Royal Hungarian Army - Turan Campaign v1.2 (Mar 23, 2016)

[asuser]

Hello McGuba,

I played the first two scenarios with level Colonel. The landscape looks very nice, the troop placements are well done. I have reached a DV after 12/14 rounds in the first scenario, but had to play until the last round. In the second scenario, I have reached a DV after 22 rounds, thereafter the scenario ended immediately.

In the second scenario, the obstacle line is really an eyecatcher, was that in reality in this area also in such a big form? Here you can see also the benefits of the bridge engineers without this it goes in this area with many rivers only very slowly. I really liked the idea of the supply units of the Motorized Brigades in Gara and Hercegrzanto and the paratroopers in Szeged.

I was surprised by the raids of the Partisans! If you don’t know about these “evening” raids, then you have to make a pretty long way to recapture lost primary targets again. Nice idea! Since I usually do not play as much with cavalry troops, it was also amazing that they still have a good combat power.

As a new idea for the next update maybe you could install in the awards folder a XL variant for the awards. This is then displayed directly also at the ceremony window. Otherwise I get the message of the awarding of a "German" award, but it’s a Hungarian medal. Therefore you need to update the “strings.pzdat” file, where the big XL awards are described?

At the end, I get also a medal - cool! Now my troops are about to dive into the Operation Barbarossa, hopefully the troops are strong enough ...

[McGuba]

In the second scenario, the obstacle line is really an eyecatcher, was that in reality in this area also in such a big form? Here you can see also the benefits of the bridge engineers without this it goes in this area with many rivers only very slowly.

The "Yugoslavs" (there is no such nation, that's why the quotation mark) well fortified their border with Hungary (with French help) from the 1920's as they were expecting that Hungary would try to regain some of the territories it lost after WWI. There were at least two main defense lines, with additional forts and bunkers scattered around. The defense lines contained lines of barbed wire, trenches, minefields, tank obstacles, MG nests and stuff like that. All the roads and railroads were closed as well. However, as Hungary only joined the invasion of Yugoslavia several days after it had started, most Yugoslav units had already withdrawn from the frontier area. So the real problem was crossing the defense lines, but the engineer units did help alot. A part of the tank obstacles on the frontier:



And it was like that for hundreds of kilometers.

As a new idea for the next update maybe you could install in the awards folder a XL variant for the awards. This is then displayed directly also at the ceremony window. Otherwise I get the message of the awarding of a "German" award, but it’s a Hungarian medal. Therefore you need to update the “strings.pzdat” file, where the big XL awards are described?

Hm, I think it worked well with the earlier verisions of PzC. I have to check out if there was some change since I released v1.1.

[asuser]

Looks interesting! Every detail is important!

And today...

I have completed successfully the third and fourth mission Barbarossa and Uman. The third battle was close, a MV with 30/34 rounds. It was amazing and that is also historically accurate, that in some cities enemy troops "are not at home". In the fourth battle I had luck at 26 rounds a DV. Hard fighting on the massive trench line Nova Odessa-Suvorovka and to the ultimate goal Nikolayev with massive concentration of troops. The idea with the LSSAH was not bad, resulted in a great and short battle in the east.

As an idea, you could make the friendly AA guns also switchable, then we can use it for ground combat. Interesting to see, the fight is harder now ...

[McGuba]

The idea with the LSSAH was not bad, resulted in a great and short battle in the east.

It was not really my idea, the LSSAH did indeed take part in the battle of Uman and the in the final assault on Nikolayev

As an idea, you could make the friendly AA guns also switchable,

There will be a multipurpose AA gun availbale for purchase, a licence produced 80 mm Bofors gun, quite similar to the German 88 mm AA gun. It will be available from August, 1942.

Interesting to see, the fight is harder now ...

As historically, the overall difficulty (and the Hungaian losses ) will gradually increase during the campaign, although there will be some easier scenarios now and then. German auxiliary units will always bring some much needed help, whenever they appear so use them wisely.

[Halibutt]

There will be a multipurpose AA gun availbale for purchase, a licence produced 80 mm Bofors gun, quite similar to the German 88 mm AA gun. It will be available from August, 1942.

Some time ago I even wrote a Wikipedia article on the 80mm AA gun, in case you wanted to know a little more. In short, the German acht-acht, the basic guns of Sweden and Hungary, and the Japanese Type 4 AA had common roots.
Cheers

[asuser]

Here is my next scenario massage to the fifth scenario Dniepr.

First I get a headache because of the many obstacles such as swamp areas, minefields, destroyed bridges and barely space to safely set over the river. But since I could bring some bridge pioneers in the correct position I felt better. A little help I got through the German 21.Armee? in the north. Surprisingly I achieved even in the 21 round a DV. The defence forces of the Red Army are not so strong in the end, so 34 rounds are too much for the whole possible rounds. Perhaps you could then add a little more enemy attack activity in the south and north?

Playing the scenario was fun in any case, until the last turn, the excitement remains high.


Observation: Briefing text is alternately in English/German? Is that a adjustment work within the location files or is there no use after the 1.20 patch?

[McGuba]

I think you made it a bit better than historically, then.

Historically the Hungarians could only cross the Dnieper when the Germans arrived from Kremenchuk. If I remember well, the scenario is set up in a way that if the player can cross the river and take one (or a few?) objectives, the Soviets start to retreat to avoid encirclement, as they did historically. Probably that's why you felt it a bit easy towards the end. So the trick here is a successful crossing.

Observation: Briefing text is alternately in English/German? Is that a adjustment work within the location files or is there no use after the 1.20 patch?

I have absolutely no idea. It was made before v1.20, so it might be. I only wrote English texts as my German is very basic. Can you provide an example, by the way? Then I would know which files to check and possibly fix.

[McGuba]

There will be a multipurpose AA gun availbale for purchase, a licence produced 80 mm Bofors gun, quite similar to the German 88 mm AA gun. It will be available from August, 1942.

Some time ago I even wrote a Wikipedia article on the 80mm AA gun, in case you wanted to know a little more. In short, the German acht-acht, the basic guns of Sweden and Hungary, and the Japanese Type 4 AA had common roots.
Cheers

Thanks, it is great indeed! However, I knew about the common roots of the '88' and the Bofors guns. It is also mentioned in the "The Encyclopedia of Weapons of World War II". But, I did not know about the similarity with the Japanese gun.

[asuser]

I attached a screenshot from the end of the Don scenario and the start of the Uvry mission.

The first is the congratulation message in German, the second is the mission debrief of the new scenario in English and the last is an ingame info in English, both of the new Uvry scenario. This style of mixed language messages I have also in the other scenarios too.

Turanbrief02.png (197.9 KiB) Viewed 9272 times

The sixth task around the Don river was short, after 12 rounds I got a DV. But...the enemy forces are strong, very good weapon results minimize some of my best troops.

Nice to see, that also enemy bridge pioneers comes around the corner, but don't attack my strongholds. Enemy tanks and fighter planes still appear in small numbers, so this scenario wasn't too difficult to win. Let's go to Uvry...

[McGuba]

Ah, now I see. If you are playing PzC in German some of the message files are read from the German localization folder as in some cases their names are identical with the ones in the vanilla game. So for now I can only suggest changing the game language to English in the main menu screen to avoid misunderstanding. In the next version I will change those messages as well to English for consistency. (Unless someone volunteers to translate all the briefing files to German.)

[asuser]

Hi McGuba,

here comes my next scenario experience Uryv.

There are only 10 rounds, but hard work! From the beginning, you have to watch that you will not be overtaken. The enemy troops are well equipped with rocket launchers, battle planes, assault troops, tanks, heavy guns - and what the hell is that piece of artillery 203mmM1931? Nice!

The heaviest fighting is not to Uryv, but Storozhevoye and Korotoyak. I had expected that from the direction Svoboda and in the southern part comes my final death - but did not thankfully!

Something critical is at the beginning, the few core slots, here I would have more, even more near the front line. So the Light Support Division is almost something too late to bring the punch into the frontline. In the end I reached surprisingly with the last round a DV, which I had not expected. With this scenario, you really get a good impression even how hard these fights were. Really permanent outnumbered in men and material. Well done!

Next is the Alex… scenario into the cold winter… someone bites the dust/snow…

[Rockety]

Oh the fun just begins from that scenario

[McGuba]

Hi McGuba,

here comes my next scenario experience Uryv.

...

Actually I am pretty much impressed that you could make a DV here, as it might be one of the hardest scenarios in the campaign to make a DV. As a result, you have missed the next scenario in the campaign Korotoyak, in which the player would need to recapture those bridgeheads which would be otherwise lost in the Uryv scenario. Thanks to your report, I have discovered there is an error in the Library as it says the player gets to Korotoyak after Uryv, even if he makes DV, which is not the case.

You are already doing better than historically, but the war is still far from its end.

[asuser]

Alexeyevka - Hell on Earth!

In this scenario, I lost almost half of all additional troops and about 1/3 of my core troops. What an epic battle! In the war on the Eastern Front literature you can read often the term "breakthrough battle", sums it up in a nutshell. Constant attacks of fighter planes, rocket launchers, tanks and shock troops decimate your own troops as when ice melts in the sun.

After the end of the scenario I felt quite exhausted, in the 18/18 round I reached even a MV. Curiously, I could set no own aircraft - no separate airfield available! Very, very bad!

A specific question: Was it intended that a portion of the troops are seen with white camo and another part in standard gray? I could understand if the standard troops had no winter uniforms or equipment...

Thank you for this exciting, nerve-racking battle! Could not be better!

Now it goes to Kolomea to fight off the Allied landing ... surprisingly against the Russian troops and not the US or GB Troops in France...

[McGuba]

Alexeyevka - Hell on Earth!

Hell, yeah, my grandad was there and he made it back, but more than half of the 200000 men strong Second Army was not so lucky.

Curiously, I could set no own aircraft - no separate airfield available! Very, very bad!

There are two Hungarian owned airfields on the map: 8, 21 and another at 1, 21. Maybe these are hard to spot on the snow covered terrain?

A specific question: Was it intended that a portion of the troops are seen with white camo and another part in standard gray? I could understand if the standard troops had no winter uniforms or equipment...

Most photos show the soldiers not having a winter uniform during the winter and the retreat, but some individual soldiers did have some improvised winter camo at least, like white linen or pieces of white clothes added. However, it seems that the tanks received a white wash camo at some point. So I think it was mostly a mixture of winter and non-winter camo due to the fact that the army was largely unprepared for the winter.

Now it goes to Kolomea to fight off the Allied landing ... surprisingly against the Russian troops and not the US or GB Troops in France...

While some small Hungarian units were used in France, mainly engineers, these were only company sized units at max. The large majority of the Hungarian army was deployed against the Soviets throughout WW2. The Western Allied landing on the Balkans, something that the government was really looking forward to as a last resort to avoid Soviet occupation, never happened.

[asuser]

Next scenario successfully completed - Kolomea.

At first I found it a bit strange, the local places or villages I could not assign right: Where is Kolomea, Le Havre is not on the Atlantic coast, some villages had strange "East European" sounding name? Is that a simplification or ... ?

Nevertheless, even this mission was a lot of fun. The attack pressure of enemy troops was partially enormous. But ... I could now start my own air force's into the game and then came the 503rd Heavy Tank Battalion! That saved my day! In the south, my mountain troops were quite strong, have fight away what comes from enemy troops. Luckily I had in the last round a DV.


To the next order in the Carpathians: Did I understand that correctly that it needs by the end of that scenario: Each hex that is labeled "A" is to be filled with a separate own unit?

[McGuba]

Haha, yeah, by now I realized that you are playing PzC in German and since the mod uses some of the original files like in this scenario, the game uses the German localization files which have different briefings and different placenames here like Le Havre, lol. That's why I suggested you to change the game language to English if you can in the main screen when you start the game. Other than that I will try to fix this language problem in the next release of the mod.

Did I understand that correctly that it needs by the end of that scenario: Each hex that is labeled "A" is to be filled with a separate own unit?

This scenario is about a fighting retreat to the mountains, so yes, you have to place at least 20 auxiliary units in those hexes marked with "A" for a MV or at least 30 auxiliary units for a DV. (Auxiliary units are all those other units which are not part of your core army that you take over from scenario to scenario.)

So here in this scenario the best is probably to retreat with your whole army to those hexes with "A" and try to minimize losses then there should be no problem.

[asuser]

Thanks McGuba, yes my HQ is in Germany!

Normally I have no problem with the "false" game language, but since I had built up my own scenario maps with google maps landscape, I use my sharp eyes to check the town and river names also for historical correctness.

But...easy going, the gaming fun comes first!

The next map looks great! Retreat strategy...ok, but my Prussian education don't allowed me to go backwards!

German officer!!! Will see, what can I do...

[asuser]

Now, I have completed the “Retreat mission”. That was a strange feeling to have to fight at half strength to occupy the “A” positions at the end.

While in the south and in the middle of the battlefield the enemy assault troops were manageable, the north around the city Stanislav was a face to face fight from a monstrous attack pressure. Permanent supply of T34 and Lend Lease Sherman tanks expressed with irresistible force draw my troops backwards. Nice to see, the Pz IV tank had only limited success against the T34. Only if your tank had already laid in ambush, a group of bushes or even standing in the city was the right place to reach the right battle damage.

A fixed anchor was already the Tiger tank in the middle of the battlefield, the enemy got here always big punch in the face. Also nice to see again and again, enemy infantry is much more effective than the own infantry. It’s the first sign of missing war enthusiasm?

At the end I reached a MV ... so the end was for me also satisfied. The next mission is probably no less challenging, I have to force my troops... to rescue the Romanian allies.

[McGuba]

Also nice to see again and again, enemy infantry is much more effective than the own infantry. It’s the first sign of missing war enthusiasm?

A 2nd level of infantry will be available for purchase in the next scenario. This will be more effective against the Soviet Regular 43 and SMG units. But ill-equipped reserve units will also be present.

At the end I reached a MV ... so the end was for me also satisfied.

Yeah, nice result.

The next mission is probably no less challenging, I have to force my troops... to rescue the Romanian allies.

Hmm... Actually, former allies. In August 1944 Romania changed sides and declared war on Germany and Hungary and joined the Allies, in effect the Soviet Red Army.