bazooka10165

I believe that a working enigma was captured from a sub that had grounded on a reef near one of the islands off the northern coast of England or Scotland. For a very entertaining piece of historical fiction about Enigma, Bletchley Park and WWII encryption in general, I highly recommend Cryptonomicom by Neal Stephenson. [This message has been edited by bazooka10165 (edited 03-31-2000).]

Thanks for the tip Joe. BTW - based on your post (and if I recall correctly, some of your prior posts), here's a site you might enjoy. www.psn.net/~xocxoc/math/glossary.htm Archangel - I'll see if I can find it on Amazon [This message has been edited by bazooka10165 (edited 03-30-2000).]

I went back the bookstore to check the figures I reported at the outset of this post. The stats were for fatalities only(not all casualties). So, if his figure is correct (420,000 British fatalities at the Somme), then it appears that this far exceeds the total US battle fatalities in both World Wars combined (based on the figures provided by Jason). That just blows me away. I cannot believe that the soldiers did not mutiny/desert in droves in the face of such a slaughter. The book looks like a tough one to slog through. Neutral Party - Is it at all readable? Rob - Glad to see you survived your latest trip to Louisiana

In my local bookstore yesterday I came across a book entitled the Pity of War. The thesis of the book seemed to be that inept British politicians were primarily responsible for the outbreak of WW I and for the ensuing slaughter. In any event, on the dust cover of the book it stated 1) that in the first day of the Battle of the Somme, the British army lost more men than the US did during its entire involvement in Vietnam and 2) over the course of this one battle the British army sufferred more casualties (420,000) than the US sufferred in both World Wars combined. Does this sound accurate to you history buffs?

How close does infantry have to get to a tank before the tank cannot target them with its main gun. I was able to have the Tiger in LD target the ground at a range of 4 meters. It proceeded to immobilize itself. Is it possible for assaulting infantry to get so close to tank that they cannot be targeted (except by the MG)

BTW - What is the vehicle being toasted by the bazooka in the trailer? Jagdpanther?

On a related note, I've searched but been unable to find the answer to this question. How close does an assaulting infantry squad have to get to an AFV before the AFV cannot engage it with its main gun? Is this modelled separatly for each type of AFV based upon its maximium angle of gun depression?

I've seen posts about a bug in the beta demo which causes german infantry armed with shreck to be overly disinclined to engage nearby armor if there is american infantry nearby for it to target. I had a slightly different problem. In playing LD, I had a veteran squad armed with one shreck run to a spot 22 meters from the side of an immobillized hellcat. Like I asked him to, he target the hellcat instead of a nearby infantry unit. However, rather than use his shreck, he began throwing grenades at the hellcat (which made pretty explosions, but didn't do much of anything else). By the end of the turn he had hit the hellcat with three or four grenades and still hadn't used his schreck. Does this seem like rational behavior?

Colin - Are you sure that you're only 14 years old?

So Rob, I see you too are spending your employer's time reading this message board. I know, its a tough habit to break. Too bad that you can't run CM on your computer at work. Then we could do some really serious damage to our careers. BTW - I realize that I am fixated on this rubble bug thing. I'm pretty sure that it got several of your men too. IT MUST BE STOPPED. Something is disturbing to me about having my soldiers evaporate into thin air. I'll stop talking about it now.

I hope so. I'm just finishing up a PBEM game in which the rubble bug got 18 of my men, including an entire MG42 unit. That one hurt.

Fionn - Math isn't my thing, so maybe you can set me straight, but: If two players are evenly rated, their DR will be zero. (unless "difference in ratings" means something other than what I think - in which case disregard the rest of this post) Under your formula, this will result in a WE of 1 for both players [1/((10*(0/400))+1)]. A WE of 1 will result in a WEM of 0. [(1-1)*(force balance multiplier)]. This will be true regardless of how mismatched the force composition is. Unless I'm missing something, in a game between two equally rated players, a player who routes an SS armored division with a company of green bazooka squads, is rewarded no better than if he had won with a division of Pershings. The losing player in such game would receive a positive modification in his ranking even if he had greatly superior forces since K(W-WEM) will always result in a positive number if the WEM is 0. Perhaps the WE formula should have a +2 not a +1 at the end, giving evenly match players a WE of .5 instead of 1. Shouldn't two evenly matched players, playing an evenly matched meeting engagement, each have a WE and a WEM of .5? Its too late at night for me to see if this works. I hope this entire issue is not a figment of my mathmatically challenged mind.

If someone has a moment to discuss something other than the ranting of Davedial, I would like to know if anything other than HE rounds can knock down a building. If a building is already severely weakened by HE, can an AP round, a bazooka or a PF rocket finish it off?

It took me a while to realize that too. However, in this instance, when my Stug targetted the Sherman, it indicated that the Stug was hull down and the Sherman was not. However, when my opponent had his Sherman target the Stug on the same turn, there was no indication that either was hull down to the other and the hit percentage calculated for his Sherman to hit the Stug (88%) clearly did not include a modifier based upon the Stug being hull down. Either the Stug was hull down or it was not. One of us (almost certainly him) was receiving incorrect information. I'm wondering whether this is a bug or some sort of FOW effect.

Anyone have any ideas on this?

In a PBEM CE game that I am currently playing, there appears to be a discrepancy in the targeting info my opponent and I are receiving. My stug which was parked behind a ridge line on my right center was shooting it out with a Sherman which was parked by the crossroad near the wheatfield facing each other head on. When I targeted the Sherman, the game reported a 75% hit probability and indicated that I am hull down to him. My opponent reports that when he targeted my Stug, game did not indicate that the Stug was hull down and gave him an 88% hit probability. The result of the exchange was that the Sherman's first two shots flew way over the Stug. The third shot hit but did no damage. The Stug hit the Sherman with its second shot and KOed it. Seems to me that my opponent was receiving inaccurate data regarding his hit probability. Targeting data for me indicated I was hull down. Eyeballing it, the Stug does appear to be hull down to the Sherman. If the Stug really was not hull down and the Sherman really did have the 88% hit probability which was reported, the chance of the Sherman actually missing both of its first two shots was around 1%. I guess its possible that he just had bad luck, but I think its more likely that he received an inaccurate hit percentage because hull down was not reported or factored in. Since we received conflicting reports regarding hull down status, clearly one was wrong. Is this a bug or is the report of hull down status affected by FOW and sometimes inaccurate (potentially resulting in highly inaccurate hit percentages)? One other question, forgeting about whether or not the Stug was hull down, how could the Sherman have such a higher hit percentage. Vehicles were head on to each other. The Stug seems to have such a lower profile that I would think it presents a much smaller target. Is the sherman's gun inherently more accurate? Maybe a better crew?

When units assaulting a building succeed in entering are they then considered to be on equal footing with defending units already present in the building or do the defenders continue to enjoy some sort of advantage by reason of their being there first and having established defensive positions? In a current game I had 3 assaulting squads successfully enter a building (supported by heavy multiple MG fire). However once in the building they got wiped out by a nearly comparable defending force and caused only minimal casualties to the defending units. No low ammo. no broken units, just got wiped out. Did notice that one of the defending units was a veteran and all assaulting units were regualr. Does this factor make such a huge diffence. BTW - is the proper way to conduct an assault to have the units run to the target area (with covering fire) or is it preferable to use the move command so that the units can more easily engage targets as they assault.

STEVE WROTE: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Charles finally got around to putting in incomming artillery/mortar sounds. Always wanted them in, but it took until now to have the time to do so. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Lets see if we can read any deeper meaning into this statement. Does the fact that Charles now has time (apparently for the first time in quite a while) to add some cool, but non-crucial sound effect, indicate that he has completed all more important aspects of his job? Steve - you must appreciate that we will analyze every word in your postings like economists analysing a speach by Alan Greenspan. Did someone say Irrational Exuberance?

I refuse to buy anymore games which look like Doom, Warcraft, Myth or MechWarrior. This makes selecting games easier since it virtually eliminates buying anything The only games that I have dished out money for in the past six months are my CM pre-order and an online game called Spiritwars (which you can download and play for free on WON.NET - interesting combination of strategy and tactics required - worth checking out)

While playing CE I observed a German shreck team firing at my stationary sherman at a range of 190 meters and its rockets were sailing some 20 to 30 meters past the target. This initially puzzled me as I did not realize the difference between the panzershreck and the panzerfaust and thought that all German handheld AT weapons had a range of only 100 meters. I now know that the shreck has a maximum range of 225 meters, but are they actually anything for a AFV to be concerned about at this range? Is it overly cautious (or even downright cowardly) to keep my Shermans 250 meters away while engaging unidentified infantry? I realize that since it is a shaped charge the impact of a shreck rocket is not effected by the range it travels, but do shrecks have any realistic chance of hitting anything (even a stationary target) at extreme ranges? Anyone out there ever kill a sherman with a sheck from 200+ meters?

Great work CCJ. I can't wait to hear the final product. Can I suggest depositing a copy of the 10 meg file at www.click2send.com. I've had good experience downloading large files from them. Don't know if it supports resume, but seems to have good bandwidth (unlike GEOcities and xoom).

Can any of the beta testers out there tell me if they have noticed a significant improvement in the AI from the beta demo. Not to brag, but I have been able to win against the computer rather easily. I've now played each scenario from both sides and haven't really had a close match yet. Maybe I've just been lucky. I'm assuming that the overt bugs have been fixed (such as platoon leaders making solo charges into heavily fortified positions). But I have the impression that the AI in the demo doesn't make very intelligent tactical or strategic decisions. It tends to keep moving units into areas where I have just decimiated other units. In short, it doesn't seem to adapt very well to prior events which would definitely affect a human player's decisions. By way of example, I'm currently playing CE as the US. I have three shermans on the wooded slope which is near the vertex of the triangle formed by the wheatfield and the church. They have a very narrow corridor with a clear line of sight to the German edge of the map. The AI moved one Stug into that corridor for three consecutive turns. Each turn the offending stug was promptly dipatched. By the end of Turn 6, I had destroyed all three Stugs, which fired a combined total of 2 rounds (neither of which hit). I get the impression that if the AI had 10 Stugs, it would keep moving them though this area one at a time and I would keep blowing them to pieces. Shouldn't the AI have figured out that maybe it wasn't such a good idea to keep moving its Stugs into this particular spot, especially after the first two exploded? The AI clearly knew that my Sherman's were there and that they had a clear line of sight since there was german infanty in the same area as the destroyed tanks. As you can imagine, the rest of the scenario hasn't been much of a challenge, with 5 shermans against the unsupported German infantry. I realize that there are limits to what one can expect from an AI opponent. Although the AI in the beta demo is better than the AI in most commerical products, I am still hoping that the final product makes significant improvements. I'm curious to know what the beta tester's experience with the AI has been in more recent builds.