kipanderson

Magua, hi, If Lo-res is easier for you then go for it. I am keen to use what ever you come up with. You really do know what you are doing and seeing a entire new building set from you would be huge fun. Terrible thing the RW when it interferes with the CM world! All the best, Kip.

Panzer rarity. Hi, I was considering this very question just a week or two ago. Specifically, I was interested in the rarity of the various German AFVs during 1944. In order to answer the question of their relative rarity on the battlefield during 1944 I turned to the monthly production figures as found in the excellent books by Walter Spielberger and Thomas Jentz. My conclusion was as follows. MarkIV/StugIII/StugIV made up roughly 65% of total, Panther made up around 20% And the rest accounted for about 15% of the total. The figure of 15% for the “rest” increases to around 25% during the last six months of the war with the increased production of the Hertzer. All the best, Kip.

Hi, thanks for letting us know. Had not been to your site before, looks fun. All the best, Kip.

Hi, I have the same book and will now go back and take another look. Thanks for the info. Cheers, Kip.

Hi, being a huge fan of all Magua's work I too would be very interested to know the expected time schedule for this mod. I do realise how much work is involved, just interested because I am such a fan. All the best, Kip.

Mensch, hi, Great to see the update, your site carries a lot of quality stuff. However, I have come across a bit of a problem. I downloaded both of the new DesertFox battles but when I tried to open them I got an error report. The report read words to the effect of, “7000..bits missing from .zip file. Can not open” I was not using Gozilla or any other download program, just the facility that comes with Windows ME. Sorry to cause trouble. All the best, Kip. PS. Same thing happened with both battles.

Hi, looks good. Looking forward to giving them a go. Thanks for the effort. All the best, Kip.

Manx, hi, good to hear that there is going to be a happy ending. All the best, Kip.

Hi, thanks for letting us know, looks interesting. All the best, Kip.

Rexford, hi, I am one of those that is very interested in these matters and so will be keen for a copy of anything you come up with. Please keep us informed. All the best, Kip.

Hi, I am 43. All the best, Kip.

Hi, just downloaded the clipboard. Looks great, not nearly so "harsh" as the original. Goes far better with the latest terrain mods. Thanks for the effort. All the best, Kip.

RPG Model 43 AT Grenade. Hi, Just a few words to confirm what Michael Emrys wrote about Soviet WW2 anti-tank grenades. During WW2 the Soviets used three main types of anti-tank grenade. The RGP 40, the RPG 43 and lastly the RGP 6. The RPG 40 was indeed a stick grenade with just a conventional explosive charge. As such it lacked penetrating power. The RPG 43, and later RPG 6, both had the same 76mm shaped charge and a penetration of 76mm. Both the latter two designs were extremely clever and if you could see the illustrations I have of how they worked, you too, would conclude that they did in deed stand a reasonable chance of striking nose first. At this point it may be appropriate to give a brief explanation of why it was that the Soviets were so behind the other major players in hand-held anti-tank weapons during WW2. The reason is that during one of Stalin’s purges the entire team responsible for designing such weapons was wiped out. No one thought to build up a new team until a year or so into the war. The problem was not with shaped charge technology, which the Soviets made widespread use of and had a sound grip on. (In CM2 you will find a lot of HEAT rounds available to Soviet artillery. Or you should do if Steve and Charles model things correctly which I am sure they will.) Just post war, in 1946, the Soviets introduced a number of bazooka type weapons. My main source for all information on WW2 Soviet weapons is a stunning document I came across in the archives of the Tank Museum in Bovington, Dorset. Record of Foreign Weapons and Equipment, Volume One, USSR. It is about one thousand pages long and was produced by British intelligence in 1947. Everything you could possibly wish to know about the subject. Makes even the best books on the subject look amateur. I approached Greenhill Books, the publisher, but they said it would be far too expensive to produce properly for the size of the market. All the best, Kip. PS.I had the entire document photocopied and sent to me by the staff at the Tank Museum. They will do the same for you, at a price. If you are interested ring and ask. [This message has been edited by kipanderson (edited 02-22-2001).]

My CM2 feature wish list. Hi, Now that the team at BTS are hard at work on CM2 it seems appropriate to post up a list of my “wished for” features to be included in CM2. As CM2 is to be a tweaked version of CMBO, i.e. not a new engine, there is nothing very grand about my list, nor very original. If just one of the BTS team read it, and consider the requests for a moment, I will have for-filled my aim. I should say that a straight conversion of CMBO to the Eastern Front would be more than good enough for me, but as it is being heavily tweaked here is my wish-list of features. As suggestions I make are invariable turned down I am not holding my breath, but here they are in no particular order. 1) Full-feature mine warfare. Mines are handled very well in CMBO. However, as they played an even bigger part in warfare on the Eastern Front, imagine modelling Kursk without mines, one or two extra features would be useful. It would be nice to give engineers the ability to crawl forward and clear lanes through minefields. I have heard the argument of this not being within the time scale of CM, but I disagree. In one of my many books on the Eastern Front, most likely one of David Glantz’s, the statistics on Soviet mine clearing are given and when I read them I remember calculating that “lanes” through 10m-20m deep minefields were cleared within 30-60 minutes with relatively few losses. (I have been racking my brains trying to remember in which of my books I saw the data, but I not remember.) As the powers that be at BTS seem to agree with those that argue this is outside the time scale I suppose it will not happen, however, there is another mine warfare feature I have high hopes of. It would be a very great shame, and somewhat puzzling, if the Soviet PT34 mine roller was left out. These mine rollers were a common feature, during the second half of the campaign, and their inclusion would allow a far more realistic modelling of breaching operations. Fingers crossed, this one may happen. 2) Engineers with small explosive packs for blasting through walls. During WW2 the standard way to assault from one adjacent building to another was to blast a small whole in the wall between the buildings and then assault through it using grenades. It would make street fighting a lot more realistic if this tweak were included, in my view. 3) Trenches. It would be fun to see trench systems modelled. From the maps I have seen of Kursk, and other battles, these were a common feature on both sides. 4) An increase in the maximum length of battles in operations. I find the 30 turn maximum length of battles in operations rather restricting. I know a lot of people like shorter battles but I believe 40-50 turns would be more realistic. I am not too keen on the “truncated” nature of battles in operations. “Assaults”, which is really what each “battle” in CM is, seem to have a natural rhythm of around 40 minutes, in my view. Anyway it would be nice to have the option to design operations with longer battles than 30 minutes. 5) Smaller minimum elevation step change. Currently the minimum step change in CM is 2.5m. For CM2 I would like to see that reduced, to say, 1.25m. From the many photographs and maps I have seen of Russia and the Ukraine a step change of 1.25m, combined with a total of some twenty different elevations, would produce very realistic terrain. The 2.5m minimum is just too server for the Eastern Front. 6) Finally, do not forget, what the British called, the RPG Model43 anti-tank grenade. This was a hand thrown grenade that contained a 76mm shaped charge and was designed to land “nose first”. It had a penetration of three inches, 76mm, and according to a vast, 1947 British report on Soviet equipment, was very useful. It was widely available. With CM tracking each grenade individually, the sort of feature I still find hard to believe very time I watch it on a one minute movie, this would be ideal. It means that if, and it is a big “if”, one could separate the Panzergrenadiers from the armour, Soviet infantry would be quite a threat to German tanks. Imagine one of those landing on the roof or decking of a Tiger, unhealthy. I will leave you all alone now. All the best, Kip.

Military Technology. Hi, For those that may want to know how military equipment really works, the equations behind armour penetration and such, the stuff Rexford writes to well about, here is “the” source. http://www.batsford.com/brasseys.html The Brassey’s Land Warfare Series are books written by the staff at the Royal Military College of Science, Shrivenham, for use by visiting service personal. These guys really, really know what they are talking about. The books are full of data and equations but can by understood by the average guy. They are aimed at visiting Lieutenants on three-month courses. They are not too, expensive. All the best, Kip.

John, hi, If you want a copy of the Brassey's book, or any others in the series, then Foyles, in London, is the place. They have a huge military history department, twice the size of any specialized book shop I have come across. http://www.foyles.co.uk Best to ring and talk to the staff in the military history department. All the best, Kip. PS. Brassey's Land Warfare Series is what you need.

Hi, I have got the Brassey's book. A very fine book and not that expensive, probably around $30. It is one of a series of books written by the staff at The Royal Military College of Science for use by visiting service personal. Its a text book. Great series of books for anyone that really wants to know a subject. All the best, Kip.

Hi, There is clearly a demand for some sort of refinement to the elevation settings. There has been quite a range of suggestions. However, there does seem to be a consensus, even if only amongst a relatively few souls, that it would be great if one could make use of a elevation setting smaller than the current minimum of 2.5m. So, may I take the opportunity to ask a straight question to any of the four that actually run BTS. a) Is there any chance of CM2 having an elevation setting less than the current minimum of 2.5m? Or are you not answering these forms of direct question because BTS prefers to keep such matters under your hat, for the time being? You want to surprise us in your own time. At this stage I should point-out that I am entirely relaxed about it, I have had a number of suggestions turned down and still enjoy CM just as much. All I am really asking is “is there any practical purpose in continuing to lobby you on the topic” or is the collective mind of BTS made-up on the subject. All the best, Kip. PS. I realise it is not a priority, so you may not have even considered the subject.

Lawyer, hi, I am lucky enough to have done two battlefield trips to the Ardennes. Just small private tours with a few friends and lots of beer. I have stayed in both St.Vith and Bastogne. My advice is go for Bastogne. There is nothing at St.Vith, more bars in Bastogne, but still a very small, rural town. You will enjoy the trip there is lots to see. All the best, Kip.

Hi, Grisha, my advice, with regard to using Pupuy’s equations, is to go for it. You have probably figured it all out better than I did, but here are a few hints with regard to what I consider the easiest and best way to use the formulas for the Eastern Front. First you need to know overall force ratios and the casualties in the operation in question. Then set up a calculation for an imagined operation with identical force ratios to those in the “actual” operation you are interested in. If the actual force ratio were 3:1, Soviets to Germans, using numbers such as 60,000 attacking Soviets and 20,000 defending Germans would be perfect. The equations work best within the range of 15,000 to 60,000 personal. Enter what ever you feel is most representative of the actual operation in terms of combat mode, i.e. hasty defence, deliberate assault, what ever. Do the same with regard to terrain, weather and so on. However, when it comes to any factor to do with troop quality and equipment enter a 1 for both sides. What you are saying is that the Soviets and the Germans were “clones” of one another. Run the equations and get the results in terms of casualties for each side, assuming they were “clones” of each other in terms of quality. Then go back and look at what the actual losses, in the real battle, for each side. Then compare the casualty ratio you get using the “cloned” forces in the Dupuy formula with the actual, historical, causality ratio in the real battle. If the actual casualty ratio in the real battle was, say, 1.45:1, Soviet to German, and the causality ratio in the imagined battle between the “clones” was 1.4:1, you know that in the real battle the Russians performance was only marginally less than that which a similar force of attacking Germans would have achieved. Hope I have been of help, but probably not. Wolfpack, The short answer it no, such factors do not enter into the above calculations. However, I do have an answer of sorts. The all time low point for the Soviets, in my view, both on the battlefield and on the home front, was spring 42. To be more specific to your question one can look at the production figures for 44 and compare them to 43 to see if there was any sign of a slow down. Let’s take tanks. Between the two years there was very little increase in numbers but there was a big increase in quality per unit. T34/85s replaced T34/76s and JS2ms replaced KV1Ss. And so on. When you look as the specification of the “typical” 44 Soviet tank and “typical” 43 Soviet tank there is a big increase in the latter year. Another factor is also worth noting. With the end of the war all aid to Russia, and by the way to Britain, stopped died. The Marshal Plan was strictly for the so-called “defeated” nations. However, Russia did recover very rapidly under its own steam and until about 1970 grew at a stunning rate. (At this stage I should point out that I am an out and out “market economist” and do not wish to make a political statement, but I am familiar with the statistics of Russian growth.) The fact that in 44 Russian output continued to grow, certainly in terms of value, and that just post war there was no 1920s/1930s style famine, as far as I know, plus explosive growth, leads me to believe Russia was “coping” on all fronts. Certainly, on the military front, by the second half of the war there was no uncertainty as to whom the winner would be. If you look at the post-Kursk operations to clear the Ukraine from August43-February44, at the strategic level, there was no contest. Long before D-Day. All the best, Kip.

Soviet Combat Effectiveness. Hi, You have asked a lot of interesting questions, only some of which I may know the answer to. Over the years I have done a lot of work on trying to calculate Soviet Combat Effectiveness during WW2 and due to the flood of great books and articles over the last five years I believe a clear picture has now emerged. I have been threatening to do a longer post on this topic, for what it’s worth, but for the time being here are some of may conclusions. There are three forms of analysis I have used, a) TN Dupuy’s classic quantitative “combat effectiveness” approach, losses per one hundred frontline riflemen, per combat day and finally c) what might be called the “historical” record, i.e. the narrative of events in books such as those by David Glantz. All this is now possible because since the archives were opened in the early 1990s it has become clear that the Soviets did, in fact, keep very detailed records of losses and the forces employed. Here are my conclusions, however little they may be worth. a) If you set Soviet combat effectiveness, during the second half of the war, from 1/7/43 to 31/3/45, to equal 1 then German combat effectiveness over the same period equals 1.15. To set this in context the similar figure for the Germans against both the Commonwealth and American forces during the campaign in NW Europe was 1.20 i.e. Soviet forces were of marginally higher quality than the western allies. The reason for this relatively high figure for Soviet combat effectiveness is that their losses and their overall force ratio advantage, were both very much lower than had been believed before the true figures became known. Taking into account all factors, importantly, including the relative size of the forces employed, one would have expected Soviet losses to number 1.4 times those of the Germans assuming, and this is a very important point, that Soviet forces had been of “identical quality” to German forces. In fact Soviet “actual” losses over the period numbered 1.6 times German losses. Only 0.2 different from the losses the Germans would have inflicted on their enemy had they been fighting “clones” of themselves but numbering the same as Soviet forces “actually” numbered. When looking at losses per one hundred frontline riflemen, per combat day, I did not compare Soviet and German forces but Soviet and American forces. This does not tell us, directly, anything about Soviet combat effectiveness but does tell us something about the tactics being used, the style of combat. If the Soviets were suffering twice as many casualties per one hundred front line riflemen, per combat day, as the Americans in Europe then it can be taken as evidence that they “may” have been using more bloody tactics at the small unit level. If you go through the statistics in detail what you find is that from the autumn of 43 onwards losses per one hundred frontline riflemen, per combat day, were the same in US and Soviet units. Contrary to popular belief life in a typical, frontline Soviet rifle-company was no more dangerous than life in an American rifle-company. There was still horror and tragedy in bucket loads but not the mass slaughter some German accounts imply. What this implies, I put it no more strongly than that, is that similar tactics were being used by the Soviets and the Americans. No more mass infantry attacks against concentrated machine-gun and artillery fire, unless something had done horribly wrong, as it did now and then. c) When is comes to the “historical” record the operation that has never really been able to “fit” into the traditional German view of Soviet combat effectiveness is Bagration, or the Destruction of Army Group Centre. It is not that the Soviets “won” the overall battle, but the nature of their victory, that has always been the problem. The Soviets won at both Stalingrad and Kursk. However, at Stalingrad the loss ratio, Soviet to German, was 4:1 at Kursk 3.5:1. During Bagration the overall loss ratio, Soviet to German, was 0.7:1, during the first two weeks 0.2:1. Something very different was happening. If one looks at he battle in more detail the picture becomes even more puzzling for those that take the “German” view of Soviet combat effectiveness during the latter half of WW2. German pockets of 10,000-20,000 troops, in areas that had been fortified as “fortress cities”, were being collapsed in 2-3 days and at very little cost to the Soviets. What was happening was that German combat teams were being despatched to block an advance, along one of the few “dry” corridors through the swampy terrain, and being pushed aside with ease. The speed with which the German pockets were collapsed, and the very light Soviet casualties, means that at the level of the contact battle, company v company, the Soviets must have been the equals of the Germans. If this had not been the case the causality ratio in the first two weeks would not have been so in the Soviets favour. Also the German pockets would not have collapsed as quickly. Non of the above is conclusive, there are imperfections in the approach on all counts. However, taken together the above has convinced me that, indeed, Soviet combat effectiveness during the second half of the war was every close to that of the Germans. I will end with two pieces of information that go some way to illustrating why the view of Soviet combat effectiveness has changed in the last five years. Firstly, it is now known that Soviet losses during 1943 were no greater than the annual intake of conscripts. Even as early as 43 the Soviets were no longer being “bled to death” as the Germans hoped, and many believed. Secondly, the following is a paraphrase of something written by David Glantz in the mid-eighties. “ During the second half of the war force ratios were not as high as the Germans claimed, 7-8:1, nor as low as the Soviets claimed, 2-3:1. More likely they were 4-5:1 in favour of the Soviets.” We now know that the average force ratio throughout the second half of the war was 2.7:1. (These figures can be found in David Glantz’s own books form the mid nineties onwards, and other sources.) As the true figures have emerged so the view of Soviet combat effectiveness, post Kursk, has changed. I know from previous posts that Steve, as in BTS, believes the Soviets did not return to the level of combat effectiveness they had in 1940 until 1945. Clearly, I disagree with this. However, that is what makes the subject so interesting, we nearly all disagree. The good news is that, for those of us that are interested, there is likely to be a continuing flood of new books on the subject for sometime to come. All the best, Kip. PS. Sometime I will get round to making a far longer post giving a blow by blow account of how all the calculations are done, i.e. Dupuy’s combat effectiveness and others, with a full list of sources for all the data. (If any one is interested.)

Magua, hi, using your current set of buildings and DD's terrain I never thought it could be improved on. However, you seem to have managed it. It looks stunning, I would love to have a copy of the full set. I know it is a lot of work but it makes a huge difference to the enjoyment of the game. Greatly looking forward to see the completed version, all the best, Kip. PS. more pics would be great!

Hi, I resisted for a while and then cracked! Kip.

Hi, Steve, Yes, I sympathies with you. I have done a number of CM maps from topographical maps of the Ardennes and have found one has to curtail the elevation range. I always use the 2.5m setting and using the full twenty odd steps I find I still end up with a very hilly map even if not quite as hilly as the real thing. Helge, I agree that it would be great if one could have a differential of 100m in elevation over the map and smoothness at the same time. For CM3, which I believe will have a new engine, this may well happen but CM2 is just a tweak of the current engine so I suppose that is outside its range. It will be interesting to see if someone from BTS joins this discussion and what they say. BattlingBigBob, specifying the elevation step change would be stunning, as would the use of a Bezier curve tool. When it comes to such big changes, once again, I would expect us to be talking about CM3 not CM2. But again, I am not sure and look forward to hearing what BTS have to say on the subject. Aacooper, I agree that in the perfect world more elevation steps within a given game would be great, but from my point of view there “may” be a problem with this. I do not like the use of grids to show elevation differences on the maps as I like everything to look as “real” as possible. Given this, I use changes in colour to spot elevation differences. I use DD’s high-resolution grass and have tweaked it just a touch to increase the change in colour as elevation changes. My reservation about more elevation steps is that one would either have to decrease the change in colour for every change in elevation setting or make the lowest levels even “greener” and the higher elevations even “yellower”. The colours at the extremes would be becoming unrealistic. Twenty odd elevation settings in a given game, I think, works very well. However, no doubt in some later version of CM, maybe CM2, what you wish for will happen, it’s a logical extension of the system. When it comes to your question about the book I cannot be of that much help. I spent two days studying the book in Edmonton library in the late 1980s; it is the only copy I have ever come across. I recommend ring Edmonton library, Alberta, and asking them about the book. Some one will know about it. A search of the Library of Congress or the British Library would also bear fruit; no doubt they are both on the net. I have produced a 2000m by 2000m map using a range of just ten elevation settings, using the 2.5m step change, so as to get an idea of how such a map would look using a range of twenty 1.25m evaluation settings. We are talking undulating hills cut here and there by the odd dry riverbed or gully. Eight of the elevation settings were used to model the large, in area anyway, hills with the gullies always being two elevation settings, or more, below the levels of the surrounding hillsides. I am no artist and others could do better, but it does look like Russia/Ukraine to me. However, there is no denying that it would look much better, close up, if modelled in 1.25m step changes. This would also have the added benefit of increasing the colour range over a small change in height thus better showing the subtleties of the terrain. It would be great to be able to model ridges, of say, 400m in width but just 5-7.5m in height in 1.25m step changes. I do not know how much coding is involved but having a 1.25m elevation step change option in CM2 would add greatly to the “eastern front look” of the game. Hope it happens. All the best, Kip.

Hi, Currently there is a choice of 2.5m or 5m elevation changes in CM. This works very well and the programming, in order to smooth out changes in elevation between tiles, is of the same high standard as the rest of CM. However, it has always been my view that the most moderate change of 2.5m, over the distance of just one 20m tile, is still quite server. Put three or four such elevation changes side by side and it produces a very steep hillside. Of course, what we all do is to change elevation every four or five tiles so as to produce a more moderate hill. The problem here is the “stepped” nature of the hillside/terrain that results. For CM2 I would like to see a more gentle elevation option of 1.25m per tile. This would produce a more naturally undulating landscape without the violent step changes in height produced by the 2.5m elevation changes. This is particularly relevant for CM2. I have never been to Russia or the Ukraine but have seen detailed studies of the landscape. The best study I have come across is one produced by the US DoD in the 1980s. I spent a couple of days studying a copy. It is a very large format book with 1:25,000 and 1:50,000 topographical maps and photos of the western regions of the then Soviet Union. Marked on the topographical maps are black dots with arrows extending from them. Next to each such mark is a small number, which corresponds to a photo taken from the location represented by the dot, facing in the direction of the arrow. A very clever and effective system for illustrating a landscape. From the above book, and others, it is clear that much of Russia and the Ukraine, including the wooded areas, is gently undulating broken only by the odd steep sided gully. Remembering that it is certainly not flat. If one imagined a CM2 battlefield 2km by 2km in size then using all or most of the twenty different elevation settings, at 1.25m per elevation change, it would be possible to produce a “very” realistic landscape. Over such an area I would use 10-15 of the elevation settings to reproduce the undulating nature of the ground and 5 or so to model steep sided gullies. The maps in CMBO are stunning as things are, but for me the addition of a 1.25m elevation setting would be a big plus for CM2. Maybe instead of the 5m elevation option, which I never use anyway. All the best, Kip.