France: Build Garrisons or INf Corps??

[Blathergut]

I've seen in the AARs that most of you seem to build garrisons but the Germans also seem to carve through these fairly rapidly. Would it not be better to build inf corps? Would these be able to hold around Paris a bit more strongly?

[schwerpunkt]

The primary reason for using Garrisons is the ability to form a double line and to create additional ZOC movement penalties for the German. Having said that, I usually like to build a couple of Inf for use at "strong points".... For the allied player, the French campaign is one of delay and the longer you can keep the German player congested, the better. Once the German player reaches the Seine River, the French are down to only a few turns as the River line can be easily forced by TACs.

Hope the above helps.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

The main goal for the Allied player is to try to keep France alive for so long that Sealion won't happen. The Germans need a turn or two to repair losses and move their land units adjacent to ports. So if France falls in late June the the invasion probably won't start before August.

The rivers flow differently in Grand Strategy compared to the vanilla game. There are more cities in all countries so you have to rethink how to best defend in France.

It looks like the Allied player needs to adjust the defense line several times and withdraw from one river line to the next if the river line is compromised.

It's harder to attack across river in GS in fair weather (50% attack strength instead of 70% attack strength). I think building some more corps units is very important. If you build a defense line then the attacker will usually attack only from 2 hexsides until he can kill a unit and penetrate the line. It's not that hard to kill a garrison with air attacks and then 2 land attacks (even across river). So placing corps units in the front defense line means it's not easy to roll up the entire river line. It was actually quite easy to roll up an entire river line if only garrisons occupied the front line. You start attacking one of the flanks of the river line with 2 air attacks and then 2 land attacks will kill the garrison, then you don't advance across river. Now you can send an armor unit across river to attack the next garrison. A corps will finish off the next unit and you can repeat with armor and mech units (moving across the river to attack from behind) until the line is destroyed completely.

If you place a corps unit in the defense line you need 3 units to kill it and that means you can't roll up the line the way I described. So only building garrisons is a mistake. They only defend well in forests, rough, cities etc. 2 land attacks almost always destroy a garrison in a clear hex. So build some corps units and transport the garrisons in northern Africa and Syria to France.

[Blathergut]

Have been partial to corps in the vanilla game. Haven't had a chance to do other than one Fall of France against the AI in GS, but will see how the French play out against the human mind soon hopefully.