In TEN #9 the following questions were presented for discussion:

• How do you presently assess the play balance of Scorched Earth? Between "equal" teams, which side do you believe will win the game most frequently?
• What should the "historical" play balance be? That is, what percentage of games should result in a Soviet or a German victory?
• Which side won those SE games you have seen played to a reasonable conclusion? Were the two sides in these games "balanced"?
• In games you have seen, what were the Soviet ground losses for the two Jun II 41 turns? What were the results of the Surprise Air Attack?
• In games you have observed what were the average per-turn losses for each side? What was the mix of combat odds utilized? How were the air forces used? Have you ever compared the actual forces in an ongoing SE game to those Usted in the 1942 Scenario upon reaching Apr 1 42?
• Are house rules employed by your group? If so, is this done for play balance purposes?

Here is a sampling of the results, chosen from the large number of responses.

Charles Meyer

My observations of SE are based on not having played with the new railroad engineer rules (from TEN #7) and I realize that many German supply problems are thus eliminated, but for my two cents... I believe the "correct" chance for a German game victory provided "equal" play is less than 5%. In reality, there was no chance.

On the Jun II turn, Soviet losses in our games average about 150 isolated and 250 unisolated. The Soviet air usually suffers a 40-50% reduction. Thereafter, Soviet losses run about 125 points per turn until the beginning of winter. The losses then drop to around 60 points per turn. The German losses go from about 20 per turn through July up to 100 per turn in the winter. The normal mix of odds used for German attacks range from 7:1 at the beginning to 4:1 in November (lower with modifiers). The Soviets can afford to attack at 3:1 after July. Losses are very painful at first, but it helps in the long run. Soviet odds will only increase until they hit 6:1.

On the Jun II regular turn, the German air usually hits the marshalling yards to paralyze the Soviets. It is very effective. The Germans primarily use their air for offensive ground support, while the Soviets use offensive and defensive support depending on the situation. The Germans also bomb Soviet rail to seal certain sectors. The Soviets use their long-range bombers to bomb unprotected German bombers and aborted fighters and bombers.

The only house rules we use are strongest unit on top, odds rounding, and we refuse to use slime. (Editor's Note: Charles considers cutting supply lines with anything other than a division slimy.) Otherwise, we play by the standard rules. When played to a "reasonable" conclusion, the Soviets have won every game. When comparing our games to the 1942 Scenario OB, the Soviets are slightly stronger and the Germans much weaker.

I have talked extensively with groups from New York, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Rochester, Eau Claire, Chicago, and Washington and they pretty much concur that experienced Soviets will almost always win.

Roy Lane

The following casualties are from a recent game of FitE/SE/TU in which the Soviets employed a forward defense: The Soviets lost 135 during the the special invasion turn and 212 in the regular Jun II 41 turn. German losses for both the above totalled 73. In the ensuing turns the following losses were incurred, expressed as a ratio of Soviet losses to German losses: Jul 239:105; Jul II: 240:81; Aug 178:85. This comes to a total of 1004:344 which equals a German Kill Ratio of 2.92:1.

The above game ended on Sep I 41 turn, with the German side quitting from demoralization. The game ended too soon to really judge whether the Soviets can pull off a forward defense strategy with such losses and still survive. However, I do believe The Urals has redressed the play balance somewhat toward the Soviet side in this regard. I am presently testing the same strategy against different German opponents.

Editor's Note: We hope to publish Roy's forward defense deployment for the Soviets in a future issue.

Here are my overall impressions on SE play balance based on repeated playing over several years: I think the German side will win if they are the more experienced team, and Axis teams have won more than they have lost in the games I've seen. The Soviets typically lose between 350-400 strength points in the combined Jun II turns. The average Soviet losses per turn thereafter run around 175 per turn, and the Axis 75. The Soviets attack most often at 4:1 and 5:1, while the German odds range from 4:1 to 7:1. 1 dislike playing with house rules, preferring to play the game as the designer intended.

Phil Pomerantz

The Germans could not have defeated the Russians in the real event, even with better industrial organization and more coordinated and less lunatic leadership. Let's not forget that the Russians stopped the Germans in 1941 despite making as many, if not more, serious errors than the Germans did. If we assume perfect play on both sides in the real war, I think the margin of defeat would be even greater than historically.

Therefore, a game that would give each side an even chance of victory must slant the rules against the Russians. Any game which allows the Soviets their historical chance for success must handicap the Germans more than they are now, probably in their ability to attack in poor weather and their ability to supply their armies.

Peter Robbins

Editor's note: Peter penned this at the conclusion of a particularly hardfought postal campaign, in which he played the role of the Axis Finnish/Arctic commander with great flair.

Victory! The Government of Finland has decreed three days of official celebrations, in which church bells will be rung from the Gulf of Viipuri to the Arctic coast. The lost territories, particularly Karelia, will be opened up for resettlement, and reparations will be demanded of the Soviet Government. The victorious troops return, greeted by a joyous populace. For once, they really have been brought "home by Christmas."

So, history could have been different. With the benefit of hindsight, a good German team could have beaten a not-quite--solucky Soviet team.

However, there was an important difference in 1941: the Soviet Government, from Stalin to the lowest commissar, knew that life under the Nazis would not have been pleasant. If the Germans would have been satisfied with the territory already occupied by the winter of '41, a negotiated peace might have been possible, as in our postal game.

But given the situation in 1941, neither side could have believed that Hitler would have been content with that. A prostrate Soviet Union would have been forced to supply raw materials to Germany, oil in particular. The collapse of the Soviet Army might have allowed several republics to break with Stalin, and these republics would have gravitated into the Axis orbit in all likelihood. The rump of the Soviet Union would probably have dissolved into a second civil war, and it would have proven an irresistible temptation for Hitler to occupy more and more of the pieces. This was, of course, Hitler's hope at the beginning of "Barbarossa."

Until the events of the past six months, the suggestion that the Soviet Union might have disintegrated in 1941 was not taken very seriously. In retrospect, Hitler may have been very close to the mark. What he did fail to foresee was the determination of soldiers, civilians, and governments to resist when resistance seemed futile - if the alternative was worse. When a game ends, no one is shot. No hostages are handed over, and no one is deported to labour camps.

So, wargames are more easily ended than wars. Defeat is written in cardboard and paper, not in smoke and blood. With a game, we pack up the cardboard. In a war, the defeated dictator would have been shot: if not by one side, then by the other. Knowing this, there would have been no surrender.

Ralf Schulz

FitE play balance was tremendously biased in favor of the Russians. I have only played the revised version, SE, several times due to the length of the game, but

I find the current balance much truer to life. I read complaints that the German player now wins easily, but I don't see this .happening. Perhaps the quality of opponent playing the Russian side is lower? In my most recent game I have been unable to repeat the actual German achievements despite more than my share of help from my opponent and fewer than usual errors on my part.

My games always take the same strategic shape: First resistance crystallizes before Leningrad in the good defensive terrain there. Then the front spreads southward to the Valdai Hills to cover the Leningrad-Moscow RR. Then MoscowTula are covered. In old games of FitE I didn't capture Kiev until late in the mud season, sometimes winter. Now I take Kiev in summer and cross the Dnieper only to peter out before the Kharkov-Zaporozhe line.

After tough fighting in the winter I attain the line LeningradKharkov-Stalino, but Leningrad is never captured without prohibitive German losses. Never, in any game have I cut off Leningrad or captured Rostov as the real Germans did. On the other hand, the Germans never suffer the defeats the real ones did during the winter. During the summer of 1942, the north and the center are so heavily held that the only strategic advance possible is in the south. This is true to life. Now, on to the specific questions raised in TEN #9:

Given the game conditions (i. e. full German knowledge of Soviet strength, which restrains them from overextending as their historical counterparts did), I think about 60% of games should end in German victory. I have never played a game to 1944 completion, so don't have a feel for what the victory point total would be.

For Jun II 41 the Soviets lose about 250 factors; this then drops to 130-150 from then on unless the Soviets attack strongly. Combat odds for the German side are generally 7:1 +11, with 3:1 +3 or 5-1 +1 for surrounded units. Important attacks are made as low as 5:1. Minimum is 3:1. Russians take what they can get, usually no more than 5:1. 1 have seen 1.51 +3 successfully used. An "EX" is a victory for the Soviets, so this is satisfactory as a result. Air is used primarily as attack support. Ship attack is the #2 use. Generally the Apr II 42 turn finds the German slightly stronger than the reality and the Russian weaker. We follow only the official rules without partisans.

As a final note, in playing these games, my aim is not play balance, but historical fidelity. The game rules should not be altered for play balance, but only to address simulation flaws.

Dary Grumbein

Mike Mullinax and I are currently playing two games at the same time. In one he is the Axis, in the other, I am. We did this so we could examine more options in a shorter length of time. We both make the Axis move at the same time, then switch to the Russians. We discuss various strategies and thus learn more about both sides.

Until recently we had played about 6 or 7 games, but never got past Dec 41 before restarting. Each time we got farther as the Germans, but never felt we had progressed enough to pull out a win. I started grumbling about the system and was becoming frustrated with it. In our current games we are still trying to win with the Germans, using standard rules. I remember in the old DNO it took 6 or 7 games until we learned how to win with the Russians, so maybe the reverse will prove out here.

I've seen several articles on FitE/ SE but most hardly mention 1942, and later years not at all. From this I've made one last assumption: not many people have played a game from 1941 until the end of 1944.

Editor's Note: The above two games are on-going and reports are being submitted. The results will be presented in a "Campaign Report" in a future issue. This snippet is included to highlight the approach taken, which is an excellent means of evaluating play balance. Dary's other comments above are also central to proper evaluation of SE.

Jay Kaufman

Any comparison of German chances for victory in the USSR to those of the Poles, French, or Yugoslavs is well off the mark, and certainly dismissing them altogether is wildly over-bold. The Poles and Yugoslavs fell in days without threatening German territorial or material integrity. France fell in a few weeks with minimal damage to the Reich's territory, cities, and factories. Now we all know how deeply the Germans drove into Russia, how terribly Russia's economic base was harmed, and how long it took the Soviet Union to drive the invaders out - and then not without major pressure exerted on other fronts by other powers. Yes, the Germans definitely had a chance to win. However, any gauging of German chances for victory must be made on several levels:

What is the correct "historical" probability of a German win? For my two cents: 25%. This is a substantial, but still low chance for victory. This percentage is based on the strategic reality with which the German Army was harnessed. In 1941 the Wehrmacht was operating under a number of handicaps: an unfocused attack plan, gross underestimation of the Soviet Army, a policy of terrorizing the Russian and Ukrainian peoples and failing to enlist their support versus the Communist government, the refusal of Hitler to put Germany's economy on a complete warfooting, and so on.

On the above basis it is my opinion that on a strategic level the Germans were not a "crack" team. Any claim they have to such lofty ranking was achieved at the operational, tactical, technical, and mechanical levels. Much of this strategic weakness is built into SE beyond the ability of players in the game to alter. Nonetheless, the Axis team does have the ability to improve upon strategic-level campaign planning and is not faced with rigid (and often impractical) tactical orders from Berlin.

What of chances for victory in play of the game SE? Given two evenly balanced teams, which trade blunder for blunder, and master-stroke for master-stroke, the success rate for the Axis probably rises to about 40-50%, which seems to be the norm from the published reports I've read. To the extent that this is higher than the 25% chances above, I tend to side with those who insist the German ability to win SE is unrealistically exaggerated.

The expectation of a German victory could very well increase further in Grand Europa. While France may not fall as quickly in GE as she did historically, and Poland might add a couple turns to her lifespan, almost every other situation where Germany failed - defeating the R.A.F., taking Malta, committing more resources to Africa, not overcommitting to Scandinavia, etc. can be made good by the German command.

Others have observed that Hitler and Mussolini "played" well, even brilliantly, until the actual start of the war. The Axis team inherits their tours de force and then can build on that. FDR, Churchill, and Stalin won the fighting, not the prewar maneuvers. Thus the Allied teams may have to outplay their Axis opponents just to "break even" and achieve victory in the May II 1945 initial phase.