Traffic Penalty, and how it changes things.

[Jinx]

(I initially posted this on my AAR, but I thought it worth while to post here as well.)

Morning!

Has anyone tried playing around with the traffic penalty? What are your thoughts and observations?

In our PBEM, we recently switched to v1.02 and with that came a traffic penalty option. Since there is no description on what the levels of the penalty do, I started up a fresh game, set the penalty to half and began moving various sizes of armies and corps across the plains in various weather.

Some interesting results!

It seems on average that single armies did decently well, loosing a bit more cohesion then they would have without a penalty. But anything upwards of a single army seems to have strong effects.

For example, two armies worth about 2000 CP, marched on a clear day across the plains, at the end of the turn they lost about 30% - 50% cohesion.

Those same two armies traveling in mud across plains, suffered 80% - 90% cohesion loss.

Another interesting case is where a force of 1500 CP crossed the plains in clear weather north to south, while a second 800 CP force crossed east to west on the same territory a day or two after the first force cleared the area and suffered 80% - 90% cohesion loss. Ending with only 119 CP and failing to engage the enemy at the end of their march.

These results could be because my TEAW files being a bit scrambled and not the cleanest install. So don't take it as gospel truth. But it's interesting.

This may see the end of anything more then a single army and perhaps a couple attached corps making any attacks. Which will definitely be a game changer, and may provoke a more spread out advance, hard won gains, and more easily held territories in the face of numerical superiority. As it is (at medium penalty), I hesitate to make any attack unless I have UNDER 1500 CP and still in clear superiority against the enemy.

It may need to be tweaked a bit, as all new features go, but I think this is a good thing, and it makes it nearly impossible to make any advance unless specific conditions are met.
It will eliminate any super stacks and therefore it will most certainly mess it up royally for any attacker in a war of entrenchment. It will change the face of entrenchment warfare to one in which any attack against an enemy army will require armies to attack from multiple adjacent territories. Flanking, defeats, and dispersed forces will be the new way.

I'm excited for how it could change the face of the eastern front too! Russian defense will be a lot easier! We may even see an entrenchment line being formed by the Russians along defensive points.

Interesting indeed.

In our game though, I think it would be unfair to use the medium penalty, even the lowest penalty, especially at this stage of the game. After all, the bulk of the Central Powers advances have been made, and they begin to drift into a more defensive posture in the whole war. Especially as before long the USA will also join the fight. Making the Entente purely the more aggressive party in a war that will favor the defender even more strongly.

I would consider a switch to the lowest penalty over then winter, or even a month or two from now. To change now in mid-operation may be a little unfair, now when it is my time to be offensive after nearly breaking through into Germany and the Central Powers to become more defensive after using stacked armies to knock out Russia.
This feature, if it works the way I suspect it is intended to work, is a major game changer for a more realistic and historical approach to the war of of 1914.

Well done!

Anyways! Has anyone tried this out? Any similar results?

[oldspec4]

I'm using this option at a low level; and also like the effects as you have noted.

[Jinx]

I'm using this option at a low level; and also like the effects as you have noted.

How does the AI cope? I tried it short term to try movements (without AI interfetence) and the rest is speculation.
Does it waste cohesion! Or is it adjusted to be more economical?

[oldspec4]

How does the AI cope? I tried it short term to try movements (without AI interfetence) and the rest is speculation.
Does it waste cohesion! Or is it adjusted to be more economical?

I don't know the details re: the AI, etc. But I have received the traffic message in the message log and noticed significant hits (in a good way) to my movement and cohesion.

[Jinx]

I don't know the details re: the AI, etc. But I have received the traffic message in the message log and noticed significant hits (in a good way) to my movement and cohesion.

Nice! Let us know if it looks like the AI is launching attacks using two armies or more. :-)

[Kensai]

I am afraid that at higher levels it messes movement in wild and uncivilised regions, for examples the ones the Ottomans operate. The game already portrays movement in these areas unrealistically slow, we need to make sure it does not become worse because of traffic.

I suggest you use a low-mid value until all implications have been mapped.

[oldspec4]

I am afraid that at higher levels it messes movement in wild and uncivilised regions, for examples the ones the Ottomans operate. The game already portrays movement in these areas unrealistically slow, we need to make sure it does not become worse because of traffic.

I suggest you use a low-mid value until all implications have been mapped.

Yeah, I have the traffic set at the lowest setting for the reasons you have noted.

Still not sure of the total impact to both the AI and human player. But I have not seen any large power stacks in my current game.

[Highlandcharge]

Has anybody got any more in depth info regarding what effect exactly the different slider settings actually do?

Thanks

[Taciturn Scot]

I'd like to know too as this new feature seems to be creeping into PoN as well and probably will into Espana and the RUS Gold game too.

[Pocus]

No by default it's not active in these games. Cranking the slider results in higher cohesion loss, but try the standard before. In the final version there will be a direct slowdown in move, right now the slowdown is indirect and coming from your troops having a lower cohesion, so moving slowly.

[Merlin]

Right now in 1.01 it also seems to be affecting fleets. Large fleets near the CP limit take heavy cohesion loss which just wasn't there before. I don't know if this is an issue in 1.02.

[Pocus]

Indeed, this will be fixed in next public beta patch. Thanks for the report.

[Highlandcharge]

Hi pocus, I am just starting a few new pbem,s of EAW, is worth starting them or should we hold off until the public beta is released?


Is there a rough ETA on the patch?

Cheers

[Pocus]

There won't be major change now between the latest release candidate and the official patch, so you can safely start it now.