Signal companies

[markslawson]

I keep on reading and hearing different accounts of signal companies. Some players swear by them, others say don't bother. So what is the state of play? Signal companies in panzer and motorized? In everything? Not at all? And, incidentally, what do they do?

 

[Voigt]

They increase planning speed, which is quite useless because the general/fm ability let's you plan extremly quickly either way.
They also provide reinforcement chance, which you could use:
On offense you should attack with all divisions for a certain battle at once, so they are all at the frontline immedatly either way.
On defense it is quite expensive to equip all your divisions with them and atleast divisions entrenched at the front line also all should be in the battle when attacked.
But you can use it for a mobile firebrigade defense, like Mot+AT or + TD. So those divisions join a defensive battle quickly, and also if they are already in the province are selected for frontline over other divisions if you have more than the needed combat width on a tile which gets attacked.

 

[Reman]

I hear signals can be quite valuable in multiplayer, where failing to reinforce (AKA "slipping") on key defensive tiles like El Alemein or the Stalin Line can make or break games. Battles against competent players also tend to be much more grindy and drawn out, making reinforcement checks more important.

In SP, however, losing a few tiles here or there almost never matters, outside of specific achievements like Neither Death Nor Dishonor. You can restart offensive battles to instantly reinforce, and defensive battles are rarely important enough to justify spamming signals in all your infantry. Overall, I almost never see a reason to use signals in SP.

 

[him_15]

I use them on armoured division only for immersion favour.

 

[markslawson]

Okay - gottit - I'm always single player .. no signal companies for me..