The second battle from the second turn of campaign Rakitnoe.

Here I had a great mix of units from the 11.Panzer Division.
I commanded units from the 4.Panzergrenadier-Regiment, lots of infantry with great deal of half-tracks.
They were supported by one StuG III assault gun.
And I had four Marder III's from the 61.Panzerjäger-Abteilung.

Situation in the middle was that the Russian 253.Rifle Bde moved a little south.
We have to push them back to secure the left flank of my units near Rakitnoe.
I deployed my units close to the roads on the tactical map. This way I could move my armor on the roads and leave the infantry in the woods to secure their flanks.
I deployed my Marders far right flank. The Russians might get support from the 195.Tank Bde.


At first contact my units spotted a light personel carrier with few infantry.
The 3.7cm PaK from this Sd.Kfz. 251/10 half-track attacked the enemy.


After a first hit the carrier got damaged and wounded/killed the crew.
A second shot was fired.


The carrier got destroyed after firing 3 rounds.


After a fight of like 10min the first checkpoint was taken. My units moved to the second checkpoint up north.


Moving your armor over the roads in dense wooden area is a good idea. Keep your infantry close for support.




Before reaching the second checkpoint we got a little more resistance from Russian infantry, supported with Inf.Guns.


I heard those guns firing while I was giving orders elsewhere. I rushed my Marders off road to support my infantry without checking the conditions of the terrain. Last night this part of terrain was hit by an artillery strike. One Marder got stuck in the shell holes when the driver lost control. The Marder got damaged (not lost) and the crew was safe.


The second checkpoint was taken without heavy fightings and both ends agreed for cease fire. The result was a draw but I was happy with the result. Had minimum losses and one amor got damaged. I pushed the Russians back and won back some territory.

That pocket of enemy looks so tempting to cut off and crush wicked!

Great job on the AARs, keep them coming.

Really, really beautiful screen captures there Wicked! You've got an eye for camera angles.

Great screenies..the AI driving into holes is something that needs looking at..but when brought up at the forum Andrey feels it's a player problem not an AI one.

Still great game I forget how good it looks close up as you rarely get that close when playing. Thats why I wish it was WEGO or you got stop the game a rewind that last few minutes or so. That way you wouldn't miss anything.

I think we can agree on this one. The AI could need a little finetuning. The driver could have moved like 2 meters and avoid the shell hole. On the other hand if I knew the terrain had lots of shell holes I would have kept them moving along the road. Also accidents like this do happen. I did not loose the Marder for the rest of the campaign, it just got damaged and will return later on, I hope.

And yea..I have been reading the Graviteam forum also about the pathfinding. The player has to think ahead before ordering them to move from A to B or you might loose a panzer stucked fording a river, in a shell hole or between some trees or houses.
One thing though..I would advise Graviteam dev-team to make a difference between heavy armor, medium armor and light armor. Pretty much all objects are destructable. And the AI does not see the difference when driving around. That is..some light armor AI driver will run over a house and big trees as he is driving a heavy tank. In real the light armor would get damaged very easily. So AI of light and perhaps also medium armor should go around those objects. I do not think we will see this soon though and I think never. Best thing is as player to check the terrain before ordering them to move. And roads will do for now in dense wooden area and villages. Open country you can order whatever.

To all, thanks for the kind comments. My holidays is soon over but will finish second turn of my campaign From there I keep updating my campaign in between. Thank you.

Thank you for another great AAR and reply to my query.

Nice.

Do you record AAR form Mar.2013?

Gotta quit reading these things. It makes me want to whip out the credit card.

Those were written pre march updates.

I wish I could continue writing AAR's. Will have to start over with newer version though.
Unfortunately I do not have much time for gaming in general at the moment.
My dad being very sick and in hospital for almost a year. Need to support my family.
Thank you all for liking the AAR's.

Best regards,

Wilfred a.k.a. Wicked

Very sorry to hear about your family's health issues Wicked. I myself have gone through the same sort of thing. It is not easy. I wish you and yours the best.

Sorry to hear that.

Easy bro, good old days will come back finaaly.

I wish everything will be OK.