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Bing -> LV - Twilight Zone (2/3/2002 12:53:00 AM)
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Per Red Buttons, "Straaaange things are happening ...." - on the Eastern Front.
First two battles went just fine, across the river, then consolidate the bridgehead, I sort of feel these were made a little easier so as not to discourage the newer player, which is all to the good. Experienced players should not have much trouble getting DV's for both battles.
Battle #3 "A Vital Bridge" is a good fight, right down to the last turn for me. Duked it out on the bridge, there were losses, secured and held the 3 bridge VH couple turns before end of scenario, got a Draw which was earned the hard way.
Good tough fighting, especially from the Clark Kent Soviet Motorcycle squads. These guys not only don't break and run, they can withstand nearly unlimited fire and won't be reduced! Just for fun, I lined up six German rifle squads and a tank and everybody emptied their magazines. 5 squads and the tank had no effect whatsoever - we're talking point blank range, guys. Finally, with the sixth squad blazing away, the Soviet Superhuman Hell's Angels were reduced by two and fell back - precisely one hex.
Am not annoyed, rather am amused. Not amused with loss of FO, however. As turned out, did not auger well for future.
Battle #4 "Recon to Radzi~" - all kinds of field arty plus a gaggle of Stukas and no FO, where previously there had been three of them. Something is rotten in Peenemunde when a HT driver has the same arty rating as the force commander. If this is game balancing in action, I don't like it. What happens is the player must anticipate enemy movements, because all fire is delayed minimum 1.4 turns. This can be a tricky proposition if the player must move as quickly as possible - which is the case here, in order to secure the last four VH's in the lower right quadrant of the battle map.
We know how important VH ownership is: Means everything in a campaign, it determines not just outcome of a particular scenario, it also has tremendous inlfuence on what will happen next in the branching. Fighting is very tough in this battle. Without all the VH's the player probably can't get more than a Draw, if that. First time through the last turn, I had controlled all of the "per turn" VH for almost all fifteen turns, with a few and very temporary exceptions, when I lost one I took it back. Immediately, if not sooner. The last four VH, per above, came at T12 thru T13 (they are EOB type).
I got a Moderate and was pretty well satisfied with that. HQ drooled all over me, which I thought deserved more than "Moderate" rating, but a good soldier does not complain (oh yeah, sure).
But due to what happened next, I redid the Battle #4 last turn, this time my heroic Panzer crews took out two more Ruski tanks and now I got an Decisive!! And a medal!! And the same drooling over me, this time at least it meant something. Was not prepared for what came next, must say that.
Battle #5 "Exploitation of - or at - Radzi~" - I took the Delay option. BTW, with my medal and all that shouldn't I get a better fanfare than I did with a Moderate victory? And a personal congratos from the guy with the ersatz German accent? I didn't. Think I'll go eat worms.
I have no explanation for what happened next, maybe someone does: I was supposed to get Aux of 2 X Pzr IVc + 2 X "Pzjgr" + 2 X "engr". Instead I got two Pzr IVd's (that is certainly OK with me), no Pzjgr and no Engineers. Instead I got 2 X sIG33 ausf Pz-1 which is a thin-skinned infantry assault gun, carries no AP whatsoever and is as much a danger to supporting infantry as it is to the enemy. The engineers simply did not make it and I reloaded several times and restarted I think three times.
But get this, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls: The sIG33's came in RIDING ON THE pZ IVd's!! I mean loaded ON the tanks. The game engine also took away the A0 Vebber's HT, he is supposed to be riding on a StugB, he isn't, instead he is on the ground but when I did "L" on the tank to see what would happen, Hauptmann Vebber JUMPED fifty meters to the hex beside the tank - Paul, if you are not training for the next summer Olympics you ought to be.
I did get a couple of Bf110D-2's but without the FO they will just as likely bomb Germans as Russians. Are they supposed to be a substitute for the engineers? Maybe?
So ... the bottom line is that at battle #5 of MCLV, Vebber lost his ride and his command vehicle, the FO is nowhere to be found, I didn't get the Aux forces promised, all the attached armor and field artillery went elsewhere. If there are bunkers up ahead, which I believe is a pretty fair assumption, the lack of engineers will be felt right away.
If this is the way Germany treated its heroes, no wonder they lost the war.
All in good fun, no serous criticism intended. But maybe there ought to be more issues addressed with an MCLV patch - if there will be one, which I do not really know (?).
Bing
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