7th Army Start

antirelic

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7th Army Start

« on: February 08, 2009, 05:01:35 PM »

I've played about 10 games and believe I have found a working strategy to push the Americans back on their heels.

Build Order:

Pio -> WQ -> Grenadiers -> MG -> Scout -> Gren -> T2 -> Krieg Barracks -> AT Gun -> Falls -> AT Gun -> T3 -> T4-> Hetzer

The strategy will be to get about mid map and hold. FTFL + Defensive perimeter as soon as you get them and build slit trenches for your infantry. Your scout should go forward to spot for your AT guns: Be sure to "hold attack", as without these scouts your AT Guns may get flanked by Allied armor. You may also want to create a medic bunker further back in the event of a full out allied assault. Your trenches will draw the wrath of the allied war machine, so be patient. Use your falls to cap surrounding areas.

Be sure to keep your initial forces together until you set up your strong point. Allied AI will swarm the region with Jeeps and Engineers, eventually followed by Riffles until the Tanks show up. You should have your slit trenches up by the time the infantry shows up, but certainly by the time the tanks arrive. Do not make more than two trenches, and do not make them too far apart. Your AT guns should have no problem taking care of allied armor with scouts up front, but they will quickly fall if your scouts die. Be sure to use mines, and lots of them. They are not as strong as vCOH or OF, but they are also not as expensive. They are greatly worth it though, and can make a large open field very troublesome for an armor rush.

Do not use your Hetzer as a primary attack weapon. Use it as a reaction force to armor that gets too close to your advancing troops. If you send them forward, Allied Tank destroyers will eat them alive. Side or rear hits are instant death.

After you get FTP, go right hand side and get ready for your super tank, which you probably wont need, but is good just in case your AI ally falters and leaves you having to having to destroy an armor push on your flanks.


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COL.TIKER

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Re: 7th Army Start

« Reply #1 on: February 08, 2009, 05:50:49 PM »

what ai does this work with? 2 experts? because i find that versus experts i have to corner two of my jadgpanther LV/70 somewhere with a scout team behind them to hold off the enemy then i start getting ground bak after i can call in tiger I


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antirelic

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Re: 7th Army Start

« Reply #2 on: February 08, 2009, 06:38:20 PM »

This works against 2 AI expert, with 1 AI hard as my ally. The map I've been playing mostly is Foy. While the above build order is for an ideal series of events, its not meant to be set in stone. For example, if the cuts off the town between you and your ally, you might have to get an extra Falls before you get your AT gun in order to clear a path for your AT gun to get to the trenches. But dont hold off on those AT guns for too long, because if you do, it will be too late.

My first experience with this game was the same. I had to use my call in tank to drive back enemy armor, but this way gives you much more breathing room, allowing you to hold ground and take back and solidify your grip on the map. Remember, the AI is much better at capping and moving around erratically then a human player, so dont panic if areas get cut off unless you are in a bad situation... which you shouldnt be because you have trenches to hold out with. :-)

Oh, and I forgot to mention, you might want to turn a house near the trenches into a Forward HQ to re-man losses close to the front. The building in the background of one of those pictures is actually a forward hq.


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COL.TIKER

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Re: 7th Army Start

« Reply #3 on: February 08, 2009, 07:29:46 PM »

i am not really into the whole man pushed arty and AT cannons since the enemy calls way to much arty in and when 2 or 3 arty strikes happens at once it is impossible to move them out of the way


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antirelic

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Re: 7th Army Start

« Reply #4 on: February 09, 2009, 07:54:05 AM »

I'm not a big fan of AT guns for the same reason, however, the simple fact remains that the allied side is going to have armor out on the field well before you have any real AT capabilities (the StuG is even worse in BoTB v2 than in vCOH). This is even more so true for 7th Army than the 5th or 6th. With artillery in BotB costing munitions, there is only so much of it to go around, and if the allies are using arty to snuff your AT, then they are not using it on other more dangerous abilities such as Field Repair or AWM.

Besides, the AI focuses more on nuking your trenches with arty and pretty much just ignores your AT. Also, your AT should be in the "fog of war" and you should have scouts out in front of your trenches, with "fire at will" turned off. This will make it very difficult for a human opponent to target your AT as firing blindly into the FOW very wasteful (which is EXACTLY what you want). Remember, since arty costs MU, you want them to waste it as much as possible. Arty is not that scary, and AT guns are relatively cheap (and can be recrewed).

The focus of the 7th Army is to bleed your opponent to death over the course of the game, not to nock the life out of them with one punch. This is accomplished by using brutal infantry (falls) in hard to kill trenches. Holding critical fuel will make it more and more difficult for the allies to field armor, forcing them to use excess MP on infantry, which is where 7th Infantry wins the war.

Using the above tactic, a typical game will not take much more than 30 minutes, and this includes destroying both enemy bases. If you want, I can post a reply on the GR website and link it here.


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COL.TIKER

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Re: 7th Army Start

« Reply #5 on: February 09, 2009, 09:43:15 AM »

lol the human oppoents wont be able to hit what they cant see with arty but the CPU always seem to get them. i find that the best way to take out tanks without tanks of ur own is to use 3 or 4 squads of infantry that has panzerfaust. the troops are cheap to replace and 4 panzerfaust guranntees a kill on the tank. but normally when playing with ai teammate they build too much pumas which destracts the attention of the enemy tanks anyways


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ShiningBuddha

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Re: 7th Army Start

« Reply #6 on: May 29, 2009, 01:51:53 AM »

I haven't watched the attached replay, but I would swap Mgs, with grens in your build order simply because these can not only dominate chokepoint areas but devastate infantry moving through open fields, whereas Grens are going to cost you munitions before you can counter the higher rifle numbers. That means you're less likely to end up running around behind the frontlinechasing down engineers and scouts who slipped past.

Have you tried adding any mortars to that strategy? I personally find them really useful for adding that little bit more firepower to any infantry battle, and they're also useful for fending off light vehicles, or even adding a couple of effective attacks when faced with a medium vehicle.

Quote from: antirelic

Remember, the AI is much better at capping and moving around erratically then a human player, so dont panic if areas get cut off unless you are in a bad situation...

If you're having troubles with being outmicro'd behind your frontlines, I'd try keeping an assault squad in a half reserved position, or even a light vehicle; beng cut off in itself is a bad situation both economically and combat-wise.

Quote from: antirelic

if the allies are using arty to snuff your AT, then they are not using it on other more dangerous abilities such as Field Repair or AWM.

If your enemy is expert they'll be buying anything they want with their resources Tongue

and Col. Tiker is right, the AI calls artillery in on your positions, not on what it can 'see'.

This strategy is very balanced, I think it would work best as a basic structure for PvP fights. It's a shame the AI is broken with 2.5xx versions else I'd like to test and use this against the usual tank-spam


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