How Does One Win On Defense?

[Col Deadmarsh]

I still think they give too many points to the attacker but it's possible I just don't know how to set up a good defense. 

To me, it seems all the attacker has to do is smoke with the arty and then rush your infantry forward and you have a 2 - 1 fight against the enemy who doesn't have as many troops covering that area.  Maybe I'm missing something here but I've played 2 other defense battles and I've lost both of them.  Now, I like to believe that I don't suck that bad since I do know general tactics but I always feel weaker as the defender.

In the other two games I played on defense, my opponents didn't even use that much smoke but simply concentrated their force on one side and bull-rushed me.  What can the defense do?  The flags are usually spread out all over the map and therefore, so are my forces so I can guard them.

I guess the biggest question I have on constructing a good defense is:

How does the defense counter against heavy arty smoke followed by a bull rush of infantry into one position?

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Youth is wasted on the young.

[Guest Pillar]

Colonel Deadmarsh has met the Narrow Front Attacker! MUHHAHAH!

All joking aside, you have to make the point of enemy attack your strongpoint. If he isn't using recon, he may stumble into it for you and do you a huge favour.

I just finished writing an article on the topic you may be interested in. It's at http://combathq.thegamers.net/articles/Learning/learning.asp

And artillery is your biggest friend if he is physically massing his infantry. Jason Cawley can tell you all about that!

(There is a big discussion going on in the Tips and Tactics Forum on these things: check it out)

edit: here -- http://www.battlefront.com/discuss/Forum7/HTML/000464.html

[This message has been edited by Pillar (edited 01-27-2001).]

[Mace]

Best thing is to set up mutually supporting positions, and to place them in the lest expected places on the map.

The reason for this is that the Attacker is always going to pound where he thinks you are with artillery.

Another thing I prefer to do is defend the most important of the VLs, not all of them!

However, always do some thinking first where you would attack if you were the other side, and set up accordingly to counter this!

Mace

[CMplayer]

Originally posted by Mace:

Best thing is to set up mutually supporting positions, and to place them in the lest expected places on the map.

The reason for this is that the Attacker is always going to pound where he thinks you are with artillery.

Another thing I prefer to do is defend the most important of the VLs, not all of them!

However, always do some thinking first where you would attack if you were the other side, and set up accordingly to counter this!

Mace

I think these are very sound comments.

I would just like to add that as the

defender you shouldn't worry too much

about defending territory, i.e. VL's.

Just think of the VL's as valuable

intelligence about where the attacker

is likely to go. Set up your defence to

inflict casualties on the attacker,

not to hold VL's at all costs. This

is especially true if some of the VL's

are very untenable as defensive positions.

An example of this is the Nijmegen map

in Close Combat. (Sorry to take an

example from there). There is a critical

VL called 'Hunner Park' which is right

at the foot of the bridge. But this open

park is faced on three sides by tall

stone buildings. Obviously, whoever

holds those buildings has a commanding

influence over the park, so the houses

are the point to defend, not the park

itself. (In the same way, attacking the

park directly will only lead to

catastrophe)

You can win on points, even without

holding the VL's, and if you destroy

the enemy then you get the VL's at the

end anyway.

regards,

--Rett

[Col Deadmarsh]

Rett,

You couldn't of used a better example to explain your point. Having played over 1000 CC2 games, I'm well familiar with this map and completely understand what you mean. This is one thing I haven't been doing. Instead of looking for the best field of fire, I've been looking for the best fields of fire around each of the vl's.

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Youth is wasted on the young.

[Guest Der Unbekannte Jäger]

Here are some of my strategies:

Strategic considerations are what you should examine first. Try to learn as much as possible about your foe and his possible force dispositions. Next try to place yourself into your enemies shoes and plan how you would conduct movement to contact on the map pending terrain considerations and victory locations. Examine who will have the advantage of terrain and mobility during the game, will the attacker have good cover on the approach? Will the defender have natural obstacles to use in channeling his attacker? When planning for your initial setup do not allow your forces to become "garrison units", instead plan for flexibility and mobile attrition fighting, the key is movement, if your enemy can't come to grips with you and bring his full weight to bear then you may stay out of reach while slowly degrading his strength with hit&run tactics. So plan for mobility.

Posturing of forces includes occupation of favorable terrain and objectives. As well as preparation for contact with your enemy. Hence you will begin placing thy troops in accordance with your need to inflict large casualties in a short period of time, and then get out of range of your enemy. In short you must prepare to maul your enemy then fade your troops away before any counter attack can be organized. As the defender you should always strike fast and hard then withdrawn before you suffer unacceptable casualties. Again the planning for mobility and flexibility is the key.

Deception is they key to either the attack or the defense. If your opponent knows not where your troops are or your force levels then you can keep them guessing and probing, which slows them down as they become more cautious. This will tie in with mobility and flexibility, your deception will be to hide your troops and await the enemy once he is within a kill zone unleash hell upon them. However do not stand around at this point as reinforcements and artillery is bound to be on its way, instead pull your men back once again into the shroud of fog of war. He will have lost contact and will be forced to find you again, at which point you repeat the procedure. When you want to simulate an appearance do it so your enemy is confused and you are able to lure him into your kill zone. Remember stay active. flexible yet careful and you will keep your foe off balance.

Deftness, fierceness and swiftness are your weapons of choice. Deftness means that you should make and execute a crafty plan; fierceness is the overwhelming application of force at key points that will devastate your enemy; swiftness means that the fight is over as fast as lightening, you have reacted and killed your enemies troops, at that point your men have already fallen back away from contact leaving your opponent to lick his wounds and try to reorganize his mauled forces. The above points however require initiative and flexibility, this can be gained as noted above by staying mobile.

Recon is one of your most valuable assets and should be treated as such, by knowing where your enemy is you will have the initiative and flexibility required to henceforth defeat him. Use your scouts boldly yet at the same time carefully, do not waste them needlessly.

Terrain has and always been the most important factor that you must understand. Setting up firebases. ambush points, channeling thy enemy as well as cover for your own troops will be just some of your considerations. Some terrain is more important than other types, know how the terrain will benefit you and how it will impede you, if analyzed correctly you gain successfully plot an enemies destruction. Again a big consideration is the occupation of terrain that allows for mobility (roads for example so you may rapidly advance reinforcements is one example) and yet allows for a rugged defense. Some key types of terrain are heights above the battlefield, solid and strong buildings, bridgeheads and roads.

By succesfully implementing the above theories you have achieved the first level required of planning. The battles will still have to be fought and though defeat is still possible you may be able to gain the upperhand and render the hunter the hunted.

ps. sorry for such a long post, mostly nonsense it contains...sleep must now.

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"'S muladach ma theid ar sgaoileadh..." -Duncan Ban Macintyre

[CavScout]

Originally posted by Colonel_Deadmarsh:

I still think they give too many points to the attacker but it's possible I just don't know how to set up a good defense. 

bah! Tell that to Slapdragon who is starting to annoy me! Everytime I poke my head out somebody shoots it off! I say the defenders are to tough!

[Mannheim Tanker]

Great points in your defense article, Pillar. I've done a little experimentation, taking heed of your suggestions. Using an advanced recon element while on the defense can make or break your entire defense! The majority of the time that I've used it, I'm able to adjust my reserve accordingly and inflict losses on the attacker by using some well-placed artillery. I admit that I have limited experience using this against a human attacker (only a few battles), but I certainly see the merits of the advanced recon. Basically, it allows you to turn a 2:1 fight into a 1:1 fight (or even better!) at any one point.

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"Oooh, tough crowd. A real bunch of nihilists.

Let them eat chads..." - Lawyer (who else!?)

[Guest Mr. Johnson-<THC>-]

Use the Force Luke!

[Guest Pillar]

Originally posted by Mannheim Tanker:

Great points in your defense article, Pillar. I've done a little experimentation, taking heed of your suggestions. Using an advanced recon element while on the defense can make or break your entire defense! The majority of the time that I've used it, I'm able to adjust my reserve accordingly and inflict losses on the attacker by using some well-placed artillery. I admit that I have limited experience using this against a human attacker (only a few battles), but I certainly see the merits of the advanced recon. Basically, it allows you to turn a 2:1 fight into a 1:1 fight (or even better!) at any one point.

You got it Mannheim. I'm glad you enjoyed the article and gained from it.

- Pillar

[L.Tankersley]

How does one win on the defense? With difficulty.

It can be done, though, under 1.1. Good comments above. One key point that bears repeating is you don't have to garrison every victory flag. Going into the scenario, you know your opponent has a 3:2 or better advantage in points. If you spread out, you make things much harder for yourself. I've had success examining the map and the flags, and finding a concentration of flags that I can defend with mutually supporting positions. Don't bother defending an isolated flag off on the flank, you'll just sap your strength elsewhere. Instead, pick an area you can defend in strength and defend it with (almost) everything you've got. Of course, you don't want to be too predictable, either. Put some OPs out in other areas so you get some advance warning of what the enemy is doing. If you've got a few cheap vehicles, remember that there's nothing that says the defender can't do the "gamey last-turn charge" and rush over to contest a flag on the far side of the map. Another point to remember is, you don't have to defend close enough to flags so they show you control them. Remember, your opponent is likely to concentrate artillery prep fires in these areas. Instead, pick spots so you can cover the approaches to the victory locations with fire. There is always time to move a squad into range of the flag later on. And if the enemy is too strong for you to do this, you weren't likely to be able to hold onto that flag in any event.

I've also had some success with reverse-slope defenses (or other deployments where the defending troops are out of LOS of the attacker until at close range). Instead of defending in the first row of buildings, which are likely to get shelled into oblivion as soon as the attacker knows you're there (if not before), defend a bit further back in a village. Set up behind hill crests so when the enemy infantry comes over the hill you're hitting him at close range in open ground with overwhelming firepower and his support equipment (MGs and direct-fire guns) won't be able to suppress you.

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Leland J. Tankersley

[Slapdragon]

Originally posted by CavScout:

bah! Tell that to Slapdragon who is starting to annoy me! Everytime I poke my head out somebody shoots it off! I say the defenders are to tough!

Poor Cavscout is meeting an integrated multi-kayer defense, plus the random map just plain sucked for him.

First you look at the board. What are the attack lanes, and do they poke into the open were you can get at them. You need to make sure multiple units can get a bead on him in these points.

Next, nothing goes in the shop window if you can help it. The attacker will pound the **** out of the places that look like perfect hiding places.

Then, you make sure you buy attrition forces. For my match with cavscout, I only bought around half of the tanks I could have. I spent more money on things to force him into a funnelled attack. Then I trade him a 50mm AT gun for 2 Greyhounds (he made a lucky hit with one on a bunker at 750 meters, so it was not all my way) and keep him occupied.

95% of the points I have are still hidden at this point in the game. I can count maybe 75% of his points right now assuming the tanks I see are what they seem to be. His attack is faltering because I use piddling attacks to distract him for a turn and he cannot continue until he shoots them down.

He has still not reached the MLR. His attack was not bad, it was just the terrain was for me, and the Germans have a distinct defending advantage if you buy some of the historically more common but CM less common units and hide them effectively.

[Slapdragon]

BTW-- I am leaving out the bit about mobile defense, reserve in depth, flankers, and fall back routes because I still expect CavScout to blindly tumble for each and every one of them.

[Warmaker]

The above posts make extremely good ideas to draw from but I guess I'll offer my one cent(Uncle Same took the other cent for taxes). For those smoke and ensuing infantry rushes, nearby mortar teams or perfectly timed defensive artillery can break up or stall those infantry assaults. Mortars or light artillery are quite effective at this. Mortars have a quick response and the 81mm's have good effect. If you can be good in coordinating the use of heavy artillery in this role then it makes your grunts' job MUCH easier. Even vehicles if caught in this barrage will button up and help in your ATG's effectiveness. Of course heavy arty can destroy AFVs and open topped ones are in deep trouble (i.e.Halftracks,M36,Whirbelwinds,etc.).

Armor in the defense gives you lots of possibilities esp. those late war German heavies. Tiger IIs acting as your strongpoint/bunker is popular but predictable. But my preferred way of using armor in the defense is as part of my Kampfgruppe's "Fire Brigade." Keep the panzers back and haul a$$ to the area(s) where your defenders are in dire straits. Mounted infantry in SPW/Halftracks are magnificent to reinforce frontline forces, just deploy them behind cover or with EXTREMELY good covering fire. Panzers/AFVs give naturally good firepower but their best asset is mobility to counterattack.

Oh yeah, when setting up your defense, esp. soft targets(infantry/ATGs/etc), you sometimes don't want to bunch them up in VLs that have good cover. The attacker may see this as an obvious choice for a defensive setup and may bombard you with heavy arty to soften you up. The gamble is up to you.

I simply prefer to have Panzers and mounted Panzergrenadiers as my reserve force due to mobility on the defense but they can also be used to flank an enemy attack. It seems to work well for me if the attackers have armor in the assault. They have 3 options if you flank their attack.

1. Keep pressing home their attack and get shot at from the flank by my Panzers.

2. Turn to face the new threat and expose their flanks to my defensive ATGs

3. Divide their attention to both threat directions. This significantly cuts down their firepower against both elements and if your greatly outnumbered this is a good thing.

For German players, the Panther is a wonderful tool for this role with its speed, armor, and good gun. The Tiger I/II are slower so seem more suited to straight up meeting the attackers head to head thanks to their heavy armor and guns. TDs are also good enough to flank enemy armor. I've even experimented with light ATGs mounted on halftracks/trucks and attach them to these flanking units but have mixed results due to the embark/disembark and setup. Hope at least some of this helps.

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"Uncommon valor was a common virtue"-Adm.Chester Nimitz of the Marines on Iwo Jima

[jasoncawley@ameritech.net]

Recipe -

1 bull-rushing attacker massing his infantry

1 120mm mortar FO (81mm in a pinch)

1 reserve platoon of infantry

(SMG armed, and HQ with combat bonus, are a plus)

optional - 2-4 anti-personnel minefields.

Step one - determine route of bull-rush.

Step two - call for 120mm fire mission, preferable on woods along route.

Step three - manuever reserve platoon to behind the fire mission.

Step four - cook slowly over open flame

Step five - when pieces start dripping off / running away, cancel the fire mission

Step six - immediate move platoon into area just plastered, then halt them as soon as in cover

Step seven - wait for the immediate survivors around you to all become dead

Step eight - withdraw platoon before his own mortar fire arrives

Optional additions, if you can guess his route of advance during the set up, are - flanking MG fire over an area of open ground, or from log bunkers, to slow the rush and bunch his men up for the mortar strike (at least 2 HMGs or bunkers - no LMGs - firing toward one another), or 2-4 anti-personnel minefields to halt him, or to channel him to a narrow opening in the mines, for the same purpose.

[jasoncawley@ameritech.net]

While my last response was in a flippant tone, the question was actually a good one.

The truth is, that attacking with twice as many men by just putting them more or less on-line and closing the range as quickly as possible, is not nearly as dumb as it sounds.

A company of infantry packs a lot of firepower, and it will eat through thinner defenders quite rapidly. And defenders cannot afford high casualties, while "attrition" does not matter so much for the attacker.

There is a strong urge on defense to cover every scrap of open ground with the fire of some unit, and then hold onto one's cover and hope it is enough. This rarely works, because the shooters assigned to a small spot of ground can't do more than pin one squad crossing it. Then an entire platoon or more of attackers sits down opposite that shooter, eats him quickly, and continues on.

Instead, one needs to have a sense of the amount of firepower necessary to truly deny some zone to an attacker. This typically takes either -

a full platoon of infantry able to hit the same area at 100 yards range or less - or -

more than one heavy machinegun able to hit the same *open* area, preferable from two different angles, but longer ranges OK - or -

a tank with several MGs and guns - or -

an anti-personnel minefield - or -

an artillery strike.

Any of those can put enough fire into an area to cause not just a passing casualty, but pinned and panicking squads. Notice that in the case of the machineguns, you really have to be able to hit in open ground. If the target area is in cover, then several MGs (or mortars) will be able to break men, but only if they can fire at them repeatedly over several minutes, while stationary. They will not stop them from passing through, unless they hit them in open ground.

You are not going to be able to assign firepower in the above quantities to *every* location or avenue of advance. And you are going to have to task units with several locations, to have any hope of covering areas with enough density of firepower.

With FOs this is easy. You may have a TRP set for the main place you hope to use the big stuff, or in a place nothing else can really reach that nevertheless you have to "plug". But the FO can hit other places, and even if he can't see the target he can call a mission there, just with a longer delay and less accuracy. The problem with FOs is they run out of ammo. It is hard to save it until you really need it, and especially with longer lead times there is a strong urge to call it early.

Mines are fine, but do not move, and cover only a limited area. Engineers can also pick paths through them once somebody has hit them, given enough time. But usually, they are a fine "block" for narrow places, liek the one neck of woods leading from covered position A to covered position B, etc.

HMGs as mentioned are only really effective if they can hit the attacker in open ground. In addition, although this is a somewhat more subtle point, they are most effective at steep inward angles (nearly parallel to the initial direction of the front) and at long range.

One, because when the enemy is close, his return firepower can easily suppress the MG. Two, because when the MG is facing "forward", it is relatively easy for enemy direct-fire HE weapons (like tanks, or light mortars) to get an LOS to the MG. Such shooters tend to hang back at range, because of the dangers of short-range infantry AT weapons, or minimum ranges for mortars. They find it harder to get LOS to the MG if the MG is facing "sideways", therefore, while the MG can get LOS on the advancing infantry.

Three, because the attacker is more likely to expose himself over patchs of open ground when he thinks cover in front of him masks LOS, and he is less likely to worry about the sides - and he often can't cover both sides even when he can cover one. (E.g. which side of a building does he hide behind?). And four, because it is easier to get ranges that are long on diagonals, and long range is the protection of the MG against return-fire suppression.

And a more subtle effect, five, is that the MG team will tend to fire better and sooner, especially at units in their brief periods crossing open ground, if the team it facing in basically the same direction from shot to shot, instead of wasting time rotating to each target.l

So MGs are tricky to use. The impulse is to set them up in a "front" location with a wide field of fire. But that means they will soon face all the attacking force, many of them at close range. Mortars will be called down on them, and enemy MGs will fire at them regularly. Their own fire will be a "spray", at many targets in a wide arc, one after another. They will not do all that much to each, and will not live very long before being pinned. So they will not deny the enemy any particular spot of ground.

By comparison, a "fire plan" of four MGs that looks like a doubled diagonal cross-hatch, with the MGs facing almost toward each other and covering the open ground about 100 yards ahead of the other MGs in the set, can work much better. Part of the point is, the infantry rushing MG#3 can suppress MG#3 if it is facing them. But if it isn't, and MG#1 is the one shooting at the open ground in front of MG#3, then the MG is not going to be silenced by the massed attackers, until they overrun it anyway. And overrunning it will not free up the return fire on the over-runners, but instead only hurts the fire you dish out to some *other* part of the field (where, by construction, his over-runners *aren't*).

With infantry, there is no such fiddling. Their firepower goes up much more strongly as the range drops, so the area they can dominate by fire is the area right around them, about 100 yards from the center of a platoon.

You should try to keep platoons together, because broken up they do not have the firepower to defend themselves very well. One shooter pins a squad, and then another finds it easy to move closer and piles on, and by then the squad starts panicking, and it isn't in command-control, and its a goner.

You can sometimes detach 1 squad from a platoon or two and give them to a higher level HQ, to make another platoon, with command and able to manuever independently. But 2 full squads and an HQ, is about the minimum "unit" of standard infantry you want manuevering about the field, or positioned together.

This lets them employ some elementary fire and movement, to get a squad in a bad spot out of danger without the enemy getting free shots, for example, or for one squad to keep a pinned enemy pinned while the other closes the range and kills it.

The key thing with standard infantry on the defense is to be everywhere at once. That is a joke. You have to be willing to move. Sitting still can be OK for the first few minutes until you see where the attack is threatening, but soon you will have to adapt and shift men.

Because of this, you want your standard infantry platoons to set up in places that are either behind, or just as the edge of, large or deep LOS obstacles. That means a crestline you can hide behind, or a treeline you can disappear back inside of, buildings you can stop being in and start being behind, instead.

You do not want him to know where your platoon positions are, and you do not want them to stay the same once he has hit one of them. A stationary platoon, against a competent attack with his superior odds, can expect either a fire mission or a multiple-platoon firebase shooting at it, or something equally nasty, in a matter of minutes. What you want to do is to shoot the heck out of some guys that stumble on you or that you caught crossing a field, for 2-3 minutes, then "blink" you are gone again.

Breaking contact with the standard infantry, once in a firefight, is the hardest defender's skill to learn. It is always somewhat messy and it is always dangerous. The main things are #1 not to wait too long, until you see and know you are being overwhelmed, #2 do not monkey around with half-steps by two squads when you decide to do it, but run, and well to the rear and #3 to have some factor that is helping, outside of the withdrawing platoon itself.

That something can be - MG cross fire on pursuers, a fire mission on the enemy as you break away, smoke from mortars, another platoon opening up from a different angle, a route of withdrawl that goes by or between minefields, cover from a tank popping up - whatever you have got and can swing. The point is simply to have something there to help. When you have nothing, you run a 50-50 chance you will get shot up and rout.

Besides your infantry platoons, your vehicles are the other "manuever element" of the defense which are powerful enough to deny an enemy a piece of open ground. These too should move around, like the infantry, and they can also benefit from the inward-looking angle idea that the MGs use. You want repeated ambushes on enemy vehicles, or set ups where you blast a field clear of enemy infantry over 3 minutes or so, then disappear again before his countermeasures (whatever they are) arrive.

Rather than trying to cover every place the attacker could come, count more on the fact that he doesn't know where you are. So his pell mell rush reaches the objective. OK. Gee, there is nobody there. Where does he go *after* the objective? Here is an obvious place to move next, to get a more secure hold on the place - whammo! Didn't see that coming, well, back to the objective - incoming!

Try something unexpected, throw him a curve ball instead of standing in front of his steamroller. You get the idea.

[Guest Pillar]

Good one Jason (recipe)

[Gen. Sosaboski]

Usually I lay an ambush within places where tanks cannot get unless they come within infantry AT range (villages/towns)or have several lines of defense planned out. Remember, it's very bloody though, and sometimes you'll have to make the right move as to when to pull out sometimes. If you inflict enough casualties, you may just suffer a minor defeat or a draw.

[CavScout]

Originally posted by Slapdragon:

BTW-- I am leaving out the bit about mobile defense, reserve in depth, flankers, and fall back routes because I still expect CavScout to blindly tumble for each and every one of them.

*CRYS*

Flips through manual looking for the nuke strike option....

[Slapdragon]

Originally posted by CavScout:

*CRYS*

Flips through manual looking for the nuke strike option....

Hey Cav, your attack is not bad, but what do you think about them 20mm? Had enough yet?

[CavScout]

Originally posted by Slapdragon:

Hey Cav, your attack is not bad, but what do you think about them 20mm? Had enough yet?

My M8s have for sure.

As for the "attack", I thought I was on defense.

[CavScout]

If I hear "ack ack" in another playback I am going to be sick!

[Col Deadmarsh]

The one thing I've noticed about this game is that it's hard to play defense on a short map. Reading the comments here, most people tend to think alike when it comes to flexibility when preparing to be attacked.

The "attrition" method of whittling away one's opponent as he moves in is usually the best way to stop him, yet a small map does not afford you that luxury of hitting the enemy out front and then moving back from a "watchtower" or "1st wave" defense back to one's main line.

I'm playing a QB now where I am defending as the Germans on a small map with very large hills in both deployment areas for him and me and a valley inbetween us. These hills, which I thought were going to be my friend, have instead given my opponent an easy view for his spotters who merely picked out my best lanes of fire on one side of the map and used a couple of 80mm arty strikes to block my view with mass amounts of smoke.

He then proceeded to run his infantry in and bullrush my single platoon of men hiding behind a stone wall and some woods. The lanes I had chosen were very good. There was no way he could simply walk in there and take the flags without getting shredded by my infantry. Only by using smoke, was he able to use those lanes to his advantage, overtake me by sheer numbers, and claim that side of the map as his own.

I've been trying to think of what I could've done instead of simply waiting for his attack, but I am stumped. I couldn't fall back as there is only one line of defense on this map. Falling back to whatever woods or such there is in the absolute rear would mean giving away the fortifications on the big hills which overlook the valley inbetween us. The hills themselves are the prime spot to be in.

So, does anyone have an idea of what defense would've worked in this situation?

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Youth is wasted on the young.

[CavScout]

Originally posted by Colonel_Deadmarsh:

The one thing I've noticed about this game is that it's hard to play defense on a short map. Reading the comments here, most people tend to think alike when it comes to flexibility when preparing to be attacked.

The "attrition" method of whittling away one's opponent as he moves in is usually the best way to stop him, yet a small map does not afford you that luxury of hitting the enemy out front and then moving back from a "watchtower" or "1st wave" defense back to one's main line.

I'm playing a QB now where I am defending as the Germans on a small map with very large hills in both deployment areas for him and me and a valley inbetween us. These hills, which I thought were going to be my friend, have instead given my opponent an easy view for his spotters who merely picked out my best lanes of fire on one side of the map and used a couple of 80mm arty strikes to block my view with mass amounts of smoke.

He then proceeded to run his infantry in and bullrush my single platoon of men hiding behind a stone wall and some woods. The lanes I had chosen were very good. There was no way he could simply walk in there and take the flags without getting shredded by my infantry. Only by using smoke, was he able to use those lanes to his advantage, overtake me by sheer numbers, and claim that side of the map as his own.

I've been trying to think of what I could've done instead of simply waiting for his attack, but I am stumped. I couldn't fall back as there is only one line of defense on this map. Falling back to whatever woods or such there is in the absolute rear would mean giving away the fortifications on the big hills which overlook the valley inbetween us. The hills themselves are the prime spot to be in.

So, does anyone have an idea of what defense would've worked in this situation?

I think sometimes you just work with what you have. Sometimes there is no "best" way to do something, sometimes it is the only way.

[Col Deadmarsh]

I think sometimes you just work with what you have. Sometimes there is no "best" way to do something, sometimes it is the only way.

Well now that's a thread killer if ever I've seen one. All that typing down the drain...

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Youth is wasted on the young.