French fortresses

[DrOnline]

Playing Germany in 1.6c vanilla.

How does one get 20 french divisions out of the lvl 10 fortress areas? I've tried mindless assault, and it got me nowhere. And my planes got chewed up in one hour. I've enveloped the area.. the three provinces, but not enough to get that sweet 40% bonus.. I think one has to envelop a single province for that, right?. If I can't finish those areas I'll need to station a large army there to quaranteen the enemy, and I need those to stop the Russians from pommeling me

Are the enemy supplied in those three areas? I've taken all the rest of mainland France. Does the lack of supply mean that their org will drop? or perhaps their strength?

Any help would be nice at this point

PS: Is it just me, or is it pretty annoying that every time one conquers an important city, another important city springs up somewhere else? Why is this?

 

[unmerged(26982)]

If you have already taken Paris, then the capital of France is moved to one of the Maginot Line provinces. What you should do is surround Paris, but dont take it. Then, attack the other provinces of France and annihilate the armies that have no organization because of lack of supply. Then take Paris.

 

[DrOnline]

hmm. yeah that would probably work. But it would feel like abusing an AI error...

Is it really not possible to attack those fortresses without using this tactic? and I want to know: are they losing org and strength in there?

 

[unmerged(26982)]

hmm. yeah that would probably work. But it would feel like abusing an AI error...

Is it really not possible to attack those fortresses without using this tactic? and I want to know: are they losing org and strength in there?

If the capital has been moved into the Maginot Line, then no. If the capital is NOT there, then they should be. It is possible to take the forts even this way. Get your best general with Fortress Buster traits and give him as many foot infantry units as he can command. Bomb the province for a long time and then send in the ground troops. Dont attack with tanks or motorized infantry. Just foot soldiers. Even then its not a sure win... o

 

[Thistletooth]

hmm. yeah that would probably work. But it would feel like abusing an AI error...

Is it really not possible to attack those fortresses without using this tactic? and I want to know: are they losing org and strength in there?

If the capital is within the pocket, then no, they are not losing any org.

CORE doesn't have this problem, but there is a way that you can replicate what CORE does to fix it:

Once you have created the Maginot pocket, use the "showid" cheat code in the F12 window, and find the ID numbers for the Maginot provinces. Then save the game, go into the savedgame file, go down to the entries for those provinces (using a wordfind would help out a lot if you're new to this), and change the fortress levels to 3. Close the application and reload the new save. Now you can conquer them at will, and you won't really be cheating, since that's what a lot of us do, only we have scripted events to do it for us automatically.

I'm only mentioning this because it seems to be a huge problem for vanilla newbies, since this topic has graced the boards so much.

 

[DrOnline]

Perhaps I should give CORE a chance. I have .85 installed, I just haven't tried it yet.
Ok.. I'm starting a new game as CORE. I'm dangerously understrength after having been broken against their walls three times.. once I attacked during winter.. what was I thinking?

 

[Thistletooth]

Perhaps I should give CORE a chance. I have .85 installed, I just haven't tried it yet.
Ok.. I'm starting a new game as CORE. I'm dangerously understrength after having been broken against their walls three times.. once I attacked during winter.. what was I thinking?

OK, but for the record, I didn't convert you.

Because that's wrong.

 

[danoh]

Once you learn how to deal with Maginot it's really simple to conquer them. First isolate Maginot from Paris. I usually do this by attacking Arlon, then Chaumont, then Nancy, then Dijon. Germany should have enough troops for a second attack in the north, but if you don't, then isolate Maginot first. Although it almost looks connected, I'm pretty sure Besancon is not next to Colmar so you don't need it to cut Maginot supply.

Then you can take the rest of France next, excepting Paris. In 4-6 weeks the Maginot boys will be down to zero org and you can walk in with a single infantry division or paradrop one guy and take the areas. To see them loosing org, occasionally tac bomb one of the areas, like once a week on a single daylight raid. It works every time. Once Maginot falls you can take Paris.

Never attack a supplied Maginot hex unless you are looking for a long battle to gain experience for some leaders. Even a single division in that level of fort can hold off 24 divisions. There are ways to success with fortress buster generals or massive attacks, but it's so easy and guaranteed to just surround them and wait a few weeks I think it's the best plan.

 

[Mediator]

Or you could try the exploit/mega cheat I described in this thread

 

[unmerged(14249)]

Note that, historically, the Maginot line fortresses were quite impregnable. The Germans tried attacking them in various ways but made little impression - even their biggest 420 mm / 16" guns did nothing to them. And they were quite well supplied and so only gave up after the general Armistice - the Vichy event, in game terms.

Andrew

 

[BiB]

Why would you prefer wiping out the Maginot line instead of taking the Vichy option?

 

[unmerged(3221)]

Even when the French capital is in one of the Maginot Line provinces, those provinces can be taken. But it takes time. One problem that France will then have is that they do not have enough IC to produce supplies for their troops and they don't have a lot of replacement manpower.

Just keep a defensive force around them with a fast motor inf eng or Pz reserve. Then wait a few months and attack when you have accumulated enough inf div to do the job.

You should have at least basic bombers and a large stack of them will start to knock down the org. Then attack from as many directions as possible with 24 div from each direction. Promote your two fortress busters Von Salmuth and Heinrici to FM and give each of them 12 inf div. Give Von Manstein 12 inf div (offense + trickster + pz) to get the -20 surprise on the enemy. Use Von Bock et al for other 12 div armies.

Sometimes a secondary attack just after a retreat will catch the enemy reinforcing their divisions which results in zero org for them. If the first attack does not succeed, subsequent attacks will because the French will be unable to reinforce their divisions even if you don't catch them right at zero org. Either way there are opportunities and eventually they will fade away.

Another possible way to handle this would be to leave a province undefended so that the French will walk out of Maginot into it. You can entice the AI to lose strength and sometimes divisions by repeatedly doing this.

The other advice for any newbies is to take Vichy if it's offered. After you understand the game better you can try other options, but it's always best to first try the historical way and succeed and then progress to considering other options. The only exception for Germany would be to not take Norway because the Royal Navy will slaughter your navy most times (unless you go thru Sweden first). Then do better in Russia than Hitler did.

 

[DrOnline]

Yeah, my navy was massacred pretty early on, but I'd built up a large 50+ flotilla of subs so I locked off the baltic sea and took both Norway and Sweden. I felt I needed that steel. But perhaps the oil and time I spent taking it could be better spent on other areas.

I think I'll go with Vichy France next time.

PS: I know this could be tough in game terms, but fortresses are often mainly aimed at one front, where as the maginot line seems to be impregnable from all sides.. that sounds unlikely.

 

[unmerged(17501)]

In CORE there's an event that fires that lowers the fort rating of the Maginot line after you flank it out. I believe they drop to 2 or so. Try using CORE sometime and see if you like it.

 

[Kyril]

Yeah, my navy was massacred pretty early on, but I'd built up a large 50+ flotilla of subs so I locked off the baltic sea and took both Norway and Sweden. I felt I needed that steel. But perhaps the oil and time I spent taking it could be better spent on other areas.

Of topic: If you take Denmark, the Baltic is locked off as well.