More War Game Stuff ...

Call to Arms: Panzer Elite - In Game Screenshot

"Beg to report, Sir! All objectives have been seized. We lost one tank, sucks, but the Krauts lost beaucoup scout cars and halftracks. We also destroyed a number of anti-tank guns."

So yeah, picked up where I left off yesterday. Finally got past the airfield and on to the final objective, a large village with a big church which could be seen from the airfield. Orders were to capture it. So I did, without losing anybody, which is always good.

I've started using a couple of tactics which seem to be working well.

• Avoid motoring down a road. The enemy will cover those as they're the fastest way to get from Point A to Point B. They like to cover the roads with dug-in anti-tank guns. Which sit low to the ground and usually only take one or two hits to make your day very bad indeed. DAMHIK
• Avoid charging across open spaces. Just because your tank is very fast, the ability of a gun crew (whether in a vehicle or on the ground) to track you and put a round into you is pretty high. As the computer can't think like a human, it will follow set patterns.
• If you get hit, start backing up, very quickly. Then try and figure out where the shot came from. If you look first, that second round will ruin your day.

So far, it's been a learning experience ("learing" for you folks in Minneapolis/St Paul). Which I suppose is the point as I've never served in a tank unit. (Reminds me, I need to get a screen shot of a tank blowing up for juvat, usually it's one of mine getting blown up so I forget to grab a screenshot. I'm too busy trying to figure out where the shot came from. It's the guy you didn't see who kills you.)

Now this game is what is called in "Early Release," which on Steam (where I get most of my games from) means that a product is playable, just not ready for prime time yet. If you buy it in Early Release, you DO get all the updates as they come out. If you wait for the full release, the price usually goes up. I don't mind being a "guinea pig," it's what I spent the last few years of my career doing, beating up on software trying to get it to fail. Which usually just means using it for its intended purpose.

For a combat system that might involve firing more missiles than the ship can carry and seeing how the software handles it. (In early versions, before deployment, that answer is usually "not very well." I had a software puke tell me "that's not a realistic test." The Navy guy standing next to him asked, "Based on your zero years in the Navy?" Heh.)

Anyhoo, if something crashes, the game will immediately grab logs, screenshots, and whatever else it needs and sends it off to the developers. So far this beast has only crashed a couple of times on me, and within a day or so they publish an update.

So, airfield secured, time for the next mission. Now the solo missions are coming out slowly, after all, they need to program the AI as well as everything else in the game. If you're playing against other humans the problem is simpler, from a programming standpoint. So, what's my next mission?

In the solo world there are only two American missions, neither of which is very easy, both of which can take hours to get through. As the enemy never seems to react quite the same way all of the time and might set up a hundred yards or so away from where you saw him last time, the game is very replayable (sic).

So let me see, let me see. Ah, there's a new German mission!

Prior to deployment the game sends you to the hangar. Not sure why it's called a hangar, that's where one stores aircraft, I probably would've gone with "motor pool" or "tank park." But that's just me. Anyhoo, it looks like this when you first enter -

Call to Arms: Panzer Elite - In Game Screenshot

You click on the gray box with the plus sign to select one of the vehicles listed above the white bar which says "Add Vehicle." You can have up to five vehicles, provided you have the points.

Also note that some vehicles (like the Panther and the Tiger) don't become available until you've progressed further in the game. I haven't played against real humans yet so I'm not sure how that works. Baby steps for me, baby steps. I don't want to wander into the arena and have people say, "Look at the newbie, has no clue, let's kill him quick."

And humans tend to be far nastier opponents (and more clever) than any computer AI. Now in some games the make the AI challenging by letting it cheat. It will never run out of ammo, it will kill you first time, every time, and always knows where you are. I haven't experienced that yet in this game.

Which I like.

Now in  the next screen you see your tanks all ready to go.

Call to Arms: Panzer Elite - In Game Screenshot

Here you pick your platoon, so to speak. You get X number of points to spend and as you get further into the game, you get more points. For this mission I have 2,000 points, which as you can see above, I have misspent. The Pzkw IV Ausf H is a better tank than the Ausf G. Why I picked two Gs and three Hs is beyond me. (I went back in and corrected that, I now have five Pzkw IV Ausf Hs to deploy and fight with.)

Once you pick your platoon, you deploy to the field and the "fun" begins. For this mission, which I haven't started yet (still celebrating the capture of the airfield, not ready to get my ass kicked again, just yet), there are four objectives. Here's the in game map -

Call to Arms: Panzer Elite - In Game Screenshot

From what I gather, as I start paying attention to the details of the game, the dashed orange lines around the objective (numbers in diamonds) are where one can expect to make enemy contact. I'm not sure if the areas outside of that are clear of the enemy, but I don't know yet. I don't have enough hours under my belt yet. My platoon is within the orange circle. I added that, the game shows your vehicles as little arrowheads.

As I went into the game, I noticed that there are four supply dumps. Four. Which lead me to believe that I will be expending a LOT of ammunition. Another thing you get at supply dumps are "repair kits." If your tank takes damage, you can repair it. (Note that if you're immobilized where the enemy can see you, you probably won't get a chance to fix anything. A second shot will be coming in shortly. DAMHIK.)

Here's the statistics for the Pzkw IV Ausf H - 

Call to Arms: Panzer Elite - In Game Screenshot

Now the Stuart carried 81 rounds of anti-tank ammunition, the Pzkw IV only carries 40 rounds of anti-tank ammunition. (Listed under APCBC above, APCBC = Armor-Piercing, Capped, Ballistic Capped, which you can read all about here, provided, of course, that you want to learn esoteric armor things. I do, you might not.) Bigger rounds take up more space, in case you're wondering.

So you have fewer rounds, and as the game gives you five main battle tanks, expect to meet main battle tanks, which might take more than one round to kill. So more ammo dumps says to me, harder mission. And as one progresses, one expects to see harder/tougher missions.

One more note on those repair kits, you get three but they can be replenished at a supply dump, they are also medical kits. If a crewmate gets wounded, he can't do his job. Bad thing if your loader, or for that matter anyone in the crew gets hurt. Can't drive, can't shoot, can't do lots of things. So you can also "repair" a crewmate.

Anyhoo, I've gone on far too long about this stuff, which many folks will probably skip. Which I don't mind, remember I blog for me, if y'all like it, well that's a win-win. If I get one or two people who enjoy the post, hey, I'm happy.

And lately we've been making thousands of spambots happy.

Bless their little hearts.

Like I said, next week is going to be busy and probably hectic, looking forward to the three flights and eleven hours to get to Fresno. (Yes, that was sarcasm, how could you tell?) But at the end of the day, I get to see LUSH and two of my grandkids. Maybe The Naviguesser might make an appearance as well, he lives a couple hours away. The Nuke is flying in for the weekend so it should be grand.

I might not be blogging much, we'll see.

If I'm not online, have fun, stay out of the liquor cabinet, and empty the trash on your way out. (Looking at the pilots out there ...)

Ciao!