All purpose Panzer General thread

[Grumbold]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
As I pointed out, advanced options is not available to a leader if he changes to a different type of unit, IIRC. So Rommel can't make an arti unit to do Bombard, say.

Advanced options, no, but they get all the benefits of multiple actions while the former unit loses them. So quality of the tropps under command counts for absolutely nothing, the leader is everything. In PG1/2 if the 15th Panzer excelled in Poland, Norway and France it would be veteran troops in the next mission no matter who led them or what tanks they were given to drive.

Not sure what you are saying here. Though fighters and antitanks don't need matching leaders. Esp fighters. They just need loads of actions.

A unit should be commanded by an appropriate commander, no matter how incompetent. You should never have to match up a pilot leader with an artillery brigade or have a tank commander flying a stuka because of mismatches in the force pool/leader pool.

All in all, its just that PG2 did this much better, so PG3d was actually change for the sake of change that made the gameplay and the historical accuracy worse. I'd rather feel like I'm driving on Moscow with a slightly strange army than that I'm playing toy soldiers in a sand pit. PG3d feels more like the latter

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by VetLegion
I've played PG3D and didn't manage to play more than two scenarios. An atrocious game.

Panzer General II on the other hand

Some general tips about PG II:

0. The obvious. Never only wound/damage enemy units. Always kill. It is better to kill one unit than to damage three, even if you manage to heavily damage them.

1. It is surest to win if you develop a good airforce. While you can play with only one or two fighters, it can be very frustrating in later scenarios when enemy gets really strong planes. Dragging AA guns around is pretty impractical, and they are not very good at getting expirience either. With a good airforce, which means at least four modern fighters and if possible, more (buy in early scenarios to get them expirienced), you can have a control of the skies, which is invaluable.

2. Spend auxiliary units or get own units expirienced? Use auxiliary ones for recon and tricky advancing into unknown. But always use your own units to finish enemy units, because that brings most expirience.

3. Spend some prestige on overstrengthening your tanks. It does wonders for their overrun ability.

4. Never, if you can help it, buy replacements on the field. I never did it.

5. Infantry eats tanks in cities.

6. Tactical advice: destroy unit by unit. I often get carried by the moment and do something like when having four enemy infantry to kill, I decide I can take down three with a tank when I weaken them, so I first weaken all three (say, two with an artillery shot, one with a bomber) and then move in the tank only to have it fail to overrun first unit (kill without overrun, or fail to kill) which leaves two of his units alive and me slowed for at least a turn. So, the rule is: Move, than shoot immediately, and go for one at the time.

Zero - yeah, ive figured that out.

1 - hmm, 4 fighters? i dont want to overload on air - ive heard thats a bit of an exploit - or is that fixed in PG2? 4 fighters sounds reasonable, though

2. thats tricky, trying to use core units and NOT lose them - im still getting the hang of it.

3. Havent tried either overstrength or overrun yet.


4. Really??? Why not?


5. Yeah, Ive figured that out too.


6. Sounds right

[Grumbold]

4 fighters is good by the later scenarios, but by then you'll have 4 of most things...

You should rarely lose cores if you make sure to support them (arty behind your inf, fighters over the arty etc) but its bound to happen from time to time if you are strict about never reloading.

Overstrength and overrun are both very useful.

I do use replacements during battle when I have to. Its a loss of prestige but if it means the unit gets to fight on then its well worth it since they usually earn more prestige back. If its nearing the end of the scenario dont do it unless you plan to take them overstrength.

Infantry are mincemeat to tanks in cities too, provided you've softened them up enough that their entrenchment level is comfortably below the experience level of the armour.

On the 'kill, not wound' arguement, its normally true, but there are occasions when it is not so. If you can get 3 units adjacent to an enemy it cannot reinforce. Bomb a line of those units and they all either die in a turn or two or have to pull back in an attempt to reinforce. That can pull a whole line out of entrenchments into positions where they are easier to kill. As long as you advance and maintain contact you have gained ground, removed their entrenchments and lost nothing.

When you're trying to get experience for new troops allowing a weak enemy unit to escape and reinforce is also quite nice. Meanwhile your elite troops are doing the real work.

[BeBMan]

I played Allied General and I think what you call PG2 (there's confusion since it was sold in Germany as PG3D, and the real 3D was sold as PG4 I believe). Also I played Peoples General which uses the same game engine and gfx style as PG2, but plays in modern times (I can only recommend it), and Pacific General which is similar to Allied general in graphical aspects.

I liked these games very much, esp. the concept of the core units which get experience and are used for a whole campaign.

To the air force discussion: yes, experienced fighters are a must, as well as good strike aircraft. In some cases (eg. British Mosquitos) they are quite capable in defending themselves against enemy fighters, so you can compromize here, and go perhaps for more of them instead of more fighters.

Something about anti-tank guns, but especially for tank destroyers in AlliedGen and PG2 (and clones): they are supposed to be used for defense, so move offensively, but fight defensively with them against enemy tanks unless they are very experienced. This goes esp. for US/UK TDs against later German tanks.

You might also think of having paras in your core forces for taking objectives far away - it can be tricky, since they must have a bit experience before they are effective, and there's a certain risk that you run into unknown resistance when dropping them far behind enemy lines, but OTOH they can be quite useful

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Grumbold
Advanced options, no, but they get all the benefits of multiple actions while the former unit loses them. So quality of the tropps under command counts for absolutely nothing, the leader is everything.

I don't think performing multiple actions is a sign of a better unit. Performing advanced actions, on the other hand, is. It's just me, though

Originally posted by Grumbold
A unit should be commanded by an appropriate commander, no matter how incompetent.

You can do that most of the time, just that with a bad leader, your unit is going to suck.

Originally posted by Grumbold
so PG3d was actually change for the sake of change that made the gameplay and the historical accuracy worse

You don't think getting any equipment you wanted is ahistorial?

[lord of the mark]

dang - with the help of the above comments i was close to a brilliant victory in the polish scena, i had a leader and all that, and the game crashed

Even with the patch (v1.02) the game is still buggy, at least on my system. Gotta remember to save.

[BeBMan]

Another note: suppression can be very useful, esp. in scns where you get strategic bombers (I never had them in my core army, though).

I remember a scn in Allied General were the German AI had a nasty Jagdtiger unit which inflicted heavy losses when I played it the first time. In later tries I bombarded it, and surrounded it so that it couldn't get supplies or reinforcements. IIRC bombarding a unit with a strategic bomber does not only suppress, but it also reduces its ammo, so after two bombardments and some attacking the Jagdtiger was left without any capability to fight back. I think PG2 this works too, since it is very similar gameplay-wise.

So if you cannot kill dangerous enemies at once, sometimes you can at least suppress them so that they cannot act effectively against you.

Suppression or air support can also help if you use paras as I posted above for taking objectives behind the front lines

[ErikM]

Originally posted by Frankychan
I only played the 1st Panzer General.

I challenged my friend that he couldn't beat me in the first German campaign (take the 2 Polish cities in 10 turns, I believe). I told him to be the Germans and he readily accepted.

Anyway, as Polish General I had some of my infantry and calvary units engage his attack force to stall for time. I left a token garrison in the first city, while building up my men in the 2nd. He laughed at the "pathetic" resistance I left in the first city, thinking that's all I had....until he saw my main defense.

Lets just say I won......

Actually, this first scenario was almost impossible to win as Germans against half-competent human opponent. As you say, just buy some units and stall for time - Germans don't have enough units to break through fast enough for a victory.

Ditto Barbarossa. Was simply incredibly easy as Russians.

Kursk, on the other hand, was almost impossible to win as Russians. Kursk as Russians was the most difficult scenario I've ever seen in a computer game. Civ III on Sid is easy in comparison

First PG was really good. *Fond memories*. PG2 was OK. From there, it was all downhill.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by ErikM
First PG was really good. *Fond memories*. PG2 was OK. From there, it was all downhill.

Same reason why we veteran Civvers find the original the best.

[Fake Boris]

If I can mind a comment about PG2- the point of Brilliant victories, is that they are increasingly harder to get as they net you less prestige. It's the highest challenge.

[Tamerlin]

I will come back to this thread later as I don't have much time this week end. I am just popping here to write that some people have adapted People's General (IMO the best gaming engine of the General Serie) so that you can use all the PG II units and scenarios with... People's General.

It's called People's General: World War II (or PG: WWII) and can be found here:

http://www.peachmountain.com/5star/PEG_DOWNLOADS.asp

P.S.: all those interested in WWII wargames should give Strategic Command a try.

[lord of the mark]

I have enjoyed the game thus far - had some difficulty with the Finland scen, which required more strategic approach than the first two scens

[Urban Ranger]

I found SSI's Clash of Steel - Future Edition online, which is sort of similar to Strategic Command AFAICT. Simplified, it seems.

[Tamerlin]

Post edited in order to remove an unauthorized link...

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Tamerlin
You can find many older games at this website:



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