Bil Hardenberger

This post (with a quote from Charles) has some explanation for Sherman v Pz-IV, might help. Good luck with your crusade Shift8, seriously I hope you find peace of mind in regards to this subject.

I believe in CM the partial penetrations are rounds that have penetrated (not lodged in the armor) that have had their killing energy absorbed by the armor. Don't hold me to that, but that is my understanding.

I think you will find most disagree with you.. I for one think any penetration regardless of degree or damage inflicted is a penetration.

Well.... how much control do you really need? In CMBN and the follow-on games you can split squads down into two or three teams with from 3 to 5 members each.. Sounds like you might want to look at ARMA 3 if controlling individuals is your cup of tea (I think you control individuals in that game). There is a WW2 version too I believe.

John, the playback will freeze at less than a second intervals.. what I do is hit the play/pause button real fast as I get close to the event I want to capture, stopping and starting the playback in very short segments.. sometimes it takes several tries to get the shot I am looking for, but I always eventually get it. Takes practice.

To me buddy aid is exactly that.. in the Army we were taught buddy aid for our fellow squad mates.. "buddy, buddy, are you okay?" help them bind wounds, apply tourniquets, mark the dead, take special weapons to help with the mission, etc. then leave them and move on with the assigned task. I think this is all that's going on here. That they are removed from the map at this point only indicates they've been dealt with, nothing more. Nor IMO should there be more in this game for casualty extraction, that is usually done after a fire fight I believe in most cases.

Vanir, those numbers with partial penetrations added in are what I was looking for when I first saw shift8's test results.. it does look like there doesn't appear to be much wrong with the game at this point... and you have a larger sample size too which helps. Thanks for posting them.

Thanks for that.. regarding the test firings that have been mentioned throughout this thread and are the basis for the main argument.. do we know how many actual rounds were fired at Tiger tanks? Were they fired at actual Tiger tanks or at armor mockups? Were they fired at separate Tiger tanks/armor mockups? This last point is important because armor will degrade the more it is impacted so those tests could be flawed.

That's the kind of information that Battlefront likes to see. Let me ask you this, how many of the PP hits were there at each range listed? Personally I think those should also be counted as penetrations as they have an effect beyond what a bounced round would have and really they are penetrations even if the round doesn't fully enter the interior of the tank. Thanks for laying out the numbers for me, now I am beginning to understand your concern.. I don't know that I agree yet, but at least we are on the same page and talking the same language. I think it's interesting that the penetration percentage is higher at 1000m than it is at 500m.. of course 100 hits might not be a large enough sampling to really get accurate numbers.

Really? Seriously I think it's your attitude that is rubbing me the wrong way rather than the actual subject of your posts which I find interesting. I did of course read what you wrote: That means nothing to me.. I can't tell if you made a test scenario and ran the tests a hundred times, or if you are talking about your impressions while playing the game over several years? If the former where are your numbers? What does your map look like, what distances were tested? How many shots were tested? etc... Your comments and findings are meaningless without some solid numbers and a test file that can be used to confirm or refute your arguments. There is no way Battlefront will ever make any changes with the approach you are taking with this thread. If the second case, then your tests are meaningless.

I don't think you can just jump to this conclusion, have you done tests in CM to prove it? Or are you talking about your impression while playing the game? What were the angles of the opposing tanks? What were the height differences? In a real game we are never going to see a range setup with two tanks on level ground at set distances from each other. In my opinion, there are way too many things going on under hood to make a determination that something is broken. I don't think this is something to really get all defensive and aggressive about either, I trust that Charles has put the best information he could find in the code and I am comfortable with the simulation of armored combat as it stands. We had a lot of discussion when CMBN was coming out about the armor and AT round modeling, those threads can be found with a search I'm sure... also see my CMBN BETA AAR (first link below) where Charles makes a rare appearance (through a quote in one of my posts) explaining some of this,.

I am happy to hear you are playing some H2H John. How about posting some screenshots?

Another great test MOS. One way to "maybe" get around the LOS issue with hiding units is to have another unit with a very small target arc nearby that can do the spotting for them (ie. sharing spotting info), the maybe the hiding unit will be able to spot better while in dense terrain (maybe). Perhaps worth a test. By the way I almost never use hide.

By the way I discussed some of these principles and how they relate to CM in my CMBN BETA AAR if anybody is interested.

Jason, true, but the point wasn't to actually "hit anything" when firing on the move, but to provide a psychological weapon primarily against infantry... the German 7th Panzer Division used it to good effect during the battle of France (I know there were other uses (and other than 1940) but this one comes quickly to mind). I use firing on the move as a tactic in CM but in the manner I just described, never as a tactic versus enemy tanks, that is asking for disaster.

SLIM, I will be posting a workbook template, one for the US and one for the Germans... after that it'll be a simple cut and paste operation to build it to whatever size and configuration you like... stay tuned.

I think we have shown most aspects of this system, so will probably end this game soon so we can try it in a real scenario. I will be finishing up the Excel tutorial, but really this should be simple to use as all of the entries you need to make are either drop downs or very simple in execution. I will also be bundling this training scenario and the workbooks for you so you can try it out yourselves in pre-set conditions. If there are any outstanding questions or concerns, please let me know.

In this next turn Warren is using Initiative for one of his tanks.. after the Initiative tasks are complete the unit will return to its originally assigned Task. First he expands the Initiative hidden cells (top right plus sign) Note that the task assigned for 1 M4A3 (the unit using Initiative) is Idle-Reserve A - The INITIATIVE STARTS column entry for this unit is green and matches the CURRENT GAME TIME so there is no delay for this unit to use Initiative. B - Warren locks in the Initiative time C - He assigns the Initiative Tasks - in this case he wants the unit to Move & Engage my Sherman and then Withdraw D - Warren enters any notes required... note that the second Task, Withdraw is not necessary for a shoot and scoot.. simply indicating it in the COMMENTS column is sufficient E - I am trying to figure out why I included the ENDS NLT entry ... I think I will remove it, as the Initiative Task, though it should be a quick diversion from the original Task, should not be restricted.. I think what I wanted to ensure is that the player has to be forced to end the Initiative Task(s) at some point and to reinforce the temporary nature of such orders... please let me know your thoughts on this. Finally, Warren gives the orders in the game, he must give the full order, including the spot he wants his unit to open fire from, and the waypoint(s) he wants to Withdraw to. CLICK THE IMAGE TO ENLARGE

Doug, the only person I am sore at is myself. Holien, pleasure meeting and chatting with you. Next time I'm in England I'll return the favor (or favour). Cheers.

Womble, yeah maybe. But I could see me losing tanks one at a time in that situation. Might have been worth the risk though with all of them coming over the top at the same time, might have gotten lucky. If I had a couple M10s then maybe I would have had a better chance. But then they would have become mortar fodder.

A quick and dirty post battle analysis... Doug gave me three maps to choose from and I chose this one.. one of the others was the same map I played the FJ v Red Devils BETA AAR on and I didn't like the looks of the third for some reason that I don't remember I then chose the US as I expected a close in battle and the US would have the advantage in that sort of fight.. of course it never devolved into a close in fight so my expectation was faulty. The map which I thought favored me in fact heavily favored Doug.. he could move straight through covered terrain to both center objectives, while I had to move down one narrow covered defile and then had to maneuver to the flanks.. it simply took too long for me to move into position, by the time I started to get into position with the mass of my combat power he was already in position on both center objectives... the terrain also played havoc with my tank movement. I never felt comfortable with the terrain and actually should have insisted on an infantry only fight on this map... that would have been more interesting and a better show for the AAR. Doug played his side to perfection and he successfully countered every move I made.. I think the time it took for me to move my forces really telegraphed my intentions. Good job Doug you played one hell of a battle.

Looking forward to reading this thread.. I hope you guys went easy on me Doug and I are winding this game down and both selecting cease fire.

This turn I am selecting cease-fire and ending the game, at this point, (actually should have started after I lost my M10) I am ordering a general withdrawal, we'll call in the P-47s soften them up, wait for reinforcements and then go at them again. A tip of the hat to Doug as he made no mistakes and beat me fair and square. I lose another Sherman this turn, as expected, though not the one I thought I would lose Doug also started to open up his Panthers at my infantry... which of course was very effective. Not a pretty battle from my side, and I apologize for the weak showing.

I did of course consider smoke in front of the Panther... but I did not have LOS to that area so... I did plot mortar smoke in front of it, but they never fired the rounds. Best I could do was pop smoke and pray

The Sixteenth Minute I moved my Shermans behind their smoke screen to the right along the hill.. I think this move is several turns too late though. Note that on the Finnochio objective (second image) that Doug is starting to gather troops to defend... its not going to be easy, if it is even possible in this terrain. Panther 1 did not move again this turn, though Panther 2 moved up next to it... it looks to me that right at the end of the turn that Panther 2 gets a spot on Sherman 2 as it quickly rotated its turret and lowered its gun.. then the turn ended,.. could be lights out next turn. I cannot reasonably push an attack against two unchallenged Panthers. Turn 16 overview...