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Battlefront....please explain.


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Yeah but it's a quickbattle situation that we are discussing here. Seems like a lot of effort going into this.

JonS has already chimed in with the correct answer. The TO&E for scenarios/campaigns has to be created first and it is always created based on the best research available. So if there is no Heer PzIII available then we don't make TO&E with that possibility. QB TO&E, by default, uses the standard TO&E. If it is/isn't available for scenarios/campaigns, it is/isn't available for QBs by default. Which is why I say it would take effort to undo the historical realism because that's the starting point.

And who knows whether existing records are really complete enough to reflect the odd Pz III in the Heer.

Sure, but in that case they are present in such small numbers that they shouldn't be available anyway.

It really boils down to two different style of players. There is the "I don't give a flying fig about realism, I know what I want and don't restrict my wants". It's a legitimate position to take, so believe me when I say I'm not sneering at such people. But there is the other way, and it's the way we've chosen to follow "in order for a player to have the best feel for a particular setting the units available need to reflect reality of that time and place as closely as possible."

Steve

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Reassigning a Pz III to a Heer unit doesn't imply "I don't give a flying fig about realism".

In fact, even if the Heer didn't have any Panzer IIIs it is very likely that Luftwaffe tanks (which were the only ones with large numbers of thick skinned AFVs) were supporting Heer infantry, even in very small engagements. Something that you disable here.

But that's not the topic, the topic is whether investing all this time into coming up with all this can possibly bring a bigger payout than spending the time elsewhere.

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Reassigning a Pz III to a Heer unit doesn't imply "I don't give a flying fig about realism".

In fact, even if the Heer didn't have any Panzer IIIs it is very likely that Luftwaffe tanks (which were the only ones with large numbers of thick skinned AFVs) were supporting Heer infantry, even in very small engagements. Something that you disable here.

Having LW crewed PzIIIs supporting Heer troops isn't the same thing. CM's crews are explicitly assigned, the formations explicitly created, for a specific purpose. Which means in the TO&E code there is a LW PzIII Platoon assigned to a LW PzIII Company assigned to a LW Panzer Battalion. As far as the game is concerned there is no such thing as a Heer PzIII of any sort. We'd have to create the TO&E for that, which is why I said that (in this case) having the possibility of Heer PzIIIs involves creating fantasy TO&E. Both work and compromising reality.

But that's not the topic, the topic is whether investing all this time into coming up with all this can possibly bring a bigger payout than spending the time elsewhere.

I have spent more time answering your posts than it took to setup the TO&E to be the way it is. Just saying... :D

Seriously, your imagination is getting the better of you. In this case (adding PzIIIs for Heer) would take MORE time, not less. And even then only a few minutes because it would involve duplicating LW TO&E, changing a bunch of variables, and swapping out the crews. So if your concern is about us spending time in the wrong places, and you say you want realism, then having us spend more time to make the game less realistic shouldn't be at the top of your wish list.

The only time savings we could have is if we didn't do historical research at all. Just whinged it. That would save probably a week. But it would also seriously harm the game, so it's not a week I would advocate being spent on other things.

Steve

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Reassigning a Pz III to a Heer unit doesn't imply "I don't give a flying fig about realism".

In fact, even if the Heer didn't have any Panzer IIIs it is very likely that Luftwaffe tanks (which were the only ones with large numbers of thick skinned AFVs) were supporting Heer infantry, even in very small engagements. Something that you disable here.

Only in QBs. Nothing is stopping you from assigning HG Pz IIIs to Heer formations in the scenario editor.

And this being "disabled" has nothing to do with TO&E, but is a limitation in the QB system that does not let you mix same-side services/nations. TO&E is not the route to address this issue.

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I think it's great the games try and be as historically accurate as possible. I love history, although I am not well read in these matters compared to so many on here.

Gerry

+1 -- Been burned by way too many other PC games that "winged it" on OOBs and TO&Es, forcing the modders and community to spend many hours figuring out and trying to retrofit more realistic forces into a game. Many, more cynical game companies probably assume the majority of players either won't care or won't notice the bogusness. I'm grateful BFC did all that work for us, and since we know they're dedicated wargamers too, we can actually trust their decisions and feel confident that they did the best feasible job on representing whatever was in a particular theatre at a particular time.

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Yes, exactly. I also wish the QB system could allow players to mix and match Branches. There's some sort of code reason why that's not possible, which makes sense because we'd already have changed it otherwise. I don't remember what it is or when we might be able to work around it, but for sure we want to allow more flexibility with QB purchases.

Steve

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+1 -- Been burned by way too many other PC games that "winged it" on OOBs and TO&Es, forcing the modders and community to spend many hours figuring out and trying to retrofit more realistic forces into a game. Many, more cynical game companies probably assume the majority of players either won't care or won't notice the bogusness. I'm grateful BFC did all that work for us, and since we know they're dedicated wargamers too, we can actually trust their decisions and feel confident that they did the best feasible job on representing whatever was in a particular theatre at a particular time.

On top of that the fact is most people don't want to spend the hours it takes to research this stuff, yet do want the realism. The rub is they have to trust that the information being used is good and consistent. We're very proud of our attention to realism in general and in particular TO&E. Certainly we've put more effort into it than probably any other wargame company in the history of wargaming. Certainly takes a lot more effort to simulate each soldier own to individual bullets than it is to make a piece of cardboard that says "2-3-5" :D

Steve

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Yes, exactly. I also wish the QB system could allow players to mix and match Branches. There's some sort of code reason why that's not possible, which makes sense because we'd already have changed it otherwise. I don't remember what it is or when we might be able to work around it, but for sure we want to allow more flexibility with QB purchases.

Steve

This cuts right to the heart of it and should be read a couple of times because it says quite a lot. Thanks!

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Well I didn't know there was a code reason. I guess that explains it.

It looked like a silly restriction because if you can do it in a scenario then you should be even more free to do it in a quickbattle which by it's very nature won't be top of the line historic anyway.

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Considering people used to cream over the prospect of setting Germans vs Germans or Ally vs Ally in CMBN, and nobody worried about realism there, it seems like we're giving BF rather a hard time over this "realism" issue cos a unit or two are not available. Hopefully in the next patch/module/family...

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There was no separate/additional Panzerjäger StuG Abteilung/Battalion for the HG division. The only HG StuG unit was III/Pz.Rgt.HG and has been already included in the count, so total for the HG division was 20 StuGs and 9 StuHs.

Nafziger (not reliable but useful) says that Abteilung was part of the PzGr.Rgt. while Jentz includes it in the Pz.Rgt. According to Jentz the StuG Abteilung was renamed III.Abteilung/Panzer-Regiment Hermann Göring on November 42.

Two times as much:

HG: 29 StuGs/StuHs + 46 PzKpfw III + 32 PzKpfw IV + 7 PzBef = 114 Panzers and StuGs. According to Jentz 217 Panzers and StuGs were commmited to the island so about 103 were Heer (217 total - 114 HG = 103 Heer):

15. PzGr.Div.: 6 PzKpfw III + 46 PzKpfw IV + 1 PzBef = 53

2./s.Pz.Abt. 504: 17 PzKpfw VI (Tigers) = 17

29. PzGr.Div.: 103 Heer - 70 (15.PzGr.Div. & Tiger Co.) = 33 StuGs and PzBefs out of 46 were on the island.

I include the the Tiger company in the Heer. It had been assigned on 30th June to 15. PzGr.Div but on 9th July it was assigned to the HG. However it was a Heer unit anyway.

Fernando - we are just going to have to agree to disagree my friend because it's just not worth my time to go around in circles with you.

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Fernando - we are just going to have to agree to disagree my friend because it's just not worth my time to go around in circles with you.

No problem. Out of curiosity, what was your source?

I am always ready to buy any interesting book out there ;-)

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We're very proud of our attention to realism in general and in particular TO&E. Certainly we've put more effort into it than probably any other wargame company in the history of wargaming.

Ahem. GDW, at least in its glory days mid-'70s to mid-'80s, put a great deal of attention too OOBs and TO&Es. Whether they were as successful at it or not I will leave for others to judge.

Certainly takes a lot more effort to simulate each soldier own to individual bullets than it is to make a piece of cardboard that says "2-3-5"

That may well be true, but then, trying to account for all the rifles and other assorted impedimenta in a given army isn't necessarily a piece of cake either if one is serious about it. Having a chat with Frank Chadwick might be an eye opener.

Michael

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Well I didn't know there was a code reason. I guess that explains it.

Yeah, sorry. What I thought you were asking for was Heer PzIIIs, not the ability to mix LW PzIIIs in with a Heer force.

It looked like a silly restriction because if you can do it in a scenario then you should be even more free to do it in a quickbattle which by it's very nature won't be top of the line historic anyway.

Yup, and honestly I forget what the coding hurdle is. But for sure it can be overcome because the game is capable of running multiple nations/branches at one time already. It's something we should look into again now that we're at a point where we can spend the attention on things like this without sacrificing bigger things.

Ahem. GDW, at least in its glory days mid-'70s to mid-'80s, put a great deal of attention too OOBs and TO&Es. Whether they were as successful at it or not I will leave for others to judge.

Oh, I think many games from that time period tried to do accurate TO&E to whatever level of resolution their game system could support. Which is part of my point... paper and dice inherently limits the scope of what can be achieved.

Plus, speaking as the guy who does the CM TO&E... the resources available now compared to even 12 years ago is substantially better. And I can only imagine the resources 12 years ago were substantially better than 12 years before. So on and so forth. The end of the Cold War, inexpensive publishing options, and electronic forms of communication have changed the nature of pretty much all research, not just TO&E stuff.

That may well be true, but then, trying to account for all the rifles and other assorted impedimenta in a given army isn't necessarily a piece of cake either if one is serious about it. Having a chat with Frank Chadwick might be an eye opener.

Certainly the higher up the scale, the more information that's needed to support it and the more effort needed to exploit it as well. But generally the scope of what is detailed becomes more more focused. Usually nobody cares about how many rounds of pistol ammo an assistant MG gunner in an HMG Squad has when the game is at the Corps level. At least I'm pretty sure nobody would want to play a game like that if it mattered :D

BTW, from a TO&E standpoint CM is basically divisional in terms of its TO&E since we detail each combat formation within a division. Some Corps level stuff as well, though those are unusual. We don't cover support units, though we have all the info to do that if it were relevant.

Steve

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Plus, speaking as the guy who does the CM TO&E... the resources available now compared to even 12 years ago is substantially better. And I can only imagine the resources 12 years ago were substantially better than 12 years before. So on and so forth. The end of the Cold War, inexpensive publishing options, and electronic forms of communication have changed the nature of pretty much all research, not just TO&E stuff.

Agreed on all points. :)

Certainly the higher up the scale, the more information that's needed to support it and the more effort needed to exploit it as well.

Again, it all comes down to how serious the game designer is. I have no doubt whatsoever that it is easier to conceal slack research in a game where the primary units are divisions than one where the primary units are platoons, or even individual men.

But generally the scope of what is detailed becomes more more focused. Usually nobody cares about how many rounds of pistol ammo an assistant MG gunner in an HMG Squad has when the game is at the Corps level. At least I'm pretty sure nobody would want to play a game like that if it mattered

Well for sure the player would not want to be burdened with an ocean of detail like that. However, if the designer is really trying to arrive at the most accurate determination of a corps combat power, that might well be something he'd need to look into. Once he'd done that, it all goes under the hood though.

Michael

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Yeah, sorry. What I thought you were asking for was Heer PzIIIs, not the ability to mix LW PzIIIs in with a Heer force.

It's worse. I don't care either way :D

Just thinking fictional and extra-fictional (quickbattle) scenarios should probably be able to imagine mixing in all the gear that was on the small island in the short timeframe anyway.

That doesn't mean that I supported dropping Churchill tanks from parachutes to fight with airborne infantry in CMBO quickbattles.

ETA:

thcal.gif

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