Balanced Campaign Scenarios?

HMCS Rosthern

Anecdotally, there have been statements posted here that campaign scenarios are not really sufficiently tested because it is impractical to test large and long scenarios the required multiple times to make a true assessment. The result is that some campaign scenarios are claimed to be unbalanced and favour one side.
1. Is the consensus that this is true?
2. Across all WDS (Tiller) Operational Campaign game series, and all titles, what campaign scenarios, based on your experieince, do you consider to be the most balanced?

Liebchen

(5 hours ago)HMCS Rosthern Wrote: Anecdotally, there have been statements posted here that campaign scenarios are not really sufficiently tested because it is impractical to test large and long scenarios the required multiple times to make a true assessment. The result is that some campaign scenarios are claimed to be unbalanced and favour one side.
1. Is the consensus that this is true?
2. Across all WDS (Tiller) Operational Campaign game series, and all titles, what campaign scenarios, based on your experieince, do you consider to be the most balanced?

You should make a poll.

I think that the grand daddy of them all, Smolensk '41, is very balanced, fwiw.

ComradeP

The vast majority of the PzC campaigns covered had a clear winner, but it depends on how lopsided the victory was how unbalanced the campaign scenarios are.

I agree with Liebchen that Smolensk '41 is balanced, also because the historical result was a draw of sorts strategically. The Soviets lost a lot of men, but the German advance towards Moscow was stalled.

One balance issue with many Eastern Front PzC titles, even if the Soviets won the battle, is that the large maps and limited unit density can make a local breakthrough a game winning move. The Soviets also have serious issues with dealing with any kind of Axis mobile defense in 1943 and early-mid 1944. If the Soviets can't pummel the Axis, winning becomes much less likely. Smolensk '43 is likely to have a historical result against equally skilled players due to the Soviets having massive advantages in manpower and firepower, combined with the limited number of German mobile divisions present.

Of all the series, I'd say campaigns in FWWC are most balanced, because forces tend to be more evenly matched and the limited mobility of the era prevents disasters in a limited number of turns.

A number of the MC campaigns can seemingly also go either way based on comments, but I only have limited experience with the series and only with Certain Strike '87.