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Bugs? Balance? Game unplayable


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I recently picked ToW2 along with Caen on Steam, and the game is currently entirely unplayable for me.

I've completed the tutorial, and read the entire PDF manual through nearly twice. I can't complete the first British mission, it's impossible in all ways I've tried. And not just that, but it's impossible at the very beginning, not near the very end.

From the start no matter where you spawn your troops you're almost immediately under fire by a bunch of permanently invisible anti-tank guns in a treeline. I've tried using the whole map and there is absolutely no way to outflank them. Okay, so you're supposed to just attack them the game must be saying to me. But by attacking it is literally impossible for me to survive with anything but 30% of my starting forces; and this is only the first 1/10th or so of the level.

Things I've tried:

Tank rush. Gets decimated before it spots a single gun. I've tried the "spotting" mechanism by clicking the gun and then using defend and it still wont spot them period, not even when it's 1 meter away.

Tank/infantry advance. Tanks get mowed down the same as the tank rush, even Churchills. 90%~ mobility kills before I spot the first gun.

Infantry advance. Infantry is decimated by HE before spotting the first gun, can't spot the guns any better than tanks. (screenshot: http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/6181/spotting.png)

I've tried these tactics mixed with artillery bombardment; there can be a Loony Toons-style outline of craters around the "suspected" firing position of the gun and yet it still continuing mowing down my troops. I honestly ordered four 25 pounders to "attack ground" near the suspected position of one single gun and set the time to x2 and walked away to grab some food. When I came back the guns were out of ammo, and bumrushing a bunch of units at that gun I found that even with craters less than half a foot away from the gun it was still completely undamaged and firing.

So what the hell am I supposed to be doing? I'm a veteran of games like Close Combat, Men of War, Blitzkrieg, Sudden Strike etc. I'm used to this sort of brutality; but in those games it's possible for infantry to spot anti-tank guns firing away a hairs breath away from them, so that's different.

Also, assorted buggy occurances:

When ordering tanks to attack another tank they seem to enjoy charging ahead full steam until they're grinding glacis against one another, even if there is a perfect line of sight to the tank from where they were. The tank is set to attack whatever is visible (hull or turret), and isn't to my knowledge in "assault" mode: As far as I'm aware, right clicking an enemy tank with your tank when the little red crosshair shows up is a simple "attack" order, not a "bumrush him and skewer him with your gun" order. When ordered to attack it's very frequent units simply wont comply with the order, even if their crosshair is red showing them they have a line of sight to the target. I've had 3 Achilles near a Panzer III, on an open field, all maybe within 50 meters of one another and ordering the Achilles to attack either caused them to race towards the tank, stop, and turn their turrets away from it, or do nothing.

Part of this issue; units can't seem to spot anything even at ranges where my half-blind grandfather could see them, and yet my units are always visible to the enemy.

Currently this game is entirely unplayable for me, I've exhausted all known sources of information for how to manage this game, and I'm near the point of just uninstalling it and wishing I hadn't spent the 30 bucks.

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Well, I got it from Steam yesterday and it's uplayable for me, too -- only for technical reasons (constant game freezes make play impossible). But now that I've read your post, I know I must not be missing much (except my $30). I just wanted some Normandy action to tide me over until CMBN comes out sometime this year. Oh well...

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What version? Is there more than one version of Theatre of War 2: Battle for Caen?

Unless you're referring to whether I downloaded it from Battlefront or Steam which I don't think makes any difference. I'm posting here (and on the Steam forums) because they seem to get a lot more traffic than 1C's own forum.

Edit:

I wake up every morning wanting to give this game a better try but I just can't seem to enjoy it, between the bugs and the game balance it's like it's begging me to not enjoy it.

http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/7237/bugsbugsbugs.png

How am I supposed to beat the Nazis and be home by Christmas if they've successfully found a way to bend light and develop cloaking anti-tank emplacements?

I also tried moving an officer with high scout skill up in "Sneak" mode and at about 1km out he got 1-shot sniped by an 88.

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Most of what I'm reading here seems to me a bit exagerated (probably out of frustration?), and most of your problems seems to be related with not having understood how all the commands and orders are working. I agree that the manual is a bit limited, and does'nt always explain everything perfectly.

I'll try to give you some tips that will probably solve most of the trouble you're having:

"spotting" mechanism by clicking the gun and then using defend

There is no such mechanism in the game. The defend order (the shield icon) is used either to orient an unit in a desired direction (select a soldier-click the shield icon-click on the ground to have the soldier facing this direction), or to orient the turret of a tank (select the main gun of the turret, click on the ground in the direction you want it to face) .

You can also use the shield icon to orient the tank hull (with tank weapons deselected, click the shield icon, then the ground in the direction you want the hull to be facing)

The shield icon can also be used to have soldiers defending other soldiers or vehicles, or to have vehicles defending soldiers or an other vehicle (select the defender, click the shield icon and then click on the unit you want to defend). Basicelly, this means that the defending unit(s) will follow the unit targeted with the shield icon.

When ordering tanks to attack another tank they seem to enjoy charging ahead full steam until they're grinding glacis against one another

Almost every player had this problem untill they understood the use of the "Hold" command (left-clicking the Action Mode button to stop the unit moving on its free will)

Units will stop moving toward an ennemy they spotted, will keep their position, and will open fire if a target is in range and if there is a direct line of fire).

The problem you have is that the unit you ordered to attack has at some time lost line of sight with the target. The attack order is a bit tricky, so I almost never use it, unless the unit has previously been set in the "hold position" mode. What is happening is that your tank has lost line of sight of it's intended target, and the attack order has been automatically transformed in a "Move" order. Since in move order, the tank will try to move as fast as possible toward the last known position of the ennemy, it is very likely that he will end up right next to it's intended target without having fired (tanks usually can't fire while moving) .

Still, the "free move mode" is still usefull, as in this mode, the tank ordered to attack a target will automatically start moving toward the target untill it has clear line of sight, and clear line of fire. When it becomes possible to hit the target, the tank will open fire (usefull to get in a hull down position behind a crest). If at some point, line of fire is lost, the tank will start moving again toward it's target, trying to reaquire line of fire. But the attack order become troublesome as soon as line of sight has been lost with the target, because the attack order will be cancelled, and revert to a move order.

Infantry given the attack order will behave in the same way.

I almost never use the free move mode, as it can easily become troublesome, units starting to move on their own can find themselves in deep trouble before you know it.

Before the battle, I'll choose to have everyone in the "hold position" mode, so that I'm sure they'll stay concealed, and will stay where I want them to be.

There is also an other way of using the "attack button": instead of clicking on an unit to target it, you can click on the ground where you want your unit to move. Your unit will start to move toward the spot you targeted, while being more cautious during it's advance than in the "assault" or "move" mode. As soon as a target is spotted, the unit will start moving toward it, untill it has line of LOS and LOF, where it will start firing. If the target spotted is killed, and there is no other target, the unit will resume it's move toward the spot you designated. This order can become a little tricky if there are plenty of targets available in a place different from where you intended your unit to go, as your unit will move toward the targets it spotted, rather than where you intended, unless there is no target in sight.

I found that even with craters less than half a foot away from the gun it was still completely undamaged and firing

I've never experienced anything like that in Kursk (rather the opposite). Indirect fire by artillery (howitzers, mortars and guns) is rather very effective in destroying hidden gun emplacements, as his the "target ground" order. As soon as you see an icon showing the emplacement of an ennemy hidden gun, you should target the area around it with mortar and/or howitzer HE shells. It is very unlikely that the crew of the gun will survive a few shells falling in their immediate vicinity, even if the gun is emplaced in a gun pit. For this artillery fire to be effective, your guns/mortars should not be too far from their target (mortar fire can be very accurate if fired by experienced troops at close to medium range of the target, but the shells might widely scatter if fired from long range)

When ordered to attack it's very frequent units simply wont comply with the order, even if their crosshair is red showing them they have a line of sight to the target.

This is an other "problem" that is often mentionned. But line of sight and line of fire are two different things. Most of the time, you'll have line of sight, but not line of fire. There can be a lot of reason for this. For tanks, the sighting device of the commander is usually located higher than the gun, so it is possible to see the target while not being able to shoot at it. Other times, it might be that depending on the position of the tank, the gun can't be depressed or elevated enough to fire on the target in line of sight. This kind of situation is sometime happening in the case of guns in gunpits, or MG in bunkers. The crew has line of sight, but is not able to fire its weapon on the intended target.

Most of the problems associated with line of fire/line of sight can be resolved with the "attack ground" order (I had sometime occurences of machinegunners not firing on a target until I gave the order to "attack ground". "Forcing" fire this way can sometime be dangerous, in the case of guns in gunpits, as they might hit the embankment of the trench rather than the intended target.

Part of this issue; units can't seem to spot anything even at ranges where my half-blind grandfather could see them, and yet my units are always visible to the enemy.

This seems to be highly exagerated :) , but it is true that if your troops are inexperienced, they'll fare poorly on the field of battle. Wether troops are experienced veterans or total rookies make a very big difference in their performance.

Infantry being the most vulnerable units, during your first battles, you should only concentrate on their survival, using them only when you can't do without them (never using them to attack, and only using them to man captured ennemy trench system, for exemple). If they managed to survive the battle, they'll have acquired more experience, and will fare better and be more usefull in combat in the next battle. Greenhorns are almost useless, and will be killed in droves.

there can be a Loony Toons-style outline of craters around the "suspected" firing position of the gun and yet it still continuing mowing down my troops.

Looking at your screenshots, I suspect they're just a demonstration trying to prove your point, as I see no craters around the ennemy guns position. I also hope that your infantry standing in the open in front of the guns is just for the purpose of demonstration too, as such WWI tactic is even probably less effective in TOW2 than in real life, and will have the same effect, having your soldiers being wiped out well before reaching their objectives.

A few things working rather well against guns in ToW2:

-The most effective way of dealing with them is to fire Howizer or mortar HE rounds near them. Very soon (unless the gun is extremely well protected), some crew members will be injured or killed, reducing the effectiveness of their fire. After a few rounds, there should be none left alive (unless the mission designers have provided for soldiers from other units to automatically replace the fallen crewmen - something I've not seen in Kursk)

-Having MG firing at the area near the gun is also effective, as a few crew members might get hit, and the incoming fire hitting near them, if close enough, will reduce the morale of the gun crew

I also tried moving an officer with high scout skill up in "Sneak" mode and at about 1km out he got 1-shot sniped by an 88.

It all depends on what you call high scout skill. If he was a scout, then he would probably be very good at scouting (90% scout skill), unless he's a replacement for a squad member killed in an earlier battle.

If it is an officer from a "normal" infantry squad, then the scouting skill is probably rather average. Even having a good scout (90 to 100% scouting skill), is not a total assurance that he'll never be spotted. Usually, scout squads with high scouting skills are seldom detected by the ennemy, if keeping prone, without firing, and if told to hold their ground instead of freely moving once they've sighted the ennemy (if left without "hold position" order, they'll probably move from time to time - moving troops have much more chances of being spotted than troops remaining stationnary and hidden in bushes).

If your officer was spotted by an 88 from 1km away, it might be that he was moving, and was spotted by the leader of the 88 gun with its binocular (leaders have binoculars, and when not moving, will scan for targets with their binoculars from time to time, giving them a better chance of spotting than the average soldier with naked eyes. Crews of tanks are also good at spotting infantry from long range, thanks to their sighting devices. A sniper with high scouting skill can also be an excellent scout, as he might use his sight to help him find targets.

I hope all thoses tips will make your enjoyement of ToW2 worth purchasing it, and the experience less frustrating. Nevertheless, ToW2 missions are usually frustrating, because the missions have been designed to be very challenging, and seldom let you time enough to breathe. The opposition is usually very tough.

The learning curve is rather steep for this game, and the manual does not explain everything very clearly, but I'm sure that once you've mastered all the orders, and perfectly understand what they're doing (their names is sometime a bit misleading), most of the trouble and "bugs" you're experiencing will vanish.

My explanations about the "Attack" button and the "Action Mode" hold position order should already make things much clearer and make your experience more enjoyable by removing most of the problems you're experiencing.

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Most of what I'm reading here seems to me a bit exagerated (probably out of frustration?), and most of your problems seems to be related with not having understood how all the commands and orders are working.

I'm not exaggerating at all, and I've attached screen-shots of the most critical issues to prove it. I honestly wish very deeply I was exaggerating but I'm really not, this game feels entirely broken to me.

and most of your problems seems to be related with not having understood how all the commands and orders are working.

Possibly, but considering like you've admitted the manual is deeply unsatisfying there wasn't much I could do about that.

There is no such mechanism in the game. The defend order (the shield icon) is used either to orient an unit in a desired direction (select a soldier-click the shield icon-click on the ground to have the soldier facing this direction), or to orient the turret of a tank (select the main gun of the turret, click on the ground in the direction you want it to face) .

The manual describes the act of orienting a turret in a specific direction as "spotting", and I quote. Notice I put "spotting" in quotation marks for that reason. The manual describes the gun sight as having a long range but a small LOS and tells the player to orient the turret in the direction of possible enemies to "spot" them at a longer range than either the drivers hatch or commanders periscope.

I've never experienced anything like that in Kursk (rather the opposite). Indirect fire by artillery (howitzers, mortars and guns) is rather very effective in destroying hidden gun emplacements, as his the "target ground" order. As soon as you see an icon showing the emplacement of an ennemy hidden gun, you should target the area around it with mortar and/or howitzer HE shells. It is very unlikely that the crew of the gun will survive a few shells falling in their immediate vicinity, even if the gun is emplaced in a gun pit. For this artillery fire to be effective, your guns/mortars should not be too far from their target (mortar fire can be very accurate if fired by experienced troops at close to medium range of the target, but the shells might widely scatter if fired from long range)

I've done exactly that multiple times and had the gun continue to fire after dozens of hits all around it. I read around the forums exactly what you're saying; that artillery should be quite effective. So far this hasn't been the case for me. Next time this happens I'll take a screenshot.

This is an other "problem" that is often mentionned. But line of sight and line of fire are two different things. Most of the time, you'll have line of sight, but not line of fire. There can be a lot of reason for this. For tanks, the sighting device of the commander is usually located higher than the gun, so it is possible to see the target while not being able to shoot at it. Other times, it might be that depending on the position of the tank, the gun can't be depressed or elevated enough to fire on the target in line of sight. This kind of situation is sometime happening in the case of guns in gunpits, or MG in bunkers. The crew has line of sight, but is not able to fire its weapon on the intended target.

Most of the problems associated with line of fire/line of sight can be resolved with the "attack ground" order (I had sometime occurences of machinegunners not firing on a target until I gave the order to "attack ground". "Forcing" fire this way can sometime be dangerous, in the case of guns in gunpits, as they might hit the embankment of the trench rather than the intended target.

I understand this, but it's happened to me in situations it shouldn't. I've had anti-tank guns absolutely surrounded by infantry on all sides, many less than 20m away with zero obstruction ordered to attack the gun and they simply don't comply. This is at the beginning of the mission so they're certainly not out of ammo.

This seems to be highly exagerated

See the screenshots posted.

but it is true that if your troops are inexperienced, they'll fare poorly on the field of battle. Wether troops are experienced veterans or total rookies make a very big difference in their performance.

Well considering it's the first mission of the campaign there isn't much that can be done about that.

Infantry being the most vulnerable units, during your first battles, you should only concentrate on their survival, using them only when you can't do without them (never using them to attack, and only using them to man captured ennemy trench system, for exemple).

And this is the problem I'm having with the game. It's purportedly very "realistic" and yet it seems to be begging me to play completely unrealistically. I don't see how I'm supposed to beat this first mission if I can't use infantry, because without them how am I supposed to spot these AT guns? When moving my tanks up one time without infantry they were literally parked on top of the AT guns yet could not spot them at any orientation.

Looking at your screenshots, I suspect they're just a demonstration trying to prove your point, as I see no craters around the ennemy guns position.

The screenshots are of normal games that have become so unreal for me in their sillyness that I was forced to screenshot them for posterity. None of the screenshots were in an attempt that I used arty heavily on, specifically the one I mentioned where I had 4 25 pounders empty their stores of ammo on one single target, which is where I get the "Loony Toons-style outlines" claim from.

I also hope that your infantry standing in the open in front of the guns is just for the purpose of demonstration too, as such WWI tactic is even probably less effective in TOW2 than in real life, and will have the same effect, having your soldiers being wiped out well before reaching their objectives.

Have you see the maps in this game? There is absolutely zero effective cover, it's giant open fields and tree lines. How is an infantry spearhead a "WWI tactic"? What should I be doing with them, cowering them a half a kilometer behind the entirely blind Churchills while they all die?

I've only made it past that initial AT gun barrier with more than 30% of my forces once; and that was with an infantry spearhead followed shorty behind by tanks. Putting tanks in the front always results in at least half of them being mobility kills in the dozen or so times I've tried this map.

Other than this, your post was very informative and I appreciate it. I'll try the attack/move suggestions over the next few days and see if that helps any. Although if the artillery bombardment doesn't pull through like it hasn't been, I might still be in need of a solution to this AT position that doesn't involve arty or 50%+ casualty rates.

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Hello. I'm sorry you're disappointed with the game, but perhaps not all is lost yet. ToW series are famous for being a though nut to crack. All of the missions represent a very high level of difficulty and you really got to have a good plan and army composition to win them. Sure there are glitches, some more, some less frustrating. Although, to be honest, I've never had so many problems with things you describe. The artillery, as Knokke already wrote, seems to really be a queen of the battlefield. I'm not sure why you can't knock out those ATGs. Maybe you're not hitting the right area? The bracketed unit icon means that somewhere here is the enemy. But from my experience I can tell you that this "somewhere" means a lot. The ATG could be even 30 meters from that position, so unless you have LOS to it or have spotted it earlier, you can never be sure of its whereabouts.

Now, you've picked four 25-pdrs to nail that pesky jerry, but if you ask me, I'd rather pick four mortar teams instead of the big guns. The distances in the game are way too small to use that kind of artillery effectively, unless you're fighting the enemy on a flat desert or Russian steppes. 25-pdrs cannot lob their ordnance on high angles, so in the bocages and hills, mortars would do better.

Your infantry, even inexperienced, don't have to be a cannon fodder in this mission. On the Order of Battle screen, try to manually compose your army from the best of the best soldiers you have available. Pick those with the highest possible scouting skill. Also, do the same to tank crews. I noticed that scouting skills of tank crews, especially commanders', are important too. A wise idea is to add as many Churchill tanks to your army as possible, leaving a space for two or three Achilles TDs and a Honey or two. Those may become useful in flanking light ATGs while the heavy armour draws their fire. Finally get some mortars.

In the setup phase, I would place tanks along the tree-line, as close to them as possible, so they won't be spotted by guns on the hill. Same with infantry. Avoid open fields all the time unless you're sure they're safe. Move infantry between the trees. Each squad should be accompanied by mortars. Order your vanguard to sneak in crouched position, or, if you suspect enemy activity, go prone. I don't remember whether Churchills had smoke shells or not (don't have the access to the game atm), but if they do, it's a good idea to use them when your troops are being fired upon, to cover their withdrawal or advance. Mind you that one smoke shell almost always is not enough.

Enemy artillery is very cleverly positioned in this mission (some on reverse slopes), so even if it's spotted, you could have no LOF at it. Therefore, it's important to have some mortars nearby to knock it out quickly with their lobbed rounds. A word of warning though. Mortar accuracy degrades significantly over distance. So if it's possible, try to keep them close to your units.

If it's light ATG that's firing at your heavily armoured infantry tank, don't move it forward. If you think the distance is safe and the Church will withstand the beating, let them pound him and, at the same time, flank them with your other, fast (Honey, Cromwell) units. You can even run them over(!), but there's a risk that your vehicle will enter the field of fire of another artillery piece if you go too far.

If you want to attack known enemy positions with your infantry, use attack order on the ground somewhere near the Jerries. And keep your infantry crouched.

I found the movement command to work the best in withdrawal, troop relocating, or desperate charges when speed is critical and there's a lot of distance to cover. Just remember that infantry won't shoot back in this mode until stopped.

The assault order is good at close quarters, charging houses with enemy presence inside and attacking nearby gun emplacements. I also found it pretty useful in trench-combat.

When scouting with a sniper, wait a couple of seconds after he has stopped to let him look through his scope. Scouting with a sniper in this particular mission is relatively safe if you stick to hedges (represented by tree-lines).

Those are some of my quick thoughts. I hope that at least some of them will be of any help.

Good luck!

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I managed to clear the first 5 or so anti-tank guns with only a single Churchill casualty, and with great difficulty and much save/reload cheating. It seems to me 88's are particularly resistant to artillery. I noticed I had little problem clearing out Pak nests but 88's seemed to soak up artillery damage like it was nothing, took around 15 near-hits (>30m area) on one to clear the final crewmember out.

My unit composition is a little different than suggested (I'm just reading your post now, played the game earlier), 4 Churchills and 8 Achilles and 4 25lb'ers not mortars. The Achilles to me performs the same role as the Stuart/Cromwell in that it's fast (48km/h vs the Churchills 52km/h IIRC) but also has one of the best tank guns in the game. I will take to note your suggestion about mortars however.

But I'm stuck again. Glitch, balance, doesn't matter at this point.

There are 2 Panzer III's (one could be a Panzer IV I didn't check) that come out of a large animal barn and for some reason as soon as they exit they begin firing with impunity at my tanks, and yet no act of willpower on my part can make my tanks fire back. I've tried using the "attack" command and the "attack ground" command on the tanks; they simply wont shoot at them when they clearly have a shot (or at least as much of one as the Panzer III's do).

I have an infantryman near them (who was real useful the first time around but it seems now every time I reload he dies immediately) to spot. Artillery has issues hitting this area and the effectiveness of it on tanks is likely nil.

My tactic is to let the agro'd Churchills soak damage (which they normally do effectively enough), while I move up 1-2 Achilles to the left flank. Yet as I move them up they are consistently shot by the Panzer III's before the Achilles can even fully spot them. I'm stuck again, and I have no real idea what to do.

http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/1853/bugsbugsbugs2.png

It seems now the Germans have invented X-ray lenses for their tank periscopes, because they can see through this thick brush and fire accurately yet I can't.

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I'm glad that you're making progress in the mission.

The problem with Achilles gun carriages is that they are open topped and thus vulnerable to small arms and high explosive fire, not to mention their relatively weak armour. I'm not sure if storming enemy tanks with them is a good idea. Especially when, as I estimate from the screenshot, the distance between them and enemy tanks is about 80-150 meters. They are loosing all their advantage that comes from their big gun capable of destroying heavily armoured targets from great ranges. What's more, they are moving, or at least one of them is. Moving targets are easier to spot than stationary. Also, their crewmen cannot use their optics until the vehicle comes to a halt.

The reason why Jerries can see and shot you without difficulty may come from them being hidden close behind the bushes. When a unit is positioned behind vegetation, it can see through it easily. Your TDs can't for they're too far from them. If you have LOS, but no LOF, it may be a tree-trunk, branches/bushes or whatever blocking the fire. Take a closer look at the attack cursor when you hover it over one of the German tanks. If it's a cross, you should be able to fire freely. But if it blinks, like, a cross, no-LOF, cross again, and so on, then you might want to either try to target a different part of the hull (turret for example) or slightly adjust the position of your vehicle. The first often helps in this kind of situation, without taking the risk of moving the unit to an even worse location.

Here's a nice thread on LOS/LOF with some rants and explanations:

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=93902

If you want to use ground attack to fire at a tank to which you have no LOS/LOF, be sure to pick the ground spot on the same height as your turret's at. Or something close to it. So the line of fire actually crosses the enemy silhouette and the shots will land on his armour plates not on ground. It's a bit tricky when there's no slope behind the enemy tank or sme other object to aim at. Also, be careful with the ground attack as tankers tend to load HE rounds. Be sure to order them to switch to AP shells.

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The noticeable lack of infantry in this mission (only 2 units max, both in the village) was my reasoning for choosing the Achilles vs the Churchills (which have much reduced anti-tank capability by comparison). I would've compromised and chosen Fireflies but they aren't in this mission.

I did manage to complete the mission, again with a ludicrous amount of save/reload cheating if things went sour, with only the complete loss of 1 Achilles, with a further one significantly damaged (turret/gun and both tracks) and two more losing a track each. That at the cost of 15~ enemy tanks.

Some things still confuse me. Like when I have a unit selected sometimes it is a red crosshair (to me indicating an ability to fire), yet the unit cannot engage. Conversely with the grayed crosshair with an X through it (to me indicating a lack of an ability to fire) I've been able to engage tanks effectively. I'm not sure what this is to imply.

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The reason why Jerries can see and shot you without difficulty may come from them being hidden close behind the bushes. When a unit is positioned behind vegetation, it can see through it easily. Your TDs can't for they're too far from them. If you have LOS, but no LOF, it may be a tree-trunk, branches/bushes or whatever blocking the fire. Take a closer look at the attack cursor when you hover it over one of the German tanks. If it's a cross, you should be able to fire freely. But if it blinks, like, a cross, no-LOF, cross again, and so on, then you might want to either try to target a different part of the hull (turret for example) or slightly adjust the position of your vehicle. The first often helps in this kind of situation, without taking the risk of moving the unit to an even worse location.

Here's a nice thread on LOS/LOF with some rants and explanations

That is a very usefull piece of advice.

First, by explaining why units behind bushes/foliage are hard to spot and target, while they've no difficulty doing the same. Things are working in the same way with smoke cover. Units inside the smoke can target/spot units outside the smoke easily if there is no obstruction (provided they're just a few meters from the smoke border) while units located far from the smoke will have no LOS/LOF to targets located in the smoke.

Second, by pointing a way to "force" units to fire even when they have no LOS or no LOF on a unit located behind foliage . "Attacking ground" behind the targeted unit while making the line cross the position of the target will make your gunner fire "blind" in the direction of the ennemy. It is best to select the "fire high" option on flat ground, else the shot might hit the tracks of the ennemy tank, intead of the hull or turret.

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I almost forgot. After each mission, be sure to divide each infantryman points evenly between marksman and scouting skills. The marksmanship will let yer troops shoot better and the scouting will increase their survivability by decreasing chances of detection. After two or three missions your most used squads will become real Rambos giving you the edge over enemy. Forget about other infantry statistics. "You'll thank me later", as would Mr. Monk say. :)

Okay, that explanation isn't enough, I admit. Why to leave the other skills? The truth is that your infantry grunts won't need gunnery and driving skills almost 90% of the time. Those skills are useful only in replacing dead crewmen of tanks or AT guns. But mind you, that immediate replacement of a just destroyed ATG crew isn't too wise, as your replacements will be eradicated in to time just the same as were the original poor sods. If they died due to HE or small arms fire, the chances are that the gun is totally exposed to enemy fire and will remain in that state until you react with your other forces to release some steam from enemy roller.

As for the tank crew replacements, believe me, you won't either have the time or chances to do this. Most of the time, really.

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It seem to be that the Steam lot have all the problems, there have been heaps of discussions about the BF version here covering all sorts of issues both real and imagined together with their fixes. As a search would reveal. Putting up a heading in BF's forum saying essentially that the game is unplayable is simply irresponsible, to say the least.

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I almost forgot. After each mission, be sure to divide each infantryman points evenly between marksman and scouting skills. The marksmanship will let yer troops shoot better and the scouting will increase their survivability by decreasing chances of detection. After two or three missions your most used squads will become real Rambos giving you the edge over enemy. Forget about other infantry statistics. "You'll thank me later", as would Mr. Monk say. :)

Okay, that explanation isn't enough, I admit. Why to leave the other skills? The truth is that your infantry grunts won't need gunnery and driving skills almost 90% of the time. Those skills are useful only in replacing dead crewmen of tanks or AT guns. But mind you, that immediate replacement of a just destroyed ATG crew isn't too wise, as your replacements will be eradicated in to time just the same as were the original poor sods. If they died due to HE or small arms fire, the chances are that the gun is totally exposed to enemy fire and will remain in that state until you react with your other forces to release some steam from enemy roller.

As for the tank crew replacements, believe me, you won't either have the time or chances to do this. Most of the time, really.

I was actually going to ask about that next. The manual describes in a bit of detail the uses of each skill. Is it worthwhile to auto-allocate points, or is it truly necessary for me to get my hands dirty and toy with each individual soldier?

It seem to be that the Steam lot have all the problems, there have been heaps of discussions about the BF version here covering all sorts of issues both real and imagined together with their fixes. As a search would reveal. Putting up a heading in BF's forum saying essentially that the game is unplayable is simply irresponsible, to say the least.

It's the same game with the some code and thus the same issues, regardless if it's a Battlefront download or a Steam download. And like I said, Steam and 1C forums don't get any traffic for this game. I've never heard of someone using a different download location to gripe. I mean really, get with it.

Edit: oh wait you're Australian. Sorry I wasn't aware of your condition.

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According to my experience, auto-allocation function distributes the points according to the following algorithm:

  1. If a person can be promoted, promote him.
  2. If a person can be awarded a medal, award him with the best decoration possible.
  3. Find the highest skill and maximize it.
  4. Allocate remaining points in the second highest skill available.

If you use auto point allocation after each mission, I think you would pretty soon end up with lieutenants and colonels in the roles of ordinary grunts. It's an assumption of course for I've never used it. I feel that by manual points distribution one have a much greater control over his troops' quality.

Also, some words on rank promotions and decorations. My hypothesis is, that if a certain unit amasses enough experience, by promoting him or awarding him a medal (or both), you will raise his experience level by one. So, for example, the unit will become a regular after being a novice. I've noticed, that promoting or giving out awards to troops that participated only in light fire exchange, or didn't fight at all despite being selected as a part of the OOB, will very rarely cause their level gain.

Speaking of skills distribution, I would like to make a suggestion for 1C dev team. Please consider a right-mouse-button over a (+) button to maximize a selected skill OR introduce customizable presets functionality, that would allow people to apply skill changes according to their own templates. For example:

- one, like me, likes to distribute available skill points evenly to marksmanship and scouting of infantrymen. Doing the same for 40 or more GI's is a real pain.

- Tank units - select the skill emphasis of each of the crew members (I personally, tend to maximize scouting for leader, driving for driver, gunnery for gunner, driving and gunnery for loader, gunnery and marksmanship for machinegunner; If those skills are maximized - increase scouting). Apply per vehicle.

If some action is very repetitive, and distributing skill points in ToW is, a good thing is to simplify it.

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  • 2 months later...
Hello. I'm sorry you're disappointed with the game, but perhaps not all is lost yet. ToW series are famous for being a though nut to crack. All of the missions represent a very high level of difficulty and you really got to have a good plan and army composition to win them. Sure there are glitches, some more, some less frustrating. Although, to be honest, I've never had so many problems with things you describe. The artillery, as Knokke already wrote, seems to really be a queen of the battlefield. I'm not sure why you can't knock out those ATGs. Maybe you're not hitting the right area? The bracketed unit icon means that somewhere here is the enemy. But from my experience I can tell you that this "somewhere" means a lot. The ATG could be even 30 meters from that position, so unless you have LOS to it or have spotted it earlier, you can never be sure of its whereabouts.

Now, you've picked four 25-pdrs to nail that pesky jerry, but if you ask me, I'd rather pick four mortar teams instead of the big guns. The distances in the game are way too small to use that kind of artillery effectively, unless you're fighting the enemy on a flat desert or Russian steppes. 25-pdrs cannot lob their ordnance on high angles, so in the bocages and hills, mortars would do better.

Your infantry, even inexperienced, don't have to be a cannon fodder in this mission. On the Order of Battle screen, try to manually compose your army from the best of the best soldiers you have available. Pick those with the highest possible scouting skill. Also, do the same to tank crews. I noticed that scouting skills of tank crews, especially commanders', are important too. A wise idea is to add as many Churchill tanks to your army as possible, leaving a space for two or three Achilles TDs and a Honey or two. Those may become useful in flanking light ATGs while the heavy armour draws their fire. Finally get some mortars.

In the setup phase, I would place tanks along the tree-line, as close to them as possible, so they won't be spotted by guns on the hill. Same with infantry. Avoid open fields all the time unless you're sure they're safe. Move infantry between the trees. Each squad should be accompanied by mortars. Order your vanguard to sneak in crouched position, or, if you suspect enemy activity, go prone. I don't remember whether Churchills had smoke shells or not (don't have the access to the game atm), but if they do, it's a good idea to use them when your troops are being fired upon, to cover their withdrawal or advance. Mind you that one smoke shell almost always is not enough.

Enemy artillery is very cleverly positioned in this mission (some on reverse slopes), so even if it's spotted, you could have no LOF at it. Therefore, it's important to have some mortars nearby to knock it out quickly with their lobbed rounds. A word of warning though. Mortar accuracy degrades significantly over distance. So if it's possible, try to keep them close to your units.

If it's light ATG that's firing at your heavily armoured infantry tank, don't move it forward. If you think the distance is safe and the Church will withstand the beating, let them pound him and, at the same time, flank them with your other, fast (Honey, Cromwell) units. You can even run them over(!), but there's a risk that your vehicle will enter the field of fire of another artillery piece if you go too far.

If you want to attack known enemy positions with your infantry, use attack order on the ground somewhere near the Jerries. And keep your infantry crouched.

I found the movement command to work the best in withdrawal, troop relocating, or desperate charges when speed is critical and there's a lot of distance to cover. Just remember that infantry won't shoot back in this mode until stopped.

The assault order is good at close quarters, charging houses with enemy presence inside and attacking nearby gun emplacements. I also found it pretty useful in trench-combat.

When scouting with a sniper, wait a couple of seconds after he has stopped to let him look through his scope. Scouting with a sniper in this particular mission is relatively safe if you stick to hedges (represented by tree-lines).

Those are some of my quick thoughts. I hope that at least some of them will be of any help.

Good luck!

Boy i could use this type guidance for my mission 1 as Jerry side ???????????????thank you.

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Hi. I would gladly give you some hints on this mission, unfortunately I don't have Kursk currently installed on my machine. But if you could refresh my memory with screenshots of both: a minimap and some high angle on the tactical map, I'm sure we would come up with something. :)

PS. If you're a German speaker, some ToW guide written by fans appeared recently on the web. You can find it here:

http://www.designmodproject.de/forum/viewforum.php?f=1903

Although I have not read it and can't tell how accurate it is, it looks very pro.

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