History Line: 1914-1918/Mosel

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



General Situation

Buildings

Units

Strategy
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