Condition of para/glider units

[BigDuke66]

I'm just playing the Maleme Campaign and was wondering why all units dropped by glider or para are in such a good condition?
Much to good for my taste. Day 1 is over and my units are advancing just too good.
Where are those heavy losses and the wide spread landings that are always mentioned about the Operation Merkur?

Units coming in that why should already have losses to men & equipment and should also have a low cohesion.

[Banquet]

I'm pretty sure the cohesion should be low. I haven't played the Axis at all yet so can't comment from experience - only what I've read in the manual.

[BigDuke66]

Yes your right the cohesion is very low.

But most units don't even loss one man.
As far as I know the loss of manpower & equipment was very high this should somehow be simulated by this bad para option that can be used in the scenario editor.
Only low cohesion isn't enought

[Arjuna]

Steve should be along in due course to confirm but as far as I recall the German's lost most of their casualties after the drop/landing not during it. Sure there were a small number of gliders that crashed but on the whole most landed OK. Where they came a cropper was with the para drops. Because their weapons were dropped separately, they took some time to recover them ( 40 minutes I think on average ) and it was during this time that they were vulnerable. In those cases where they dropped right on top of allied troops they were effectively wiped out/captured straight away. But in cases where they were dropped some distance from allied troops they were largely none-the-worse albeit it took them some time to get going.
 
As I said Steve can provide more authoritive comment on this.

[GliderRecon]

ORIGINAL: BigDuke66

I'm just playing the Maleme Campaign... Day 1 is over and my units are advancing just too good.

I'm having a ball with CotA, but I too was a little dissapointed with the way the Maleme campaign is set-up.

Playing as the Germans, I expected taking the airfield on Day 1 to be extremely tough. In fact it's usually a cakewalk.

[Golf33]

There were some losses due to transport aircraft and gliders crashing or being shot down enroute. From memory (and I'm away from my sources) casualties were not terrible provided units didn't land within range of the defenders; those who did land on top of defenders, such as III/Luftlande, were pretty much annihilated on the way down or while they searched for their weapons.

Dave, it is possible that losses on landing in a defended area need to be tweaked up a bit - try setting up a Crete estab Australian infantry battalion dug-in or entrenched and dropping a Luftlande para battalion on top of them - the Luftlande battalion should be largely wiped out with little loss to the Australians. I think we apply a fairly steep firepower hit to parachuting forces on arrival but it might not be enough if they are still effective on landing.

[MarkShot]

Well, we have a known bug here. In HTTR, drop units auto-reorg upon arrival. In COTA, despite low cohesion, they respond to orders immediately (due to the 59 minute order delay waiver).

[BigDuke66]

So they should be sitting ducks for 1 hour?

That will have an impact on the game for sure.

A "Known Problems" topic in the support forum would also be useful.

[GliderRecon]

**POSSIBLE MALEME CAMPAIGN SPOILER**

The main reason taking Maleme airfield in the campaign is so easy is the size of the German force that drops close to the western end of the Tavronitis bridge. By 9AM on Day 1 the German player has around 1100 men and 50+ guns concentrated within the 1km bridge grid square. More than enough to steamroller defences around the airfield and the northern/western slopes of Hill 107.
This doesn't seem to fit with any of the accounts I've read.

[GliderRecon]

>>This is an excellent account of the first day at Maleme<<

It includes this description of the German situaution west of the bridge at around 9AM:

"For forces with which to launch it he (Meindl) had Braun's group already engaged; the remnants of Koch's group if they had yet begun to make their way down into the riverbed; the remains of Plessen's company from the river mouth, which cannot have had many casualties; 5, 7, and 8 Companies from II Battalion; and the heavy weapons of IV Battalion with 15 Company as well."

Reading this I think the force around the bridge was nearer 550 than 1100 (the 1100-strong force in the scenario doesn't include II Battalion who are further west at 9AM)

[Arjuna]

TT2971 - AI - Review para drop reorg on arrival

[MarkShot]

Dave, you already have a TT for this.

TT2674 - AI - Ensure para units reorg on arrival by para drop

[Arjuna]

Thanks Mark. Now it's doubly important, hey![;)]

[GoodGuy]

ORIGINAL: GliderRecon

Reading this I think the force around the bridge was nearer 550 than 1100 (the 1100-strong force in the scenario doesn't include II Battalion who are further west at 9AM)

Exactly, that's a good conclusion, and accounts I've read point to the same direction.

ORIGINAL: Arjuna

Where they came a cropper was with the para drops. Because their weapons were dropped separately, they took some time to recover them ( 40 minutes I think on average ) and it was during this time that they were vulnerable

While this is true for the heavy equipment (MG34, Leichtgeschütz 40 (LG40, AT weapon) etc, I'm not sure whether it's been the same with light equipment (e.g. MP40), since there are accounts saying that 25% of the paras carried these (small/short) machine pistols.
There are other accounts saying the paras carried hand-guns only (I can't imagine them just carrying pistols though, as pistols used to be reserved to CO's and military police, afaik), during the drop.
Also, I'm not sure whether the number of MG34s in the game is correct. Most accounts say that every 8th to 12th german soldier carried a MG34, one guarantor for the massive firepower deployed on Crete.

But in cases where they were dropped some distance from allied troops they were largely none-the-worse albeit it took them some time to get going.

There are many vet-reports about larger parts of the paras dropping over various huge agave fields, inflicting casualties even before any enemy opposition had been engaged/met.

[Vince_Tooket]

If you are not agree with paradrop loose, you can always add it in the scenario editor. Particulary on the units who start close to the enemy!

[wodin]

Maybe they could sustain a percentage of casualties on landing? Even better if the scenario designer could say what percentage could fall.

Say 1 to 5% on an easy drop upto 10 to 50% on a drop where ground forces are.

[Crimguy]

That's a nice idea.

I also thought, to add to the confusion, individual units that paradrop may be "out of control" by their immediate superior. Having them try to take orders from the top could simulate the confusion of a bad drop, and also balance things out by increasing orders delay. Perhaps, if they are out of control, they might only get attached to their superior after an hour or two.

As it is now, they do seem to be much more organized than they should be.

ORIGINAL: wodin

Maybe they could sustain a percentage of casualties on landing? Even better if the scenario designer could say what percentage could fall.

Say 1 to 5% on an easy drop upto 10 to 50% on a drop where ground forces are.

[Arjuna]

All para drops have the potential to loose men. For normal drops IIRC it's up to 2%, while for bad para drops its up to 5%.

[BigDuke66]

So do dropped units now reorg?
Just tested it and it doesn't look like they reorg.
Will this be fixed in patch 3?

[Arjuna]

A word on reorg. As the code stands ( and Patch 3 is already done - just waiting final installer testing ), the units should reorg on a para drop. however, if you give them an immediate order then they will try and obey that regardless of their cohesion level. Now that is a design decision made on the basis that we don't want to have the AI second guess the user's intention.
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So I would recommend either ordering them to reorg for 30 minutes or leaving them for 30 miinutes and then ordering them to do something else.