Simon Fox

A conscript army is never going to perform well in this kind of warfare, a high level of professionalism and flexibility at the tactical level are essential. Also the interaction of the military and political are too complex for that.

Exactly, this is one of the good things about CM not something to complain about. The anecdotes related here are just the tip of the iceberg and nothing to do with "training". I can think of about 10 WWII instances right off the top of my head. Often even when the units realised their misidentification they were so mixed up that no-one wanted a fight anyway. My grandfather was in a British divisional intelligence unit and he had a few personal tales of driving his jeep along in German convoys at night. Los is right about friendly fire too, Ken Tout relates a story of two British SP guns blasting the hell out of each other in Normandy. IIRC there were only a couple of survivors from both crews. ------------------ "More German prisoners were now arriving. There were well over 150 of them, with a lot more yet to be brought in. I watched them sitting in the dust, knowing they must have been in a state of shock. This was something that had never happened before. They couldn't bring themselves to admit that this was their first defeat of the war. Not only that, but it was suffered at the hands of Australian infantrymen, who were vastly outnumbered and fighting their first battle of the war."

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>my tank isn't spotting them at all even they were in line of sight of that tank<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Is your tank buttoned? Spotting is not instantaneous in CM. If your tank is buttoned it is even slower. Are you sure they had los to that tank? You must use the los tool to determine this. Visual inspection is insufficient due to scaling of the units (default is +2 I think). Also los is determined to the centre of mass so it may have only just appeared. The tacAI is not perfect but in my experience it is better than your comments tend to suggest, especially in recent patches. Therefore my inclination is that other factors are also involved in the behaviour you describe.

Dear jpinhead, I am thoroughly sick of you being sick and whining about people whining about the inconsequential. Get well soon, please.

Here's some user whining for you Bas SEND ME THE BLOODY MOVIE! As for the rest of the thread there is nothing like a good argument/discussion as long as the quality is of a reasonable standard.

Firstly, How do British tank optics compare in the quality stakes? I imagine they were a bit more on the ball with regard to longer engagement ranges with the desert experience. Also they had the 17pdr which falls into the category of "flat trajectory/high velocity" that you guys are alluding to. Secondly, The neutral steer issue is a bit more confusing since IIRC at least the Churchill had the same ability and I am not so sure if the Panther had it? Though the Tiger did. I'm inclined to think the StuG did not. You certainly can't use sweeping statements like "most german tanks".

Some great posts from Claus (cbo) there. Good to see some lucid and logical examination on both the sources of various published data (ie empirical or calculated) and also some narrowing down of where exactly various groups of data deviate and some rationale for this deviation.

Hey babs, you can't be looking to hard. The British and Canadian Armies used turretless M3A3(mainly) and M5(occasionally) Stuarts as recce vehicles and prime movers for 17-pr AT guns. They seem to have a bit more armament than CM gives them however especially in the recce configuration where I have seen a .50 and a .30 plus a hull .30! Check out this page http://www.geocities.com/spoelstra.geo/cmp/stuart_vi_recce.html or this one http://www.armourinfocus.freeserve.co.uk/m3/m3intro.htm a picture of one may be seen here http://www.magma.ca/~tracks/shermans.htm and this discussion http://www.mo-money.com/AFV-news/cgi_bin/webbbs/config.pl?read=4196 Also there is vanguard book on the Stuart which a friend assures me has some pictorial evidence. [This message has been edited by Simon Fox (edited 08-28-2000).]

Sherman IIC cbo (Claus) is basically correct, a mate does have copies of the original RAC reports used by Peter Brown to compile his data, but I always use his website since it is much easier It is pretty clear from those figures that almost without exception 'Fireflys' should be VC in the time frame of CM, ie June 1944 on in NW Europe, the Med theatre would be different. Of course I agree with the point made by a few that the differences between the two performance wise are minimal and therefore of little real impact on the game. Official RAC wartime documents on Sherman nomenclature are quite clear that officially there was no IIC variant. If such did exist it would due to field modification and numbers would be minimal at most. If pictures do exist they only demonstrate the existence of one or two such. This hardly justifies their existence in the game. Patrick Delaforce says that the 8th Armoured Bde was issued with VCs. Of far more significance is the unfortunate absence in the game of the Churchill types with 6pdr of which a considerable proportion were until well into 1945. Also of interest to me is whether Sherman diesel variants were used in NW Europe. The RAC preferred diesel tanks and in the ME theatre most units had diesel Shermans at least initially. It is well known that the units which were transferred to Britain for D-day from the Med were absolutely mortified to be equipped with petrol Shermans vs the diesel they had before. In a number of areas the diesel version was considered superior, including a belief that it was less flammable (correct?). It would be hardly suprising if these units did their best to obtain diesel Shermans if they could, though I have only come across anecdotal evidence for this. Anybody care to comment? Stuart Kangaroo I have never heard of this either but consider it just a nomenclature for a turretless Stuart quite distinct from the T18. The British removed the turrets from many Stuarts in NW Europe, this is well recognised. It is quite feasible for such a vehicle to carry a team sized unit- it's capacity in CM, within it's hull. In many cases the turret openings were widened further by removing additional armour on the top deck to improve access. The model shown above is a T18 I beleive not a Stuart 'kangaroo'. My main concern is that these vehicles are shown with the bow MG removed in CM and I wonder that this was standard practice for such a conversion. Furthermore I suspect that an Bren AA mount may have been commonly added (though manned by the passengers).

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Chamberlain, Gudgin, Hogg, Hunnicutt, Gander, Jentz, Spielberger and von Senger and Etterlin<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Geez, Helge you just can't do that. These guys all got their info from someone elses tests. Are they the same original source or different ones? Did they do their own analysis of the raw data or do they use the analysis given by the guys testing? You may be right but it is impossible to know from what you say. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>But arguing the credibility of LF testresults in one case and backing up your point with them in another case makes me scratch my head.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> ???? You are just obscuring the issue by that statement. I fail to see how all the german tests in WW2 could be considered as one homogeneous entity. Why should they be considered as such? Even with each gun and ammo type there may have been multiple tests. Hypothetically speaking would you consider someone 'concerned' about the results of one experiment as having challenged the credibility of them all even when they are quite distinct? Your answer should prove illuminating. Will someone please answer Lewis's question as it seems pretty pertinent.

Phil you Dill you've gotta be more specific. I've never come across the incident you describe in my reading but I am pretty sure that the absence of capital (thanks Speedy) punishment precedes Gallipoli. Also there was no queen then it was a king. Yes, there were the 'Rats of Tobruk' long before the lesser denizens of this board even conceived of their rodent armies. Filthy plagiarists as they are. ------------------ "More German prisoners were now arriving. There were well over 150 of them, with a lot more yet to be brought in. I watched them sitting in the dust, knowing they must have been in a state of shock. This was something that had never happened before. They couldn't bring themselves to admit that this was their first defeat of the war. Not only that, but it was suffered at the hands of Australian infantrymen, who were vastly outnumbered and fighting their first battle of the war."

And fine fighting units they were too. Oss near Hertogenbosch was a little village which contained an enormous Wehrmacht food and rations dump from which many British units 'drew' rations. "The problem was that Oss was in No-Man's-Land alternatively occupied by one side or the other-often with confrontations. 552 Coy RASC appropriating rations for 8th Armoured Bde were rudely attacked and needed a Guards Recce Sqn to restore the situation. The RASC defended the rations with great bravery and rightly deserved the award of two MCs and two MMs." Must of been a pretty hot fight! ------------------ "I never saw such a dejected army, even the Italians carried themselves better in the old desert days. They were mostly Germans, but includede Poles, Russians, Mongols, Czechs, Yugoslavs, Frenchmen, even one American - all in Nazi uniforms."

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>The point of contention here is: Charles public statement that The German Wa Pruf Waffamt: wartime data used by Jentz concerning penetration results obtained in LF tests of KwK.43 annunition is flawed. All signifigant data of these tests has been supplied as well as the outcome.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Though I hesitate to speak for him this is not my impression of what he is saying. My impression is that he is saying they are inconsistent with other data and therefore "suspect" in the absence of other evidence to the contrary. Which is not precisely the same meaning as "flawed". <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Their is a bigger issue here apperently no one sees but me, if the 8.8cm data is flawed then ALL German ammunition test results are flawed as the same criteria was used for all German ammunition.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Whoa, well there is a good reason no one else sees it, it aint there. I fail to understand how you can come to such a bizarre conclusion based on this discussion. Sheesh, some guy was sacked for falsifying a research paper the other day....well there goes the entire years research output for the US in that field <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Simon, you are incorrect in that primary source material has not ben cited. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Well strictly speaking I am not. Jentz and Hogg are not primary source material even if they worked from it. My point is that properly they should be cited as 'blah blah data blah' from 'such and such wartime document' as cited/reviewed by Jentz/Hogg. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>It seems logical to me that if I make a public claim that is contrary to primary source material or a preponderance of documentation; that its up to me to provide empiracal evidence to support that claim.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Well this is a gross oversimplification of the circumstances as you should know since what is in fact occurring is a disagreement between primary source materials in addition to the mathematical model. It can hardly be characterised as 'the model' disagreeing with 'real' world test results but rather one set of real world test results of possible questionable integrity which in turn do not agree with other real world results. From where did Hogg source his data? The fact is that everyone should be less concerned with defending one (or two) sets of test data vs another, and more with the intellectual question of how these discrepancies could come about, whether through methodology or human intervention at the data analysis stage. Then rather than just blindly support one set we could have some sort of rational discussion about it. Generally it is the body of evidence both theoretical and experimental that counts not specific parts.

I have read this thread with interest though I freely admit to having little actual interest in the technical aspects of armour penetration. As a scientist I have been more interested in the nature of the debate. I have to say that I agree with Charles and Steve that those questioning the predictions lack scientific rigour in some of their arguments. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>The thing that you are dodging is the most basic principle of scientific research.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Exactly. It may be that those questioning the CM data are correct and that the formulae used in CM though largely accurate does not account for all eventualities and that it has been supplanted somewhat by more modern methodologies. However, this has not been satisfactorily shown and that means not just quoting conflicting data but properly citing the source and methodology used to obtain it as well as giving an argument as to why it is so. To summarise: (1) There is an empirically derived formulae which fairly accurately predicts the vast majority of experimental data. (2) The experimental data for one series of experiments conflicts with the results predicted by the formulae. Lakowski, Waters et al in their arguments cite data from the review publications by Jentz and Hogg among others to support their hypothesis that the formulae does not adequately model the 88L71 gun performance. They fail to cite the primary sources for this data. Nor do they cite the actual methodology used to perform the tests including the experimental design and the materials. Furthermore since they do not cite the primary source for the data it is impossible to properly judge the scientific credibility and integrity of the individuals and/or organisation which originally published the data. Since it appears that no other comparable data is available for this gun (?) and it is clearly impossible to repeat these experiments I beleive that they have provided insufficient argument to support their hypothesis. It may be that they are correct to question the validity of the formulae used. However, as it now stands it accurately predicts all of the properly documented experimental data. I would hope they can provide further evidence to support their argument. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Reality is never as simple as a formula, and the 'balls in your court' to prove that the 88L71 penetration data is wrong ,cause its been doctored.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Well actually a lot of reality is fairly accurately predicted by formulae and quite a lot of the rest of it can be closely approximated. The ball is really in your court to support the integrity of the data you cite and mount an argument as to why it deviates from those the formulae predicted. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>The burden of prooveing (sic) that the 50yr old 8.8cm L/71 German wartime test data is valid has been laid on ppl who disagree or don't know who is correct.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Exactly [This message has been edited by Simon Fox (edited 08-23-2000).]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>I think, in all fairness, it was pretty obvious I was just having fun<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> No Elijah, it was not pretty obvious... It was totally and completely bleedin' obvious. In fact you could have not made it more obvious unless you inserted some javascript so that a hand grasping a damp trout emerged from the moniter and smacked the reader around as they read your post. Several disabled smilies tried to enter this post but I cunningly failed to build a wheelchair ramp to it.

To answer your question. How big is a T/KT/JT? How big is a Sherman?

I've never heard of the incident to which you refer and I don't think any Aussies were executed in WW1 since the Australian army did not have corporal punishment at all. I suspect you are thinking of the Boer war and the events shown in the movie "Breaker Morant" which did involve the execution of prisoners. These events led to the Australian decision that in any future wars which involved Australians, discipline would be administered by the Australian army alone. Where did you find this story?

Geez, I think you've got your wires crossed there somewhere. There was a political decision made in WW1 to ensure Australian troops fought together right up to Corps level if possible to ensure that they were not employed piecemeal by the British. This carried on into WWII though it wasn't always adhered to unfortunately. Churchill was told to shove it a few times much to his chagrin, hehe. Unfortunately that seriously emotionally crippled individual MacArthur didn't get the same treatment.

The first 17pdr AT guns were in use at least by late March and early April 1943 in Tunisia. I consider it highly unlikely that that the Archer saw action there. The development of the 17pdr gun and the SP versions of the gun; Archer and the M10 conversion (Achilles) came under the aegis of the RA which demonstrated vastly more foresight than their RAC counterparts in terms of gun development. As has been stated before the Archer was extremely popular with it's users and had a long service with the British army. Those who are unhappy with it's performance in CM should blame only themselves. ------------------ "I never saw such a dejected army, even the Italians carried themselves better in the old desert days. They were mostly Germans, but includede Poles, Russians, Mongols, Czechs, Yugoslavs, Frenchmen, even one American - all in Nazi uniforms."

Actually Fionn British AT units in Africa would have recieved the 17pdr AT gun itself some time before they got the Archer. In fact in one of those fortuitious circumstances of war the British started receiving the 17pdr gun at almost exactly the same time as the Tiger first appeared in Africa. So they immediately had some antidote to it. Contrast this to the poor bloody US units who were still equipped largely with the useless 37mm AT gun in Africa! ------------------ "I never saw such a dejected army, even the Italians carried themselves better in the old desert days. They were mostly Germans, but includede Poles, Russians, Mongols, Czechs, Yugoslavs, Frenchmen, even one American - all in Nazi uniforms."

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>He never posts there, but Simon reads the Peng Challenge thread, aka The Cesspool<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Yes, working with viruses and bacteria I have a passing interest in observing the antics of the lower forms of life. Of course I wouldn't want to stick my hands in their habitat and stir it around or try and start up a conversation with them there. Fortunately some of them seem to be able to drag themselves temporarily out of the primeval slime and interact on a higher plane (ie Andreas). One wonders if perhaps they are degenerated from a higher form rather than caught in evolutionary stasis. On the other hand some of them (ie Peng) seem incapable in this regard. ------------------ "I never saw such a dejected army, even the Italians carried themselves better in the old desert days. They were mostly Germans, but includede Poles, Russians, Mongols, Czechs, Yugoslavs, Frenchmen, even one American - all in Nazi uniforms."

I thought there was a nasty stench when I opened up this thread... Peng, I don't quite know how you managed to drag your fetid carcass out of the cesspool thread but kindly get back in there. Mop down that filthy trail you've left as you go too.

Is the resistance to penetration of two 100mm armour plates spaced apart effectively identical or sufficiently similar to one homogeneous plate 200mm thick?

There were quite a few aussies sticking it up 'em on Crete too. A few Cretans armed with pitchforks as well IIRC. In fact the only troops Martin Poppel seems to have had anything good to say about were the ANZACs. Though he wasn't too hard on the Russians either. The FJs had their arses saved by the GJs on Crete and it was the essentially the end of airborne assaults for them. ------------------ "I never saw such a dejected army, even the Italians carried themselves better in the old desert days. They were mostly Germans, but includede Poles, Russians, Mongols, Czechs, Yugoslavs, Frenchmen, even one American - all in Nazi uniforms."

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>"I'm too lazy to do it all myself"<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Hey you've been tuning in to the FAQ dilletantes brain again! Furthermore Mr Guachi you FAQless posterboy following on from your comments on another thread, I offered to help well over a month ago (and Mr "Interesting" did too IIRC) but you never emailed me what you wanted me to do. Furthermore I have seen your 'fanciful' database since I downloaded it from Colin's site. I didn't bother you 'cos I thought I might get emailed an catalogue for inflatable companions instead On a more serious note will the system Colin is setting up avoid duplication of effort, since I am sure no-one wants to do more than they have to? ------------------ "I never saw such a dejected army, even the Italians carried themselves better in the old desert days. They were mostly Germans, but includede Poles, Russians, Mongols, Czechs, Yugoslavs, Frenchmen, even one American - all in Nazi uniforms."