Force Selection - How?

[Ivan Zaitzev]

An interesting topic. I am as well pretty bad selecting forces. Specially when playing the Germans with all the vehicle designations I end up purchasing quite useless stuff. But I haven't really played that much PBEM to be fair. The little I have played I have enjoyed more H2H stock scenarios where the forces are already selected.
Is there any unspoken rule against ratios? I remember when I played SPWAW that you normally could not spend more than 10% of your points on artillery, for example.

 

[Fredrocker]

Is there any unspoken rule against ratios? I remember when I played SPWAW that you normally could not spend more than 10% of your points on artillery, for example.

A great question: around here at FGM you will find some guidelines that some players will use, but mainly I think the norm is to ask your opponent before setup on what you want to agree upon; i.e. Arty Strikes (1st turn, Setup Zones, etc), Heavy Armor Qty, Rarity (which in many cases will restrict you down to certain units), and so forth... This way both you and your opponent are on the same page so nothing (gamey) or out of your personal realm should occur (except of course when your freakin pixeltruppen dont do what they are ordered to do... )

I hope this helps... you will find most here very accommodating and easy to get along with (but remember most are 'killers' on the battlefield).

Cheers and Good Hunting...

 

[Rico]

Never found a working solution/formula to force selection --- tended to use QB's to experiment with different OOB's ad force combinations ... never seem to get everything right -- always short of something: once it's too few tanks, then it's not enough infantry, why didn't I get a few more mortars... etc etc.

But then I am not too worried about winning the casual battles as such -- just fun to play and will try my damnest with what kit I got.

 

[A Canadian Cat]

@Ivan Zaitzev I find the best approach is to get a good combined arms force. I am really liking the combined arms battalions in CMBS to be awesome. In that title I find I am starting with one of them and then cutting things out to fit the size. In the ww2 titles I find that creating a reasonably realistic force with infantry a few tanks and some artillery to give me the best results. It's true what @Rico says about feeling like your short but hind sight is 20 20 as they say. Better to have a balanced force and be flexible than go overboard in one area and really feel short in the other.

As for ratios and extra rules like @TeddyR says talking it over with your opponent is a good thing (tm). My personal preference is to not have any percentages assigned 1 because I am a firm believer that poor force selection will get punished on the battlefield and 2 I am always afraid I'll make a mistake with one to may of X and be in violation or I'll be stuck able to buy only 2.5 tanks and be annoyed.

 

[DasTiger]

Im awful at force selection and have lost many battles on that screen alone.

Ditto.

 

[Swastakowey]

I certainly learned not to leave engineers behind. Incredibly useful guys they are.

 

[Odin]

If you are defending and expect to face infantry and/or armoured cars heavy mortars and TRPs are a much underrated purchase. TRPs and an elite/crack observer team can bring down the barrage delivery time to a couple of minutes, and they will drop on your opponent without warning. Frequently, if you are defending and purchase off map artillery without TRPs, and are facing an observant opponent, your artillery strikes will be too slow and the spotting rounds will give your intentions away and give him time to dodge your artillery strike.

As others have mentioned, it's worth bumping up vehicle crew experience, but I only find it worth bumping up crew morale if they are in a heavily armoured tank which can take some hits from enemy AT. Otherwise, they will just sit there and get obliterated rather than try to reverse to safety.

Bumping infantry morale and experience is well worth undertaking, particularly for units you expect to lead your attack/counter attack.