(07-25-2017, 06:37 AM)Matt W Wrote: Racing to assault any fixed defense can be frustrating. Did you try to reduce the morale of the defenders through fire first? I found that preparation prior to assault can greatly improve the possibilities to move forward. The scenario you picked is one that permits a great deal of fortification for the defender and involves a river crossing as well. Fortified river lines should be hard to break!
If the process of breaking down fixed defenses is too frustrating pick scenarios with fluid situations or rural fighting. With literally thousands of scenarios to choose from there are plenty that don't involve that type of battle. PG-HQ can be helpful as well as you can screen scenarios as to fortifications, etc.
This scenario only had 16 turns in which to breach the river defense and get across to the next board. And then there is the pressure of massive Soviet reinforcements that can come from turn 3 & 6 on respectively. And it was night so one had to close with the defense in order to shoot at it to "prep" it to begin to whittle them down. I fired illum and had massive amounts of firepower to shoot at the defenders. All the defender had to do was to wait until after the preparatory fires to rally and then waif for the defenders. This is a problem of the game sequencing. And it is easier to rally or pass MCs by 8 morale troops than achieve effects due to the distribution on the combat table since there is usually no effect at the most likely dice rolls. This is a constant problem with PG, not tactics. It is not very realistic to hit a hex with artillery, then direct fire and do so a number of times and they don't become suppressed in any fashion.
The problem is also somewhat scenario design too but it is the system that makes it tough to make these types of scenarios interesting as in my experience they end up being turns of many dice rolls for the shooting the morale checks and the rallying and nothing much else happens. To say "well, play the more fluid scenarios" is not the answer as many scenarios are of this type, or has these aspects in it and were a larger part of the action of the conflicts depicted.
However, I have a notion I thought of yesterday that maybe could fix this problem of the game system. I need to test it few times and then I'll ask Dr. B if he would like it for a "daily content" article.
