A how-to for beginners (Full Version)

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larryfulkerson -> A how-to for beginners (11/18/2009 6:46:03 AM)

I'm putting together an html document that explains my modus operandi for rank beginners. This is the document I wish I had when I was learning the game. I'm limiting the size of document(s) so that they are under 10M bytes in size so it won't be much of a burden to download them, and you do need to download it to watch it because I have bou cou images in a directory that the html document needs to load. After you download this package just double-click on the file called D21 turn 4.html and your browser should open it automatically for you. This thing reads like a very very detailed AAR. I'm planning on having a series of these so stay tuned for subsequent issues of this project. You can find the first document at this url:

First Document: http://www.mediafire.com/?m4wm0mwiwld

Your questions and comments are more than welcome.

Edit: I thought I'd move the link to all the documents to here so you don't have to go through the entire thread looking for the documents.

2nd Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?2rzmgjwghyg
3rd Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?zx1dnql3yjm
4th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?zdgwygit5x5
5th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?jqrnothltwt
6th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?ndiunyyyxyw
7th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?mmmmo32j32y
8th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?jggg1gynhkn
9th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?mkm1355znjz
10th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?nyyzgmumzgt
11th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?gmmmqzyymqn
12th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?o3t02c4zj3f
13th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?zn0n0zmhojy
14th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?nzb5muo2i2m
15th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?kvydlhmmnji
16th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?lyfz3hihowj
17th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?ngenyyzy1tz
18th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?ede33jmm2oj
19th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?yzowq4hmg4z
20th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?etgngm1zojy
21st Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?1rq2qyjjy0z
22nd Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?jkyhkmhtjt0
23rd Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?y2ttemzmmnt
24th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?cr02ziwmqgj



Silvanski -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/18/2009 7:50:21 AM)

very well put together Larry



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/18/2009 11:27:36 PM)

D21 turn 4 doc 2 is ready you guys.  It's a continuation of the above mentioned document and the second in the series.  I have no idea how many of these are going to be produced but if there is enough demand for more I'll keep doing them.  You can find the second document in the series at this url:

http://www.mediafire.com/?2rzmgjwghyg

As before, questions and comments are more than welcome.  I hope somebody finds these things useful or at least entertaining.

And thanks for the kind words Silvanski dude.



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/19/2009 4:48:46 AM)

The third document in this series is ready for publication.  I capture some of the hexes of Riga in this document.  We're still in round one however so the main attacks haven't been executed yet.  I have about 80% of my units left to move so there's more material coming still.  You can find the third document at this url:

http://www.mediafire.com/?zx1dnql3yjm

As always your questions and comments are more than welcome.  Lemme know what needs to be changed please.  I want to produce a quality produce for you guys.



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/19/2009 9:23:21 AM)

The fourth document in this series is finished already.  I've changed up my style in this one.   This one is more entertaining with some humor ( how do you spell humor? ).  Anyway, I try to be funnier and I think I may have succeeded in a spot or two.  You can find the fourth document at this url:

http://www.mediafire.com/?zdgwygit5x5

Lemme know how you like it.



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/23/2009 2:32:13 AM)

Is anybody reading these things?  I can't see me doing these things if nobody is looking at them.



wilecki -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/23/2009 5:56:53 PM)

Hi Larry,

I am currently considering buying the game.. well, actually I have already made up my mind, and your how-to's have greatly helped me with that, I am only waiting for the coming sale :) So far I have read only two docs and I have no comments yet, except that it reads really nice and I didn't feel overwhelmed by the game, which was my biggest concern. I hope to finish reading when I finally get to try the game myself, so please keep them coming :)



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/23/2009 11:42:35 PM)

HI wilecki.  Thanks so much for responding.  Your post has encouraged me to continue.  I'm working on a fifth document now.  It's about turn 8.  Marc Antill also sent me an email saying he's reading them too.  Okay, okay, I'll keep going.  I hope you find them helpful or at least entertaining.  I'm going to try to include more funny stuff and/or historical information to make it less boring. 

I was on the original TOAW III playtest team for a year or so and did that because it's my favorite game.  I've been playing TOAW since TOAW COW came out and I have no idea how long ago that was but it feels like about 6 years or so.  I've played other games but I keep coming back to TOAW III.  It's the best game I've played since boardgames and cardboard counters were the rage. 

I'm retired and don't have much to do except play wargames and nobody in my family understands the obsession I have with the game.  I play it sometimes 18 hours a day with a break to eat and drink once or twice.  Sometimes I eat my meals in front of my computer just so I don't miss something on my opponents replay.  I've noticed that there are perhaps a couple of hundred people who post on this forum and there's only one or two people who voice any negative remarks and I suspect that it's mostly because they don't understand the game engine quirks or have strong opinions about the military arts that isn't simulated very well in TOAW ( like naval units ). 

The learning curve for TOAW is somewhat steep at first but after pushing some units around and having a combat or two you can usually pick up the basics quickly.  It's the subtle things about the game that is what's rather difficult.  I'm no expert but I have been playing awhile and I still learn a thing or two from the people who post here.  It's actually a deep game if it's done right.  Like moving some fighters to cover the area you're going to be moving your ground troops into first before you move your ground troops in case of enemy interdiction.  There's lots of how-to's posted by people who know what they are talking about since they are ex-military where you can gain a boat-load of good ideas for gameplay here on this forum.  I love this place.  Good ideas from good people all the time.

Keep us posted on your games.  Ask all the questions you want.  I can answer ANY question.  Sometimes I have to answer 'I don't know' but I do have an answer.  If you run into a hard spot and don't know quite what to do post your problem and people like me will give you our opinion.  Let's learn together.

Your questions and comments are welcome of course.  Drop me a line anytime day or night.  Send 'em to larryfulkerson2002 (at) yahoo (dot) com and I'll give you all the help I can.  I don't have anything else better to do.

Look for document 5 here in a couple of hours.  It'll be about turn 8 of Directive 21.  That's when the face of the game starts to change from 'run-for-your-life-comrad' to 'maybe we should start building a front line right here'.  The Soviet union starts to stand toe-to-toe with the Axis and Soviet losses aren't 1,000+ squads per turn anymore.  But I'm rambling. 





larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/24/2009 8:33:21 AM)

Document 5 is ready to publish.  It's about turn 8 and I exclude all the non-interesting things that happen in the game so that what we're left with is the meat and potatoes.  You can find doc 5 at this url:

http://www.mediafire.com/?jqrnothltwt



Silvanski -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/24/2009 3:04:30 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson

Is anybody reading these things? 


I sure am. It's interesting to see the step-by-step development of the campaign.



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/24/2009 3:30:45 PM)

Document 6 is ready. It's the wrap-up last rounds of turn 8. You can find it here:

6th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?ndiunyyyxyw

And thanks Silvanski dude for your kind words. It's interesting writing these documents too. Makes you think harder about doing the right thing when the entire world is watching. Please feel free, you guys, to point out something different you might have done or something you think I didn't quite do right. This project is for all of us to learn together and I'll be the first to say that I don't think I'm an expert and have made a boner or two already so please, point them out. It'll make all of us better players. At least that's the hope. Questions and comments are always welcome.



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/25/2009 11:55:17 PM)

Document 7 is ready.  It's the early part of turn 9 and I'm including a really really large picture of the front lines all 1.9M bytes of it.  It's a huge picture and it's so large I couldn't post it in a regular AAR so you'll only find it here.  You can find doc 7 at this url:

7th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?mmmmo32j32y



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/26/2009 7:14:55 AM)

Document 8 is ready.  It's the wrap up of turn 9.  You can find the document at this url:

8th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?jggg1gynhkn



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/27/2009 4:57:08 AM)

Document 9 is ready.  It's about turn 10 round 1.  You can find it at this url:

9th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?mkm1355znjz



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/27/2009 4:07:16 PM)

Document 10 is ready to publish.  I put a movie in this one so it's about 14M bytes big.  The flash movie in this one needs an internet connection to download the flash player plugin but it works on my machine.  Please let me know if you have any problems playing the movie.  Needless to say I've not put a movie in an html document before so this is an experimental document.  Questions and comments are welcome of course.  You can find document 10 at this url:

10th Doc:http://www.mediafire.com/?nyyzgmumzgt



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/27/2009 9:59:08 PM)

Document 11 is ready to publish.  This one has a movie in it as well but it's not as big as the previous movie.  This document wraps up turn 10.  You can find doc 11 at this url:

11th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?gmmmqzyymqn



Abnormalmind -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/28/2009 1:17:26 AM)

Very nice work. Thanks!



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/28/2009 1:29:56 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Abnormalmind
Very nice work. Thanks!

You're quite welcome. By the way, are you seeing the kind of detail you want to see? I've been assuming people wanted to see a really super detailed AAR and have been writing it that way but I'm flexible and can write about strategic / tactical considerations as well. I tried to record the turn 10 Soviet moves but the file was about 400M bytes big and I tried to convert the avi file to swf to put it in an html document but it was still 90M bytes big and therefore not really usable for our needs. Maybe I could post the sal file and you guys could just load it in TOAW and watch it yourselves? I'm saving the game after each round so we could get detailed losses of both sides if needed, I am playtesting this scenario after all.



Abnormalmind -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/28/2009 1:59:17 AM)

Yes the detail is very good. The encirclement / assault information is very useful. You've already outdone yourself with these, and I'm not sure what else you could show!



Qbec -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/28/2009 4:45:36 PM)

Bonjour Mr Larry.
First thing, sorry for my bad english( I'm french Canadian). I love your AAR and read it with a lots of interest. I learned a lots of things about this game and his mechanism in your AAR. Thanks for that! But , I have a question concerning
what king of checklist you use during a round. If you can give more information for the use of plane during a round . Why use some kinds of planes in attack , some others in support . And what you do with all your unites during the last round of a turn. I will appreciate this kind of information.

Qbec (André), one of your fans



Qbec -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/28/2009 5:19:07 PM)

Sorry, I forget a important thing....... Thanks.....

Qbec



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/28/2009 11:54:45 PM)

Very very good questions Andre, thanks for asking. I've answered your questions at the end of document 12 in detail with pictures and everything. I'm publishing it now so you can have your answers since there isn't enough bandwidth here on the forum ( pictures are limited to 200Kb for instance ). You can find document 12 at this url:

12th Doc: http://www.mediafire.com/?o3t02c4zj3f

Keep those questions and comments coming you guys. TOAW is a great game and so it deserves great players. Let's learn together.



Qbec -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/29/2009 2:28:46 AM)

Wow !!!! What answer to my request .It's exactly the kind of information that I won't. Merci beaucoup! Mr Larry. I printed the doc and I read it again ,again and again......I love this game and now I am more confortable with some subtle mechanisme .

Thanks again ( I will continu to read your AAR with concern)

André ( Qbec)



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/29/2009 5:31:06 AM)

Wow indeed Andre.  You are too kind by half.  A disclaimer is in order I think.  I'm no expert...there are lots of players better than me.  I loose to Karri E. everytime we play.  I've never won a FITE game ( so far ) ( Curt Chambers is another excellent player ) and there's lots of things that I'm doing wrong probably.  I don't press my units until they are out of supply and cherry-red in health like some other players and I guess that's why they win and I don't.  I'm just trying to put some of my thoughts in words for whatever they are worth.  I'd love to read a 'watch over the shoulder' document by the true experts so that I can become a better player too.  I love TOAW and the depth of detail(s) it provides can cause the learning curve to be rather steep at times but with more practice it's getting easier to keep track of every little detail.  I just thought some of our beginners deserved to watch over the shoulder of someone rather than nobody at all.  I would really love to have had a document like this one when I was learning the game.  I've been playing TOAW for about 5 years now and it's still the game I keep coming back to because it's really that good.  Thanks again for your kind words.



junk2drive -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/29/2009 8:09:21 PM)

I'm about to buy the game because of the holiday sale and I'm sure a few others will too. I'd much rather read your how-to than go through all the forum posts here and elsewhere.

Thanks



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/29/2009 11:36:58 PM)

Thanks junk2drive, but if you don't go through the forum posts and other sites you might miss some other excellent articles written by real experts like the one shown in the image below. I've read them and I can vouch for their excellence etc. There are other sites, I'm pretty sure, that have other articles. Someone has collected all of them into one place for people like us to peruse I think, but I cannot remember where since my mind just went blank. Anyway, thanks for your kind words. I've gotten about 6.9M bytes into document # 13 so it should be published here in an hour or two. Stay tuned.

And to save some typing mistakes on the address shown in the picture I'll tag it here for you:

http://www.the-strategist.net/RD/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=1090

[image]local://upfiles/16287/AA015CEED48C4E50944D5571D65ACF2A.gif[/image]




junk2drive -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/29/2009 11:58:09 PM)

I intend to go through forum posts, in fact I just came here from the blitz AAR section. I know about Gamesquad too. Never been to Rugged Defense. Thanks for the linkpic (new word)





larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (11/30/2009 1:36:41 AM)

Document # 13 is ready to publish.  It's about the wrapup of turn 11 of Directive 21 and you can find it at this url:

13th Doc:http://www.mediafire.com/?zn0n0zmhojy



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (12/1/2009 1:34:55 AM)

Document # 14 is ready to publish.  It's about the turn 11 Soviet attacks and the start of turn 12.  Odessa is under seige and I'm pounding away at Kiev and doing mop-up southeast of Kiev.  The push to Sevastapol is underway and progress is being made.  You can find doc 14 at this url:

14th Doc:http://www.mediafire.com/?nzb5muo2i2m



larryfulkerson -> RE: A how-to for beginners (12/1/2009 4:25:25 PM)

Document # 15 is ready to publish.  It's about the turn 12 attacks and the results thereof.  Some spectacular results were made and the push is on.  You can find doc 15 here:

15th Doc:http://www.mediafire.com/?kvydlhmmnji



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