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john g -> (11/21/2000 12:10:00 AM)
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quote:
Originally posted by Blackbird:
I'm playing WW2 Campaign, and every time I get assault mission computer buys a lot of mines. Problem is that thay are placed along the line of deploy. It's too obvious...
OK, that isn't really the bug, but bug is that the lines on top and on bottom of the map never contain mines. So why would I clean mine fields if I know that I have 100% clear path in front of me?
I learned really quickly when playing my wwii campaign about the free rows top and bottom, though that lesson comes back to haunt you in 44 and 45 vs americans, who will airstrike the heck out of you massed troops on the map edges. With a 2200 pt starting core, I saw up to three layers of mines late in the war, but only once did I see a mine in an edge row. At least one of the maps had a swamp/stream/rough cluster at one edge and I lost more vehicles to immob going around the mines than I would have waiting to clear the minefield.
The ai giving you the option to flank the defense line is historical in some respects. In the North Africa Gazala line the mines ended south of the French box and the Germans were able to drive easily around them, getting to the softer targets like the 3rd Indian MB.
In a human vs human game you would never make such a mistake, just as you would hardly ever leave a rear cluster of victory hexes to be defended only by the A0 unit. I won several battles with less than a company sized paradrop that took the rear hexes before the ai could move troops back to defend them.
Late in the war it is suicidal to send vehicles within infantry-at range, it is more in tune with their abilities to send them where the enemy are not. One battle (the only one I restarted) I plowed into american bazookas when going thru the open areas of the map 1/3 up from the edge. I saw that it was going to be a horrible defeat that way, so I restarted and tried a different tack, I put all my armor on the opposite edge ran them down that edge until I got to a road that led back to the middle of the map and the back victory hexes. After I took those hexes with only the US hmc's defending them, I then faced counter attacks from the US but was able to beat them off since a moving unit will always be less effective than a non-moving one. That battle was the only honest draw that the ai got from me, and I was happy to get it. That was the one battle in the campaign that the US spent all it's points on ground units, no air, no ob artillary, so they had many many units to use in their delay.
Another gimme you will sometimes see is a river crossing with a river that has swampy ground at one edge. That way even if you fail to buy barges you can still get your vehicles across. That happened in a Japanese long campaign, assault battle, but none of my 20 man squads could fit in an assault boat, so the entire battle was decided by the troops that went around the edge and crossed over in the 4 barges I bought.
Part of succeeding is figuring out the path of least resistance, an equal pt value of big at guns will take out a tank force, an equal pt value of aa guns will take out planes before they drop (I'm talking about late war american airstikes 20+ planes). An airdrop will take an undefended victory pt cluster long before tanks can move to them. A few excellent infantry will take out masses of poorly led junk (try 1930's Japanese vs Nat Chinese) 40-1 victory margins are possible and occur all the time.
Horse cavalry are still too strong in the game. As compared to the other fast infantry (motorcyles, bicycle, ski, truck, ht) they come off great, the horses never break down, can swim in the water, only give them size three (those 13+ man units should go up at least to size 4). As it stands, horse cavalry is still one of the last great secrets of the game, they can get there first, they can chase down and destroy retreating troops, they can blow their way past minefields, perhaps if real life was like SPWaW the Polish would have been right.
thanks, John.
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