Slitherine

I like them, too! I'm sure the Germans were kicking themselves for not realising how useful they were earlier. So next scenario I might buy a 88 AA for the switching ability (the AT version is nopurchase). Cheers.

I wasn't talking about the 88. I think they were first used as AT in an improvisation by Rommel in 1940. If a Polish AA battery was attacked by German tanks, is there evidence they stood their ground?

Just finished the grand campain 1940 on the Col difficulty setting ( Original Beta not the upgrade) again no problems.

Great game play with the added senarios really adding to the game.

A few questions

1 - Could captured enemy equipment be coloured field grey? (older eyes like mine can get confused when there is a mass attack happening)

2 - After finishing the Magionet line it took me to the Main game Low countries senario - How will the new senarios fit in the main campain game?

3 - My Artillary doesn't allways give counter fire when my units are attacked even though they have ammo

One more request could a campain review/ Results and Stats be included in the future?

Used to like that feature in PG2 so you could try and better your last game

IMHO, the Spoils of War scenario should probably be eliminated. It is historically inaccurate and there are too many Russian units, some of whom are at a ridiculous overstrength value of 15 (after the purge!). No Germans units are at 15, and where are the Panzer III's and IV's?!

mrgolf wrote:IMHO, the Spoils of War scenario should probably be eliminated. It is historically inaccurate and there are too many Russian units, some of whom are at a ridiculous overstrength value of 15 (after the purge!). No Germans units are at 15, and where are the Panzer III's and IV's?!

I disagree, its a fun scenario and I think they made the right choice in making it optional. The stength 15 Russian units are conscripts I think so not to dangerous

I do agree a Panzer III or IV would have been nice!

You will see the III's and IV's in France, guess you will just have to make do with the PZ 38t for now. I am trying to remember if PZ IV was available right away in PG or not, been so long since I last played it....

Difficulty: Colonel. The scenarios so far are terrific; harder than usual - seems that there is always more territory than your units can effectively guard or detect enemy positions. You are faced with difficult choices and exposed flanks; is more realistic and certainly more challenging! You can't just roll across the map secure in the knowledge that there are no undetected enemy threats. Scenario briefings were improved and I very much like the idea of special objectives instead of just grabbing victory hexes - it adds another dimension to the challenge. Prestige seemed sufficient - I had decisive victorys until Wasigny which I started with approx. 1100. The prestige and scen. balance seem right considering that 3/4ths of the way through a scen. I thought I was getting my butt kicked only to pull out a decisive win. AI performance overall was very good. Enemy tanks of every model seemed much more difficult to deal with though and occas. were surprising lethal - it sure put a premium on acquiring 88s and having them well positioned. Hero and medal acquisition and exper. cap were fine. Made it to Wasigny so far before getting my head handed to me. I'll post a separate reply re that scen. on its own thread.

Again, the content is terrific , not just a quantitive but a vastly superior qualitative addition to an already fantastic game! Looking forward to testing the remainder - thanks for the opportunity!

Wanted to add my two cents, thanks for the invite to continue testing. As before in the main beta, I usually play at colonel level. I found the going a little harder in the DLC 39 campaign. The balance at that level seems just right, for me anyway! I wasn`t able to capture the last objective in the first battle, and the amount of prestige earned seems lower, but still in the ballpark.
I think the AI is putting up a better fight also, previous battles always ended with a bunch of empty cities, and a tons of prestige, but through 3 battles I haven`t had that luxury as yet.
The defensive battle was a neat idea, and I`m looking forward to the train battle next. Good to see you guys taking risks with these new ideas, adds to the enjoyment of the game.
Looking forward to more playing time this weekend, and catching up with the forum, and Kerensky`s misdeeds...

I find the AI much more formidable and I have played from Sergeant to Field Marshall. Each level gets progressively more difficult and surprises me sometimes with well placed counter attacks.

I have noticed a marked improvement in the game play with the beta 2 patch. The AI has surprised me on several occasions and they are attacking much better.

I am not having too much difficulty with the '39 Campaign, but I am with the '40 at Colonel difficulty. I've had to regress to the lieutenant level to try to get through it. It seems like there are too many allied troops and not enough Germans. You can whack them pretty easily, but more and more keep popping up! You wouldn't want it too easy, but it was pretty much a cake walk.

Just finished Poland campaign. Ended up with all MV except for the second scenario as I was not paying attention to the clock and did not grab that most northern city in time. I Was playing on Field Marshal and it was quite a challenge. For Warsaw I went Warsaw North, and about turn 12 the Poles started some major counter attacks against me from the arty cities I guess, I didn't bother with them myself, I had 4 tac bombers a level bomber and a fighter and 4 arty on the ground, so who needs more artillery? Guess I missed the Polish souvenir arty piece but thems the breaks. Prestige was pretty much at the low end for me in this campaign, so I had less reserve troops to have in my core. I have found having extra troops that stay in reserve makes for a very flexible force and is a great idea too, attacking a major city, skip the tanks and grab the extra Luftwaffe. Looks like AA city, take more artillery. I also found the Poles kept popping fighters in Warsaw, I think it was about 4 or 5 by the time it was all done, kept my fighter hopping about and really chewed up my tac bombers too. Ended with only about 134 prestige or so. Near the end the Poles got a few good attacks on me and I needed to repair or die, or give up a victory hex.

Spoils of War was the big surprise for me, the Russians were very aggressive. I lost 3 tanks in that one, one to the KV that suddenly crossed the river and one shotted a pz 38t. Also the REd airforce was out in strength, with the PE's actually making attacks for a change, and spawning more planes after I had destroyed them. Fortunately I had kept my troops together and advanced in a line type formation so it kept the swarms down. I took the full Luftwaffe and artillery for this one, Stukas dont do much to that KV, 1 hit per attack. I pretty much had to wait till it ran out of ammo before I could risk ground attacks, and it was facing at least 3 or 4 hexes of adjacent Germans and it still killed pretty much anything it fired at. I finally got it in the end though.

The update is looking good, I have just done the first 2 Norway scenarios, almost missed the victory hex that was under the one fort, had to backtrack with 3 turns to go to get that one Really got to pay more attention to the map I guess.
I am really enjoying the DLC campaigns, and look forward to seeing what else you have coming for us later. A big congratulations and job well done to the devs on these campaigns, you deserve a lot of thanks from all of us players for a great job.

I had the AI do an odd thing with the update. On turn 14 of the first scenario, I was closing in on the last objective city but, having positioned my infantry badly, had to assault with armor - not good. My first assault with a 10 armor after arty caused the defender to drop to 3. Yet, it routed out and I rolled into to the town free for a DV. I can see AI units retreating early in the game or from a trash town but handing me a victory when the AI could conceivably had held on strikes me as a flawed response. I was playing on Colonel.

Retreats are not voluntary - they occur if all strength points are suppressed. You just got very lucky!

I guess I must get lucky sometimes. Why can't it happen in FoG?

In FOG it always seems its your opponent that gets all the luck.....

Well, sorry for having been so slow, but here I am, with the 39 campaign finished (I'll be away for a few days, so I doubt I will be able to significantly test the 40 campaign before the DLC is out, my apologies for that). I did give my feedback in the particular scenario threads, but here is my recap.

I have already said this, but I'll say it again, that campaign is a masterpiece, because, within the boundaries of the "simple" mechanics of the original game and of existing assets, the map design, scripts, creative objectives, diversified situations are used with a creativity that bring the game to another level. Unlike the relatively static model of the original game scenarios (variations on the "plod through the map from objective to objective"), each scenario feels and plays completely different : you'll have to plan according to the game briefing, react on the fly to unexpected situations like enemies counterattacks, solve different problems. Which brings a level of immersion completely but pleasantly unsuspected. I loved the fact that DV were tied to additional objectives, not the turn counter.

Let's go with a quick recap of my campaign (more details in the specific threads). I played the campaign on the colonel setting, like I did in the original game - which is sufficient for me Scenarios up to Modlin included were beta1, others were beta2. Yeah I know, I have been that slow ! Every scenario was a DV except Spoils of Wars (on the way to DV, probably, but reload/skipped due to losses).

- Poznan : good blietzkrieg scenario, the element of surprise is nicely simulated by units with no supplies and ammo.

- Danzig corridor (south) : even better, because of the nasty and unsuspected counterattack on the Vistula bridges. The urgency of the Blietzkrieg is represented by the relative ease of the first turns against unprepared enemies and the comparative difficulty of the following counterattack. The drive to strike hard and fast is led by actual gameplays elements, not an abstract turn counter.

- Lodz : a rescue mission, an encirclement manoeuver (as advised in the briefing), and foreshadowing of the next scenario. Perfect exemple of the innovative new design of this DLC.

- Piatek : a balanced, though but fair defense mission in the early days of the war. A bit iffy on the bridge defense issue though (baiting units by abandoning the bridges to crush them with the river penalty plays a bit weird)

- Kampinoska Forest : another one with a completely new objective, defeat the trains. The terrain is the actual enemy !

- Modlin Fort : decent one, this armored train is scary

- Warsaw (south) : long, taxing, exhausting scenario (not a critisim ). The sprawling city area where you fight like city block by city block is very impressive. I can only imagine how those iconic city battles in the Russian campagin will be like ! The artillery capture objective give some diversity to the scenario

- Spoils of Wars : will not rehash my critisism. Seems a good one for those up to the challenge, skippable for the others, which is OK

- Oslo : another nice one with an amphibious assault, a fortress to crack, a distinctive geography, and an iconic secondary obective.

- Lillehammer : easy but enjoyable, with weather playing a role, a good introductory scenario for the east front campaign

- Narvik : a crowning scenario for a great campaign, a bit reminiscent of the (great) original campaign scenario. Each and every gameplay element is added to the mix : a lot of naval action, decent air battles all supporting ground assault, isolated auxilliaries in advanced position, significant weather, and a big multi hex fortified town to crack at the end. Masterful !

Thanks for having me on board for the beta testing process, and I hope the release will find a deserved success.

I'm not having much trouble with the '39 Campaign at the Colonel level, but the '40 Campaign seems much more difficult, even at the lieutenant level. I cannot seem to hold the minimum 3 victory hexes for the 2nd, Albert Canal, scenario. I will now try at the sergeant level. There are too many Dutch troops coming from all over. You don't seem to have enough German troops to move forward to capture all 5(?) hexes. You have to leave so many behind to combat all of the troops that come from all sides. It also seems that the combats often come out worse than predicted, even on the lieutenant level. Anyone else experiencing this, or is it just me?

mrgolf wrote:I'm not having much trouble with the '39 Campaign at the Colonel level, but the '40 Campaign seems much more difficult, even at the lieutenant level. I cannot seem to hold the minimum 3 victory hexes for the 2nd, Albert Canal, scenario. I will now try at the sergeant level. There are too many Dutch troops coming from all over. You don't seem to have enough German troops to move forward to capture all 5(?) hexes. You have to leave so many behind to combat all of the troops that come from all sides. It also seems that the combats often come out worse than predicted, even on the lieutenant level. Anyone else experiencing this, or is it just me?

What is your core composition, what units?
If you have a low number of tanks and tactical bombers, I suggest you have at least three of each, possibly even 5 tanks.