Second Front Feedback

[Cal]

Which civ got the Apollo Wonder? That would solve the map problem, but only for either the airforce or the ground forces. Hmm... it's a difficult problem.

[Xin Yu]

SS: engineer alpine flag makes the game somewhat easier. Use a 'boarding party' of a ranger and an engineer to attack costal batteries was very effective.

The first turn I have my gliders/commandos landed on a lightly defended city and waited there. Then I sent a combat engineer and some commandos to the city (takes 3 turns). On turn 5 I use the gliders to paradrop the engineer to the 'Atlantic Wall' city and kill the command post inside the city, thus I'll get the city and the wonder. The alpine flag saves me two turns.

Use planes to patrol the seashore and kill the mines. Have a sheet of paper and write down the coordinates of the river mines, cities, batteries, and safe landing positions (a safe landing position is surrounded by water and barb wire hence nobody can attack you immediately).

Some planes can reach France in one turn. Keep the battlefield within the range so you can use them for 3 turns instead of 1. Never attack stacked units with planes.
[This message has been edited by Xin Yu (edited October 06, 2000).]

[Sten Sture]

quote: Originally posted by Captain Nemo on 10-03-2000 09:14 PM One of my testplayers said "Be careful with those gliders, Xin Yu is sure to find a way to misuse them"...

LoL. I can hear Captain Nemo cursing you from here!

What would it take to keep you from successfully doing that one? I assume increasing the defensive units in the close-to-glider cities would suffice - easy enough.

I have changed my mind on wanting the engineers to have reduced movement - if you lose some to mines, you can lose a lot to coastal bombardment.

I kinda wish there were fewer mines, or they wouldn't show up through the events.txt. I would be willing to risk losing some units to random collisions, but I tried once to run through the landing with out clearing it first and I lost 60% of my first wave - yikes. It doesn't feel right to take them out with planes. And it is tempting to check for them in crucial situations.

[Xin Yu]

SS: actually I messed it up with another city. I did take the 'Atlantic Walls' once, but couldn't remember it clearly after playing the first several turns a hundred times.

The only thing works for a command post (a=1, not 0) is veteran heavy artillaries. I paradroped all vet artillaries available to the city and took it. The engineer was used to occupy the German air field city close to it. It took me 3 artillaries to take out one command post inside the city. 105 Howitzer M7 works too but are less effective.

[Cal]

According to the World Wonders menu, the atlantic wall wonder is in Le Havre, which looks like a very large city that could never be taken until it came time to do so. How did you manage to capture that?

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The strategically impaired,
-Cal
[This message has been edited by Cal (edited October 07, 2000).]

[Xin Yu]

Cal: on turn 1, use gliders to land your commandos on a city Southeast of your starting point (the city is one square inside the dark area, use the paradrop icon to detect it) and take it. then land your gliders inside and fortify the commandos (buy an anti-tank if necessary). Later, use a glider to paradrop a commando one-square from the city to take out the anti-tank gun, the glider can still come back and hide inside the city. You can hold the city for a while (the only threat will be from air raid and a panzergradier).

Start from turn 2, move your transports towards SouthEast but make sure they will not be attacked by mines. Meanwhile use chain-transportation to move heavy artillaries and combat engineers to the frontmost transports. On turn 3 your airplane should be able to take out all mines so you can move your transports ahead right beyond the battery range but can reach the shore. By turn 4 you should have two engineers land and take out both the 210mm battery and the haus unit inside a city (the city is withing paradroping distance from the glider city). Land heavy artillaries and occupy the city, then paradrop the gliders to there. On turn 5, paradrop the heavy artillaries to the first city and you are ready to strike. On turn 6 La Hevre is yours -- just paradrop heavy artillaries (A) and commandos (C) to attack in the following sequence: ACACCAAA. The first two artillaries should be vets.

[Cal]

If only Ike, Montgomery, Patton, and all the others had the creativity to think of that.

You're good... you're a pro, Xin.

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The strategically impaired,
-Cal

[Captain Nemo]

Very good feedback...

I never intended the gliders to be reused beyond the first turn and thought I had made it impossible by limiting their range. The next version will definitely make it impossible to salvage the gliders.

Historically Caen was taken about July 9 and Le Havre became an isolated pocket that held far into September (A month after Paris was taken) therefore it should be impregnable until the very last part of the scenario and then should be difficult to take.

Taking Le Havre and Caen will not change the overall course of the scenario significantly and should make it MORE DIFFICULT to win!! Diverting resources away from the historical objectives makes you less likely to take them hence you might not achieve the required technologies for parts 2-11. Taking Caen too early eliminates the "Caen Captured" technology which is source of half the British reinforcements in parts 4-7... Sending so many good units to Le Havre will trap them there when the gliders dissappear in turn 2 and they will be unavailable to use against the required objectives.

Of course this is not intended but it will not make the following parts so easy that there is no challenge. This great feedback should allow me to close some of the loopholes and make the next version better.

Who thinks the scenario is too easy?
Who thinks the scenario is too difficult?

Another interesting development I would like to hear about is the long term success... Achieving the D-Day objectives at too high a cost (Especially in airplanes) may make the following parts more challenging if not impossible...

MagyarCrusader: Your scorecard looks like you achieved the desired results but at a tremendous cost... Especially you fleet got devastated!

Version 1.1 will at least include the following:

Tougher defense of Caen (Though I was never able to capture it before the historical date) (Being good at designing scenarios doesn't mean you are any good at playing them )
The "window" between having just the early defenders during the invasion and the arrival of the tough SS divisions will be closed.

Better readme file with a map, list of objectives with dates and stats for all "normal units".

Disabling of the "Xin factor" (I will make SURE the gliders are totally useless!!)

Stefu:
Isn't there a SF44.sav file (Starting position)? That one is the starting position. SF.sav should be the save file after you start the game so to restart just use SF44

[Shadowstrike]

Those sea mines are evil......

I must have lost a dozen transports by smashing into them...

Is there any trick to holding the cities you take? I've captured quite a few different cities only to have them reclaimed a turn or two later. Every time I try, the British front gets decimated and the American front soon follows suit.

[klesh]

Well, I hate to say this...But i am going to say I think this is too hard.

I haven't been able to break out like some of the kids here have done. I've restarted a few times, but I never have the reinforcements to press on. I'm usually left with scores of US Infantry that can't advance for the life of 'em. Perhaps I'm not attacking at the right points? I'm on the MGE version, so I never know where the counterattacks are coming from.
Basically, I feel lost and alone in this French wilderness. I have taken heavy losses in the Airforce and they don't seem to be holding back the German reinforcements.
There is all kinds of civil unrest in England, it occure before it is possible to resupport any units.
I have seen no where near as much success as some of the kids here are talking about. I'm not playing around with loopholes either.

But alas, I though RedFront was too hard untill I got the hang of it. I guess it's the looming thought that If I don't take what I need to now, the events and rules wont give me the reinforcements I need. It's like I'm trying to hang on to a string that I can't see, you know. I'm sure once I find a way to really do well on D-Day, that all will be well.

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I am the Ukrainian Anti-Pope!
Großdeutschland!

[DarthVeda]

Actually there's a really easy way around the mines. Use the goto function with the mouse drag and send them toward land. Sure it takes a bit longer but you'll never lose a guy since the goto automatically avoids enemy units.

[Sten Sture]

Darth - since all of the units can see the mines, you really just have to watch where you are going - the go-to will leave you adjacent to mines and inside shore gun range.

So far I think the scenario is quite tough, but pretty balanced. Playing it in MGE is driving me a little nuts with the invisible counterattacks but so be it.

Once I figured out the easy way to see the mines it made landing without blowing everybody up in the water much easier. In fact, I would suggest that you make the little buggers visible (just barely) to speed up the process of moving - if they are visible then maybe a few more of them.

You could eliminate the glider problem by making sure the commandos alone can't take Langrune - perhaps with just adding a blockhaus. Any glider that doesn't get to a city in that first turn is pretty much gone.

I like the layout of the German fixed positions that tie down the zoc's on Utah. Having a primary road through the hedges that could be blocked by the Airborne might be handy.

One thing that I think you should make a house rule is allowing limited pillaging - maybe by placing a couple of size one Kreigsmarine cities around the map at junctures where commandos took out bridges in the early hours of D-Day to block reinforcements (Pegasus Bridge comes to mind.) Actually that might not work either, but you get the general idea. Maybe let the player pillage a limited number (three or four?) road sections with the Airborne & glider Commandos.

Rereading Ambroses' D-Day between gaming sessions really makes the history come alive. Good work!
[This message has been edited by Sten Sture (edited October 09, 2000).]

[Cal]

I think the scenario is just right... I couldn't blindly march ahead and complete the objectives, but I was able to work out some sort of strategy.
Also... I've never had a problem with cities being recaptured, the only time that happened was when I took Langrune and left two commandoes in it... both badly damaged. In fact, the germans usually don't even counterattack, except to throw Luftwaffe units at the cities.

This is referring to part 1... of course, part 2 became harder once the panzers showed up and stopped my advance on Caen.

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The strategically impaired,
-Cal

[Shadowstrike]

Grr.. I'm struggling through Part I and someone pops up and tells me Part II is harder....

Nemo, you really have to make an "easy" version for those of us who are less skilled civ-wise...

[Cal]

Why not go check the Art of War forum for strategies?

Just try not to lose any ships to those silly coast mines. When seizing Omaha beach, I prefer to go after grandcamps or port-en-bessin and sneak through to capture omaha that way, it's a lot easier than to risk having your forces destroyed in the minefields.

Btw, Captain Nemo, since the Allies expected to have seized Caen on D-day, shouldn't it be an objective before it was actually taken historically?

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The strategically impaired,
-Cal