Recon question

[OldJubilee]

Hello again everyone

Okay, now that I have played through the tutorial missions, including the artillery one (my personal favorite was Using a Tiger..what fun!) my next question regards the use of reconnaisance units. I use recon very heavily, usually a platoon of armored cars and a couple scout teams( I'm currently playing the long campaign as Germans, I'm midway through 1944 or thereabouts). Is there a best way to use these guys? The attrition among my recon units seems to be pretty frightening, 75 percent or more. Is there a way to maneuver my recon units to avoid this, or is it just par for the course?

Thanks again.

[tracer]

Foot units can spot better than vehicles, and are also harder to spot (especially if you move them 1 hex per turn). Try loading a scout team onto a recon vehicle, then either drop them off when they make contact, or use the vehicle's generous movement to pull them back to cover.

[Supervisor]

1 added note, always check your elevation, spotting from an elevated covered position can bring great rewards before they knew what hit them.

[Capt. Pixel]

Yep - reconn attrition is usually high. Often near 100%.

But there are some things you can do to minimize their losses, or at least prolong their usefulness until something sturdier gets to the frontline.

Reconn are your 'eyes' not your 'fists'. Don't engage them in a fire exchange if it can be helped at all. Pop up, take your view, and back down into cover.

Set your Range to '0'. The 'Y' key sets the response range for opportunity fire. It also seems to affect opp fire drawn from the enemy during your move.

In an extreme situation, you might even consider turning an infantry scouts' weapons to OFF. You do this hoping that you can disappear into the hex and not worry about opp-firing inadvertently.

Scouts generally move faster. Use that extra movement to sneak from heavy cover to heavy cover. Try to not expose yourself in the open to enemy units.

If your scout is in cover, not being observed, not drawing enemy fire, and capable of surveying sufficient terrain and enemy movements - then he's doing his job. Leave him there.

If your scout has come over the top of the hill, discovered a half a company of tanks and trucks, survived all the incoming opportunity fire - do a quick look-about and get off that hill !!

Again, he's doing his job. Now you (and your artillery ) know what's on the farside of that hill.

Once contact with the enemy occurs, retreat the scouts to deal with incidental threats like bailed crews. Hold them in reserve to advance with your main force. Let them wander your backfield to check for infiltrating threats.

Nothing's better for a tank commander than to have a scout pacing out in front of him.

[Mangobreeder]

what i normaly do is land a few snipers in a glider deep behine NME lines, i turn there wepons off and range to 0 they work a treat normally they can sit next to enemy unit in an adjecent hex and not be spotted, definatly worth the extra investment.

Mango

[Capt. Pixel]

Originally posted by Mangobreeder
what i normaly do is land a few snipers in a glider deep behine NME lines, i turn there wepons off and range to 0 they work a treat normally they can sit next to enemy unit in an adjecent hex and not be spotted, definatly worth the extra investment.

Mango

Or you could just buy the gliders and dribble them onto the board one at a time, over several turns, for snapshot reconn. Also, the opponent won't know if they actually contained troops - so he'll have to check it out. :rolleyes:

[Larry Holt]

Recon can have two functions:
- Find the general location of the enemy
- Find the specific location of the enemy

If you are just looking for the enemy's FEBA (forwad edge of the battle area) recon can probably survive without too many casualities. If your want to spot ATGs, HMGs, tanks, etc. look out.

In the first case, have several recon units overwatch one that is moving. When it is shot at (hopefully at long range where it will not be killed by one shot) the others may spot the firing unit or at least see where it came from.

In the second case, don't move recon in LOS of known but unspotted enemy units. Have them where they have a LOS to the suspected hex and just sit there, then move heavy, main battle force units (tanks, infantry, etc.) which will take shots and survive. The recon units will see the enemy shooting and spot them.

Remember, once the enemy shots at you, even though they may not be spotted, you should know from what hex they shot from. Supress that hex with artillery and direct fire (using the Z key)

[Orzel Bialy]

There is a saying I once saw somewhere that went something like this...." A good Scout is a dead Scout".
Obviously meaning that scouts that did their job successfully usually paid a heavy price.
If you are to be successgul in locating enemy forces...or defenses, you must be prepared to face the fact that you will see a large rotation in your scouting corps during the course of a campaign. It's just the nature of the beast.
But don't stop using them...they are tremendous assets despite the fact that they get killed off quite often!

[panda124c]

Originally posted by Orzel Bialy
There is a saying I once saw somewhere that went something like this...." A good Scout is a dead Scout".
Obviously meaning that scouts that did their job successfully usually paid a heavy price.
If you are to be successgul in locating enemy forces...or defenses, you must be prepared to face the fact that you will see a large rotation in your scouting corps during the course of a campaign. It's just the nature of the beast.
But don't stop using them...they are tremendous assets despite the fact that they get killed off quite often!

I think that the saying goes, "A spotted Scout is a dead Scout" I use scouts extensively, my attrition happens to the support units. A good scout unit is;

one scout (2 or 4 man)
one transport vehical (small soft or hard vehical, fast)
two Armoured Cars (small, MG armed, or auto cannon, fast).

The scout does the work, the AC's are to extract the scout when the going gets rough, this is where I lose my support units. I have scouts that have only died once or twice during an entire WWII Campain. A dead scout is of no use to me, he tells me nothing. And don't forget the longer they last the better they get at spotting and not being spotted.

[RockinHarry]

I read many times that armored cars personnel bailed out to get into a covered position on foot, from what a safe look into the countryside was possible! Meaning, drive behind an obstacle (crest, house..), hit 9-key to bail. Then in same (dangerous!) or following turn move the crew to the vantage point. The abandoned armored car is safe, if not detected at the time the crew bailed.
If you gathered enough info with the crew, go back to the vehicle hex, recrew and drive elsewhere...

Best is to bail while unobserved and move the crew in next turn one hex only.

________
Harry

[tracer]

Harry,
Does the bailed crew still retain the spotting bonus given to recon units? If I'm doing the math right, recon vehicles have the same spotting ability as a standard foot unit (they have the spotting penalty for vehicles removed). Your idea would work since the enemy would have a harder time spotting the crew. I just hope they remount the vehicle quick when the enemy approaches!

[RockinHarry]

Originally posted by tracer
Harry,
Does the bailed crew still retain the spotting bonus given to recon units? If I'm doing the math right, recon vehicles have the same spotting ability as a standard foot unit (they have the spotting penalty for vehicles removed). Your idea would work since the enemy would have a harder time spotting the crew. I just hope they remount the vehicle quick when the enemy approaches!

Hi tracer,

Yes, I think the crew retains spotting bonus although I´.ve not played with this idea for a long time, so this needs to be tested once more again. Sure,..it´s dangerous to bail the crew, that said if possible bail only, while the "*" asterisk is not shown (if feature toggled on). This needs skill (experience value of crew) and good timing. Not to forget...LUCK! If just on the other side of the crest or building an enemy infantry unit is positioned...Good bye crew! Probably it´s better to have a small 2 men scout tank rider on the AC if load cost allows...

It´s just interesting, that you can do the same in SPWAW that was done historically by armored reccon troops,... bailing the crew voluntarily and have them patrolling on foot to stay unspotted!

_________
Harry

[Henri]

Originally posted by Orzel Bialy
There is a saying I once saw somewhere that went something like this...." A good Scout is a dead Scout".

I recently did the first scenario of the Lost victories megacampaign, where the Germans have a LOT of scouts (2- or 4-man teams). Although some casualties were taken and although I used some of them to fight (contrary to normal doctrine), most survived. Without them, I couldn't have captured all of the victory hexes as I did.

A couple of 4-man teams catching an enemy infantry platoon in a crossfire in the open can decimate that platoon pretty fast, although that is not the best way to use them.

In this scenario expanding a bridgehead in heavily forested terrain, the scouts were sweeping in the vanguard, and since I usually made them stop in wood hexes, most of the time they were not harmed when fired upon, or when they did, since they were fewer than a nomral patrol, they took fewer casualties.

Note that here they were fighting spooky Russian infantry in the opening day of Barbarossa, so more caution might be in order when using scouts against tougher enemies.

Henri