[updated 8 July 2023]
Theater of War Mission Pack: The Southern Fronts
Mission: Heavy Rain
This is the same map used for the Panzer Crossing missionโnow turned upside down, and played in the dark and in the rain. Unsurprisingly, given ToW’s strong bias in favor of the Russians, the map that is the hardest when you play as Russia gets even harder when you play as Germany.
On General (Hard) level
The devs are always tinkering with mission and unit properties, and as a result of recent changes the Heavy Rain mission is no longer consistently winnable on the hardest level. (Consider using console commands to even things up.)
There was once a clear path to victory: Use your starting units (make no new units) to quickly take all points on the left side of the map, kill the Pak-43 crew at the top of the map with your snipers, make 4-5 fuel caches with your pios on left-side territory points, bring in four StuGs without delay, and have them hit the Russian base from the very top of the map. Now it seems to take a minute or two longer to get the necessary number of StuGs out, the StuGs are weaker, and the Russian base is much better guarded with ZiS-3 AT guns (essentially unkillable within the base), AT-nade-throwing infantry, PTRS-wielding penals and guards rifle infantry, and base-rebuilding pios. The IS-2s that your CPU ally used to kill reliably also now survive and at least one will help defend the Russian base when you attack. Too bad! It was once a fun, if nerve-wracking mission.
On Captain (Normal) level
Even on “Normal” difficulty level, the rush-StuGs strategy is now more difficult than it used to be on “Hard,” and probably will fail most of the time for the average player.
What does seem to work somewhat reliably, at this difficulty level, is to start in the usual way, including the construction of 2 or 3 fuel caches, but also build an HMG, a couple of 251s with flamethrowers, and an extra pio squad. Use the snipers to kill the Russian Pak-43 crew at the top of the map, then man this gun with pios, reinforcing with your first 251 (before adding a flamethrower). Use the big Pak to kill either or both of the IS2s when they come in range. Plant some AT and antipersonnel mines around (especially north of) that Pak-43 site, and generally defend that zone from Russian attacks until you have at least a StuG, a Panther, and a Brummbar, in addition to your other vehicles (rocket launcher, flamer-251s). Once your armor is in place and you’ve reached your pop cap, head to the very top of the map with your armor in the lead, cross the stream, take out the HMG bunkers at the top of the Russian base, and destroy the base methodically from north to south. Your 251s can hose down Russian infantry, your armor can take out any Russian armor that shows up, and your pios can repair damaged vehicles. Leave your HMG and snipers on the left side of the map to slow down the Russian advance (your CPU ally will have virtually collapsed by this time), and, once your main force is in the base, self-destruct the captured Pak-43. Should take not much more than 25 minutes.
There really isn’t any commander that gives you very useful stuff for this mission. All you need are the basics. In fact, I always seem to get better results on this when I choose no commander at all.
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