0
- Главная/
- Игры/
- Steel Panthers/
- Читы
Maintained by Hong Ooi
Revision: 1.1, 24 September, 1996
Contents:
Introduction
Copyright
Disclaimer
Credits
Before the battle
How do I get mines and dragons teeth?
How do I get my troops to dig in?
How do I upgrade my units?
Why can't I upgrade to Jagdpanthers?
When can I buy artillery?
When can I buy aircraft?
When can I buy mines and fortifications?
How do I do a preliminary bombardment?
How do I load my infantry on to vehicles?
How do I buy elite units (SS, rangers, paratroopers etc)?
Why do my support units get new equipment before my core?
In long campaigns, why does it sometimes seem to skip an entire year between
battles?
Why do I get non-historical battles (e.g., Polish Assault) in long campaigns?
Why can't I upgrade my (motorized) infantry's trucks to halftracks?
How do I stack units during deployment?
Experience, morale and suppression
How do experience and morale work?
What is suppression, and what does it do?
How do pinning and retreating work?
How do I get rid of suppression?
How do I unbutton my tanks?
How do I get my crew back in their abandoned tank?
How does a leader's rating affect accuracy?
Armour and infantry
How is accuracy calculated?
How do I stack units during a battle?
Does gun caliber affect armour penetration?
What do the armour thickness numbers mean?
How do I fire only my machineguns, or main gun?
Why do I lose main gun shots when I only fire machineguns?
What different sorts of ammo are there?
How do I force my tank to use HVAP ammo?
How are turreted and non-turreted vehicles vehicles different?
How do I destroy an abandoned tank/pillbox?
What is "OP" fire?
Is 0 range useful for anything?
Why can't I do overruns?
Why does the AI like tanks so much?
Sometimes I'm told my squad is "assaulting" a tank. What's this mean?
How can I make sure they always assault?
How do I stop the other side from assaulting my tanks?
How do I detect mines?
How do I clear a mined hex?
How do I use barges and barge-carriers?
How do I get my engineers to use their flamethrowers?
How do I lay smoke screens?
What effect do smoke screens have?
What effect do shell craters have?
How can I start fires?
What effect do fires have?
How do I destroy bridges?
What happens to a unit on a destroyed bridge?
What benefits are there to being on a higher elevation?
Artillery and aircraft
What's a spotter for?
How do I call in fire support?
Why doesn't my Inf-Gun show up on the Bombardment menu?
Why can't I target certain hexes for indirect fire?
Does the computer artillery cheat?
Does on-board artillery have any use in this game?
Can I direct fire on-board mortars and artillery?
What's the difference between Panzer Artillery, Infantry Artillery, VG
Artillery, Corps Artillery, etc?
How do I use aircraft?
Why can I use some aircraft lots of times but not others?
Why does the AI take so many aircraft?
Why doesn't my AA shoot at planes?
Why don't they ever seem to shoot anything down?
Why did my plane attack my own unit?
The Scenario Editor
How do I edit Victory Hexes?
Can I delete Victory Hexes?
How do I build straight north-south roads?
How do I create a startup description for my scenario?
How do I set the length of a scenario?
What are reaction points for?
What are waypoints for?
Can I tell the AI whether to stay put or be aggressive?
Why do my units retreat in the wrong direction?
Is there a limit to the number of unit types in an OB file?
Can I design my own mini-campaigns?
Can I use the doubler?
Side effects of the doubler
Why do my infantry units have passengers?
How do I avoid entrenching?
How do I entrench only Player 1 or 2?
How do I entrench only part of one player's units?
How do I get rid of entrenchments?
Can I get a running number for doubled formations?
Patches and bugs
What patches are available?
Where can I download them?
What changes are implemented in each patch?
Which patches do I definitely need?
Do I need to install the patches in a set order?
Why doesn't the sound work?
Why does the game crash instantly when I start it?
When I load a saved game, all the smoke is gone. Is this a bug?
What other bugs are there?
I've found a new bug. Who should I tell?
Miscellaneous
How do I read the gun descriptions?
So what's this thing called SPEDIT?
Can my battle results affect the course of a long campaign? I.e., can I make
Germany win the war?
How do I play an email game?
Can I play a campaign game by email?
Will there be a modern-era version of Steel Panthers?
Are there any problems running SP on Windows 95 or OS/2?
Other resources
Introduction
============
This is a list of frequently asked questions (FAQ) about Steel Panthers, the
WWII tactical wargame from SSI. This list concentrates mostly on technical
issues, as opposed to tactics; that is, getting the program to do what you want
,
rather than ways to beat your opponent. There are a number of places you can go
to for tactical tips:
- If you have Usenet access, point your browser at the newsgroup
comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic.
- The Tankers' Homepage maintains a SP discussion page on the World Wide Web:
.
- The major online services, eg AOL and Compuserve, have discussion forums on
wargames in general and SP in particular.
- Pascal Ode offers a shareware strategy guide to SP. You can visit his
dedicated web site at or mai
l
him at <100257.1375@compuserve.com> for more details.
[Update: the Tankers Homepage has now closed down! It was good while it lasted,
guys, I'm sorry to see it go.]
Copyright
---------
This document is copyright (c) Hong Ooi, 1996 [or whoever I pass it on to].
Unauthorised modification or publication for profit is prohibited. Basically,
you can post this document WITHOUT MODIFICATION on public echos, discussion
forums and newsgroups; if you want to put it in a magazine or magazine
supplement which is to be sold for the purposes of making money, you should ask
me first.
The material contributed by Pascal Ode (and attributed to him) was collected
from a number of sources, including discussions on Compuserve forums and an
article by Peter Smith in Strategy Plus magazine.
Disclaimer
----------
Information in this document is not guaranteed to be correct. I've made every
effort to ensure it _is_ correct, but by Murphy's Law something always slips
through. Similarly, I take no responsibility for any horrible things that might
happen to your computer/house/life/neighbourhood/continent if you use the advic
e
contained herein. You uses it, you takes your chances!
Credits
-------
This document was put together with the help of a lot of people, including:
John Waters
Arnaud Bouis
Paul Calvi
Mikkel
Tuomas Seijavuori
Martin Rapier
Bill Thacker
Pascal Ode <100257.1375@compuserve.com>
sstale@sn.no (Staale Sannerud)
Tim (whoever you are :) )
...as well as many others.
Responsibility for any errors in this document is taken by the maintainer. If
you find a mistake, or you think something should be included but isn't, or if
you think something is included that should be deleted, send me an email at
hong@magna.com.au and I'll fix it.
Before the battle
=================
How do I tell which version of SP I have?
-----------------------------------------
Move the mouse cursor over the leftmost button in the lower row on the SP main
menu screen ("Design your own battle", or whatever the button reads.) The
version number will then appear in the title bar at the top of the screen.
-- sstale@sn.no (Staale Sannerud
)
How do I get mines and dragons teeth?
-------------------------------------
Mines and/or dragons teeth are only available if you're playing a "defend"
scenario.
First, you have to buy them from the Misc menu, when you're selecting your
forces. What you buy is a "pool" of points, which you can allocate to either
mines or dragons teeth (1 point=1 mined/obstructed hex). In the deployment
screen, press X; this will let you select which hexes to mine. You can place
multiple mines/dragons teeth per hex; this just makes it more difficult to clea
r
and (for mines) more likely to inflict damage on anyone passing through.
How do I get my troops to dig in?
---------------------------------
If you
re playing an "assault" or "defend" scenario, your infantry and on-board
artillery automatically starts the battle entrenched. You cannot entrench DURIN
G
the battle (although infantry can re-occupy abandoned trenches).
Your vehicles will only start the game entrenched if you're the defender in a
"defend" scenario.
Neither artillery nor vehicles can re-occupy abandoned positions.
How do I upgrade my units?
--------------------------
In the campaign battles, a player can upgrade his/her units between battles.
After each battle, you'll see the repair/upgrade units screen. Click on the
"Change" button, then click on the unit you wish to upgrade. You will be
presented with a list of units you can upgrade to. Just click on the desired
unit.
You can only upgrade within each "type", ie armour/artillery/infantry. So for
example, you can change a Pz-IIIj (armour) to a Panther, or a rifle squad
(infantry) to an engineer squad, but you can't change a Pz-IIIj to an engineer
squad. The only exception is the A0 unit, which can be switched between armour
and infantry as desired.
Note that upgrading units results in loss of experience! You will lose about 5
experience points every time you upgrade.
Why can't I upgrade to Jagdpanthers?
------------------------------------
This is a bug in versions 1.1 to 1.17x. Basically if you
re playing the Germans,
there are "too many" types of units late in the war to fit on the menu. This ha
s
been fixed in 1.18x. (On the other hand, the menu now lists all sorts of
"garbage" items -- Russian infantry squads, British planes, mines, etc. I
haven
t tried choosing one of these garbage items yet. Anyone been game to find
out the effect of this new bug?)
--
This is a bug in the upgrade screen. If there are more upgrade options than fi
t
on one screen, the extra options cannot be selected. There is a very short (on
e
month) time window, immediately after the Jagdpanther is introduced, where it
will appear for selection; after that, the appearance of new tanks forces it of
f
the screen.
-- Bill Thacker
When can I buy artillery?
-------------------------
In the canned scenarios, you sometimes have it and you sometimes don't. In the
campaign battles, you have to buy artillery, just like tanks, halftracks or
infantry. If you don't buy any arty, you can't use it.
There is a difference between off-board artillery and on-board artillery. Off-
board artillery can only be purchased if you are playing an "assault" or
"defend" battle. On-board artillery, like mortars or self-propelled guns like
the US Priest or German Hummel, can always be purchased (if you have enough
points).
When can I buy aircraft?
------------------------
Aircraft availability depends on the year and the weather. Basically, the
Germans and Japanese can count on air superiority for the first half of the war
.
This means they have a greater chance of having air support available. The
opposite goes for the Allies -- they can count on having air support in the
latter part of the war. Also, summer months generally have better chances of
aircraft being available.
As far as I know, it's not possible for both sides to buy aircraft in the one
battle. On the other hand, it
s quite possible for both sides to NOT be able to
buy aircraft -- so just because it
s 1939 and your Germans are invading Poland,
that doesn't mean you'll definitely be able to buy Stukas for support.
When can I buy mines and fortifications?
----------------------------------------
Only when you
re fighting a "defend" battle. Mines and forts appear on the Misc
menu when you're making your selections.
How do I do a preliminary bombardment?
--------------------------------------
On the deployment screen, make sure you have your chosen spotter unit selected,
then click on the bombard icon or press B on the keyboard. You will see a list
of the artillery available to you. Click on a hex where you want your
bombardment to land, then click on the Bombard icon for the unit you want to
fire at that hex. Repeat for all arty/aircraft units. The bombardment will
arrive just before the first game turn.
If you want to lay down a smoke screen, follow the same procedure, except that
instead of clicking on the Bombard icon, click on the Smoke icon.
How do I load my infantry on to vehicles?
-----------------------------------------
Select the infantry unit, then press L or click on the Load button. Click on th
e
vehicle on which you want to load the infantry.
How do I buy elite units (SS, rangers, paratroopers etc)?
---------------------------------------------------------
If you're playing a campaign game or a generated battle, you can't. SP doesn't
provide any units with special morale or experience. There are units like SS
panzer platoons, commando squads, or fallschirmjager (paratroop) platoons, but
this is a bit misleading: commando squads have extra weapons compared to normal
infantry, and SS panzer platoons have five tanks compared to the normal four,
but otherwise these units are of average quality.
If you're creating your own scenario, of course, there's nothing to stop you
from making "elite" units of your own.
Why do my support units get new equipment before my core?
---------------------------------------------------------
That
s just a quirk of the way the long campaign works. You get to upgrade your
units AFTER each battle, rather than BEFORE. Say your first battle is in
December 1941. After the battle, you get a chance to upgrade to whatever
equipment is available in December 1941. But the next battle might be in June
1942, so when you go to buy support units, they'll have equipment relating to
June 1942. If you survive this battle, you can then upgrade to June 1942
equipment as well.
--
It's a matter of timing. Say you start a campaign in 1/41. You buy your core
units, buy support, and fight a battle. You can then repair/upgrade your core
units; all of this happens in 1/41. Next, the calendar advances to your next
battle, in 3/41. You buy support units, and they include everything available
in 3/41: but your core units are still from 1/41. After you finish the battle,
they can be upgraded to 3/41 equipment.
-- Bill Thacker
In long campaigns, why does it sometimes seem to skip an entire year between
battles?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The game skips over periods when, historically, there was little or no ground
action on the part of your nationality. For example, historically the German
Army didn
t take part in much fighting between June 1940 (when France fell) and
April 1941 (when Germany invaded Yugoslavia). So if you
re playing the Germans,
you won't see much action in this period either. The same goes for the other
nationalities, eg the Russo-Finnish war concluded in March 1940, and the
Russians were then mostly idle until the Germans invaded in June 1941.
Why do I get non-historical battles (e.g., Polish Assault) in long campaigns?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The battles are generated more-or-less randomly in long campaigns (as opposed t
o
short campaigns, which are designed with a realistic "script.") You will get
accurate theaters and locales (i.e., no combat in Western Europe in 1942, and n
o
battles at Stalingrad in 1944), but the type of engagement is apparently random
.
-- Bill Thacker
Why can't I upgrade my (motorized) infantry's trucks to halftracks?
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The type of infantry you get (foot, motorized or mechanized) is fixed when you
start a campaign. At the moment there is no way to change this once the campaig
n
is underway.
--
Choosing motorized or mechanized infantry increases the infantry
s cost, but as
a bonus their transport is provided "free", without counting against your 48-
unit limit. This "organic" transport cannot be accessed for upgrades. You will
end the war with whatever sort of transport you choose at the beginning of the
campaign.
-- Bill Thacker
How do I stack units during deployment?
---------------------------------------
Normally you're not supposed to stack units during deployment, but there is a
workaround that will let you stack as many _infantry_ units (not vehicles) in a
hex as you like. Put a vehicle in the hex where you want your men. Load the
first infantry squad on the vehicle and unload it again. It will appear in the
hex. Repeat with every squad.
--
I've found two ways, both by accident (sort of). They're kind of kludgy, but
they work.
First, you can load, then unload a carrier vehicle. The passengers dismount int
o
the same hex as the carrier. This is how you may put tanks (or HT's) and
infantry in the same hex. Placing a vehicle first, then loading/unloading
successive squads of an infantry platoon on it could conceivably place the
entire platoon in one hex.
Second, you can deploy two formations so that they overlap one another. This
will tend to put more than one unit in a hex. (This uses the "formation deploy"
button.)
By combining the two techniques, you might conceivably place several vehicles
*and* several squads in a hex. We might consider this a bug, since we cannot
*move* more than two units into a hex under normal conditions ... but I
ve seen
two loaded vehicles in the same hex "drop their loads," as it were [g] when
taking fire, resulting in four units in the hex.
If you try this ... expect airstrikes and artillery [g}. You've created a
*really* nice target.
-- Mitch Cobb
Experience, morale and suppression
==================================
How do experience and morale work?
----------------------------------
The quality of your troops is governed by two statistics, experience and morale
.
In general, green troops have low values for both of these, while highly
experienced troops have high values. Highly experienced units have better
chances to spot enemy units and to hit when they fire their weapons. Units with
high morale are less likely to suffer suppression effects (see below) and are
less likely to break and run when taking severe casualties.
Different nationalities have different base experience and morale values. These
values are also affected by the year. In general, the Germans and Japanese have
the highest experience and morale early in the war, but their troop quality
slowly declines after 1942. The Allies have low experience and morale early on,
but gradually improve.
Here are the morale and experience tables of Steel Panthers for each nationalit
y
and year of the war. Courtesy of Jim Wirth.
Revision: 1.1, 24 September, 1996
Contents:
Introduction
Copyright
Disclaimer
Credits
Before the battle
How do I get mines and dragons teeth?
How do I get my troops to dig in?
How do I upgrade my units?
Why can't I upgrade to Jagdpanthers?
When can I buy artillery?
When can I buy aircraft?
When can I buy mines and fortifications?
How do I do a preliminary bombardment?
How do I load my infantry on to vehicles?
How do I buy elite units (SS, rangers, paratroopers etc)?
Why do my support units get new equipment before my core?
In long campaigns, why does it sometimes seem to skip an entire year between
battles?
Why do I get non-historical battles (e.g., Polish Assault) in long campaigns?
Why can't I upgrade my (motorized) infantry's trucks to halftracks?
How do I stack units during deployment?
Experience, morale and suppression
How do experience and morale work?
What is suppression, and what does it do?
How do pinning and retreating work?
How do I get rid of suppression?
How do I unbutton my tanks?
How do I get my crew back in their abandoned tank?
How does a leader's rating affect accuracy?
Armour and infantry
How is accuracy calculated?
How do I stack units during a battle?
Does gun caliber affect armour penetration?
What do the armour thickness numbers mean?
How do I fire only my machineguns, or main gun?
Why do I lose main gun shots when I only fire machineguns?
What different sorts of ammo are there?
How do I force my tank to use HVAP ammo?
How are turreted and non-turreted vehicles vehicles different?
How do I destroy an abandoned tank/pillbox?
What is "OP" fire?
Is 0 range useful for anything?
Why can't I do overruns?
Why does the AI like tanks so much?
Sometimes I'm told my squad is "assaulting" a tank. What's this mean?
How can I make sure they always assault?
How do I stop the other side from assaulting my tanks?
How do I detect mines?
How do I clear a mined hex?
How do I use barges and barge-carriers?
How do I get my engineers to use their flamethrowers?
How do I lay smoke screens?
What effect do smoke screens have?
What effect do shell craters have?
How can I start fires?
What effect do fires have?
How do I destroy bridges?
What happens to a unit on a destroyed bridge?
What benefits are there to being on a higher elevation?
Artillery and aircraft
What's a spotter for?
How do I call in fire support?
Why doesn't my Inf-Gun show up on the Bombardment menu?
Why can't I target certain hexes for indirect fire?
Does the computer artillery cheat?
Does on-board artillery have any use in this game?
Can I direct fire on-board mortars and artillery?
What's the difference between Panzer Artillery, Infantry Artillery, VG
Artillery, Corps Artillery, etc?
How do I use aircraft?
Why can I use some aircraft lots of times but not others?
Why does the AI take so many aircraft?
Why doesn't my AA shoot at planes?
Why don't they ever seem to shoot anything down?
Why did my plane attack my own unit?
The Scenario Editor
How do I edit Victory Hexes?
Can I delete Victory Hexes?
How do I build straight north-south roads?
How do I create a startup description for my scenario?
How do I set the length of a scenario?
What are reaction points for?
What are waypoints for?
Can I tell the AI whether to stay put or be aggressive?
Why do my units retreat in the wrong direction?
Is there a limit to the number of unit types in an OB file?
Can I design my own mini-campaigns?
Can I use the doubler?
Side effects of the doubler
Why do my infantry units have passengers?
How do I avoid entrenching?
How do I entrench only Player 1 or 2?
How do I entrench only part of one player's units?
How do I get rid of entrenchments?
Can I get a running number for doubled formations?
Patches and bugs
What patches are available?
Where can I download them?
What changes are implemented in each patch?
Which patches do I definitely need?
Do I need to install the patches in a set order?
Why doesn't the sound work?
Why does the game crash instantly when I start it?
When I load a saved game, all the smoke is gone. Is this a bug?
What other bugs are there?
I've found a new bug. Who should I tell?
Miscellaneous
How do I read the gun descriptions?
So what's this thing called SPEDIT?
Can my battle results affect the course of a long campaign? I.e., can I make
Germany win the war?
How do I play an email game?
Can I play a campaign game by email?
Will there be a modern-era version of Steel Panthers?
Are there any problems running SP on Windows 95 or OS/2?
Other resources
Introduction
============
This is a list of frequently asked questions (FAQ) about Steel Panthers, the
WWII tactical wargame from SSI. This list concentrates mostly on technical
issues, as opposed to tactics; that is, getting the program to do what you want
,
rather than ways to beat your opponent. There are a number of places you can go
to for tactical tips:
- If you have Usenet access, point your browser at the newsgroup
comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic.
- The Tankers' Homepage maintains a SP discussion page on the World Wide Web:
.
- The major online services, eg AOL and Compuserve, have discussion forums on
wargames in general and SP in particular.
- Pascal Ode offers a shareware strategy guide to SP. You can visit his
dedicated web site at or mai
l
him at <100257.1375@compuserve.com> for more details.
[Update: the Tankers Homepage has now closed down! It was good while it lasted,
guys, I'm sorry to see it go.]
Copyright
---------
This document is copyright (c) Hong Ooi, 1996 [or whoever I pass it on to].
Unauthorised modification or publication for profit is prohibited. Basically,
you can post this document WITHOUT MODIFICATION on public echos, discussion
forums and newsgroups; if you want to put it in a magazine or magazine
supplement which is to be sold for the purposes of making money, you should ask
me first.
The material contributed by Pascal Ode (and attributed to him) was collected
from a number of sources, including discussions on Compuserve forums and an
article by Peter Smith in Strategy Plus magazine.
Disclaimer
----------
Information in this document is not guaranteed to be correct. I've made every
effort to ensure it _is_ correct, but by Murphy's Law something always slips
through. Similarly, I take no responsibility for any horrible things that might
happen to your computer/house/life/neighbourhood/continent if you use the advic
e
contained herein. You uses it, you takes your chances!
Credits
-------
This document was put together with the help of a lot of people, including:
John Waters
Arnaud Bouis
Paul Calvi
Mikkel
Tuomas Seijavuori
Martin Rapier
Bill Thacker
Pascal Ode <100257.1375@compuserve.com>
sstale@sn.no (Staale Sannerud)
Tim (whoever you are :) )
...as well as many others.
Responsibility for any errors in this document is taken by the maintainer. If
you find a mistake, or you think something should be included but isn't, or if
you think something is included that should be deleted, send me an email at
hong@magna.com.au and I'll fix it.
Before the battle
=================
How do I tell which version of SP I have?
-----------------------------------------
Move the mouse cursor over the leftmost button in the lower row on the SP main
menu screen ("Design your own battle", or whatever the button reads.) The
version number will then appear in the title bar at the top of the screen.
-- sstale@sn.no (Staale Sannerud
)
How do I get mines and dragons teeth?
-------------------------------------
Mines and/or dragons teeth are only available if you're playing a "defend"
scenario.
First, you have to buy them from the Misc menu, when you're selecting your
forces. What you buy is a "pool" of points, which you can allocate to either
mines or dragons teeth (1 point=1 mined/obstructed hex). In the deployment
screen, press X; this will let you select which hexes to mine. You can place
multiple mines/dragons teeth per hex; this just makes it more difficult to clea
r
and (for mines) more likely to inflict damage on anyone passing through.
How do I get my troops to dig in?
---------------------------------
If you
re playing an "assault" or "defend" scenario, your infantry and on-board
artillery automatically starts the battle entrenched. You cannot entrench DURIN
G
the battle (although infantry can re-occupy abandoned trenches).
Your vehicles will only start the game entrenched if you're the defender in a
"defend" scenario.
Neither artillery nor vehicles can re-occupy abandoned positions.
How do I upgrade my units?
--------------------------
In the campaign battles, a player can upgrade his/her units between battles.
After each battle, you'll see the repair/upgrade units screen. Click on the
"Change" button, then click on the unit you wish to upgrade. You will be
presented with a list of units you can upgrade to. Just click on the desired
unit.
You can only upgrade within each "type", ie armour/artillery/infantry. So for
example, you can change a Pz-IIIj (armour) to a Panther, or a rifle squad
(infantry) to an engineer squad, but you can't change a Pz-IIIj to an engineer
squad. The only exception is the A0 unit, which can be switched between armour
and infantry as desired.
Note that upgrading units results in loss of experience! You will lose about 5
experience points every time you upgrade.
Why can't I upgrade to Jagdpanthers?
------------------------------------
This is a bug in versions 1.1 to 1.17x. Basically if you
re playing the Germans,
there are "too many" types of units late in the war to fit on the menu. This ha
s
been fixed in 1.18x. (On the other hand, the menu now lists all sorts of
"garbage" items -- Russian infantry squads, British planes, mines, etc. I
haven
t tried choosing one of these garbage items yet. Anyone been game to find
out the effect of this new bug?)
--
This is a bug in the upgrade screen. If there are more upgrade options than fi
t
on one screen, the extra options cannot be selected. There is a very short (on
e
month) time window, immediately after the Jagdpanther is introduced, where it
will appear for selection; after that, the appearance of new tanks forces it of
f
the screen.
-- Bill Thacker
When can I buy artillery?
-------------------------
In the canned scenarios, you sometimes have it and you sometimes don't. In the
campaign battles, you have to buy artillery, just like tanks, halftracks or
infantry. If you don't buy any arty, you can't use it.
There is a difference between off-board artillery and on-board artillery. Off-
board artillery can only be purchased if you are playing an "assault" or
"defend" battle. On-board artillery, like mortars or self-propelled guns like
the US Priest or German Hummel, can always be purchased (if you have enough
points).
When can I buy aircraft?
------------------------
Aircraft availability depends on the year and the weather. Basically, the
Germans and Japanese can count on air superiority for the first half of the war
.
This means they have a greater chance of having air support available. The
opposite goes for the Allies -- they can count on having air support in the
latter part of the war. Also, summer months generally have better chances of
aircraft being available.
As far as I know, it's not possible for both sides to buy aircraft in the one
battle. On the other hand, it
s quite possible for both sides to NOT be able to
buy aircraft -- so just because it
s 1939 and your Germans are invading Poland,
that doesn't mean you'll definitely be able to buy Stukas for support.
When can I buy mines and fortifications?
----------------------------------------
Only when you
re fighting a "defend" battle. Mines and forts appear on the Misc
menu when you're making your selections.
How do I do a preliminary bombardment?
--------------------------------------
On the deployment screen, make sure you have your chosen spotter unit selected,
then click on the bombard icon or press B on the keyboard. You will see a list
of the artillery available to you. Click on a hex where you want your
bombardment to land, then click on the Bombard icon for the unit you want to
fire at that hex. Repeat for all arty/aircraft units. The bombardment will
arrive just before the first game turn.
If you want to lay down a smoke screen, follow the same procedure, except that
instead of clicking on the Bombard icon, click on the Smoke icon.
How do I load my infantry on to vehicles?
-----------------------------------------
Select the infantry unit, then press L or click on the Load button. Click on th
e
vehicle on which you want to load the infantry.
How do I buy elite units (SS, rangers, paratroopers etc)?
---------------------------------------------------------
If you're playing a campaign game or a generated battle, you can't. SP doesn't
provide any units with special morale or experience. There are units like SS
panzer platoons, commando squads, or fallschirmjager (paratroop) platoons, but
this is a bit misleading: commando squads have extra weapons compared to normal
infantry, and SS panzer platoons have five tanks compared to the normal four,
but otherwise these units are of average quality.
If you're creating your own scenario, of course, there's nothing to stop you
from making "elite" units of your own.
Why do my support units get new equipment before my core?
---------------------------------------------------------
That
s just a quirk of the way the long campaign works. You get to upgrade your
units AFTER each battle, rather than BEFORE. Say your first battle is in
December 1941. After the battle, you get a chance to upgrade to whatever
equipment is available in December 1941. But the next battle might be in June
1942, so when you go to buy support units, they'll have equipment relating to
June 1942. If you survive this battle, you can then upgrade to June 1942
equipment as well.
--
It's a matter of timing. Say you start a campaign in 1/41. You buy your core
units, buy support, and fight a battle. You can then repair/upgrade your core
units; all of this happens in 1/41. Next, the calendar advances to your next
battle, in 3/41. You buy support units, and they include everything available
in 3/41: but your core units are still from 1/41. After you finish the battle,
they can be upgraded to 3/41 equipment.
-- Bill Thacker
In long campaigns, why does it sometimes seem to skip an entire year between
battles?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The game skips over periods when, historically, there was little or no ground
action on the part of your nationality. For example, historically the German
Army didn
t take part in much fighting between June 1940 (when France fell) and
April 1941 (when Germany invaded Yugoslavia). So if you
re playing the Germans,
you won't see much action in this period either. The same goes for the other
nationalities, eg the Russo-Finnish war concluded in March 1940, and the
Russians were then mostly idle until the Germans invaded in June 1941.
Why do I get non-historical battles (e.g., Polish Assault) in long campaigns?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The battles are generated more-or-less randomly in long campaigns (as opposed t
o
short campaigns, which are designed with a realistic "script.") You will get
accurate theaters and locales (i.e., no combat in Western Europe in 1942, and n
o
battles at Stalingrad in 1944), but the type of engagement is apparently random
.
-- Bill Thacker
Why can't I upgrade my (motorized) infantry's trucks to halftracks?
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The type of infantry you get (foot, motorized or mechanized) is fixed when you
start a campaign. At the moment there is no way to change this once the campaig
n
is underway.
--
Choosing motorized or mechanized infantry increases the infantry
s cost, but as
a bonus their transport is provided "free", without counting against your 48-
unit limit. This "organic" transport cannot be accessed for upgrades. You will
end the war with whatever sort of transport you choose at the beginning of the
campaign.
-- Bill Thacker
How do I stack units during deployment?
---------------------------------------
Normally you're not supposed to stack units during deployment, but there is a
workaround that will let you stack as many _infantry_ units (not vehicles) in a
hex as you like. Put a vehicle in the hex where you want your men. Load the
first infantry squad on the vehicle and unload it again. It will appear in the
hex. Repeat with every squad.
--
I've found two ways, both by accident (sort of). They're kind of kludgy, but
they work.
First, you can load, then unload a carrier vehicle. The passengers dismount int
o
the same hex as the carrier. This is how you may put tanks (or HT's) and
infantry in the same hex. Placing a vehicle first, then loading/unloading
successive squads of an infantry platoon on it could conceivably place the
entire platoon in one hex.
Second, you can deploy two formations so that they overlap one another. This
will tend to put more than one unit in a hex. (This uses the "formation deploy"
button.)
By combining the two techniques, you might conceivably place several vehicles
*and* several squads in a hex. We might consider this a bug, since we cannot
*move* more than two units into a hex under normal conditions ... but I
ve seen
two loaded vehicles in the same hex "drop their loads," as it were [g] when
taking fire, resulting in four units in the hex.
If you try this ... expect airstrikes and artillery [g}. You've created a
*really* nice target.
-- Mitch Cobb
Experience, morale and suppression
==================================
How do experience and morale work?
----------------------------------
The quality of your troops is governed by two statistics, experience and morale
.
In general, green troops have low values for both of these, while highly
experienced troops have high values. Highly experienced units have better
chances to spot enemy units and to hit when they fire their weapons. Units with
high morale are less likely to suffer suppression effects (see below) and are
less likely to break and run when taking severe casualties.
Different nationalities have different base experience and morale values. These
values are also affected by the year. In general, the Germans and Japanese have
the highest experience and morale early in the war, but their troop quality
slowly declines after 1942. The Allies have low experience and morale early on,
but gradually improve.
Here are the morale and experience tables of Steel Panthers for each nationalit
y
and year of the war. Courtesy of Jim Wirth.