Operation Kurgan - Branching Plot-lines

If you play digital RPGs or, indeed, ever read a Fighting Fantasy gamebook or any of their myriad imitators, you'll be familiar with the idea of a branching plot in a game. This is where the player or players make a decision that pushes the story in a particular direction. Other options for the story are then closed off and the story follows the plot line arising from that decision.

Sometimes, branches like this re-connect with another plot-lie. More often, they don't.

In a narrative-based solo campaign, there's a limit to the extent to which branching plot-lines are possible unless I want to write a book consisting of hundreds of missions, rather than a dozen. But I do have some options. For example, the players can make decisions that will influence the conditions of the next mission. These are pretty minor branches and I'm using them a fair bit in Operation KURGAN. For example, some missions offer you access to a new ally. And, of course, your success in a solo mission gives you XP which you might then spend on changing your deployment choices (which occurred in Operation NEMESIS and will repeat in KURGAN).

However, a bigger option is to have missions that only become available in the course of certain plot-lines. And I just can't decide whether this is a good idea or not.

My vague concept is to have the plot-lines branch after the sixth mission. So, effectively, rather than have a twelve-mission narrative campaign, you'll have a nine-mission one, with three missions you don't play.

On the one hand, it's a shorter campaign. On the other, it improves replayability, because you can just start again from mission six, take a different decision in the course of it and play out the other three missions.

And it's a solo/co-op miniatures game so, y'know, you can just play the missions in whatever order you like anyway. I'm not standing there with a gun to your head if you dare to peek ahead at missions you've not played yet.

So, overall, what are your thoughts about having the story branch off at Mission 6, giving your three more missions to play, whilst three will be left for a different playthrough?

Would you feel like this was an enhancement or a detriment to the game concept, overall?