Keith
United States
Germantown
Maryland
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Mission 9 is the Battle of the Bulge / "Ardennes"
Terrain. The area of operations consists of a 6-square city that you control surrounded by a combination of light woods, heavy woods, hills, and open terrain.
Enemy. On Hard difficulty, you face the following enemy forces:
German back row, your left to right:
10.5cm Howitzer: SOFT ARTY (3), 8/4/3/8/3
Wespe: HARD ARTY (2), 8/4/3/5/3
7/1 Track: HARD ARTY (1) (anti-air), 4/8/3/5/3
7.5cm Howitzer: SOFT ARTY (2), 6/3/2/6/2
Kubel Wagon: MOTOR INF (command car) 1/4/2/8/2
Wespe: HARD ARTY (2) 8/4/3/5/3
German front row, your left to right:
223 Scout: ARMOR SCOUT, 2/4/2/3/2
Panzergrenadiers: MOTOR INF, 8/7/3/10/6
Panther: ARMOR HVY, 12/9/2/12/6
Panzergrenadiers: MOTOR INF, 8/7/3/10/6
Tiger I: ARMOR HVY, 10/8/1/10/5
Stug: ARMOR MED, 9/3/1/8/5
*NOTATION*: if arty, (#) refers to range, then the #/#/#/#/# refers to:
hard attack / soft attack / support / defense / hit points
Conversely, your own forces are initially limited to just the following five units, plus your initial hand of cards:
Regulars: REG INF (L), 5/7/2/7/5
5mm Anti-tank gun: ARTY (1), 7/3/5/3/2
Veterans: REG INF, 7/8/2/8/6
105mm Howitzer: LIGHT ARTY (3), 8/4/3/4/4
4.2cm Mortar: LIGHTS ARTY (2), 5/10/2/4/4
Even more depressing is that your opponent has 200 Prestige to your 10, and he normally has enough unit cards in-hand at the beginning to fill up every space of the board up to your front lines with his units.
MISSION.
1. DESTROY ALL ENEMY UNITS
2. OR SURVIVE FOR 9 TURNS
3. PREVENT CAPTURE OF 5 OF 6 VITAL TERRITORIES (the city spaces)
EXECUTION.
So, how to accomplish this? First, let's check the deck-editing restrictions. Yikes! Even though I've unlocked plenty of cards through the other campaigns and have maxxed out the multiplayer unlocks, I cannot add ANY units to the deck. The units in the deck are limited to the following:
*Only three armor cards are present: 1 Scout car, 1 M3 medium tank, and 1 M4A3 Sherman.
*Only six infantry are present: 2 regulars, 2 veterans, and 2 engineers.
*Only six artillery units are present: 1 105mm, 3 57mm guns, and 2 4.2cm mortars.
It is not possible, at least for me, to add any Rangers, Paratroopers, Command Cars, other Shermans, other Howitzers, etc.
Fortunately, there is some flexibility in how to edit the Combat and Action cards. On the other hand, many of the most valuable cards are completely unavailable or very limited.
.. . . . . . . . . .
So, I have yet to survive this mission.
Here is a strategy someone named tartrazine5 posted at gamefaqs.com:
Quote: I think I beat this one on hard last night. It definitely was very, very difficult. I don't think it was as frustrating as MIssion 6 cobra on Hard. For this one, I should have taken more detailed notes on how I did it, cause it surprised myself. I got up to turn 7 on one game, but then got beat. I realized I CANNOT run out of Prestige, so I was forced to the strategy of getting and holding the cities in the middle. Here's some things I did:
- On the right of the screen, I kept a unit on the hill, so when an enemy approached him, my guy kicked his butt with the +3 hill attack bonus. This unit kept getting stronger each time.
- You NEED artillery on the back row, and if it can't reach, then move it up a space or two.
- My right side wasn't too busy, but the left side was. They kept coming down the left side. But, they kept walking into my pincer, because they moved in and I was surrounding them on usually two sides, and a corner support unit.
- I would place a higher-Prestige unit on the Free Placement tile, and move him step by step over to the left, or up into the cities. I would move him forward if I needed a support unit on the hill-entrenched tank.
- DO NOT PUT A UNIT ON AN SPACE WITH NO TERRAIN BONUS. Let THEM step into these.
- Half of the time on this mission, you DO NOT advance after the battle. Stay in the city!
- I definitely tried to save cards for their attack, cause that is what always kills me. It seemed to work this time.
- If you KNOW you'll lose a unit, don't waste your cards in battle or by sacrificing them!
- I CANNOT COUNT how many times I saved and reloaded. It's a must for this. If you don't do this - you will lose. I was even such a wuss that if I attacked someone, and didn't use a sacrifice card, and the dice didn't work out in my favor - i reloaded and did it again. I STILL wouldn't use a sac card, but I'd reload until the dice rolled my way. This happened quite often, as my turn would start and I would look around the board and see which units could be picked off WITHOUT having to use additional combat or sac cards.
- You will slowly start getting stronger, and being able to buy more cards at the start of your turn. BUY AS MANY AS POSSIBLE, but leave yourself 15 or so Prestige for actually playing those cards.
- When I would use the Supply card, I found myself getting Bombardment cards. I also tried to get Unit cards, because there is strength in numbers! You need units to win this mission! And keep them all in the center, and fighting like hell to keep the city. If a unit dies, then drop a new unit on his tile, or move a new unit up to take it's place.
- It goes without saying, but I was being dumb and was moving Artillery units onto the frontline city squares, and they were getting crushed. Keep them back! And like i said earlier, please get as many of them as possible.
- Keep your bada$$ units that are holding back the cities with Replacements and Morale Boost.
- In this mission, I had to focus more on seeing what type of enemy was coming (whether armor or infantry) and move my best corresponding attacker into that place.
- The bottom left corner for me was also another ambush point, where they kept bringing armor down, only to die by my hands.
So, does anyone here have any great war stories and/or tips on how to beat Ardennes on Hard? I've got to get to it now.
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Keith
United States
Germantown
Maryland
-
......ok, so that has taken awhile but I finally got it...if you count the save/reload/reload/reload/reload method as "getting it". In addition to the above, here's what I suggest:
* the most important thing is to be very stingy with your battle-value sacrifice cards. Don't blow a 6 when you need a 3, don't blow a 3 when you don't need to play, etc.
* don't go out of your way to kill weak units that are directly in front of your line. If you can kill a King Tiger, great, but if there's a Scout or Stug or Panzergrenadier with 1 health in front of you, let it clog up your opponent's lines of attack while you improve your hand and defense.
* It is very important to try to keep your units dug in. I was fortunate to draw the RESERVES card (find 3 units in deck) very early, and pulled some engineers and mortars, both of which auto-dig. It's better to have your infantry units sit dug-in than attack, kill something, and be susceptible to the next unit behind it. IF you can do massive damage to the unit in front of your infantryman and NOT take any damage while doing so, go for it.
* The AI probably has a few Deadly Fires, Prep Fires, Snap Shots, etc. at the beginning of the game. Make him use them up. The first few days will be the hardest, as the full might of 200 Prestige Points hits your weak line of units. If you can even keep your units alive at 1 health once those are gone, you'll be able to heal them up through your own cards and by the +1 morale for defeating units.
* It's painful, but don't worry if you lose a unit or two every once in awhile. The terrain is actually more important. So if your unit nearly kills its target before going, and you can maintain control of that tile by immediately placing a new unit or will be able to take it back if the enemy moves a weakened attacker there, it's a net plus.
* That said, don't let a unit die needlessly. If there's a way to spare it that won't keep you from losing other units, great, but if not, don't spend any cards to ease its pain. Let the AI use its cards to overkill your sacrificial unit so you can use those cards on units you
can save.
- - - If you can kill the first wave of attacks, e.g. the King Tiger on turn 2-3, a few of the Panzer IVs and Vs, you'll find that the rest of the German units are not as effective. Slowly eat them up as you consolidate your control over the city. I initially only controlled the starting points, but after taking out some tanks, was able to slowly advance a Veteran infantry, with mortars and an anti-tank gun in tow, up the right side, clearing a path in counter-clockwise fashion to take the rest of the city tiles. Once I had done that, I essentially had control over the whole map and was able to pick off the German units one-by-one as I desired.
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Posted Wed Jul 20, 2011 8:16 pm