Little glitches/observations/suggestions

[Drifter Man]

I've been playing around with my CMBN and made a few observations along the way... I'll dump them here in case they could help polishing the game. Nothing game-breaking really 

- A soldier with a Schiessbecher without grenades waits a long time after emptying the rifle before he starts reloading. As a result, his rate of fire is about half of a normal Karabiner 98K. Maybe intentional?

- Another soldier (battalion commander) who used his Walther P08 backup weapon after spending all his rifle ammo makes a similar pause before starting to reload the pistol. In the meantime, he is waving the empty rifle around, holding it in one hand as if it were a pistol. Finally he puts it down, grabs a pistol magazine, reloads and gets back to shooting.

- Upon entering a supply truck, troops with no ammo sometimes automatically take a few rounds just to reload their weapons once; sometimes they don't.

- I didn't find a way to give units cover arc orders in the same turn after they exit the vehicle. This may cause troops to open fire even if I don't want them to. The best thing I found to prevent them from firing was to give a fast/disembark order followed by a hide order at the destination.

- Also, it would be nice to be able to give troops order to exit one vehicle and enter another in the same turn.

[MOS:96B2P]

8 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

- I didn't find a way to give units cover arc orders in the same turn after they exit the vehicle. This may cause troops to open fire even if I don't want them to. The best thing I found to prevent them from firing was to give a fast/disembark order followed by a hide order at the destination.  

For cover arcs (Target Arcs) I assign those to the teams while they are still in the vehicles.  Usually 360^o Target Arcs. 

[Erwin]

10 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

Also, it would be nice to be able to give troops order to exit one vehicle and enter another in the same turn

Yes, have been requesting for years a revamp of the ACQUIRE routine so that troops could be resupplied (with time and ammo restrictions) from adjacent units.

 

10 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

Upon entering a supply truck, troops with no ammo sometimes automatically take a few rounds just to reload their weapons once; sometimes they don't.

Never heard of that b4.   Curious...

[A Canadian Cat]

Cool, welcome to the forum! I have a couple of thoughts...

 

10 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

I've been playing around with my CMBN and made a few observations along the way... I'll dump them here in case they could help polishing the game. Nothing game-breaking really 

- A soldier with a Schiessbecher without grenades waits a long time after emptying the rifle before he starts reloading. As a result, his rate of fire is about half of a normal Karabiner 98K. Maybe intentional?

- Another soldier (battalion commander) who used his Walther P08 backup weapon after spending all his rifle ammo makes a similar pause before starting to reload the pistol. In the meantime, he is waving the empty rifle around, holding it in one hand as if it were a pistol. Finally he puts it down, grabs a pistol magazine, reloads and gets back to shooting.

Sounds not quite right. I am not a weapon's expert so it is possible but it sounds like a mistake. Do you have a saved game hanging around? I can probably reproduce it but frankly I have a back log of stuff so I have no idea when or if I would ever get there.

 

10 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

- Upon entering a supply truck, troops with no ammo sometimes automatically take a few rounds just to reload their weapons once; sometimes they don't.

This is the automatic ammo sharing kicking in. Troops with empty mags will take a mag at a time from either other units in their platoon (including vehicles) or from ammo dumps. They only share as needed - in other words one mag at a time. That is fine when you have guys in a fixed position but it can be a problem when things are dynamic. I don't know why they would sometimes not pick up ammo but I do know that if there is even one round in the mag they have they will not get another one. Perhaps not perfect but the feeling is things like that are not going to change.

Just to be sure: you can acquire ammo in significant amounts using the acquire command once they are in the vehicle. I'm just making sure...

 

10 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

- I didn't find a way to give units cover arc orders in the same turn after they exit the vehicle. This may cause troops to open fire even if I don't want them to. The best thing I found to prevent them from firing was to give a fast/disembark order followed by a hide order at the destination.

I like the hide idea but @MOS:96B2P has an even better one.

10 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

- Also, it would be nice to be able to give troops order to exit one vehicle and enter another in the same turn.

Yeah, it has been asked for before. I can only imagine it is pretty low on the priority list though.

[Drifter Man]

8 hours ago, MOS:96B2P said:

For cover arcs (Target Arcs) I assign those to the teams while they are still in the vehicles.  Usually 360^o Target Arcs.

I couldn't make that work for troops in trucks - presumably because they can't fire from the inside. Look at the selection of commands in the screenshot: and it doesn't get much better when I highlight the final waypoint (the commands only get un-greyed but still no cover arc or target orders). In contrast, the MG team in the halftrack has full range of combat commands available.

[Drifter Man]

6 hours ago, IanL said:

Cool, welcome to the forum!

Thanks!

6 hours ago, IanL said:

Sounds not quite right. I am not a weapon's expert so it is possible but it sounds like a mistake. Do you have a saved game hanging around? I can probably reproduce it but frankly I have a back log of stuff so I have no idea when or if I would ever get there.

I do - I attached the save to the post. It's not a normal scenario, it's a test setup for me to see how different guns compare (two-player WeGo hotseat, empty passwords). You can find the officer with the pistol and the Schiessbecher guy by the landmark tags. Watch how long they spend spotting with their guns empty before they remember they should reload.

The officer doesn't always wave the rifle around so maybe this was just an one-off thing I saw.

7 hours ago, IanL said:

This is the automatic ammo sharing kicking in. Troops with empty mags will take a mag at a time from either other units in their platoon (including vehicles) or from ammo dumps. They only share as needed - in other words one mag at a time.

Yes, and those were supply platoon trucks, which - I assume - can serve everyone for automatic ammo sharing (?) No idea why some failed to take any ammo by themselves. I've seen two infantry HQ units (a platoon HQ and a MG section HQ from different battalions) behave differently in this respect. It's not a real problem at all but it could point to some inconsistency in the code with other implications for the ammo sharing process.

Weapons effects 021 - 40 m.bts

[Drifter Man]

7 hours ago, IanL said:

They only share as needed - in other words one mag at a time.

Hmm wait... does it mean that they won't take any ammo from their friends in the platoon until they run dry, and then only a few mags? That's not very useful,  once the two squads get separated again, or an ammo bearer team moves away from their MG, the unit is soon empty again.

I understand there is an ammo levelling feature for vehicles that allows e.g. a tank platoon even out their ammo supply. I expected something similar for infantry.

[Erwin]

1 hour ago, Drifter Man said:

I understand there is an ammo levelling feature for vehicles that allows e.g. a tank platoon even out their ammo supply.

There is??

[MOS:96B2P]

1 hour ago, Drifter Man said:

I couldn't make that work for troops in trucks - presumably because they can't fire from the inside. Look at the selection of commands in the screenshot: and it doesn't get much better when I highlight the final waypoint (the commands only get un-greyed but still no cover arc or target orders). In contrast, the MG team in the halftrack has full range of combat commands available.

Wow, I never noticed that before.  I just tested it in CMBN, CMRT & CMBS.  In the WWII titles infantry had no combat commands in the back of a truck.  It does seem odd.  Not sure what the reasoning is.  

In CMBS troops did have combat commands while in the back of a LMTV truck (Which is cool because that is needed for any "Long Road Home" Scenario ). 

[Drifter Man]

49 minutes ago, Erwin said:

There is??

I'm sorry, there isn't. It was mentioned in a Christmas Bone thrown by Steve back in 2013. I've just tested it and apparently ammo sharing between vehicles hasn't made it into the game.

26 minutes ago, MOS:96B2P said:

Wow, I never noticed that before.  I just tested it in CMBN, CMRT & CMBS.  In the WWII titles infantry had no combat commands in the back of a truck.  It does seem odd.  Not sure what the reasoning is.  

In CMBS troops did have combat commands while in the back of a LMTV truck (Which is cool because that is needed for any "Long Road Home" Scenario ). 

A possible explanation is that you aren't supposed to drive your trucks anywhere where troops would need to consider targeting orders immediately after disembarking. But then again, as you say, sometimes you have no choice.

[A Canadian Cat]

19 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

Hmm wait... does it mean that they won't take any ammo from their friends in the platoon until they run dry, and then only a few mags?

Correct.

19 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

That's not very useful,  once the two squads get separated again, or an ammo bearer team moves away from their MG, the unit is soon empty again.

Also correct

The good news is this happens pretty rarely in regular play. It can be an issue in low ammo situations (campaigns and scenarios that start with low ammo)

[Drifter Man]

Right - I ran a few tests and it's exactly as you say, troops will only take one mag at a time from a friendly unit. The range for sharing seems to be about 2 squares on the map.

It works differently for MG/bearer teams, MG's preferentially take ammo from the bearers if they can. This made me think that German HMG teams could work differently because they are also subdivided into A and B team (much like the U.S. MG/bearer pair, only both teams now have a MG). But they only share one belt at a time, like "normal" units.

[Erwin]

IIRC, the CM2 system was changed some years ago so that ammo is first taken from appropriate ammo bearers within a couple action squares (including mortar ammo) before using the unit's "intrinsic" ammo.

[Drifter Man]

On 14/12/2017 at 12:06 PM, Erwin said:

IIRC, the CM2 system was changed some years ago so that ammo is first taken from appropriate ammo bearers within a couple action squares (including mortar ammo) before using the unit's "intrinsic" ammo.

Yes, that's what I observed. "Appropriate" means the ammo bearer of their own team, I suppose? Or will they take ammo from another ammo bearer in the platoon? Time to do some more testing

And I have two more curious questions, if anyone is interested.

1. Each unit has a pool of ammunition of each calibre and does not distinguish in what "form" it comes. Ammo bearers will happily feed 250-round belts into their rifles. Or the German 9mm is just 9mm and can go into an MP40 (32 round mag) or a P08 pistol (8 round mag), whatever is needed. Is that right?

2. I've been studying the makeup of German infantry units and noticed that armored Panzergrenadiers come in two varieties: mounted (8-man squad) and dismounted (9-man). In the scenario editor or in quick battle setup, the player can choose the variant he wants. Halftracks can be subsequently deleted from the mounted variant. Now here's the problem: One squad costs 47 points as dismounted and only 38 as mounted (regular, fit, normal motivation, 0 leadership modifier). At 38 points and with 2 LMGs per 8 men, these mounted Panzergrenadiers are a beast of a squad. Any ideas why the cost is so low? I looked at equipment, ammunition, they are the same for what I can tell.

[A Canadian Cat]

2 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

1. Each unit has a pool of ammunition of each calibre and does not distinguish in what "form" it comes. Ammo bearers will happily feed 250-round belts into their rifles. Or the German 9mm is just 9mm and can go into an MP40 (32 round mag) or a P08 pistol (8 round mag), whatever is needed. Is that right?

That all depends on your meaning of right It *is* how the game behaves though. It is a game abstraction that lets us not have to care about un-boxing, loading mags, creating belts and all that other boring stuff that soldiers do after they hurry up and while they are waiting.

[Erwin]

Re ammo bearers IIRC they have to belong to the same formation - I think that means the same platoon. 

[JoMac]

5 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

Yes, that's what I observed. "Appropriate" means the ammo bearer of their own team, I suppose? Or will they take ammo from another ammo bearer in the platoon? Time to do some more testing

And I have two more curious questions, if anyone is interested.

1. Each unit has a pool of ammunition of each calibre and does not distinguish in what "form" it comes. Ammo bearers will happily feed 250-round belts into their rifles. Or the German 9mm is just 9mm and can go into an MP40 (32 round mag) or a P08 pistol (8 round mag), whatever is needed. Is that right?

2. I've been studying the makeup of German infantry units and noticed that armored Panzergrenadiers come in two varieties: mounted (8-man squad) and dismounted (9-man). In the scenario editor or in quick battle setup, the player can choose the variant he wants. Halftracks can be subsequently deleted from the mounted variant. Now here's the problem: One squad costs 47 points as dismounted and only 38 as mounted (regular, fit, normal motivation, 0 leadership modifier). At 38 points and with 2 LMGs per 8 men, these mounted Panzergrenadiers are a beast of a squad. Any ideas why the cost is so low? I looked at equipment, ammunition, they are the same for what I can tell.

1. Yeah, the 'Ammo Pool' is a little simplified in CM, but it will have to do...Also, and If I had it my way, 'Acquire Ammo' should not be used in a CM Scenario...Things like that should take place in between Scenarios of a Campaign.

2. That's interesting for sure, and you would think by taking the extra MG from HT Mount, (and thus making it a 2x LMG, 9-man squad) would cost more...An oversight by BF ? 

Edited December 15, 2017 by JoMc67

[Drifter Man]

8 hours ago, Erwin said:

Re ammo bearers IIRC they have to belong to the same formation - I think that means the same platoon.

Confirmed - they take ammo from any ammo bearer in the same platoon before using the MG's own ammo. They will not take ammo from another platoon's bearer.

10 hours ago, IanL said:

That all depends on your meaning of right It *is* how the game behaves though. It is a game abstraction that lets us not have to care about un-boxing, loading mags, creating belts and all that other boring stuff that soldiers do after they hurry up and while they are waiting.

I meant "right" as "how the game behaves"  I'm happy with this abstraction, there's a level at which the complexity must end. Thanks for confirming this.

7 hours ago, JoMc67 said:

2. That's interesting for sure, and you would think by taking the extra MG from HT Mount, (and thus making it a 2x LMG, 9-man squad) would cost more...An oversight by BF ?

Actually the MG stays in the vehicle. Both 9-man (dismounted) and 8-man (mounted) PzG squads have two LMGs. In addition, the mounted PzGs have, by default, a halftrack with a two-man crew. I speculate that the "ninth man" is the gunner of the halftrack. The mounted 8-man PzG squad is just the 9-man squad minus one soldier with a rifle (and his ammo, ca 60-65 rounds). But the cost is 38, down from 47.

In fact, I can't think of any other infantry type the German player should want to buy in a quick battle...

7 hours ago, JoMc67 said:

Also, and If I had it my way, 'Acquire Ammo' should not be used in a CM Scenario...Things like that should take place in between Scenarios of a Campaign

I see your point, and without much practical experience with the game, I suspect it can be exploited in a QB. A player can buy a bunch of conscript trucks and give his troops extra ammo already at the start of the battle. Those Panzergrenadiers normally come with about 2150 rounds of 7.92mm ammunition, and with their two MGs they can go through it fairly quickly. Adding 1000 rounds brings them effectively on par with other types of infantry and there is no penalty on mobility I could find - they will not run slower or tire faster than troops with normal ammo supply.

[Vanir Ausf B]

19 hours ago, Drifter Man said:

2. I've been studying the makeup of German infantry units and noticed that armored Panzergrenadiers come in two varieties: mounted (8-man squad) and dismounted (9-man). In the scenario editor or in quick battle setup, the player can choose the variant he wants. Halftracks can be subsequently deleted from the mounted variant. Now here's the problem: One squad costs 47 points as dismounted and only 38 as mounted (regular, fit, normal motivation, 0 leadership modifier). At 38 points and with 2 LMGs per 8 men, these mounted Panzergrenadiers are a beast of a squad. Any ideas why the cost is so low? I looked at equipment, ammunition, they are the same for what I can tell.

Look closer. Dismounted squads tend to carry more panzerfausts. In a mounted platoon the fausts are split between halftracks and squads.

[Drifter Man]

14 hours ago, Vanir Ausf B said:

Look closer. Dismounted squads tend to carry more panzerfausts. In a mounted platoon the fausts are split between halftracks and squads.

Yep, that definitely needs taking a closer look. PzGs carry about 3 panzerfausts per platoon as mounted, 4-5 as dismounted. So by deleting halftracks, the player also deletes the panzerfausts. Thanks!

[Vanir Ausf B]

1 hour ago, Drifter Man said:

Yep, that definitely needs taking a closer look. PzGs carry about 3 panzerfausts per platoon as mounted, 4-5 as dismounted. So by deleting halftracks, the player also deletes the panzerfausts. Thanks!

You're welcome!

As for the panzerfausts, I don't see an issue here. Yes, you lose some panzerfausts if you delete the halftracks, but since the cost of the panzerfausts is also split between the infantry and the halftracks you get what you pay for either way (on average). If you want all the panzerfausts but no halftracks just buy the 9-man dismounted formation.

Edited December 16, 2017 by Vanir Ausf B

[Drifter Man]

Yes, it's up to the player and it's a fair choice whether the extra purchase points are worth it. Based on my CMx1 experience, panzerfausts with 30m range are only useful if your opponent is either careless or desperate with his tanks. But I may be wrong

Anyway, I've been looking for a way to compare the firepower of individual infantry weapons and then squads. The problem is that when the entire squad is fighting, you can't tell who is doing the most damage. I have the general idea what to expect from each weapon but I wanted to see some numbers. So I set up the following test:

• Make a map - a shooting range with several lanes running in parallel, each for one weapon test
• At the end of each lane, put two U.S. ammo bearer teams (two men each) in foxholes (for some protection). These "target troops" are regulars with zero leadership modifier but motivation is set to fanatic so that they stay and don't surrender when getting massacred at close range. I empty their weapons at the start of the test by giving area fire orders (cool fact: aim rearwards, out of the map - ricochets can easily kill at 500 meters!)
• On the other side, isolate small teams where only one man has the weapon being tested. He can have teammates but they must use different ammunition, so that our main man is the only one shooting in the end. In fact, where appropriate, I like to provide a leader with binoculars to aid with spotting. If there is no other way, I use snipers to "surgically remove" unwanted team members.
• All teams must be regulars, with zero leadership modifier and normal motivation.
• I empty the ammunition supply of these test troops as and then reload from supply trucks only the one type of ammunition that is needed for the tested weapon. The other teammates, if any, stay empty.
• I march them to a set distance from the target troops and give target arc orders to open fire. I save the game at this point to be able to repeat the test as many times as I want. The test then runs for 10 minutes. If they take all 4 target troops down within those 10 minutes, I record the time it took them to do that, in seconds (a number between 0 and 600; in practice the lowest so far has been 7 seconds).
• If they don't take down all 4, I record the number of kills they made in 10 minutes (a number between 0 and 3).
• Repeat 50 times to get decent statistics (ouch!)
• Bottom line, I work out the average number of kills per minute - "bodies per minute" as a measure of firepower of the given weapon at given distance. An imperfect one (does not account for suppression) but hopefully objective.

I'm sorry for the quality of the pictures, there's some crazy limitation on image size on this forum...

Edited December 17, 2017 by Drifter Man

[Drifter Man]

I've finished test for German weapons at 40 m and 150 m and now I'm working on the Brits. Some interesting findings:

• As HMG, MG42 is markedly more powerful than MG34 at these distances, but there isn't much of a difference between them as LMGs
• MP40 not only performs better than the MP44, but outdoes everything except MGs and sinper rifles, even at 150 m
• There is a difference in the effectiveness of the scoped Kar 98K depending on whether it is handled by a trained marksman or a regular soldier (an assistant leader in my test), at 150 m the difference is much more significant
• Gewehr 43 is roughly twice as effective as the Kar 98K
• The Karabiner 98K isn't worth much in general

 

[Drifter Man]

Then I took the composition of some German infantry units and examined their total firepower at 40 m and 150 m:

• The LMG dominates squad firepower at 40 m and, to a smaller extent, at 150 m as well
• To say that riflemen are in the squad to give the enemy something else to shoot at than the gunner is an exaggeration but not a big one. Taking the gunner down leaves the squad essentially crippled
• HMG squads (two HMGs) offer by far the best "bang per buck" in terms of QB purchase points.
• Sniper teams are a match for an entire squad (but don't have much of a headcount and would probably die quickly in a head-to-head fight)

And it seems I've run out of permitted image size allocation... I guess I'll post the charts tomorrow

[Erwin]

Shocked re the stats for the MP44 vs MP40.  Stg44 was supposed be much superior - esp at longer ranges.