Here I play Skirmish Mode using the Vire River Valley Map against 2 Expert CPUs. I play the US (allies) vs 2 Panzer Elite (Germans).
I LOST THIS GAME after a full 1:16 hours of playing. I love this map because it is evenly divided into two equal areas with a river in between. There are three ways of crossing, the middle and two bridges at each side. After setting up in the middle with four engineers, one sniper, two Anti Tank Guns, two machine gun nests, two machine gun weapon teams and two mortar teams PLUS a growing armory of Sherman Tanks, a Halftrack and a Pershing Tank (yes you need all of that to defend that place). Those tanks will eventually comprise your attack force.
I blow up the two bridges forcing the enemies to try to get through via only the river crossing in the center. It's a great way to pin the enemies because not only are they funnelled into one narrow crossing, the water also slows them down considerably making for easy pickings.
At some point however you will need to cross that river when you have amassed enough forces to attack. I tried twice. The first time at the 49 minute mark ( • Company Of Heroes - Op... .
If coming from the North my idea was to take the fuel resource on the right side of the map. My halftrack managed to take over the resources and then I left it there with a Sherman and a Pershing to protect it. After my attention was drawn to protecting the river crossing again I didn't realize they were attacked and I lost those units.
The second attempt at • Company Of Heroes - Op... ended even worse. The house near the river crossing which I turned into a base was destroyed by the Panzer Elite's too effective artillery, killing my important mortar unit - an invaluable defense against long range weapons and infantry. I therefore had to set up base at the next nearest house which made restoring their numbers difficult, because being near a base is the only way you can easily restore depleted troops.
After I thought I had enough armor I tried clearing a path using a Sherman Calliope and sent Armor in using the same tactic as above. Unfortunately one of those ridiculously powerful 88mm flak AT guns was waiting where the fuel resource was and pretty much destroyed everything ( • Company Of Heroes - Op... . I foolishly tried to continue but that gun is just too powerful.
It was fairly downhill from there. I tried building up the river crossing forces again but the constant enemy artillery, the distance between the base making troop replenishment take too long, and frankly, the idea I was already playing for an hour on what should have only taken 30 - 45 minutes was making me want to stop. I didn't expect the game to last as long, I needed to do chores, so after a final Panzer artillery attack I quit the thing.
I did manage to kill a King Tiger at the mark ( • Company Of Heroes - Op... , so hooray for me!
7 сен 2024
