Gustav Line Beta AAR Round Two PEANUT GALLERY

[dieseltaylor]

Given scenario design [and designers] can be very varied in quality I have for some years believed that the only true measure for players to look at is how well they did compared to other players in that scenario.

Though having ten players play the scenario will have people of varied skill, and of course blind luck, a range of scores will be generated. For those who play AI this would be a handy measure. If multiple people play each other in a club the picture becomes a little bit more confused as you have added another variable and humans can be very variable depending on factors like booze, the other half etc.

The great advantage of club play is that at least 50% of players will be interested in your war stories after the event : 0!

PS Is their still a site where scenarios are reviewed and scores posted?

[c3k]

I have actively avoided your, no doubt, excellent DAR because of spoilers. The temptation to "take a quick peek" has been strong though, I'll definitely read it with interest after I've surrendered...

edit: re: having fun... the whole reason I'm playing the game - and h2h never fails to be a deliver win, lose, or draw.

Oi! I'm right here! My approach has been to eradicate every last one of your men. If all your men are dead, it will be much easier for me to capture the ground. Or, maybe I'm only saying that to lull you into a false sense of expectation?

Back to GaJ/Bil: Bil's been a bit quiet lately. Perhaps readjusting forces for the next phase of the attack. I like how GaJ is moving up a bit, trying to stay engaged with Bil's forces. That does two things: it prevents Bil from having a free hand to reposition, and it gives GaJ some much needed intel.

Ken

[Blackcat]

Mr C3K,

Bill has an overwhelming armour superiority and has taken trivial casualties (certainly fewer than the defenders). If he wanted to I think he could roll over GaJ's defences as an incoming tide washes over a child's sandcastle. Instead he toys with him as my cat does with a captured mouse. Neither is a pretty sight.

In the arena the Roman mob would be booing Big Bill.

[Vanir Ausf B]

That may be true, but Bil would take higher loses winning in that manner. Bil's meticulous advance is in-line with what a real commander who cared about his troops would do, not what would make for the most spectacular show for the peanut gallery. I don't fault him for it.

[c3k]

Mr C3K,

Bill has an overwhelming armour superiority and has taken trivial casualties (certainly fewer than the defenders). If he wanted to I think he could roll over GaJ's defences as an incoming tide washes over a child's sandcastle. Instead he toys with him as my cat does with a captured mouse. Neither is a pretty sight.

In the arena the Roman mob would be booing Big Bill.

Blackcat,

From our rarified perspective, we all know that right now Bil is in the cat's seat and that GaJ is in a world of hurt. However, Bil does not know that. In fact, that FOW is the key. Bil is conserving his force as he probes forward. If he makes an errant rush, GaJ will hurt him. I agree: Bil could roll over GaJ's forces. "Could" is the operative word. If he just charges forward (despite my bloodthirsty exhortations), he could quite easily lose the battle.

Ken

[dieseltaylor]

Would anyone have dooked it out with the two MkIV's when the opportunity offered?

PS I have now checked sources and the M10 should reliably hit and kill MkIv's to 1000metes. The MkIV has a good gun but the angled armour and higher position lead me to hope that from say 700-1000m the M10 could win. Testing will tell. Interestingly the M10's cross-country speed in RL is twice that of MkIV's.

[A Canadian Cat]

Well I just finished reading both AAR posts. It seems like a mad minute is coming next turn. And they both sense it too. Fun, fun, fun.

Ken, are you happy with GAJ's counter attack?

[MikeyD]

If those M10s start 'killin stuff' the battle could flip on a dime. Alternately, I don't know what's left for him if the M10s get holed. I've lost track of where the Jpz IVs are.

[Rocky Balboa]

As cautious as Bill is being, he is still not above making a mistake or two.

Earlier in the battle he lost 2 HT's but the loss was less severe because they weren't loaded with pixel truppen. This last turn he lost a TC on his MkIV that advanced too aggressively. He could have very easily lost the whole track had Tube Guy been hiding in the tall grass.

So far his mistakes haven't cost him too dearly but the fat lady hasn't started singing yet.

[Javaslinger]

The LOS seem brutally unbalanced.. GaJ has never seen anything before Bill. Wouldn't you think the defender should get some kind of advantage here???

[ZPB II]

I've pretty much lost interest in the AAR due to the funky LOS. The attacker spots stationary antitank guns and tank destroyers while moving. Seemingly every single time. Broken and boring. Could have been an interesting fight, a shame.

It's like the AAR curse or something. That kind of stuff almost never happens ingame but when you start showcasing it to people...

[__Yossarian0815[jby]]

(what the hell kind of name is Yossarian?)!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yossarian

[__Yossarian0815[jby]]

I read it exactly the opposite. Where there are few or even only one objective, the defender can concentrate his forces on defending that one. I think one of the big headaches GaJ faces in the current DAR is the plethora of objectives that he has to protect. Given the paucity of his forces, I think he was wise not to try to defend them all, but it is still a hard choice to make. Conversely, since the initiative rests with the attacker, he gets to choose which to go after, a choice aided by analysis of which will be the hardest to defend.

Michael

OKOK, there are more objectives on this particular map ) , but usually there arent in the QB maps. (Hence my wish in the CMSF2 wish list for more freedom in the kinds and numbers of objectives you can use in QBs).

[womble]

The LOS seem brutally unbalanced.. GaJ has never seen anything before Bill. Wouldn't you think the defender should get some kind of advantage here???

LOS can't be unbalanced. The same rules apply to all units. Use of LOS can be unbalanced. The situation can mean one side has a harder time spotting things than the other side: that's the point. GaJ has seen quite a few things before Bil has, in my estimation. Just not with things that can hurt them. Didn't one of his 76 choobs whack the heffalump on the nose three times before being spotted?

Bil has more eyes and is possibly making better use of concealment. GaJ has some monolithic items to get seen, and I don't remember whether Bil took a generally higher level of experience (which does affect spotting quite markedly). Bil is also killing things as he spots them, since GaJ's defensive approach to date has been deliberately economical of units at the coal face (piecemeal, to some). So GaJ has a couple of sets of eyes looking for Bil's several dozen sets of eyes, and once Bil has seen something, he pretty much stops until that's dead, meaning that no new units of GaJ's get a chance to see Bil's units.

The long grass has certainly provided Bil with a surprising amount of cover for his scouts, but Bil has also kept most of his assets behind LOS-interrupting crests.

[Baneman]

I'm beginning to think that this battle with these forces, should have been about 20 minutes shorter.

Then Bil would have had to push forward faster with much less of the careful scouting and elimination and the defense may have had more/better opportunities to hurt.

As it stands, Bil has time to grind forward not unlike a WWI tank.

Re. spotting - I carp about spotting a lot, so I've tried to stay out of commenting on this aspect, but still, Bil has had platoons moving through the long grass which GAJ has simply not see at all, whereas GAJ has had 1-2 man teams easily/fairly quickly spotted by Bil in the same long grass.

Sometimes it seems ( note : no facts here ) that one side in a battle gets all the first time spots and the other player is just SOL.

[dieseltaylor]

I dummied up a M10 on a hill looking down to where a pair of IV's were. In not one of four occasions I ran it did the M10 spot the IV's before getting hit on a first time shot. Now the commander is a -2 but I assume the rest of the crew are not registered blind and that the M10 gives greater awareness.

I am sure that there is a factor for commanders spotting but surely with the gunner and driver looking into a narrowish covered arc that area is benefitting from people with normal sight.

I need to make a smaller map and add extra level crews and do more work. BTW I can understand an argument that a poor commander spots badly and logically this should apply to areas where he is is the only one looking. As it happened a closed IV looking straight ahead spots better to its 2 o'clock than the three crew looking at their 12 o'clock with an armour arc on.

[Michael Emrys]

;1444043']OKOK' date=' there are more objectives on this particular map ) , but usually there arent in the QB maps.[/quote']

Gee, I hate to sound like I am just being argumentative, but I keep coming across QB maps in both BN but especially FI that have three or more objectives. I also come across a lot with only one or two, so I wouldn't say that a majority of the maps are multi-objective, but I also wouldn't say that they are exactly scarce.

Michael

[dieseltaylor]

Refined the map muchly and added ATG's and a Tiger [no Elefant available]. I was pleased to find 76mm ATG was able to kill the MkIV and drive off the Tiger despite bombardment from the Tiger. So positioning does seem key from preliminary test.

[hoolaman]

Bil has more eyes and is possibly making better use of concealment. GaJ has some monolithic items to get seen, and I don't remember whether Bil took a generally higher level of experience (which does affect spotting quite markedly). Bil is also killing things as he spots them, since GaJ's defensive approach to date has been deliberately economical of units at the coal face (piecemeal, to some). So GaJ has a couple of sets of eyes looking for Bil's several dozen sets of eyes, and once Bil has seen something, he pretty much stops until that's dead, meaning that no new units of GaJ's get a chance to see Bil's units.

The long grass has certainly provided Bil with a surprising amount of cover for his scouts, but Bil has also kept most of his assets behind LOS-interrupting crests.

There's also the fact that Bil is far better at presenting his suspected and partial spots to us the reading audience, and he is not shy of gaming the game to correctly guess what he is facing. Not cheating of course, just wringing every bit of info from the game engine like a player has the right to do.

That combined with the fact that many of us are reading both threads probably gives a false impression of what he really sees at any one time.

However there are still many wonky spotting problems. Tanks still seem way too capable of spotting distant and supposedly concealed objects. And the fact that tree canopies do not actually exist in the game engine makes for some strange situations when there are different elevations.

[JonS]

;1444036']http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yossarian

It would seem that General Specific is more familiar with it than thee

[slysniper]

I'm beginning to think that this battle with these forces, should have been about 20 minutes shorter.

Then Bil would have had to push forward faster with much less of the careful scouting and elimination and the defense may have had more/better opportunities to hurt.

As it stands, Bil has time to grind forward not unlike a WWI tank.

Re. spotting - I carp about spotting a lot, so I've tried to stay out of commenting on this aspect, but still, Bil has had platoons moving through the long grass which GAJ has simply not see at all, whereas GAJ has had 1-2 man teams easily/fairly quickly spotted by Bil in the same long grass.

Sometimes it seems ( note : no facts here ) that one side in a battle gets all the first time spots and the other player is just SOL.

For GAJ, it is hard to spot with men lying down in the grass. So for all you experts lets put out this game fact. Your units cannot see very far if they are in tall grass lying on their bellies. Thus Bil, with his men standing and in motion is actually in a better situation for being able to spot. And to tell you the truth, this is the same in R.L.

It is very hard to see much on your belly when there is a decent amount of vegetation. the difference, in R.l. you move and shift until you can see over or around it. The Pixel men in the game do not do much of that.

[John Kettler]

dieseltaylor,

Regarding your gunnery experiment, please see what I said to Bil in his AAR thread about terminal effectiveness of the Shot, M79 AP vs face-hardened plate. Not good! Additionally, I've previously posted a unit report from an M10 battalion in which there's a huge gripe from the field that the TC can't see out of the turret when in fighting configuration buttoned, only the gunner. TC has no optics! Then there's also that pesky manual turret traverse, which can cause problems when confronting a target which has power traverse and the M10's turret's not pointing the right way.

There seems to be a disconnect, though on the ammunition situation, for the lessons learned piece clearly speaks of firing APC, which supposedly wasn't available until roughly D-Day. Target effect, too, is vastly better, in that a wrongly characterized Ferdinand was killed by M10 fire. Would be most interested to know the engagement geometry. Apparently, that same M10 also got a Tiger tank. Five rounds total, with two hits per kill, range ~250 yards. This M10 was covered by one which previously hit the Elefant's front armor plate, and that shot bounced. It's not possible to determine from the account where the second M10 was sited relative to the one whose frontal hit failed to penetrate. What can be gleaned is that the deadly M10 was within LOS of the one pinned down.

From "Brassing Off Kraut," quoted in full at link.

http://www.lonesentry.com/brassingoff/index.html

(Fair Use--just to be sure)

"Sgt. Ritchie ordered me to pull into open view around the corner of the building, and from this exposed position directed three hits onto the most exposed tank, it being about 550 yards up the road at that time, and knocked it out. We drew heavy AP and HE fire from the other tanks, shells barely missing our destroyer by a few feet and fragments hitting us. We were exposed for about five minutes. Then Sgt. Ritchie ducked his head and shoulders below the turret and pulled back behind the house. When enemy fire had ceased, Sgt. Ritchie had me pull out again, and from the same exposed position directed two rounds of AP shell that hit and bounced off the front armor of the Ferdinand 250 yards east of us. We again received intensive fire from the enemy tanks and shells were landing so close that fragments were coming through the open turret, one slightly wounding our gunner in the head when it hit our tank and damaging the counter-balance and .50-cal. machine gun mounted on the edge of the turret. We were again exposed to enemy fire for about five minutes. He ducked into the tank and we pulled behind the house again. We continued to fight throughout the day with our damaged gun." Sgt. Ritchie continues the story: "The second time we fired, Sgt. Christian radioed me to cover him and pulled out behind the house that he was using for defilade and directed the fire or five rounds, scoring two hits on the PzKw VI and two hits on the Ferdinand that were pinning us down. He definitely knocked them out: only two men got out of those two armored vehicles. Direct fire from the supporting enemy tanks was so intense that I saw two rounds hit the house around which he had moved to fire and another hit the corner of the building directly above his tank. If any of these shells had scored a hit, it would probably have put destroyer and crew out of action."

(Fair Use)

In my view, GreenAsJade's M10s seem to be nowhere nearly as potent as the 503rd TD Battalion's M10s were at Anzio. To be fair, though, he wasn't shooting the Elefant from 250 yards, was he?

slysniper,

Am not at all sure I agree with your interpretation. For starters, movement instantly attracts the human eye. Also, Bil's infantry is exposed well above the grass, and it's not exactly kunai grass in Guadalcanal, where the practically impassable kunai was taller than a man. Permit me an argument by analogy. In the Western Desert, one of the reasons the 88 was so deadly was because it was effectively invisible when dug in because of the heat shimmer, whereas the enemy tanks were quite visible above it. Given the apparent height of the grass and the ways Bil's moving men are considerably taller than the grass, this seems reasonable as analogies go.

There are WW II accounts in which Panzerfaust equipped infantry, even those with closer combat weapons, were able to hide in the grass and engage tanks which couldn't see them at all, but were quite visible to the infantrymen. Likewise, I know of a very successful SU-85 engagement in Lithuania in which attacking Panthers couldn't see the SU-85 in a wheatfield, but the SU-85 had no trouble seeing and killing them, since they were markedly taller than the wheat and stood out.

So, since at least some of GreenAsJade's guys are spotting from the grass at any given time and it's much harder to spot things while moving, it would seem that GreenAsJade should be able to do considerably better than he has to date, and Bil's mobile eyes shouldn't be doing as well. And if Bil can spot prone men in the grass from way out there, how much faster would he spot and kill GreenAsJade's men in the grass were everyone/most up? I think there's a disconnect here, but it may conceivably be just an ugly string of bad "die rolls," a subject of which I know a great deal! Thoughts? Anyone care to test my premise?

Regards,

John Kettler

[Freyberg]

I'm interested in how Bill moves his infantry. I remember early in the game, he said was using quite complicated movement orders, with a lot of staggered pauses, and he does seem to pay very careful attention to details of the terrain - folds etc - which I think gives a real edge to the careful player.

[__Yossarian0815[jby]]

It would seem that General Specific is more familiar with it than thee

D´oh, good one )

I´ve read the book three times (been a while though) but i didn´t catch (22) that quote.

[__Yossarian0815[jby]]

Gee, I hate to sound like I am just being argumentative, but I keep coming across QB maps in both BN but especially FI that have three or more objectives. I also come across a lot with only one or two, so I wouldn't say that a majority of the maps are multi-objective, but I also wouldn't say that they are exactly scarce.

Michael

I won´t say you are right unless you do the statistics )