The Great War: Western Front

[Tamas]

Started a new game with the release-day patch. Definitely less in-your-face AI overspending, but very early days.

Definitely gives you the feeling you'd expect from an operational/tactical Western Front game. As the Germans, I made a very successful (because very overwhelming) attack against Arras, reducing its defense by one star (leaving another). I wanted to do a second attack against it from another hex the same turn but the auto-battle predictor only gave me a minor victory (not enough to reduce the last star and take the hex) so knowing my (in)ability on the tactical map I decided against it.

And of course the AI sent reinforcements so I am now facing 5 enemy corps in Arras instead of the 1 last turn. The auto-battler can only do a stalemate result so I doubt I can do more, but I'll try. If I don't want to concede that last star I need to attack Arras at least once each turn.

So I am having fun so far. One disappointment though: before calling it a night I checked how my next turn offensive against Arras would look like - well, the trenches I built stayed as the should, great, but I was hoping I would not be playing on the exact same map that I conquered in its entirety in the previous turn. I know it is probably way too much effort, but would have been good to have a tactical map for each hex side and star of the hex - have them random generated if need be.

[W8taminute]

Ok so I think I got artillery timing down for when I attack enemy trenches.  I find that if I begin suppressing light arty fire when my own advancing infantry rifle range is 3 or 4 pixels away from the enemy frontline trench that my men make inside. 

The light artillery is good for suppression and has the spread to cover the second line of trenches in addition to the first line.  As long as they are not too spaced out from each other.

Defense in depth and how to overcome it is key in this game.

I've got about 14 hours of game time in and I believe the ai does not cheat with supply.  I've fought numerous battles now where he clearly runs out of supply as his artillery goes silent and not because I destroyed his gun emplacements.  What the ai does do however is have the ability to remember where all your forces are.  I'm ok with that though as I've figured out how to handle myself to counter his knowledge of my positions.

[SirAndrewD]

I've got about 14 hours of game time in and I believe the ai does not cheat with supply.  I've fought numerous battles now where he clearly runs out of supply as his artillery goes silent and not because I destroyed his gun emplacements.  What the ai does do however is have the ability to remember where all your forces are.  I'm ok with that though as I've figured out how to handle myself to counter his knowledge of my positions.

Yes, this was fixed in the day one patch, as was the issue with Balloons and FOW. 

AI armies are now mostly on the same playing field as the players. 

You do need to move your forces though, a lot.  This why I see a lot of players refusing to use MG nests and instead single companies, in a single trench, unconnected with depth. 

Rifles are just as good as tearing apart a company as an MG nest, and for the cost of one MG nest you can instead afford 6 Line Infantry companies, nearly 1300 more trained men.   

Building this kind of defense makes the enemy keep hopping over the top to assault and continually exposing itself to mass rifle fire.  It's worked pretty well for me.

[W8taminute]

^Good stuff SA.  I do the same thing. 

It's fairly easy to defend yourself in this game, as it should be in any WW1 style battle.  The hard part is managing your supply stockpile.  No amount of units or good preparation is going to matter if you lack the supplies to fight with. 

I love this game!!

[Gusington]

If defense and logistics and supply are flexible enough, I may even be able to be moderately successful with TGW 

[Gusington]

Computer gaming has really come a long way. From the BBC:

https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20230404-the-great-war-the-ww1-video-game-thats-eerily-accurate

[W8taminute]

^Very good article. 

Thankfully the logistics system in this game really isn't overly complicated.  You literally throw cash at the problem to make it go away.  What I'm discovering slowly but surely through gameplay is that the tech tree offers some options to help mitigate losses in men and materiel. 

I even saw a random event popup in which one of my hexes had a black market visiting it for several game turns.  What that meant was for that limited time any supplies purchased would be significantly discounted.  Which means you can get silly and launch a bunch of offensives from that hex for really cheap if you wanted.  My problem was I couldn't take advantage of the sale because a) the adjacent enemy hexes were heavily garrisoned and b) I just did not have the cash and existing supply stockpile to launch a sizeable offensive. 

[Sir Slash]

That's an interesting concept for a wargame. How do you get money?

[SirAndrewD]

That's an interesting concept for a wargame. How do you get money?

VICTORY!

Missions and segueing battlefield wins into cash reserves.  There are a few routes but you're on the gold standard you need tangible results for cash.  Cash does work to help with supply.

[Sir Slash]

If you lose, do you also lose cash, or just not get more?

[W8taminute]

You get a set income of 1000 cash per turn.  That can be improved by unlocking certain tech. Cash is spent on replenishing units after battle so it is in your best inerest to try to keep casualties at a minimum while inflicting great casualties on your enemy. 

Easier said than done.

[Sir Slash]

 

[ArizonaTank]

Only had a few hours to tinker with it.

But I can say that Petroglyph has managed to do what many said couldn't be done; make a fun RTS out of WWI trench warfare.

The game straddles realism and playability well IMHO.

The last time I had this much fun with a WWI game was Blue Byte's "The Great War" in the early '90s.

https://www.dosgamesarchive.com/download/the-great-war-1914-1918

[W8taminute]

About 20 hours of game time now and I've discovered that if your men are in the middle of a trench charge and the enemy starts to bombard them with arty, it's best to just press on.  If you try to dodge the arty your men are going to get cut down anyway from unsuppressed rifle or MG fire.