German Campaign using War Cab

[Imp]

Originally Posted by sigeena

38 turns for Advance?

You'll definitely need to move along the roads so that you can reach the objectives in good time.

Once the roads are clear, it's going to be an infantry slog to clear through the mud and rough terrain.

Your AFVs are probably going to have to stay on the road or risk getting bogged down in the terrain.

Are you playing with timed objectives?

If you have 5,400pts, I assume UK is delaying with around 2,700pts. What arty have you spotted so far?

You are right offroad is slow discovered some inconveniently placed impassable terrain as well, infantry really need to path find in this terrain.

38 turns was what the game gave me & yes timed objectives set to 6 so from turn 10 on the British will get 126 points a turn. As you say I need to take some risks advancing by turn 18 they will have a 1,000 points if still own all the Vhexes.

Artillery so far was just 2 6 pounder batteries on first couple of turns.

[Imp]

Turn 5

Contact & it could have gone better.

NORTH
No contact & spread out, terrain here is more open trying to check both sides of the road for surprises. 2 Squads will proceed up the road at 3 hexes a turn.

SOUTH

The first squad to make contact moved 1 hex into an orchard & still lost 2 men to fire from 150m, suppressed could not see firer so another squad looked & lost a man.
First blood to the Brits but at least we can see them now, he is resilient bringing up other units to engage 4 other squads suddenly open up & we are down another man. (the squad above the smoke is double stacked 2 squads there)
Then it gets worse I bring up a MkIV & discover that turret is vulnerable to rifle grenades. So used to anything but lights being safe from the front.

4 men & MkIV's main armament gone & we have not killed anyone yet so not a great opening.

Tank fires smoke & we rout & pursue the first squad killing it & discover the 2 squads further North.
As the ATG has a good field of fire show the tanks above the orange line & we can engage the top squads from here.
We can see along the E>W road seems safe.

At the bottom things went better scout & sniper discovered 3 squads without taking fire, scout pulled back.
Waiting to see if we can get behind them using the road before we engage so we do not end up chasing them. In this terrain we will have to find them again.

The squad we killed was the only damage caused of the 10 squads found 1 is in a field, 1 is on rough & the rest are in Rough + Orchard or Wood. They are not making life easy.

[Mobhack]

I find the long-barreled Mk4's glass jaw to be one of the real annoyances of playing as German - and if it is hull down or dug in then the effect is worse since hits will be more likely on the weak 5cm turret face!

They could not increase the 5cm turret front armour with the long gun on it - the turret was at max capacity. There is a P4 with decent frrontal turret armour, but a short 75 which can deal with shermans and T34s with HEAT ammo, however its a bit "iffy" relying on WW2 tech HEAT.

So I tend to prefer the long-75 stugs, but those get annoying when immobilised pointing in an inconvenient direction. The stug with short 75 is OK-ish in North Africa if it has a decent supply of HEAT - useful until the early MK4 specials show up as a unit that can support the P3s charge to APCR range with longer ranged shots.

But in a German LC, I often have absolutely no P4 or P2 in the core till the P4 'specials' show. Its all stugs and P3s for me, may have some P2 that came as part of a company buy in Poland, upgraded to a real tank for France onwards.

[Imp]

I agree only dabbled with 4's previously I normally go the 3's plus a few StuG's route myself.
So first time using 4s to any extent & in my wisdom changed my StuG's to 4's as everyone can engage at medium to long range. Thinking was till the Allies get APCR the StuG has a clear advantage at range being virtually impervious to frontal fire.
Turns out not only are 4s vulnerable to most tanks at any sensible engagement range they need to give infantry a wide berth to.

That makes them not much better than Marder's especially on hilltops in a battle I would take a few Marders over the 4s as they are less than half the cost, you know to be careful with them

[sigeena]

I'm not sure. Just personal anecdotal experience. But Pz4s seem to be better at reaction fire than StuGs. Does the game compute this? I had in a number of occasions, gotten the drop on the flank of a StuG and not received reaction fire, while Pz4s seem to react. The StuG was stationary and ready.

[Imp]

I seen to remember seeing something somewhere saying there is a minor difference.
From my experience I think they are slightly worse than tanks if it is not in their covered arc.
Did manage once to walk a couple of hexes up a road facing directly
behind one undetected & hit it with a flamethrower, mild or no suppression. Not managed it since though.

[Mobhack]

Stug-type vehicles are less likely to turn to face (and possibly fire in reaction fire) than tuirreted types. Turreted vehicles can turn just the turret, if not the hull - stugs do not do turret-only turns to face firer, only the rarer "whole-body" turns to face.

[sigeena]

Seems like I can follow this battle better. The earlier ones were too confusing.

Absolutely agree with sticking to movement along roads where possible. Just purely moving through the terrain is going to take up all your turns, not mentioning fighting through the terrain.

With 2,700 points, I'm estimating at least 6 infantry companies. Guess you found the 1st one in the South.

[Imp]

Originally Posted by sigeena

Seems like I can follow this battle better. The earlier ones were too confusing.

Absolutely agree with sticking to movement along roads where possible. Just purely moving through the terrain is going to take up all your turns, not mentioning fighting through the terrain.

With 2,700 points, I'm estimating at least 6 infantry companies. Guess you found the 1st one in the South.

If you have any suggestions on how to improve I will see if I can oblige otherwise feel free to ask.
The first screenshot in the battle is normally an overview showing the whole area of the map that the action will take place on & Vhexes. You could bookmark that or save the screen shot to refer back to the big picture if needed.
Normally take a few turns in rather than at deployment as I might be able to zoom in more.
Also rarely bother with more than a basic plan nowadays as they normally go out the window within a few turns of contact.

Done a big screenshot (4 screens joined) for the next turn showing general situation & likely moves.

[Imp]

Turn 7

No finesse here accepting a few losses because we have a timetable, we could just go straight for Vhexes & let them come to us & I am sure that will happen but I like to clear on the way.

Stuck between a rock & a hard place a lot of the action is going to happen at 150m or less.
Only 4 vehicles the Panthers & Sturmpanzers are safe from attack at this range so the infantry will have to take the load. Losses are inevitable at this range even if they are slow moving.
Much of the terrain offers good cover hit chance seems about half what it would be in clear terrain. This means we can suppress them but actually killing men is not frequent.
To speed things up we are therefore suppressing & moving adjacent using halftracks if necessary. Smoke if practical but risking hidden AT units is worth it at the moment.
Trying to get some spacing now to give the artillery several targets but due to our current speed of advance it is falling behind us.

Screen shot shows
Likely paths & the high ground on this map.
A + B are giving the flanks a rough lookover & will probably leave a unit to check for any movement later.
C has found & routed one squad they have a couple of MGs that will take up position to cover the front of the hill. Squads will then load up & head for it.
NORTH ROAD group are yet to make contact however VHexes are not that far off & there are gaps in the trees lining the road so contact is imminent.
SOUTH ROAD group 3 things happening trying to get some space.
1 Pathfinding along road to objectives
2 Started attack against far South group artillery is incoming. The units moving to cut off the retreat lost 2 men killing a squad, 150m hurts no longer shots available.
3 The battle in the fields has been hard been a bit reckless for speed & could have done better. Forced 3 squads off rough hexes straight onto another rough hex bad planning cost me a couple of men, several field hexes have rough under them.
Found another couple of squads & a sniper here, lost the 250/11 taking him out as he was causing problems. We have lost 18 men got caught out one squad routed in view of the enemy & lost 7 men.
British fire has been pretty accurate to date.