This is about creating balanced scenarios that recreate imbalanced historical situations. Most historical situations were, or ought to have been, imbalanced. For example, no one is going to intentionally attack at 'even odds' except in a desperate situation. Balanced battlefield conditions would be expected to result in an undesireable draw or worse. It is possible to create scenarios where a player can be expected to lose the fight but win the scenario on points. And therein lies the key. The balance is not in the engagement itself but rather in the judicious allocation of victory points. For example, in my scenario Lt. Levy at Cauquigny, Levy is going to be driven out of Cauquigny, or even destroyed (since CM does not do a great job of withdrawing troops, nor are players encouraged to do so). But if Levy can destroy or render disabled a (hidden) given percentage of German attackers then the player can still achieve a draw or a victory. Although on appearances the player has lost the fight. How does this make sense? Allowing a player to win on points when the objective has been lost, reflects the overall impact of the engagement on the surrounding campaign. Thus Levy's Alamo has an impact on how much of the German force remains to later attack la Fiere Causeway. So to sum up my design philosophy, not every scenario needs to have the 'appearance' of play balance, as long as the victory point distribution provides both sides a reasonably equal opportunity to win.
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