Avalanche Harder Since Updates?

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Biffy
Colonel
Posts: 173
Joined: Fri Oct 11, 2019 8:06 am

Avalanche Harder Since Updates?

Unread postby Biffy » Tue Dec 31, 2019 5:36 pm

I played the early scenarios when they first came out and they seemed nicely balanced on Normal Campaign but returning to the early game again now Husky and Avalanche seem slightly and very much harder respectively. In particular, the Salerno landings now get heavily attacked on turn 1 by the AI armour usually wiping out a whole unit and damaging another. This is again on normal difficulty but makes the scenario very hard unless you get lucky with RNG and the units survive. As this is the first time to get the 5th Army units and they are landing there is no way to strengthen the units before landing so it seems no way to counter/prevent the turn 1 attacks.

Is this working as intended as it seems a rather harsh start to the scenario?

funky_trader
Major
Posts: 62
Joined: Sat Oct 17, 2015 4:35 pm

Re: Avalanche Harder Since Updates?

Unread postby funky_trader » Wed Jan 01, 2020 4:52 pm

I feel the same. I think they buffed up the german units in a follow up patch vs. my first game on 1.00

Still quite doable though in Husky (paradrop on the top railine west of the middle city to cut off half of the island from supplies)

In Avalanche, I often have to restart if too many units get wiped out initially. However, I've also improved my playthrough abilities in the campaign mode, and often start with more veteran/elite units with more specialist steps than what the standalone scenario would give me.

Further, near the end of Husky, make sure that all units that will land at Salerno are at full strenght/full specialist steps with anti-armor. Further, if you capture on time one of the bonus objectives in Husky, you'll get an amphibious marine unit card that can be used in Avalanche to beef up the Salerno landings. They often get destroyed, but that means at least the German counterattack isn't destroying your actual units

DanL
Second Lieutenant
Posts: 9
Joined: Wed Nov 13, 2019 3:33 pm

Re: Avalanche Harder Since Updates?

Unread postby DanL » Thu Jan 02, 2020 3:42 pm

I don´t think the difficulty has changed much. On my first play through of Husky back in November (on normal difficulty), the Germans attacked my beachhead on turn 1, destroying one division, reducing another to a single step, and damaging a third. I figured that play through was a write off, but kept playing just to improve my mental map of the scenario for the next play through. I played cards for naval bombardment and bombers to clear the armor off the beaches. I wound up taking all of the objectives on time, including the bonus objectives. So, I never did replay it at the time.

On my second play through, started yesterday and still in progress (Classic difficulty), I simply chose not to land the two divisions that can only land on clear terrain. If you do that, on the second and subsequent turns, they can no longer land on the enemy controlled hex. Instead, you have to wait until you capture the hex, then they can land there (and move on the first turn.) It worked like a charm.

Also, I don´t think you can do much in terms of beefing up your force for the landing. There is only one division that carries through from Husky to land at Salerno, and it appeared to me that, in preparation for the landing, the specialist steps I gave it were returned to the force pool and It was given new AT and artillery steps. Of course those are not any help at all, since they are both suppressed on the turn of landing.

sourdust
Brigadier General
Posts: 207
Joined: Tue Apr 30, 2013 1:30 am

Re: Avalanche Harder Since Updates?

Unread postby sourdust » Tue Jan 14, 2020 7:54 am

"No retreat" orders can also help at Avalanche. You will possibly take more direct hits during the German counterattack, but your guys generally won't retreat - which is good, because they have no room to retreat and so get 100% disrupted instead, and then killed.