How to use deception units?

[dto]

I'm playing the Germans in the Alt Bulge campaign. I'm trying to understand deception units. Do I right click on them in the Deception Unit menu to move them? Do I have to get through the American front lines to deploy them?

Mike

[Deturk]

I'm playing the Germans in the Alt Bulge campaign. I'm trying to understand deception units. Do I right click on them in the Deception Unit menu to move them? Do I have to get through the American front lines to deploy them?

Mike

I'd look it up for you in the Manual, but I am busy atm.    

[dto]

I'm playing the Germans in the Alt Bulge campaign. I'm trying to understand deception units. Do I right click on them in the Deception Unit menu to move them? Do I have to get through the American front lines to deploy them?

Mike

I'd look it up for you in the Manual, but I am busy atm.    

If the manual was clear, I wouldn't need to ask the question!

[Plain Ian]

I'm playing the Germans in the Alt Bulge campaign. I'm trying to understand deception units. Do I right click on them in the Deception Unit menu to move them? Do I have to get through the American front lines to deploy them?

Mike

I'd look it up for you in the Manual, but I am busy atm.    

If the manual was clear, I wouldn't need to ask the question!

If the unit appears as a normal on map unit (4 man jeep in Wacht) then it can be deployed 15 hexes and becomes s a hidden Deception unit. 
The on map unit cannot have moved and must not be disrupted. This can be done on ANY turn. So on Turn 1 you can deploy them or try to move them so that you can deploy them later on and hopefully further behind the enemy lines.

A hidden unit stays hidden and fixed in this hex until -
- its discovered by the enemy and destroyed
- a friendly unit moves on to it and stays there to end of the turn in which case it becomes a regular unit at the start of the following turn and then can be deployed as per the rules above. This is called recall.

A hidden unit not discovered or recalled can be redeployed as a hidden unit 10 hexes. This is only done ONCE a day on the turn after the Midnight turn.

The actual menu's and mouse clicks required to do all this are not that intuitive so I'll knock up some pictures to illustrate it.

[Kuriltai]

Identify the guy you want to deploy and note the name.
Click on the hex you want to deploy.
Go to the deception dialog and highlight your unit.
You should be able to klik the deploy button unless the hex selected is too far.

Something like that off the top of my head.
Tactically, deploy near bridges and road junctions. Never hurts to have two guys in a key area in case one is discovered early.  I like to get a guy down near Schoberg bridge behind the 106th .

[Plain Ian]

Identify the guy you want to deploy and note the name.
Click on the hex you want to deploy.
Go to the deception dialog and highlight your unit.
You should be able to klik the deploy button unless the hex selected is too far.

Something like that off the top of my head.
Tactically, deploy near bridges and road junctions. Never hurts to have two guys in a key area in case one is discovered early.  I like to get a guy down near Schoberg bridge behind the 106th .

Yep that's exactly what I have as well. Dang you beat me.



Rules for redeploying are similar.

One thing in the rules that needs changed though is the last paragraph. 

Recalling Deception Units If a deployed Deception Unit is found to be in the same hex as a friendly regular unit at the beginning of a player turn, then that Deception Unit is automatically recalled and restored to its normal counter status. The player may move the Deception Unit normally at that point and may redeploy the Deception Unit to another location.

The last line says "redeploy" which suggests that this will be 10 hexes because a Hidden Unit redeploys 10 hexes. In actual fact its 15 hexes. So being pedantic I would change this to "deploy" since that's how the rules are written when describing how on map units move.

[Green]

If the manual was clear, I wouldn't need to ask the question!

No doubt and if there are areas that the manual needs to be improved let us identify them so that the necessary changes can be made. 

In this case that manual explains that;

"To deploy a Deception Unit, you determine which Deception Unit you wish to deploy and what location you wish to deploy the unit to. You should click on the location you wish the Deception Unit to be deployed so it becomes the Hot Spot hex. There are two requirements before you can deploy a Deception Unit:
• The Deception Unit must not have moved or otherwise used Movement Points in the current turn.
• The distance from the Deception Unit to the location you wish the Deception Unit to be deployed to must be within three times the Deception Range for that side or twice the Deception Range for units being redeployed. The Deception Range value can be found from the Parameter Data Dialog.

Next, you select the Deception Unit option of the Units Menu in the main program. This will display the Deception Unit Dialog. Selecting a Deception Unit entry and clicking on the Deploy button or double-clicking on the Deception Unit entry will close the dialog and deploy the unit provided the deployment conditions are met."

This seems to answer your questions. Possibly it makes more sense to me as I am familiar with how this works in practice but I would be interested to know what was confusing. Presumably the other posts on this thread have already made the rules clear to you, so hopefully you can now explain what was unclear in the manual. Thanks.

[Plain Ian]

If the manual was clear, I wouldn't need to ask the question!

No doubt and if there are areas that the manual needs to be improved let us identify them so that the necessary changes can be made. 

In this case that manual explains that;

"To deploy a Deception Unit, you determine which Deception Unit you wish to deploy and what location you wish to deploy the unit to. You should click on the location you wish the Deception Unit to be deployed so it becomes the Hot Spot hex. There are two requirements before you can deploy a Deception Unit:
• The Deception Unit must not have moved or otherwise used Movement Points in the current turn.
• The distance from the Deception Unit to the location you wish the Deception Unit to be deployed to must be within three times the Deception Range for that side or twice the Deception Range for units being redeployed. The Deception Range value can be found from the Parameter Data Dialog.

Next, you select the Deception Unit option of the Units Menu in the main program. This will display the Deception Unit Dialog. Selecting a Deception Unit entry and clicking on the Deploy button or double-clicking on the Deception Unit entry will close the dialog and deploy the unit provided the deployment conditions are met."

This seems to answer your questions. Possibly it makes more sense to me as I am familiar with how this works in practice but I would be interested to know what was confusing. Presumably the other posts on this thread have already made the rules clear to you, so hopefully you can now explain what was unclear in the manual. Thanks.

Well it took me quite a few reads to understand. Confusion was possibly self made as I tried to reconcile which bits of the rules applied to the unit when it was in its various stages of metamorphosis. It makes sense now.

What I did struggle with was trying to make the deployment happen. The first time did involve a lot of clicking and head scratching and of course re reading of the manual. However since we are using a GUI designed in the 90's (or earlier?) and I was born in the 50's I persevered and cracked it. Sort of. Ask me again in 12 months how to do it and I might struggle!!!!

[Plain Ian]

Tactically, deploy near bridges and road junctions. Never hurts to have two guys in a key area in case one is discovered early.  I like to get a guy down near Schoberg bridge behind the 106th .

Interesting because I did the same in my last game. Deploy a unit near Schonberg. However looking at the situation I'm not really sure if the Yanks can actually get an Engineer to this bridge to destroy it? Only 3 Engineers in the area and I doubt if they can release and move to the bridge in time if that is the priority.



When I play Bulge the natural tendency is to deploy all the Einheits units on Turn 1? Which means I must wait until Midnight 16th/17th to redeploy them further forward west 10 hexes. 

I think I've been playing this wrong. I think I should be holding most of them back and motoring forward in my jeeps and then deploying 15 hexes to some juicier targets?

[dto]

If the manual was clear, I wouldn't need to ask the question!

No doubt and if there are areas that the manual needs to be improved let us identify them so that the necessary changes can be made. 

In this case that manual explains that;

"To deploy a Deception Unit, you determine which Deception Unit you wish to deploy and what location you wish to deploy the unit to. You should click on the location you wish the Deception Unit to be deployed so it becomes the Hot Spot hex. There are two requirements before you can deploy a Deception Unit:
• The Deception Unit must not have moved or otherwise used Movement Points in the current turn.
• The distance from the Deception Unit to the location you wish the Deception Unit to be deployed to must be within three times the Deception Range for that side or twice the Deception Range for units being redeployed. The Deception Range value can be found from the Parameter Data Dialog.

Next, you select the Deception Unit option of the Units Menu in the main program. This will display the Deception Unit Dialog. Selecting a Deception Unit entry and clicking on the Deploy button or double-clicking on the Deception Unit entry will close the dialog and deploy the unit provided the deployment conditions are met."

This seems to answer your questions. Possibly it makes more sense to me as I am familiar with how this works in practice but I would be interested to know what was confusing. Presumably the other posts on this thread have already made the rules clear to you, so hopefully you can now explain what was unclear in the manual. Thanks.

* The rules state that deployment is within 3 x Deception Range, and redeployment is 2 x Deception Range. So the initial placement is 3 x range, and then relocating that unit is at 2 x range? You might want to say that explicitly to emphasize the importance of the initial deployment.

* Deception Range is traced from the Deception Unit's location, or from the nearest German unit to the hex? Presumably it's the Deception Unit's location.

* The presence of enemy units and ZOCs does not affect deployment and redeployment? You might want to make that clear: because the fact that German Deception Units actually start on the map, it's instinctive to assume that the Germans have to punch a hole in the line for the Deception Unit to pass through.