Ex SPII player - observations so far

[RubberNeck]

I am, by nature, a very cautious commander so I can see why you have a problem with scenarios ending too early. Many times I have had to hold back from that final victory hex because I have spent one or two extra turns advancing cautiously to avoid undue casualties.

My solution? I almost exclusively play campaigns now. Yes, I still get penalized for not advancing as far as I might have had I been reckless, but by keeping my force intact I have the greater benefit of a superior force in the next battle. There is still the requirement to get a victory but I put more value on a healthy, intact core force than a few extra campaign points.

Dean

[DRG]

The game contains a number of features to allow players to customize it to fit their personal game play style and/or experience with the game. These controls are usually ignored by newbies even though we do explain them in the manual.

Infantry toughness can be changed by the player in the preferences screen. You think infantry is too tough for your tastes???.... simple........change the setting and they will die quicker. If you only want the AI to die quicker then just adjust the AI's Infantry toughness.

Don't think sceanrio designers give you enough time to take your objectives ? No problem.....open the sceanrio in the editor and increase the number of turns allowed ( and be happy you don't have Patton as the officer above you...)

How does the AI "know" where your mortars are ? Did you fire them ? It's explained in the Game guide that comes with both games. The AI "sees" your mortars the same way you can "see" it's mortars as all mortars after firing a few rounds leave a smoke signature on the map and we have coded the AI to take an interest in any smoke signatures like that the same way any human player can.


Don

[serg3d]

However AI tanks sitting and doing nothing while in defence is quite common problem. I guess AI tank platoons actions are triggered by capturing specific victory hexes. IMHO It would be a good idea to add/increase proximity/v.hex proximity trigger and add random trigger.

[MajorDisaster]

Thanks for the tips on the turns number switch (brilliant!! It's right in front of me and I miss it!! talk about needing glasses), and the Infantry Toughness... Im trying a campaign battle with the infantry tweeked down to 90%, (on both sides.. Im not after an easy ride :-) ...).
I know that you can see smoke hanging over mortars once fired, what I didnt know was that it could "seen" by the oppostion even when visibility range was set very low on a particular scenario (9 hexes in this case). I never bothered looking at the enemy side of the map for it becuase I assumed it wouldnt be spottable, (and it was a snow map so that's my excuse for not paying attention in class).
And yes, I'm glad I wasn't under Patton - Even some of his fellow generals questionned his sanity and the man who veto'd earlier use of the Pershing tank because it didn't fit in with his personal doctrine. He slaps a kid for selfishly having shell shock, then later loses several companies of men attempting a bodged rescue attempt of his son in law from a POW camp. There, contraversy ;-) Hey there's an idea for some scenario builders - build a Normandy scenario with Shermans V Panthers then an exact copy with Pershings instead ... and see how the US does then ? I'm sure someone has done it already... Maybe.. Again, thanks all for the pointers.

[dlazov]

Counter observations...

When the DOS game was out (6.0) I learned against 3 very excellent gamers on "What not to do in SPww2".

Nothing beats a fairly good PBEM game.

Shorter scenarios, like DRG said, but on the ones I created, that is the time allowed for the quick scenario to complete that mission.

That said, when I play campaigns I like tough infantry (default setting), and setting the AI to Hard or Hardest (gives me a great challenge, nothing more fustrating then seeing my Hauptmann Wiess with 25 Kills get wasted by a P-51 with a direct hit!). I got one campaign going now with a German Infantry company reinforced with one platoon of tigers and one platoon of panthers, the Tigers have 7-15 kills for four of them (sans the leader with 30, he is almost a star) and the panthers all have 15-28 kills (sans one that 12 kills and died outright last battle). I got a MG42 with 90 exp and 6 kills.

Anyway I am raving..

[MajorDisaster]

Yeah Dlazov I read your AAR - I could almost smell the cordite :-) It might be unfair to compare SPWW2 with SPII but when I had Tigers in that they clocked up a huge tally of kills on a Campaign & ended up with more fix points than I could spend. Like you say though, it was sad if they got knocked out by aircraft/arty and the crew were wiped...
I started my 1st SPWW2 campaign as German, but will restrict to 2 Tiger (promise!!) on the basis that half a platoon was broken down a lot of time. And it stops every game turning into a "Mini Kursk".

Oh one other thing I notice... AT gun crews also shoot their small arms in the same turn - they all jugglers? I would have thought they use small arms at very close range against infantry OR their main gun at tanks - not the lot at once. Makes them too tough to take out IMHO. (Games like Close Combat too - "Super" AT guns you cant see til you sit on them, even in open, and use ALL their weapons at once). I cant imagine an AT team pinging their rifles off at a tank instead of loading another few AP shells.