Afrika Korps beta test

[Andy2012]

Operation Battleaxe 3.8, 18 turns, draw. No losses.

This is better than the last version, but you still have to play this impeccably and get your force composition just right to come out on top.
Air power is fine, I start with fighters and a Stuka in the rear airfield and add a second one to take out the flanking group faster.
Several issues persist, I think:
1. There are no aux units on Halfaya Pass and Sollum. Putting your core units there will result in their loss. So you just leave them empty.
2. I concentrate my defenses around Fort Capuzzo and the central ridge.
3. I hold the line, push the British back but they reinforce and reinforce and reinforce but barely attack or fully commit. I Nebelwerfer them to hell, they retreat, reinforce, recover, come back, repeat.
4. Meanwhile, I have to hold my tanks in the rear area so I can defeat the flanking group.
5. After they are done, I can push forward. But Sollum and Halfaya Pass are now camped by several entrenched British tank units and can only be attacked from few directions.
This makes it pretty difficult to retake them, especially with the turn limit at 18.

I suggest the following changes:
1. Deploy some aux units around Halfaya Pass and Sollum.
2. Let the British group assaulting these positions press their attack on to the central ridge or Fort Capuzzo after taking them. Resolves the camping issue.
3. Reduce British resource income to 0 and give them a stash to start with. They are already superior in numbers, both in tanks and infantry.
4. Add five turns or more. It takes a lot longer to defeat units in OoB than in Panzercorps.

This is a lot of fun and just requires a few more tweaks to be perfect. Thanks, Erik.

[Andy2012]

Dash to the wire 3.8: Just took a quick look and did some deployment. The jump in Italian core numbers is massive and I feel that you can make a lot of mistakes buying the wrong equipment. And it does add massive amounts of rather fresh and anonymous units to your roster, which dilutes your core army somewhat. (I know, this sounds weird.) I suggest you let the Tobruk perimeter and the southeast defenses be manned by aux units from the start. Then my core can blunt the attack and counterattack (dash) to the wire. This way, the core mission goal is done by my core and the secondaries (hold the line, contain Tobruk) by the aux units.

[Mojko]

Finished Iraq scenario (middle difficulty).

- map wipe at turn 20
- all objectives completed
- no unit losses

- I didn't know what to do with may aux paras, so I sent them to top right and bottom left corners with some air support
- a better target would be the fortress to the east (combined drop)
- I split my army into 3 parts:
-> North of the major river (mostly frontline units)
-> Between major rivers (mostly artillery)
-> South of the major river (mostly frontline units)
- moved them front top left to bottom right in one big swoop
- enemy airforce spawns are quite annoying not because of their strength, but rather unpredictability almost lost one Stuka bomber because of 4 enemy fighters spawned just behind it but oh well
- an overall pretty straightforward scenario with little surprises, still fun though, on to Basra!

[GabeKnight]

AK 3.7, 19Road, lvl3

Sorry, I know I'm inconsistent when it comes to the difficulty settings; usually left over from some testing rounds. But it doesn't matter with your scens anyway. Here, the real challenge are the never-ending repairs

But even on middle difficulty, I think this one was waaaaay too easy. I'm being "warned" about the Sherman Firefly models emerging, but with Panthers and Sturmtigers backed up by my Jagdpanthers, those Sherman tanks, and even the Churchill are no match whatsoever. Like no chance to knock off even one HP point - and to be honest, the AI units didn't even try. The AI had to use infantry to attack my Tiger. Infantry?!? My Tiger did not even dent, of course...

- I'd suggest to cut the land CP for the player by 20-25 and the air CP by (at least) 6 points
- no Major Victory possible if ended "early". I guess you've set the trigger on "scen turn limit"? Then it's the same advice as before, you have to create some kind of "early victory" trigger for this to work properly.
- you can change the prim. objective to capture all VP in this mission, no problem
- the invasion kind of didn't work. Although there were supply points present, the AI struggled with the landings. But I liked the idea. Rather add some supply ships (and more troops, to be honest)

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[GabeKnight]

AK 3.7, 20British, lvl4

Thank you, Erik. Now THIS scenario is - finally, again - a scenario worthy to be the final act of a campaign. A massive land, air and naval battle. Exactly as it was done in the golden, early days of this game in both the initial Pacific campaigns (Melbourne/Tokyo).

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My opinion: That's the way to go! Use every good feature of the game in the campaigns - historical or not.

For me personally, with a huge core force and enough experiece with this game, this mission was not really hard, to be honest. I had a TON of land and air CP available. It was sill a lot of fun. I had to plan for the terrain changes, efficiency draining jungles,... and the large fleet on the other side of the "peninsula" providing heavy fire/artillery support. It made my advance costy and I had to rethink my tactics during vartious stages of the mission.

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My thoughts/suggestions:

- Wast turn limit with enough room to make errors
- Good RP balance
- I think that all objectives triggers worked okay
- I think you shouldn't mark the Allied HQ in the objectives. Once you see it you can't miss it
- The "rioters" spawn near "New Dehli" belongs to some wrong faction, not allied with the British
- You've misspelled "New Delhi"
- You've given me free aux. Italian and German Navy units at sceario start, but you've additionally given those factions naval CP. This means I am able to purchase Italian naval assets and I'm not sure that's intended. I guess this was an oversight as aux. units do not need CP to deploy.
- (there's a paved road going through a mountain hex, north of Rangoon)

One thing I don't get is the Japanese incursion in the later stages of the mission, though. Don't get me wrong, it's a neat idea, but they're hostile and I do have to fight them. Why? Aren't we supposed to be allied? Axis and all?

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Thanks, Erik. Now I'll have to retrace and find my way into the "Alamein" branch.

[Andy2012]

Dash to the wire 3.8: Just took a quick look and did some deployment. The jump in Italian core numbers is massive and I feel that you can make a lot of mistakes buying the wrong equipment. And it does add massive amounts of rather fresh and anonymous units to your roster, which dilutes your core army somewhat. (I know, this sounds weird.) I suggest you let the Tobruk perimeter and the southeast defenses be manned by aux units from the start. Then my core can blunt the attack and counterattack (dash) to the wire. This way, the core mission goal is done by my core and the secondaries (hold the line, contain Tobruk) by the aux units.

Played a few turns and my first thoughts above seem to be valid, at least for me.
Tobruk is a lot more passive than the last time. However, that prowling Matilda tank is weird and a lot more difficult to take care of than in PzCorps, where putting your inf in city hexes blocked that off quickly.
Why do I get so few Luftwaffe CP but tons of Italian air points?
I also think that there are too few deployment hexes around Bardia / Sollum and the attack force there is very substantial. If I committ core forces there, there will be losses. Aux would be better.
I suggest you decrease Italian CP and let aux forces hold the line on the coast and around Tobruk. My core then defeats the armour around Sidi Razegh and dashes to the wire, everybody's happy, done.
And as always, thanks for your work, Erik.

[Andy2012]

Finished Dash to the Wire, 16 turns. I think I played this by the book and held all objectives, destroyed the three supply dumps with a swift counterattack - but the mission would not end.
Instead, the British werent fazed by the obliteration of their supply and mounted an even more powerful offensive towards Tobruk and my holdout (1 88 AT, 2 Ita HeavyInf, 2 Nebelwerfers) around Bardia and Sollum.
I think this is winnable (as I kind of did), but the end trigger does not work properly.
Also, several things should be changed - apart from the aux units mentioned above, the British force in their rear supply areas is very substantial and I can very easily be cut off. Also, the mission should end after I destroy all supply dumps and hold all primary objectives. Because I cant hold off that many units with eternal reinforcements for 36 turns while my fastest and strongest units (6 tanks) are hunting supply dumps down the map.

[Andy2012]

Second offensive, 3.8, 12 turns in and I am wondering if this is bugged.
Last playthrough I remember here (and in the original), you fall back towards El Agheila, try to save as many aux units as you can, then get resupplied and counterpush.
This time however, I instantly lose my air supply near El Agheila (you cant save it, no deployment hex on it and the AI instantly puts an M3 Stuart on it). Means my planes are in undersupply all the time, especially since I have
to give up Benghazi airport to establish a line further to the south. It also feels like you have massively increased AI tank numbers.
So now, after 12 turns, I have established a defensive line with tanks and AT behind it and am waiting for a resupply that should have come a few turns ago. Is this trigger broken?
I also suggest you increase air supply near El Agheila and Benghazi to 50 each so I can actually use my airforce. I still think it is weird that my Italian airforce has more CP than the Luftwaffe.

[GabeKnight]

AK 3.7, 21Alamein, lvl4

Finished Halfa with a draw to get into this branch. Super intense first turns. Although I kinda expected an early enemy attack like this during my deployment, the excessive arty and inf. assault still cost me two core infantry units on the very first turn, I think. Not to worry, they were fresh and inexperienced, and the massive enemy push created some nice tension. Thanks, Erik.

- same old, same old: the sec. obj. "do not lose X units" trigger counts all units that have been destoyed in previous missions and are still in my "destoyed" tab. I would suggest to change it to another one, like it's done in stock scenarios.
- I'd suggest to move the last enemy aerial reinforcement wave to the borders of the map. It happens far into the mission (turn 12-ish) and the enemy planes spawned over an already captured airfield with my planes sitting in the hangar...
- (tested: the prim. objective triggers win/fail work)
- Thanks for the Sherman, nice touch

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[Mojko]

Finished Basra. Here are my notes:

- completed all objectives at turn 21
- map wipe at turn 22
- no unit losses
- to be fair, I knew what this scenario was about as I played the original campaign
- I purposfully avoided capturing objectives, until I had half the map under firm control
- I then crushed enemy counter attack
- 4x Flak units were very helpful
- I left 1x Flampanzer in the rear to take care of any survivors
- it's a fun and challenging scenario and I really enjoyed it

On to Persia!

[Andy2012]

Second offensive, 3.8, 12 turns in and I am wondering if this is bugged.
Last playthrough I remember here (and in the original), you fall back towards El Agheila, try to save as many aux units as you can, then get resupplied and counterpush.
This time however, I instantly lose my air supply near El Agheila (you cant save it, no deployment hex on it and the AI instantly puts an M3 Stuart on it). Means my planes are in undersupply all the time, especially since I have
to give up Benghazi airport to establish a line further to the south. It also feels like you have massively increased AI tank numbers.
So now, after 12 turns, I have established a defensive line with tanks and AT behind it and am waiting for a resupply that should have come a few turns ago. Is this trigger broken?
I also suggest you increase air supply near El Agheila and Benghazi to 50 each so I can actually use my airforce. I still think it is weird that my Italian airforce has more CP than the Luftwaffe.

Finished it now, draw. I never get the expected or promised additional CP. Instead, I fall back towards El Agheila, establish a defensive line there and try to flank the very powerful British offensive. I cant fully deploy my airforce since there is not enough air supply in the south and holding Benghazi is not going to happen. Yes, I managed to save almost all aux units.
I suggest the following fixes: 1. 50 air supply in the south. 2. You get the promised resupply around turn 7-9. Without arty and tactical bombers, it is quite hard to push back the British.

[GabeKnight]

AK 3.7, 22Kasserine, lvl4

Worked mostly well, but I don't like those "choke point", narrow-mountain-road scenarios that much. You have basically one unit taking point and attacking and the rest has to wait up. Takes forever.

Observations/suggestions:

- some left-over deploy hexes far in enemy territory (see screenshot)
- both the reward units (Valentine and a Wolverine) were awarded in a strange fashion: The first one by placing a unit during deployment on some rough desert hex (see screenshot), the second one after my strat. bomber attacked the northern town and moved to a neighboring hex.
I didn't check with the editor, but I guess it's some "unit near hex" trigger set up wrong.
- The "hold Kasserine" prim. objective did not check (even at scenario end), resulting in a draw
- The only US tank required for the sec. objective, a Sherman, is sitting in the middle of the map idle. How about including the Wolverines in the count?
- I think I have too many air CP compared to the few weak enemy planes.

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[GabeKnight]

AK 3.7, 23Mareth, lvl4

Okay.... I don't know when I had to actually admit defeat the last time... but...you got me here, Erik! I'm gonna skip this one. I've restarted and failed again; interestingly enough, it's not about the lack of money. Too much enemy, no supply - "over the top" is a bit of an understatement here. I'm not saying it's impossible to find a fitting "solution", but it's no fun like this, sorry.

Kondi, if you're reading this, you've always whined about more difficulty and a challenge. Well, here you go.

This time I'll have to use a cheat code to advance.

[Mojko]

Finished Persia (middle difficulty), here are my notes:

- completed all objectives
- no unit losses
- I split my forces into 3 groups:

- northern tank army (secure exit point)
- central artillery and infantry (clean up the rough terrain)
- southern tank army (defeat US counter attack)

- this is a pretty challenging scenario especially until I could clear the sky and use my bombers
- there are few enemy units placed on rough terrain which means they can't retreat

Overall, pretty enjoyable scenario

Not too happy about the lowering trend of Italian CP's as my core artillery and infantry units are Italian.