History Line: 1914-1918/Mosel

"Mosel" is the twenty-second map on the French side of the campaign.



General Situation

Buildings

Units

Strategy
With the right strategy this map is surprisingly easy to handle.

North-east flotilla
Put the infantries from the depot into different ships, ideally the leftmost and the rightmost one you can reach. Now move all ships to factory 7 east of your HQ as fast as possible while avoiding the bunkers. For optimum speed always move the last transport ship in line first and prioritize the transport ship movement over the patrol boats. You'll arrive just in time to put your infantry directly behind the enemy infantry and capture the factory right after the computer captured it. When this is done you move 2 of your transport ships to the battle north of your HQ to form a bridge between the front and the HQ there. The third transport stays directly south of the factory so that you can directly load units on it, the fourth transport ship stays east of the factory together with the elite infantries for the attack against the factory 2 & depot 5 later. The patrol boats stay in this area to kill some attackers in the south, but take care that you don't get in range of the enemy artillery and stay one tile away from the coast so that his ground units can't reach them. The planes fly south and help killing his attack & train. Keep away from the AA. Move the planes to the central area as soon as the computer got his planes. Build 2 heavy artilleries there so that you can kill his units moving to the south and a transport plus another heavy artillery that you send to the front north of the HQ. Prioritize his artillery, AA second and then infantry. Tanks aren't as important as the D.H.4 do a great job killing them. After this build a supply car and another heavy artillery that you sent to the north-eastern front together with the two medium artilleries from the depots (you have to drive a second time for the second medium artillery). Then, build a supply car and ship it with the third transport to the central area and drive from there to the south-western front so that you can move the artillery there later. After this you can start building an invasion force for attacking factory 2 & depot 5, it should consist of a heavy artillery, the elite infantries you got in the factory, 1-2 tanks and at one light artillery. You'll also need a supply car for moving the heavy artillery to the ship. As the heavy artillery cleared out most enemy units at this time the assault is pretty straight forward. Remember to use the patrol boats to support this attack by killing bunkers, they should have a good rank by then by killing ground units.

North of the HQ, eastern front
Kill the tanks as fast as possible, remember to attack them from opposite sides as good as possible as this greatly increases his losses. Move a tank from the eastern front over as soon as you killed the first 1-2 tanks there, and move the rest over after you finished the battle there. Let the infantry run to the factory, you'll deal with it separately.

North of the HQ, western front
Do NOT attack with the tanks, they have to last as long as possible and serve as shield for the anti tank guns and later the artillery. You are heavily outnumbered but it's essential that you hold the initial line until your sappers dug the trenches from the bottom to the top so that the artillery and other units can't pass or are at least slowed down. As soon as this is done, you retreat to the area where you can have 4 tanks in a straight line from top to bottom and behind them 5 anti tank guns. With a bit of luck you can achieve this with only a few losses. About this time the reinforcements from the eastern front will arrive and you can start to exchange the most damaged tanks with the fresh ones. The cavalry should stay behind the tanks and the AT guns. As soon as you can spare them move a heavy and a medium artillery from the factory to this front. When the transport boats have arrived you can use them to create a bridge between this front and the HQ for repairing the damaged tanks and sending the cavalry plus a surplus AT gun to the south-eastern front. When the computer got his planes move all AA to the central area, dispersing it there. But keep 1-2 AA near the HQ in case he attacks elsewhere. You can also put a heavy or medium artillery in front of the HQ for clearing the enemy units that can't pass over the trenches.

Center forces
The sapper in the south-east below factory 7 builds trenches from top to bottom, basically trenching everything from his start point to the rails. With this the computer can't close in with the artillery and his tanks are forced to move at the very south. The other sappers entrench the bunkers for protecting them against the enemys planes later. The western sapper moves to the south-western front after entrenching the first two bunkers for shielding the artillery. Move the AA to the south-western front for guarding the artilleries there and the tank to the railway which takes it to the south-eastern front. The armored train also moves to the most south-eastern rail with the tank in front of it, serving as artillery for killing the first few tanks there. When the computer gets his planes move all AA to the HQ and south of it and move in with your elite Spad XIII. You will be able to kill his planes within 2 rounds after they arrived at your bunkers as he tries to attack your elite Spad, thereby comitting suicide. The AA kills the other planes. After this is done, kill the train artillery with one of your elite D.H.4, then move the planes to the south-western front.

South-western front
Again: Do NOT attack with the tanks, they have to last as long as possible and serve as shield for the artillery. Move the Renault FT 17 so that you have a straight line of tanks so that the computer can't attack from the side. Pick away the A7Vs as fast as possible with the artillery, you should be able to achieve this with all tanks surviving with 2-3 strength. Ignore the AA until no other ground unit is in attack range. Take care that the computer can't target the tanks with the medium artillery until you can pick it off with your medium artillery. There will be two A7Vs coming together with the first medium artillery, forcing you to open a gap where the first one can move in to your medium artillery. But by then your artilleries are elite, so attack the first A7V with the heavy artillery, killing it before it can move into the gap. The medium artillery isn't sufficient as the A7V can partly survive a hit from a elite medium artillery, only the elite heavy artillery achieves a guaranteed one hit kill with the A7V. After this it's easy, your artilleries can pick everything off before it reaches the tanks. As soon as there is only one target for both artilleries, move the heavy artillery up one field so that you can kill his medium artillery earlier, enabling you to leave the front line closed. As soon as the cavalry has arrived you can start to move in to his HQ, using the planes to clear most of the enemies. Attack the AA and elite infantry first with your elite D.H.4 as they will kill them easily, then mop up the rest. The cavalry takes one factory / depot after another before moving in to the HQ. Move the artillery as needed with the supply car you have there by now, but most of the work is done by the planes.

Other strategy proposals
One of the most challenging maps in the game, pity the computer will not press home his advantages and stall. Your first objective is to let your forces on the northern river bank capture the factory, cross the river and help defend the HQ area. For that, you will need to buy time. The sappers in the southeast should dig trenches as obstacles for the approaching enemy forces; in the southwest, your artillery units should keep firing at the tanks for as long as they stand; sappers in the rear should entrench every bunker and dig trenches wherever they can as obstacles. The northwestern group should make a brief stand but fall back in time while the sappers plough the whole area as they withdraw; the northeastern group should brake though quickly: it will not reach the factory first, but it can and should use the mobile flak to engage the enemy aircraft as they leave the factory.

It may be possible to capture the factory with the planes in it, and it is well worth a try, even if you receive heavy damage trying to break through the forces that stand in your way. You may lose a cavalry or two, but you get two medium artilleries and 3 planes. You are NOT allowed to build planes in this map, so if the enemy gets the factory first, you will have none all through the map, making it much more tedious to beat.

There is another, less obvious but more viable option. Use the three boats in NE corner to push SW along the canal and hit the enemy's special infantry heading for the factory. You should be able to hit the infantry twice before it reaches the factory and the second hit with all three boats will destroy it. Then the factory is all yours for taking. Planes from the factory will assist the SE group defense by knocking tanks out and once the SE corner is secure and NE factory and depot taken you can use them to good effect in final assault.

By this time, the transport flotilla from the far east should have arrived, ready to ship repaired and new units to the other side just as the enemy approaches the HQ area from the southeast. You will have a massive reserve of resources at your disposal: build several heavy artillery pieces to place right in front of the factory and fire to the east; otherwise build light artillery and tanks to ferry over. After repelling the southeastern assault you can capture the eastern industrial area – an amphibious landing is faster than taking the land route – while your bunkers deal with any enemy units approaching from the southwest. After capturing the eastern facilities, you can simply outproduce the enemy and conquer his HQ area with lots and lots of armor and artillery ferried across the river and brought in by long rows of trucks.

Quick Notes
Use sappers to block all chokepoints to hinder most enemy unit to break through. This works at least at three points:
 * Artillery outpost at bottom left
 * Sappers at bottom right
 * Tank group at top left

Factory 7 offers a rare opportunity to actually build and deploy ships!