 + 15 = 60% strategic movement speed.
45 + 7.5 = 52.5% supply speed
0 + 22.5 = 22.5% tactical movement speed.
0 + 15% = 15% suppression

This will allow for weather to slow down tactical operations but without hurting supply too much. It will make it so there are tradeoffs to fighting on terrain and building different kinds of infrastructure. It very clearly shows the difference between a railway in France and one in Vietnam. It's also easy to understand. If rails are shown on the map, then supply bottlenecks will be easy to find.

^ Make it so! ^

This would quite literally add a layer to the game, to where before, there was just a line.

Porkman said:

You're grasping the basic problem with infrastructure as it is modelled now. "All developed areas had railroads" is not the same as "All areas with railroads were developed."

The original proposal from the first of these threads was very specific.

Railroads help with supply speed, supply capacity, and speed of strategic redeployment.

Roads help a little with those things, but help tactical movement speed and partisan suppression a lot.



For rails, let's say that each level adds it's
+100% to supply capacity/throughput (The amount of supplies that can flow over the rails),
+25% to strategic movement speed, (the speed divisions move when strategically redeploying,
+25% to supply speed (the speed that supplies travel over the rails.)

Make it so there is level 0 to 4.

Next, roads. They help a little bit with everything. So each level would be
+20% to supply capacity,
+10% to strategic movement speed,
+5% to supply speed,
+15% to tactical movement speed (the speed divisions move and attack at),
+10% to partisan suppression. (representing the difficulty of fighting guerillas when it's hard to get from place to place to place.
Roads would have maybe 0 to 6 levels.

I know that sounds complex but it would work very simply in practice and result in a single set of values for each province.

So let's say that Pskov has level 2 rails and and level 3 roads.

So the level 2 railroad gives it

2 x 100% = +200% supply capacity,
2 x 25% = +50% strategic movement speed,
2 x 25% = +50% to supply speed.

It also has level 3 roads, the roads add
3 x 20% = +60% to supply capacity,
3 x 10% = +30% to strategic movement speed,
3 x 5% = +15% to supply speed,
3 x 15% = +45% to tactical movement
3 x 10% = +30% to suppression.

Now both kinds of infra combined result in single set of values like so,
(Effect from rails) + (effect from roads) = (net modifiers for the province)

In this case, Pskov has

200% + 60% = +260% supply capacity,
50% + 30% = +80% strat movement speed,
50% + 15% = +65% supply speed,
0% + 45% = +45% tactical movement speed,
0% + 30% = +30% suppression.

These are all single values according to the game.

The next day it gets muddy. Mud reduces the effect of roads by half and of rails by 10%. (How much could be based on level of the infra as well, representing that Autobahns are less vulnerable to weather than dirt roads. But the important thing is that roads are affected more)

So the new values of the rails under mud which reduces them by 10%.

(.9 from mud) x 2 x 100% = +180% supply capacity,
(.9 from mud) x 2 x 25% = +45% strategic movement speed,
(.9 from mud) x 2 x 25% = +45% to supply speed.
You can see that they are only affected a little.

The roads, on the other hand are reduced by half. So that becomes.

(.5 from mud) x 3 x 20% = 30% supply capacity
(.5 from mud) x 3 x 10% = 15% strategic movement speed.
(.5 from mud) x 3 x 5% = 7.5% supply speed
(.5 from mud) x 3 x 15% = 22.5% tactical movement speed
(.5 from mud) x 3 x 10% = 15% suppression.

Now let's see the combined values again. When it's muddy Pskov would have

180 + 30 = 210% supply capacity
45 + 15 = 60% strategic movement speed.
45 + 7.5 = 52.5% supply speed
0 + 22.5 = 22.5% tactical movement speed.
0 + 15% = 15% suppression

This will allow for weather to slow down tactical operations but without hurting supply too much. It will make it so there are tradeoffs to fighting on terrain and building different kinds of infrastructure. It very clearly shows the difference between a railway in France and one in Vietnam. It's also easy to understand. If rails are shown on the map, then supply bottlenecks will be easy to find.

Click to expand...

Impressive suggestion, nice work. It makes the whole rail vs infrastructure debate more understandable.
I've always been open to gameplay enhancing suggestions, and have kept an eye on the "2 types of infra" threads. Unfortunately, I don't see the value in the implementation effort (PDS man-hours).

For me it seems like a lot of work to add detail that is not vital to gameplay. The effects of one type of bundled "infrastructure" vs what you propose is not that different from what we have in HoI3.
For the most part, your suggestion's gameplay effects would not be much different from the existing ones. Supply is relatively immune to terrain/weather penalties, where movement speed is not.

Good supply throughput, especially in controlled provinces, requires high infrastructure in HoI3. This is representative of the need for a road network to disperse supplies once rail has delivered them.

You add in suppression, but I'm not convinced that having more infrastructure necessarily imparts the occupier with an advantage, as that would be shared by the partisans. More roads and rails also provide partisans with a target rich environment.

Your suggestion also involves double or many times more calculations per province, per day. Right now there is a blanket penalty for weather effects against movement speed. Your suggestion seems to require 3 calculations for rail and 5 for road levels to impart the penalty per weather effect.

Granted, certain rail lines are given infrastructure levels that do not make sense. If there is only a rail line and no roads spanning a continent, for example, then those provinces are misrepresented. But for those few instances, I'd rather see a terrain type, like "wasteland" or something, that gives terrible movement speed penalties.

Bullfrog said:

Impressive suggestion, nice work. It makes the whole rail vs infrastructure debate more understandable.
I've always been open to gameplay enhancing suggestions, and have kept an eye on the "2 types of infra" threads. Unfortunately, I don't see the value in the implementation effort (PDS man-hours).

For me it seems like a lot of work to add detail that is not vital to gameplay. The effects of one type of bundled "infrastructure" vs what you propose is not that different from what we have in HoI3.
For the most part, your suggestion's gameplay effects would not be much different from the existing ones. Supply is relatively immune to terrain/weather penalties, where movement speed is not.

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Two things, 1) supply shouldn't be immune to terrain or weather penalties unless it's moving along rails. If my supplies are moving effortlessly through Burma, even though I don't control the North South railway, that's a problem.

2) movement speed and strategic movement speed should be different. Strategic movement should be fast and not affected very much by weather (if done on rails), tactical/combat movement should depend on the road network.

Right now, no separation.

Good supply throughput, especially in controlled provinces, requires high infrastructure in HoI3. This is representative of the need for a road network to disperse supplies once rail has delivered them.

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But supply thoughput shouldn't require good infra beyond the rails. The infra beyond the rails is really only important for supplies once you get off the rails and are delivering them to the divisions. The transsiberian had very little infra along most of it's length but they still put together a massive force for the invasion of Manchuria. They were able to get away with that because they kept that concentration on the rail network and barely moved it off.

You add in suppression, but I'm not convinced that having more infrastructure necessarily imparts the occupier with an advantage, as that would be shared by the partisans. More roads and rails also provide partisans with a target rich environment.

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Look at the history of partisans and successful partisans during the WW2 period. Did we have successful partisans in the flat fields of France and Holland with their orderly roads and easy to get to towns? No. (we have a covert resistance, but that's different) We had partisans in marshes, in mountains, in the Chinese countryside, where a boy from the village could easily outrun the vehicles of the occupying forces, because they had to go across terrible intervening terrain with no roads. You could suppress one town, but it would take two days to even get to the next town 10 miles to the west. Partisans and infrastructure were inversely proportional during WW2.

Your suggestion also involves double or many times more calculations per province, per day. Right now there is a blanket penalty for weather effects against movement speed. Your suggestion seems to require 3 calculations for rail and 5 for road levels to impart the penalty per weather effect.

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Weather should affect more than movement speed and battlefield combat. HOI3 is 5 years old now. Your computer should be able to handle double the calculations.

Granted, certain rail lines are given infrastructure levels that do not make sense. If there is only a rail line and no roads spanning a continent, for example, then those provinces are misrepresented. But for those few instances, I'd rather see a terrain type, like "wasteland" or something, that gives terrible movement speed penalties.

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But those terrain pieces weren't wasteland. North Africa with just rails is a desert, which makes it different from the steppe parts of russia that just had rails, which are different from the jungles of IndoChina and Burma which just had rails, which are different from the flood plains and rocky hills of China which just had rails. If we just had generic "wasteland," my tanks fighting in North African desert would be just as effective fighting in Burmese jungles (provided that both got the proposed wasteland fix.)

Last, the lack of rails breaks the Eastern Front a little bit.

Take something like the Battle of Smolensk. In the game, German players can just bypass and surround major Russian cities for months at a time. They never have a real impetus to go through them.

This is partly because there's no rail system. For example, if I'm the Germans approaching Smolensk from the west, I decide not to attack the city directly and instead go for the surround as historical.

First problem, it takes a lot more troops to surround a city then attack directly.

So what would be an attack front of 4 miles on the west becomes a circle with a radius of 5 miles around the city. That means, as the attacker, I have to man a front that is now 5 miles x 2π = 31 miles long around the city. Since this is the frontline, the eastern hemsisphere of that circle not only has to be strong facing towards Smolensk, but also outward facing East. So now I have 40,000 troops East of the city, some facing west to keep the troops in the city from breaking out, some facing East to keep the rest of the Soviets from attacking into and relieving the city.

But those 40,000 troops need supplies... If I can cut off the troops inside the city, and defeat the forces immediately East pretty quickly, then I have no problems. If it lasts, however, the rails I need to ship supplies to the surrounding forces all run through the center of Smolensk. So my bold move to cut off the supplies to Smolensk is could be successful, but, by bypassing the city, I've made it so fuel, food, and ammunition has no way to get to my forces.

This is a risk that's not present in the game since all of the Soviet Union is pretty much the same infra level. You can drive around and concentrate forces however you want and whether or not they become out of supply is due to vagaries of the engine, not something you can pinpoint on the map.

There's a reason that the Germans attacked cities even knowing how bad urban warfare was.