One shot from and IS2 kills two Wespes

[A Canadian Cat]

I only started playing CMBB a few months ago - while waiting for CMBN to be released. I finally got FRAPS to work with it (newest version has a fix that makes it work).

Here is an amazing shot that happened in a QB I was playing with a friend. I was totally in control of things. My infantry supported by a platoon of Wespes was chewing up his infantry left and right. Then out of know where and IS2 showed up. The turn before the platoon HQ in the building next to the Wespes saw it coming and yelled down to warn the SP gunners. They immediately tried to reposition themselves to be ready for the coming threat. They were not fast enough:

After that things went down hill fast. His T34 on the other side of the board managed to take out the other two Wespes and slowly his infantry supported by the tanks ground me down. I spent the whole game trying to deal with those tanks and never got anywhere against them. I came close twice but my guys were just two messed up to get close enough to deliver the demo charges.

[DLaurier]

A fellow Ontarian.

Wespes are fragile things.

[RockinHarry]

Well deserved punishment on a commander using self propelled artillery as assault gun in the frontline...eheh

If Wespes and Hummels ever get into contact with enemy armor, there went someting terribly wrong beforehand.

Imagine using Sextons and Priests vs. german Tigers in the same role.

[Jaws]

Nice clip IS2 has a huge blast and its never wise to keep Wespes so close to eachother

[ArgusEye]

That's what those IS2's have those big guns for. They were impressive in direct fire at soft targets, whether dug in or not. And Wespes are pretty soft stuff.

Wespes are self propelled artillery, not designed for direct fire. If they turn up on a CM battlefield, someone messed up.

[Erwin]

Yes, one needs a huge map to use Wespes, Marders, Hummels and other lightly armored units effectively incl 88mm guns. They need to shoot from 1000m MINIMUM and preferably longer range.

And to be effective at longer ranges, they need to be Elite or Crack as the CM engine doesn't make those supposedly accurate weapons appropriately deadly accurate at long ranges otherwise.

[Joachim]

With HE, close counts. The thinner the armor, the worse.

- Large HE rounds can kill nearby vehicles.

- AP rounds with large HE charge (ie most Soviet AP) can kill nearby vehicles.

- A tank brewing up, with all the ammo inside going "bang" can destroy a nearby tank.

And in your case, it looks like the really big bang killed the 2nd Wespe, not the 122mm round.

I had a T34/76 hit a Marder which brew up and killed another Marder 20m away. (Well, actually I had the Marders )

In RL, tanks don't bunch up. There is proper spacing. Put your Wespes at least 30m away from each other - but even 30m won't help sometimes.

[A Canadian Cat]

Oh yeah thanks for the feedback. I learned all those lessons for sure playing this quick battle. Proper spacing is an important idea but more importantly use something else for an assault gun.... I don't know say - an assault gun:-)

My friend commanding the IS2 was confused about what happened to the second Wespe so I made this video to show him. And no the crew of the second Wespe did not just abandon it because they took casualties. If you select the Wespes they both show "Knocked out".

@Joachim

Yes, I think you are correct it was the big boom that killed the second Wespe.