campaign play against ai

[deploy]

I'm still learning the 'way of the woods' but now make my scouts 'priority 1'. Find your highest skilled(Inf Command, Experience and Rally) units and change them to scouts. The higher their ability the more likely they can walk right up to troops without being noticed. Second to this are snipers, though risky, firing at point blank range(one or two shots max) to yield 'pinned' opens the door for others. Motorcycles are very durable and can be used at a pinch. Though with all of them it's important to move one hex at a time. More hexes = more pain. Check all sides before firing

Flamming the woods with artillery can do a lot to increase suppression...allowing plain infantry to do a lot of the 'bouncing' work. Plus 'Z' fire can do a little...Stugs to the front(2 hexes).

Failing that avoid maps with more than a 3 woods level?

Good luck.

[PanzerBob]

Sending Kraftradschutzen into woods is useful if you have the time to dismount them they are small yet can usually survive to disengage any encountered enemy. This of course is assuming you can't avoid the woods.

Another tactic which I found works is actually a directive Rommel issued while pushing the 7th Pz Div thru France in 40, which made it SOP to fire HE into any place that looked like in could hide enemy forces along your Route Of Advance ROA. Wooded areas fall into category. This does require some artillery preplanning and insuring you have Panzers with some HE fire power along with the usual tank killers. MG fire can be effective in this role as well, especially if you have a lot of SdKfz 251's along.

This does not work for long against human commanders but against the AI some success should be possible. Killing the enemy with this tactic is not as important as suppressing him. Reaching the objective(s) with speed and suppressive power. This is ineffective when shotgun objectives are used. (Unrealistic anyway in my view)

Bob out