Getting Started This file contains instructions on how to get started with the Fulda Gap 85 software. If it is not already running, you should run the Main Program by clicking on the Main Program entry in the HPS Fulda Gap 85 program group (The HPS Fulda Gap 85 program group can be found under the Programs list from the Start button). If you prefer, you can print these instructions using the Print button above. You will get about 9 pages of text and graphics if you do this. You can get more detailed information in the instructions below by clicking on the links displayed in the text. Doing so will display the associated help file for this topic. You can return to this help information by clicking on the Back button above. Note: the Modern Campaigns software is designed to run on displays with screen areas up to 1280 by 1024 pixels and with color settings of 16-bit or higher. By default, after the introduction, the Main Program begins by prompting you for the name of the file to open using the File Selection Dialog. These instructions will get you started using #10_00_Started.scn. In the list of files displayed by the File Selection Dialog, this should already be selected. Notice that a short description of the battle will appear at the bottom of the dialog. Then click on the OK button.
Next, the A/I Selection Dialog will appear. Since you are going to play as NATO, select Automatic with FOW in the Warsaw Pact A/I group on the right hand side of the dialog. This will cause the computer to play as the Warsaw Pact side. If you want to give the computer an advantage, you could move the Advantage slider towards NATO side, but leave it in the middle for now. Later on, you can also use this dialog to experiment with Optional Rules by clicking on the Rules button. For now, click on the OK button. The battlefield will be drawn on the screen and in the lower right-hand corner of the screen, the A/I Action Dialog will be drawn. Since you are the defending side in this scenario, the Warsaw Pact side will be the first side in each turn. The A/I Action Dialog will appear when the computer is controlling the turn indicating what actions are being performed. Since you have chosen Fog of War (FOW), you won t see the action of enemy units outside of our Line of Sight (LOS) and the description you see in the AI Action Dialog will be vague. Click the Step button to advance the A/I or, to speed up the A/I, click the Run button. When the A/I completes its turn, your Command Report will appear in the lower right-hand corner. This will appear at the beginning of each of your turns to provide you with information about the status of your forces. Notice in particular that in this scenario, you have the ability to fire Artillery Mines three times. This ability will be useful in your attempt to slow
down the Warsaw Pact advance. When there are reports that indicate a specific location on the map, clicking on the report will scroll the map to that location. Click on OK to close the dialog. In this scenario, you will play the part of the 11th Armored Cavalry, attempting to defend the town of Fulda from the advancing Warsaw Pact forces. You have a variety of forces, including armor, infantry, and helicopters, but will be facing a much larger Warsaw Pact force and will have to fight a delaying action in an attempt to slow their advance. If you press and hold the Shift key, then you will see some labels appear on the map indicating some geographical features on the map. In the middle of Fulda, you will see an oval with the value 100 in it. This indicates an Objective worth 100 points, which you currently own, but if taken by the Warsaw Pact, will give their side 100 points. If you click on the map, then units in that location (hex) will be displayed on the left-hand side of the screen in the Unit List. The location on the map surrounded by the flashing square is called the Hot Spot and the Unit List shows you the units in that location. Click on the location with the 100 point Objective in it, and notice that in that location, you have a Helicopter unit and the HQ of the 11th Armored Cavalry. Both of these units are Fixed, indicating that they are currently not allowed to move. This state reflects the fact that the Warsaw Pact has attempted a surprise attack and we have not had time to react. But the state will be automatically removed during the scenario allowing you to move these forces.
If you click on a picture in the Unit List, then the unit becomes Selected and is shown with a brighter picture. If you click on the picture again, it becomes un-selected. Most actions in the game require that your first Select units. Notice that if you double-click on a map location, then all units in that location are automatically Selected. It is important that you understand how to move Helicopters in the Fulda Gap 85 game as they will be an important part of your force. In general, all units have two modes they can be in; normal Deployed mode and a special Travel mode. For ground units, Travel mode indicates that they are in column formation and can use movement by roads. However, for helicopters, Travel mode indicates that the unit is flying. Normally a helicopter unit must be in Travel mode to move. You can use the Travel Mode button on the toolbar to toggle the state of selected units between Deployed and Travel modes. Click on the map location just to the lower left of the 100 point Objective. Look in the Unit List and you will see that this unit is a scout helicopter unit and that it is not Fixed. You can use this unit in an attempt to determine what the enemy is up to. Select the helicopter unit and press the Travel Mode button. You should notice that the Movement value in the unit picture is now followed by the letter T indicating the unit is in Travel Mode. Likewise, on the map, you see that the unit counter has a white bar along the bottom indicating Travel Mode. At this point, the helicopter unit is flying and is able to move.
To move a Selected unit, click with the right mouse button in an adjacent location to the unit on the map. If you do this correctly, the unit should move and a red arrow should appear on the map indicating the movement. If you don t click in an adjacent location or if the unit is prevented from moving for some reason, then the program will beep and an error message will appear in the message area at the bottom of the program window. Notice that you can continue to right click in adjacent locations and the unit will continue to move. Move the scout helicopter unit to the upper right hand area of the map where we expect the enemy to be attacking from. As you move the scout helicopter unit about the map, you may encounter Warsaw Pact forces. But since you only have a scout helicopter unit, you should not attempt to attack the enemy, but determine their location and withdraw. If you click on other units you have in the town of Fulda, you ll notice that you have two other non-fixed units. In particular, just to the lower right of the 100 point Objective, you have a mechanized infantry unit that can move. Notice that if you click in the unit picture using the right mouse button and hold the button down, then the picture will change to an alternative display showing you additional information about the unit. Here you can see that the unit consists of Abrams tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles. The various values displayed tell you information about the combat ability of the unit and the list of names shows you the command hierarchy associated with this unit.
Select the unit, toggle it to Travel mode, and then move the unit to the upper right of the map. You can send this unit out to perform recon on the advancing enemy units. As you move, notice that the Movement value in the unit picture changes color from white, indicating full value, to green, indicating 2/3 value remaining, to yellow, indicating only 1/3 value remaining, to red, indicating less than 1/3 value remaining. It is important to note that movement points are needed to toggle out of Travel mode and if you move too far with this unit, you will be unable to toggle out of Travel mode in that turn. Units in Travel mode, except for Helicopters, are more vulnerable to enemy fire and so you do not want to leave your units in Travel mode when they encounter the enemy. When you are ready, click on the Next Turn button to advance the turn. You will be prompted to save the current battle in a file. Then the A/I will perform actions for the Warsaw Pact side. During this turn, enemy units should appear. Once it is your turn again, you can click on the enemy units and get partial information about them. You will see that you are being attacked by a force of armor, infantry, and helicopters. There are two important actions you can take in fighting the enemy: firing and assaulting. Most units have a range of 1 and can only fire into an adjacent location. Some units will have longer range or have guided missiles and will be able to fire at a distance of 2 hexes. Artillery units will have an even longer range. The range value against Hard (armored) and Soft (non-armored) targets is shown when you right click as the value after the slash (/). In this case, the unit can fire at armored targets at a range of 2, but non-armored targets only at a range of 1. Note that you will use your AA value and range when firing at either enemy air attacks or flying enemy helicopters. To fire at an enemy unit using direct fire, it must be within range and be in the Line of Sight (LOS) of the firing unit. If you click on the Visible Hexes button in the toolbar, then all hexes outside of the LOS of the current location will be darkened. Clicking on the Visible Hex button again will restore the normal map display.
In this example, an enemy unit has moved next to our mech infantry unit and we can fire on it. To fire, the program must be in Fire mode instead of the normal Move mode. To toggle from Move mode to Fire mode, hold down the Control (Ctrl) key. In Move mode, the cursor on the map will be a cross while in Fire mode, it will be an aiming circle. To fire on the enemy unit, you Select your unit, hold down the Control key, and right click on the target unit. When you fire on enemy units, you will get a Fire Report indicating the damage you did to the target unit. In general, each unit can fire 3 times during one turn, although artillery units are limited to firing twice. Moving in the same turn will reduce the number of times you can fire however. To Assault enemy units, you need 2/3 of your movement allowance remaining (a green value). Since this introduction will show you how to assault, take care only to fire once with any unit adjacent to the enemy during this turn so you have the option of assaulting later. One aspect of modern warfare is the specialized weapons that are available. In particular, artillery units can fire Chemical weapons and Artillery Mines. In this game, to enable the use of these weapons, you must first select the Use Alternative Fire option in the Command menu. After you do that, click on the Artillery Dialog button on the toolbar.
This will display the Artillery Dialog showing you all of the artillery units that you have available. Notice that if you click on the Find button, the Hot Spot will be located at the unit s location. Also notice that displaying the Artillery Dialog automatically puts you in Fire mode. Enemy units that you can fire on have a red highlight around them. When using normal firing, these are your valid targets. But in this example, you will fire Artillery Mines in an attempt to slow the enemy advance. Right click on the map in a location that you can see near enemy units. This will display the Alternative Fire Dialog indicating your fire options. This is where you will specify alternative weapons such as Chemical and Artillery Mines. Select the Artillery Mines option to fire Artillery Mines into the target hex. This will cause a Mine marker to appear on the map indicating that the location now contains mines. These mines will affect the movement of ground forces moving into that location, but will have no effect on flying helicopters. In other scenarios, you can use Chemical weapons to disrupt enemy forces. Finally, this introduction will show you how to assault enemy units. For this, you need a unit which has 2/3 of its movement allowance remaining (a green value), which is un-disrupted (this is indicated in the unit picture), and it must be adjacent to an enemy unit. To assault, select the unit and right click in the enemy location just as you would to move into that location. If successful, this will indicate that an assault is pending with a graphic in the defending location. You can combine several units in an assault on the same defending location, but when you are through assigning attacking units, click on the Resolve Assault button on the toolbar. This will calculate the combat results and display them. If successful, your attacking units will enter the defending location and any remaining defending units will retreat.
At this point, you know the basics of how to conduct your battle to defend Fulda. Since the Warsaw Pact forces will appear in large numbers, you will probably have to withdraw to preserve your units. Your goal in this scenario is to delay the Warsaw Pact forces as long as you can. At any time, you can check on the status of the battle by using the Victory option of the Info menu. This will tell you the losses in the battle and the current Objective point value. Feel free to continue the battle or save the game at this point and return to it later. To get more information, see the following help files: User Manual Main Program Help File Scenario Editor Help File Order of Battle Editor Help File