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Charles22 -> (10/3/2000 10:19:00 PM)
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DownUnder: As I read Victor's first post, I was going to remind you that Victor has also been known to pick a dozen 88mm flak guns as Germany, which given the size of the forces may be considered, as unrealistic as facing huge amount of French tanks. With such a devastating amount of devastating guns, he might need to tamper with boosting the enemy performance to present some form of challenge.
I think a good number of us prefer to limit ourselves to not being so unrealistic that we have to tamper with the enemy limits. As Victor said later, "adapting" is the key to that strategy. These type of people, myself included, tend to limit ourselves to 2-4 88 flak guns, and when going into the King Tiger era, wouldn't dream of having more than five. The basic philosophy, therein, is to try to adapt with what might consist in a balanced realistic force. No over-emphasis on the super units.
In order to blunt the super charges you might face occasionally, assuming you're campaigning, is that you can pick a couple of platoons of engineers and have them set to make mines on the defensive battles (and buy mines and place them well). Also a disappearing smaller anti-tank gun, such as the smaller 37,50,75mm ones is always a lot of fun. A unit that can fire one or more times and not be seen, can always come in handy, even if it's only chance to penetrate might only be on rear quarters.
Also, don't underestimate the role of suppressing units, you don't have to out-and-out destroy every unit to be winning in a lopsided battle. The French assault is quite unique for the German campaigner, but I did have my second-most lopsided vistory against that very charge. It looked devastating at first, but I hung in there and when he ran into my infantry screen, he lost his heart and quit (he had already taken enough losses). I thought the worst of the battle was just fixing to start, but he gave up. It's always possible. The four 88s I had were on the ground in the back, so as not to expose them to multiple fire, thus ensuring safety and a HUGE dominance in a very limited area. The situation would typically put two 88s against 2-3 S35s (if they were lucky enough to advance into the trap). I let those 88s save their shots with reduced range, the S35s never returned a shot (having a few other units suppress them a bit before the 88s engaged, also ensured that if the first 88 shots didn't hit or kill, at least they were unlikely to return fire on the 88s). One last consideration I'd like you to consider, is that though the S35s are difficult to penetrate, they basically can't hit the broad side of a barn. They generally have better penetrating power and armor than the Gerry tanks, but since they don't hit very frequently they can't suppress you very effectively.
Basically, mines/engineers/infantry/anti-tank guns can make up for an awful lot of ground you face in an enemy who is having to buy expensive tanks to assault you with. You have to be clever though, because if you just fire away non-stop from maximum range, you not only will be largely ineffective, but you will be telling the enemy artillery where those cheap units are. It's probably also a good idea to keep the cheap units at least three or four haxes away from the tanks, since your tanks will probably draw a good deal of artillery anyway.
Ironically, considering all my 'mine' advice, I'm starting to get to the point that it's becoming obvious that I'm doing so well with my units in general, that the mines are looking unnecessary and a waste. Afterall, if every abttle sees no more than two or three tanks getting that far, what's the use. I could use those points to buy more infantry or engineers (though I think one can be unrealistic with purchasing too many engineers as well). I've has a number of battles in the past, however, where the mines were indispensable. Perhaps my strategy would be better served by less points spent on the mine class altogether, and what is spent, spent on dragon's teeth and a few barb-wires instead.
Downunder, one last thing. Buy a "gun emplacement" when it's available whilst playing Gerry. It's a very good gun unit that can survive if it has any support to it's flanks, and can mow down units when you're outnumbered very well. The gun on that thing is effective at least until '43 against practically anything (and unlike the 88 flak, can take a pounding). I would caution you, however, as I'm not sure how the new artillery higher effectiveness will affect it, but it's been very reliable for me in the past (German stuff is fairly easy to rally off high suppression).
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