Still disliking Artillery

[GerryCMBB]

Hello All:

CM is such a great game. All these interesting elements - great variety of tanks, squads, AT guns, fausts/schrecks/PIATs/Bazookas, MGs of all types.

But then there is this god element, artillery. This seems to greatly minimize the play of the above elements as the plan so often seems to be: 1) find something important, e.g. an AT Gun; 2) blow the hell out of it with mortars or heavier artillery. Then rinse and repeat.

I just wish the artillery was not so powerful. There can be such great interplay among the other elements of the game. And to me this seems greatly downplayed due to the power of artillery.

Anyone else thinking like this?

Gerry

[WriterJWA]

But then there is this god element, artillery. This seems to greatly minimize the play of the above elements as the plan so often seems to be: 1) find something important, e.g. an AT Gun; 2) blow the hell out of it with mortars or heavier artillery. Then rinse and repeat.

Gerry

Funny.... that's how I've been fighting battles in Sicily so far, to the point where I wonder if maybe I'm relying on indirect fire ahistorically. But at the same time, I'm emboldened by a quote made by Teddy Roosevelt Jr, 1st ID deputy commanding general, during the Troina operation. When told the division had spent a million dollars worth or artillery ammunition, ordered "Spend another million."

... and I've used a !@#%-ton of artillery in the Troina campaign.

[Baneman]

There's no help for it vs the AI, but PBEM, you could always agree with your opponent "no artillery".

I'm playing a couple of Small battles like that at the moment, to see how a small reconnaissance clash would pan out - our rules are : Nothing fully tracked ( HT are ok ) ; no gun 50mm or larger ; no artillery ; no more than 50% points on infantry.

Armoured cars engaging like Mad Max - It's been quite a blast

[WriterJWA]

There's no help for it vs the AI, but PBEM, you could always agree with your opponent "no artillery".

I'm playing a couple of Small battles like that at the moment, to see how a small reconnaissance clash would pan out - our rules are : Nothing fully tracked ( HT are ok ) ; no gun 50mm or larger ; no artillery ; no more than 50% points on infantry.

Armoured cars engaging like Mad Max - It's been quite a blast

Yeah ... I like the infantry company vs. infantry company fight. There is indirect fire, but only organic mortars.

[Erwin]

We're discussed elsewhere that so far almost every CM game can be successfully won by a tactics version of 1) Send out scouts to discover ambushes and important enemy assets like guns etc. (the scouts often die in the process). 2) Use arty to kill the enemy asset. 3) Only then let the armor romp over the enemy infantry (with inf in support to kill bazookas etc.). 4) Use your main inf forces to occupy the ground. The reason is that nearly all CM2 scenarios are essentially frontal assaults due to small-ish maps where flanking by maneuver are very rarely possible.

Every time I have sent out inf on expeditions other than as part of the above tactic they have suffered nasty casualties and I have regretted it. But, it is very much a rinse and repeat method. The main interest in CM2 becomes admiring the amazing maps and graphics while you figure out how best to use the above tactics. However, this may have been what most western front battles consisted of and it is therefore "realistic." Nonetheless it becomes less than entertaining after a while.

Am looking forward to, and hoping that Eastern Front CM2 and CMSF2 will feature larger maps so that maneuver and mobility (riding on tanks?!) will again become more important.

[argie]

As Gen. DePuy said, they (the infantry) were just bodyguards for FOs most of the time in the Western Front.

[LongLeftFlank]

The reason is that nearly all CM2 scenarios are essentially frontal assaults due to small-ish maps where flanking by maneuver are very rarely possible.

That, and those maps that do offer some depth tend to be too sparsely vegetated, offering a huge number of possible OP sites with unrestricted LOS to the entire map. So blinding the artillery is less of an option for either side.

That was certainly the case in much of Italy of course, which is a large part of why that campaign was so slow, bloody and frustrating for the Allies. In NW Europe, not so much (hence the emphasis on securing strategic heights like church towers, Bourguebus ridge, Hill 192, le Carillon, etc.)

[Erwin]

That's a great quote from DuPuy... This game really illustrates that.

[Childress]

But, it is very much a rinse and repeat method. The main interest in CM2 becomes admiring the amazing maps and graphics while you figure out how best to use the above tactics. However, this may have been what most western front battles consisted of and it is therefore "realistic." Nonetheless it becomes less than entertaining after a while.

Especially in Italy with its vertical, spiny terrain. One of the recurring themes in Atkinson's book on the theatre is that success or failure often depended on the outcome of dueling Forward Observers. In Normandy you have more restricted FOVs, presenting geometric puzzles to solve. The Russian campaign offers, generally, flatter ground so there should be less of a feeling of attacking exposed on a well lit operating table.

Or, artillery may deserve a tweak in the direction a bit less lethality or a bit less precision, or both.

Or maybe BF nailed it.

[c3k]

We're discussed elsewhere that so far almost every CM game can be successfully won by a tactics version of 1) Send out scouts to discover ambushes and important enemy assets like guns etc. (the scouts often die in the process). 2) Use arty to kill the enemy asset. 3) Only then let the armor romp over the enemy infantry (with inf in support to kill bazookas etc.). 4) Use your main inf forces to occupy the ground. The reason is that nearly all CM2 scenarios are essentially frontal assaults due to small-ish maps where flanking by maneuver are very rarely possible.

Every time I have sent out inf on expeditions other than as part of the above tactic they have suffered nasty casualties and I have regretted it. But, it is very much a rinse and repeat method. The main interest in CM2 becomes admiring the amazing maps and graphics while you figure out how best to use the above tactics. However, this may have been what most western front battles consisted of and it is therefore "realistic." Nonetheless it becomes less than entertaining after a while.

Am looking forward to, and hoping that Eastern Front CM2 and CMSF2 will feature larger maps so that maneuver and mobility (riding on tanks?!) will again become more important.

It's kind of interesting in comparing the steps Erwin listed for the game with the real-life tactics used to overcome enemy defenses. I think it shows how well the game simulates the real event.

To get a more open battle would take a larger map. Put a couple of companies on the attack on a 2km by 2km map against a company (+) holding key terrain and it should play very differently. Even more so if the defender has to hold one or more of several objectives.

[WriterJWA]

Mild arty question: Why can't we fire "grid missions" at suspected enemy areas out of LOS of the spotter? Say.... on the reverse-slope of a hill?

[Broadsword56]

I don't understand the complaining about map sizes. We've got a map editor in-game and with 2.0 it's better than ever. Make some.

[GerryCMBB]

I wasn't complaining about the maps, rather the dominance of artillery. The winner seems to be the one that can use artillery best. I assume that artillery will still have a major effect in the east front games.

A comment on making maps. I appreciate there are many talented map makers and modders contributing to the game. But I don't understand the "Make some" comment. I paid money to play a game not to make add-ons for it. Not everyone has a creative nature.

Gerry

I don't understand the complaining about map sizes. We've got a map editor in-game and with 2.0 it's better than ever. Make some.

[Bil Hardenberger]

Artillery wasn't called the God of War for nothing:

Our artillery... The Germans feared it almost more than anything we had.

Ernie Pyle

Soldiers, you brave guys, and who are your wives?

Our wives are our loaded cannons, that's what our wives.

Traditional Russian soldiers song

"The poorer the infantry, the more artillery it needs; the American infantry needs all it can get."

French General Koechlin-Schwartz

The artillery is a god of modern war

Josef Stalin

[womble]

Mild arty question: Why can't we fire "grid missions" at suspected enemy areas out of LOS of the spotter? Say.... on the reverse-slope of a hill?

You can. Buy a TRP.

[sburke]

I wasn't complaining about the maps, rather the dominance of artillery. The winner seems to be the one that can use artillery best. I assume that artillery will still have a major effect in the east front games.

A comment on making maps. I appreciate there are many talented map makers and modders contributing to the game. But I don't understand the "Make some" comment. I paid money to play a game not to make add-ons for it. Not everyone has a creative nature.

Gerry

I don't believe that was directed at you. In all fairness a lot of people have been asking others to make them. After a while one gets this sense of entitlement from folks asking for mods to look a certain way, maps done for X size or capability, scenarios dedicated to HTH/AI (take your pick) play. The game you paid to play has what it has, asking for ANYTHING else is generally a request for someone to do something for free. However none of that is relevant to your point.

Artillery IS a pain, but I don't think it is ahistorically so. Now that does not mean you can't enjoy CM without Arty, you just simply need scenarios without it. Off hand I have no idea how many of those there are. I really enjoyed Bad Day at Red Beach in CMFI, the only arty there is the small company mortars. The thing is though, the larger the battle, the more the expectation of battalion and regimental support. Folks who design them are going to design them that way. If you take an existing scenario and try to cut out the arty, odds are you would seriously alter the play balance. It is a bit of a sticky issue, but yeah I can totally get wanting to be able to have an infantry on infantry battle without getting wonked by a lot of 105 HE rounds.

[Broadsword56]

If you hate artillery, just wait until CMFI gets to Salerno -- a teacup-shaped battlefield with German OPs on every mountain and able to spot just about everything.

[GerryCMBB]

I hear you. Not so sure what I am going to do here. Love the game in many ways; find it unfun and very difficult in other areas (e.g. finding good locations for Guns/MGs on defense takes a lot of time - LOS is really hard for me to gauge. Or navigating buildings, etc.).

Take care,

Gerry

[eltorrente]

I've won a few huge battles against the AI, where I picked one platoon of troops and a ton of artillery. Pretty easy if you are methodical, plus the fact that the AI is so bad.

In PBEM's, on the other hand.. this just isn't the case. At all.

Typically in PBEM's, a platoon or a couple squads get beat up by artillery, but it's never what determines who wins or loses the battle. Most people are too aware of the threat to sit theire in a vulnerable spot when the spotting rounds start dropping.

It's mortars in direct fire that's the most accurate, responsive, and dangerous.

[Sgt Joch]

Near St.Lo on july 11, 1944, U.S. 2nd Division artillery fired 20,000 rounds to support a two battalion attack on Hill 192 which was 1,000 yds from the U.S. front line. That works out to over 1,000 rounds for each of the 18 platoons.

U.S., CW, Russian doctrine all emphasised massive artillery support to break through the enemy line. According to the Germans, who were in a position to know first hand, U.S. artillery was more effective than the Russians. German official doctrine was the same, but by 1943, they were short of tubes and ammo and had to use their artillery more selectively.

Back to CM, artillery is probably a bit too effective for WW2 and will probably be tweaked further in the future, although this is easy to workaround now by limiting the number of rounds available.

[Andrew H.]

Arty in CMBN doesn't seem quite right to me...but I don't know whether its lethality is actually overmodeled, or whether it's because the kind of situations I use it or find it being used against me are historically unusual. Or both. (Although certainly the "Spotting round! RUN!!!" behavior seems ahistorical.)

But most of the historical instances I run across using artillery involve either preplanned barrages (aside from certain large emergency fires called by Americans in the BotB), or at least a lengthy wait for arty to arrive. The individuals receiving arty always seem to be in some sort of fox hole or slit trench (again, aside from certain BotB situations). However, the existence of these trenches may simply reflect the lethality of artillery as accurately reflected in CMx2, with the flaw being the prevalence of meeting engagements.

But what I can't recall having seen (certainly with much frequency) is the use of 81mm mortars (or smaller ones, for that matter) being used on direct fire like snipers.

[GerryCMBB]

I am suffering from precision light mortar fire right now. Team behind wall. Round drops close by and they keep firing (I had given them a Target order). Now in RL I would expect them to duck behind the wall iso continuing to fire. So I am thinking maybe BF could program that into a unit's behavior.

But it wouldn't have mattered. A bunch of rounds landed right on top of them and killed 3/4.

Gerry

...

But what I can't recall having seen (certainly with much frequency) is the use of 81mm mortars (or smaller ones, for that matter) being used on direct fire like snipers.

[ridethe415]

Light mortar fire seems a bit too acurate:

Yesterday I was receiving light mortar fire from a US 60mm morter. The mortar was

130M away, receiving mg fire from a Pznr IV, had lost one man and was STILL firing as fast as it could, and ACCURATELY.

In CMFI I am receiving a lot of accurate light mortar fire, on the first round. I am assuming this is direct fire, but still, dead center in the middle of a squad, on the first round?

[eltorrente]

In CMFI I am receiving a lot of accurate light mortar fire, on the first round. I am assuming this is direct fire, but still, dead center in the middle of a squad, on the first round?

I wouldn't say that is even close to a common occurance. I use direct fire as often as I can, and I'd love to see that happen sometime. Most of the time, they'll fire a few spotting rounds that land a distance away and I don't remember them ever getting a lucky first shot hit in the middle of a squad.

Even when they're zeroed in, it takes quite a few rounds to completely kill a squad.

[Erwin]

One of the biggest problems is with WEGO when the troops don't have the AI to take appropriate action, and one minute of bombardment can wipe em out before you can issue orders.