Will infantry be fixed in CMx2

[weapon2010]

18 minutes ago, greycat said:

For what it's worth, I'd  be happy with a formation control for infantry so that they can advance in line abreast rather than single file. This might solve some of the concerns mentioned above, but I don't know if the game engine would support it.

yes I would be for that, that would be an improvement

[Michael Emrys]

About troops advancing in single file, my experience seems to be a little different from what many complain about. Sure, they do tend to march in single file, or something close to that, when you use the Move command. But I only do that if I firmly believe that during the turn those troops are not likely to come under fire and I am in no hurry for them to get somewhere. The rest of the time—which means most of the time—I break squads down into teams and give them Quick commands (except in circumstances where I consider Hunt or Slow to be a better choice). And you know what? They almost never move in single file unless some quirk of terrain makes that a necessary or easier path. They do spread out a bit, although perhaps not as much as we all would prefer, and when they reach their destination AS, they tend to position themselves sensibly most of the time. Troop behavior could be better, but it could also be a lot worse. And it's worth keeping in mind that due to the psychology of men under fire, in real life soldiers behave in ways that can most charitably be described as "sub-optimal". They tend to bunch up under fire because in dangerous situations humans do that seeking the comfort of one another. It takes training and discipline to break that habit.

Michael

[Vanir Ausf B]

Higher causalities in CM are mostly because CM tends to under-model the ability of infantry to find cover when under fire and spotting infantry is too easy compared to reality. The first problem is being worked on, the second is hard to fix because the AI is presently incapable of area fire and will never be great at it.

In my opinion infantry spacing in CM is not wildly unrealistic. It is true that there is no collision detection on the models so they can occasionally merge together, but I doubt this has a very significant impact on results. In reality, spacing is mostly a function of terrain and lines of sight as well as the need to maintain communication.

[JoMac]

Yes, and it's good to hear that CM is at least looking into trying to minimize some of these casualties with better use of Terrain Micro-Managing...This could be in a form of varying savings rolls for each class of troops and in each posture for example.  

And like some others here, I also don't have much of a problem with Troop arrangement within an Action-Spot, and don't see it impacting the game much.

Also, different Formations in the future might be nice, but I'm fine with it now. 

Edited June 15, 2016 by JoMc67

[Ithikial_AU]

Probably the big two requests for engine improvements over the years from the community has been the two "F's" - Fire and Formations.

Is the engine broken, no, as Womble outlined earlier there are tactics you can use to minimise casualties. Can it be improved? (From an outsiders perspective with no idea about the amount of coding BF have to do ) Absolutely! We've all seen pixeltruppen do some pretty silly things over the years. The ability for pixel truppen to react / cancel orders if they see their buddies from another unit getting hit is proably number one on my list. Murder for WeGo players!

I think the disconect we players have with pixeltruppen compared to what real commanders had/have with their troops mean we all get a bit gung-ho / human wavey once and a while. For example: In Game - I'd like to take that house but I think it maybe being watched. It's worth the risk - get going 2nd Squad! Real Life - I'd like to take that house but I think it maybe being watched. I guess I'll take another look at the map for alternatives.

[sburke]

10 hours ago, sonar said:

Hey.I'm looking at  the battle I'm playing right now and in a lot of teams {not squad} there is at least two men, lying on top of each other, are you telling me that is realistic? Stop telling me how to play the game, I know how to play it, you are not telling me something I don't already know thanks I have read about Huertgen, that is not the point, i am not talking tactical decision making. I am talking about needless casualties due to the fact that there are too many men confined in too little a space i.e. one action spot. I don't know how to post screens or I would. 

Cheers.

Yep that is why I come to the forum.  My wife is a way for a week and I have no one at home to give me snot nose replies when I try to point out something.  yep  thanks, I feel much better.  Almost cozy.  Want to snuggle?

You've made an assumption based on a computer driven graphic that the individuals are too close to each other and believe THAT is the cause of your high casualty rate.  Others have given a lot of reasons for other things that can be the source of casualties and shown actual troop positioning in real life combat where the individuals are about on par with CM figures.  I wouldn't mind a bit better positioning by units, but most of what I have seen and read including the above pics says soldiers position a lot closer than you seem to think in actual combat.  With that I will leave this thread as I know that isn't what you want to hear. 

Before I go though I can add one constructive item for you - how to post a screenshot compliments of Sergei.  Bookmark this as even when you get used to it, it is a nice reference on hot keys to help make a better shot etc.

 

Edited June 15, 2016 by sburke

[Michael Emrys]

41 minutes ago, sburke said:

...how to post a screenshot compliments of Sergei.

Ye gods, Sergei! Where is that boy? I haven't seen him in the loooooooongest time.

Michael

[Michael Emrys]

Re percentage kills: I am presently reading Fatal Decision by Carlo D'Este about the battle for Anzio. I am just halfway into it and already his description of the fighting at the beginning of February is insanely bloody. Virtually entire companies simply ceased to exist. I would not have wanted to be there.

Michael

[Sublime]

Practice practice and more practice. Bad luck can ruin all of it anyways but if I * really * try I can get pretty low casualties attacking even in WW2 or BS Russ vs Americans.

Its very easy for things to go tits up as our cousins in Britain like to say though.

As far as spacing yes the squads are too close. However BFC has stuff going ond you.re not visually seeing. Like micro terrain effects, HE and arty effectiveness dialed down etc

[Sublime]

Emrys yeah anzio was nasty. We.re lucky we figured out how to jam the Fritz X bombs so quickly. I remember reading about the failed US attack on the Rapido iirc that failed miserably. Thousands of casualties. No gain. The germans sent a messenger pigeon iirc or somehow sent a note to the US saying " looking forward to your next visit "

The Italian campaign just sucked for all involved. None of the glamour of NWE. Defenders dream terrain. Godawful casualties. Fighting the German Army that whilst forever a shadow of itself pre June 22nd 41, was way stronger than a year later and thr Luftwaffe actually played a fairly serious role. One could argue Italy, especially Anzio was the last time US troops were under fairly common steady air attack.

And if course Ortona and Monte Cassino..

The mustard gas incident at Naples was a showcase of ineptness. Mark Clark, while unfortunately sharing a last name in common with me, is in my opinion one of the poorer US WW2 generals as well. And reading about his demands to the press that they reword every mention of 5th army to Mark Clarks 5th Army is just... sigh.

[Wodin]

Self preservation also comes into it when comparing casualties with real life. In game all your pixeltruppen are being the small percent in real life that shot back and made a difference and took a risk or two along the way. I expect most soldiers in real life who fought the same way they do in CMx2 would have been killed sooner rather than later.

 

Take the old gunner and halftrack issue..I bet at times when supressing a building or something they fired blind, juts popping up very briefly to make sure they where still shooting the area. Also soldiers shooting blind over cover or spraying a room from round the corner..non of these can happen either.

Edited June 15, 2016 by Wodin

[Bulletpoint]

I think part of the problem is that we want the troops to keep different spacings in different situations, but it's "one size fits all".

Generally, I'm pretty good at keeping casualties low by splitting squads, using scouts, etc. etc. but there are still many situations where it would be really nice to have the option for extra spacing. Maybe like a toggle button you could press.

 

[Sailor Malan2]

To answer the original question ( "Will infantry be fixed in CMx2 ") I think the answer is "no, it is a fundamental limitation of the engine". Having said which, there are ways to mitigate it (see above, but also there are some really good guides out there - including some video tutorials). I used to take very heavy casualties. Now I only do when I am exceedingly unlucky (direct hit from HE for example) or I do something stupid. I know I am doing it - it is usually a complete gamble (if there is any enemy in that wood/building with LoS to here this is going to hurt.... oops why did I do that?). Locate the enemy and suppress them. Then do it some more. Rarely close an enemy, and never unless they have their heads well down. If you take the 2nd casualty in the same position, you are in the wrong place, get out of there.

 

Oh, and I am fairly sure the effectiveness of fire has been tuned to compensate to some extent for the closer spacing than idea.

Edited June 15, 2016 by Sailor Malan2

[JoMac]

1 hour ago, Sailor Malan2 said:

Oh, and I am fairly sure the effectiveness of fire has been tuned to compensate to some extent for the closer spacing than idea.

Yes, and I think so as well...At least I hope it is.

[womble]

The effectiveness of bullets hasn't been tuned to compensate for the sometimes slightly close spacing, but the blast effects of HE has been dialled down "a bit".

The third thing that needs fixing about infantry is the "executive AI". The thing that deals with the next level up from the TacAI, but down from the "Scripted AI". It needs to be able to react to when an element has flinched out of its location under TacAI "self-preservation" control, and figure out a good place to withdraw to. Hint: 16m back from the hedge line you've just been shot out of is not a good place to wait for the advancing automatic weapons and grenades of the enemy that just suppressed you enough and killed enough of your squad/platoon to make you bug out in the first place. Or maybe the TacAI needs to have a bit more sense dinned into it, if the executive AI isn't able to react to cues, just find "good" positions in the painted order zones. Whatever, dropping "just back off the firing step" is terminal stupidity.

[sonar]

14 hours ago, sburke said:

My wife is a way for a week and I have no one at home to give me snot replies when I try to point out something.

Ha, no not snot nosed, just responding to your patronising assumption that i have not read = don't know, what I'm talking about when you said. "I think a good reading of action in the Huertgen may alter your perspective on levels of casualties especially in forest fighting".Really..... cheers for the link though, now that was being helpful.

So below are links to four screens that i took from a random saved game, they are all from the same turn and there were more I could have uploaded but I think these provide enough evidence as to what I at least am seeing as wrong. Hopefully this works and you will see what I am talking about. Pics 1-3 all too easily end up resembling pic 4. This has nothing to do with how I or anyone plays the game, rather it is the way the game plays itself.

Cheers.

Edited June 15, 2016 by sonar

[JoMac]

I don't have a problem with these pics showing troops slightly bunched-up a little (this is fairly common, especially in areas of cover....I don't see how it equates to more casualties being inflicted. I mean, the enemy is still going to shoot at that Action-Spot regardless if he is bunched or spread out. 

Thou, I hope Tree Clumbs are not like HT Gunners, and treated like a 'Bullet Magnet', and having all Small Arms directed towards a small area within an Action-Spot. 

Now, I'm still saying Troops might need additional Micro-Cover or, as Womble mentioned, some sort of 'Executive' AI to help alleviate some of these casualties.

Edited June 15, 2016 by JoMc67

[Vanir Ausf B]

Yes, the bunching up in those pics is to maximize the tree cover. I don't have a problem with that.

That does bring up another factor: map design. The editor gives the option of placing one, two or three trees in an action spot, but in practice most map designers only use single trees in order to minimize framerate issues. Unfortunately, this need to balance tree density with computer performance means less cover.

Edited June 15, 2016 by Vanir Ausf B

[sonar]

37 minutes ago, JoMc67 said:

I don't have a problem with these pics showing troops slightly bunched-up a little (this is fairly common, especially in areas of cover....I don't see how it equates to more casualties being inflicted. I mean, the enemy is still going to shoot at that Action-Spot regardless if he is bunched or spread out. 

"slightly bunched up"  they are lying across oneanothers legs,what would tightly bunched look like? . Are you serious when you say you can't equate this to more casualties. look at the last pic, four men lying dead piled atop each other. have you ever heard the expression  "shooting fish in a barrel" ? I agree that it is probably {I think} down to all the men going for the best cover and therefore they all converge on a single tree {although not always, like the two men on the left in the first pic, they are not near a tree}

 My point, once again has nothing to do with tactics, it's about how the men position themselves when they go to ground, this causes casualties that would be avoided were they not to behave as such, and are therefore needless.

39 minutes ago, Vanir Ausf B said:

 

Yes, the bunching up in those pics is to maximize the tree cover. I don't have a problem with that.

 

Vanir, the problem with that is it maximises the chance of pic 4 being the end result of this behaviour.

Cheers.

[Anthony P.]

I dunno. Fighting in/from woods was just a nightmare in WW2, I don't see why it should be any different in CM. Trees, roots, etc. does force large groups of people to bunch up more than normally, there's just less space. Just like for tanks, woods don't really provide much cover, just concealment.

If you have this issue, then so does the AI/your opponent. Seems fair and realistic enough.

[shift8]

On 6/14/2016 at 1:25 PM, sonar said:

Or will we have to wait for a new engine? Sorry much as I love these games, the spacing or lack of between squad members is way off. The casualties in cmx2 are much higher than before and can't get close to the kind you read about in combat reports. I've heard the arguments about pushing harder than a real life commander would do, but i don't buy that. You can play as cautiously as you like [ and i tend to do so} it won't help, because as soon as a squad comes under fire it will start taking needless casualties due to this. I'm looking at a battle i'm playing now and every squad member in every squad, is lying toe to toe with one another, and woe betide if there is a tree about as then they will lie on top of one another. It looks wrong and it is, squads get chewed up and there is nothing you can do about it. if you think i'm wrong, have a battle in a wooded area then look at the casualties at the end, most of the dead and wounded will be lying on top of each other stacked up behind a single piece of cover i.e. a tree. The bumping into one another while trying to get into position is another result of this, the ai on the whole does ok, it's just that they can't help themselves and you can't help them as there is literally no where for them to go as the are too many men confined to too small an area. if they were spread out even a little more than present, I think you would see casualties figures drop quite a bit, because from what i'm seeing a lot of the casualties are avoidable and are sustained due to the simple fact that they are just too close.

Cheers.

Infantry in the game are still essentially what they were in CMx1. They should be views as "blocks" of firepower. Infantry are far far too complex to animated or display their highly nuanced moments to such a degree that they would be 100% visually accurate. You should not be expecting that. Instead, you should view the simulation for what it is: the tactical movement of "firepower" elements. The accuracy of the weapons in game and the various calculations for micro cover etc already "effectively" take into account the effect that spacing would have. 

 

As others have already pointed out, IRL infantry do NOT follow the manual definition of spacing. COVER always takes precedence over individual space. Just because you want every man to be 10m apart doesnt mean the terrain will allow for it. You find cover where it is plain and simple. 

 

 

Edited June 16, 2016 by shift8

[BletchleyGeek]

@sonar I am mostly with you - this is an effect of having the lowest level of command (i.e. the level at which you give orders) and the lowest level at which the TacAI functions (i.e. by assessing cover and deploying the troops) to be one and the same. Ideally, one would want the TacAI to understand that it could deploy troops belonging to the same "quantum" into more than one action spot. 

Do not dismiss @Vanir Ausf B answer, @sonar. I read his message more along the lines "this is an issue because of having to account for physical constraints and what the TacAI can do at the moment".

@Anthony P. yes that happens to his adversary as well, but his adversary - if the game is CMFB - probably has 60mm mortars. Situations like the one in @sonar pictures explain a great deal of the lethality of 60mm, 3 inches, 50mm and other light mortars in CMX2. One well-placed grenade and you wipe out half a squad or a full HMG team (German HMG teams aren't broken down like their US counterparts)...

[shift8]

There is also nothing wrong with the casualty rate in CM. Too many people on here are piece meal comparing anecdotal and irrelevant real life examples with very specific CM instances. The Physics of the combat in CM is extremely accurate. IF there are some battles with higher than expected casualties it is because HOW people play, not the physical nature of the combat. 

[Vanir Ausf B]

3 hours ago, sonar said:

Vanir, the problem with that is it maximises the chance of pic 4 being the end result of this behaviour.

I don't think it does, assuming the tree is between your men and whatever is shooting at them. In fact, I will purposely try to get my men to bunch up behind trees by giving them Face or Covered Arc commands in the direction of hostile contacts.

[Michael Emrys]

13 hours ago, Sublime said:

The mustard gas incident at Naples...

You may be on the wrong side of the peninsula. The incident I think you refer to occurred in Bari. Correct me if I'm wrong.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_raid_on_Bari

Michael