One advice.. This is getting extremely fun

[janscas]

Just one advice

If you feel playing always with the last equipment (for instance upgrading all the tanks to tigers and etc..) try to adjust difficulty.
I really can not emphasize enough how important it is.

First try Field Mashall and then Field Marshall with 50% prestige.

The game really get's extremely different and more fun. Also get's really difficult to achieve decisive victory .. and sometimes marginal also.

I'm currenty playing GC at Field Marshall with 25% prestige and I can only upgrade my tanks if they are in the same group. Because upgrading to the most newer tanks are so expensive... that gets upgrading to a newer tank branch rare.

I also find playing with units that otherwise I would never have played. That are the units that I always tend to think: "why are they there? U are never going to play with such a crappy unit".

For instance keeping He 111 till 1942 is awesome. I really need to think on how I'm going to upgrade and when. Also I try to statistically never lose a strenght point on any unit unless really need to.

Viewing some deducter videos http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ot0YSB53FoU was inspiring also.

[El_Jairo]

I can second this. I restarted this game on colonel and didn't had a challenge on the vanilla campaign. I am afraid that version 1.14 isn't optimal for vanilla campaign as the difficulty feels a whole lot more difficult.
Also in a good way as you are obliged to think your tactics through or face real consequences.

[antoniocapo]

A good way to experience "crappy" equipment is to use the default forces at the start of a campaign year in the GC instead of importing your core. I used the default junk they gave in 1942 West, and was that a challenge. But on the bright side i learned how good parachutes and nebelwelfer are. Units that i dont normally buy for my core.

[Forefall]

Unfortunately the prestige is really screwed up in the GC. You get way too much early, and later on get very little. Capping yourself at 25% is fine for the early years but will kill you in later campaigns.

[ExiledZebra]

I tried to play the Vanilla campaign from the start on field marshall. Holy Jebus was it hard, the Polish denied me victory on the first mission, when I'm usually able to take them out relatively easily. They would consistently reinforce and slow may pace enough to make me lose...

Just goes to show that I still need to learn how to excel at this game :3

[Cromm10k]

I tried to play the Vanilla campaign from the start on field marshall. Holy Jebus was it hard, the Polish denied me victory on the first mission, when I'm usually able to take them out relatively easily. They would consistently reinforce and slow may pace enough to make me lose...

Just goes to show that I still need to learn how to excel at this game :3

That hurts ... but it shows what a great game PC is ... change the difficulty and you have a different experience even in the main campaign. It is the same for me atm: playing AfrikaKorps on Fieldmarshal is challanging, the temptation to reload is rising with every turn.

[Bonesoul]

I bought the game on Steam, played 3-4 vanilla scenarios on colonel difficulty, enjoyed it so bought the GC/DLC mega pack and am now working my way through it (at Stalingrad 42). What I would say is :-

1) Even if you have played war sim's a lot (I have 20 years experience of them on Pc, 30 years if you include Avalon Hill and D&D on paper before PC options existed) watch the Deducter videos. You may not always agree with his deployment layout or unit selection, you will often say I wouldn't have done that then, but what he does do is show you effective use of terrain, artillery, traps and most importantly how to force surrenders. They are a tool, use them, don't copy him exactly but look and think you will pick things up.

2) The GC/DLC's are a marathon not a sprint. Good choices compound, leading to the dreaded snowball effect the (soft cap being to reduce this), bad choices cause a downward spiral and you may forever be in catch up. Don't just think about now think about two years ahead in terms of your core. How many units of what types will you want when.

3) Experience is king. 1939-40 experience is relatively quick and easy to obtain even on FM difficulty, get into 1941 and beyond and getting it on green units is way more difficult. Get those first couple of stars on more units than you can deploy at the time, you will be deploying high 30s per scenario later on even 40 plus. You really don't want to be adding green units to get up to the number.

4) Loose those bad habits, adapt tactics when needed. 1939-40 you can easily pick up bad habits, no, more what you could do then and worked well, will get you hurt later on. Much of the enemy in the first two campaigns are hold position passive, you can charge about in transports with relative impunity, even when you do bump into something that wants a fight its rarely going to seriously hurt you. Get into Russia and almost everything will attack you and they are way way meaner. By all means take advantage of what you can early on, but adapt once you are in Russia or you will be pear shaped in no time.

5) Pick a difficulty you enjoy. There will always be those that say unless you play on masochist difficult, with one hand tied behind your back and wearing a blindfold your not playing the real game. All I can say is cobblers, play how you enjoy to play, reload if you want, play on corporal or whatever. You want enough challenge to maintain the fun factor for you, not someone else, at least on the PC version you can adjust pretty much everything and also change difficulties mid way if you are finding things either too easy or too hard, do it, its your game not someone elses. I'm playing on FM atm because it suits me, will I still be doing so in 1944, I have no idea.

A few things to consider, just have fun
Bone

[captainjack]

One of several good changes to 1.2 was the ability to change difficulty mid DLC. I think that this option is under-rated. It allows you to start at a difficulty level that challenges you while still being fun without committing you to an entire DLC if you misjudge the level. Even better, you can see what is happening and understand why.

[ThorHa]

@Bonesoul:

Regarding deducters videos I tend to disagree. He needed appr. 4x the time to think through pretty obvious moves, there is really not that much to learn except you are completely new to tactical wargames.

Really exceptional was his ability to spot AI behaviour patterns (or look after them in the editor like the active/passive setting of defensive units?), which he used to the max. after.

One example: His defence of Kiev in the last 43 scenario hinged on the observation that the AI happily runs into closed terrain with tanks if the terrain is a victory hex and that tanks always move and attack second after air. For someone with a military background (me) it seemed quite obvious that a semi-static defense of Kiev would not do as the enemy should come up with artillery and infantry to root you out. Well, it does not or too late and in insufficient quantities, so you actually can easily defend against seemingly overwhelming odds with just some HW infantry backed by arty and AA. Heavy tank after heavy tank eliminated in Kiev city hexes due to the rigid stupidity of AI routines.

I started about 6 of deducters educational videos and stopped viewing after a max. of some minutes each - his ability to spend minutes on the move of a single unit was boring and his tactics were always sound but a bit overcautious sometimes. His ability to use the AI limits to his advantage was outstanding, though.

Regards,
Thorsten

[Bonesoul]

Thor

The reason I said watching Deducter's videos could be so valuable is exactly what you said at the end of your post, having said there wasn't really that much to learn. Each and every war game is different, though some things may be similar, the exact effect and why it happens varies. For a beginner they will offer some pretty basic insights, close terrain being infantry's friend and open Armour's, but in his rambling way somewhere along the line he will explain the details of the mechanic he is using (what is happening in the game engine that makes it work not just what that it works) and given that manual's have been generally getting progressively more useless for 20 years that's not always easy to find or even know to start looking. That knowledge of what's happening inside the game engine is what takes it from basic to valuable at least intermediate level knowledge IMHO.

Which leads logically to what to me is valuable to an advanced player, at least one who believes in research rather than learning by doing, AI behaviour. Some may call it exploiting weaknesses in the game, but given the AI is the general I'm having to face unless I play PVP, to me that's just how to go, understanding and exploiting your opponents weaknesses is just common sense. In fact I would go further and say that it is often the case (I don't as yet see it in PzC) that the only way to beat the highest difficulties in a game is often counter intuitive and very much by exploiting to the max weaknesses in AI behaviour.

Lets look at an example, probably one of my favourite games of all time, Civilisation II, none of the later versions were better of to me even as good (I did like the under sea cities in civ: call to power but it still didn't match civII. Deity level, similar to a lot of games made things harder, by speeding up AI building and growth so it was nigh on impossible to keep up. The best way to beat it was very much an exploit linked to a little luck, ultra rapid pretty much undefended expansion and having a couple of more peaceful AI Civ's as your first or ideally only two land neighbours. There was a lot more to it but basically you could exploit the AI's behaviour of those peacefull civs to give peripheral cities to buy peace and they protected your borders just by being there (you were stuffed if the AI neighbour was the Mongol's).

Anyway the issues not how you beat civ II on deity, the issue is all good gamers aren't looking for what would happen in the real world and other than as a peripheral interest, or for PvP, don't give a monkey's what a competent real general would do in Kiev43, what they are very keen on is what the AI is going to do which is exploitable to gain victory. And in his rambling, roundabout way that's what Deducter does.

It's not ever second of every video, its not that all his moves are perfect or fast or you will agree with them, its not even that you can rely totally that what he does will work for you, its based on his mod and v1.14 rules I believe, so you would have to verify things work the same in your version. What it is, is the scattered nuggets of AI behaviour that you can glean from them, it may be 3-4 mins in 1-2 hours of video. But to use a real world example that's exactly what a successful football manager like Jose Mourinho does, watch hours and hours of video looking for those small few minute or even few second bites that show him what he can exploit in an opponent. Its can be boring but those nuggets may be worth it.

Cheers
Bone

PS: Please don't feel I'm criticising you, your opinions on the various threads here are often insightful and valuable in a similar way to Deducter's video's.

PPS: I assume you are saying they are only of value if you are an inexperienced war gamer as much of it is quite basic in some ways, rather than how it reads, which is that it shows I am an inexperienced war gamer. ("there is not that much to learn except that you are completely new to tactical wargames" Personal to me Vs. "there is not much to learn unless you are completely new to tactical war games" general re inexperienced war gamers)

[ThorHa]

Ooops, Bonesoul, my fault. You're right of course and as a PG veteran I made the mistake to take my knowledge of the game basics (terrain, units strengths and weaknesses, combined arms value etc.) for granted. Yes, of course it is very useful to know how the AI behaves. I just could not imagine deducter as a really good PLAYER from his videos.

I will not take the invitation to discuss Civ, suffice it to say the whole series is in my game boards, although I prefer the 3 to the other versions (Call for Power had too many useless amendments in order just to make a difference). I never beat Civ on the highest difficulties, i am too casual a gamer for that kind of masochism

Regards,
Thorsten