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New file at the Repository: Battle for Carentan HTH battle (2012-03-09)


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After consilidating all its forces after the D-Day drops the 101st Airborne Division is now ready to advance on the town of Carentan in order to merge the beachheads at Utah and Omaha.Airborne forces attempt to cross the final bridge on the Carentan - St. Mere Eglise highway in order to clear the approaches to the town for the upcoming drive on the town itself.Paratroopers from the 6th Fallschirmjaeger regiment lie in wait, command is holed up in the Ingouf Farm complex and at least 1 weapons company has its MGs trained on the exit of the bridge.

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Just want to confirm that this scenario will work with version 1.2. Thanks.

great news thanks very much for looking.

Erwin - still on it! but it will be done and ill release it as soon as possible, i kind of got carried away creating maps - a small 6 June para drop scenario, a Wolfhanze map but i think ill wait for OMG (the buildings dont look right, dunno yet) and a CWF scenario, but the Carentan map is my priority

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  • 4 months later...

mjkerner and I have been playing a HTH on this map and are up to Turn 124.

We both agree the map is awesome. Authentic, loaded with atmosphere, and chock full of fascinating and frustrating tactical challenges.

The OOB is a different story. While it looks well-researched, as far as the numbers and TO&E, there are two issues:

1. Reinforcements are just dumped on the map in no real order. Big headache for the players, and it leads to unrealistic additional delays while the players have to march units halfway across the map to get them into the formations that historically they would have already been in.

2. Naming of the units is ahistorical -- not any effect on gameplay, but annoying and an immersion-killer on such a great map. Example, US companies are numbered ("10 Company," "12 Company," etc. and the OOB doesn't follow the way American units were named.

These things would be easy to fix in the editor, but it's not time I feel like spending since I'm already in mid-battle. I still highly recommend this scenario, but this is just a word of warning to those considering downloading it. Thanks Undercovergeek for the great map and scenario -- here's hoping you (or someone) can issue a revised version some day that will address these issues.

If anyone is interested in an AAR and some screenshots, let us know on this thread and we can consider posting something later on.

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Yes, undoubtedly the best H-t-H battle I've played. The map and scenario are a Disneyland for small-unit infantry tactics--on a regimental scale. Many nuanced terrain-influenced decisions are necessary. I'm playing the Germans, so I am in my favorite element, defending against a tough/elite force playing a hold/delaying action. The map is super for that. Broadsword and I have had several small-sized (section/squad + and squad/platoon-) close range firefights that have had us on the edge of our seats waiting impatiently for the next turn to see how our orders played out.

But the reinforcements were a real pain. Undercovergeek, if you could place the German reinforcements on or closer to the main road out of Carentan, incrementally, say one company a turn with about 3-5 minutes between turns after the initial entry, that would help immensely. The unit numbering issue is an Allies problem only because the Axis companies were numbered, of course.

Thanks!

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Yes, undoubtedly the best H-t-H battle I've played. The map and scenario are a Disneyland for small-unit infantry tactics--on a regimental scale. Many nuanced terrain-influenced decisions are necessary. I'm playing the Germans, so I am in my favorite element, defending against a tough/elite force playing a hold/delaying action. The map is super for that. Broadsword and I have had several small-sized (section/squad + and squad/platoon-) close range firefights that have had us on the edge of our seats waiting impatiently for the next turn to see how our orders played out.

But the reinforcements were a real pain. Undercovergeek, if you could place the German reinforcements on or closer to the main road out of Carentan, incrementally, say one company a turn with about 3-5 minutes between turns after the initial entry, that would help immensely. The unit numbering issue is an Allies problem only because the Axis companies were numbered, of course.

Thanks!

awesome feedback - thanks for that guys. i will admit to been a bit phased by the size of it all once the reinforcements turned up. Ok now that i know what to do ill make a few changes - really really appreciate the feed back guys - thanks very much

i wanted the initial set up to be spot on, re the reinforcements i think i held off on committing masses of time until the FJs turned up - but fear not - im on it

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ucg, that will make it a superb h-t-h battle. People should be forewarned, though, that once reinforcements arrive, the Order phase will take about 2 hours for 1 minute of action, lol! Herding those reinforcement along the best paths to the Front to cut down on fatigue is quite a job for the Germans [the Alllies shouldn't have that problem--they just have to worry about artillery barrages as they try to cross the bridge :)]. As it is, I think by the time they get to the areas of action, they will need a good amount of rest.

On that point, you could place the reinforcement companies closer to Ingouf Farm, but extend their arrival time accordingly. So you could place them along that road which is about halfway between Carentan and Ingouf Farm, but have them arrive at 1 hr 30 min, instead of at Carentan at 1 hour. Or have some lined up and ready to move along the railroad close to Carentan, destination: "Cafe" area, say at 1 hour, 15 min. I lost a lot of time and added fatigue moving the companies over the marshy area

Now, that said, I am not certain of the RL reinforcement rate, location, time and condition, so it may be that the time spent handling the reinforcements is basically accurate. I will say that holding off Broadsword for an hour until reinforcments arrived (and of course I have yet to actually get them to the action) was a real blast!

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Guys d/l the Battle for Carentan HTC Battle. Not installed.

Have a dumb Question? What is a HTH? I suspect after I find out what HTH is

I won't install it. for now I am a rookie just learning playing small battles with

just a small unit's.

Thank's for any info

Zane

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H2H is if you wanna play against someone else.

I played the map but i found that the paratroopers really are a bunch of pussies. they take a little bit of fire and already run with their tails between their legs.:(

H-t-H = Head to Head/Human to Human.

@necramonium, I find that Broadswords paras are anything but panty-waists. I suspect that might be the difference from AI player behavior and human?

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  • 2 weeks later...

Just an update: mjkerner and I called off our HTH game after Turn 160, due to mutual frustration and an inevitable US major defeat after German HE destroyed the stone bridge, leaving all but 2 US reinforcement platoons no way to enter the battle.

I'll let mjkerner report any issues/suggested fixes from the German side, but we both agreed that this scenario suffers from a number of issues that put its playability into question -- the good news is, we had a lot of fun initially and the issues are all fixable.

1. Size. You're free to make a battle scenario as big or small as you want, but please warn potential players that it's regimental scale. Personally (and I prefer big battles/maps) I find battalion + supporting assets is the largest scale in CMBN that I can handle in PBEM WeGo. More than that is an almost impossible clickfest, especially if you split squads and want to play with realistic tactics.

2. Terrain. Fantastic map, but one thing that hugely affected gameplay: There's no LOS whatsoever across the river on the E half of the map (the half the Ingouf Farm is on). If that's historically accurate, then OK, but in the game it puts the US player at a huge disadvantage. I had MGs and artillery spotters on the US side of the river over there, looking all over for some way to get LOS and supporting fire into attacks on the farm. It proved impossible.

3. Deployment and Reinforcement zones/setup -- The battle could benefit from some more research how/when the actual units arrived in this battle area. Capturing the command post and the Ingouf Farm seem unattainable for the actual US forces that start on map. US reinforcements seem to arrive too late to contribute meaningfully to the battle, have to make a long and tedious approach march to even reach the river/bridge, and then if the bridge is still under fire/blown, the battle is effectively over. We'd suggest either scaling down the map, the force sizes, or both, to put the units closer to the fight.

4. Unit naming (this it a nitpick, admittedly, but an immersion-killer). Please revise the way US units are named, to use the actual unit designations of the units that fought here and follow the accurate organization of that army. US troops in WWII didn't name their companies 9 Company, 10 Company, etc.

Maybe you can have another go at this Carentan design after 2.0 comes out, and we have FJ troops too. I'd play it again if some of these issues are addressed.

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that was my plan all along Broadsword - to put the map out there and let people play it until i could put realistic FJs on

The most researched part of the scenario is the initial attack on Ingouf as there is much documented evidence to go on and the numbers for both sides are historically accurate - as are the units (down to the man for the US and an equivalent non FJ number for the Germans)

The reason i closed down the LOS is without the tree cover and bocage cover the US get destroyed coming over the bridge, each and every time on testing they would come across get pinned and the entire US force would be stuck on the bridge and then the mortars would come down

In your opinion then, would it be better to have just the initial forces without the reinforcements and draw a line just above the Ingouf farm and cafe area and have it as a company sized battle concentrating on just the farm capture? This is actually the only unabstracted part of the map and i was pleased to read a guy who drives down the ingouf farm road every day recognises the terrain and features on the map

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Yes, game-wise I prefer the company sized idea using just the historical map area and initial forces.

As the scenario stands now, the entire US game requires that initial force to secure the bridge, Purple Heart Lane, and any places where the Germans can put direct or spot indirect fire on the bridge and lane (Command Post especially, but also Ingouf Farm).

if the initial US force fails in this, the reinforcements will get killed/pinned at the bridge bottleneck and the battle is lost anyway. so why bother having the rest of the larger battle if everything really depends on what that initial force is doing?

Mjkerner said I could likely have taken the Command Post and Ingouf Farm if I'd realized how few Germans were manning the forward outposts and how little they could see in the predawn turns. But did the US commander IRL know this? I didn't feel safe just charging my force into the dark across the bridge, up a straight road, into the unknown. It looked like a classic kill zone. So I followed doctrine and waited to try and get sufficient smoke established N of the bridge, sneak some scouts across, etc. The time this took meant that by the time I really had forces moving across the bridge in strength, the Germans had time to stiffen their defenses, more light to spot the crossing, and we're able to inflict serious attrition on US units by the time they ran the gauntlet up to the FEBA.

In hindsight, I'd have done better just charging right at the objectives on Turn 1. So IMHO, you should change the briefing and just tell the US player to charge the objectives immediately. Or, start the US forces closer to the objectives on the enemy side of the river and make it a mop-up just to clear and hold. Then the real action once the reinforcements arrive would happen closer to Carentan and the Cafe areas.

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SPOILER ALERT

I agree with all that Broadsword says. Because he followed good tactical doctrine instead of simply charging across the bridge, I was able to get eyes on the bridge "ramp" on the Carentan side (South?) from several good spotting areas as it got lighter out. So adding some trees around there to help limit the German's spotting ability would be a good idea.

Because the German's right flank across Purple Heart Lane is empty at set up it takes a while to get even meager forces there to hold his probes up through hit and run/ambush tactics. Quite fun as it turned out, but potentially disasterous if the US briefing hints that the US player should just go all out across the bridge.

I think whittling the game down no more than battalion size for the US, and 2 companies (+) for the Germans (perhaps a HMG platoon and some mortar support--there's frankly too much of it now. I was able to destroy the bridge and I wasn't even trying to do that, just by a mostly continuous harassing fire), and keep it too about 1hr 30 mins would work well. The US should perhaps start closer to the bridge, and I would leave the German set-up mostly as is, maybe with a small setup zone across Purple Heart Lane. I would start a second reinforcement German company much sooner, because it takes forever to get them up to the front, and even using a lot of MOVE commands, they arrive tired or tiring in most cases. Maybe have the platoons come in 5 mins apart, starting about 15 or 20 mins in. with the shorter time period

Oh, and maybe just a few more bocage openings along PHL, on both sides of the bridge. There are some very loooooong streches with out any, and unless that is in fact historical, I would add just a few in order to ease cross-grain movement.

The above comments are for the playability factor, and of course is probably completely ahistorical, so I guess it depends alot on which aspect you want to emphasize.

But this map/scenario has alot of potential, and as I mentioned before, it produced the best, most intense, enjoyable 12-15 minute close-quarter firefight I have ever seen in CMBN. Good luck with any changes you make, UGC, and keep making maps and scenarios. Ask for playtesters to help iron out the bugs--they all have them!

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Just out of curiosity Broadsword. This battle sounds truly huge even compared with some of ours. How would you rate it compared to ours in terms of other items (was there any barbed wire etc). It seems you eventually called it off, but the battle was still running well over an hour in.

Just trying to understand what factors have contributed to some of our battles stalling out.

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@sburke:

No barbed wire or fortifications at all in this Carentan scenario/map. There may have been mines --not sure -- I didn't step on any but I had a lot of Engineers in my US force.

At ground level, I think it looked pretty close to the detail level that I typically have used on my historical maps. Undercovergeek had more urban terrain and buildings than I've ever done, certainly, due to the Carentan area at one end.

Terrain-wise, his battlefield is just slightly better groomed and "cleaner" looking than mine usually are -- with fewer weeds and general brushy foliage around.

The biggest difference I can see is in topography. Carentan is largely flat. So my maps have usually had a lot more locked elevation dots and contours on them. Also, this Carentan map has what appears to be a sunken road, but on close inspection it isn't really sunken, or not that much. On my maps I really have made some rural road segments a good 2 or 3 meters below the surrounding ground level. And, of course, my attempt at "basement levels" to two of the town buildings on my recent La Luzerne map may have made it even harder for the CM engine to digest.

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  • 2 weeks later...
heh - youre welcome - im working on changing a few things and cutting the scenario down to Ingouf and surroundings but ill save that as a new scenario as opposed to overwriting this one- glad youre having fun

Have you given any thought to heading in the other direction?, i.e. expanding the map to a little beyond Carentan, increasing the time to 4 hours, and making the town an objective?

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