Why can't I Mount?

[Agrippa]

I am playing the 1941 Campaign in the first battle as the Germans. I kicked the Reds out of the nearest builds an hoped to occury them myself,but I couldnt mount. Why? Also I didn't care for the set up. You could hardly alter to set up at all and the enemy was able to kill one of my units on the first turn. Is this common for battles?

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: Agrippa
I am playing the 1941 Campaign in the first battle as the Germans. I kicked the Reds out of the nearest builds an hoped to occury them myself,but I couldnt mount. Why?

This is an issue where casualties are sometimes not cleared from a building - it's already fixed in the v1.01c Beta update and will be fixed in the v1.01 official release. It specifically manifests in one of those buildings on the first map.

Also I didn't care for the set up. You could hardly alter to set up at all and the enemy was able to kill one of my units on the first turn. Is this common for battles?

Not all of them, no - however, the concept on the 1km x 1km maps is that your battle starts at "first contact" rather than "move to contact". For this reason, spotting works during setup so that you can see enemy units during setup if they are visible. Your change placement possibilities are up to 250m max range, but not too close to the enemy (whether spotted or not). Generally it's always possible to re-deploy to the sides or rear and rarely possible to deploy further forward.

Regards,

- Erik

[Biffa]

I have to agree with Agrippa on the deployment comment imho.

The past two battles 8 and 9 in the first campaign after boot camp have frustrated the hell out of me regards deployment.

Both battles the Germans (me) were defending I found each time I played them I usually lost units who were desperatley trying to get into a decent position (side ways NOT forwards).

Might have the number of the battles wrong but battle 8 has a large flat area where the enemy tanks come at you, you have a road on the your left (two tents?) a big field and a large orchard on the right behind a large ditch. I found that totally frustrating and fought the battle four or five times on normal to try and win it, my options for deployment were very limited. I was hoping to let the russian tanks right through then hit them in the sides of their tanks from the orchard with my artillery Paks. There was no option to do this because of the deployment restrictions.

Also noticed that in this scenario I had time to dig trenches but never had time to set up my bombardment before the Russians got theirs in first, thought that was a bit strange since it was my ground.

I gave up being clever and to win I simply stacked my tanks in a line at the back to increase the numbers of bombardments I got in before I was fully engaged and then let both my art and tanks hit the first targets that got into LOS and effective range. I also stole the flag on the left with a little infantry rush to gather the extra victory points to help.

Battle 9

This is the large town with the three bridges, I can't seem to get my infantry to move and enter buildings those already able to deploy in a building get in but those that have to run a couple of turns to a building simply stop at the walls, so I'm not convinced about the casualties being the main reason why the players infantry can't enter buildings.

Anyway this battle simply has no scope at all for the player due to the deployment restrictions. You have to have half your infantry on their own guarding flags, you have to have your artillery at the back and you have to have all of your tanks in the ploughed field at the back left. There is no other choice. Your only deployment option is a tiny amount of flexiblity regarding whereabouts at the back you can place your artillery. And this is a battle where you have obviously got there before the Russians, I accept that obviously your infantry screen pressed ahead to capture the victory flags without close armour support but again this battle starts with you rushing armour around the map and losing some of them in the process.

I don't really think that the deployment restrictions are allowing players to use the strategies they would like. I know it's there to stop us from stealing ground forward but starting a battle as the defender but having most of your force exposed and out in the open and not using the best terrain for defending just feels a bit frustrating.

Don't get me wrong I'm playing this game and loving it and that's partly because it does seem to give the AI most of the advantages which in itself is a challenge. I'm not even gonna mention the effectiveness of those Russian AT rifles or the massive difference between Russian welded armour and Germen rivetted. Anyone else had 14 of their shells bounce off a tank and it survive? My record for a German Panzer is only about four.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: SAF_Biffa
This is the large town with the three bridges, I can't seem to get my infantry to move and enter buildings those already able to deploy in a building get in but those that have to run a couple of turns to a building simply stop at the walls, so I'm not convinced about the casualties being the main reason why the players infantry can't enter buildings.

Are you using the Mount command?

I don't really think that the deployment restrictions are allowing players to use the strategies they would like. I know it's there to stop us from stealing ground forward but starting a battle as the defender but having most of your force exposed and out in the open and not using the best terrain for defending just feels a bit frustrating.

Thanks for the battle comments, we'll see if we can improve those two as far as deployment flexibility. Note that if you really want to try a different deployment, you can always use the F4 key to turn off the deployment restrictions.

Regards,

- Erik

[elmo3]

Only scratched the surface of this fine game so take my agreement with the two posters above with a grain of salt. I have had problems even deploying sideways as well. Lining up all the units along the edge is not realistic in terms of how they would advance to get into position. I have no problem with the concept of starting a scenario in contact but somehow we need more flexibility in the setup so we can at least make realistic choices on deployment.

Edit - Just saw your post above Erik and did not know about F4. Time to RTFM! [;)]

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: elmo3
Only scratched the surface of this fine game so take my agreement with the two posters above with a grain of salt. I have had problems even deploying sideways as well. Lining up all the units along the edge is not realistic in terms of how they would advance to get into position. I have no problem with the concept of starting a scenario in contact but somehow we need more flexibility in the setup so we can at least make realistic choices on deployment.

This is largely reliant on where the designer placed the enemy forces, so if we know which scenarios are causing the most frustration in this regard, we can probably tweak them to allow a bit more flexibility.

[Biffa]

Manual? [&:]

I got the digital download with the box follow up... which I haven't even opened and no I didn't bother looking for the digital manual either... who does?

Thanks for the usual quick reply and answers Erik, (Have a holiday get someone else to do it, you need a break!)

I sometimes refight a mission if I lose and very often I've felt I haven't been able to tweak my approach much due to the deployment limitations.

I promise to RTFM when I can stop myself from playing the game. Just one question pressing F4 does that ruin your score or have any downside, since I guess it's kind of cheating and not fighting the scenario the way the level designer intended?

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: SAF_Biffa
Manual? [&:]
I got the digital download with the box follow up... which I haven't even opened and no I didn't bother looking for the digital manual either... who does?

Hehe - well, at least the game is easy to play!

I promise to RTFM when I can stop myself from playing the game. Just one question pressing F4 does that ruin your score or have any downside, since I guess it's kind of cheating and not fighting the scenario the way the level designer intended?

No downside - you're the only one who will know you did it. [;)]

[Agrippa]

I don't have a problem starting in contact, but I would think that the commander of the force would have a better understanding of the battle to take place.  Understand that I have not playayed many battles yet, but I hope the breifings are more detailed.  I would think that the leader of attack would know the basic location of troops not yet on board and have the ability to set his forces up to fit the battle plan.  Say I want to have a couple units work together and one is attimaticaly place on the left and the other on the right.  I would have to spend a number of turns trying to unite them, all the while under fire from the enemy, while the ruskies are rolling their tanks down on my back side. 
 
I hope this doesn't sound overly harsh.  I think the game is very good, or I wouldn't spend the time writing this post.

[Mobius]

ORIGINAL: Agrippa
I am playing the 1941 Campaign in the first battle as the Germans. I kicked the Reds out of the nearest builds an hoped to occury them myself,but I couldnt mount. Why? Also I didn't care for the set up. You could hardly alter to set up at all and the enemy was able to kill one of my units on the first turn. Is this common for battles?

What can I say?

ORIGINAL: T-34 Mythical Weapon
At 830 on October 5, Stukas bombed Lepochkino, and the II./Pz.Rgt.35 moved sluggishly through the muddy fields. So it reached Ivanovkoye only at 1130 hrs.

After a short preparatory artillery barrage Lauchert moved on at the same time as the II./Pz.Rft 35. For the first two kilometers the going was smooth, but then abruptly he encountered a stiff Soviet defense. Initially, as many as 3,000 Soviet infantry opened up at what they reported as 40 Panzers. Then Soviet tanks appeared – (10-15 according to the Germans), followed by Il-2 “Sturmoviks”. Lauchert’s attack faltered and his offense degenerated into a stationary firefight in the Soviet forward trenches. When late in the afternoon more Soviet tanks appeared from the right flank (most probably Gusev’s withdrawing group(. Lauchert decided to call it a day and ordered all troops to fall back to their original positions, sending his tanks and rocket artillery back to Orel.

EDIT - This is the passage that Mcensk Recon is made from.

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

This is largely reliant on where the designer placed the enemy forces, so if we know which scenarios are causing the most frustration in this regard, we can probably tweak them to allow a bit more flexibility.

Mcensk Recon is one. Some infantry and an HMG team deploy in the open and can't relocate to any cover in the Setup phase.

[Biffa]

In my campaign mentioned above I'm now on 'Fire Brigade' mission... scope for using dif tacts and replayability 0/10.

Ofc allowing for F4 thats fine, but I honestly wonder how many will know about this option.

Like many strat gamers we like to think we can try different ideas coz we're so smart n clever, atm for the past few battles I just feel like I'm walking down a very well trodden path that it already laid out for me. Maybe some like it that way probably the same people who use to like Mario Brothers...

I'm not going to mention it again, I wanted to follow through atleast one proper campaign but atm I can feel a big urge to use the editors or get my modding hat on instead. I had one tank left in the battle before and I was defending... so turnover of my guys is so high I still don't have anyone I give a damn about, it's on 'Normal' but if I go Easy and use F4 well... [:-]

[Erik Rutins]

For what it's worth, you may have more setup leeway in the random battles and campaign, give those a try as well.

We'll take anotehr look at Mcensk Recon and Fire Brigade to see if we can ease things up at all while staying true to the historical battles. Keep in mind that designers also use the deployment limits in some cases to set you a tactical puzzle. If you want to avoid that, the F4 key will allow it but it can be interesting to play through once with what you have.