New Player - I want to like CB

[HowieWowie]

I've played a good number of PC games somewhat similar to CB. I went through the tutorial and have skimmed the manual. There are several things that I like about the UI but I'm left with some questions.

1 - I saw in an AAR a map view that expanded the hexed and "un-stacked" the units. I think it provides a quick way to scan forces without having to click on every hex. How is this done?

2- I might be missing something but I'd like to know when selecting units for battle what the strength of the attacking forces are in comparison to those defending. Specifically inf vs inf, armour vs armour, etc. There is no summary from what I can see of the battle parameters.

3 - If you are on the offensive I would think that you want to maximize use of the APs of your units. To do this I'd like to know what a units remaining AP would be after an attack or move.

4 - What do the various bars and colors on the unit chits represent. This is not covered clearly in the manual.

I've looked at some of the AARs and overall strategies are as I would expect. Without a feeling for the above I'm struggling with a feeling that I'm simply blindly assigning units to battle and moving things about without any idea if I'm utilizing my forces in an optimal manner.

I want to really like this game. I've had my eye on it for some time. Perhaps others can get a sense of where I'm at and pass on some of their tips.

Cheers

[joeyeti]

Ad 1) - it is one of the buttons on the toolbar, one of the first ones (cannot remember right now, not at my desk...), when you view the map normally (ie. you are not in a special mode like combat or something). There should be tooltips available to pinpoint it.

[Fonebone]

1 - I saw in an AAR a map view that expanded the hexed and "un-stacked" the units. I think it provides a quick way to scan forces without having to click on every hex. How is this done?

Just zoom in all the way and you can see all the units in a hex.

2- I might be missing something but I'd like to know when selecting units for battle what the strength of the attacking forces are in comparison to those defending. Specifically inf vs inf, armour vs armour, etc. There is no summary from what I can see of the battle parameters.

There is a hex-shaped button to change unit icons from Nato symbols to silhouettes w/numbers. The numbers indicate the power of the unit. I just strive for a 3:1 ratio in my attacks and usually have pretty good results. After some experience (mostly painful) it seems to me that you have to get the defenders' Readiness ratings under 50 for best results. Most of my attacks when opposing Readiness is higher than this come to grief. I wish the manual was clearer and more detailed, and this goes for all computer wargames, not just this one.

3 - If you are on the offensive I would think that you want to maximize use of the APs of your units. To do this I'd like to know what a units remaining AP would be after an attack or move.

Off the top of my head, I think an attack generally consumes something like 30 or 40 AP. I actually tried to look this up in the manual the other day and couldn't find it. For movement, terrain AP costs are shown by hovering your mouse pointer over the graphic depiction of the terrain in the top center of the screen.

4 - What do the various bars and colors on the unit chits represent. This is not covered clearly in the manual.

These are just a graphical depiction of the current values of the unit. Green is good, yellow and blue worse, red bad. Not totally reliable with fog of war.

If you've got the game, stick with it. I've been playing computer wargames since the 80s and I really think this is the best operational level game of them all. I'm frankly surprised it doesn't get more love. I actually like Warsaw to Paris better than CB, but that might just be because I'm more interested in the subject matter. CB has that wall-to-wall unit thing going that I find less appealing than the situations in the other game. Still love it though.

[HowieWowie]

Thanks for the reply Fonebone. My initial post was driven by frustration. I stuck with it and plan to continue to play CB. I agree that it is a goodie! Its to bad that more time wasn't invested in tutorial scenarios and the manual. I've played a lot of PC wargames and it seems that there is never enough attention given to these aspects.

[Fonebone]

Coudln't agree more, Howie. One of the joys of board wargaming is reading/studying the rules manual. This aspect of our hobby is always lost in computer gaming, but shouldn't be, in my opinion.