Advance to the Elbe (Stand alone Scenario)

[Rayrard]

Hey everyone, I am a veteran Panzer General turned Panzercorps player.

I have played all the Grand Campaigns and had gone back to playing all the base scenarios for each of the Panzer/Afrika/Allied Corps games. I play them as the Allies and the Axis, at the colonel level to start. Some are ridiculously easy as that level, and most of the time I wipe the opposing army from the map. However I run into a few that are quite challenging even at that level.

The Cobra scenario was entertaining as I had to set up inland away from the ships and bunch my units around the flak until the planes weakened and the Allied units slowly advanced south. The AI would buy a ton of long barreled Shermans (the weaker American one and not the Firefly) and it took some time to finally drive the US army into the sea.

I beat Bagration as the Germans in the standalone scenario but it is easily one of the hardest of all. The Russians would slaughter the German units within 10 turns, but I took the tactic of delaying in the south and center and massing most of the army in the north. The Russians would ignore the north and drive to the middle forested city and also cross the river in the south in mass. I would counterattack with 2 Tiger 2's and an Elephant and also a couple towed 88's and the surviving antitank guns and Panthers. The Soviets would drain their prestige on IS-2's and once they were dead, the Soviets simply bled to death. I retook the eastern towns and counterattacked. A Soviet force existed at the end but it held no cities.

There are a few other stand alones that are hard. Fort Capuzzo as Italians is difficult because you have no prestige and weak infantry. The Bardia scenario is hard as British because you have only 4 pioneers to start and have to literally buy the whole army from scratch. A few African scenarios as British and Germans are hard with minefields and long distances to travel.

However, one I CANNOT win as the Germans no matter what even at Colonel level is Advance to the Elbe. You literally face a super-heavy force of 4 star US and British tanks with 14 and 15 strength. Not only that but they have like 11,000 prestige and are attacking German units who are out in the open and some are already surrounded and/or understrength. Playing as the Allies, I can win the scenario without losing any strength as I can replace all my overstrength loss during the scenario. But even the bumbling AI can steamroll my units. None of my tactics work. I tried engaging them early and death was quick. I tried holding back and massing in the hills and forests to force them to attack my infantry with tanks and it caused heavy losses, but the losses were easily replaced by the Allies but my units lost just as heavily and could not replace! This is another issue as the Germans cannot buy any units, they cannot replace tank casualties even if lucky enough to recapture a town, and have zero starting prestige. So I can attack a M26 in the forest and take off 6 but lose 6, and the M26 is able to replace losses and the Grenadier is crippled and dead next turn. The US forces can easily one shot the German tanks and all die quickly if they venture out. The B26 bombers take out 6-8 strength points from everything they attack and even my 15 strength Ta-152 is destroyed without loss by the P-47 and Meteor. The fighters take pot shots at the Maus constantly if they don't have flak next to them. Usually the Maus bleeds 1-2 each turn at the end and finally is overwhelmed when out of ammo.

My best effort was sneaking a unit behind the US advance (usually the motorcycle unit on top that is ignored in favor of killing the Grenadier). This unit took the rear cities and gave me 100 or so prestige to get some replacements for infantry, but this was barely enough to save a few units. I then let the enemy advance in the center and north and tried to counterattack in the south against the few M36 Jacksons and infantry down there. The infantry can attack the Jackson without much damage and take off ammo. The main goal is to defend in the hills and forests with the infantry and weaken the tanks to under 5 strength. Then swarm them and try and keep them from replacing losses. I cannot destroy any tanks as the US spawns M26 Pershings with 4 stars that I cannot hold off. If I keep the core slots occupied with weak units, they cannot build new units in the rear. I then tried to swing units around the rear and retake the objective cities before the main Allied army took the northern city and got through the forest and hills.

The problem was that the Allied army and airforce simply slaughtered units too fast for me to accomplish my objective. I would have too few effective units to hold units or prevent resupply and the Allied artillery would literally blow away my infantry when it was bunched up around the weak enemy tanks. I could not separate the artillery from the tanks and infantry due to the good movement of the Allied tanks and artillery meaning they kept pace with each other and could back each other up well. The Callioppe and the Churchill artillery were especially strong. A strategy of wiping out the infantry and artillery first did not work because only a few inf were thrown ahead and the tanks actually outpaced the artillery and infantry to my main lines. So at some point I had to make a decision to start wiping out the Allied army before my forces disintegrated, and there were at least a couple cities still unoccupied by my forces. These forces were usually very weak tanks as they were useless at this point as I had no replacement ability. The Allied airforce would fly around and pick off tanks and once Allied units were destroyed, the AI would start making M26 Pershings. My battered army was then steamrolled by 10 brand new M26's who finished the rest of the battle and retook the ones I took in the rear. The worst part is that I couldn't even kill off bombers or fighters as this would introduce core slots for new M26's. By the last few turns all the eastern cities were unoccupied and the battle was over. The surviving artillery pieces, bombers, and infantry helped root out the few inf I had left.

So by the end of the battle I usually have nothing left or just a couple Russian fighters left. The US airforce is usually quite battered by the end because of my flak concentrations, but I need to be careful not to free up core slots for the AI by getting a errant flak ambush.

So this is the only base scenario I have not beaten in the Panzercorps series. Has anyone beaten this scenario? You need to hold FIVE objectives to win and I couldn't hold one even when I parked a Maus in one.

[Iscaran]

Interesting.

Your post just made me wonder - so I just tried this scenario a few times...and its really a "lost" cause somewhat. As the XP difference is so huge not even the maus can cope with the Pershings and challengers on a solid basis and without replacements....

Anyway...I also tried playing with the 1.14 rule set and I must say it makes a HUGE difference. The new 1.20 rule set makes it even much harder to gap the XP difference then it was on 1.14. But still u barely stand a chance.

I will investigate this further though - I think the only real "chance" is to bring all Heavy Gear to either north or south and try to isolate enemy tanks around the minefields.

But anyway the allied just pave the way through your units - just had a defending rugged defense Panther die off 7:0 vs one of those Jacksons...

So far...interesting.

[Rayrard]

I have only played the scenarios under the new rules. I played the East GC and had to stop because the new rules were draining my prestige with my usage of the good units. I was unable to upgrade and overstrength by GC44 because the prestige I was getting each round was so low. The new rules definitely are tougher!

The issue is that the minefields are not much of a hindrance because the enemy infantry can wipe them out and even the artillery hit off multiple. The minefields are too isolated and once found, the AI can go around and attack real units (no zone control for mines). I would try and move the entire army north to the city up there but I cannot get the heavy flak up there moving one hex at a time. Those are the best for stopping Allied air attacks. If I could get everyone up there I could narrow the front to be defensible but then I'd run into surrenders as the Allied artillery and planes would rack up surrenders. Not much room for all those German cannon fodder units.

Was thinking of putting all inf up on the top and keeping all tanks and ATG in the east, hoping the Allied tanks would massacre themselves in the forest and my tanks can counterattack when the Allies are weak and the airforce is weak.

[captainjack]

If you like the 1.2 rules but find the prestige cap annoying, make a backup copy of the Gamerules file (in the data folder) and then open it (Excel seems to work well but some people prefer Notepad or similar editors) and either change the settings for the prestige cap or switch it off.

With no prestige cap and 1.2 rules, 43 and 44 are much more manageable but still a challenge. I haven't yet tried 45 East, but at least I got there and with a feeling that it could be done!

[Rayrard]

Victory!

Proof

[Rayrard]

I won the battle on the colonel settings, and I don't think it is possible at a higher level.

This was under the new rules. That's what was left of my army

I concentrated on the top with infantry and a few anti-tank and artillery, and kept a bunch of tanks at the bottom. The middle was lightly defended. The enemy focused on the top and I kept my units far back in the woods. Instead of preserving enemy units, I went with the aim of destroying all the infantry first. The AI sent the halftracks up front with the tanks right behind them. I sacrificed many units immediately but these tanks were not going to survive anyway off all the M26's that would appear later. The tanks finished off most of the infantry or weakened them so they used green replacements and lost their advantage. The enemy tanks attacked the infantry in rough terrain and did massive damage but took heavy losses also. The southern front was stripped and I ganged up and destroyed the M36's and the one M26 down south, and the inf and artillery with them. With the south free of enemy I swung the whole left flank around the Allied front and took all the cities from behind. The Allied army destroyed the northern front of my defense and took the northern city, but by then the rest of the front had collapsed for them. They spawned over a dozen Centurions and M26's in the central city and sent them south but they were cut up on the infantry in the middle hills. The M26's and Fireflies reached the 3 hex city on the right and actually almost took the city, but they put tanks in city hexes which doomed them. The attacks south were badly corrdinated and each tank was wiped out in the rough terrain. I had around 600 prestige for replacements so the inf could reinforce at least. The eastern attack died off and I was able advance on the northern city on the last 2 turns. The battle in the middle was in the balance until I removed the Calliope that was baseguarding with the Maus once the Maus was finished with enemy tanks in the center. The middle city fell 2-3 times before falling finally on the last turn. The Allies sent their base-guarding M26 to attack my Panther on the last turn but they paid by being destroyed by Grenadiers the last turn. The way was open to the northern city and only a Aliied recon unit was left on the ground. Aircraft were reduced to the B-36 and a weak Mustang, and I had a Do-335 left. The Soviet AF never appeared as it did when I was losing the battle.

I had a couple lucky combats and a lot of one-shots on me but I didn't have to start at saves too often (I did do it a few times because I was so close to winning!). They one-shotted things way too often.

[wolfslair71]

Yeah this scenario is pretty much a lost cause for the Germans. I played as the Germans in a multi player game and got totally killed. As the Germans I got no prestige, almost all of my armour was under strengthed, none of the armour had any experience expect for the lone Maus tank you get and the Allies are all like 14 and 15 strength. I would be curious to know if anyone has won this scenario playing as the Germans