This game rocks but I have noticed some wierd things...

[Demangel]

This game has to be one of the best strategy games on the market, if not the best. the only thing that comes close otherwise is table top gaming and even that suffers since you can't resolve the orders phase in real time.

I have noticed some wierd occurances in all the versions... (older all the way till the gold version)

It seems that sometimes at the most crucial moment in a battle the Ai will do something really unheard of. Something that even with the element of randomness in the game is hard to explain...

a few examples are as follows...

In a pbem match I was reviewing on another web site, this guys artillery (I think it was the 88's on the riesberg map but don't quote me)

opened fire giving away their positions even though the player clearly and correctly gave it the command to hide/ambush. this gave away the position doing NOTHING to the enemy tank and caused the allied player to retaliate on the 88 with a flanking movement of his squads a turn later) this made the other 88 only a hundred yards or so away nervouse and it opened up (correct choice I think) but when the unit came at it, instead of fixating on the two units advancing the player had targeted, it attacked the further away targets that where still stationary (foot soldiers not a tank or something even dangerous at that range) then it finaly tried to switch back to the foot soldiers that where almost kissing the germans firing the 88 but it was too late... Why did it switch like that? moral was still high, and the men operating it where still in ok condition!

On a hotseat match with a friend on the chance encounter map (gold version) tonight. I played as axis, he having less experience with the game chose allies since I hadn't played axis on that map yet, giving him the advantage of my being somewhat unsure of that angle and it's best postiions, save for what I could glean from the times I played as allies against the ai.).

It was a messy first 10 rounds... My stuggs that normaly pummle me when I play as allies against the ai who is axis, put up a dismal fight, leaving two shermans fully functional. In fact normaly when I play as allies I have to pray to god that I get at least one, one shot kill on the stugg, my friend got them all in one shot kills! At range, and an angle that was more ideal to me than him.

My shots where pretty much effective only one shot skipped off the sherman+ all the others either damaged the tank on the first shot or killed it... and always got off the kill shot.

This is a minor thing to me though since it is easily possible. and I have done it on occasion when I play as allies...the 3 stuggs can be killed easily if attacked just right...especialy with 5 shermans concentrating fire.

By the 12th round I was winning man power wise (about 1-2 ratio). No thanks really to my arty which was falling everywhere but in the middle of the huge clump of men my friend placed all bunched up like a dolt out in the open with four rounds of constant shelling the clump had lost TWO guys... TWO!!!! all the divots and craters surrounded them making a full 500 X 600 meter expanse look like swiss cheese, and I had it on target not WIDe target!

My oppenant had no idea I was playing as defensively as I was though, only one quarter of my men actually went out to engage them since I expected heavy resistance if I was offensive.

anyway the wierdest most heart wrenching moment was when on my right flank (near the church) I had taken the hill that the allies usualy claim early...

I knew that the hill would only be mine for short time if a sherman showed up so I carefull positioned panzershrek and units equiped with panzerfuast in key locations hidden.

the tank rolled in doing it's usualy nasty bit of damage to foot troops...

so I moved my first anti tank teams into position... the panzerfuast team was the first to get a shot off, the shot was taken at about 20 meters/yrds whatever... against the side armor of the sherman (regular not the plus which I knocked out early in the game)...

the shot went wild and exploded behind the tank about tenmeters away... WTF was the guy drunk or something?

then my first panzershrek team fell to a hail of sherman heavy machine gun rounds from a beleiveable range (gritted teath) whatever I figured it wouldn't have a chance...

then I decided to pull a sneak attack on the sherman, which my oponent foolishly just left in it's position, not even rotating to face my main firce in the woods...

I ordered my last panzerschrek team in the area to sneak up to it and fire nearly point blank at the side armor. He had NO supposrting units near it, so I figured a close range side shot would not only be easy to sneak into position for, but would wipe it out easily...

Sure enough my trusty two man team slowly crept up to the oblivious tank... it was pounding away at the diversion I had started way off in the tree line...

just when the team should have gotten los to it and opened up (there was a rise of a smallhill in the way)

the team changed it's mind and ran toward the Allies in the house nearby... these allies where on the oposite side of the house (no los). And the panzerschrek team was in excellent condition and was only very tired from the previous turns of running and walking.

As the team ran to the house it lost it's stealthy sneakyness (ie running not sneaking). In fact I never saw a unit in this game run so fast! It ran up to the house provoking the two units inside to open up and the tank to swivel it's turret at it... the baboons got right up to the wall before they where all gone...

this pissed me off so much I had to surrender and do something else, I'm not a sore loser mind you I did have a girlfriend to call and this game had taken nearly 2 and 1/2 hours to play so far... we where only on the 25th round when I ended it... I just didn't want to spend another two hours fighting for every bit of land against two shermans half his orrignal troops and having only two antitank teams left and no armor ecept what was smoldering sadly on the hill.

I would most likely have won the game, since when I showed him my unit placements he nearly **** himself for seeing I had still 3/4 of my total available army to throw at him that he never even saw, and he had lost easily half of his men and three tanks at the cost of only 1/4 of my men and my three stuggs... but it would have been a hard win, and my other antitank teams where way out of the way to make another run on the tank. Needless to say I lost the right flank.

So why oh god why did the things I mentioned happen? Can't anyone tell me?

Why did my arty just make noise, vandalize the feild, and make pretty lights around the whole damn close together clump of units. Why did my anittank teams act like they had been taking hits of acid? Even my friand asked me why in the world my last antitank team charged the house! which leads me to think even the greenest of dolts would know what is the better target. hmm a sherman that is a sitting duck at close range, or a nice house full of gi's... Ok so maybe if they where fired on they might fire back... if they had been routed or panicked they might have headed for the house thinking it was safe... but would they just act like there was a keg in the house and run at warp speed to stand in front of an encircling fireing squad?

I think not... and I watched this happen ten times on replay and checked the status of the team each time... they where only fatigued from running, and the tank hadn't even spotted them yet.

they had seen no combat till that moment, and had not even been shot at once.

the overall moral of my forces was still above 80% (even though I myself was pissed at losing the three stuggs so quickly)..

Oh well I suppose my friend put it best when he said:

"Dan now you know why you'll always want me on yer side!"

"Why mike, cuz you think you have some tallent?" Sarcasm dripping off my tonge as I stared at his poorly placed units all cowering in close together clumps in open ground...

"NO silly, for the simple fact that i have dumb luck on my side..." I could see what he meant as I stared at the happy tank and the not so bright antitank team bleeding on the side of the small house...

Anyway I have mentioned this in another forum on here...

If anyone can give me a good reason why this happened. I'd love to hear it... I am not all knowing when it comes to WWII weaponry, but I know enough to get by just fine (Ie what should be able to beat what in what situation).

I understand that the sneak command makes units fire on the first thing they see, but this was not really possible... the first thing the anitank team would have seen was the tanks side... not the people in the house on the oposite side... facing away from them. and even if by some act of god I miscalculted the los of the house and the anitank team would they really have run up to the house to close comabat the 2 12 man teams in it? I would think they would try and rocket the house from some range... not get up close and stupid... (by up close I mean within ten meters or less...)

Ok thanks for reading this lengthy mispelled posting...

Overall though this game is by far the best strategy game I have ever played... A few bugs or whatever are fine with me, all games have em, and for the most part the AI works just fine if not perfectly... but on occasion.. regardless of the randomness factor in the game it seems like if I was playing with dice, and the rules had a bad roll rule (roll a one and it counts as a n error). I would have to roll a one twenty times in one toss to get the whacky mishaps that happened to me...

Well whatever thanks for the awesome game... I can;t wait till the cd comes to me... (drool)

-Demangel