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Unity of Command (game series)
Game scale
IMO it’s well worth spending the time to develop the ability to visualize what these units and hexes represent.
The map scale is 20km (12 miles) per hex.
Units represent German divisions / Soviet corps.
That’s ~10,000-30,000 men depending on which side the unit is on and what type of unit it is.
Soviet infantry corps are on the upper end of the range, German tank divisions are on the lower end.
Why the variation:
One reason may be that the more expensive the equipment was to manufacture (e.g. Tiger tanks vs. Mosin-Nagant rifles), the fewer men the resulting division would be able to make use of, simply because they couldn’t manage to build more equipment.
Another reason may be that the equipment the men are using simply requires more space on the battlefield to operate effectively or requires more supplies, leading to a natural limit on the number of units for a given frontage.
For example, tanks can’t fit into every nook and cranny of the battlefield the way infantry can, and each tank requires a lot of heavy fuel and ammunition to operate.
So a single “step” in the game seems to represent around a battalion or two of men (~800-2,000 men), depending on the side (~1 battalion for the Germans, ~1.5-2 battalions for the Soviets).
How I know this: I just Googled/ChatGPTed how many battalions were in a German division / Soviet Corps.
A battalion is around the upper limit of what you can reasonably command in Combat Mission (both CMx1 and CMx2). A “standard” fight in Combat Mission has you commanding a company of men, so a battalion fight is when you’re commanding around three companies at the same time.
“Typically, divisions would rotate battalions between the front line and reserve positions. This allowed battalions on the front to engage the enemy, while those in reserve could rest, receive reinforcements, re-equip, and prepare for future operations. The number of battalions engaged versus those resting depended on the situation's tactical and strategic demands. During intense operations, such as major offensives or critical defensive stands, a higher proportion of a division's battalions might be engaged simultaneously. For example, in high-intensity scenarios, two-thirds of a division's battalions might be in combat, while one-third rested or served as a reserve. In less intense periods, this ratio might shift to allow more battalions time to recuperate.” (ChatGPT)
A battalion (single step) might be given an order to capture a particular town, while a company might be tasked with capturing a particular part of town.
A division, then, might be found simultaneously attacking several large areas of key terrain along a 20km frontage, such as towns, hills, and forests: one battalion might be tasked with taking a town, while another is attacking a hill, and a third is attacking a forest, all in one big line.
Each turn represents four days of real time.
General thoughts
The game has a weird vibe of being halfway between a wargame and a puzzle game.
Having the entire map constrained to a single screen (as is often the case, but not always) contributes to a puzzle-game feel, since puzzle games often have all the information on a single screen.
I think another thing that contributes to the puzzle-game feeling are the combat outcome predictions. In a puzzle game there's generally no ambiguity about the effect that a particular action will have on the state of the game, whereas in most war-games that level of certainty only comes with having played the game a lot.
Another big factor in the puzzle-game feel is the total lack of fog of war. You can see all of the opponent's units. The second game apparently does have fog of war, though.
I think of this game as being in a "club" of realistic wargames that handle different levels of warfare: from lowest-to-highest-level:
Arma 3: individual → squad → platoon
Combat Mission: platoon → company → battalion
Command Ops 2: company → battalion → regiment/brigade
Unity of Command: Army → Army Group
HOI3: Theater → National
What I like
The game is very easy to pick up and start playing. There aren’t a lot of controls / UI to learn.
What could be improved
It doesn’t make sense to score solely on whether the objectives are reached/held without any regard to casualties.
A Steam review pointed this out and I agree.
I wish the game tracked what kinds of victories you'd gotten on the different scenarios in the past (when playing them individually).
General advice
Turn the music off.
You can access the game manual through the main menu.
Don't attack with units who have been out of supply! They'll get destroyed.
ZOC doesn't apply if you have a friendly unit in that space.
I failed one mission because I didn't do an analysis of my likely avenue of approach, taking into consideration the major annoyance that rivers create.
Recommended campaign order
For some reason you can only have one campaign active at a time, so it’s worth spending some time thinking about which one to play first.
Playing in order of difficulty:
A Steam review said the Red Turn DLC is the easiest, so maybe start with that.
A Steam review said a big problem with the campaign is that the AI moves units that are entrenched at the start, losing the entrenchment bonus.
The Black Turn DLC is more difficult but is apparently not as good as the original Stalingrad campaign, so maybe do the Black Turn DLC next?
One Steam review said it was more difficult than the Red Turn DLC, maybe just for getting brilliant victories; another review said it was easier, maybe just to get a basic victory.
The Stalingrad campaign is the original campaign included with the game and is apparently the best one.
Playing them in chronological order:
How to use different unit types
German Security division
These are basically just weak infantry: normal German infantry divisions attack at 4 and defend at 3, and these attack at 2 and defend at 2.
Historically, presumably these were less-able-bodied, less-well-trained, less-well-equipped, and/or non-German-speaking units, so the idea was presumably that the Germans had more men available to fight than they had resources to properly train/equip them (or they had men available to fight who weren’t in good-enough physical condition to, say, run across a field to conduct an attack or run from one defensive position to another, or couldn’t speak the German necessary to coordinate with the other units needed to conduct an attack), so they opted to turn these men into security divisions that would focus on less-demanding tasks (than attacking and defending) that still needed to get done.
In-game, these seem to be most useful for:
breaking through zones of control so that your infantry divisions can push further than they otherwise would have been able to
preventing enemy units (like partisans or weakened infantry divisions) from breaking your supply routes
Infantry division
Motorized infantry division
Mechanized infantry division
Panzer division
Air support
A defining feature of air support is that it can be used anywhere on the map without needing to traverse the terrain. For that reason, it's probably best used later in a scenario to support your furthest-advanced units as they attempt to take your most ambitious victory locations. This is because the way these scenarios tend to play out is that you start with a large number of units at a front line, you will attempt to pierce that front line with your infantry divisions, and you’ll then advance a smaller number of motorized/mechanized units which will need to confront further resistance behind that front line.
Questions
What real-world ability is the "logistics" theater asset supposed to represent?
How do railways work with supply stations that are near the railway but not on it?
A: Railways only work for sources of supply that are actually on the railway.
What duration of time does a turn correspond to? A day?
Summary of the tutorial
The map scale is 20km (12 miles) per hex.
Each turn represents four days of real time.
Click and drag to move the view.
G to enable / disable hex grid.
Hold T to show terrain icons.
Weather can be dry, mud, or snow. Hold W to show the icons.
P to toggle showing enemy territory as red.
You win missions by capturing objectives (just like Combat Mission).
Hold O to show a description of the objectives.
Your score is based on how quickly you capture the objectives.
Units represent German divisions / Soviet corps.
Click a unit to select, right-click anywhere to deselect.
When a unit is selected, hover over the stats in the info sheet to see a description of what it's about.
The circles underneath a unit represent its strength.
A white arrow on the unit's icon means it can move (it has "Movement Points").
Action Points (AP) are used to attack. A unit gets (at most?) one per turn.
If a unit's icon shows a thunderbolt, it can attack (it has an Action Point).
The action point can be used instead to do "extended movement".
An orange outline showing the unit's movement radius indicates that the unit can attack. Black means it cannot attack.
When you select a unit, use the mouse wheel or space bar to switch to extended movement.
You can see an estimate of the outcome of a potential attack by clicking on the unit to attack with and then hovering over the potential target. If you hold Ctrl, you can then move the mouse cursor over to the info sheet showing the estimated outcome.
Zone of Control (ZOC) is the area one hex around a unit which will basically force enemy units to stop (so they can't just move around you).
Weak units don't exert a ZOC.
When you're considering moving a unit and have selected it, ZOCs will show up as orange dots within your movement radius.
To cross a river you must first position your unit next to the river and then have it wait a full turn.
If a unit has a grey AP (lightning) icon, that means the AP is "locked" and cannot be used for extended movement.
You get a certain number of air attacks every turn.
You can build bridges, destroy bridges, and repair bridges. If the bridge is near enemy lines, its destruction is not guaranteed.
Units can move through hexes occupied by friendly units.
[Later: This is false.] The second air attack on a particular unit in a single turn seems to have a dramatically lower chance of inflicting damage.
The one-turn example task presents you with several enemy units, but in order to capture the objective in a single turn you need to concentrate all of your units and airpower on one or two infantry units. So it teaches you that your goal in this game isn't really to inflict the maximum losses on the enemy; it's to capture those objectives as quickly as possible.
Summary of learnings from the introductory scenario
Hold S to show what hexes are in supply.
What's a "reinforceable unit"?
Does attacking have any kind of drain on the defender other than the "step" stuff shown? Like, if I attack with crappy Romanian infantry, and they get annihilated, does that have any draining effect on the defender?
A: From having tried it, the answer seems to be "Yes, but a very slight effect for entrenched defenders".
You want to use tanks to attack fortified positions.
You want to rotate your units against the enemy's positions. Look for units that'll have at least one movement point left after the attack (there'll be a "1" when you click on them and then hover over the potential target).
This is a good scenario to try to get a Brilliant Victory on. It'll teach you how to win.
Concentrate all of your airpower on a single enemy unit to try to get them to the point where an armored attack will cause them to be over-run.
There's a "CORNERED" modifier that seems to cause extra damage.
I don't really understand what I'm supposed to use these Romanian Infantry for.
[Later: I think they're useful for finishing off weak units. They're also good for rushing in to take an objective after your real infantry have been spent destroying the defenders.]
Units go from "Standard" to "Veteran" very quickly. Like, just a few attacks will make them veterans.
Don't concentrate your airpower on the front line of enemy units. Instead concentrate the airpower on the second unit behind the first one, then use your infantry to break the first line, and have your armor rush through and also destroy the second line.
After attacking an entrenched infantry unit in a city with several other infantry units, it would usually lose its entrenched status.
Standard procedure for creating your plan
Background
I think the most interesting way to play Unity of Command is to do it while trying to write out a standard way of operating that maximizes your chances of succeeding on a new scenario that you have never seen before.
Procedure
Take a screenshot of the scenario.
Hide the Force Pool, Minimap, and Info Sheet.
Hold “T” to show the terrain features.
Take a screenshot before the units disappear from holding “T”.
Your final result should look like this:
Open the screenshot in the image-editing software of your choice (I use Greenshot).
Add labels to each of the objectives with the turn by which the objective must be seized (it must be by the end of that turn, not the beginning).
Optional: in smaller text below, include the equivalent number of days to make it easier to remember what the turns stand for. So, for example, “T1” is “4 days”, “T2” is “8 days”, etc.
Add labels for each of the supply sources indicating their range.
Recall how movement works:
Infantry move 3+1 (3 hexes while being able to attack or 4 with no attack), mechanized infantry move 5+2, and armor moves 5+3.
Units can use their movement points before or after they attack (it’s not like any remaining movement points are lost after attacking).
Different terrain types have different costs to enter them:
Starting from the furthest away objective:
If the hex is defended:
For each hex adjacent to that objective hex that you could conceivably reach:
Move five hexes towards your starting positions and label that hex with an ‘A#’ or ‘MI#’ to indicate that that is the furthest that either your armor or mechanized infantry can be while still attacking the objective hex.
If the hex is undefended:
Move seven hexes towards your starting positions and label those hexes with a ‘MI#’ to indicate that that is the furthest hex that your mechanized infantry can be and still seize the objective hex on time.
Draw small arrows for each of the planned ‘starting hexes’ for that turn to their respective planned ‘ending hexes’.
In general, at the beginning of the scenario the idea is that your armor and mechanized infantry will be going for far-away objectives, while your infantry will be used to blow through early zones-of-control and then kill the bypassed units over the next several turns.
Work backwards from the furthest objective with your armor, and then when you get to the first turn think about where you want your armor to end up at the end of that turn, then think about where you’ll want your mechanized infantry to go (they can do extended movement to get ahead of even your armor), and then finally think about how you’ll need to order your infantry around to open up the zones-of-control necessary to allow your mechanized infantry to push as far forward as possible.
TODO: I feel like I’m missing something about how to best alternate having units do extended movement to push forwards vs. limited movement so that they can still attack and destroy units.
TODO: Write up how to plan out how your supply will work on each turn. Like, you may have to capture certain hexes just to free up the railroad so your forward units can be supplied.
How being out-of-supply affects units:
Once you’ve planned out where your armored / mechanized units need to be by each turn to reach their objectives on time, then think about which turns they will likely be in supply and which turns they will likely be out of supply, and label them on the map like this: “T# In supply” or “T# Out of supply”.
I use a white background with an opacity of 25.
If you will need to have a certain rail route totally open and under your control by a certain turn to ensure your units are in supply the following turn, label that on the map.
TODO: I feel like my plan should account for likely enemy movements; I shouldn’t just be assuming the enemy units will stay where they are.
You don’t need to finish your plan in one sitting; you can do a 30-minute session every day to work on a small piece of it. If you do this, you can leave a note for yourself on the actual plan diagram about what to work on next.
You need to think about how you are going to protect your supply routes; you don’t want to leave gaps in your line that can be exploited.
You need to plan for enemy units retreating when attacked. If you don’t want them to be able to move, you need to plan ahead to have them surrounded.
AARs
Black Turn: Operation Barbarossa 1941
Army Group North
Army Group North - Unity of Command: Black Turn
I created this video right after getting the brilliant victory on the scenario.
Summary of my advice:
Take a screenshot of the map at the beginning with both the units and the landscape visible, then work out where your units need to be by the beginning of each turn to reach either: 1. an objective, or 2. whatever position they need to be on the next turn in order to meet their future goals.
Look for ways to get your tanks to achieve over-runs: look for a situation where two enemy units are positioned next to each other and one is ideally already weakened.
Understand the movement ranges of all of the different unit types and how they’re affected by terrain, and extended vs. normal movement.
For each objective, first check if your infantry have enough movement points to reach it / attack it / take it, and if they don’t, you know you need to use your mobile units instead.
Use your furthest-away units first to attack so that your closer units can better exploit the opening.
Understand that zones-of-control will prevent moving through certain hexes and that you’ll need to move units into those hexes to free up movement.
If you can kill the enemy units and remain on schedule, you should do that rather than bypassing them. Letting enemy units fall back or remain un-killed seems to be a mistake because it holds up your movement too much to be able to reach your goals on time.
You make most-efficient-use of your units if you can have them both move and attack on a turn.
Be sure to plan ahead about how your supply lines will work and how many turns out-of-supply your units may end up being.
Use your mobile units (esp. mechanized infantry) to surround enemy units and prevent them from retreating.
Army Group Center
2018.07.08
Axis Victory, Score: 750/1000 (Captured everything by turn 6)
I didn't capture the supply lines quickly enough. I noticed my units were just generally too far to the west by turn 4, when they needed to be at the east edge of the map. I think I should have sacrificed more infantry to be able to get the tanks / mechanized units through. I was avoiding any fights where I would lose more units than I would kill of the enemy's, and I think that may have been a mistake.
I initially thought I would try to encircle the first line of Soviet troops, as the briefing seemed to suggest happened in r/l, but while playing I realized I couldn't really do that because they were guarding the train tracks that my units needed to stay in supply. So cutting off the Soviet supply would also leave me out of supply.
Security forces seem useful for going after weakened units while your real infantry keep pushing forward.
Lone isolated enemy units will go on suicide missions to recapture objectives and cut off your supply lines rather than retreat to safety or surrender.
I captured the further Turn 3 city but then lost it when an enemy unit took it from me. I just generally wasn't doing a good job of guarding my supply lines and captured cities.
I should have used my infantry to destroy the first line of Soviet defenses, even if that meant taking heavy losses, and had my tanks and mechanized troops rush straight for the Turn 4 objectives.
I also wasn't doing a good job of rotating my attacking units (this was the first time I was playing in months), so I'd end up with units that couldn't move away from an enemy unit after attacking it, which would prevent my other units from attacking that enemy unit.