Axis

Initial Deployment

German.
Place within 7 hexes of a division of their Army, but not adjacent to the border: 1 Pz, 2 Pz, 3 Pz, 4 Pz, 4, 6, 9, 11, 16, 17,18th Army HQs. 18 LPs.

Romania.
Place within 7 hexes of a division of their Army, but not adjacent to the border: 3rd, 4th Army HQs. 2 LPs.

Rumanian Reserves.
1st, 2nd Army HQs

Finland:
Within 7 hexes of Helsinki: Southeast Army HQ Anywhere in Finland: Karelia Army HQ. 2 LPs.

Regular Reinforcements

Jul I 41
German: 2nd Army HQ
Italian: 8th Army HQ

May I 42
Hungarian: 2nd Army HQ

Apr I 44
Hungarian: 1st Army HQ

Soviet

Initial Deployment

Place 1 Front HQ each in:
Leningrad or Baltic MD, Western MD, any one Ukranian MD, Trans-Caucasus MD, Arkhangelsk MD. 14 LPs.

Regular Reinforcements

Aug I 41
Leningrad MD: lx Front HQ

Nov I 41
Moscow MD: lx Front HQ
Leningrad MD: lx Front HQ
Orel MD: lx Front HQ

Nov II 41
Moscow MD: lx Front HQ

Feb I 42
Moscow MD: lx Front HQ

Jun I 42
Orel MD: 1x Front HQ

Jul I 42
North Caucasus MD: lx Front HQ

1942 and 1943 Scenarios

In the 1942 and 1943 scenarios, both sides may initially deploy those Army and Front HQs received per the above schedule by the start date of the scenario. Army and Front HQs may be placed in any friendly-owned hex.

1942 Scenario:
German: 15 LPs
Finnish: 1 LP
Soviet: 10 LPs

1943 Scenario:
German: 13 LPs
Hungarian: 1 LP
Soviet: 14 LPs 

Notes: (1) The Romanian 3rd Army and Hungarian 2nd Army are in the replacement pool at the start of the 1943 scenario, but may be replaced. (2) The Italian 8th Army HQ has been withdrawn by the start of the 1943 scenario. (3) The Romanian 1st and 2nd Army HQs are deployed in reserve. (4) Players may spend LPs before play begins to activate Army HQs on the first turn of either scenario.

Comment: The order of battle for the Axis Army HQs was simple, since their numbers and designations did not vary throughout the war. The generic nature of the Soviet Front HQ designations results from the fact that their names changed during the war based upon their region of operation. It makes no sense to me to have the same Soviet HQ represented by separate counters marked Stalingrad, Steppes, and 1st Kiev MD when in a given game the Front HQ might be deployed instead at Yaroslavl, Saratov, or Zaporozhe.

New Counters

Players must create the new Army and Front HQ counters using the icons provided below. Each counter should have an active side (front) which contains the Army or Front's numerical or alphabetical designation, and an inactive side (back) which contains only the unit type symbol. Note that all Army and Front HQs should have the infantry unit type symbol on their backs, except for the four German Panzer Army HQs, which should have the armor unit type symbol.

Editor's Note: All the German and Italian Army HQs appear in the special Axis countersheet recently printed by GR/D.

Conclusion

I have done my best to offer a specific and coherent system of reform that can actually be evaluated through playtesting. I have already playtested it myself to a limited extent, but have generally tried to put my ideas to the Europa community as expeditiously as possible, rather than submitting many good, but generalized, suggestions. If the future of Europa does not take the exact form I have outlined above, I suspect it must at least resemble my proposals.

Any changes to the ground system must be comprehensive. Too often individual rules are altered or introduced without considering their wider effect. For example, many want weekly game turns. That's fine, but so far the proposals I've seen have relied on a few simple game artifacts; e.g., the amount of dead are exactly doubled by having twice as many combat phases, so just double the replacement and special replacement rates to compensate. This is saying that, as things are, exactly half the historical number of casualties are generated. I don't know that this is true, or that the suggested repair would solve anything. If the time scale is changed, it would also require changing the combat system so that there would be fewer casualties per tam and they would be inflicted in a different way; it might be necessary to reward some sort of "sustained attack." And it might, on the whole, be better to introduce reserve and secondary impulses with limited movement and attack abilities rather than have two turns identical to what is now one turn. But such reform would require much careful consideration, nothing simplistic would be likely to work adequately.

If anyone is dissatisfied with what I have proposed, please let him say so in great detail, and, even better, let him submit his own revised system for all to consider.

Europa Reform: Rules Changes