How do I use ammo trucks?

[Charles22]

Imp: No Imp, you read me wrong to a degree. I'm not for easy victories, in fact my desire to play weaker nations speaks to that, and often in wargaming I desire the defeated nation more, but, then again, Germany was a defeated nation.

Now think of all the things that would make Germany or most any nation uber-powerful. Buy plenty of 88's for example. I buy only two. If things get really bad I might add two more, but as Germany can get pretty good or outstanding tanks sooner or later, there's only a temporary need there.

Now that I have dwelt on a truly more effective core in writing it here, it does occur more clearly to me the greater advantage I have against the AI, but what else are you to do? It's obvious what the point of campaigning is. My idea is that my army is the elite force of that nation's army, or at least it will be if I do well. I personally think my force is VERY susceptible to air attack, but since that won't come till late '41 at the earliest, I can always add in more AA later. Another thing is, that part of the idea of optimizing your effectiveness, becomes that much more necessary should you be campaigning as say a weak Japan. Optimizing with Japan, or Italy becomes a lot more crucial and you don't succeed with them buy buying trucks in core; no way. Germany and the USSR can often skirt despite having such a thing.

The one thing about Germany that attracts me more to playing them more than the others, is that not only were they defeated, but they were also a nation who had lots of victories. IOW, they're not a nation that sees pretty much only one type of battle, like the USA for example.

As far as the AI giving me a challenge, realize first of all that almost every battle, even against the Poles as Germany gives me many challenges. I may have a very effective force, but I am crippled by playing fire brigade style. What is fire brigade style? Firstly, it's playing on 200X140 map with somewhere between 90-110 core units. You see the problem? The map is so tall and narrow, that every battle that has the AI attacking is much more dramatic, as I don't have enough units to cover all the holes. This leads often to my armor having to rush from one scene of non-defense, or helping a picket line somewhere. It's really a lot of fun. Overall, you might look at the end result in points and conclude I didn't have a good time, as I am almost always getting decisive victories (excepting possibly France '40 and USSR '41), but it's those little periods of weakness that even make the overall decisive victory so enjoyable. Can the flank, be reinforced by units in the middle in time, for instance? Will the middle regret sending them and be subject to a heavy attack afterall? Will the other flank help the then weak middle and get there on time? A lot of that goes on. Even just the battles before help arrives is quite invigorating, as a platoon of infantry, perhaps, tries to find the most effective way to either slow the attack, run from it, or dish out maximum damage. I have so many units that end up being on the lopsided side of things, for a time, that there's no way you can truly say that I'm not at a disadvantage and that it's a total bore. Besides, for me, losing even one core unit is something of a tragedy, though I know those losses will often come.

I will tell you one thing about this game though, that would make it more interesting. I used to play Panzer Strike way back in the old days, which was very similar to SP. It had a campaign feature where if you replaced/upgraded more than a certain percentage of your core at one time, you would not be able to fight the next battle and have to wait till the battle after that, or longer. To put that in winSPWW2 terms, that means that when that occurs your 60 battle war just went to 59 battles at most, such that it hurt your point total to not fight as many battles. Part of me plays to better what I achieved in Panzer Strike and SP, where despite the scoring system being somewhat different, and there being no delays for changing your whole core if you want to, I at least have some sense of whether my warring has improved over the years.

BTW, I will probably buy 30 mines maximum, probably 15-20 in most cases, just because I know how overwhleming they can be. The AI can mine me to hell and back, and that's one advantage he will have over me and I'm not that terribly good at sniffing them out. I almost always will buy a pillbox or two, just because they throw a different element into the game, though I find their effectiveness debateable. It's just fun to have certain units which cannot be moved and have to be defended to the last man.

The AI, when it's available to them, often WAY overspends me in both artillery and air support. I buy 'maybe' two air sections when I can, usually one. The entireity of my arti comes from one battery of offboard core 100cm's in for early Germany anyway (4 guns), 2 onboard 75IG's, and 2 150IG's. I might pick another arti battery of some light variety in support for assaults, but usually not.

Other than the experience I hope to gain later, there's nothing terribly overpowering about my force. I tone down my air, I tone down my arti and look for my most major punch being in each core unit being as effective as it can be through experience gain.

I will give you some example form my last battle of the kind of excitement can be found in parts of my battles. I had almost exactly what I described to you earlier concerning an infantry platoon picket in a meeting engagement with the top 40 hexes being completely berift of units, save for this platoon and one lousy PZ38t. The PZ38t was there as sort of a flank infantry support, and to do exactly what I did with it. What is that? He found a cranny where the 2-3 platoons of tanks were coming (a small cranny with at most 15 hexes before trees would interupt it) and started destroying them one-by-one. Now it wasn't exactly easy, and he got damaged mid-way through the battle himself, but I stuck it out with him and the sector ended up not needing help and got none. Should the tank had been destroyed, or there were another platoon of enemy tanks, I probably would had sent help. Now you may ask, why didn't you send help earlier, despite the unlikely huge success? I don't recall why exactly. Maybe the closest armor was just too far away. Maybe I was convinced the attack once past that point would home in on where the rest of my frontal forces were and come to me, so to speak. Or maybe I just had a hunch. You see what I mean? Nothing too dull about that, I was against tanks that could had just as easily destroyed that tank and swept the area. These weren't tanks with just MG's and that close range could had easily destroyed them. Oh, I'm wrong I did have some help, as I sent an airstrike up there and immobilized or destroyed one tank by that.

To me, as I so often found when playing SPWAW, the game got boring partly because I often was confined to a map height of 20,40,or 80 hexes (at the extreme most 120 hexes) against my will. There's just not too much fun when the flanks can be reached by placing AFV's, even in the early years, in the center of the map and blast away without moving. Excitement is when you have to move AFv's not just one or two turns to reach that area, but sometimes as many as eight turns. You're gritting your teeth, will they get there in time? Jolly good fun. It really gives you the feeling that you have individual armies out there, let's say about 7 or 8, and each one has it's own particular problems, whether extremely successful or not, instead of having such a blob of concentration that it feels as if the whole thing is just one or two armies.

OTOH, I don't attack in a very concentrated manner against the AI. Oh my two tank companies will have an infantry platoon with them perhaps, but that's as much concentration as I get. I'm pretty much attacking the entire AI line at one time, but with VERY varying amounts. Sure, my 2 main armored thrusts will often have great success, but when that same infantry platoon and one PZ38t hit a certain area you know they will be at their wit's end just like I described in that defensive portion of that meeting engagement I mentioned. With a 200 height map, there's all kinds of spots where your two armored thrusts aren't going to be able to reach very soon.

One last bit of my not excessively pressing an advanatge a lot of people would press...not only am I picking only two core 88's but I don't even plan on using them until France, maybe not until the USSR. They're such an expensive unit for that early, that not only do I hate to lose them, but I don't want their experience severely crippled should they engage units that don't need to be interfered with by them, and lose men. They start the battle on something of a rearward hill with transport nearby. If something breaks through, as is almost always the case, the target will have to be really worth it, and even then I will probably wheel them off after only 1-2 turns of firing, because I'm pretty sure the AI will bring the arti a calling.

When France comes, when I'm pretty sure they will do a good amount of firing, I will change where I place them, but not as you might expect, such as some front hill overlooking a big area, but the opposite, should I be on a defensive mission. I have had them on the ground, guarding a cranny, maybe 30 hexes deep if possible. The idea is for them to engage strong AFV's when not more than a couple of the AFV's will be able return fire. They're that way never overwhelmed, and while they're not the most active of my guns, in that role they are devastating more than usual, because almost no units can engage them in equal terms. It's taking your most expensive unit, which will definitely draw all kinds of fire and artillery and making it available to every unit and their dog, that gets your best units in trouble. If it were a Tiger in '40 france, I would blaze away on a hill once I was convinced the enemy had no air (and maybe even then) but as the 88 is a lot more vulnerable if have to play these games with it.

So you see, I give the AI quite a few chances, but I'm not dumb about it either. I still want to come away with a victory of some sort, and I should if I have a nation which is often favorable. Playing with Italy or Japan, I should feel lucky to get even a marginal victory. Different nations; different measures of success. If you can play with as much fun as I can with the USSR or Germany, due to a small ratio of units to map size, then even these traditional more boring nations can have a good deal of fun. Yes, there is some boredom, but that's if I forget all the nice little undermanned battles I won to get to that point, and all the delaying actions that made a difference.