Technical note
I was having trouble displaying the images the way I wanted to. Thanks to the invaluable help from Ashley at Paint it Pink (panther6actual.blogspot.com, if you're into wargaming, Battletech and mechs do pay her a visit) the wider/larger ones now appear as thumbnails that you can click on to inspect on their original size. It was actually very simple and straightforward: on the blog's general settings there's a toggle for "Image lightbox" that should be set to "Off"; when inserting the image in the post one then selects a size that actually fits in the text column; when the post is published the image shown becomes a clickable thumbnail; when previewing the post this feature does not work.
/Technical note
Welcome.
This my very first blog starts with a playthrough of Slitherine's/The Artistocrats Order of Battle World War II Boot Camp (tutorial) and U.S. Pacific campaigns.
The difficulty is set at the highest, "Fleet Admiral" setting and I will simulate an Iron-man mode where I'll progress the campaign with the first successful play of each scenario. I will also endeavour to accomplish all secondary objectives.
I first came across Order of Battle (OOB) some seven years ago with the YouTube playthroughs by ParadogsGamer and Night Phoenix. Recently (starting in late November/early December 2022) TheEdmon published another playthrough also on YouTube, playing blind on the highest difficulty setting. Paradog's playthrough is very dated and Night Phoenix's got deleted (his channel is still active though). I have some issues with TheEdmon's (hence this blog) but it is IMO worth a (critical) watch.
I also read and recommend the U.S. Pacific campaign playthrough by Averysgameblog on Wordpress ("airboy" on the Slitherine forum) where I've picked up a few things even though he played it on the "Lieutenant" difficulty setting.
To emphasize, I'm not playing blind: for a long time I had to settle with the free-to-play version of the game due to personal circumstances but I have played the Boot Camp campaign many times in the last seven years albeit at the "normal" "Captain" difficulty setting and I have "under my belt" a single, successful play of the U.S. Pacific campaign also at the "Captain" difficulty setting.
I will however include in each scenario's description my estimation of how an intelligent and attentive blind (first-time, no prior knowledge but not a complete neophyte where war games are concerned) player would process the information available to decide on a course of action.
This putative blind player would have read the game's manual. There's a button in the game's splash screen and when the designer goes to the trouble of producing a manual the intelligent player should recognize its importance. OOB's manual is obsolete in at least how "Specialisations" are handled but it is still valid and informative.
On a technical note, I'm using a 5-year-old (at the time of writing) laptop with a screen resolution of 1'366x768 pixels. Screenshots are further degraded from png to jpg. I have little to no experience manipulating images. I hope the images will be clear enough but I already have trouble with the text in game. I beg your indulgence on that matter.
Before the tutorial proper let's set some options. These are preferences and I'll try to explain mine.
 |
| Figure 1 - Options |
Enable hex grid: I grew up with hex-based wargames, this is an hex-based wargame and seeing the grid helps me get my bearings.
2D World Map: this is not a one-size-fits-all. The 3D World Map is pretty but it gets confusing to my poor old eyes. The 2D appears to load faster. There's a big caveat though: bridges that are destroyed show as intact, the road over the river is pristine. This hasn't been a problem with the US Campaign, in my (so far) single run in normal difficulty the Red Team and the Japanese didn't blow a single bridge (other than by an event on the last mission).
Enable tutorial messages and Reset tutorial history: I'll explain why after the last tutorial scenario.
Summarised Unit Stats: set to "OFF" for which I do have to thank The Edmon; knowing the actual efficiency values of your units (and the enemy's) makes a huge difference.
Player Animations Speed: set to "Fastest" for which I have to thank someone I didn't think to record the name who made that suggestion to TheEdmon in a comment on one of his videos. My units take much less time completing their actions.
Not shown on this screenshot, on the Performance tab the "Permanent Wrecks" is set to "OFF" because I find them confusing. "Is that enemy unit dead or alive?"
---
Comments on this post are disabled. That's just for ease of management. They will be enabled in the last post for each mission.
