The "Wunderwaffe"

This is the part where you will meet the Panzerkampfwagen VIII Maus, the German Super Heavy Tank. It is based on the capture of the Panzer viii maus.

The first mission will require you to destroy the prototype Maus. The will be an outpost for you to capture so that you can gain information about this monster. Although your forces at the start may seem lackluster, i.e. a BM-13 and a bunch of infantry, once you capture the outpost, you will by given more troops including a KV-1, two SU-76 and a load of T-34s. If you do not destroy the Maus in time, it will head back to the edge of the map and and will be repaired by supply trucks, making your job A LOT harder. The camouflage ability is very useful in this mission, because the Maus likes to target your heavy tanks. Make sure the Maus can’t find them by camouflaging your KV I.

Gamers Note: the Maus can fire back three times, so to absorb its fire, attack it with infantry three times, then send in the tanks. The Maus has the range of a standard tank, so long-range units will be useful. Also depending on luck, the Maus will appear on the little islet where the bunker used to be, so try to station a decent portion of your forces there.

The Second mission will require you to destroy supply trucks heading for a tank factory producing those damn Maus tanks. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, the armored supply trucks seem to be as armored as a Tiger I, and that make life a lot harder. One Maus needs 5 supply trucks to manufacture, so you will have some breathing space, but try to get rid of as many as you can, or you might have a Maus on the loose. At first, they will ask you to destroy 10 supply trucks, and that’s hard. Then after that, they will ask you to destroy 5 more supply trucks, before three Pe-2 Peshkas finally destroy the tank factory. At the top of the map where the force that has the KV-1 is, there is a German supply depot close by. This can cause trouble so better destroy it along with the AT LEAST four MG-42 positions. SU-76 is pretty effective against these jokes they call armored supply trucks so good to have one standing by. After roughly 15-20 attempts at playing using the forces given to me in this mission, I decided to buy my way through it. I bought two SU 76s, one for each army, and an extra T 34 for the army at the bottom. There is a supply depot nearby the army at the bottom, and it can cause some serious problems if it remains in action. After your first turn, aggressively push up towards the supply depot and target it using your T 34‘s and AT infantry. German units will attempt to defend the depot, you should ignore them and destroy the depot. If you do this, you should remain relatively unopposed throughout the mission, leaving you with plenty of breathing room to obliterate the armored supply trucks In the final cutscene, it is mentioned that the 4th tank division found more tank factories. Although there is actually a 4th tank division that fought in ww2, it was not involved with anything involving the Panzer VIII.

The third mission will need you to destroy three of the German’s tank factories, but you will have to recapture your supply depot first. There will be a few Panzer III, Panzer IV and infantry guarding it, but KV-1 being KV-1, they will be gone if played well. About KV-1, there will 4 disabled KV-1 somewhere around the map. Use your supply truck to repair them. One is at near the German supply depot closest to you, while another is at the bottom of the map near the river. The other two are near the farther tank factories. While you are playing, a Panzerkampfwagen VIII Maus will pop by for a visit. It will appear either from the road leading up from the bottom of your screen, or on the road leading in to the right. But the good thing is, you can commandeer it. To do so, you will need to reduce its health to an extremely low level, where the crew will then surrender the Maus to you, comrade! You’ll have to resupply it several times to repair it, but once do you’ll be nigh invincible. The Maus will do a drive-by on you, he will only stay near your troops for a max of three turns, and after he is gone it is almost impossible to locate him again. Don’t let the other units escorting the Maus distract you, concentrate fire on the Maus. Don’t let that tank escape or you’re toast. There will also be an airfield for you to capture, as the continuous Stuka raids can be bad over the long term. Now, in the next paragraph, I will talk about how to destroy the three German tank factories. I will order them from the one closest to you from left to right, please don’t get confused.

The first factory(Stahlwerk, meaning steelworks): It will be near a German supply depot, separated by mountains. You can place an infantry unit on the mountain and camouflage it to get a good view of the factory, then if your budget permits, buy a ML-20 artillery piece and shell the factory from the other side of the mountain. This ML-20 will come in handy when the Maus comes. Don’t wait too long to destroy this factory though. If you wait, it will periodically create five Panzer VIs and send them at you, which can be aggravating, especially over the long-term.

The second factory(Stahlschmiede, meaning steel smiths): Ideally, by now you should have commandeered the Maus, so use it and roll right up to the factory and smash it. It is guarded by a Panzer IV, Tiger I and a Bunker. Be careful of the marauding Stukas though. After the destruction of this factory, don’t slow down. Relentlessly push forward using the Maus and KV Is and capture the airfield along with the neighboring supply depot. Bringing infantry and other non-heavy tank units along on this push is a bad idea. They will quickly get demolished and only take up space. Use your heavy tanks and crush all resistance.

The third and last factory(Stahltiegel, meaning steel crucible). It is northeast of the second factory and north of the airfield. Ideally you should have gotten rid of or captured the airfield, so Stukas should not be a worry. Just roll right up to the factory and Maus it to death. If you want to drag out the German’s inevitable defeat, entrench your Maus and heavy tanks just outside the factory. Every couple of turns, the factory will create some Panzer VIs that you can one-shot using your heavies. This is a great gold farm to pay for the incredible expense of this campaign.