Blunting the spear campaign issues

[Rokko]

I'm finally getting to play the German campaign from the CMRT base game at a decent rate and thought I'd share some of the things I've noticed in it, before I forget about them again. Most of the things I am going to point out are going to be negative, since thats the stuff that keeps sticking to your mind more, so first off: I am greatly enjoiying playing this campaign so far (I am about halfway through Mission 3). I like the scale and the open country armor clash gameplay of it very much. I also like that all maps so far have been cut from one large mastermap, as it gives a feeling of continuity from battle to battle. I also like that you get quite a lot of fire support, instead of artificially cutting away your batallion mortars or something like that, like many other scenarios do. But for the issues I've noticed:

- The bug with the missing Panzerfaust allotment for armored Panzergrenadiers is no gamebreaker by any means, but it is annoying and more than once I had wanted to send some legged tankhunters into some undergrowth to weed out some T-34s that were hiding there and couldn't because there were no PzF around.

- The motorized Panzergrenadier you get in Mission 3 also suffer from this. Their trucks do have one PzF each, but you can't have the passengers acquire them. I don't think this particular bug has been noted before.

- The scoring in mission 1 seems quite off. In the end, the entire map was void of any Soviet forces except for a scout team or two and I still got a minor defeat or a draw because I didn't occupy all of the required areas (and I got most of them actually, it was Soviet bonus point that tipped the balance). Since many of the Soviets actually retreated and were off map, they didn't surrender either.

- In mission 2 the scoring also seemed off. You have to attack a urban center with an artificially short time allotment of only one hour (1:20 actually, but it takes 20 minutes until you have a significant force at your hands). Seemed unrealistic to me, why the rush, why the ambitious goals, many of them weren't even held by enemy but you have no way of knowing the enemy is actually pretty weak in terms of force size). I think I also scored a minor defeat in this one despite seriously thrashing the enemy. Only about one platoon in relatively good order was sitting in the town center in the end.

- the briefing for mission 2 is pretty inaccurate and some of the information it gives you is false. For instance, KG Baker gets a PzIV icon in the TacMap. What you actually get is a armored recon infantry company. So I was waiting the whole time for another group of tanks from the North West (?) which never came. The briefing also mentions you'll get a battery of 150mm artillery (6 Hummels I think), which never arrives.

- I am not 100% sure, but in mission 3 it appears from the briefing seems to indicate you are expected to rush your truck-borne infantry force over a lot of open ground to reach a bunch of exit zones. Also seems ahistorical to me, I don't think this is the way motorized infantry was used. I am essentially not obeying my orders in this one and just take my time and walk everybody where they need to go and probably will not score a victory again. 

- In the beginning of mission 3 there is a pre-planned barrage hitting within your set-up zone. To me that is a no-go, it is just annoying and simply gets you to start over again and avoid the barrage.

- In missions 2 and 3 the soviets get ground attack aircraft. While they didn't cause much damage (one self propelled Vierling wiped out while firing ironically) and it's cool to see your Flak reacting, from what I read about the Battle for Radzymin it is rather ahistorical. It appears the Germans for once actually had - temporarily and locally - air superiority during this battle.

[SlowLarry]

As no one else wants to get the ball rolling, ill take a shot. 

The issue with the PzF seems to be a matter of chance, sometimes the squads will have some, sometimes none. I have played the campaign more than once, especially the first mission and at times the left most platoon had 5 Panzerfäuste, sometimes none. All things told, in this campaign at least they dont need them so desperately because you will always have enough own armour to fight the red tanks. I would even refrain from attacking any tanks with PzF in this scenario, because this usually leads to dead halfsquads or tankhunters in a minute...For the truck bourne infantry you can dismount the driver, he will have the PzF. This could be a bug though. At least this unit has a Schreck, making it actually quite usefull against enemy armour. 

Re scoring in mission 1: you need to wipe out the red armour, of which some retreats of the map once the game starts. There are a couple of positions on the map, where you can take on the fleeing t-34s, at the chance of getting hit by the tanks hidden in the trees. So this is kind of a trade off or tactic if you will. While technically you get a score for the mission the briefing states IIRC that your job is to kill as much tanks as you can so they wont be present in the final battle of the campaign. Which means kill enough of the tanks and you will score a victory. This goes for all missions in this campaign, again IIRC. 

2nd mission: yep, quite a timelimit here. Its what makes this mission difficult, you have to live with it. Once you have killed of the tanks guarding the broad entrance to the town center you can move your own armour around at will, the russian infantry has no means to stop you unless you get very close. I used my armour in platoon strength to clear the roads, always 2 pairs a 2 tanks per street. First one pair moves in, followed by the second at 50m, then followed by infantry mounted in halftracks 50m back. The tanks hose all houses in their path with mg fire, move slow and take a 15sec stop every 20m or so. No need to lead with infantry anywhere, at least not vs the ai.  

3rd mission: no need to move anything from the map, the exitzones are again for the russians, your job is to hinder them from retreating off the map. I played this one just recently and got 28 tanks while losing 1, ironically to a groundattack plane shooting through the open hatch...in the end the russians surrendered. There is no need for units to stay in their trucks, from their entry point let them dismount, take up a defensive position on a flank or hide them in the center woods, and once your Panzers have cleared out the enemy armour have them mount on your tanks and move up to the next position. 

All in all, outstanding campaign. Dont get distracted by the scoring, your job is to kill 3rd tank corps. Wether you do this over the course of the campaign or in the final mission is up to you. The final mission will be easier if you extracted a serious toll out of your enemy in the missions before. 

[Rokko]

As no one else wants to get the ball rolling, ill take a shot.

The issue with the PzF seems to be a matter of chance, sometimes the squads will have some, sometimes none. I have played the campaign more than once, especially the first mission and at times the left most platoon had 5 Panzerfäuste, sometimes none. All things told, in this campaign at least they dont need them so desperately because you will always have enough own armour to fight the red tanks. I would even refrain from attacking any tanks with PzF in this scenario, because this usually leads to dead halfsquads or tankhunters in a minute...For the truck bourne infantry you can dismount the driver, he will have the PzF. This could be a bug though. At least this unit has a Schreck, making it actually quite usefull against enemy armour. 

 

 I am pretty sure it's a bug, because it is very different in CMBN and this only appeared after patch 1.03. I reported this a few months ago and I believe it was then aknowledged to be a bug. The driver having the PzF is also clearly a bug and nowhere else in the CM series is equipment treated that way. But I agree that these issues don't really affect gameplay in this campaign.

Re scoring in mission 1: you need to wipe out the red armour, of which some retreats of the map once the game starts. There are a couple of positions on the map, where you can take on the fleeing t-34s, at the chance of getting hit by the tanks hidden in the trees. So this is kind of a trade off or tactic if you will. While technically you get a score for the mission the briefing states IIRC that your job is to kill as much tanks as you can so they wont be present in the final battle of the campaign. Which means kill enough of the tanks and you will score a victory. This goes for all missions in this campaign, again IIRC.

 I got that there were enemy tanks retreating, but most of them that got away went through the woods appearently I couldn't really do anything about that. I don't know how many were there to begin with, but I just went back and checked and I had taken out 9 back then, so almost a full company at the loss of one PzIV and another that had it's main gun damaged. The full score for taking out Soviet armor would have been 500 of which I got 322, so probably 7 or 8 tanks got away.

2nd mission: yep, quite a timelimit here. Its what makes this mission difficult, you have to live with it. Once you have killed of the tanks guarding the broad entrance to the town center you can move your own armour around at will, the russian infantry has no means to stop you unless you get very close. I used my armour in platoon strength to clear the roads, always 2 pairs a 2 tanks per street. First one pair moves in, followed by the second at 50m, then followed by infantry mounted in halftracks 50m back. The tanks hose all houses in their path with mg fire, move slow and take a 15sec stop every 20m or so. No need to lead with infantry anywhere, at least not vs the ai. 

I pretty much realized from the start that given the strict time limit I'd probably not score a victory in this and just rolled with it, considering the campaign doesn't branch and doesn't kick you out for losing. When I determine the scenario goals to be not really achievable I generally decide to just play at my own speed and have fun with it. Having played CMBN before, I am probably a bit too timid when using tanks against infantry, even though Soviet infantry can't do a whole lot against armor.

3rd mission: no need to move anything from the map, the exitzones are again for the russians, your job is to hinder them from retreating off the map. I played this one just recently and got 28 tanks while losing 1, ironically to a groundattack plane shooting through the open hatch...in the end the russians surrendered. There is no need for units to stay in their trucks, from their entry point let them dismount, take up a defensive position on a flank or hide them in the center woods, and once your Panzers have cleared out the enemy armour have them mount on your tanks and move up to the next position. 

I realized this after the mission was over. I am not sure they really meant to show the enemy exit zones to the player or or if it was an oversight (incorrect setting in the editor) considering they didn't in the first mission, so it's kind of a consistency issue. If it was meant to be seen by the player I'd suggest to rename the zones to Soviet Exit or something like that. What I did was essentially first take out all enemy armor with my own and then advance the infantry to their objectives on foot. Only for the final push I lorried in two platoons that came as reinforcements. 

I actually scored a total victory in this as the enemy surrendered when I advanced into the village center after mercilessly shelling it into the dust.

 

All in all, outstanding campaign. Dont get distracted by the scoring, your job is to kill 3rd tank corps. Wether you do this over the course of the campaign or in the final mission is up to you. The final mission will be easier if you extracted a serious toll out of your enemy in the missions before.  

This was essentially what I did so far, I just wanted to share my thoughts and give the designers some feedback, maybe there will be some revisions to the campaign in the future. Either way it's a lot of fun.

Another historical note, which of course does not mean the campaign has to be absolutely historically correct, but 3rd Tank Corps would have had about 180 T-34s at full strength (doubtful it was at full strength in early August 1944) + maybe a regiment or two of SPGs.  After the third mission I have already taken out some 40 tanks and there is still a bunch of missions to come. Maybe those will be less armor heavy, but there elements from 5 Panzer-Divisions involved in the battle for Radzymin and the destruction of 3rd TC, not only the 4th Panzer Division.

[Rokko]

Thought I'd share two screenshots I took.

This company of T-34 decided to come driving out of the forest road out off Radzymin at the wrong time and was promptly taken apart by a bunch of Panthers without being able to fight back.

This road proved to be death trap to retreat along. That Panther in the background was responsible for taking out two or three of the visible T-34s

Edited October 29, 2015 by Rokko