How do you play this game?

[Appren]

You don't need to manually move supply, in most cases.
Have a main HQ, located in your homeland, or if you are on an isle, in a port in your homeland, this HQ needs to have at least one truck (and a transport ship if overseas) attached. Other headquarters are then linked to that HQ, or, if you fight on a different continent or a huge map, you may chose to have a link in a friendly port there.

Main HQ --> Frontline HQs, or Main HQ --> "midpoint" HQ --> Frontline HQs.

Typically have all SUPPLY produced sent to the main HQ, and it will be automatically distributed to your frontline headquarters, as long as they are in supply range, and not cut off (build roads if needed, and most importantly, bridges)
Soldiers and new hardware produced should be sent directly to the frontline headquarters that need to be reinforced, by linking the producing city to that particular HQ, and changing that every turn as needed. This means you will not need to maintain a huge amount of transport capacity in your main HQ.

[Shambling Strider]

Hi Panzers,
 
In my humble opinion, ATWWII is really a great game because of his deepness. I'm playing this game almost every day for months now and I'm still commiting a lot of mistakes because I'm still learning rules![:D] But once you did a mistake, especially in a PBEM game, you'll find and understand why and then never forget it!
 
I've learn it by first play some random games against AI and some simple operationnal scenarios like the Ardennes.
 
And the community is so alive!
 
Hope you will have fun with it!

[british exil]

@ Shambling Strider, glad to hear that you make mistakes. Hope I recognize them in GPW.[:'(]

Mat

[jeffreysutro@jeffreysutro.com]

ORIGINAL: panzers

This moght sound stupid, but I was trying to learn these thinfs in the training game. Does that mean that the optionis not there even though I have the PP. And, of course, I was at port. I haven't played anything but the tutoirials and the training game because I'm trying real hard to use them as a learning tool, so Is that my problem? There arn't those type of options?

panzers:

Although I think Advanced Tactics is a great game, I have to agree with you that the tutorials and the training games are nearly useless, especially since they don't address supply, production and upgrading units. On the bright side the though the second (or was it the third?) training scenerio did teach me the importance of scouts and good recon, especially for tank units. [:)]

[Shambling Strider]

@British Exil :
 
With all the mistakes I do, I'm practicing a lot to repair it as fast as possible ! [;)]

[mcv]

ORIGINAL: panzers


Well, it's like I said: I have read the manual twice, played the tutorial 3 times and played all four training games with the naval one 3 times, so I am aware of all what you guys are saying so I think I have my answer: maybe I do know how to play the game. I just haven't gone beyond the training and tutorials yet and it seems as though those are very basic and generic scenerios and they don't seem to offer the bells and whistles that come with a regular game, so I will go on to a regular game now. I'll keep you posted

The best way to learn this game is to play it. I played it before reading the manual, played the tutorial once, and never played any other training scenario. What did help me immensely, though, was the blitzkrieg staff academy for pacifists. It's actually not all that well written, but it explains a couple of subtle yet vital concepts of this game, and helps you get started in the "russia 1941" scenario.

I messed about a bit with the first turn of that scenario, then played a couple of quick random scenarios to get the hang of it, and then returned to russia '41, and beat the crap out of the AI. Now I'm playing a "World at War" scenario, and I'm still learning new stuff.

Don't expect to grasp every part of this game all at once. Naval operations, paradrops, supply drops to units that are out of supply, there's lots of stuff in this game that you're not going to need in your average game. Until recently, I didn't even know it was possible to upgrade existing subformations.

Focus on the basics first:
* How to move, how to attack from several directions at once, how to do artillery, air raids and shore bombardments.
* Create new units (HQs or formations)
* Production.
* Buy new tech. (Build political points, go to the tech screen and buy new tech.)
* How to organise your command structure properly to make supply, strategic movement and commanding attacks as easy as possible.

That last one is the biggest one, and the least trivial for beginners. Here's some advice:

* Make one HQ your "Supreme HQ". It stays in some central location in your empire. This will be the only top HQ you have; all others should have a an HQ superior to them (often this one or one directly below it). Send all supplies to the main HQ, and from there it will automagically be distributed to all sub-HQs that are in supply-range.
* All combat formations belong to a local command HQ. The command HQ needs enough staff to command all it's units (keep staff above 100%), and it needs to be close to the units it's commanding.
* If the units under a command HQ get too spread out, transfer some to another HQ, or create a new HQ and transfer some of your staff there.
* If a command HQ gets out of range of the supreme HQ, create an intermediary supply HQ. If the supply HQ has the supreme HQ as its HQ and is in supply range, and the command HQ has the supply HQ as superior and is within supply range of that, then supply will still happen automatically.
* Keep lots of transport capacity in your HQs. Usually trucks, trains in "world at war" scenarios, cargo ships for coastal HQs, and ocasionally transport planes. Transport capacity makes it easy to transfer subformations from one unit to another, or use strategic movement to get a unit to the front quickly.

I probably missed some things, but the important part is to play around with these. Try new things, learn new approaches, etc. There will be things you'll do the wrong way for a while. Originally, I did naval invasions by making a unit with cargo ships and land units, moving to the island I want to invade, create a new unit there, transfer the land subformations to the new unit, and next turn, it steps on land. Then I learned to transfer the cargo ships to the new unit so the land unit could land on the same turn. And only after that did I leanr the proper way: use the "load another unit on this unit" button. I knew there had to be a better way.

Paradrops also took some getting used to. And sometimes I still don't know if I should have transports and cargo ships in an HQ for strategic movement and transfers, or in a seperate unit for movement by hand.

This game is a larning process. It helps a lot if you enjoy learning, experimenting, and figuring stuff out for yourself. And if you do, write an online strategy guide to help other newbies out.

[jamus34]

Ok, so between reading the Supply for Beginner's post and playing a couple more (abortive) random scenarios I think I am starting to get the whole supply thing down.
 
Correct me if I am wrong but there is no way to automatically "stretch" supply lines...you need to move the nearest HQ so it is within the maximum range of the troops it supports. My question...Can you create a "dummy" HQ that has no staff or units assigned to it but is there solely as a placekeeper to help move supplies or do you need to have something attached to it to make it active?
 
Also, with regard to port towns...say you produce both land and sea units in town how do they get distributed??? At a guess they should go to the HQ that the town is assigned to but if that HQ is inland what happens to the sea unit?
 
I haven't even really gotten to the air units yet...played around with bombers a little bit but that's it...I'm slowly learning.

[Barthheart]

ORIGINAL: jamus34
...
Correct me if I am wrong but there is no way to automatically "stretch" supply lines...you need to move the nearest HQ so it is within the maximum range of the troops it supports. My question...Can you create a "dummy" HQ that has no staff or units assigned to it but is there solely as a placekeeper to help move supplies or do you need to have something attached to it to make it active?

You can have a string of up to four(default) HQ's to stretch your supply lines. Supreme HQ - Front HQ - Army HQ - Div. HQ. with the max supply range between each... for example. These extra HQ's don't really need staff or any other SFT's.

Also, with regard to port towns...say you produce both land and sea units in town how do they get distributed??? At a guess they should go to the HQ that the town is assigned to but if that HQ is inland what happens to the sea unit?

Sea SFT's created in port that has it's HQ inland will either create a new unit to put the "boat" into or put the boat into a unit already in teh port. Note this means if you have a land unit in the port teh "boat" gets added to it making it nolonger move on land. Create a new unit and transfer the "boat" to it.

[mcv]

ORIGINAL: Barthheart

ORIGINAL: jamus34
...
Correct me if I am wrong but there is no way to automatically "stretch" supply lines...you need to move the nearest HQ so it is within the maximum range of the troops it supports. My question...Can you create a "dummy" HQ that has no staff or units assigned to it but is there solely as a placekeeper to help move supplies or do you need to have something attached to it to make it active?

You can have a string of up to four(default) HQ's to stretch your supply lines. Supreme HQ - Front HQ - Army HQ - Div. HQ. with the max supply range between each... for example. These extra HQ's don't really need staff or any other SFT's.

Exactly. In fact, not having any staff or other SFTs makes it trivial to move this supply HQ around with strategic movement.

Also, supply range is pretty big, so you're unlikely to need a full string of 4 HQs to get supply to where you need it, except perhaps on the largest maps. At least as long as you keep your HQs in accessible locations with roads, port, etc. When a Division HQ needs to move into mountains with lots of rivers and no roads, it may be a good idea to give it an extra supply HQ at the nearest road.

Also, with regard to port towns...say you produce both land and sea units in town how do they get distributed??? At a guess they should go to the HQ that the town is assigned to but if that HQ is inland what happens to the sea unit?

Sea SFT's created in port that has it's HQ inland will either create a new unit to put the "boat" into or put the boat into a unit already in teh port. Note this means if you have a land unit in the port teh "boat" gets added to it making it nolonger move on land. Create a new unit and transfer the "boat" to it.[/quote]

That's one of the few things that are really annoying about this game. I'd like my boats to be added to new units or pure naval units, and not have a regular infantry unit suddenly be stuck with a cruiser.