Subject: War Without Mercy - Review
From: thirts@aol.com (Thirts)

This review is just to give a very general overview of Clash of Arms War
Without Mercy (WWM) and my opinion of it and some of it systems.  It is based
on only three playing, one of which was solitaire and another which is still in
progress so this is by no means an authoritative view

When examining the game it more or less demanded that I buy it, the scale was
spot on for me, just what I had been looking for in an East Front game
(Army/Corp mainly with some Div., 30 miles per hex and two weekly turns).
Components are excellent and the rules seemed to have the right amount of
detail.

There are several scenarios, Poland, which is a simple introduction to the
system, then there is Barbarossa which can be extended to include the Russian
counter offensive, Kursk and the full campaign.................. well to Dec
1944

I am in the middle of my third game of the Barbarossa scenario with the
prospect of continuing to the end of the full campaign.

My thoughts so far is that the game has not lived up to what I expected.

The air system is fairly detailed and does slow the game up. Air units
represent fighters, ground attack and bombers, these are allocated to various
missions (interdiction, ground support, interception, escort etc) air combat
then takes place if air opposing air units are in the same hex, followed by the
completion of the mission for any surviving units. I would have preferred I
more abstract system so as to concentrate on the land game.

Also it appears to favour the defence, which I feel is out of character with
the reality of WWII air support which I understood was more effective in
attack.  This is because the combat system is the normal combat ratio and
therefore 10 points of air in defensive support is worth more than 10 in
attack.  e.g 30 ground points attack 10 (3:1), defender allocates 10 air
support points, therefore to maintain the 3:1 the attacker would need 30 air
points..  To try to counter this the defender allocates air points before
attacks are declared but in reality it is fairly obvious which hexes are going
to be attacked. Also the attacker can call of the attack once the air battles
are resolved.

The supply rules are a little odd and having written to Clash of Arms I still
feel somewhat bemused. I can't go into detail here as I might take several
pages to explain, however there is nothing that common sense shouldn't
overcome. One thing that I don't like is that a major city e.g Lenningrad can
still supply hordes of units despite being cut off from the rest of Russia so
long as all adjacent land hexes are not in ZOCs of enemy units.  In a game I
played this happened and it looked bloody silly.

The land system itself is simple and trouble free, movement with overruns,
combat, exploitation movement and overruns (mech. units only) exploitation
combat by units with leaders only.  Terrain affects combat and movement as in
most games, however armour is penalised more than infantry when attacking into
cities, forest & swamps. Die modifiers can occur if you are dominant in armour
or have a leader present, terrain can also provide modifiers as well as affect
combat strengths.

Reinforcements/replacements are fixed for the Germans. Russian reinforcements,
and there are lots and lots are also fixed but replacements are generated by
control of major cities.  Therefore to reduce the number of Red army units
re-appearing the Germans need to capture these cities ASAP.

The game itslef plays smoothly apart from that damned air system, my initial
views are that if the Russians run away in the first few turns then the Germans
will have an almost impossible task in winning and the game will turn into
trench warfare.  Having said that I have seen this happen in other East Front
games unless the players are prepared to repeat the mistakes their historical
counterparts made.  The reinforcements and replacements that the Russian player
generates has a demoralising effect on the German because no matter how many
Red army units are killed off, they just keep coming.

To sum up, WWM is not bad, it compares very well with one of my all time
favourite games, Russian Campaign and that is no mean feat.  In fact it makes
Russian Campaign looks dull and dated.

It is also colourful, fairly straightforward and in some ways seem
right..................Russia does look a awful big place to conquer.  It is a
big game and needs a reasonable investment in time and space, one full turn
takes about an hour, two turns to the month................. figure it out
yourself.Unfortunately it misses being a great game.  As I mentioned earlier
this is my third game I am in the middle of playing and if I never play it
again that is still probably twice more than many other games I have in my
collection so it must be OK.