Mission types?

[Elmar Bijlsma]

Will the missions be more realistic this time around? Most TOW missions were gruelling battles where both sides slaughtered each other until a handful of lucky troops (usually the survivors from some disabled tanks) finished of the last remaining enemy.

I hope that there are at least a few maps where the fighting is less brutal, with victory possible without the annihilation of one side or both.

I think back with great fondness of CC2:A Bridge Too Far, where many a battle ended because I ran into stiff opposition and decided advancing further wasn't worth it. Or those battles where after bloodying an opponent I retreated before my troops were overrun.

[Nicdain]

I second this. I consider the absence of realistic victory conditions (e.g. surrender) one of the flaws of Theatre of War that prevents me from fully enjoying this game.

[Knokke]

I agree with that. Something like the "truce" option in Close Combat, or at least the possibility to withdraw and abandon the ground to the ennemy is really lacking. Strategy also means being able to know when a fight is lost, and we should be able to withdraw and regroup to fight an other day.

[Gnasher]

Agree surrender code would be excellent

For some perverse reason I also think it would be great fun if you could become a war criminal & shoot em once they've surrendered as well!

[GlobalExplorer]

I agree with that. Something like the "truce" option in Close Combat, or at least the possibility to withdraw and abandon the ground to the ennemy is really lacking.

So that was never implemented in TOW? I thought it had long been added in a patch, that "fight to the last man" philosophy was obviously ridiculous. If it's still not in TOW2 I really wonder who is the target audience of this game.

[GlobalExplorer]

I think back with great fondness of CC2:A Bridge Too Far, where many a battle ended because I ran into stiff opposition and decided advancing further wasn't worth it. Or those battles where after bloodying an opponent I retreated before my troops were overrun.

I second that.

[SG1]

I agree too... However I am pretty sure no sooner gets surrender implemented - if ever - some will complain it needs toning down because it is a shaaaaaaaaaaaaame their super-hero soldiers do not fight more bitterly.

[Arzok]

All is possible with the editor.

You just have to try instead of complain.

But to make a campaign, that take into account the fact that you may retreat and "replay" the day after, with more units, it takes much more time to create this.

For exemple, for 4 missions, you will have to create 16 missions to deal with each case.

It is not possible !!! and it does not worth for the creator of the campaign.

And also, why should the IA retreat after a bloddy combat ?

The player never does that... The player plays until the last man...

[Gnasher]

I agree too... However I am pretty sure no sooner gets surrender implemented - if ever - some will complain it needs toning down because it is a shaaaaaaaaaaaaame their super-hero soldiers do not fight more bitterly.

But this could be optional for the player, maybe after hitting escape there could be a "Withdraw" option.

[Arzok]

So that was never implemented in TOW? I thought it had long been added in a patch, that "fight to the last man" philosophy was obviously ridiculous. If it's still not in TOW2 I really wonder who is the target audience of this game.

If you use the battle generator, it is implanted.

There is a trigger (retreat trigger). When the IA'soldiers are less than 30% of the initial number, the IA retreats.

It is very simple to change the proportion (one parameter) and quite easy to make the same trigger for the player.

So your dream is in TOW 1...

[Dietrich]

So many times, in playing a scenario in ToW, my troops wipe out or otherwise rout the enemy infantry and knock out almost all the enemy tanks, but then that last surviving enemy tank just happens to knock out my last surviving AT gun, and then it proceeds to gun down or steamroller all my remaining troops (and in many cases I had suffered relatively light casualties from the enemy assault as a whole).

To put it in clearer context: Sure the T-34 was the bane of the Wehrmacht wherever 88s or heavy artillery were not to hand, but there were plenty of instances were German infantry took the initiative (and took advantage of the characteristically poor visibilty from inside a tank) and dealt with T-34s (as well as KV tanks) with grenade bundles, demo charges, or even single grenades tossed into unlocked hatches or thrust down cannon barrels. In ToW, though, there's nothing can do against even light tanks without an undemolished AT gun to man or a Panzerschreck (with ammo) to pick up. Even in the great JSH mod, which provides German infantry with grenade bundles, the geballte Ladungen just bounce off, and even when they explode near the running gear, they don't break the track or anything helpful.

What makes this helplessness of infantry vs. tanks really painful is that it's as if tanks have infrared optics -- I have my infantry hide and hold fire, but that darn tank still hunts them down and guns down or steamrollers every last one. And there's nowhere for my troops to go! At least in CMx1 you can flee off the map, conceding the entire map to the enemy but saving your troops (whether they've been decimated or not) from being wiped out. (Of course, in CMx1 tanks have pretty much the same capabilities and limitations as real-life tanks. Tanks in ToW seem unduly quick to suffer a shot-off tread, yet when intact even Tigers are capable of what looks like 40 mph off road, and even the lightest armored vehicle can push over dozens trees in succession and only be slowed down momentarily.)

And what if you're willing to sacrifice virtually all your troops (there has to be at least one guy left standing for you to win, or else . . . what happens?) to achieve the scenario's win conditions and you then lose all your troops? You have to do it all over again! (Unless if you have "Ignore Campaign Loss" checked, but that means starting the next scenario with effectively green troops.)

I know that casualties are inevitable if you want to have any hope of prevailing, and I'm . . . but if it pains me to see my guys fall while charging across an open area in the course of an actually successful attack, can you imagine how I must feel when the enemy's armored reserve arrives without infantry support and kills my troops to a man?!

(*clears throat* Please forgive my outburst. It won't happen again.)

That said, panicked units can go beyond the playable map area . . . but even that doesn't necessarily save them from enemy fire or from enemy tanks hunting them down.

John Keegan in The Face of Battle (he makes a mind-blowing number of insightful points in that book, though I wish he had included a battle from the Second World War among those he dissected) elucidated the sad truth that troops can be most vulnerable when running away from the enemy. So I don't think it would be reasonable that a "retreat" or "withdraw" battle-ending option would make it as if the troops of each side were teleported consequencelessly off the battlefield. I think conceding a battle should come with a small penalty in casualties, though in the end it saves the bulk of one's force for future battles. ("He who fights and runs away . . .")