The Impressions of a Long-Time Panzer Corps Player

[Gnarly]

One more suggestion.
It would be nice if units could do a more realistic "rear guard" or strategic withdrawal. As it is now, if your unit fires, it can't move.
So it either has to give up the position without a fight or you end up throwing it away.
Too often, a unit is in a fortified position, particularly on a river bank, and if you want to move it you can't fire at the exposed & vulnerable enemy.

Why not add a new option to the movement & fire mechanism?
If a unit has been sitting in a fixed position, it can fire and then withdraw, but maybe with a movement penalty.

[monkspider]

After playing a bit more, I have come to revise a few of my opinions.

I now think that Order of Battle is probably about equal in terms of land combat to Panzer Corps. I have come to appreciate the supply and morale system even more, and I like that light and heavy tanks now have more differentiation with the light tanks being "light tread". One thing I have come to realize though is that the game seems to favor the attacker more than Panzer Corps. With artillery and strategic bombers, I feel that even the most entrenched, defensible position can be fairly easily overcome. I still think some limited form of defensive artillery fire would help here.

I also think the air combat isn't as inscrutable as I thought it was at first. It is a pretty clear improvement to Panzer Corps.

I also really appreciate more how different the two factions play. In Panzer Corps, different countries had different strengths and weaknesses at various points in the war, but ultimately they all played very similar to each other. In Order of Battle, the United States and Japan actually feel significantly different from each other, and that is a great thing! I hope this differentiation is expanded on even more in the future.

[Longasc]

@Monkspider I am back at Leyte, a huge scenario so will need some time to play through that. Now with more RP and better forces, so should work out, just will take time.

I got the impression you managed to complete the Japanese and/or the US campaign?

Can you compare them? I somehow got the impression that the US campaign is harder to players as I never saw anyone bitching about a Japanese campaign scenario! I feel always a bit short on RP for upgrades in the US campaign.

[monkspider]

I haven't completed either one yet! I started as Japan but got my campaign cut short by a bug. I started a US campaign, got to New Georgia when I realized, like you, my core was insufficient. With the new patch I started over as the US and am up to Okinawa now.

I agree though that the US seems harder than Japan, which is odd since I expected the reverse for sure. Resources have been very tight for me as the US, only now, at Okinawa, have I had enough resources for some lavish upgrades and purchases.

[Longasc]

Good to hear the RP roll in at Okinawa!

I wonder if it is possible to farm RP at Leyte, it's +60 per turn, twice the best income I ever had before in a scenario. So wonder if not taking the final objective but waiting a few more turns might be worth it. Would be nice if those RP would be awarded even if you meet objectives earlier, but no idea if this is the case.

[Tarrak]

Good to hear the RP roll in at Okinawa!

I wonder if it is possible to farm RP at Leyte, it's +60 per turn, twice the best income I ever had before in a scenario. So wonder if not taking the final objective but waiting a few more turns might be worth it. Would be nice if those RP would be awarded even if you meet objectives earlier, but no idea if this is the case.

As far i know you get the prestige from leftover turns awarded if you accomplish the objectives earlier. I am not 100% certain tho.

[simcc]

Don't worry bout Okinawa hahaha IMO it's the easiest scenario in the campaign and you get a lot of RP

[adherbal]

Yes income for all turns "remaining on the clock" after you get an early victory will be added for the next mission.

Also, 50% of repair costs on auxiliary units is refunded at scenario end.

[Longasc]

Now that is good to know!

I wish there would be an ingame library with a listing of this and similar mechanics. It could also be in the manual.
I am afraid nobody who doesn't read the forum knows this and similar things, and that's a pity!

[Greven]

Agreed. Why is the manual so poor when it comes to details?

[RVallant]

Manuals are a thing of the past these days, they don't get sufficient resources applied to them.

As a PZC Player the main things I liked were the supply and Anti-tank support fire. AT Support fire was overlooked in PZC in my opinion, but there we go!

[StephenHopkins]

I'm a Panzer Corps player as well and I just downloaded Pacific; looking forward to it. I'm a casual gamer that had the original PG and PGIII Scorched Earth as well as Pacific General. Really happy to find this and glad I found this thread to read the observations and comparisions.

edit: glad to hear there is a manual... I'm a inveterate reader and prefer to have a reference. Too bad copies of older games like Battlestations Midway don't seem to come with them anymore...

[verstaubtgesicht]

Well, I found this a very appropriate topic, so I'm using the old original post to reply, but really ask questions before I commit to this game... Even though I'm late to the party, I'd appreciate some feedback in terms of comparing this to PanzerCorps, which I have played extensively for 4 yrs (finished all campaigns on increasing levels of difficulty up to and incl. Rommel and even some on Manstein), so PzC is the gold standard for me. When I asked which game I should look into next at the PzC forum, people recommended OOB. My impressions and questions so far:

The Good: more sophisticated supply mgmt, swap adjacent units feature, more diverse specialization, AT support, better naval combat

The Bad/questionable:
- Unfriendly and unreliable GUI - slow/difficult to navigate the map, 1-2x per hr the screen goes "crazy" (blinking in a rainbow of colors, must restart), I am using Steam on Mac, is this maybe the reason?
- Hard to predict the decrease of the effectiveness (is this kind of like suppression in PzC?) when bombarding - in PzC it was clear from the predict window not only how many kills are predicted. but also how much suppression. One of the main tactical moves in PzC was surrender - surround a unit, predict the suppression, and formulate attack based on this. Is there any such thing here?
- Is there arty "back-up" like in PzC, i.e. if an arty is behind a unit, then when that unit gets attacked arty fires? I could not test it in the intros offered.
- I don't see how one can choose between different range of outcomes ("chess", "modified chess" and "random" in PzC). It seems that this is kind of like "modified chess", outcomes are very close to prediction +/- 1. I prefer the less predictable outcomes like "random" in PzC, incl. "rugged defense". More like real life, sometimes a highly outnumbered and outmatched units stood their ground, like at the Battle of the Bulge.

The real ugly:
-The fact that units cannot move after combat - I find this quite ridiculous! First, in real life this is possible. Second, if a unit can move and then attack, why couldn't it attack and then move? Most importantly, the combat mechanics are quite messed up, for example, one faces a Hobson's choice when a bomber is above a juicy target: if you bomb you re exposed to aa and fighter attack, if you leave you lose an opportunity...
- AI is really slow! I am not sure that it's compensated by being smart, though. that's a real weakness of PzC - bad AI - maybe not the case in OOB?
- Can't find "undo" button???
- The faux "free game" (a single pathetic scenario per pack), i.e. offensive marketing gimmick, and then shamelessly expensive DLC's - it seems much worse per scenario than PC, but maybe I'm mistaken?

So far, I am underwhelmed.

[Mojko]

Well, I found this a very appropriate topic, so I'm using the old original post to reply, but really ask questions before I commit to this game... Even though I'm late to the party, I'd appreciate some feedback in terms of comparing this to PanzerCorps, which I have played extensively for 4 yrs (finished all campaigns on increasing levels of difficulty up to and incl. Rommel and even some on Manstein), so PzC is the gold standard for me. When I asked which game I should look into next at the PzC forum, people recommended OOB.

Welocme to OOB. I myself am a PanzerCorps veteran and I also struggled a lot with OOB. I actually gave up in my initial attempt to play the game, but I gave it a second chance moths later and I don't regret it. My initial frustration was caused mostly by low transparency of the UI and game manual - you have to learn a lot by trial and error, but some were also caused by my own expectations. I expected the game to be played as PanzerCorps because it looks very familiar. I was wrong, very very wrong. The game is very much different, unit compositions are different, strategy is different. If you know PanzerKorps the best thing you can do is unlearn and learn new stuff from scratch. Is it worth it? Is OOB better than PzC? HELL YES!!!

My impressions and questions so far:

The Good: more sophisticated supply mgmt, swap adjacent units feature, more diverse specialisation, AT support, better naval combat

Here are several good things you missed (there are actually many more, but here are some major ones):

- predictable resource gain (you know how much RPs you get each turn, unlike PzC where you get some RPs between scenarios, but it's never clear)
- predictable rewards for objectives (you can do better planning if you know the objective reward)
- focus on unit synergy instead of single powerful units

The Bad/questionable:
- Unfriendly and unreliable GUI - slow/difficult to navigate the map, 1-2x per hr the screen goes "crazy" (blinking in a rainbow of colors, must restart), I am using Steam on Mac, is this maybe the reason?

Yes the UI is still an issue. Some units stats like sight range is still not available in the GUI for some reason. You also need to enable "advanced units stats" to actually see important units stats.

- Hard to predict the decrease of the effectiveness (is this kind of like suppression in PzC?) when bombarding - in PzC it was clear from the predict window not only how many kills are predicted. but also how much suppression.

There is no prediction, but OOB is much less random compared to PzC.

One of the main tactical moves in PzC was surrender - surround a unit, predict the suppression, and formulate attack based on this. Is there any such thing here?

No. A unit will always retreat to an empty space that is under your area of control if there is one. The retreating algorithm is actually more complex than that, but for the sake of basic explanation this should suffice for now. Thanks to this retreat mechanic it is much more difficult to actually kill a unit. Additionally more experienced units are much less likely to be killed off even while having small strength left. Even if your unit gets killed it can be revived later with some penalties.

So once again, you can do more planning. Keeping enough space for retreating units allow you to fight without using a single unit even on higher difficulties. This is also thanks to less random outcomes on the attacks and the fact that arty can't finish off units with small strength.

- Is there arty "back-up" like in PzC, i.e. if an arty is behind a unit, then when that unit gets attacked arty fires? I could not test it in the intros offered.

No, there isn't an arty support fire. Artillery is still very powerful when properly used.

- I don't see how one can choose between different range of outcomes ("chess", "modified chess" and "random" in PzC). It seems that this is kind of like "modified chess", outcomes are very close to prediction +/- 1. I prefer the less predictable outcomes like "random" in PzC, incl. "rugged defense". More like real life, sometimes a highly outnumbered and outmatched units stood their ground, like at the Battle of the Bulge.

It's much less random than PzC which is a good thing in strategy game.

The real ugly:
-The fact that units cannot move after combat - I find this quite ridiculous! First, in real life this is possible. Second, if a unit can move and then attack, why couldn't it attack and then move?

I was also outraged by this at first, but after a while I realised that it helps you make better strategic and tactical decisions because unit patterns are more predictable.

Most importantly, the combat mechanics are quite messed up, for example, one faces a Hobson's choice when a bomber is above a juicy target: if you bomb you re exposed to aa and fighter attack, if you leave you lose an opportunity...

After you bomb/strafe a ground target by a plane you can move the plane to adjacent hex. Additionally, if you force enemy ground unit to retreat you can move your ground unit to the newly vacant position.

- AI is really slow! I am not sure that it's compensated by being smart, though. that's a real weakness of PzC - bad AI - maybe not the case in OOB?

Yes, but the devs are making gradual improvements.

- Can't find "undo" button???

There isn't one. OOB gives you more predictability as I explained earlier, that's why we don't believe in second chances here in OOB

- The faux "free game" (a single pathetic scenario per pack), i.e. offensive marketing gimmick, and then shamelessly expensive DLC's - it seems much worse per scenario than PC, but maybe I'm mistaken?

OOB was originally sold as a standalone game containing US Pacific and Raising Sun campaigns. The rest of campaign were DLCs. Later they switched to the current model which makes every first scenario in every DLC available for free and the rest of the content is purchased as DLC. This allows you to play some content for free and also you have more flexibility of what you buy which I think is an improvement.

So far, I am underwhelmed.

Patience my friend, I'm sure you will grow to like OOB as I did. And now onward to victory!!!

[Horst]

@verstaubtgesicht: I know PC very well too.

GUI: why is it difficult to navigate? You can increase scroll speed and use the minimap. I have the next-active-unit and sleep functions assigned on my extra mouse buttons, so scrolling and finding units is rarely an issue.
If the display of graphic is going haywire after a while then it’s very likely an overheating issue. I have no idea about the Mac game version or hardware in general.

Effectiveness: reduction is heavily depending on the attacker’s shock value (explosion icon), but also slightly on every attack. The loss of effectiveness by every attack is slightly reduced with more unit experience. Yes, it’s a bit unclear, but imagine that a unit’s effectiveness equals 100 points in fully rested state. An enemy shock value of 20 would reduce these points to 80 and less by additional regular attack, but only shown as 8 or 7 in game. I can’t tell now exactly if 80 would equal 80% combat power, but it’s possible.

Arty: no, there is no defensive artillery fire. Artillery in OOB has often a longer range, so it’s more likely to hammer with more artillery units on the same enemy. Defensive fire is only possible by anti-tank and anti-aircraft/naval units, so tank rushes are hampered and infantry has more chance to assault enemy positions. If that’s good or bad, that was already discussed in other old topics.

Outcomes: there is only slightly randomness in combat by default, and also imagine that damage is also internally calculated by more digits like effectiveness, so 1-strength can also mean 0.5-strength. No unit seems invulnerable so it can take a while that even very low-attack values or predictions that show 0 damage can defeat a high defense value in a while.
Playing single scenarios offer a special combat randomization option. No idea if such is also involved into the higher difficulty grades besides more enemy strength points, but I guess not.

Move-after-attack: I got quickly used to it. Combat in OOB basically lasts a whole turn and forces unit engagement. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, as the enemy has chance to retaliate instead of hunting down attackers in its own turn. This also gives artillery more chance to strike on targets as little excuse for having no automatic defensive-fire.
Attack-Run tactics would have been useful for weak recon units at least, but we still got this one-hex move after aircraft-bombing and –strafing that allows up to 7 aircrafts to attack the same target – pretty annihilating. You can also occupy the attacked hex after combat at least if the enemy was defeated or forced to retreat.
Reinforcements/repair on the move is extremely useful too.
The only occasion when I really miss attacking before moving is during naval engagements. Retreating with ships is usually doomed if the enemy can always attack during the chase while the escapee can’t.

AI: yes, could be better, in particular isn’t always smart using artillery first. It seems to take ages with aircrafts sometimes. You possibly need a lot of CPU power for this game.

Undo-button: we have to learn from mistakes, I guess? I think the reason was to prevent cheating by recon moves. Load savegame function is still there for lousy Generals like me.

DLCs: I totally agree that the amount of official scenarios leaves much to desire and can’t be compared to the PC releases. I guess there was too much time spent in bug-fixing and switching the game from Pacific to WW2 in the past, which isn’t a bad thing either. I’m glad to fight on all fronts now. There is still some free content around in the scenario forum by ambitious fans to check out.

[verstaubtgesicht]

Thanks for the feedback. I guess one has to play the game for a while and decide (buy one DLC). What is discouraging is that there are much less information on forums how to play than for PzC, for example. I am against spoilers, but reinventing the wheel in terms of game mechanics is very tedious. For example, it is very useful for a newbie to know in PzC that prestige is precious and needs to be accumulated early, as softcap + prestige shortage will kill you in GC '43-'44. Why spend hundreds of hours playing before finding that out? I used to over-strength to the max in earlier versions, then basically eliminated over-strength on tanks until late based on forum discussions when the rules changed. I also changed the game style to attack almost exclusively with X:0 odds and went systematically after surrenders. And also never reinforced during the game. It seems to me that unlike PC in OOB one has to take hits and reinforce during the game, but I have no clue how this would affect the latter scenarios.

Furthermore, I've just tried to play on Steam today, and something is wrong. It worked before, doesn't work now. When I start any scenario there are no deployed units and nothing happens. When I download an older game, all units are visible (no fog of war, as expected and saved). Maybe has something to do woth the release of Kriegsmarine...or is it just me and my computer? Very frustrating.

[Myrddraal]

Hi verstaubtgesicht, was that when starting a new game (that there were no units deployed)? If so, I don't suppose you could you open a topic in the tech support forum and upload the log file? It is called output_log.txt and sits in the <game root>\Order of Battle - WW2_Data\ folder. For Steam, the default folder path usually is: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Order of Battle Pacific\Order of Battle - WW2_Data\
NOTE: This file gets cleared every time you restart the game. So grab the file after you've loaded a game and seen the problem, but before you start the game again.

[Mojko]

Thanks for the feedback. I guess one has to play the game for a while and decide (buy one DLC). What is discouraging is that there are much less information on forums how to play than for PzC, for example. I am against spoilers, but reinventing the wheel in terms of game mechanics is very tedious. For example, it is very useful for a newbie to know in PzC that prestige is precious and needs to be accumulated early, as softcap + prestige shortage will kill you in GC '43-'44. Why spend hundreds of hours playing before finding that out? I used to over-strength to the max in earlier versions, then basically eliminated over-strength on tanks until late based on forum discussions when the rules changed. I also changed the game style to attack almost exclusively with X:0 odds and went systematically after surrenders. And also never reinforced during the game. It seems to me that unlike PC in OOB one has to take hits and reinforce during the game, but I have no clue how this would affect the latter scenarios.

Sure, give it a try. I would suggest to start with Morning Sun DLC and then continue with Rising Sun DLC. Of course if you need information feel free to ask me anything regarding the game I played all the DLCs and some of them multiple times so I know the game inside out. I agree that the biggest issue of OOB is the transparency of the gameplay information so asking questions on forums is a good way to sort things out. Here are just a few starting hints:

- enable the "advanced unit stats" option in the setting (I don't even know why we don't show all unit stats by default)
- consider enabling 2d background setting when using slower computer (like I do) this speeds up loading times 200 times on my PC

have a look at these forum topics:

- OOB vs Panzer Corps
- game tip: order of combat
- Elite Replacements: worth it yet?
- Don't waste my RP! and stuff