Defense in Squad Battles

SnowBlue · 07-28-2009, 12:06 PM,

I am curious as to how you would defend in squad battles. I was writing a long opinion on it, but realized that I did not really know what I was talking about so deleted it. Basically I am just not sure about how to defend. For starters unlike in PzC a defeated defender usually takes massive losses making them less useful after they were assaulted. Other aspects such as pinning an enemy at long range is good but will suffer from reduced weapon effectiveness when they get closer.

Rabbit · 07-30-2009, 02:51 AM,

Greetings,

Here are some general defensive strategies:

1.) Try not to fire your weapons further than half their maximum range, exactly for the reason you mentioned - it lessens the weapons' effectiveness while only firing at half strength.

2.) Following up on that first point, pick the timing and location of when to strike the oncoming enemy. Oftentimes, your units will start the scenario in a concealed state (presuming you are playing with fog of war enabled). By setting your units to hold their fire, you can wait until the enemy exposes themselves in unprotected terrain before revealing yourself and opening fire on them thereby inflicting maximum damage. By remaining concealed up until this point and preserving your weapons' effectiveness and firing within half your maximum range, you have a much greater chance of pinning your opponents with your first few shots. Likewise, remaining concealed lessens the chances of your enemy disrupting/pinning you via advance fire.

3.) Concentrate on taking out high value targets, such as helicopters, tanks, leaders, etc. They help towards your victory points total, but they also pose big setbacks to your enemy whenever you knock any of them out.

4.) Keep in mind, your goal is often to just slow down the enemy, rather than to stop or destroy them. Pinned units cannot advance and disrupted units generally cannot advance more than a hex or two. And just as important, pinned and disrupted units only fire at half strength. Therefore, you usually want to focus on disrupting/pinning as many of the enemy units as you can rather than to continually firing at a few targets trying to obliterate them. Though having said that, make sure during your turn that you shoot at least once at every disrupted/pinned/demoralized enemy unit to help ensure they remain that way.

Hope that helps,
Bill

TheBigRedOne · 07-30-2009, 03:17 AM,

Rabbitt offers some very keen insight here.

The 'hold fire' option is one that new players often struggle with, and even veterans. When to hold, when to let loose. I've had chances at OP fire go by because I held fire too long and let armor pass by while in hold fire mode. It's timing, really. I like to hold fire as long as I can, then hit leaders, stacked units and high value targets. Stacks are the most opportune target, and if you enemy comes into firing range stacked, you can really do some damage.

Weapons like sniper rifles are really useful when you want to pin units in the open as they are coming towards you, as well as taking out leaders. In many cases, as Rabbitt astutely mentioned, don't need to kill them all, just slow them down. The more you can bog your enemy down, the better off your chances will be in the end because a weakened enemy will take longer to get to the objectives, and will not have as much punch. If you've pinned a unit with the first volley, go onto the next closest target and try to pin them next. It doesn't always make sense to hammer away at a pinned unit, especially if they get down to lower numbers. I tend to go after leaders hard because if you kill them, the units around them are vulnerable. If pinned, they are stuck.

Chosing which weapons to use when is also important.

I recommend reading some of these articles, Snowblue. They might offer some insight as well.

http://tfe4.wordpress.com/tactics-articl...-archives/