Renaud

The BSBD game is a treasure trove, and I will be making a few corrections to unit designations based upon it. I think "140th" battalion of 255th Brigade is probably "14th"...could be a typo either way, so probably not too important. I wish I could include that video in my scenario briefing, especially the Naval Infantry. I found the battlefield.ru article pics in some orphaned links. I included one in the scenario package.

You are a far smarter man than I. Actually, designing scenarios is what brought me back into the game. I bought CMBB and was disappointed in playing the AI and dropped it for 2 years. I started designing and learned first hand how damned fickle and under-developed the AI really is. What I enjoy is researching the battles and trying to get at least a good H2H scenario out of a design. </font>

Where were you guys before I finished the scenario?! Just kidding...thanks for the info. More is always appreciated as I WILL go back and correct glaring historical inaccuracies. I have no shortage of sources and am pretty confident about the accuracy thus far, although sources can contradict one another, even the russian sources. And of course I happily make concessions for playability and fun factor. There were 31 M3L Stuarts involved, but only around 10 made it to shore. The Soobrazitelniy was actually a Storozhevoi Class Destroyer commissioned in 1939 (4x130mm/50 Pattern 1936 guns). The Besposadniy was a Gnevnyi Class destroyer with 4x130mm as well. Gotta love that variable romanization of cyrillic!!! I think you gents would enjoy the scenario! I hope you will take a look. Oh and John, almost forgot, that cool newsreel shows a 4x130mm/50 Pattern 1936 guns firing as a coastal battery from the east coast of Zemess bay, 5-8km from targets in the 'little land' near the fish cannery, the subject of scenario #2 in this series! The newsreel is actually from 7 months after the events of these scenarios however, during the final daylight operation to occupy the city after it was more or less abandoned by the Axis.

Alright, this beast is ready for testing. I've hotseated it all the way through. There are 3 versions, v1=HtH, v2=Russian vs Axis-AI, v3=Axis vs Russian-AI. v3 probably has negligible playability and is not yet tested. Novorossisk_Ozereika I would love to playtest with me as either side, preferably in 1-2 minute TCP for brevity. Let me know if interested. From the general briefing: By late 1942 the Axis advance in the South had ground to a halt at Stalingrad on the Volga and Tuapse in the Caucasus. The Soviet high command executed operations designed to surround and destroy the over-extended axis armies, with stupendous success on the Volga. Farther south in the Caucasus, operations were planned with the goal of bagging even larger Axis formations currently withdrawing northwest toward Rostov and the Crimea. These operations called for amphibious landings behind Axis lines west and south of Novorossisk on the Black Sea in conjunction with an overland attack. These landings would constitute the largest Soviet amphibious operation to date, and the 2nd largest of the war. References: 1. Miroslav Morozov, "The Fate of Amphibious Assault Tanks", Tankomaster no. 1/1999 (www.battlefield.ru) 2. Wilhelm Tieke, The Caucasus and the Oil, J.J.Fedorowicz, 1995 3. Yu.S.Bondarevskiy, "Landing of Amphibious Forces in Offensive Operations of Great Patriotic War", Military Historical Journal, No.4, April 1986 (www.redarmystudies.net) 4. I. Korotchenko, "Wartime Experience in Amphibious Landing Operations", Military Historical Journal, No.3, March 1982 (ibid) 5. Admiral N.Kuznetsov, Memoirs, Progress Publishers 1990. Translated by Vladimir Krivoshchekov: http://admiral.centro.ru/ 6. Charles B. Atwater, Jr, "Soviet Amphibious Operations in the Black Sea, 1941-1943", CSC 1995 7. 1:50k & 1:100k Soviet Topo Maps, Genshtab, Pulkovo-1942 8. http://www.navweaps.com/ (Russian Naval Guns) 9. http://www.worldwar2.ro/arme/?article=13 (Romanian Perspective) 10. http://rkkaww2.armchairgeneral.com

Alright, this beast is ready for testing. I've hotseated it all the way through. There are 3 versions, v1=HtH, v2=Russian vs Axis-AI, v3=Axis vs Russian-AI. v3 probably has negligible playability and is not yet tested. Novorossisk_Ozereika I would love to playtest with me as either side, preferably in 1-2 minute TCP for brevity. Let me know if interested. From the general briefing: By late 1942 the Axis advance in the South had ground to a halt at Stalingrad on the Volga and Tuapse in the Caucasus. The Soviet high command executed operations designed to surround and destroy the over-extended axis armies, with stupendous success on the Volga. Farther south in the Caucasus, operations were planned with the goal of bagging even larger Axis formations currently withdrawing northwest toward Rostov and the Crimea. These operations called for amphibious landings behind Axis lines west and south of Novorossisk on the Black Sea in conjunction with an overland attack. These landings would constitute the largest Soviet amphibious operation to date, and the 2nd largest of the war. References: 1. Miroslav Morozov, "The Fate of Amphibious Assault Tanks", Tankomaster no. 1/1999 (www.battlefield.ru) 2. Wilhelm Tieke, The Caucasus and the Oil, J.J.Fedorowicz, 1995 3. Yu.S.Bondarevskiy, "Landing of Amphibious Forces in Offensive Operations of Great Patriotic War", Military Historical Journal, No.4, April 1986 (www.redarmystudies.net) 4. I. Korotchenko, "Wartime Experience in Amphibious Landing Operations", Military Historical Journal, No.3, March 1982 (ibid) 5. Admiral N.Kuznetsov, Memoirs, Progress Publishers 1990. Translated by Vladimir Krivoshchekov: http://admiral.centro.ru/ 6. Charles B. Atwater, Jr, "Soviet Amphibious Operations in the Black Sea, 1941-1943", CSC 1995 7. 1:50k & 1:100k Soviet Topo Maps, Genshtab, Pulkovo-1942 8. http://www.navweaps.com/ (Russian Naval Guns) 9. http://www.worldwar2.ro/arme/?article=13 (Romanian Perspective) 10. http://rkkaww2.armchairgeneral.com

Welcome Bob! When you 'preview' a map in the editor (ie you are wandering around the 3D view of the map you created), you can return to the editor by clicking the GO button in lower right corner, do more editing, etc. When you buy units from the UNITS menu in the editor, you can go back to the map editor and preview it. At that time you will see the units lined up on the 3D map and you can place them where you want. Right click the selected unit or hit space bar when unit is selected to see available options, like rotate, dig in, etc. Hope this helps.

Quality stuff...I need to download and try this one out over the holidays!

Nice mod! I have a bunch of scenarios hosted at TPG featuring the pz38t, if you want to see the graphics in action: http://www.the-proving-grounds.com/scenario_finder.html search by Game: CMBB search by Author: RENAUD

Aha, a chance to pimp a scenario. For a good example of the value of the light recon unit as a quick reaction anti-partisan force, try this: Tashkenak Station

* update: the battlefield.ru site is back up, with a full translation of the Tankomaster article! Thanks Kingfish. I do have a machine translation of that document, which is originally sourced from: Morozov Miroslav, The Fate of Amphibious Assault Tanks, Tankomaster no. 1/99 It's no longer hosted on the battlefield.ru site, through they do have some unlinked pics of the beaches and south and north bluffs, wrecked M3A1's, barges, etc. It's about 99% certain that there were only M3A1 Stuarts in this battle. If there were Lee's, I would simulate with a few Shermans. That article is a critical resource! I can understand about 80% of the translation, especially the numbers, vehicle models, units, etc. As is usually the case, I must reconcile conflicting accounts of the battle from around 10 sources, although I consider this one pretty authoritive on the Russian side of things. Interestingly, there is a conflict about whether the 164th reserve AA Battalion had 2 88's stationed there, or whether those were 2 105mm guns of the 3rd Battery/789th Coastal Artillery Battalion. Anywho, the scenario is coming along nicely, map and forces 95% done. It's a vast map, fully 2km*4km. Forces however are not too unwieldy: reinforced battalion on the Russian side, various but less on the Axis side. Now to hotseat and tweak... [ December 06, 2006, 09:25 AM: Message edited by: Renaud ]

Emar, "The Caucusus and the oil" by Wilhelm Tieke is the book that got me started on this. Regarding the tanks, Tieke mentions Lee's, Grants and Stuarts, but Russian and other sources indicates the 563rd only landed with Stuarts. I believe they were entirely equipped with Stuarts, and the entire battalion of 31 was lost. No mention of lee's and grants beyond Tieke. So I've only got Stuarts in there. If you remember that other book with the pictures let me know!

Found a couple of good articles there, thanks andreas. Official writings and histories of the Soviet period avoid mention of the landings at Ozereika for reasons you may discover when you play my scenario. But for some german, romanian and post-soviet accounts it might have disappeared down the memory hole. The other celebrated 'diversionary' landing is discussed in one of the VIZH articles with good information on rate of troop landing, boats used, artillery support, etc.

Hi, for the past few weeks i've been intensively researching the Feb 43 amphibious operation at Novorossisk. This is a little known operation which was overshadowed by later events. This operation is not to be confused with the final attack which recaptured Novorossisk 7 months later in Sept 43 - the google-hosted newsreel video is from that (daytime) operation. I am about 60% done with the 1st scenario which will depict the landings at Yuzhnaya Ozereika in the predawn hours of Feb 4th. That battle is a truly epic story. Troops of the Soviet 255th Naval Infantry Brigade and 563rd Seperate Tank Battalion conduct a desperate night amphibious assault. The 2nd scenario depicts a simultaneous diversionary attack conducted by another battalion of the 255th at Stanichkya, a suburb south of Novorossisk. Both scenarios are based on research including autobiographical accounts of russian and german soldiers, scholarly articles, previous wargame research and scenarios, the memoirs of the chief of staff of the black sea fleet, and several books. Both maps will be replicated with as much detail as humanly possible in CMBB using photographs of the area and 100,000:1 and 50,000:1 russian military maps of the battlefields. I'll post here when done, and on the scenario forum as well.

I get the idea that yes, you will be seeing individual hellfires and GPS bombs flying in from offmap. Thanks for the update Steve!

Don't be sorry. Being overtasked and unmotivated myself, I was looking for someone to pawn all the work off to... </font>

I made a map featuring a lake/damn/river combination not too long ago: dam map It's a scenario. Feel free to clear the map and use for your QB's.

The next 3 battles will be set in Rostov during the assault there at the end of June '42. They should be good, and all historical as I have obtained fairly detailed accounts and OOB's. The 22nd saw 3 days of heavy action assaulting into the east side of Rostov and establishing a 3rd bridgehead across the Don. By this time they have been stripped of their artillery regiment and 1 motorized infantry regiment making them tank/SPW heavy. After that the 22nd went into reserve on the Don and Chir northwest of Stalingrad between August and November. During this time they were given no fuel and their panzers were essentially mothballed in wheatfields. They were largely destroyed in the russian offensive on the Don and Chir at the end of November. Two other designers have covered this, but i'll do at least 1 scenario also. After the Rostov action, the 22nd PZD's Pioneer Battalion was reassinged to 6th Army and subsequently destroyed at Stalingrad in january 43. I have no detailed information but MIGHT do a semi-historical or fictional scenario using that as inspiration.

Probably early-43 around the time of the 3rd battle of Kharkov is the period you are looking for. The russian tanks were about the same but german tanks had been considerably upgunned/uparmored. By mid 42 the germans were rolling out the PzIIIj and j(late). With rotkappchen (tungsten) ammo, which was readily available at this time, the 50l60 could defeat KVI armor in a close-to 90 degree impact angle and range under 500 meters. (hold fire until you can get 90-degree aspect angle on front, rear or side). The j(late) turret and upper hull armor could resist 76L41 AP hits from outside a few hundred meters. But not the lower hull, so you must stay hull-down. The pak37 also had stielgranate available which could kill KV's from any range, but sub-100 meter range is desirable for first-round hits. These ammunition types are not uncommon in early-mid 42, but are random in QB's so you might not get it... By June '42 most german panzer divisions in the south were equipped with at least 12 PzIVg-lange model (75L43 gun) in preparation for Fall Blau. These could defeat KV-1 and T34 armor. 88's are always good, but seldom affordable in QB's of the size you specify and of course totally immobile. The 150IG is a good cheap alternative, but if you don't get any of the hollow-charge rounds you are in trouble vs KV. You might disable or cause abandonment though. [ December 14, 2005, 12:40 PM: Message edited by: Renaud ]

A pic of charles coding, wearing a santa outfit, or at least the hat, would be suitable.

guys, i'm pretty sure your attacking force can 'overrun' the enemy by exiting off the far (or side) map edge. If all your forces exit past the enemy, then you pop out behind him on the CMC map. Voila, your armored spearhead has bypassed the enemy. But you had to fight a CM battle to do it so it slowed you down on the CMC map. I'm pretty sure this is what hunter said on some question like this a while back. Oh yea and as far as above issue of many tiny ME's slowing advance to a crawl, the ME size is determined by the campaign designer and should be reasonable, not a bunch of tiny units unless it's a tiny Op. The player can't split his ME's, for this and other reasons I imagine.

Notice that all the german armored cars have radios. The 'radio car' is there only to provide a historical unit as far as I can tell. No different 'radio' abilities than the regular AC's. If CMx2 ww2 module models radios in more detail, then you might see differences. Different ranges, different commo nets, receive-only sets early-war, etc. For the germans at least, there were several different radio models for contacting aircraft, arty, local tactical units, etc. The CM command ranges of radio equipped vehicles are pretty short and only semi-sorta realistic. Ranges varied greatly depending on whether you were stationary or on the move and the radio model. The game vehicle command radii seem to model the range of the smaller german tactical sets used while in motion, on the conservative side. A more detailed model would greatly increase the range when the vehicle is stopped. [ December 08, 2005, 07:01 PM: Message edited by: Renaud ]

I guess this belongs in scenario talk, but since JC brought it up here...Google Earth is a good backup resource particularly when all else fails. I have used it in my 22nd PZD scenarios. The topo is useful. One thing to be aware of is that rural cultivation and population is more intensive now. I found large areas of my scenarios which were definitely just empty fields, wilderness or forest in the 40's now show up as vast patchworks of cultivated fields in Google Earth. In connection with this, there is also a lot of new irrigation, dams, flooded valleys, etc. Sometimes towns where action occured are now at the bottom of reservoirs. Soviet ethnic cleansing also results in a lot of confusion with where towns are or were. Entire towns were depopulated, relocated to siberia, renamed to russian sounding names, etc. Makes it a challenge to locate places sometimes. For the Crimea I used combinations of 1920's soviet military maps, modern maps, pre-soviet Tartar maps, and Google Earth. Translating cyrillic is also fun, hehe. The nice thing about russia is that some cities are virtually the same since WW2. Rostov is still quite recognizable from 1930's soviet maps for instance.

I had great fun with 315. Been designing scenarios so much I forgot how much fun it is to actually play! I played germans giving AI soviets +50% troops...was I supposed to play russians? hehe. It's just amazing how much CM complements and enhances the study of WWII. ** oh yea I won 91% to 9%. 12 casualties. [ December 06, 2005, 04:30 PM: Message edited by: Renaud ]

According to one inspector who examined the remains, the total loss was caused when 120mm charges ignited and burning rapidly, leading to ignition of everything else. It seems the Challenger has a rotating 'wheel' on the turret floor beneath the main gun which functions as a sort of ready-rack for 'charges'. (I guess the Challenger uses 2-part ammunition?). This ready ammunition is apparently unprotected. I can't tell from the document if that was the cause of death for the 2 crew members inside the tank, but I didn't see any mention of exposed ammo as a factor in the findings or recommendations. A hit like this would not have destroyed an abrams, assuming the crew had the ammo door shut (like it is supposed to be!!). Whether the HESH hitting the hatch still would have killed the crew is arguable. I personally would not feel comfortable with 120mm propellant charges stored unprotected in the turret. A challenger just doesn't look much like an MTLB to me, but things can get pretty blobby in the old generation thermals depending on conditions. This brings up another question for me: is this a challenger 2E with the new thermals (like M1A2 SEP thermals) or the older one with old generation thermals (like M1/M1A1 original thermals). Supposedly the new thermals have much higher resolution.

"Mighty Tiny Little Bastard" is what they called them at NTC. The opfor used them. Very fast and very low profile.