There are noticeable improvements to the tactical AI, the user interface and a host of little things which make the game a worthy successor to the last one. It's such a joy to spend most game time thinking instead of clicking. These two are a truly unique experience.
I've had the game since release, but only got time to play over the weekend. I thought I'd write up an AAR for another forum to show off the game's features and mechanics, so I jumped into the Malta scenario as Germany on realistic delay and favouring neither side settings. I have a number of observations;
1) Stragglers. In HTTR, stragglers could be mostly ignored as the scenario carried on. However, with supply routes modeled, leaving 2-3 shattered companies alive can play havoc with transport assets. There are a number of issues here: The first is that there are no orders to "destroy" an enemy formation. Launching attack after attack and adjusting it slightly to overlap the latest sighting of retreating forces is a bit clunky. Secondly, it's exceedingly hard to get units to surrender. After a Regimental sized attack on the Safi and Hal Far airfields area (SE Malta) there are still a number of stragglers following 48 hours of fighting. I even brought a couple of independent pioneers to mop up, but they simply pass through an enemy company causing it to rout and run slightly further away. Of course the problem of stray units shouldn't be a simple one to deal with, but rather than a handful, I'm finding the brunt of a destroyed enemy formation remains intact and wanders the battlefield in perpetuity, often hitting convoys or wandering into victory locations.
IMHO, ideally there would be an "evapouration" type mechanism, where stray companies are removed from the board and reappear as replacements at the nearest base sometime later, but under the current game, is it possible to look at the settings for surrender and consider tweaking them?
2) Flak Batteries
I've found these units to be nearly indestructable.Currently, I have two battalions surrounding one and hardly denting it. My troops appear incapable of overwhelming the defenders and instead dig-in and defend around a flak battery for 10's of hours before they are neutralized.
3) Large Scale Maneuvers
I rarely used full regimental-sized movement or assault orders in the previous game, but I found several situations calling for either a 2-battalion or 3 battalion order to be issued to a regimental HQ. I don't know if this is new, or I never noticed it before, but relatively few enemy units can disrupt a large formation for hours at a time. I've had mixed fortunes in maneuver and assault: those without much enemy fire along the march go quickly, but a couple of companies and some artillery can bring about a complete shutdown as the regiment continually reasseses the situation and suffers orders delay upon orders delay (at least that's how it appears.) I've also been able to do the same to the AI; I blocked an augmented Regiment-sized formation preparing a counter attack with a half battalion of glider troops who happened to get in the way at the right time. The AI made adjustments and continued it's movement, but it lost >12 hours in doing so and the opportunity was lost.
Obviously there's a balancing act between allowing such maneuvers free rein, and blocking them for every mortar platoon which manages to land a couple of shells in the right place, and I was wondering if my experience is common place and intentional, or something else is going on.
4) AI passivity
I know I was fighting the British, but they seemed a bit timid and conservative even for them
The AI appeared more concerned with stacking defensive forces around objectives, than building a larges scale counter-attack and knocking me off balance. In this particular scenario, I overextended myself early and was ripe for an attack in numerous areas, but the AI was content to watch and defend instead of kicking me in the rear end. While defense is important, a situation where the numbers will eventually be overwhelming requires intelligent use of disruptive attacks.Later, when the AI did counter-attack, it did so on low casualty setting and quickly retreated when not istantly gaining a breach. Again, this added to the timid/passivity factor.
To repeat, the game is superb, and I could drone on about the great points all day, but I thought it worthwhile bringing these things up in hope of getting other opinions and whether I'm alone in seeing some of this behaviour.
