OK, I finally got the game to work, after installing the patches, so I've been trying to play it. I'm still pretty bewildered, though, even after reading the documentation. And the tutorial, though it seems better than it was last January, when I first tried this, still leaves a lot to be desired (IMHO).
There really wasn't any indication of where I should start the game. I looked at the Quick Battles, but apparently I would have to choose all of the units on both sides and set them up (no way for just a quick introduction to the game, as far as I could tell). So I went into the Campaign section. Again, I wasn't sure where to start, but the top campaign (Operation Star, reasonably enough) was already open, and I figured I should probably go from the top down, right? So I started the Taranovka, February 16-17, 1943 scenario.
Now, the
one thing I thought I'd figured out from the manual was that red was my side and blue was the enemy. But as far as I could tell from the description there, I was supposed to command the "320 Inf," who were shown in
blue! The
red guys were the "6 gds. Cav. Corps," my
enemies. Now
that was confusing. When I got into the next part of the game, the colors were reversed from this, but this backwards color scheme at the start was confusing.
Also, I was told that my guys were encircled, though they didn't
look encircled. And I was also told that my mission was to break out of encirclement and advance to the east, to join division "SS LSAH." The problem with this was that I could
see "SS LSAH" units on the map, and they were just a short distance to the southwest,
not the east. So how could I meet up with them by going
east through the solidly blue territory in that direction?
Oh, trust me, this was only the beginning of my confusion!
In the south center of the map, I had a supply depot and three platoons, all of which said "encircled." Well, there were enemies to the north and east, but it looked clear to the south and west. As I say, they really didn't
look encircled. And if my mission really
was to meet up with "SS LSAH," I could see them just a short distance to the west. As it turned out, I could move my guys pretty much halfway there in my first move, so why wouldn't I? But is that what I was supposed to do?
There were two problems with that idea (in addition to the fact that this would have been moving them west instead of east). First, I couldn't move my supply depot guys. When I clicked on the three platoons, I could move them a surprisingly long way, if I wanted, but I had no such option for the supply depot. Well, it made sense that they couldn't carry crates of supplies on their backs, but if I was supposed to break out of that encirclement, I was going to have to leave the supply depot behind
anyway, wasn't I? But I couldn't seem to give them those orders.
The other problem was that my platoons were very short of ammunition, while the supply depot apparently had ten crates of the stuff. At the very least, they'd fill up their pockets before they left, wouldn't they? But how was I suppose to order that? I still have absolutely no idea. Given all this, the lack of ammo, my inability to move the supply depot personnel, and my complete confusion about even which
direction I was being ordered to go (neither Hitler nor Stalin being very forgiving of that kind of error, I suspect), I basically stayed put. And the enemy attacked me.
(Note that I also moved my guys at the north of the map. Since most of them were already as far east as they could go, I figured they were supposed to go
west, despite what my mission objectives said. But no one attacked me in the north, near Taranovka, so I didn't get any further into that.)
OK, according to the arrow, my enemies were supposed to be attacking from the north. However, there was a solid mass of blue (the colors were correct in this part of the game) just to my east, as well. Shouldn't I expect that they might attack from that direction, too, even though there was no arrow (intelligence?) to that effect? I really had no idea, but I put one of my three platoons to defend a likely line of attack from that direction. (As it turned out, they had
one enemy show up, I think, so it was mostly a waste, but not entirely. But I guess I do need to defend in other directions, too, then, right?)
My platoons were still desperately short of ammo, and I had no idea how to tell them to get any more. Is it suppose to happen automatically, if they're close enough to a supply depot? If so, how close is close enough? I still have no idea. (And I still think I should have run like hell to the west, and left the supply depot people to be captured, if they were too dumb to come with the rest of us. Of course, it probably wouldn't be much of a war game if I just ran away from battle all the time.)
Anyway, the enemy attacked from the north, with infantry
and tanks. Nasty! I had a second platoon just a little out of position, expecting maybe a flank attack from the northwest, where there was cover, so the bulk of the attack hit one platoon. They were hit pretty hard, but they did OK until they all ran out of ammunition (they'd started with just 30% ammo, despite the supply depot being nearby). Then they panicked (reasonably enough) and ran to the south.
I tried to do a pincer attack using the two platoons that still had some ammunition, but then I got a notice in green that said "cease fire." Note that it didn't say I was being
offered a cease fire, so I was a little confused by that, but I didn't think a cease fire could just
happen, without my input, could it? There was an icon which said I could offer a cease fire by left-clicking it, and it was highlighted in
red. (The manual seems to indicate that it should be highlighted in
green if I can accept the enemy's offer of a cease fire, so I'm still not sure what was going on there.)
So again, as throughout this game so far, I had no idea what I was supposed to be doing. I really
did want to accept a cease fire, if I was actually being offered one. After all, most of my guys were out of ammunition! So I tried clicking on that icon, to no apparent effect. Eventually, I suppose I must have done something wrong, because I got a battle resuming (I don't remember the exact wording) message. I tried clicking on that icon again - maybe I could offer a cease fire myself? - and eventually, I got that green message about a cease fire again.
Well, I was completely lost at that point, so I hit 'Esc' and went back to the operational phase of the game. If I play it again, I'll start all over. (How do I do that? Do I have to create a new player profile, or is there a way to start from scratch again?)
At this point, I'm not sure
when I'll try this again. So far, the game has been more confusing and frustrating than fun. However, I'll probably feel more ambitious another day, if I can ever figure out (1) what I'm actually supposed to be doing, (2) how I can get more ammunition to my guys, when it's right
next to them, and (3) how I can accept a cease fire (or otherwise end the battle) and what that's supposed to look like when it happens.