Unity of Command Forums

I agree and would like to emphasis the importance of reading the manual .

I also agree with Comrade P's suggestion to plan ahead. If you intend to mobilise a unit to make a break through lines (which inevitably will cause a break in your own lines), ensure you have enough cover to not only support them, but can react to an invasion by your opponents as the brilliant AI will counteract quickly and hit like a hammer

Supply is critical. Partisans on the soviet side can be ruthless.

Also, keep poking that bear. Concentrated attacks win you maps. Attacks from multiple units on the single (poor) opponent one seems to have a nice synergistic, and devestating, effect. Additionally, using logic works wonders: mechanised are very strong against infantry.

Big red letters are a great idea, but a giant red "push me" button always gets my attention (I say attention, but its more like a moth attracted to a light. I feel compelled)

It's really good to see the testers contributing tips in this way. We're going to have a bunch of new players coming here in 2 days or so, this could prove to be most useful.

Hey pelin, wouldn't it 'bout time to update the top post with these newer tips

Well, I was thinking that every post is Tip or Trick, so people can just scroll through thread. But... you went OT and now I must find some kind of punishment! (and update first post:D)

When adding reinforcements, take care not to drop a unit's experience level.

I'd like to add to this that although it might seem like there is no difference between adding a replacement before or after attacking, there could be a very real difference in performance during the turn if the replacement would reduce the experience level and there's a difference in general as you might even lose the step you just added.

For example:

You have a unit with 3/25 experience towards elite.
You know you can destroy 3 steps of an enemy unit.
You could: 1) give the unit a replacement step, reducing experience to Regular or 2) wait until after the attack and then give the unit the replacement step, maintaining the experience at Veteran level. 2 is the most preferable option, because in that case your unit remains a Veteran unit for the entire turn and is thus more effective than it would be as a regular unit. You also don't have the risk of losing the replacement step you added during your own turn.

On that note, why use a tank to block up the enemy ZOC? Feel free to use other units, like infantry, to springboard your tank, motorized, and cavalry units into action!

Word of warning though--a space like that is inevitably going to be counterattacked by enemy units in the area, and any unit you push through may well end up cut off! Either incorporate this into your plan or make the ZOC occupying unit strong enough to fend off an attack or two. (So it's probably not a good idea to put the Romanians there )

Also don't be afraid to re-organize units that have taken a hit too many and are not useful for combat. If you're facing partisans, keep some around the vital points. Otherwise freeing up troops to reinforce the push as it goes along can help a bit in the longer run

IMHO, one of the most important things to understand is SUPPLY. Read the manual to get an understanding of how supply is handled in the game. For example, a supply source (and it's associated range) may or may not be attached to a railroad. This can have a huge impact on where your axis of attack should be. A supply source attached to a railroad calculates its range from each railroad hex as long as you have an uninterrupted path back to the source, whereas a source not attached to a railroad calculates its range only from the source hex. Being out of supply is not a good thing! It will bring your well thought out offensive to a screeching halt!!

In addition, the AI knows the importance of supply and will try to cut your supply lines every chance it gets. So basically all you have to win is..

1. Take X amount of objectives...
2. In X amount of turns (The sooner the better)...
3. Understand the combined arms / combat aspects of the game...
4. While making sure your troops in the field REMAIN IN SUPPLY

Enjoy!!

When playing germans: Add Engineers - always add engineers! A 5-7 step armour division with an engineer step will slice through anything.

Also - if possible conserve some units for only "easy" attacks. After killing 10 steps even infantry can become quite powerfull with the one experience star/cross this adds. And add a step of arm. or eng. to this unit and you've got a new powerfull offensive unit.

Notice that in some scenarios some units start out with kills - Baku and Nizhny comes to mind. Dont re-enforce these units until you have the needed experience.

Example: A regular 6 step infantry with 8/10 kills. Be sure to kill some poor two-step enemy with this unit and voila you have a star and the big boost that goes with it. Had you re-inforced this unit to seven steps immediately then it would have taken 8 kills before reaching this star. And the likelyhood of taking casualties in this process would be much higher. Once it hits 5 kills on level one experience you can add the last step without loosing the experience star.

Danielefc wrote:When playing germans: Add Engineers - always add engineers! A 5-7 step armour division with an engineer step will slice through anything.

QFT
An excerpt from Blitzkrieg by Len Deighton:

"At the heart of the blitzkrieg technique and its versatile use of heavy fire were the combat engineers. The Germans called them Pioniere but they are not to be confused with manual-labour units that built roads in back areas of other armies. The Pioniere were a highly trained specialist who was like to be at the front of the hardest fighting. But instead of the infrantry's heavy weapons - anti-tank guns, howitzers and mortars - the Pioniere had speicalist equipment. For combat there were flamethrowers, mines, explosives in many shapes and sizes, smoke equipment, mine detectors and barbed wire. They had inflatable boats and pontoons as well as two bridging columns per division. Combat engineers also had power saws, pile drivers, compressors, generators, emergency lighting equipment, welding gear and a range of hand tools."