xerxes

Will bunkers still be easy to take out with small caliber guns and ATRs? Just wondering.

I'm working on a followup scenario to "A warm place to sleep." I'm looking for the author's permission to reuse his map.

That's very odd, I'm playing "road to moscow" in a PBEM right now and it's an excellent ME.

Area fire should be used against any gun/mg/infantry position that you ID. Direct firing will often lose targeting just as you are putting some hurt on. The only exception is when you have units close enough to the target that you KNOW you won't lose the target lock. Heavy use of area fire is one simple technique that distinguishes middling CM commanders from good CM commanders. Exceptions: 1. Area firing bunkers is pretty much a waste. 2. If you are fearful that something will attempt to engage your firing unit you probably don't want to use area fire since the reaction to a new threat tends to be slower.

jpeg would be great! Thanks, this is very cool. -marc s vmclz@ * swbell.net *

I think exact to the turn arrival times are very unrealistic. Unless the reinforcements are literally just off map and will arrive in the opening minute or two, I don't think you should give an exact arrival time.

It was a 600 point axis attack. You can tell be loading the game file that Michael gave out, going to the map view and hit briefing. Also, if you want to load the map into a QB you need to save the game file Michael sent and then put it in your QB maps folder. You can then "load from file" on the map selection screen of the QB. I tried an attack against the ai selecting similar defensive forces as Jason did. It's not easy and against a better defender then the ai it would be very difficult. Buying 8 75mm IGs helps out a lot though. The 75mm IGs are very useful because they're cheap, have a good HE load and their DF smoke is critical for blocking out the maxims on the initial approach. The problem with guns, particularly on this map, is that a good defender would probably have some onboard mortars to deal with a gun heavy attack force. Going only with 150mm IGs is problematic since the 150 dies just as easily as the cheaper 75mm IG when hit by mortars.

Methinks these are a tad unbalanced battles.

Joining a CM campaign really does up the realism and uncertainty factors a lot. You end up in lots of "unbalanced" battles but they are a lot of fun. You just have very different and more realistic objectives.

SMGs with low ammo in close (<40m) will still tear a hole in any squishies that get in their way. The key is to have the SMGs close enough that they will continue to fire on low ammo. If SMGs can avoid HE fire, it's guaranteed to become a bloody mess evicting them.

I think I hear someone yodeling.

If the pricing of SMGs going to be revised in CMAK? An smg in Italy is going to be much more effective then a rifle. They should cost as least as much as a rifle and probably more.

wire.

Your opponent could clarify. The mortar may have damaged a track and panicked the crew. Panic can cause the tank to "de-target".

It was gamey to claim using mortars against tanks is gamey. Very gamey. If you check the film closely you should be able to tell if it was the ATR or the 50mm mortar that damaged the gun.

I think it would be good to be able to modify the global morale starting point (or rate of change) in scenarios. That would be useful.

A historical accurate force makeup in the early desert war might feature an Italian force attempting to breakout of an encirclement: Italian: 2 battalions of green Italian infantry (0 bonus HQs): 2400 points 1 company of regular Italian infantry (reasonable HQs): 500 pts 5-6 guns of regular and vet quality: 300 pts 20 L3 tankettes: 1000 pts total: 4,200 points British: 8 Matildas: 1,000 points 1 company of vet infantry w/ transport: 700 points 1 25lb FO: 120 points Total: 1,820 points Now the bad thing is, the Matildas are almost indestructable. The Italians won't win this one.

Monty immediately did away with the Jock columns. Previous to that the Jock columns were extremely effective in a mobile/flexible screening role. Since Monty was interested in major battle it probably made sense for him to eliminate the Jock columns. I think some Jock Column scenarios would be quite interesting.

It's very important for infantry moving through heavy woods. You don't want to be running past enemy infantry blasting at you at point blank range.

I think that's a great point about POW treatment and how it influences combat. If the Germans had invaded Russia as liberators I think their chance of beating Stalin would have been improved immeasureably. A different orientation would have improved the Germans odds of success far more than military strategy, tactics, and weaponry. Then again, treatment of POWs/Civilians/etc really is part of the greater military strategy. [ September 27, 2003, 08:24 PM: Message edited by: xerxes ]

When ordered to abandon a heavy weapons it was standard practice to disable the weapon (for obvious reasons). I certainly agree that an abandon weapon order would be very useful and realistic.

If you actually play for the full 120 turns the automated "saveSanity.exe" kicks in and erases CMBB from your hard drive. The bonus is "saveSAnity.exe" continues to run to protect against reinstalling CMBB.

hovercraft, now that would be cool.

Human wave is useful when you have green/conscript troops that need to traverse a little open ground where they make take some long range fire. A normal move or run will end up with pinned/broken squads. The Human Wave helps them cross that 20m of open ground. Human Waving into close range generally just ends up with a lot of dead russians.

uh-oh, you changed the unit marker to a swastika, it's gonna hit the fan. Another set of great pics and captions. Can't wait for the next release.