I'm neither a big writer nor a native speaker, so I'm going to keep this short and won't include any screenies (can be provided though). Basically, I just wanted to make some suggestions for possible future improvements; most of these should already have been posted to these forums by others.
Country: Germany
Scenario: '36 Standard
Settings: Normal/Furious
No mods. It was my second AoD game overall (the first one I mainly played to become familiar with the changes over Arma).
1938: Invaded Hungary out of pure boredom. Up to that point, the game took a fairly historical course. Exceptions: Japan didn't invade China, and Nationalist Spain was down to two provinces after only a couple of weeks of fighting. I didn't increase my IC and chose a fairly balanced mix of forces in the initial buildup. I even construced some militia to cover the western border, as I expected an early DoW from my neighbours due to the Furious AI setting. That didn't happen though until ...
1939: Danzig or War, and it's war with Poland, France, the Netherlands and the Commonwealth (South Africa pulled out immediately again, only to rejoin the Allies a month later). Poland gets taken out within a month. I then move the bulk of my forces to the western border, invade the Netherlands, DoW Belgium and find myself in France.
Early 1940: After I reach Paris, Italy is welcomed into the Axis, quickly followed by Japan, who immediately DoW the USA. I had hoped they would join the Allies at a later date but oh well ... I almost reach France's southern border before Vichy finally fires. I continue to move into Spain; the Republicans joined the Allies a couple of days after the Vichy event. Unfortunately, they manage to take out the last remaining Nationalist province before I can come to their aid (Franco refused my invitation anyway, so no loss). Soon, Spain and Gibraltar are mine.
Mid to late 1940: While my subs and naval bombers patrol the channel to prepare an invasion of England in the summer, the Weserübung event fires; Denmark gets quickly gets annexed, Norway takes a bit longer due to an unfortunate encounter of my unprotected transports with the Norwegian navy. Meanwhile, my industry suffers from strategic bombing by Britain and the US; two stacks of fighters aren't enough to protect the Reich. The invasion of England starts in late July and is successfully completed a month later. Luckily, the Home Fleet was hit pretty hard earlier on, so my troops storm the beaches pretty much unopposed. News from the Allies: Italy's assault in Nothern Africa comes to a halt at Alexandria, Japan creates huge stacks of troops in Taiwan and at the border of Singapore but doesn't seem to attack anywhere; they're losing some of their Pacific islands.
Early 1941: To help the Italians, I chose to invade Yugoslavia in the winter. An offensive through the snowy mountains? No problem for the über-tanks. Sigh. After the fall of Yugoslavia, Italy DoWs Greece, which is quickly overrun by our combined forces. Because my fleet for the Mediterranean isn't finished yet, I invade and overrun Bulgaria, which refused my alliance offers.
Mid to late 1941: I'm in no shape to wage war on the Soviet Union, with my forces still spread in England and Southern Europe and most of the beaches unprotected. I chose to build up my forces, produce garrisons for beach defense and take Suez, although I do not advance much further in Northern Africa. Just making sure the Italians are safe from the British and the first US divisions which now start to appear in Africa.
Early 1942: With nothing else to do, I declare war on Romania in April. That oil will come in handy later on. The SU doesn't like that and DoWs me in return, but I've already massed forces on my eastern border, so Russian and Romania are invaded at the same time. I finish Romania as quickly as possible to reinforce the Russian front. Lvov sees a massive land battle lasting nearly a month, with 24 tank divisions and 12 mechanized infantry divisions taking turns against the Soviets. At the beginning, they field 30something divisions but quickly reinforce their defenses while pulling out exhausted troops. At times, I face 70+ divisions in Lvov. However, in mid May, the battle is finally won. I gamble and chose to push on with my troops that are now very low on org (30-40) to encircle their troops near the Black Sea. Luckily, there are no counter attacks, but Soviet attacks on Memel and another Polish province (forgot the name) force me to pull back some of my tanks to help out with the defense. Memel is only defended by 15 milita divisions left over from the battle for France and almost falls to the Soviet assault. But only almost.
Mid to late 1942: After stabilizing the front and wiping out some 50 Soviet divisions at the Blak Sea, I manage to encircle another 70 or so in the western Polish marshes. The advance goes a lot quicker than expected, mainly due to the Russians fielding a lot of outdated (1936) infantry, that are low on organization. Maybe they should try to move/redeploy their armies a bit less often than they seem to. In the fall of 1942, I already know I've won this war. According to my intelligence reports, the Russkies are down to 300+ infantry divisions, whereas they started at 400+. However, I chose to sit out the winter, since I'm running low on man power (down to 100 at times). Meanwhile, the US landing event for Vichy fires. I completely forgot abouth that. Luckily the Italians are on their toes and manage to push nearly all the way to Casablanca before the Americans can land too many divisions. A tank corps just leaving my factories mops up the remaining Allies there, and Africa is safe once again. News from the Japanese: They finally managed to take Singapore and the northern Indonesian island but seem to have gone back into hibernation afterwards. They're being beaten by the Russians, who have manged to push far into Manchuko.
1943: The spring sees a push towards Leningrad with some encircling along the way. Finnland joins the Axis. Armie group north rushes to their aid. In the summer, I reach Moscow. I fight loads of militia. The Soviet AI seems to have gone into panic mode after only a year of fighting. (Or might that be because my own militia production earlier on? I know there used to be a bug like that in HoI 1.) Militia are absolutely worthless against tanks - three panzer divisions wipe the floor with even a stack of 15 of them. After the fall of Moscow, the Soviet front absolutely crumbles, and I reach the rest of the Bitter Peace provinces without much fighting; there are vast areas without so much as a single Russian division in them. Expecting the Bitter Peace soon, I move about half of my forces to Persia to push on into India, because the Japanese seem to be really in trouble in Asia, especially since they got DoW'd by almost all Chinese states, including Communist China and Tibet (though these two do not join the Allies).
1944: The Bitter Peace event doesn't fire. Reluctantly, I send the remaining half of my troops on the long, long way to the last remaining Soviet victory provinces (including some former Japanese ones). While there is little resistance, supply becomes a real problem. Tanks run out of fuel on their way from one province to the other and take forever to refill and regain org; infantry seems to handle the way through these low-infra areas a lot better. Meanwhile, the Allied resistance in India is a lot stronger than expected, especially since US bombers constantly harass my troops (unfortunately, I had only build interceptors, whose range is way too small to effectively protect my land forces in India) and the Americans manage to stage two small invasions in my unguarded rear. However, by the end of 1944, I've made my way through India and am closing in on China from three directions.
1945: Literally hours before I take the last remaining Soviet victory province, the Bitter Peace event finally fires. Argh! Miffed, I chose to take the dissent hit and annex them. Due to the high dissent rate, partisans are starting to appear everywhere, and I have to pull some of my forces away from the Chinese front to take care of them. What follows, is a horribly slow grind through China and playing catch with partisans. No joy, especially since the Japanese and the Manchurian (?) AI cannot even defend the tiny front they now have to cover. Not because they face overwhelming odds but because they chose to actually pull back their troops to create huge stacks in completely random places. Before the Chinese start to threaten German-Siberia, I take control of Manchuko's troops to at least protect my flank.
1946: In the summer, China is no more. My dissent rate is back to zero. So I take some of my troops on a voyage towards Australia and New Zealand, hopping islands and annexing the Netherlands along the way. Not an enjoyable task, since the tiny fuel tanks of my transports constantly forces me to move them from one harbour to the next. Without any land connections, the Pacific islands take forever to conquer, and the Americans seem to take conquer them quicker from the Japanese than I can take them back (the Japs drove me nuts with their passive behaviour, they even managed to lose Okinawa). After annexing Australia and New Zealand and releasing them as puppets (why won't puppeting directly ever work?), I decided to forget about the Pacific and conquer Africa instead.
1947: Africa is a cakewalk. It seems that the British and the Americans lost nearly all of their forces in India. The only annoyance are occasional single division landings in my rear.
It is now mid '47, and I've run out of steam. Sure, I could invade the US. But taking all those victory islands will take forever, and island hopping is just a pain in the behind. For now, I've quit this game. Maybe I will come back to it later and start a nuclear assault on US soil, just for the fun of it (yes, I'm evil).
Some observations:
- The fuel tanks on transports are incredibly small. More than once, my troops abandoned a landing in the middle of a fight because the supporting ships ran out of fuel. Also, once out of gas, the transports will return to their home base and won't refill in any other port - why? This is especially annoying, since they lose quite a lot of strength on their way back due to the lack of supplies.
- I know that cutting the land connections on (most of) the Pacific islands increases realism. But it certainly doesn't increase fun for me. Island hopping takes forever. I do not think I will play as Japan anytime soon.
- It has been said but before more than once but I will happily repeat it: Tanks are overpowered. They are the best choice for any task, even landing operations in frozen mountains. That's just plain wrong.
- The long battles have received a lot of criticism but I have to admit I like them a lot. I've seen some really epic fights in France and Russia where the advantage swayed back and forth.
- Overall, I think the AI acts too passively, both on the strategic and on the tacic level. Of all my enemies, only the US showed some initiative. I've already read that the AI will be improved in the next patch, especially regarding encirclements. I'm very much looking forward to this.
- What's wrong with Japan? Seriously! I know I've only played two games but both times Japan just seemed to create huge stacks of infantry in Taiwan and Singapore but they never seemed to advance very far. They really were no help at all. Italy, for example, acted a lot better in both games.
- Speaking of stupid Allies, when I conquered Africa, I brought Vichy into the Axis to help me out a bit. What did they do? Just like Japan: Pulled all their forces back from the front to create one huge troop stack and gave up nearly all of their land to two lonely British Cavalry divisions. Oh, the pain ...
- Is there a reason that my interceptors never upgraded to turbojet models? Happened in both games ... my bombers upgraded just fine.
- For world domination, I'd really like to see a further researchable upgrade for transport capacity. From 1945 on, I was constantly way over my transport limit. I think the last figure was 2.100/1.600 or something, without ongoing redeployments.
- It's really a pity that some countries still seem to be hard-coded never to join the Axis, even if you influence them all the way and even manage to stage a coup (fascist, 200 relationship Chile still won't join me).
Overall, thanks to the devs once again for creating such a great game! Apart from the problems mentioned, I really enjoyed playing it a lot.
PS: Did I say I was going to keep this short? Oh well, I have no life. My sympathy for anyone who tried reading this ...
Country: Germany
Scenario: '36 Standard
Settings: Normal/Furious
No mods. It was my second AoD game overall (the first one I mainly played to become familiar with the changes over Arma).
1938: Invaded Hungary out of pure boredom. Up to that point, the game took a fairly historical course. Exceptions: Japan didn't invade China, and Nationalist Spain was down to two provinces after only a couple of weeks of fighting. I didn't increase my IC and chose a fairly balanced mix of forces in the initial buildup. I even construced some militia to cover the western border, as I expected an early DoW from my neighbours due to the Furious AI setting. That didn't happen though until ...
1939: Danzig or War, and it's war with Poland, France, the Netherlands and the Commonwealth (South Africa pulled out immediately again, only to rejoin the Allies a month later). Poland gets taken out within a month. I then move the bulk of my forces to the western border, invade the Netherlands, DoW Belgium and find myself in France.
Early 1940: After I reach Paris, Italy is welcomed into the Axis, quickly followed by Japan, who immediately DoW the USA. I had hoped they would join the Allies at a later date but oh well ... I almost reach France's southern border before Vichy finally fires. I continue to move into Spain; the Republicans joined the Allies a couple of days after the Vichy event. Unfortunately, they manage to take out the last remaining Nationalist province before I can come to their aid (Franco refused my invitation anyway, so no loss). Soon, Spain and Gibraltar are mine.
Mid to late 1940: While my subs and naval bombers patrol the channel to prepare an invasion of England in the summer, the Weserübung event fires; Denmark gets quickly gets annexed, Norway takes a bit longer due to an unfortunate encounter of my unprotected transports with the Norwegian navy. Meanwhile, my industry suffers from strategic bombing by Britain and the US; two stacks of fighters aren't enough to protect the Reich. The invasion of England starts in late July and is successfully completed a month later. Luckily, the Home Fleet was hit pretty hard earlier on, so my troops storm the beaches pretty much unopposed. News from the Allies: Italy's assault in Nothern Africa comes to a halt at Alexandria, Japan creates huge stacks of troops in Taiwan and at the border of Singapore but doesn't seem to attack anywhere; they're losing some of their Pacific islands.
Early 1941: To help the Italians, I chose to invade Yugoslavia in the winter. An offensive through the snowy mountains? No problem for the über-tanks. Sigh. After the fall of Yugoslavia, Italy DoWs Greece, which is quickly overrun by our combined forces. Because my fleet for the Mediterranean isn't finished yet, I invade and overrun Bulgaria, which refused my alliance offers.
Mid to late 1941: I'm in no shape to wage war on the Soviet Union, with my forces still spread in England and Southern Europe and most of the beaches unprotected. I chose to build up my forces, produce garrisons for beach defense and take Suez, although I do not advance much further in Northern Africa. Just making sure the Italians are safe from the British and the first US divisions which now start to appear in Africa.
Early 1942: With nothing else to do, I declare war on Romania in April. That oil will come in handy later on. The SU doesn't like that and DoWs me in return, but I've already massed forces on my eastern border, so Russian and Romania are invaded at the same time. I finish Romania as quickly as possible to reinforce the Russian front. Lvov sees a massive land battle lasting nearly a month, with 24 tank divisions and 12 mechanized infantry divisions taking turns against the Soviets. At the beginning, they field 30something divisions but quickly reinforce their defenses while pulling out exhausted troops. At times, I face 70+ divisions in Lvov. However, in mid May, the battle is finally won. I gamble and chose to push on with my troops that are now very low on org (30-40) to encircle their troops near the Black Sea. Luckily, there are no counter attacks, but Soviet attacks on Memel and another Polish province (forgot the name) force me to pull back some of my tanks to help out with the defense. Memel is only defended by 15 milita divisions left over from the battle for France and almost falls to the Soviet assault. But only almost.
Mid to late 1942: After stabilizing the front and wiping out some 50 Soviet divisions at the Blak Sea, I manage to encircle another 70 or so in the western Polish marshes. The advance goes a lot quicker than expected, mainly due to the Russians fielding a lot of outdated (1936) infantry, that are low on organization. Maybe they should try to move/redeploy their armies a bit less often than they seem to. In the fall of 1942, I already know I've won this war. According to my intelligence reports, the Russkies are down to 300+ infantry divisions, whereas they started at 400+. However, I chose to sit out the winter, since I'm running low on man power (down to 100 at times). Meanwhile, the US landing event for Vichy fires. I completely forgot abouth that. Luckily the Italians are on their toes and manage to push nearly all the way to Casablanca before the Americans can land too many divisions. A tank corps just leaving my factories mops up the remaining Allies there, and Africa is safe once again. News from the Japanese: They finally managed to take Singapore and the northern Indonesian island but seem to have gone back into hibernation afterwards. They're being beaten by the Russians, who have manged to push far into Manchuko.
1943: The spring sees a push towards Leningrad with some encircling along the way. Finnland joins the Axis. Armie group north rushes to their aid. In the summer, I reach Moscow. I fight loads of militia. The Soviet AI seems to have gone into panic mode after only a year of fighting. (Or might that be because my own militia production earlier on? I know there used to be a bug like that in HoI 1.) Militia are absolutely worthless against tanks - three panzer divisions wipe the floor with even a stack of 15 of them. After the fall of Moscow, the Soviet front absolutely crumbles, and I reach the rest of the Bitter Peace provinces without much fighting; there are vast areas without so much as a single Russian division in them. Expecting the Bitter Peace soon, I move about half of my forces to Persia to push on into India, because the Japanese seem to be really in trouble in Asia, especially since they got DoW'd by almost all Chinese states, including Communist China and Tibet (though these two do not join the Allies).
1944: The Bitter Peace event doesn't fire. Reluctantly, I send the remaining half of my troops on the long, long way to the last remaining Soviet victory provinces (including some former Japanese ones). While there is little resistance, supply becomes a real problem. Tanks run out of fuel on their way from one province to the other and take forever to refill and regain org; infantry seems to handle the way through these low-infra areas a lot better. Meanwhile, the Allied resistance in India is a lot stronger than expected, especially since US bombers constantly harass my troops (unfortunately, I had only build interceptors, whose range is way too small to effectively protect my land forces in India) and the Americans manage to stage two small invasions in my unguarded rear. However, by the end of 1944, I've made my way through India and am closing in on China from three directions.
1945: Literally hours before I take the last remaining Soviet victory province, the Bitter Peace event finally fires. Argh! Miffed, I chose to take the dissent hit and annex them. Due to the high dissent rate, partisans are starting to appear everywhere, and I have to pull some of my forces away from the Chinese front to take care of them. What follows, is a horribly slow grind through China and playing catch with partisans. No joy, especially since the Japanese and the Manchurian (?) AI cannot even defend the tiny front they now have to cover. Not because they face overwhelming odds but because they chose to actually pull back their troops to create huge stacks in completely random places. Before the Chinese start to threaten German-Siberia, I take control of Manchuko's troops to at least protect my flank.
1946: In the summer, China is no more. My dissent rate is back to zero. So I take some of my troops on a voyage towards Australia and New Zealand, hopping islands and annexing the Netherlands along the way. Not an enjoyable task, since the tiny fuel tanks of my transports constantly forces me to move them from one harbour to the next. Without any land connections, the Pacific islands take forever to conquer, and the Americans seem to take conquer them quicker from the Japanese than I can take them back (the Japs drove me nuts with their passive behaviour, they even managed to lose Okinawa). After annexing Australia and New Zealand and releasing them as puppets (why won't puppeting directly ever work?), I decided to forget about the Pacific and conquer Africa instead.
1947: Africa is a cakewalk. It seems that the British and the Americans lost nearly all of their forces in India. The only annoyance are occasional single division landings in my rear.
It is now mid '47, and I've run out of steam. Sure, I could invade the US. But taking all those victory islands will take forever, and island hopping is just a pain in the behind. For now, I've quit this game. Maybe I will come back to it later and start a nuclear assault on US soil, just for the fun of it (yes, I'm evil).
Some observations:
- The fuel tanks on transports are incredibly small. More than once, my troops abandoned a landing in the middle of a fight because the supporting ships ran out of fuel. Also, once out of gas, the transports will return to their home base and won't refill in any other port - why? This is especially annoying, since they lose quite a lot of strength on their way back due to the lack of supplies.
- I know that cutting the land connections on (most of) the Pacific islands increases realism. But it certainly doesn't increase fun for me. Island hopping takes forever. I do not think I will play as Japan anytime soon.
- It has been said but before more than once but I will happily repeat it: Tanks are overpowered. They are the best choice for any task, even landing operations in frozen mountains. That's just plain wrong.
- The long battles have received a lot of criticism but I have to admit I like them a lot. I've seen some really epic fights in France and Russia where the advantage swayed back and forth.
- Overall, I think the AI acts too passively, both on the strategic and on the tacic level. Of all my enemies, only the US showed some initiative. I've already read that the AI will be improved in the next patch, especially regarding encirclements. I'm very much looking forward to this.
- What's wrong with Japan? Seriously! I know I've only played two games but both times Japan just seemed to create huge stacks of infantry in Taiwan and Singapore but they never seemed to advance very far. They really were no help at all. Italy, for example, acted a lot better in both games.
- Speaking of stupid Allies, when I conquered Africa, I brought Vichy into the Axis to help me out a bit. What did they do? Just like Japan: Pulled all their forces back from the front to create one huge troop stack and gave up nearly all of their land to two lonely British Cavalry divisions. Oh, the pain ...
- Is there a reason that my interceptors never upgraded to turbojet models? Happened in both games ... my bombers upgraded just fine.
- For world domination, I'd really like to see a further researchable upgrade for transport capacity. From 1945 on, I was constantly way over my transport limit. I think the last figure was 2.100/1.600 or something, without ongoing redeployments.
- It's really a pity that some countries still seem to be hard-coded never to join the Axis, even if you influence them all the way and even manage to stage a coup (fascist, 200 relationship Chile still won't join me).
Overall, thanks to the devs once again for creating such a great game! Apart from the problems mentioned, I really enjoyed playing it a lot.
PS: Did I say I was going to keep this short? Oh well, I have no life. My sympathy for anyone who tried reading this ...
