I suck

[Kuokkanen]

if you can keep them unseen, they can get into the enemy rear faster and will help you spot units well behind the front.

If my memory serves, I tried something like that on 1st tutorial mission with armored cars (could had been Wolverine). My plan was drive with them ahead while my tanks (Shermans and M-10s) were dealing with panzers. Anyways recon was stopped short when AA tank opened fire and damaged (or destroyed) leading car. So how do I keep noisy vehicles hidden but keep their LOS clear?

If I am sure that I am going to get strafed by overwhelming airpower, then I get a platoon of rapid fire (quad 20 mm) AA

I'll check it out if this weapon is available in Preparing the way. But how about 40 mm Bofors? I think it was most numerous AA weapon of Finnish Defence Force in WW2 and it was used against tanks too.

People use motorcycles and AC’s to charge into the enemy rapidly so that all the enemy guns opfire and give their positions away.

Was that really done in history? I mean, if tricks used in real history are available in SPWAW, I would like to try them first.

I prefer to set my 4-man recon patrol weapon range to zero and slowly creep around

Please define slowly. Like how many hexes in turn? And what exactly does speed have to do with spotting parameters?

You can also “Z” fire with another unit into a suspected enemy position and suppress them enough for your recon to move right next to them and not be seen.

Did that in Preparing the way. Target was western aircraft hangar where enemy fire was coming from. But they just kept scrathing paint of my Shermans! (and then dive bombers bombed most of my infantry company).

Learning how to use recon units is the best way to improve your play.

No wonder I suck: I used to play Steel Panthers without recon units.


Few more questions left. When LOS is only couple hexes at best, like on wine field on 1st scenario of Balkan Crisis, what choices do I have to find machine gun teams without walking on them? I have one idea: fire on said houses with mortars and overrun with couple Panzer III. Anyone has better advice?

It seems that unit can be mounted on vehicle only when they are on same hex. What is best way to get them on same hex? So far I have moved vehicle to edge of infantry's movement area and then moved infantry by clicking on next to vehicle and infantry stops on same hex with vehicle becouse lack of movement points. Bit frustrating you know.

[FlashfyreSP]

Use the "shift" key to move one unit into the same hex as another.

[vahauser]

Matti,

I don't know how well you read English, but the SPWAW manual has some good information in it.

Also, have you looked at any of the AARs and DARs in the AAR/DAR section of the forum?

[Kuokkanen]

ORIGINAL: vahauser

I don't know how well you read English, but the SPWAW manual has some good information in it.

I read well enough, but I have other books to read (like Total Warfare) and I've got school exam season on next week. I'll get on with manual when I'm done with Total Warfare (some 200 pages to go).

Also, have you looked at any of the AARs and DARs in the AAR/DAR section of the forum?

No, it didn't hit my eye before. I'll take a quick look over there right away, then get back to school books.

[Poopyhead]

Recon units are your eyes on the battlefield. Start them where you have a good LOS. At the beginning of every turn, cycle through the recon units and spot in every direction. Then move each one hex and spot as you go (if you are defending, then just leave them where they are). Don’t use all of their movement points so that you can back away from anything that you find. Move so that they take advantage of terrain to remain hidden or smoke their route. Drop light artillery in front of them to suppress any expected enemy. Take the time to recon a safe zone where your maneuver units can operate all the way to your objective.

Using tanks to overrun infantry that are in a building or entrenchment is usually a bad idea. Unless the infantry are dug in on or next to the victory hex, just smoke the area and take the VH. Now the infantry must leave their nice warm fighting position and attack you.
Good luck!

[Kuokkanen]

Tally ho! I've got more questions for you

I've never really understood meaning of weakly armored tank destroyers. Many of them have loysy armor which can be punched through by armored car's ~37 mm cannon. Sure some of them are cheap, like halftrack ones. But I need better understanding of this weapon branch. Where, why and how tank destroyers are to be used?

Game manual, page 57

Infantry units gain a defensive bonus if they only move one hex in a turn that they are fired on.
They also are less likely to be spotted if they move slowly. Such units are 25% as vulnerable as
units moving at a normal speed. Stationary units are 20% as vulnerable.

When, where and why would this be used? There are time limits you know, so crawling 1 hex per turn don't take units very far before turns run out. Where and when would be fast approach under fire (charge) be more appropriate? Tell me examples.

[Riun T]

Firstly,tank hunters operate best with a shoot from cover and move to new cover thoery,,they usually have very good fire control and accurate "view to range" first shot high percentages of hit. so position and turn them to make best use of long flanking "lanes of fire" with the intention of backing them out or inching them forward under converging swaths of cover.
Moving slowly,, especially after maybe trucking your units to the closest available cover for the transport at a "point of contact" allows u to "sneek" threw the remaining cover,, usually unspotted, to a "local of engagement".
walking or crawling units are harder to see than running units, so u can make some of your advances,ambushes instead of allout "charges" which will get u cut down!![:(] 

[FlashfyreSP]

The "tank destroyer" concept was fueled by the thinking of the period that tanks would not fight tanks; tanks were 'breakthrough' weapons, used to exploit holes in the enemy's defense line by moving in his rear areas, destroying artillery and support units and disrupting communications. To fight tanks, it was thought, you needed tank destroyers, fast but lightly armoured vehicles that could shoot from cover, strike hard, and then move to new positions before the enemy tanks could pinpoint them.

Remember, at this time 'shooting from the move' was discouraged, as most of the tanks of the day did not have any means for keeping their main guns 'on target' while moving. The US M4 Sherman was an exception, having a rudimentary hydraulic stabilizer fitted to the breech which kept the muzzle 'locked' on the target. It only worked in the vertical plane, though, and only kept the gun steady at elevation; it did not keep the gun on the target as the tank changed positions, but did help when moving straight at the enemy.

As improvements in sighting and fire control gear were made, tanks became more multi-functional units, and the weaker-armoured tank destroyers were phased out in favour of better tanks.

[Kuokkanen]

I had done some research about TDs myself and Wikipedia proved to be very good source on that. Flashfyre is probably describing American thinking which don't fit on german heavy TDs, like Elefant and Jagdpanther. From lesser german TDs Marder II is modified Panzer II: new turret and bigger cannon on otherwise outdated tank. Makes nasty and maybe even embarrassing surprise for brand new Sherman.

And by the way, Wolverine isn't very fast either.

[FlashfyreSP]

Be careful using Wiki as a source; it's not as reliable as many would believe. I prefer to use documented books by well-known authors, with bibliographys that can be checked for sourcing.

The Germans had similar thinking in regards to the TD concept: to have armoured AT guns to engage enemy tanks from ambush, in order to allow the medium tanks ( the Pz IIIs) to breakthrough the defense line and rampage in the rear. As the war progressed, Hitler continued to press for bigger guns and more heavily-armoured vehicles, both tanks and TDs. But the general concept remained the same: use the TDs to engage the enemy tanks from cover, and use the tanks to manuever.


As for the Wolverine being fast, I did not say it was. But the successor, the M18 Hellcat, was the fastest AFV in WWII, at a top speed of 50mph.

[Kuokkanen]

Is there button for screenshots? I've tried Print Screen and paste to Paint, but result don't look like it's from SPWAW.

[Goblin]

Matti,
 
I was completely clueless about screenshots until quite recently, when some of the guys helped me out. Now I have no problems with them. See this thread for a good rundown on how to do it, easily.
 
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=1317106&mpage=1&key=&#1317203
 
 
Goblin

[Kuokkanen]

Thanks Gob, it looks better now... though it still don't look like in the game and my version of Paint don't understand JPEG

Off to bed now

[Goblin]

Make sure that JPEG Compression box is NOT checked. G' Night Matti. [:)]

[Kuokkanen]

It wasn't, and still it looks like this:

[Riun T]

hey matti this looks like a vidio driver issue what kind of video card do u have??
and what do u have the monitors refresh rate at?? I play games like battlefield veitnam and call of duty with the refresh at 85 mghz and have the nvidia manager change it to 70 when I play SPWAW,, give that a try??

[Riun T]

U've seen by the screenshots that others like myself have done in AAR's/DAR's that the colors aren't supposed to be like that,,, I just can't figure out why yours is doing that??

[Goblin]

Lol, it's kinda cool. Very Easter-like.



Goblin

[Kuokkanen]

ORIGINAL: Riun T

hey matti this looks like a vidio driver issue what kind of video card do u have??
and what do u have the monitors refresh rate at??

radeon 7000.
and 85 Hz.

[FlashfyreSP]

Paint won't work for adjusting screenshots; you need a Photoshop-type program, one that can deal with photo files like JPEGs and PNGs. I use Paint Shop Pro 7.

Also, make sure your screencapture program is using the SPWAW palette of colors; some of them won't recognize a color or two from the game, and you'll have to manually replace those colors.