How to Kill 88's

Pip Roberts · 11-17-2006, 06:01 AM,

It's not easy so how do you experts do it?
It's great if you can get long range artillery onto them but if that is not avaiilable they are very tough enemies
Aircraft are so unreliable that I don't even bother to attach an anti-arircraft unit to the 88 battery.
I have tried hitting the 88 unit with smoke then rushing up several fast units (such as BT7's or their equivalent) so that the survivor can hit the 88.
It helps if they can sneak up under cover but if the 88 is in a forest or village
there have to be more than one survivor.
Infantry are good if there are several units and they can sneak up under cover in trucks.
If the country is open and there is no long range artillery available the only option seems to be to avoid them.

I would appreciate your comments.

Thor · 11-17-2006, 11:42 AM,

Pip,

In my experience, artillery is the best bet and several pieces plotted on them in the same turn will take sps off the 88s quickly if you have LOS.

Otherwise, direct fire from large bore AFVs (76mm+) will do the trick quickly too.

In fact, I have found that keeping 88s alive is much harder than killing them. I tend to deploy 88s only in areas, mostly on flanks, where 1) they cannot be overrun in one turn (e.g.: woods; bluffs, etc) and 2) where LOS is very resticted to prevent the enemy from simply spotting them at great distance for artillery plotting.

If you have 88s hidden in woods at bottlenecks with limited LOS and infantry support, they can really be nasty beasts for the opponent to get around. :boom3:

Even then, at best they will merely slow a determined foe rather than stop him. As soon as enough enemy infantry comes up, if the enemy has arty, the 88s are toast.

cheers

Thor

Steelrain60 · 11-17-2006, 12:08 PM,

Very much agree with Thor's comments.

88s are one of those weapons systems that were much more dangerous in reality than in CS. Once exposed to enemy artillery or tank fire, they tend to die pretty quickly. And there are never enough of them to make a real difference in a battle. 88s should also never be allowed to conduct opportunity fire. They should only fire at carefully selected targets.

If I have to destroy an 88, I'll move several infantry-type platoons into position (sometimes in smoked hexes if there are a lot of powerful enemy forces about) to have visibility of the 88. If these platoons can provoke opp. fire from the 88, in the same turn, I'll move armor up and blast away. If I don't have armor that can hit the 88, I'll plot artillery or mortar fire on the 88. At the very least, the 88 will be disrupted in the next turn and it's fire will be less effective.