Beginner needs help please

[sean.keane]

As a total beginner, what are the couple of basic things I should know/ focus on/ do? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Banquet]

Welcome to the forum - and this great wargame! [:)]

To my mind the important things in understanding and playing the game would be;

Orders delay.. realise that the further down the command chain you go, the longer it will take for things to happen. Ie, issuing orders to a battalion HQ is going to take some time (maybe 2 hours) for the various intermediate HQ's to receive and re-issue the orders down the line. (Assuming the scenario has you playing the Army, Corp or Divisional HQ)

Detaching units.. if you need to issue specific orders to a unit it will detach to be under your direct command. This can be useful where you need to micro manage and will reduce the orders delay on the unit - but you can't do that to too many units or else your HQ will become overloaded, and so will you!

Keep note of supply.. and be aware of what orders you're issuing and if they are going to burn through lots of supplies (it's frighteningly easy to run artillery out of supply)

Read the scenerio description carefully.. there's a lot of good info there.. make sure you appreciate where on the map the game will be won and lost (victory points - some matter loads, some matter a bit)

Trust the AI to command your troops. You need to think ahead of now as your orders will not happen immediately. You need to try to visualise what the map will look like when the units will start to move and trust the AI to do the job for you.

Terrain, in AA games generally, and in COTA especially is vitally important. Spend a bit of time looking at the map before you start.. get to know where the 'funnel' points are - where motorised units will struggle, etc

That's about all I can think of off the top of my head. The game plays very well and feels right if you know what I mean. The 3 main differences between it and other games are the AI control of friendly units, orders delay and detaching units. It's one of those games you can just play without having to read the manual all the way through. The manual however is first class (best I've ever seen) so it's good for looking at when your not playing the game to catch up on the details of what's going on.

Others will hopefully post with much better articulated idea's for you.. but really just go ahead and play and have fun! [:)]

[JeF]

Welcome Sean,

If you didn't do it already, I'd recommend you start by raading the Getting STarted guide and practice the excellent tutorials.

Then to add to what Banquet said about orders delay, pay attention to the time your units will react. Don't try to push to many orders and then change them too often. You will just pile the delays. Think in advance and keep cool.

And yes, be confident on your guys. They can make a good job. I usually give orders at Bn HQ (the first in the chain of command starting from the lowest units) and detach artillery here and there. In this way you don't end up with too many units under your direct command.

Cheers,

JeF.

[Arjuna]

Sean,
 
Welcome.
 
Of course you can just dive in and start playing any of the scenarios. The user interface is intuitive enough and if you have a good understanding of operational warfare for WW2, then you should do OK.
 
However, I would recommend you invest a little time and start with Getting Started manual. Read the short intro and then start the Intro Tutorial. This plays without Orders Delay - make sure it's turned off in the Scenario Options screen, when you start the tutorial. Just follow the instructions step by step and you will soon have a handle on the user interface. The intro tutorial is designed to teach you the mechanics of the game. Allow a couple of hours for this.
 
Then play a few of the simpler scenarios - the recommended ones are listed at the back of the Getting Started manual. Once you have a few of these under your belt, dive into the Advanced Tutorial. This uses Orders Delay and will guide you through a reasonably complex scenario where you will learn about operational planning and tactics. It's like a primer for operational commanders. Allow about four to eight hours for this. You can save at any point and restart later. In fact all the tutorials have a set of pre-canned saved games that allow you to start from the various sections within the tutorial.
 
If you are used to traditional turn based, hex based wargames, then the best advice I can give you is to relax and forget about micro-managing. In real life good operational commanders don't micro-manage, they macro-manage - ie they issue orders to their subordinate commanders and let them worry about the details of how to achieve them. The AI is good enough to do a reasonable job of managing your subordinate commands. It's not always perfect. Like real life subordinates they sometimes make mistakes. But on the whole you can trust them to do a reasonable job.
 
Once you embrace this trust you free yourself up and instead of focusing on the minutae of each and every unit you can focus on the big picture and spend more time on assessing enemy intentions, how and when you can react to them and how you can achieve your overall objectives.
 
Good luck and once again welcome.

[HansBolter]

As a former turn based board gamer who has made the transition the best advice I can give is to pause, pause, pause.

Any RTS (Real Time Strategy game) can qucikly bring on an overwhelming feeling of "getting out of control". The longer you let it run unrestricted and unmanaged the worse this effect gets.

Start the game. Give your initial orders and start the clock running. Give your troops a little time to start doing things and then pause and look things over. Get a feel for how they are carrying out your orders.

As soon as they come into contact with the enemy and the firing starts, pause again. Look over the units engaged with the enemy. Check their logs for a listing of what is happening to them and what they are doing. Take note of which are starting to suffer casualties.

Start the clock again in slow mode and watch the engaged units closely. Assess the rate at which they are taking casualties. Watch to see what effect they are haiving on the enemy. Gauge whether or not the orders you gave are turning out to be effective or if you need to consider altering them.

In essence...start slowly and examine all the data returning to you that you can as the game runs. Pause when you feel that you cannot keep up with assessing that data in real time.

If you do this, you will never get that frustrated feeling of having lost control of the game and the action.

[sean.keane]

Thanks so much to all of you: HansBolter, Arjuna, JeF and Banquet - your advice helped a lot and I really appreciate it [:)]. I played the tutorial and it must've been the best fun I've ever had wargaming. I've always just played those arcade-type strategy games before and been frustrated at the lack of realism and depth. But this game is incredible, exactly what I've been looking for. I can see myself spending way too many hours at this! I wish I'd found out how good this is earlier. [&o]

[Banquet]

You're welcome Sean. I can't believe I forgot to say to try the tutorial but at least others were sensible enough to mention it! [:D]

Glad to hear you're enjoying the game.. it's brilliant isn't it! [:)]

[MarkShot]

Welcome,

Don't forget my tips in the official doc set.

Additionally, there are over 300+ pages of Mini-Guide material on HTTR/COTA either via the online threads or PDF downloads to checkout. (The threads are more current.)

There is a 200 page HTTR Strategy Guide on sale which is 50% applicable to COTA.

Finally, the Panther Games War College has just opened its doors.

So, perhaps it's time to quit you day job and begin work on your second career as a general. This is your chance to leave your mark on history!

[Arjuna]

Finally, the Panther Games War College has just opened its doors.

So, perhaps it's time to quit you day job and begin work on your second career as a general. This is your chance to leave your mark on history!

[:D]

[DoubleDeuce]

ORIGINAL: MarkShot

So, perhaps it's time to quit you day job and begin work on your second career as a general. This is your chance to leave your mark on history!

Yeah but if we did that how would we finance our purchase of Battles From The Bulge? [:D]

[sterckxe]

ORIGINAL: Double Deuce

ORIGINAL: MarkShot

So, perhaps it's time to quit you day job and begin work on your second career as a general. This is your chance to leave your mark on history!

Yeah but if we did that how would we finance our purchase of Battles From The Bulge? [:D]

Once you're a general you can start conquering other countries, plundering their treasure, selling of their wifes and kids as slaves and using the booty gained that way to buy more Panther Games [;)]

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Arjuna]

Once you're a general you can start conquering other countries, plundering their treasure, selling of their wifes and kids as slaves and using the booty gained that way to buy more Panther Games [;)]

The above comments by Eddy are not, I repeat not, official Panther Games policy. Rather they reflect a primordial attitude that has lingered within the fields of Flanders and its surrounds and in what Eisenhower referred to as the "warring tribes of Europe".[;)]

[final_drive]

[blockquote]

[blockquote]quote:

Once you're a general you can start conquering other countries, plundering their treasure, selling of their wifes and kids as slaves and using the booty gained that way to buy more Panther Games [;)][/blockquote]
The above comments by Eddy are not, I repeat not, official Panther Games policy. Rather they reflect a primordial attitude that has lingered within the fields of Flanders and its surrounds and in what Eisenhower referred to as the "warring tribes of Europe".[;)]

[/blockquote]
Yes, and now our Flemish regional president wants battlefield tourism to be one of our region's primary touristic attractions, we're always looking for some opportunities to raise new monuments, museums and souvenir shops. [;)] 

[sean.keane]

Just read the tactical recon article in the Panther War College, it's class. Great job.

[526526b]

I too am a newbee and had recent trouble with the game crashing to desktop.  I uninstalled the game and now can't get it to reinstall.  When I click on my cd drive it shows one icon under files on cd-  The icon says 'conquest of th eAegean-set pRelease-DR'  and when I click on the icon another icon appears with the same wording and crashes.  I can't extract any files either.  Am I doing something wrong?  Am I missing something very simple?  I would appreciate any help as I certain was enjoying the game earlier and had no problems, no crashes the first two or three weeks.

[MarkShot]

Probably, best to post your problem in the tech support forum.

My initial thoughts (this is not official support; just my own thoughts): Try turning off any security software which you may have running while installing (and do it from the administrator account if on 2000/XP/Vista). I would first try turning anti-virus and anti-spyware software off. If you plan to try to turn off a software firewall on your PC, then I would suggest physically disconnecting your machine from the Internet before trying the install. An exposed system can be hacked from the Internet in as little as 30 seconds.

Good luck.

[Arjuna]

sean,

Yes please disbale any AV software and try again. If that fails, I'd say you have a corrupt download and need to redownload. But first try disabling the AV software and we'll take it from there.