What's the Secret to the France 44 Battle?

[texican]

The main thing to realize in this scenario is there are three enemy elements or groupings that you have to eliminate in sequence:

1) Allied air (just convert your dive bombers to FW 190g's so they can join your fighters in clearing the sky)
2) Allied naval (ship bombardment will keep you away from the coast, but a high exp. overstrength level bomber will take care of these).
3) Allied ground (once you've done 1 and 2, this is a cakewalk).

(Other players' panzers' mileage may vary, of course.)

[MarsRobert]

The main thing to realize in this scenario is there are three enemy elements or groupings that you have to eliminate in sequence:

1) Allied air (just convert your dive bombers to FW 190g's so they can join your fighters in clearing the sky)
2) Allied naval (ship bombardment will keep you away from the coast, but a high exp. overstrength level bomber will take care of these).
3) Allied ground (once you've done 1 and 2, this is a cakewalk).

(Other players' panzers' mileage may vary, of course.)

Makes sense to me Texican. I must admit one thing I hadn't thought of was converting my Me110 to an FW190 specifically for this purpose. And right, although maybe not historically accurate, I'm starting to notice that of all the aircraft the level bomber does the best against ships. Also, as someone else mentioned, in gaining air superiority I try to find stray lone targets of opportunity rather than taking on a big grouping of enemy planes. Anyway, since starting my second campaign I'm doing a lot better this time around. I'm poised to do Sealion (which will hopefully short-circuit Overlord , and thus far the only battle I haven't won a decisive victory in was Norway. Yet again I got hung up at Narvik, and made the mistake of rushing my Kreigsmarine into battle piecemeal. One more thing. With my decisive wins in Fall Gelb and Fall Rot, in both cases I did it on the last allowable turn and had to revert to a saves numerous times in order to as one reviewer of the game so aptly noted, "put the puzzle together".

[MarsRobert]

The West Germany scenario is rather easy. I made decsisive in 7 rounds.

The Germany scenario is IMHO impossible to win.

The East Germany scenario is maybe possible if you focus on a defense ring around berlin. I must figure out a good tactic some time.

By West Germany scenario do you mean the Ardennes Offensive? And yes, having gotten a taste of 'Die Gotterdamurung' (did I spell that right? at the end of my last campaign, it seemed to me to be a 'Kobayashi Maru' unwinable scenario if there ever was one.

[Fritz]

By West Germany scenario do you mean the Ardennes Offensive?

No its the last scenario after Ardennes (if you are not fast enough). You come to it if you have beaten the Russians but failed to conquer Britain.
Press F1 for campaign info.

[MarsRobert]

By West Germany scenario do you mean the Ardennes Offensive?

No its the last scenario after Ardennes (if you are not fast enough). You come to it if you have beaten the Russians but failed to conquer Britain.
Press F1 for campaign info.

Understood Fritz. FYI, I've been making it a point at this stage not to look at the campaign tree. I like to be surprised. I will probably look at the tree after I finish this (my second) campaign.

Alas, I couldn't decisively defeat Britannia, so I guess that means I'll be doing Normandy again at some point.

[SardaukarCRO]

yup, sea lion 40 is a very tough scenario, britain's fighters are far better than yours so you should be very careful about them and keep your bombers protected because you will need them to take that one enemy tank that gave me headache (matilda?) ... their bombers are focused on your submarines so you shouldn't worry about them in the beginning. it's imperative to have at least 2 level bombers to take out enemy's ships, especially lone battleship in the middle between the west and northeast fleets. after you deal with that battleship, disembark there and begin land operations. land battle is easy once you disembark all your units, especially if you attack London from two directions - southeast and northeast if you manage to disembark in the northeast. keep your paratroopers at full strength and capture ports with them. also, if you are fast enough, you can capture the west victory point with them because AI won't protect it very well (maybe an antitank and infantry unit).

[Fritz]

Sea Lion 40 is hard but Sea Lion 42 is the ultimate challenge. So i suggest always to make decsisive on Low Countries and France.

But if you start with the Barbarossa Campaign you must do Sea Lion 42.

[MickMannock]

There is problems with how the Normandy scenario was created and set up. The biggest problem is the fact that there are too few German aux units along the coast. This leads to Caen being taken by the British on the first turn and the Americans break out of Normandy basically during turn two. It makes the scenario very ahistorical, even more than necessary, and unbalanced.

Someone said that the scenario is designed to make the player lose, since the scenarios are setup to follow what happened historically. The problem is that the Germans didn't really "lose" the invasion. They kept the Allies at bay for over a month which was a decent result given the resources of both sides. I'd say the scenario should be modelled for the German to achieve a marginal win. A descisive win should be nearly impossible of course.

In my opinion this needs to be done:

1. Split the scenario up in two scenarios, just as it was in PG. First you get to handle the invasion in one scenario. The other scenario lets you deal with Operation Cobra (the breakout of Normandy). The limited scope of those scenarios will be easier to handle for the AI too, I think.

2. More German aux (i.e. cannon fodder) units placed along the coast. This makes the Allied progress a bit slower and lets the strategic reserve (your core units) catch up with the action at a more probable spot and makes the scenario more balanced.

[texican]

There is problems with how the Normandy scenario was created and set up. The biggest problem is the fact that there are too few German aux units along the coast. This leads to Caen being taken by the British on the first turn and the Americans break out of Normandy basically during turn two. It makes the scenario very ahistorical, even more than necessary, and unbalanced.

Someone said that the scenario is designed to make the player lose, since the scenarios are setup to follow what happened historically. The problem is that the Germans didn't really "lose" the invasion. They kept the Allies at bay for over a month which was a decent result given the resources of both sides. I'd say the scenario should be modelled for the German to achieve a marginal win. A descisive win should be nearly impossible of course.

In my opinion this needs to be done:

1. Split the scenario up in two scenarios, just as it was in PG. First you get to handle the invasion in one scenario. The other scenario lets you deal with Operation Cobra (the breakout of Normandy). The limited scope of those scenarios will be easier to handle for the AI too, I think.

2. More German aux (i.e. cannon fodder) units placed along the coast. This makes the Allied progress a bit slower and lets the strategic reserve (your core units) catch up with the action at a more probable spot and makes the scenario more balanced.

I think your point #1, splitting up the scenarios might work. In fact, I'd toss out D-Day and just have Operation Cobra. (The rationale being that Panzer Generals like us would never allow a D-Day to succeed anyway; we're brought into the scene almost too late when Cobra is happening.)

[MarsRobert]

yup, sea lion 40 is a very tough scenario, britain's fighters are far better than yours so you should be very careful about them and keep your bombers protected because you will need them to take that one enemy tank that gave me headache (matilda?) ... their bombers are focused on your submarines so you shouldn't worry about them in the beginning. it's imperative to have at least 2 level bombers to take out enemy's ships, especially lone battleship in the middle between the west and northeast fleets. after you deal with that battleship, disembark there and begin land operations. land battle is easy once you disembark all your units, especially if you attack London from two directions - southeast and northeast if you manage to disembark in the northeast. keep your paratroopers at full strength and capture ports with them. also, if you are fast enough, you can capture the west victory point with them because AI won't protect it very well (maybe an antitank and infantry unit).

Yes indeed, I did notice my four ME109's taking a bit more than they received from the Spits and Hurricanes. Also, yes, that Matilda west of London was indeed tough. Since he seemed content not to venture out from where he was, I pretty much screened him and left him alone. I basically did three thrusts: The main force went north to London, a smaller force went northwest to Bristol then northeast to Oxford, and my paras took that town in the Northeast. Also, it took me at least 4-6 turns to make the south coast safe for a landing, and this delay more than likely precluded any chances I might have had of wining a decisive victory. In any event I settled for a normal victory and proceeded to Barbarossa.