Matrix a confirmé hier que ce wargame allant simuler à l’échelle opérationnelle l’offensive allemande de l’été 42 sur Stalingrad sera disponible à compter du 31 mars prochain.
Peu de nouvelles images depuis l’annonce initiale l’été dernier, mais voici quand même illustré dans le dev diary ci-après (ou sur cette page), un des aspects importants du jeu : le brouillard de guerre.
A noter que ce jeu s’inspire de Desert War 1940-42 (voir ce test), voyez les explications dans le deuxième chapitre des notes de développement. Voyez également le premier chapitre dans lequel le duo de développeurs menant ce projet résumait leur démarche. Évoquant les quatre années nécessaires pour arriver au résultat que vous décovurirez donc bientôt.
Il semblerait aussi que le nouveau moteur de jeu créé et qui va donc être inauguré avec cette fameuse bataille puisse servir à l’avenir à représenter d’autres importantes opérations militaires similaires.
Pour plus d’informations sur WEGO WWII – Stalingrad, pour lequel une version Steam ne semble pas prévue pour le moment, voyez cette page chez l’éditeur. Il devrait également y avoir très prochainement sur Twitch et YouTube diverses vidéos de gameplay.
Communiqué
WEGO WWII: Stalingrad – Dev Diary 3
Before we get to the Dev Diary, we have some important announcements to make.
First off, we have a release date! We are glad to announce that WEGO WWII: Stalingrad will be released on March the 31st. Mark it on your calendars.
Secondly, starting tomorrow we are going to stream the game on Twitch! Every thursday at 8pm (UK time) on our Twitch Channel XTRG will be streaming WEGO WWII: Stalingrad, in a Let’s play series which will accompany us until the release.
Fog Of War
One of the most important things to consider when playing a WEGO game is battlefield intelligence. In a IGOUGO game, one can always advance a single unit forward to identify enemy positions and then alter your plan in the very same turn as more enemy positions are revealed. In a WEGO game, however, you only have the information available at turn start, and any forces that recklessly advance may well blunder into unidentified superior forces. And if those enemy forces are using Move and Attack orders, they may well inflict severe losses on your forces. Fog of War, I believe, makes WEGO games even more interesting.
German player ordering Air Recon. Notice limited information available on the two Russian Tank units – these may not even be Tank units!
So, as Fog of War is so important, how does it work in WEGO WWII: Stalingrad?
All ground units gather intel on their surrounding hexes. Some units (leg infantry) have average intel gathering capacity, whereas others, like Recce units have strong intel capacity (both in terms of range and of the strength of intel they gather).
Air units, and Intel assets (e.g. Radio Intercepts) can gather intel on areas anywhere on the map. These can vary widely in both the intel range and strength.
Enemy units are only visible when you have intel on that hex. An enemy unit could, for example, enter an observed area during its movement and then leave, and so it could appear and then disappear during its move.
The player can display the intel strength on map. The greener the color, the more recon strength is being exerted; the more yellow, the less.
Note that if you keep an enemy unit under observation, you retain knowledge of that unit. But if you cease to have intel on that enemy’s hex, the unit, and all your knowledge of that unit will disappear. This is very important at night, when intel range reduces, and when one cannot carry out Air Recon. However, one still has EW (see below) assets, and nighttime is the perfect time to use these assets to keep enemy rear areas under observation.
The player has varying levels of Intel on each hex, going from level 0 (no intel) to level 5 (full intel). Below is a table of the different levels and information revealed:
FOW Level 5 is only available when an enemy unit is adjacent to a friendly unit.
Note: To achieve FOW Level 5 intelligence it often requires an attack by friendly ground forces on the adjacent enemy.
FOW Level 2 can misidentify a unit’s type, but type will be similar (e.g. A mobile unit type [Armor, Motorized, Recce, and Mechanized] may be incorrectly portrayed as another Mobile unit type. A combat engineer unit may be incorrectly identified as infantry unit (but infantry units are never misidentified). A “gun” unit type (artillery / antitank / heavy antitank) may be incorrectly identified as another “gun” unit type.
INTELLIGENCE COLLECTION
Intelligence collection has two parts:
Intelligence Range: The distance in hexes that a Unit can ‘see’.
Intelligence Strength: The amount of information about enemy units discovered. This strength ranges from 1 (minimal information provided) to 5 (all information about enemy unit is provided).
The Intelligence Range and Intelligence Strength assigned to a unit varies based on the unit’s type:
Unit Type – Intelligence Range – Intelligence Strength
Recce – 4 – 4
Armor – 3 – 1
Mechanized – 3 – 2
Motorized – 2 – 2
Infantry – 1 – 2
Artillery – 1 – 1
Combat Engineers – 1 – 1
Others – 1 – 1
Every unit gathers intelligence on the hexes around it. The Quality rating of an enemy target unit will increase or decrease the amount of intelligence you can collect. The better the quality of the enemy unit, the less information can be acquired. Conversely, the poorer the quality the more information can be gained about the enemy. Adjacent hexes will provide the highest level of intelligence. Intelligence level detail decreases by 1 per hex distance (i.e. an adjacent hex may provide FOW Level 5 information, but at two hexes, the FOW Level equals four, and at three hexes, the FOW Level equals three, etc. However, the FOW Level will not be reduced to zero if a unit has intelligence range remaining; i.e. the FOW level will be one.
Air Recce and Electronic Warfare (EW) assets can also gather intelligence. These assets have their own intelligence values:
Asset Type – Intelligence Range – Intelligence Strength
Intel Estimate – 6 – 3
Air Recce – 2 – 2
Air Recce (photo) – 3 – 2
EW Intercept – 2 – 4
EW Direction Finding – 4 – 2
Ground and Air reconnaissance and EW assets will display enemy units that move through their reconnaissance zones. Enemy units that move out of a reconnaissance zone will disappear.
The Intel Range of all ground units is reduced to one during night turns—except infantry (leg, motorized, mechanized), combat engineers, recce and ski units.
Combat engineers and infantry (leg, motorized, mechanized) intelligence range is increased by one—if they remain stationary. This represents night patrolling (mounted and dismounted) in their “local vicinity” from an established patrol base. Intelligence is gleaned from ground and obstacle reconnaissance, surveillance, and/or capturing prisoners for interrogation.
“War is the realm of uncertainty; three quarters of the factors on which action is based are wrapped in a fog of greater or lesser uncertainty.” — Carl Von Clausewitz
