Bil Hardenberger

Sorry guys real life is keeping me from an update... should be able to get to this next turn tomorrow... maybe Bil

Yeah sorry about that Hister.. I was testing the file storage linky thingy... I was going to take them down but then thought.. ah hell, who's going to notice them? I still have one more piece of required reading before you should really play these though. Bil

Okay, I'm sending my Jpz crews back to the range.. both of them had chances to kill all three of Ken's tanks (that's right, the support tank joined the two AA tanks in exiting the town), both missed all shots, except one which hit the support tank, and bounced. Wow. Good on Ken for getting them out safely.. but what is he doing with them? I suspect he is moving them to the rear and laterally across the battlefield to deal with my edge huggers... its a head scratcher really. The town is the objective of this scenario (I am ignoring all the other objectives) and moving your storngest assets out of it doesn't make sense to me. Well, now Ken has presented me with an opportunity... the town has nothing but infantry and support units in it.

Gerry, not to worry I will cover armor combat starting with the tank section and building from there. If you read the prep material before playing the scenarios then you should be fine, play it more than once if necessary until you master the material and feel comfortable. The first armor scenario is the Tank Section Attack (tank section = a pair of tanks working together). You will build on that experience and knowledge with some tank platoon scenarios and eventually some combined arms.. we will stay platoon to platoon plus for quite a while learning the fundamentals. If you find you are having trouble with them then post in this thread or comment in the blog and we'll sort you out. Bil

More of the same this turn... long range sniping to little effect... one dead PIAT team from a Stummel round, etc. There was one significant development however... these little babies were spotted moving out of the town.. now that's interesting. Right at turn end one of my Jpz's was aiming at the foremost AA tank.. with any luck it'll kill it next turn just in time to get the second in its sights as well.

...brrrr... you are really cold.

Okay, so the Sdkfz 251/21 is broken... bug report filed.. but that means it is useless to me for the rest of this scenario. Damn.. too bad too as it has clear spots on four of Ken's units, shown in the treeline opposite are an HQ team, a Sniper Team, an LMG team, and a PIAT team.. this last fired at the 251/21 and missed short. Its a shame to be in that position with those spots and to not be able to do anything about it. Oh well. that's BETA testing for you Ken is rushing about a platoon's worth of troops across the fields just short of the town.. wonder what he's up to with them. They are fired on by several of my units, including this 251/17 (2/9 Platoon HQ's mount), the Pz Section 1 Panther and a couple MGs. All that firepower and no casualties noted... You need to watch this video of the rush across the fields... pay particular attention to the HMG team featured at the very end of the video... [wink wink]

Michael, I plan on posting here whenever I post to the Blog.

Hilts sure. Make a copy of your CMBN game folder, only upgrade one of them, then you will have the best of both worlds. But I would refuse to play with them until they upgraded.

Ken has officially ceased attacking now. He has pulled back and is taking up positions in the woods and it appears is collapsing on the town as well. On the right I am pushing one halftrack with squad as far as Ken will let me drive it... so far no enemy units have been found this far in the rear. This is only a diversion.. my goal here is simply to hold Ken's attention. My first objective is to capture the small farm that Ken captured early in the game. I will go after these smaller goals one at a time, and see what opportunities present themselves on the way to my main objective.

I have a lot of material i want to get through before I get into specific tactical challenges like fighting in wooded and urban terrain, etc. I will eventually get to these, probably as part of either a platoon or company level exercise. Bil

So... I had an email exchange with Ken today and he mentioned that some people were upset that I was using the edge of the map to move to the other side of that field (the large hedgelined field on my extreme right). I wish those who were complaining about this would have come in here, I would have explained it to you. Here is the explanation I sent to Ken, do with it as you will: Bil

Gerry, as I said before they will work in base CMBN 2.10 when that patch gets released... I actually meant to have these work in at least 2.01.. I built them in the new BETA and for some reason, though there is nothing unique about them they will not open in the older version of CMBN (2.01). I think this has to do with the map changes that were made for 2.10. I have no plans right now to create these for CMFI.. though I am open to doing that down the road and do think it would be useful and that theater does offer some unique challenges. Well what these will force you to do is think on the smaller unit level, squads and platoons, without getting overwhelmed by the number of units in the i.e. battalion you are commanding... you should be thinking big picture for the battalion command of course.. but down in the weeds if you use these techniques and take the battle one bite at a time then it should help reduce the overload you are feeling. The time allotted for a battle really should not effect your thinking at all.. most of the time I think that is just an arbitrary number that sounded about right to the scenario designer. Most battles I have participated in, win or lose, rarely go over the 40 minute mark. There is rarely a reason, unless you have a stubborn opponent, to normally take a game to the end of the time limit. Bil

Relatively quiet turn.. Ken continued to pull back, my Pz Section 1 did some sniping with main gun rounds at individual soldiers. I expected Ken to throw some mortar fire at my Wirblewind this turn so I had plotted a reverse move.. and it was timely as Ken unloaded several mortar rounds right on its original location. On the right I have two squads with their mounts and the Mobelwagen that have passed through the only available narrow path while Ken seems to be throwing more and more infantry into the woods in front of them. I don't think I'll be pushing anymore over to this side of the fields... but I am pushing one squad deep into the rear.. if nothing else to give Ken something to think about and perhaps make him push more into this area. Near the town it looks like Ken is not actually advancing towards the windmill but seems to be consolidating his units in this area, some moving back toward the town, others laterally.

Yep, there will be accompanying scenarios specially crafted to help you practice/gain an understanding for each concept as they are introduced. The first two scenarios are complete and have been tested. These will be released after Market Garden is out.. you will need that module or the 2.10 patch to CMBN to play these. The first two scenarios will be: ---Infantry Squad Attack ---Tank Section Attack I only have one more Battle Drill to add before all the prerequisite reference material is ready for these two scenarios, and that is: Fire and Movement... coming your way in the next few days. Bil

Blog Update: I just posted the procedure on how to get a tank into a good hull down position. Enjoy.

It will be an amalgamation of period and modern tactics. They are similar though to how most western armies operated at the lowest level even then. I will get in to more nation specific doctrine and technique but on average what I will present will be generic and applicable to all.

Personal weaknesses? Well I'm easily distracted by an attractive woman or a fast car.. so send one of those my way and you are guaranteed victory... though my wife might have an issue with the former. Beating a good player is primarily done by not rushing, and taking it slow. Make sure you have an idea on what the enemy is doing and what force he has where... I rarely make a decision to move until I have some intelligence on the enemy force or movements. Regardless, always think through an action and understand the consequences could be annihilation if you screw it up, for example, not ensuring your flanks are secure. Bil

When the Market Garden module gets released I will be releasing officially the Combat Mission Tactical Problems Blog (link). It has been up for some time as I have been slowly adding content. Eventually I will have practice scenarios that will be targeted towards practicing and experimenting with different tactical concepts. The first scenarios are completed and tested, only waiting for the module to release and for me to finish the content necessary for their completion. These problems will be progressive, meaning that you will start with small units (squads and tank sections) and then build to full company (+) combat teams. The tactical concepts and procedures will get more complicated as you progress. I will add to this content as I get the time and motivation. I thought a little sneak peek, now that Market Garden preorders are active, was in order. Feel free to look around and comment, either on the blog or in this thread if you have any questions or if you see any errors or issues. If any of this information helps your CM play, in any of the different CM games (the concepts will be similar from game to game) please drop in and let me know. Here is the overview post from the Combat Mission Tactical Problems Blog:

Ken obviously has not read my Blog, especially the Battle Drill section, React to Contact, and the Squad Attack Drills. If he had, he would have known that advancing this team at the windmill around the hedges into a situation where it was outnumbered... ...would end in its demise. The grenades were thrown by the HMG team which recovered and reoccupied the building this turn. I hope Ken is going to call a halt to throwing these terrific soldiers away now... this is part of the cost for attacking the windmill... he lost much more than what is seen in this image, probably the better part of a platoon. SITUATION This image shows that Ken still has two distinct forces. #1 seems to be all infantry... #2 I know has at least 3 tanks (2 AA tanks and 1 support tank). Force 1 is taking up strong positions in the woods... his force is made for that terrain while mine is not. I am crafting a new plan of action now, I'll share it later, but suffice it to say that I am going to shift my focus entirely now. It's time I taught Ken how to attack.

On the Dunes... ...while my Panther had fun shooting up skedaddling Paras, Ken had one brave PIAT team that had the balls to fight back. Watch this video of the fight on the Dunes to see how it ends. At the windmill Ken continued to push teams forwards. One team makes it to the hedges and is able to finally force my HMG team from the building.. no casualties however. The other team hangs back in a support by fire position and gets more than it expected... here is a video of the action at the windmill. The Wirblewind was in action this turn putting some pain on two teams, one of them the support by fire team advancing towards the windmill, that will be the team at the very end of the video above. Ken is on the move with a large force of infantry from the town towards the windmill and my right. No sign of his remaining three tanks... but I expect to see one or two of them moving as well.. I am waiting for that actually.

Glad to hear someone got the reference

Good job Johnsy! The video is interesting and fun to follow, good presentation! Looking forward to additional installments. FYI, I put in a request to sticky this thread, so that'll be taken care of when it reaches the top of Moon's inbox. Bil

I wanted to go over the current situation as it might be getting confused... currently at the hedgerows, Ken continues to extricate his force from the cross fire they found themselves in. Note in the bottom image that they were restricted to one narrow escape point.. and this was clearly in view of my 3/9 force that had long range coverage of this entire area. 1/9 is holding and advancing slowly as 3/9 makes a sweeping move around the right side to hit the enemy force in the flank. At the Windmill, 1/10(-) is desperately trying to withstand the enemy advances as Pz Section 1 starts to move over the Dunes into the flank of Ken's Windmill Force. As Pz Section 1 starts to advance into the Dunes the Panther spots several enemy infantry teams. The next couple turns will be interesting.. I am thankful that Ken no longer has any mobile AT assets for me to worry about, only PIATs as far as I know to this point. At the windmill Ken keeps trying to push infantry teams towards the windmill.. I don't really understand why he continues to push them into the meat grinder. Note in the bottom image where Ken has his mortar strike going in.. it has cost me about an infantry squad worth of troops so far, but I was able to extricate the Wirblewind from the impact zone.

Haven't noticed any difference to this point... but I suspect they are as vulnerable as ever... as they should be... not a lot protecting them from incoming fire. Bil