Beginner questions

[conanthelibrarian6372]

Love the game so far, but I have a few questions that vets can probably help with: (I'm currently playing the Rising sun expansion)


1. I don't understand units at times. My flame tank that worked so well in the first scenario was 9 strength and couldn't kill a militia in the open with 1 strength. They sat there for 6 turns not killing each other despite trying.
Also, in the 4th scenario, there are some '35 Chinese cavalry that beat everything I throw against it. Tanks, HVY Inf., doesn't matter. How? Why?
Another example, I have an 8 STR. '37 HVY inf, against 2 '35 militia in a river hex, and they beat me 2-0. I just don't get that.

2. Reinforcement... not sure why some units will get a full 5, but others only 1 or two. I get it when close to an enemy, but that is not the case I'm talking about.

3. Arty... love me some arty in all games I play, but this seems underwhelming. I'm normally lucky to get 1 kill, and if they are in a city, often none. Am I using them wrong?

4. I have a tank unit, and everytime I select it, I get Hexes at a range of about 2 that all have red lines through them. What does this mean?

5. Efficiency, what effects it, and is that my problem with #1? If so, what effects it and can it be recovered?

6. Best units for dislodging INF. in cities? Arty to soften them and then HVY INF? Engineers?ww

I'm sure I'll have more, but thanks for the help so far.

[Horst]

1. You assumed right in point 5 that your units’ effectiveness got too low to still do some damage. You notice that in the yellow-orange-red strength numbers too. Let your units get one turn rest by not moving and preferably repairing to recover effectiveness and strength at same time. You recover 7 points of effectiveness per turn this way, as long as units don’t get attacked in the enemies’ turn. Better move your worn-out units away from enemies first to let them recover. You can for example swap positions too between adjacent front and second-line troops what is useful in such case.
2. If units don’t have moved and aren’t adjacent to an enemy unit in the same turn then they can reinforce by up to 5 strength, otherwise only up 2. If you don’t get all strength then you possibly lack requisition points.
3. I think artillery got recently a damper on damage basically rather only suppressing enemies by reducing their effectiveness and entrenchment. Its damage is usually lower in terrain with high cover, similar like with vehicles.
4. This is a commander’s bonus radius. The unit you selected got a commander attached that gives all units in the hatched radius all bonuses he lists too. Not all commanders have such radius, so it’s pretty powerful!
5. See 1.
6. Strafing and bombing with aircrafts, artillery, flame-tanks, engineers, and last but not least your most powerful unit nearby. If you have reduced the city defender’s effectiveness already to a red strength number, you can basically attack with anything that does some damage without much fear for retaliation. You need to judge how much time you have left in the scenario if bashing quickly through cities is worth the losses or rather be patient and do more safe bombardments first.

By the way, I recommend checking out the game's manual. It has some further informations what is always useful for strategy games: http://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steam ... 1486050526

[Andy2012]

@Conan: Horst is right. Efficiency is key in OoB. Imagine fighting without ammo or your ears ringing after a heavy arty bombardment - not very good. So keep your units inside the supply lines and keep the efficiency high (white numbers). If they go yellow or even red, retreat them or leave them be for a turn. Vice versa, knock out enemy units with low efficiency and have zero losses.

[conanthelibrarian6372]

Thanks for replies. I restarted and paid better attention to my efficiency. That really helped.

I'm going to have to restart the whole thing, because after the 50 turn battle, I was out of cash, and unable to resupply units at the beginning of the next two battles. I have about 5 planes and three arty with three tanks. Is this too much to afford?

Also, how do you deal with reinforcements? I used to use elite all the time, but I think it sapped too much from the war fund. Should I pick a few units to make "elite" and let the rest just be lower level?

Now that I'm figuring out battle, I need to get a handle o the economic side of things.

Thanks again for the help.

[Andy2012]

Thanks for replies. I restarted and paid better attention to my efficiency. That really helped.

I'm going to have to restart the whole thing, because after the 50 turn battle, I was out of cash, and unable to resupply units at the beginning of the next two battles. I have about 5 planes and three arty with three tanks. Is this too much to afford?

Also, how do you deal with reinforcements? I used to use elite all the time, but I think it sapped too much from the war fund. Should I pick a few units to make "elite" and let the rest just be lower level?

Now that I'm figuring out battle, I need to get a handle o the economic side of things.

Thanks again for the help.

Fives planes - well, depends on which ones and how you use them. Havent played Morning Sun.
Reinforcements - dont use elite on aux units. If your core is still inexperienced, you can go with regular reinforcements. Later on, I would go for elite. If you stick to the efficiency rules (dont attack when your units have low efficiency, better retreat them. Reduce enemy efficiency with flame tanks, engineers, arty, bombers, then attack.), you should not have high losses in your core and thus can save money. Conserve your core, never lose a core unit. High experience units use their efficiency very slowly. Also, keep some light AT behind your infantry to let tank attacks bounce off.

[Svensk]

need help to...i marked setting "windows" but when playing i can only move map right-left not up and down with my mouse pointer

[Erik2]

need help to...i marked setting "windows" but when playing i can only move map right-left not up and down with my mouse pointer

I prefer to use the arrow buttons on my keyboard for moving around the map. The windowed option is a bit half-baked over-all, especially if you use two monitors.
Also I use the mouse two-button option, which means it is easier to avoid misclicks on a unit and order it to do something stupid.

[Horst]

You can still move around fine inside the large minimap or hold right mouse button if you only like to move the camera slightly around.
I think the best method is to use the alt+return/enter key-combo to switch to full-screen and back if needed. The windowed-check won’t be changed this way. This switch is instant, so no big deal to keep the game windowed as default.

[Erik2]

alt+return to switch between windowed and full-screen is a nifty trick.
But the full-screen display is not as sharp and clear as the windowed screen, at least on my PC.

[Horst]

It’s likely that this full-screen windowed mode doesn’t offer the same performance than a true full screen mode. At least I don’t bother much about the graphic performance and don't see a noticeable difference with my hardware.
If you are often busy with other things in the background and especially with the game's editor then I gladly pay the price for fast and crash-free task-switches.