Slitherine

But air recon in my experience is very ineffective, as most infantry will be hidden in cities and forests.

If only they had decent spotting range and the ability to split movement, they might even be worth adding to a core force.

Epperaliant wrote: ↑Mon Oct 18, 2021 10:44 pm But air recon in my experience is very ineffective, as most infantry will be hidden in cities and forests.

If only they had decent spotting range and the ability to split movement, they might even be worth adding to a core force.

Adding recon abilities to commandos/rangers/raiders is a good idea IMO.
And the devs should give the Germans a Brandenburger unit type.

For the Rangers, the list of the Unit Traits is already very long, impossible to see everything on the screen...

Rangers do not have any means of transportation, they must always move on foot... Perhaps they could have a specific transport such as SAS (CP=0) ?

I like the idea of them having mechanics similar to subs.

Move fast: Can be spotted like standard infantry. Move slow: Invisible unless a unit tries to tries to share the hex.

Also suggest a 2 hex range attack ability. This would simulate a raid. Think LRDPG drives into airfield, shuts it up and then gone before any reaction. Think sneaking in, laying demo charges and been miles away when they go off.

Attack values should be the same as standard infantry if unspotted, reduced if spotted, lost eliminate of surprise.

I would also build in some kind of supply constraint for repair and build up of next attack. Use Recon units, air or land, to supply this unit or just do a 3 turn wait like a subs torpedo's.

Cheers

Here’s how I used the knife attack for the first time with Rangers :


My Ranger unit made a bad meeting in the mountains around Kasserine :


The only way to limit the damage for a counter-attack was to make a knife attack :


The result seems satisfactory :

like mentioned before in this thread, you should not use Rangers/SAS/SBS as frontline troops, they will get ripped apart. You should either
1. Drop them or land them behind enemy lines and use them to destroy support units like arty/aa/ground planes at airfields or
2. use them to flank and clean up broken enemy formations. I found them very useful for flanking dug in troops in mountain passes and made sure to support them with 1 or 2 regulars and arty. the knife attack also attacks enemy efficiency, so combining them with a commander that deals assault or fortification damage is very effective. When the turn ends, the enemy unit is usually at 7 or 6 efficiency, and takes heavy losses attack the commando unit, making finishing them off next turn much easier. there is also
3. Place them on roads you know the enemy will use so they can ambush enemy units. there were many times I was able to sneak a commando onto a road being used by enemy tanks/mechanized units that ran into them and took 3-4 damage while my commandos took no or 1 damage in return. This is probably the most dangerous way to use them, since it leaves them incredibly vulnerable to extra enemy units around the ambush point.

I ended Allies Resurgent with a 3 1/2 star SAS unit and a 3 star Ranger unit. Very specialized unit that needs practice to be used at its most effective. My commandoes also destroyed multiple bothersome luftwaffe formations raiding their airbases

unless you are savescumming they are not good if the map is full of infantry especially if it is jungle, forest. yes of course if you reload it is fine. if you KNOW where infantry is/how they move they are ok as they are now except marine raiders which are pathetically weak. if you use them within your supply zone, they are sort of fine because you can reinforce them.

i realized i need to TRAIN them to 4 stars, after that they dont need the knife attack (except the raiders). so i encircle as many units as possible and attack+kill them with the commandos as much as possible. there are a lot of scenarios where prestige is very tight so 10gold/unit/turn is unaffordable on the long run.

Wow, I never thought about using the ambush mechanic, I really need to try that.