Slitherine

I have played the very first Panzer General and all its follow-up, variations and DLC and prefer generaly turn by turn games (it started with chess).
Kriegsmarine and more generaly the order of battle series has really answered my wish for an afterwork game of tactic.
I want to thanks the team for this extension in particular the balance of the different ships type and my computer opponent intelligence which brought me more than once to restart the same scenario.

I had real fun.

Despite some frustrations with a couple scenarios and the new naval mechanics, I also enjoyed the heck out of Kriegsmarine's campaign. I hope it continues to receive additional patches and polish, but the game is a lot of fun as released.

I really enjoyed the Kriegsmarine DLC Looking forward to the next one.

Man, do I want this thread to grow.

OK, I still enjoy OOB very much

Erik wrote:OK, I still enjoy OOB very much

I can sign that, too. I want this franchise to do well. (But I still think KM is not on the level as Blitzkrieg.)

Thanks and please for Africa Corps DLC (or Fall Blau)
Don't jump all over the globe, just finish what you have started !

kondi754 wrote:

Thanks and please for Africa Corps DLC (or Fall Blau)
Don't jump all over the globe, just finish what you have started !

Thai Police strongly points elsewhere. My guess is that Blitzkrieg and Wehrmacht stuff is off the menu for the next months.
You can try Eriks campaigns if you have withdrawal symptoms, they are pretty good already.

Horst's report of future unit types points to something British in South-East Asia.

The official campaigns are numbered sequentially. It looks like number 8-9 were planned/started before Kriegsmarine, but KM could be finished earlier since it is smaller in scope.

@Erik: Wow, you and Horst are some true file detectives, really digging up interesting stuff...Thanks.

8 and 9 could be reserved for the two other German campaigns in 42-43 and 44-45(+46?).

Looks like it might be 5th campaign now.
It may indeed be Malaya, Burma, and perhaps even the continuation of the war in China, this time by the side of Allies.

maybe still time for the Axis whatever in Europe or Asia it will be good

My guesses would be a Commonwealth campaign for #5 and 1942-45 campaigns for both Germany and the Western Allies for #8 and #9.

Add Afrika Korps as #11 and the sales will skyrocket for sure!

Horst wrote:Add Afrika Korps as #11 and the sales will skyrocket for sure!

I'm sure that's in the pipeline, although the current supply rules will definitely need to be reworked to do it properly. Rommel's wide outflanking maneuvers around British defensive positions won't play out if the German player has to maintain continuous lines of supply and communication through barren sand dunes. Likewise, maintaining control of the roads should be critical to maintaining continuous supply. It'll be silly if you have a situation where the Afrika Korps cuts off the road to the coast but the Eighth Army remains fully supplied because they still hold possession of a patch of wasteland between their positions and Cairo.

I hope the devs at some point revisit the supply rules. I've mentioned the harsh out-of-supply effects for units before.
Another issues is that supply flows as easily through jungles, over mountains etc as along a paved road.
Supply in difficult terrain should be reduced to a trickle, making roads and tracks more important.

I really liked the Pacific (OOB) and African (Panzer) campaigns and playing the Brits would be nice.
Regarding the supply lines, what would you think, regarding the game balance, if the first turn that a unit is cut from it supply, its combat effectivness is only decreased very slighty to allow for a counterattack?

Designing maps with narrow supply lines to all placed units could already help a bit to make the lines behave more reasonable. It could also help for attacking teams to cut-off the defenders which is much more difficult against a whole ocean of supply. The auto-fill supply-zone mechanic of the game could ruin this though again.

euramer wrote:I really liked the Pacific (OOB) and African (Panzer) campaigns and playing the Brits would be nice.
Regarding the supply lines, what would you think, regarding the game balance, if the first turn that a unit is cut from it supply, its combat effectivness is only decreased very slighty to allow for a counterattack?

I'd argue that they should retain full or near full effectiveness for several turns. The whole point of the German panzer divisions (and their Western and Soviet counterparts in the later years of the war) was to punch a hole in the enemy's defenses and race ahead to their operational or strategic objectives. These formations carried with them enough fuel, ammunition, food, and other supplies for several days or even weeks of sustained combat operations, and even had mobile repair workshops along with spare replacement vehicles complete with their crews. The German plans for the invasion of France included the possibility of air supply to the panzer divisions, but this ended up not being necessary. If you ever read any accounts by Guderian, Rommel, or their subordinates, they all emphasize the need for the panzer divisions to keep pushing forward and bypass any significant pockets of resistance rather than constantly getting bogged down in combat. The way the scenarios in the Blitzkrieg DLC play out is usually the opposite: your tanks should advance cautiously and stay fairly close to the infantry to provide flanking support and to hunt down damaged units that have been forced to retreat, and you should take rather than bypass most towns and villages along or near your line of advance. It's not a matter of difficulty, as you'll usually be able to take your time and still achieve victory (which is also ahistorical).

The flip side is there's little reason for your panzer spearheads to race ahead to grab railheads, road junctions, bridges, etc. because supply flows freely through all hexes, even across major rivers, mountains, trackless deserts and jungles, and other terrain that would be impassible for supply trucks. Therefore it makes more sense to use them as a slow moving steamroller (often the scenario objectives include just that: destroy X number of enemy units).

Maybe there could be a unit trait or specialization (which the Germans would have from the outset) allowing panzer and motorized infantry units to be supply independent for X amount of turns. Western and Soviet armored units did not function this way at the beginning of the war but would need to acquire this ability to carry out mid- to late-war breakthrough and pursuit scenarios like Operation Cobra or Operation Bagration. To the best of my knowledge, both Japanese and Allied tank formations usually served in the infantry support role in the Pacific theater (the sole exception being the Red Army's August 1945 Manchurian offensive).