It be odd if the game let you play as Peiper and allow you to execute prisoners. However if it didnt allow you, it wouldnt be historically accurate. :-o
!? Do they really have personalities in the game? If so, then they should have Kurt Meyer in the DDay campaign. “Panzer” Meyer, my favorite SS commander.
What you wish for is granted in Battlefield 2, although still there are people who aren’t team players. It’s not WW2, but it blows BF1942 out of the water. Voice chat is the bomb!
You can find the Ardennes offensive in a variety of games : COD1, for instance.
I’ve heard good things about BF2 and I will get it eventually when I get a good computer. I’m hoping that they keep updating it like they did recently. Maybe they can even throw in some sub saharan nations for Europe colonial conflict and new terrains. What would be really cool to see would be a Red Dawn scenario type game.
The reason I’m not getting A&A DDay is because I now know that the Bulge will be out this year. I haven’t played EiB yet but I’m sure the story will eventually find its way there and beyond, and maybe they’ll even hit the Market Garden fiasco. I like how they actually do the campaigns though instead of the campaign hopping that MoH does.
So far we’ve found that the Japanese are toast unless you can really get in a good defense. The biggest problem is the weakness of their tanks in comparison to the western ones. The best thing I’ve found so far is to focus on infantry and artillery, and only use tanks for attacking wayward enemy infantry. My brother is much better at the game than me but even still he can’t win with the Japanese.
I don’t pay attention to number of units max, especially with the Soviets.
My 150 army, when the map calls for it, involves one Nashorn and at least two more decent tanks. This I play on defense and once I’ve got my movement kills on the enemy tanks, I will use the MBTs to close in and crush them. Of course, this means that I can’t let myself get too spread out (Nashorn is expensive so I have limited defense otherwise). Last night I tried this and got surrounded by the faster west-Allies tanks.
Thanks for this. I’m seriously thinking about getting it.
Also a great Hex game that is kind of old, is Civil War General.
Honestly, I’m kind of tired of ALL of the attention going to Normandy all the time. Now I have absolute respect for the men who fought and died at Normandy. That was a better battle than what I was ever in, but that was one landing in a war that had so many. What about the near 7,000 men who died on Iwo Jima? What about bloody Tarawa, or Peleliu, or the D-Day (in scope, not in landing tactics) of the Pacific: Guadalcanal? The greatest battle in Europe for the western powers was Ardennes, so if they do make the series with the 101st we will probably see it.
If they every do make a game from the German perspective, it would be nice to see it from the Afrika Korps, since that part has been neglected by game makers (and because Rommel is my favorite general of the era).
What others, of a similar type, are better? Seriously I want to know because I would buy them.
If I had to rate the top games on a big map (besides deeply complex wargames), I would place them like this:
1. Diplomacy
2. A&A
3. An offshoot of either of these, like the unofficial A&A upgrades or Game of Thrones.
@cystic:
thanks for the post. I had been thinking of getting Brothers in Arms. How did it compare (for you) to Medal of Honor?
Compared to Medal of Honor, the story is much better. I think the main character’s waxing intellectual is boring and melodramatic, but I’m kind of thick skinned about things like that. One thing about Medal of Honor was the 40’s movie-esque way you took on the entire German Army yourself. Now those were great for the kids and may have raised morale in the states, but the Germans laughed at them, and upon returning, they made the Veterans sick. The VAs in BiA are very, very good. Best I’ve heard in a wargame really. MoH’s were cheesy. Medal of Honor was also heavily ‘on rails,’ meaning you didn’t have a free roaming environment. IMO, that’s what made the greats like Doom what they were. BiA is kind of on rails, but you can choose your avenue of approach and the deep gameplay makes up for it. MoH is great cinematically, but great games are not interactive movies (except Kessen perhaps….but that is touted as one). One other thing about MoH: The reloading system has always sucked. Even if the gun is reloaded, you have a delay until it actually registers it, so you are screwed over a lot.
Interestingly, the upcoming MoH Airborne is supposed to have all kinds of free roaming, even allowing you the choice of where you land.
The agent/soldier thing is a great idea, but works best with Metal Gear Solid. If they made one of those about a British or American or even a free French agent in WW2, that would be king. MGS spinoffs generally suck though, and it’s just because of gameplay.
The thought of a massive battlefield game with BiA gameplay makes me want to clean my guns and turn up some music. That would be the greatest. I liked BF1942 a lot, but it’s still like a war between a bunch of commandos and NPCs. If there were all kinds of squad leaders with an actual in game command structure (based on victories and experience) where players are the officers and commanders, that would be the ultimate online game.
Call of Duty, despite what it’s touted as, is actually almost the same as MoH in all the ways I’ve discussed. The enemies are deadly but still to easy. Lifebars really don’t have a place in shooters anymore…not with the technology we have today. CoD is still a very good game like MoH, but I resent that you can play as the Soviets but not the Wermacht. I am hoping they branch out in to the Pacific and even into the Sino-Japanese war perhaps. It’s a fun game but once you’ve done it, you’ve done it. AI is probably the weakest in CoD.
A rundown of the AI in each game:
MoH: The enemy waits in his designated place for you to do what you are supposed to do. If you shoot a machine gunner in the head, expect them to line up like sheep to the slaughter for more headshots.
CoD: Same as above, but the enemy really doesn’t want to live. Defending a point can be difficult, but why are the Germans doing Stalin Marches? :?
BiA: Cover system is very strong in this one. Troops follow your commands well (Ghost Recon…take some notes). The enemy makes attacks that cause you to think as well as use your trigger finger. Enemies defend positions as well as attack yours, and you have the occasional enemy who charges like he’s at Verdun. Close fighting is deadly and decisive. The conscrips fight like conscripts and the veterans fight like real Gold Badges.
Of all the WW2 shooters, the best one is Brothers in Arms. I have the first one, Road to Hill 30, and I will get the second eventually. In short, it’s everything a WW2 game should be, and less Duke Nukem than the other ones. There aren’t any one man armies carrying all kinds of weapons, killing the enemy with bubblegum and stuff. This one does the squad system very well, and even gets into working with tanks and the like. Like so many other games, this one begins with the D-Day campaign. Here you are from the Airborne perspective, and the game actually goes from engagement to engagement in a single campaign.
The only problem is that the aiming is sometimes off, but then again, this is about squad command and maneuver, not going all Carlos on them.
Guadalcanal? That’s king! I hope Edson’s Raiders get in there as a unit.
Spot on with the comparison of Risk to “War” with face cards. A&A is king for WW2 action and scenario specific, but my favorite conquest game is still Diplomacy. You have to out-trick the other guys, not out roll them. The only thing is that you better have a big crowd for it (and hopefully they don’t get mad easy :lol:
I’ve been eyeing this one for a while now, to test how we play with more standardized units and for new terrain. Does the base set just include Normandy or does it have several campaigns?
Three Battles of Manassas looks really good if you want to get really in depth. Second Manassas is one of the most astounding and forgotten battles of that war. The third is a ‘what if.’
RE Lee CWG is good and I wish I could get part 2 to work.
Right now I was just putting forward ideas for the nations that already are in the game, but if they include Croats under other Axis nations then I’m all for Serb Partisans.
To go about that, maybe instead of having individual unit morale, they can have a general morale scale. It would be a sliding marker on a bar with half a side green and the other gray. That would be to represent overall troop morale, and it would be based on number of points lost by having lost units, key points on the map, and so on. For alternate scenarios, like attack and defend, morale would be shifted heavily in the defender’s favor, but would plummet if a major point is taken.
That’s just IF morale came into it all though. The tactical usages of Shock troops and Guerrillas are enough to warrant their use.
I don’t see a problem with it as long as they were vehicles actually used by the Airborne divisions. It should also apply only to units in the Europe theater.
Actually, Pacific is the scenario game that I first plan to get. At first I wanted to get Europe, because in that I can play as any force with only some bias towards Germany….but in the Pacific, I was way biased for the US. Every gamer I’ve talked to tells me how much more interesting the Pacific game is though, and how it really can be open ended. Pacific is the one I’m going with.
Despite being the most enduring Fascist state, Spain never did come into the war for the Axis in full force. The most famous Spanish soldiers were the volunteers of the Blue Division, which suffered such great casualties that they either disbanded by 1943, or if they were diehards they melded into other units.
On using other units: We have a ‘cold war’ scenario every now and then. It’s US vs USSR, with everything that either side has. If you want it to be more realistic, just think of the Russians as the North Koreans instead. In the Korean war, we were still using equipment from WW2.
Also, since there are no Polish line units, if I ever do a Polish invasion scenario I supplement them with Mosins and KMT Officers. The KMT Rifleman seems wrong because the Poles did put up a valiant and desperate fight. The only problem with doing this is that you can’t have a Poles vs Soviets scenario. Maybe some Polish riflemen and officers are in order.
Hi, my thoughts for two new types of units are all about infantry. It’s just a few of my thoughts. Feel free to expand on them or make other suggestions.
Shock Troops. The purpose of a shock unit is to have something to break up the enemy with an initial assault so that it can be destroyed while broken in morale and disorganized. The Germans knew this well and gave their Stormtroopers a position of prestige, but neccnecessity had other countries use their equiequivalentn America, the first real shock troops were the famed foot cavalry of the Stonewall brigade during the Civil War. During the first World War, the troops in the white leggings (the Marines) where referred to as shock troops because of their tenacity. Further back, even Sun Tzu made mention of “extraordinary forces” which would be optimized for offense. In the A&A CMG, these could have an advantage in advancing and may even cause an automatic disrupt if they move into an enemy hex. Maybe they could even have a movement bonus.
Ideas for the units:
SS Liebstandarte. 1940
Although it later became an armored unit, the Führer’s own was an elite unit with obvious political ties. Thus they were very highly motivated as the best of the best.
Marine Raiders. 1942
Known for their harsh training, even my Marine standards, and their assault on Edson’s ridge at Guadalcanal, the Marine Raider battalion and their actions have passed into legend. The common misconception is that these were the predecessors of the recon units, but those already existed and developed on their own. This unit was able to
Ranger Regiment. 1944
These were the men who scaled the seawall at Normandy, and have been the Army’s finest light infantry ever since. Their history actually goes back (traditionally) to the Revolution, and Rangers today still learn the standing orders of Maj. Robert Rogers. As with the Raiders, they were well trained and extremely mobile.
Elite Infantry. 1941
The Imperial Japanese Army was truly a remarkable force. Equipment shortages, bad assignments, and bad chow were all part of life for these men. Like the crack soldiers of Gen Kuribayashi’s defenders of Iwo Jima, the most experienced of Japanese soldiers would fight with determination comparable to the Spartans at Thermopylae. This was, in no small part, because of the belief that it was a sacred thing to die in the service of the Emperor. If they did have one weakness, it was that they would underestimate an enemy they didn’t understand.Â
Irregular or unconventional units would be those that may have had a different motivation for fighting, but were absolutely loyal to their ideologies. What they lacked in training and equipment, they made up for in their flexibility and fanatacism.
Irregular fanaticismommunist Guerilla. 1939
RecruiGuerrilla rural regions of China, the guerilla’s of Mao gained guerrilla’s fighting the Japanese which would aid them in their sweep to power. Highly motivated and single minded, they should fight well in adverse terrain but would be equipped with whatever they could find.
Hitlerjungen Defense. 1945
During the battle for Berlin, the German Army fought with remarkable professionalism even with the downfall of the Reich. Most feared by the Soviets, however, where the young men who had spent their entire lives in the Third Reich. These boys, often no older than 12, would appear out of nowhere and were extremely motivated. Bonus would be “low profile,” or ability to displace in the urban environment. Maybe a bonus when attacked in an urban hex.
Russian Partisan. 1942
The early defeats of the Red Army made it a necessity for anyone of able body to fight the invader. The Partisans were especially hated by the Wermacht because of their activities such as train derailing and unexpectedly showing up.
Shinshu Militia. 1945
Okay, this one’s fictional, but the Japanese people were as indoctrinated with loyalty to the Emperor as much as their cities were designed as defense structures. The fictional part about this is that there was no ground assault on the Japanese homeland, due in large part to the unrelenting fanatacism of the people, and a lonfanaticismof fighting over and for Shinshu (or the ultra nationalist name for Japan, “Land of the gods”).