Wooded areas -impassable by default ?

[sdp]

Sorry to be a nuisance with all this questions, but here's an issue that really puzzles me;

On the CM battlefield there may be a path of open ground or scattered trees through a otherwise heavily wooded area.

This path is passable by vehicles with reduced speed in a CM battle. Thus, it would seem logical that the same might apply on the operational level.

First question therefore must be; are woods and pineforests passable by vehicles on the operational map?

If so -are they this by default ?

It might be that a premade battlefield has one wooded quadrant with a passable path and

another wooded quadrant that doesn't have a path. Will this be depicted on the operational map?

(Of course, on way of finding out would be to open the CM battlefield in the editor beforehand. This might simulate

terrainreconnaissance in advance...)

/M

[JasonC]

Most real woods are large continuous blankets of forest cover, not the patchwork open ground the CM auto generator (and too many designers) typically gives.

Open woods, meaning thin tall trees well separated without significant undergrowth, on relatively level ground - were sometimes passed through by tanks or other vehicles, though not rapidly, and at considerable risk if not accompanied by sufficient infantry etc. Mostly it took full AFVs and the distances were relatively short etc.

Typical real woods are passable to infantry but not to vehicles of any kind. The densest are barely passable even to large bodies of infantry, but those are rare.

What I did in my own campaigns is indicate the level of vegetation on the operational map with different CM tile types. Brush for light woods generally open, which was passable to all vehicles. In CM terms that means farmland terrain type with medium tree cover, (or village if there is one etc). Scattered trees for open woodland of the sort CM depicts, passable to fully tracked. That means rural heavy woods.

Woods on the op map means true woods, which I typically represent as continuous blocks of the scattered tree terrain type on the tactical map (the level of cover is right, the LOS distances, etc). Only occasional small clearings, the basic background is "painted" uniform scattered trees first.

Pine for dense forest, which means continuous blocks of pine or woods on the tactical map, as the previous but with the denser wood types. Only occasional firebreaks etc.

[Hunter]

As per Jason C's campaign, afai can see, wooded quadrants are very slow to traverse for armored (or worse, 4 wheeled, 2WD vehicles) units. If you want them to be easy to traverse, then there will be a road (dirt at least).

Hunter

[sdp]

Well, I'll try to explain a bit more precisely;

In this map two quadrants are covered with rather dense woods

http://molnhavet.se/sdp/docs/CMC_pict_web/DU_b02_overview.jpg

-as you can see in the NW quadrant there's a path of open ground through the wooded area. This might simulate a road of worse quality than the average dirt road, perhaps just tracks. Still tanks for instance might be able to use it.

Although it might not be advisable, it would allow for, say, an armoured unit to pass through that quadrant.

Here's a situation that I've been thinking about;

http://molnhavet.se/sdp/docs/CMC_pict_web/cmc_tankassault_woods.gif

(dark green -woods,light green -open ground, yellow -farmland)

Could the red infcoy assaulting the quadrant occupied by the blue infcoy to the south get backup from the red tankcoy north of the wooded quadrant ? (One may assume that the wooded quadrant allowed for passage by an "open ground path").

Or,I guess I could put it this way; should passages through woods be simulated like this

http://molnhavet.se/sdp/docs/CMC_pict_web/DU_b02_perspective.jpg

or like this

http://molnhavet.se/sdp/docs/CMC_pict_web/dirtroad_woods_perspective.jpg

lotta lotta questions, I know...

regards/M