Slitherine

Okay, I am working on 02Airborne of our Normandy 1944 UK & Canada campaign. Please keep an eye on this thread as I develop comments and questions.

First, I intend to adhere to this description of Operation Tonga in Wikipedia, if that is alright with you. I am re-writing the Scenario Name and Description accordingly.

Here is a map of Operation Tonga:


I am going to see if the bridge locations on your map approximate the ones suggested by this map. Also, the Merville Gun Battery; I assume this is it, a flag marked "Pillbox" on your map:


It was an important major gun battery covering the coast for miles. I want to replace the concrete bunker with a fortress to give it more distinction, labeling both the spot and the fortress as "Merville Gun Battery." The coastline is festooned with mines, bunkers, and army units. My assumption is that the mines and bunkers are window dressing, as the goal of Operation Tonga was not to take the beaches but the bridges and the inland gun battery.

What I am pondering is whether any of those German army units would abandon the beaches to move inland and deal with the British airborne attack. My inclination is no, but maybe some units could "peel off" and go Seek & Destroy. I will see what you have left me to work with concerning the Wehrmacht; maybe I will leave all of those beach defenses alone and static and just make up my own bridge guards. If you have an opinion on this, please let me know soon.

As far as the British, you as always are in charge of Allied forces. I'm not sure how closely you have followed history as to where the 7th, 8th, 9th, and 13th Parachute Battalions would have landed, and when, but that is up to you. Just please keep an eye on where I may move their targets around.

Actually, the placing of the six primary VP river/canal bridges on your map is not bad. What is confusing a bit is that your map has more rivers than the one above and the names don't match. (For one thing, the original Scenario Description mentions "the River Dives" while your map has signposts for "La Divette River" and a "La Dives River" — whichever it is, I will standardize the name and rename other rivers as needed, with more signposts.)

I have to get a handle on what actually happened versus some of the directions and comments in here. Right now, the primary objective is "Capture and hold all 6 functional bridges" but the Scenario Description says "Their task [the 6th Airborne] was to secure the bridges across the Orne River and Canal and hold until relieved. Additionally the bridges on the River Dives as well as the Merville battery overlooking Sword beach had to be neutralised to prevent the Germans interfering with the planned British seaborne landings." Indeed, Wikipedia states "The division was to capture two strategically important bridges over the Caen Canal and Orne River which were to be used by Allied ground forces to advance once the seaborne landings had taken place, destroy several other bridges to deny their use to the Germans and secure several important villages."

So I think we will have a hybrid objective here. Not to hold all six bridges intact, but only the ones over the Caen Canal and Orne River. The other four are to be destroyed to delay German reinforcements coming from the east.

Next, I have to see what you were trying to do with the Bridges trigger folder and "Note that any German unit positioned on a bridge will blow it." I don't think that would have been their intention at all, EXCEPT in the Caen Canal and Orne River area and only after the British had taken one or both of those bridges. They may have decided to blow them in that case, perhaps, considering the British 3rd Division would be advancing on the other side of the canal/river. But at the same time, they would be fighting to keep the other four bridges to the east operational, preventing the BRITISH from blowing them.

As it is, the Pont de Varaville and Pont de Bricqueville are immediately blown because German units are placed on them in the beginning of the scenario. I will remedy this, one way or the other. Probably, as I said, the Germans will be looking to defend these bridges, not blow them.

Please look this over and see if you have objections. If so, kindly post in the next day or so. Otherwise I will proceed on the basis of my assumptions. If I am wrong, we can always undo and revise.

One more thing before I dive in (parachute in? pun was not originally intended): I am a fan of building just a bit of suspense, so I favor moving these initial paratrooper transports west a bit so that the player must use one turn to fly to target.


Also, 249 Para Eng is already on the ground. Intentional? Kind of non-immersive if you ask me, because it is not apparent how they got there. Infiltrated and swam the river yesterday? Parachuted by themselves early for a reason? I'm going to see if I can give them their own transport plane. Plus, all planes will be flying EAST-ward, by Jiminy!

EDIT: Okay, I see what you are doing here at the start and in the first turn two turns (including spawning paratroops at the start of the German turns). Quite a few units are on the ground already, not just the 249 Para Eng. With a nod to your knowing what you are doing with the paratroopers, I strike this post altogether, including moving the planes (except they will face east). Never mind the rest.

Follow-up: Eureka! Here is an even better map for my purposes. It clearly shows which objectives were to be captured and which were to be destroyed. Moreover, it identifies River Divette vs. River Dives.


The other map is better for your purposes, perhaps, as it shows where the parachute battalions landed, I think. In any case, I don't see changing the six primary VP locations now, just how they are handled. I am on my way!

Excellent, Bru. Looking forward to your final treatment.

The Germans along the beach are meant to be guarding against seaborne invasions. So they have local defend orders with a bit of distance.

The airborne support units need to deploy on the ground. Putting them in air transports means the may only land on airfields/airstrips. Note that their deployment locations have carefully calculated supply.
Forcing the airborne to move one turn before parachuting is a good idea. Maybe even add some bridge flak units.

Erik2 wrote: ↑Thu Jul 21, 2022 11:34 am Excellent, Bru. Looking forward to your final treatment.

The Germans along the beach are meant to be guarding against seaborne invasions. So they have local defend orders with a bit of distance.

The airborne support units need to deploy on the ground. Putting them in air transports means the may only land on airfields/airstrips. Note that their deployment locations have carefully calculated supply.
Forcing the airborne to move one turn before parachuting is a good idea. Maybe even add some bridge flak units.

All very good. Thanks for the clarifications; your Allied deployments are unchanged.

I should have something in the next few days. In the meantime . . . take this!


[the Merville Gun Battery objective completed]

Started the Olympic Campaign. Was hoping someone would do this. I chose the center campaign. I seem to have hit a major Bug in 03Packard. I started on the Southern Beach and then Chose Western for reinforcements. Problem is, 12 Turns in and no reinforcements just the 22cp I started with.

The reinforcements arrive in the shape of command points, not units.
Are you saying that the CPs did not increase?
That would indicate that the Set Trigger State effect wich should activate the reinforcement triggers doesn't work...
That said, I've just finished the Ariake-Packard-Center-Northern branch and had no problems playing these scenarios.

Anyway, I see that since all reinforcements are simply CPs I can change all the triggers to pre-activated and the dialog is really not needed (originally the reinforcements were units).

Correct CPs did not increase.

The trigger is working, but perhaps a player is expecting Marines CPs?

When you took out the unit placements, you obviated the need for the dialog window asking the player to choose which beaches to land on. Now it's up to him to choose because you are not forcing him to follow a script of all follow-up landings at one particular spot.

I am confused as to whether this is a U.S. Army or Marines scenario, or both. Core Marines units are provided in the beginning but the additional CPs are U.S. Army. Perhaps the CPs are for U.S. Army core units from previous scenarios?

If you want, and you would explain the forces and processes, I will attempt an overhaul of this CP enhancement module according to the time schedule that you have in mind (0800=T2, 1000=T3, etc.) along with another popup explaining the situation (a U.S. Army landing or additional Marines, choose a beach, and so forth).

Please let me know.

Packard is an US Army scenario.
I have simplified the reinforcement triggers, now they are simple command points and resource income triggers.
I have played through the US Army Ariake-Packard-Center-Northern branch and added fixes to the scenarios.
Currently playing the Marine Western-Sendai-Center-Northern branch, will implement any fixes to those scenarios of course.
When I'm finished with the third branch I'll publish a new campaign version (or probably put it in the Bru-folder).
At that point it would be nice if you did a good old-fashioned CSI on all reinforcement triggers.

Erik2 wrote: ↑Sun Jul 24, 2022 4:27 pm Packard is an US Army scenario.
I have simplified the reinforcement triggers, now they are simple command points and resource income triggers.
I have played through the US Army Ariake-Packard-Center-Northern branch and added fixes to the scenarios.
Currently playing the Marine Western-Sendai-Center-Northern branch, will implement any fixes to those scenarios of course.
When I'm finished with the third branch I'll publish a new campaign version (or probably put it in the Bru-folder).
At that point it would be nice if you did a good old-fashioned CSI on all reinforcement triggers.

Okay, you are the boss and the doctor. You know what you want to accomplish and have a campaign-long perspective. I look at scenarios individually, and therefore can be concerned when I see Marine core units with no CPs to deploy them with, either initially or subsequently. But perhaps these units are being "carried through" to a future scenario in the campaign. They certainly cannot be deployed at this point:


Sure, I will do a CSI on the campaign when you are finished. Just clean out / refresh the Dropbox folders and let me know.

Both US Army and the Marines faction need to be active in each scenario, wether they are used or not.
This to make sure the core reserve units are carried to a later scenario where the faction is in play.
Play-testing all branches is (of course) the only way to check that everything works in every scenario independent of the way forward in the campaign.
I usually find a couple of snags that I fix as I move along.

Heh, you must have been fatigued when you typed this. It's not an easy typo to reproduce!


On a hunch, I searched online for "Gmernas," hoping for an aliens tie-in that we could use, but came up with nothing.

Could be one of the former Yugoslavian Balkan republics.

I spaced these out a bit — you had a few of them spawning in the same hex, right over one of the bridges — so as to not have any of these planes spawning directly over the bridges, where I want to place token guards to be overcome. As you know, the trick will be to hold onto these bridges in the face of counterattacks.

I also nudged this fellow one hex over so that the player can see the all-important LZ Main Supply during the briefing.

02Airborne (the new beginning scenario for Normandy UK & Canada 1944) is in the _Back to Erik folder. Caution: I did not affix a number to the folder name this time, so don't mix it up this revision with the original 02Airborne which is still in the _Ready for Bru folder.

Changes
• Turned off the background battle sounds. This scenario starts at midnight on June 6. I just read in a web site's D-Day timeline (https://www.dday-overlord.com/en/d-day/timeline) that the "First shots of naval artillery on the German coastal positions" occurred at 05:10 AM. The actual landings began about an hour and a half later, after daybreak. Thus any battle sounds in this scenario will come from the action right in front of us.
• Rotated German units in natural directions so that they are all not facing east.
• Similarly, rotated all Allied units, particularly the air transports, so that they generally face eastward.
• Gave Allies an Off-map Air Supply Source, and air exits, so that the air transports don't show fuel warnings from the beginning.
• Relabeled (and repeatedly) "Canal de Caen" and "Fleuve L'Orne."
• Relabeled (and repeatedly) "Rivière La Divette" and "Fleuve Dives."
• Identified and labeled (redundantly) "La Grand Canal."
• Removed superfluous loops in the L'Orne and the Dives.
• Channeled Canal de Caen and L'Orne closer together in the north, as IRL.
• Discontinued Rivière La Divette just north of Robehomme — it really is nothing further south (there are tons of tiny streams and canals in this area but we cannot show them all — see comment below).
• Removed some other rivers on the map; those not of the four named above and which crossed roads within the envisioned "perimeter." Reasons: 1) They were distracting, and 2) They were creating bridges, some with paved roads, that should and would have been important targets if they existed.
• Converted Bricqueville to Robehomme which is shown on the map above.
• Removed Pont de Bricqueville (there's no longer a bridge in that hex) and moved it east to Pont de Robehomme. Moved the primary VP along with it.
• Paved the road from Bavent through Hameau St Clair so that the Pont de Bricqueville/Robehomme would be more important.
• Paved the road from Troarn to Bures and ran it further east to St-Richer in order to make the second bridge objective near Bures more important. Now there is a "Pont de Bures (rail)" and "Pont de Bures (road)".
• Beefed up Varaville and moved its flag left one hex to the intersection. Reason: This would have been a key point to take and hold to block any traffic moving down from Cabourg.
• Similarly beefed up Troarn.
• Cleared swamps from various primary roads and railroads (illogical to have major arteries running through swamps).
• Cleared up a few spots where roads and railroads ran together in one hex instead of crossing each other.
• Added swamps between "Canal de Caen" and "Fleuve L'Orne" to emphasize why the bridges near Bènouville were so important, like an east-west funnel.
• Added farmland where swamps and rivers may have been previously.
• Increased the turns to 24 because I like round numbers (24 hours in a day) and because the size of the map doesn't seem to be commensurate with only 20 turns. We may need more; if so, please adjust the next item.
• According to Wikipedia, Operation Tonga took an entire day, not just one night. "By 00:00 7 June, the entire 6th Airborne Division had been fully deployed on the eastern flank of the invasion beaches ..." So on Turn 6, sandstorm (night clouds) lift (day breaks) and on Turn 18 it resumes (night descends).
• Removed all German blowing bridge triggers except those over the Caen Canal and L'Orne River. For those two, I made special triggers.
• Compacted German forces along the beach, assigned a few loose AT guns to nearby regiments, and restricted all of these forces to Local Defense, Distance 1. Reason: Facing impending seaborne invasion, no German units would be abandoning beach defenses to go hunting paratroopers. There are enough inland units for that purpose. Only if the player foolishly wanders too close to the coastline will these beach defenses engage.
• So in lieu of activity from enemy troops guarding the beaches, I garrisoned all points of interest in addition to automating available inland units.
• Added supply for the Germans and spread it around because, once the Allies take the LZ Supply of 200, local German supply will be severely reduced.

Notes
• All objectives to be accomplished on their own; no delaying one to allow accomplishing the others. As the general says in his interim report, "timing and coordination are everything in this operation. No aspect of it can be delayed so another can be accomplished. It will all be done by the deadline or the mission will be deemed a failure."
• Turn 2b, two British units spawn but income changes +8. Intentional? (Considering that the player may have to rebuild a bridge or two over the Caen Canal and L'Orne River, perhaps this is advisable.)
• With seven bridges to destroy or possibly rebuild, I was concerned about a sufficient number of Allied engineers but I see there are plenty available.
• I cannot see vehicles being landed in this operation, so I agree with no transports for Allied artillery. It does severely limit their usefulness, however.
• I am a bit concerned about gameplay balance in this one, against the player this time. It's not the garrisons that I added, which can be picked off one by one and are compensated for by restricting the beach defenses from moving inland. Rather, it's the two strong armored columns that you have coming up from the south and that I choreographed to attack. Will the paratroopers be able to fend them off?
• I fawned over Brucourt, touched as I was that they would name their village after me.

That was an impressive list of changes.
I'll give it a play as soon as I've beat a rather nasty covid-attack.
I even had to cancel playing with my band at my daughter's wedding-party