Map scale

[Kiwikkiwik]

There is an elephant in this room, here it is exposed.

If a stuart light tank is moving down the road at top speed, 58 kph, this translates into 966m/minute or 19 hexes/minute. This is how far the vehicle can travel in one turn suggesting that a game turn is one minute.
It takes me about 2 minutes to jog 300m in just runners, so Infantry can run at about 150m/min or 3 hexes/minute.
As infantry can move 6 hexes a turn then this suggests that a game turn is about two minutes.
So using distance travelled as the measure of turn length then turns are around 1-2 minutes long
The 1-2 minute turn time is very conservative. Probably the tank is never going to move at top speed and the infantry man is weighed down with equipment.

A typical WW2 75mm AT or tank gun tank has a rate of fire (ROF) of 10 shots or better PER MINUTE
So the 75mm AT or tank gun should get at least 10 shots at the stuart as it traverses its 19 hexes during a turn of one minute. But it only gets 3 shots. Out by a factor of 3. Missing 7 of the shots it should get in the turn of 1 minute.
Using 75mm AT or tank gun ROF as the measure of turn length then each turn is around 20 seconds.
The same AT or tank gun firing HE at the infantry should get 20 shots as the infantry moves its 6 hexes in 2 minutes. It only gets 3.
So using 75mm gun ROF against infantry as the measure of turn length then each turn is around 10 seconds.

This is using 1-2 minute turns, if the turns are actually longer then the ROF/Movement discrepancy is much much greater, if a turn is meant to be 4 minutes then the Stuart should be shot at by the AT gun 40 times, not 3, as it moves its 19 hexes.

Because distance travelled and ROF are inconsistent across units there are other examples that give worse or better results but most show this same order of discrepancy, massive.

So moving units are attracting only a small fraction of the fire they should be exposed too for the distance travelled.
Movement is greatly favoured at the expense of fire. Fire and movement should be equal for a realistic game.

I think most people would agree that the map and icon scales don't match, if the icons were shrunk to match the map scale they would be tiny dots, so not much fun. But the map scale can be changed to match the Icons scale.
The Icons, units, houses, trees etc are about the size they would be in a 10m hex. So change the map scale from 50m to 10m hexes.

This change of map scale not only shows the actual correct distance between units on the Icon scale BUT ALSO FIXES THE ROF VS DISTANCE TRAVELLED DISCREPANCY.

I have simulated the effect of changing the 50m hexes to 10m hexes by multiplying weapons range by 5. I find that you can leave everything else virtually as is, and the game plays MUCH BETTER.
Because.
ROF now corresponds to turn time.
The ability to cross massive swathes of beaten ground without being shot at disappears from the game.
You can still soak off a units shots to advance unshotat but for example with infantry on 10m hexes, after advancing your 300m allocated that turn you now still have 25 hexes to travel to the target whereas before you are on top of your target straight away that turn. So teleporting forward no longer an option.
Units that had to be stacked in one hex how have 20 or so to choose from but are still covering exactly the same frontage. So a lot less staking is required, this largely removes the necessary but unrealistic penalty of shared suppression from being fired at when stacked in the same hex.
Short range weapons, light mortars, Some HEAT weapons etc now make more sense, they no longer get overrun after a one or two turns.
Suppress and swarm style is much harder to play, the game becomes much more tactical to play.

Scales within the game would need to be changed by a factor of 5.
for example
Map height changes could be 1m instead of 5m.
The scale on WW2_APCalc.exe needs to be factors of 10 not 50
Rally range changes from 5 to 25 or maybe 20
Speed and ROF stay as they are, Fire control, Range finder and Accuracy Probably need to be tweeked but they played OK in my test games.
Spotting to me seems OK as is.

Some other advantages of the change would be
Eases the exaggerated suppression overflow effect of the blast circles into neighbouring hexes as units are more spread out.
With 10m hexes short range weapons, grenades SMGs panzerfausts and so on can be ranged right.
Visibility lowers from 5 kilometers to 1 k, but might be factored up to 3 k maybe, a more practical battle range, especially for identifying friend from foe.
When Icon and map scale match, firepower is no longer underestimated.

As a programmer I would say that the change is straightforward, tedious and doable. No algorithms need changing, just scaling and variables. If it appears too difficult I can help. It is a relatively simple change to make for an absolutely massive benefit.
Alternately the hexes could be reduced by a factor of 2 to 25m, or by 3/10 to 15m etc. But a 10m hex brings the ROF up to a level which matchs about a 4 minute turn which seems to be about as long as a turn should be.

Please do not dismiss this post out of hand. Please try a test game with ranges multiplied by 5 first.