Has It Been Changed in CMx2?

[M4a3e8]

I loved the system, but CM one drove me nuts because of several equipment/OB errors.  I always wanted to play the Americans, but they were so severely crippled that it became too frustrating and sad to play after both of my like-minded frequent opponents, who would cooperate making adjustments, died in the real world.  I am now contemplating purchase of the new game.  What I want to know is whether any of the following have been corrected in the current iteration:

1)   In western front CM, American artillery larger than mortars cost as much as the German.  The Allies had four times as many gun tubes as the Germans, each Allied tube had four times as much ammunition and the flexible control system gave units access to the support of more batteries than German units had, but all this was represented by penalizing the Americans.  They received no discount for huge availability of artillery.  The U.S. units of fire were twice as large as the German, costing so much that it was generally not possible to buy them.  The cost was maximized by the lack of an option for telephone spotting in any weapons larger than mortars.

2)  American 81mm M1 mortar drove me particularly wild.  The British "3-inch" mortar was actually of 81.2mm caliber, and after the Normandy landings a majority of the shells fired by them had originally been manufactured for the U.S. weapon, but apparently the game designers decided that Britain got all the heavy shells. 

3)  The Germans had their 81mm mortar upgraded.  Because of transport problems in foot infantry units a cut-down version had been put into production.   By 1944 the original 8cm Granatwerfer 34 had been reserved for regimental artillery units, while companies and battalions were equipped with the Kurzer 8cm Granatwerfer 42, which fired the same ammunition as the old weapon to about half the range.  On anything but a small map that would be significant.

 

4)  In CM Afrika Korps, all the German top end vehicles were generally available.  Fair enough; the gaming community is overrun with fanboys who won't buy a tactical game that won't allow  them to use Tigers, though the availability penalty should have been higher.  Historically many of these types only came to northern training areas furthest from Allied air bases.  There was a six month period during which there was a single company of Tiger I's in the country, eight vehicles, which never got into action.  They did, however, lose three of them in a single cataclysmic road accident.  QBs set in that period gave a 20% availability penalty to Tiger I.

Do these problems still exist?

[Rinaldi]

In sum: Yes, it has changed. No, these problems do not persist.

The rarity system now in game is a much more accurate depiction of the realities of a theater on its default setting. German howitzer artillery is generally too expensive and too slow to react to be worth much for defensive fires, whereas the US artillery is the fastest responding in game. Target Reference Points offset that, as they should, but these also incur a rarity cost. American 81mms generally have upwards of 80 rounds plus WP; whereas German trench mortars (120mms) iirc don't have more than 30 rounds. The 'mountain' 81mm is also in game for the Germans now as a company-level asset for several formations. Purchasing a 4 gun battery, be it pack-75s or 105s, is not going to break the bank for an American player, taking the larger Self-Propelled batteries is when it starts to get problematic. The Americans also have more options; in lieu of a full 105 battery a platoon from a cannon company can be purchased for 105 point fires at a much more reasonable cost than their nearest equivalent LeIG and ScIGs (if memory serves).

Further it must be said that the armor coding is much better than anything you will see in CMx1. Solid shot to the Panther's turret from 76s will pen or partially penetrate upwards to 800m and will often knock the Panther out. Shermans can take hits on the mantlet at excessive range from Panzer IV and Pak40 - 1000m and 1400m, respectively. The game does American armor justice, when handled skillfully and with their much more flexible fire support you'll find you can generally out-do the opponent, even if they have cats. Panzer IV H and Js are nary a worry and can be engaged conventionally. This is anecdotal but I find Sherman's situational awareness to be much higher than their counterparts as well, crew skill aside. If that is actually modeled it would reflect the higher FOV sights available to the Sherman's gunner; giving it an extra pair of eyes over, say, the Panther, which did not have such. Given how well CM captures the maxim "he who sees first..." that's worth mentioning.

Heavies are much rarer. I can count on one hand the amount of times an opponent has taken them against me. They're often simply not worth the trouble; as most people would rather have 6 StuGs instead of 1 Tiger, even in the smaller scenarios. If a unit isn't there, its not available. A good example of the rarity system in action; try taking E8s in Nov. 1944, then try again in Jan. 1945. It's almost impossible to in the latter, but quite manageable in the former.

Telephone communications are now abstracted; you'll notice HQ units without radios can still ask for fire missions. This is a representation of laying lines.

OOB in general is vastly improved, and if Steve is to be believed, still very much improving.

Edited March 27, 2017 by Rinaldi

[akd]

1 hour ago, M4a3e8 said:

I loved the system, but CM one drove me nuts because of several equipment/OB errors.  I always wanted to play the Americans, but they were so severely crippled that it became too frustrating and sad to play after both of my like-minded frequent opponents, who would cooperate making adjustments, died in the real world.  I am now contemplating purchase of the new game.  What I want to know is whether any of the following have been corrected in the current iteration:

1)   In western front CM, American artillery larger than mortars cost as much as the German.  The Allies had four times as many gun tubes as the Germans, each Allied tube had four times as much ammunition and the flexible control system gave units access to the support of more batteries than German units had, but all this was represented by penalizing the Americans.  They received no discount for huge availability of artillery.  The U.S. units of fire were twice as large as the German, costing so much that it was generally not possible to buy them.  The cost was maximized by the lack of an option for telephone spotting in any weapons larger than mortars.

This is more an operational than tactical advantage.  To say that the Americans should always have more artillery is simply incorrect.  Point cost does not represent availability, but effectiveness.  Rarity represents availability, but standard equipment tends to not be subject to rarity.  There are advantages in game for US and British artillery, but a system that made it so that US always has 2x 105mm tubes in every tactical battle would be highly artificial and unbalanced.

Also, the idea that the US was deficient in equipment and tactics and gained advantage through more artillery and ammunition is just a myth.

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2)  American 81mm M1 mortar drove me particularly wild.  The British "3-inch" mortar was actually of 81.2mm caliber, and after the Normandy landings a majority of the shells fired by them had originally been manufactured for the U.S. weapon, but apparently the game designers decided that Britain got all the heavy shells. 

US 81mm mortars have only a small number of Heavy HE rounds available, and I'm not even sure how to get the units to use them.

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3)  The Germans had their 81mm mortar upgraded.  Because of transport problems in foot infantry units a cut-down version had been put into production.   By 1944 the original 8cm Granatwerfer 34 had been reserved for regimental artillery units, while companies and battalions were equipped with the Kurzer 8cm Granatwerfer 42, which fired the same ammunition as the old weapon to about half the range.  On anything but a small map that would be significant.

This is incorrect.  The kurz 8cm was mostly limited to FJ division use, although some infantry units utilized them.  However, the full length 81cm remained standard and in widespread use.  The short 8cm is available for FJ in CM.

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4)  In CM Afrika Korps, all the German top end vehicles were generally available.  Fair enough; the gaming community is overrun with fanboys who won't buy a tactical game that won't allow  them to use Tigers, though the availability penalty should have been higher.  Historically many of these types only came to northern training areas furthest from Allied air bases.  There was a six month period during which there was a single company of Tiger I's in the country, eight vehicles, which never got into action.  They did, however, lose three of them in a single cataclysmic road accident.  QBs set in that period gave a 20% availability penalty to Tiger I.

German AFVs tend to be subject to higher rarity costs in general, but if none of the type were at the front, they are not available at all for the relevant dates.  For the period when only Tiger-Gruppe Schwebbach was present in Italy away from the front, Tigers are not available in CMFI.

Edited March 27, 2017 by akd

[M4a3e8]

3 hours ago, akd said:

Also, the idea that the US was deficient in equipment and tactics and gained advantage through more artillery and ammunition is just a myth.

Don't see that I said anything that could be taken as endorsement of the myth.  But the "overwhelming American artillery" manifested itself far more often than, say, Tiger tanks. Do I correctly recall that there was no encounter in France between American armor and Tigers until the Ardennes offensive?

Nevertheless, it sounds as if CMx2 is worth a try.  At some point soon I will also have to discover whether the Soviets in CM:RT are still equipped with ruchnoy protivotankoviy granatomyot instead of ruchnaya protivotankovaya granata, but right now the budget only allows me one game

[akd]

37 minutes ago, M4a3e8 said:

Don't see that I said anything that could be taken as endorsement of the myth. 

I thought you were hinting at that as the broader issue, but the more specific issue you raised is not an issue in the current games.  Artillery is available in different-sized units priced based on their effectiveness.

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But the "overwhelming American artillery" manifested itself far more often than, say, Tiger tanks. Do I correctly recall that there was no encounter in France between American armor and Tigers until the Ardennes offensive?

Tiger Is possibly (I don't recall), but they definitely fought Tiger IIs earlier.  But QBs have always been intended to be sandboxes for the given theatre / campaign.  The relative frequency issue is handled by rarity. IIRC, standard US artillery has no rarity cost, and Tigers have fairly steep rarity costs, so if you play with strict rarity rules (an option for QBs), you will likely see much more US artillery relative to Tigers.

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At some point soon I will also have to discover whether the Soviets in CM:RT are still equipped with ruchnoy protivotankoviy granatomyot instead of ruchnaya protivotankovaya granata, but right now the budget only allows me one game

I know what the difference is, but not sure what you are getting at here.

Edited March 27, 2017 by akd

[Vanir Ausf B]

 

[M4a3e8]

7 hours ago, akd said:

I know what the difference is, but not sure what you are getting at here.

Barbarossa to Berlin equipped Soviet antitank teams with an unspecified "RPG", starting in 1942.  Unfortunately, the weapon seemed to be the RPG-2 or even the RPG-7, deadly  at several hexes range and neither of which were actually issued to troops in the real world until after the war.  The weapons they should have had were the RPG-40 and RPG-43 hand grenades, weapons that German training films dealt with by saying, "don't worry about them". 

Less provably, Molotov cocktails seemed a little ineffective but at the same time excessively portable, too easy to deliver but unlikely to do damage when a hit was achieved.  All the propaganda pictures of Soviet militia charging forward with canvas bags full of glass bottles of gasoline do not mesh with the accounts I have personally heard from Hungarians who actually attacked tanks with improvised fire bombs in 1956.  Molotov cocktails should have equipped only units that started the game entrenched and did not move.

[LukeFF]

1 minute ago, M4a3e8 said:

Unfortunately, the weapon seemed to be the RPG-2 or even the RPG-7, deadly  at several hexes range and neither of which were actually issued to troops in the real world until after the war. 

Umm, no, neither weapon was in CMBB.

[M4a3e8]

8 hours ago, LukeFF said:

Umm, no, neither weapon was in CMBB.

Perhaps it was not supposed to be, but something carried by the Soviet infantry antitank teams marked RPG routinely killed German tanks with frontal shots from two hexes distance.  My comparative tests showed it deadlier than the best Panzerfaust.  I stopped playing CMBB when multiple opponents began selecting forces with no infantry but antitank teams, sometimes with no vehicles at all.

Edited March 28, 2017 by M4a3e8

[Pete Wenman]

I don't recall there being any hexes in CMBB ?

[Thewood1]

Are you sure you're thinking of the right game.

[M4a3e8]

On 3/28/2017 at 10:03 AM, Pete Wenman said:

I don't recall there being any hexes in CMBB ?

It's the right game. For about four years I played nothing other than Civilization V and Combat Mission.

It took me twenty years after "Tactics II" to learn to say 'hexes' instead of 'squares'.  I doubt I will live long enough to change back again.

[Thewood1]

Wait...squares?

[BletchleyGeek]

22 minutes ago, Thewood1 said:

Wait...squares?

Action spots are square 

[A Canadian Cat]

It is true that action squares are real but the only some times they rear their ugly head.  Usually its best to just totally ignore that there are squares at all. The vast, vast majority of the time I do not concern my self with the underlying squares. When you plot movement orders for vehicles they don't factor in. When you plot movement orders for infantry you can see the highlight squares as you plot the way points but even then the soldiers themselves shuffle around in that area and are not in a fixed place so they don't really show themselves once the soldiers are on the move. The other place you can see them, of course, is when you issue area target orders - your actual target location will snap to the squares.

[Thewood1]

11 hours ago, BletchleyGeek said:

Action spots are square 

But I thought he was talking about his experience in CM1...no action spots.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

On ‎28‎/‎03‎/‎2017 at 2:03 PM, M4a3e8 said:

Perhaps it was not supposed to be, but something carried by the Soviet infantry antitank teams marked RPG routinely killed German tanks with frontal shots from two hexes distance.

Those would almost certainly be Panzerfausts, Soviet troops used them whenever they could find them and they found lots.

I believe they are an option for Soviet tank hunter teams (been so long since I played I can't honestly remember), if they're not they should be.

Edited March 30, 2017 by Sgt.Squarehead

[Ultradave]

Squares:  Avalon Hill Tactics II board game had squares. Two countries Red and Blue with equal forces Duke it out. Came out when I was a young teenager I think. (Dating myself)

[Michael Emrys]

3 hours ago, Ultradave said:

Came out when I was a young teenager I think. (Dating myself)

I might have been too, I don't know. I didn't discover wargaming and AH until I was old enough to legally buy booze, and that was with Stalingrad. A year later Afrika Korps and Battle of the Bulge came out and I was thoroughly hooked.

Michael

[Ultradave]

Tactics II, then Bismark, Midway, Blitzkreig and Africa Korps.

[Erwin]

PanzerBlitz here.  I didn't even realize there were things called wargames until I found that.  I think it was mentioned on a Brit TV program in B/W days.

[M4a3e8]

On 3/30/2017 at 1:08 PM, Sgt.Squarehead said:

Those would almost certainly be Panzerfausts, Soviet troops used them whenever they could find them and they found lots.

I believe they are an option for Soviet tank hunter teams (been so long since I played I can't honestly remember), if they're not they should be.

Nope.  CM:BB clearly indicated whether the AT team was equipped with Molotovs, RPGs or Panzerfausts.  In the real world the Soviets captured hundreds of thousands of them and in 1945 were issuing them as a standard munition, far more effective than anything they were then manufacturing for themselves..

[sburke]

Heh things go a bit round and round on you eh?  My suggestion is to just try the demos. See for yourself if you think it won't drive you nuts.  My concern is you may just find other things to razz you. I try not to get too emotionally involved to that degree in any game. There will always be something that is going to irk you to some degree. 

[akd]

9 hours ago, M4a3e8 said:

Nope.  CM:BB clearly indicated whether the AT team was equipped with Molotovs, RPGs or Panzerfausts.  In the real world the Soviets captured hundreds of thousands of them and in 1945 were issuing them as a standard munition, far more effective than anything they were then manufacturing for themselves..

I think there was simply some abstraction / fuzziness around the range of RPG-40 / RPG-43.  Remember that squads in CMx1 occupied an infinite point and had no real footprint, so the assumed location of a close-assaulting soldier was not necessarily the straight-line distance from the squad "point" to the target.

[M4a3e8]

On 4/1/2017 at 6:23 PM, akd said:

I think there was simply some abstraction / fuzziness around the range of RPG-40 / RPG-43.  Remember that squads in CMx1 occupied an infinite point and had no real footprint, so the assumed location of a close-assaulting soldier was not necessarily the straight-line distance from the squad "point" to the target.

Could be.  But that still doesn't explain the significantly greater lethality of the RPG as compared to the various panzerfausts in the game.