Tank on Tank Digital: A Dice Rolling Festival

I bought Tank on Tank Digital: West Front and East Front (DLC) yesterday. I loaded it up last night and tried a few battles.

The proposition is attractive. A fast moving wargame on World War II low level combat, akin to the old Squad Leader. The units are single vehicles, single anti-tank guns and also squads or sections. At least I think they are because the vehicles and units have facing. In other words, their frontal aspect would be the strongest while their flanks and rear would give a small modifier to enemies attacking from that direction. Each units would have a range, defence value (soft or hard), a movement factor. Strangely enough there is no attack value. In other words, your Puma would roll the same two dice as your Tiger I in an attack. Your M26 would roll the same two dice as your M4. With the exception of infantry having a -1 when attacking into woods, town or improved positions, this is rather puzzling. With larger units, one could claim that this would be an aggregate of the unit and more. In this rather low level depiction, it seems odd.

The wargame attempts to depict the issues of limited command with a small amount of command points available each turn and also the usage of the HQ units. However this restraint can mean that for a unit to reach a victory point across the map, the expenditure of command points would be prodigous, leaving very little room for anything else. This could be an issue of scenario design, this could be that of the system as well.

I tried several scenarios. The scenarios are tight, leaving little room for error. They often degenerate onto a dice rolling festival as it is difficult to launch a combined attack without the expenditure of several turns of command points thus increasing the odds for success in an attack. It usually boils down to a dice rolling contest. A lucky shot or two will change the complexion of the scenario.

In one game, the AI knocked out six or seven of my units with its artillery with its first attack on those units. Well, that's luck. In another, the enemy anti-tank gun successively killed two of my infantry squads which were hidden in urban spaces. The AI seems to have consistently significantly better dice rolls too. I have not managed to win a single scenario yet.

I read that the AI has incredible dice rolls in many of the reviews. In my five or six games, it seems to bear that out.

I managed a victory tonight after six or so attempts.