[ToV - Falaise Pocket] City Under Siege - Mission 2

[DrEvil....EVIL!]

City Under Siege

It will only be a matter of time until the Americans make another move on Trun. Fortify the town and repel any remaining Allied forces before another American push occurs.

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The Falaise Pocket campaign is incredible hard and even though I have completed the game on expert, there are a few holes in my score notably from the mission City under Siege.

1. This mission is pretty crazy. Any info on how much and how the enemy spawns would me nice. Any advices would also be welcomed.

2. Secondary objective is to build a defensive line, though there is no info on what defenses you should build or something.

3. Medal objective is to hold the entire map (all reinforcement points) and when your enemy capture the mentioned points, you can also recapture them, but what if the entire building is destroyed?

[Weavern]

If you destroy the building it still counts as being held, althou the territory is lost as is the income and unit produced from it.

If you recapture it before the mission ends it also counts as holding it.

The defenses objective is broken, I have no idea how one achieves it. There are also many other bugs but that isnt too terribly important to the overall completion strategy.

Key means to complete it is to spam 88s and tanktraps. Then to produce shrek grens and pumas to guard. (mission 2). You also want to get henschel as your doctrine as soon as possible as it will be extremely helpful.

Mission3, your eco is completely wrecked so your major defensive force will be paraeng and snipers. Artillery is a major issue here so you want to be very careful with the location of 88s as there are safe zones (relatively). Your major objective is to hold the top front AT ALL COSTS. You also will be flanked by an armor divison from the south so you can lay tanktraps and some 88s on that approach. Demoing all infantry bridges previously with goliaths would be a wise task as they unnecessarly complicate it.

[DrEvil....EVIL!]

yea, I managed to archive the medal. Also useful in mission 3 is to tank trap and wire the lowest entrance, blow the bridges and then use the units as Weavern mentioned. If you have done this you will only be attacked in the upper level. Arty is annoying as hell though...

[Dr Dave]

The key to this mission is to contiue where you left off the last one (Hold the line at the edge of the town)
88's are useful as are MG squads and AT squads in support

Do not put people in garrisons as they are useless outside they can be replaced! Micro manage

Mine the town when you have resource and time

One of the objectives of the next mission (or it may be this) is to retake the garrisons. if you do not lose them then you do not have to retake them! (if they get destroyed it does not affect you).

If you can hold off to the end and some of your 88's are still standing they will still be there next mission which gives you a few more minutes to set up defences. Also a mobile HQ turns up at start of next mission into the field where the northern lot of tanks were, an 88 here makes a mess of this!

There is part of this mission (I think its this mission) that is frustrating as it tells you to build defences at three locations (north crossing, south river crossing and central bridge). I have built tank traps, placed wire and mined the hell out of it but still not got the secondary objective. All these defences are a waste of time anyway as they bomb the hell out of them! What are you meant to build?

[SHARKMEAT]

I haft to agree not to clear of what defences they asking for..........CHEERS

[SHARKMEAT]

Quote: The defenses objective is broken, I have no idea how one achieves it. There are also many other bugs but that isnt too terribly important to the overall completion strategy.

If this is the case what or how can you get a true completion with out the reward badge in your profile reward department ??..I think Relic owes us a fix if the defence areas are broken !!!. It is easy to get a competed mission but I looking for all the medals....for the game.....CHEERS

[Dr Dave]

There is part of this mission (I think its this mission) that is frustrating as it tells you to build defences at three locations (north crossing, south river crossing and central bridge). I have built tank traps, placed wire and mined the hell out of it but still not got the secondary objective. All these defences are a waste of time anyway as they bomb the hell out of them! What are you meant to build?

OK thanks Sharkmeat, did not know it was a bug. Pehaps I should read the 'bug' lists!

By the way, this problem was only a minor issue on this mission and it is only a SECONDARY OBJECTIVE and as such does NOT affect you getting the medal.

[gbanay]

If you followed my instructions on previous mission this one is easy too:

1. Send 2 eng. to defend the main bridge same as river crossings (I guess they fixed this bug).
2. Since the Americans can't enter the garrisons you defended in the previous mission they just wonder arround.
3. Now send a sniper to kill infantry and artillery to kill the vehicles.
4. Once they are all dead the 2nd phase begin - Kill the main bridge and build 88's where needed.
5. Use artillery to defend garrisons from being captured.

[Dunnik]

Difficulty: Normal
Medal Awarded (Control All Territory)
Post-Battle Summary: As Dr Dave says above, "The key to this mission is to contiue where you left off the last one (Hold the line at the edge of the town)".


Phase 1 - Deploying to the Front

Unlike in the previous mission, you actually get to choose what troops you want this time. You start with a single unit each of Gren, Pio and Volks, plus a Puma and Stug. You will be facing lots of armor plus infantry, including Rangers, so I chose to go with 3 Luftwaffe for 88 repairs and anti-infantry (each equipped with Shrek plus LMG) and the rest Grenadiers with double Shreks. I did build up to the pop cap, knowing that 2 tanks and 2 infantry were going to be reinforcing - too big a pop to reserve. I did not build any AT guns, figuring (correctly, as it turned out) that the 88s plus the Grens would be enough.

Conveniently, most of the 88's I sited in the previous mission, including all their local defenses and fields of fire, come in very handy in this mission. The medal objective is to defend all garrisons, and they imply that you have to take them back if/when you lose them. But as a previous poster noted, no need to take garrisons back if you never lose them in the first place! So basically its a matter of rushing your troops to the front lines. The mission has a change of perspective - the default view flips so that the front line is up instead of to the left as in the previous mission (but tapping Backspace restores it to that previous view), so I'll describe the defensive line from this new, front is "up" perspective.

From left to right, the defensive positions I had were as follows:

Left side were the two 88's in the southern group from the previous mission. I placed a Pio plus Luft in this area for repairs on both 88s plus anti-infantry duties, plus 1-2 Shrek'd Grens and a HMG team. I parked the Puma nearby, and got its AT gun upgrade.

In the middle - the x-roads 88 position - I placed 2 more Shrek Gren's, the Sniper in the x-roads building (he never died, racked up tons of kills), a HMG team, the STUG and a Pio plus a Luft to handle repairs on the 88 and the Stug.

On the right, the front line is where the old Armoured Car depot was from the previous mission. I lost my nearby 88 on the right very late in the previous mission, but this turned into a blessing in disguise as I was able to re-position a new 88 right next to that old Car depot HQ, facing across the field. Placed Volks with LMGs and MP40s in the barn (they were safe the whole mission) packed up by another Luft and a Gren.


Phase 2 - Probing Attacks

The first waves of attacks are nothing serious, mostly infantry. Your front line troops should be able to beat them off without any other assistance, so no need to use off-map artillery or air power on them. Save your muni, and otherwise build Goliaths to destroy the footbridges for the next mission (I also had a Pio wire and TT the river fords during this period).


Phase 3 - Attacks in Strength

A scripted event will inform you of the next phase of the attacks. These waves are much more serious, Shermans, including Crocs, M10s and even the odd Pershing tank. Hopefully your 88s and Gren's can hold them off along with arty and air. Remember to heal up squads at local HQ's - as in the previous mission, the front line has 3-4 convenient HQ's nearby. Not too much micro is required here beyond healing up squads, targeting the Pershings, and, as usual, babysitting your infantry so as to make sure they don't run off across half the battlefield (ie, you place them behind a TT in heavy cover with good fields of fire, and they go charging off ahead sigh).


Phase 4 - Reinforcements Have Arrived

A PzIV and PzV will appear along with two STG infantry squads. This put me way over pop cap, but no matter. I sent the Panther to sit on the near left side and placed the PzIV on the right (Stug was covering middle). Nearby Luft and Pios would heal them as well as the nearby 88s. Likewise, I placed one STG inf on the left of the line and one on the right.

At this point the battle can get pretty hectic as wave after wave of American troops try to close the Pocket. Be vigilant, hold the line, drop air and arty early and often, and you should be able to come out in one piece.


GL and HF!

P.S. (mild spoiler) The cut-scene at the end of the mission has your CO refuse orders to hold the pocket open. He says he's going to make a run for it, with any troops willing to join him. Instead of pulling out his own Luger and doing to the CO what the CO did to the radio, the junior officer merely sits there and looks shocked. In the German army of WWII (or WWI, or the Franco-Prussian War for that matter) that cowardly officer would be shot right then and there. CoH is a very historically accurate game, but sometimes...it isn't =P