Andreas

M Hofbauer, funnies were widely used. 79th AD had about 1,500 or thereabouts AFVs at the end of the campaign. There were special liaison officers at every Commonwealth division GHQ (and maybe 9th US Army as well, since it was part of 21st AG) to ensure that they were used correctly, and not lost because the infantry officers did not know what they could and could not do. They were also parcelled out - the Crocodile was AFAIK the only Commonwealth AFV that had the half-troop as smallest tactical unit (presumably because four of them were overkill in most situations). Deployment for funnies was out of proportion to total numbers. I am just not sure that they were used in the CMBO part of the battle. When I get the time I check my copies of UK divisional histories for that.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Kim Beazley MP Ma: Most scenarios are US-centric, which I am not that interested in. An alternative is write my own, which is something I'm presently working on.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Go to Der Kessel (in my sig-line) and have a look at the following by me: 49th Recce (Brits) To the last man (Canucks) Into the East (Poles) Trun (Canucks) Raid across the Rhine (AI) (Canucks) These are five of the seven scenarios I have published so far. The first three of the above list are in Big Dog's 'Top 10 with at least 3 reviews at the Depot list' (I think). Except for the last, they can be played either side (a TCP version for that one is forthcoming). I have four more with Commonwealth forces forthcoming, one of these a historical battle of 5th DCLI (at Les Plessis Grimault) and none with US. I have a historical battle of Maltot (A Sqdr. 9th RTR and 7th Hamps on 9th July 1944) on my HD that I will not publish because it does not work as well as I want it to, but I would be happy to send it to you, maybe you have an idea about it. Michael Dorosh has done a lot of Commonwealth scenarios, IIRC. If you can not find good Commonwealth stuff, I think you have been looking in the wrong places. Now, just to lay this other idea of me being against reinforcing the Commonwealth to rest: the three vehicles I miss most in this game (not in the Commonwealth vehicle list) are in order of yearning: Buffalo (for the Scheldt battles) Crusader AA tank Churchill III w/6-pdr Regarding the tripod-mounted Bren. I saw the picture. What I meant are pictures in action. I have seen a lot of pictures of ordinary Brens in action, but I have never seen one of the 2,500 that JonS talks about in NWE. Maybe they hid them when the photographers came around, maybe my collection of Commonwealth literature is just not good enough, but somehow I wonder if it could be that they just weren't deployed that often.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Kim Beazley MP Ma: I suspect you'd be dreadfully upset if CMBO had appeared without the Puppchen or the Wirbelwind yet you seem to get annoyed when I or others point out that these weapons were available to the British and were utilised by them and then ask why they aren't in the game or even considered in the game. I suggest, if you really want to show your disdain for things Australian, do it with a bottle of Grange Hermitage or are you too cheap?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> You suspect wrongly, I actually coud hardly care less. Equally rightly I could tell you that you really need to rid yourself of the 'Commonwealth Persecution'™ complex. I am also not annoyed, I just would like to see some proof that these were used in the way you intend them to. Not that it matters, since the game won't be changed anyway. I go and look up the Le Havre story tonight, can't recall that one, but my memory is going anyway, so that does not say much. BTW, I don't have any disdain for things Australian, I just hate Australian wine. If you identify Australia with wine, the worse for you

Stuart? Panzer IV? Der Kessel? Go and review it a The Scenario Depot 300m is really sort of close range for armoured combat, even in WW2.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by CMplayer: Okay, I'm convinced, thx. Would it be an equally weird abstraction to allow HQ's to spot for some kinds of fire missions?(such as medium mortars which are 'closer' to the HQ in organizational level) And still...suppose you purchase 2 155 spotters for example. One team gets bushwhacked. Dead. Isn't that a case where the other team could just as well call in the dead team's ammo (in RL) ? And while I'm at it, why can't I put 10 sharpshooters in a halftrack????!!!!???!!!!!! Do sumfink!<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Hey, it is really just my opinion. YMMV, as they say. It is weirdly abstracted to a degree, and yep, I never heard of 3" FOOs either, but hey, I got used to it, and I need my medication anyway, so there.

Well, FOOs for field arty and mortars were different, AFAIK. At least in the Commonwealth they had different spotters for 4.2" and Field Rgts, and 3" mortars were organic at BN level, and controlled in another way I don't understand, while 2" mortars were under direct command of the platoon commander, and therefore totally out of the loop. So I think to have a one spotter controls all would be even more unrealistic, and should affect the price for the FOO team. Would be a weird abstraction really...

Weight of Leichtgeschuetze: 7,5cm Standard - ? 7,5cm Mountain - 270kg (special version, could be broken down) 7,5cm Para - 175kg (special version) Total production 653 (1940-44) Fired an ordinary HE shell 6,500m. 10,5cm - 436-480kg (depending on version) and fired ordinary HE round from lFH 8,000m. 528 produced 1941-44. From Lexikon der Wehrmacht. German speakers only

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Kim Beazley MP Ma: Pity you cannot do similar in the other thread devoted to the question of the missing funnies. [ 09-10-2001: Message edited by: Kim Beazley MP Ma ]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Well, at the moment we are all waiting there, with baited breath, for the numbers of tripod-mounted Brens employed in NWE, as well as those instances where fascines and scissor bridges were used in a CMBO setting (outside the training movie). Not saying they weren't, but it would be better to have something to go on when you make claims about how badly the game simulates this that or the other. In the mean-time, please excuse me while I pour a bottle of Jacob's Creek down the kitchen sink, it needs disinfecting

I take an AT gun any day over a RR, but they are not ineffective. I have seen the 75mm variety drill Shermans at pretty good ranges. Luck of the draw.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Kim Beazley MP Ma: Another problem I have is the way so many of the scenarios simply lump all the units into a all to often tiny form-up area and then the first few turns I find all too often I'm sorting out units into proper formations. As the location of many of the units are locked, this has to happen at the start of the battle rather than before it, as it should.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Play scenarios that get good ratings at the Scenario Depot, and rate those that are crap, and over time the quality should go up. Regarding the statement of the Commonwealth being undermodeled - *shrug*. Finns think Finns are undermodeled (and they are not even in the game), and some think Germans are undermodeled, and Americans think Americans got shafted, which to me says BTS got it pretty much right. Even people I really trust on the Commonwealth stuff (like Simon Fox IIRC) say that it was difficult to say how common the tripod-mounted Bren was. I have never seen a picture of it, or heard of it being employed, and I own a fair range of Commonwealth books. As Vanir says - BTS did not have time to do everything. They needed to get the game out at some point, it was already six months late, and one my most beloved funnies (and a truly crucial one for the Scheldt battles) is the Buffalo. I eventually got over it. Anyway, since a fascine carrier or a bridgelayer are nothing but AVREs as modeled in the game once they have dropped their load, you can say that they have been modeled as vehicles, albeit not with their special abilities. Open ground is not just open ground - in the background, the calculation takes into account shallows, ditches, etc. Not small streams, but I really don't know how important that is for the modeling in the game. I live in north-western Europe BTW, and I don't feel the game is artificial at all. Many maps are (particularly auto-generated), but with some knowledge of the terrain, and some abstractions in terms of cover, you can create realistic and good-looking maps. It is very easy.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tero: I quess this is why the infantry can not fire off its small arms beyond LOS (in the dark for example) even if it was physically possible.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Yes, same for why you can't fire into smoke.

Despite what you saw in a training movie, I somehow doubt that the bridge-layers and fascine carriers were used extensively in a CMBO setting, I'll go and check my copy of 'Churchill's secret weapons' again though. The one I miss most is the Sherman flail. Then again, defenders don't have trenches, and mine-fields are not as common, so hey. While fascines were used to get across anti-tank ditches, and bridgelayers to get across small streams, one should remember that there are no ditches and small streams (the CMBO water tile is 20m, the Valentine bridgelayer could bridge 18m, IIRC), so it could be argued that you don't need them. Pre-assault bombardment - you can do this in prebuilt scenarios, I have started to experiment with it, and a combo of briefing nudges, green/conscript FOOs and TRPs should induce players to use them in that way.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Cooper: Before band of brothers start up i would like to make a suggestion to all those scenario designers out there. I hope when cm2 comes out scenario designers take into account german attrition during wwII. Any battle on the eastern front after 43 had german unit way understrength. Companies with less then 60 men before combat is not very uncommon. Battalions with about 2 companies the norm more so than 4 full strength ones. I think having your german units understrength, in you scenarios, would add a little bit of the desperate situation the germans were facing after 1943. Just a suggestion.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Infantry on all sides was very rarely on TO&E strength. I have a lot of references to UK infantry companies with 50-80 men instead of the TO&E strength of about 130 (IIRC) in Normandy and thereafter. The UK and Canada faced a manpower crisis as early as Normandy (where the UK disbanded a whole division and an armoured brigad because of lack of reinforcement). 'Roll me over' by Ganter (a US infantry squaddie) states that his squad never had authorised strength post Ardennes (when he joined it). This was a fairly common problem, not restricted to the Germans. Just saying they ought to get, let's say, 50% strength, while the attacking Allies are always at 100% is going to be as ahistorical as the current situation where both sides are always at 100%. I am taking attrition into account in some of my scenarios now, too, by substracting squads or teams, but on both sides.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Bad Dog: Or is that too gamie?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Gamey, shmamey, it is not allowed by the engine because of the borg spotting model.

Don't think they did that in the scope of a CMBO battle. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>From Glantz 'Soviet Defensive Tactics at Kursk': Viciaus fighting raged as the Germans threw in fresh forces, first toward Ponyri and then Ol'khovatka, in desperate attempts to slice through the dense mass of infantry supported by a profusion of self-propelled artillery, antitank guns, tanks, and sapper units incessantly sowing new minefields.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> and later: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>From Glantz 'Soviet Defensive Tactics at Kursk': Both first-echelon divisions created antitank reserves from the division antitank battalions and designated sapper platoons equipped with mines as mobile obstacle detachments that they positioned near likely tank avenues of approach.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> and later: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>From Glantz 'Soviet Defensive Tactics at Kursk': Flame throwers and exploding minefields, laid overnight by sappers, accounted for twenty-two disabled German tanks.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Emphasis by me. Does not sound like they ran in front of the tanks and put the mines there. I just did a quick search of the document that Adam provided. If someone has got indications that they actually did it in CMBO type battles, I'd be interested to hear that.

That might just do it

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by lcm1947: Alright this could be fun but I just want to sit on the side lines. Please nobody mention my name. I'll just be watching but as far as a subject how about the American's, British and Canadian armies would have still beaten Germany's butt even without the Eastern Front and the Russian's.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Who needed the Americans? If memory serves me right, the maginificent string of victories achieved by Commonwealth armies by dint of their tactical superiority and aimed fire up to 1942 (Norway, France, Greece, Crete, desert battles, and in the Pacific Hong-Kong, Malaya, Singapore) is proof that there was no need for the dastardly Americans to come and muck things up. It's just that the British are sporty, so they let them play too. Red Army, Russians? Weren't they the ones rescued only by lend-lease Valentines, many of which were still in use with 3rd Shock Army in 1985, ready to pounce the Fulda Gap?

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Michael Dorosh: Keegan's exact words are "To fire too late....would have been to drive the Russians too quickly to cover, sparing many and leaving them with their will to advance shaken, while calling down on the German positions a further helping of the terrible prepatory bombardment which they had undergone..."<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Mellenthin actually mentions Red Army arty in a footnote at least (Soviet Artillery in WW2) He said it did not have the capability to do e.g. silent registration. It is probably looking at your quote that the German officer is indeed talking about continued fire on previously registered targets that still resist. Or a case of the practice of allowing the Germans to come out of their dug-outs, and get caught in stage two, or the practice of leaving gaps leaving small gaps in the barrage, to allow infantry to move on undetected. There were cases during Bagration (1944) in which the barrage needed to be cancelled, because the initial recon-in-strength had already taken the German line the day before. Red Army arty appears to have been very well led during this initial bombardment, but the general verdict from readings on the GPW that I have done so far is that the Red Army relied on the direct support from assault guns, once they had broken through, and that the German practice of attacking at the hinges of breakthroughs, and holding on to strongpoints their, was very counterproductive, because both of these would be in the range of the initial barrage guns. Michael is of course correct that the quote by Keegan gives no time-frames, and does not appear to say whether this was a position that had already undergone bombardment.

BTW, Kip - great info. You just showed me how to spend my book token

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Scott B: What factors would make late war experienced Soviet artillery spotters with effective communications (ie: ruling out commo and experience) less responsive than the Germans, anyway?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Different organisation of artillery support could be a factor. I maybe totally off here, but AFAIK the Red Army concentrated artillery at a much higher level, making the weight of fire more devastating, but at the same time removing lower-level control over it. While the Heer, at least on TO&E had access to fairly heavy stuff on Division and Corps level, this may not have been the case for the Red Army to the same degree. As I said, I fully expect a correction, the GPW is not really my strong point...

Try the Byte Battles link on the site linked to in my sig. Check with the Scenario Depot whether they are worth it (they are), and once you have played them, use the Scenario Depot to review them. Enjoy.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Michael Dorosh: [QB]Graves was required reading for our WW I history class in University, though we were told to skip the first 50 pages. The book is indeed an excellent read, and Graves manages to find much humour. I recall Sassoon's being a little more dry but its been ages since I read it.In 4.5 years of fighting in WW I, my own regiment had 1313 fatal casualties. In .75 years of fighting in WW II, the total fatalities were 403. In WW II, the regiment suffered 22 fatal officer casualties (of a full strength of 36). If you figure that non-fatal wounds outnumbered fatalities on the order of 4 to 1, the regiment went through their officership twice. [QB]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Actually, the first 50 pages give you a good insight into the background of many of these officers (public school and all that). I thought the book benefited from it. Regarding casualties in WW2, 6th DWR was disbanded because of officer casualties (the report by the Lieutenant-Colonel asking for the Battalion to be disbanded makes grim reading), and 11th Armoured was apparently told after Goodwood that it would have a week to sort itself out, or be disbanded, due to losses of junior leaders.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Agua Perdido: If it walks like a dork and quacks like a dork, it must be something fowl. Keep whining and I'll start writing space opera again. Agua Perdido<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Be my guest - it's not like I would read it. Last time I checked they did not charge for use of band-with here. Your presence makes me consider recommending that to Steve though.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Agua Perdido: Page one wanker... Agua Perdido<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Yawn... Oh yes, I seem to vaguely remember you. Aren't you one of the annoying dorks who appeared one day? Is that the best you can do? Obviously need to take your clues from Elvis (and we all know what that says about you). You must be getting along well with the other nitwits here.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Joe Shaw: Certainly, in addition to witty, chaming and sophisticated men such as myself, they've been know to let almost anyone in ... you're here aren't you? Speaking of that ... is this just another guest, cameo appearance or can we expect your scowling, Teutonic personage on a regular basis? We'e been neglecting the minefields and it'd be good to have advance notice. Joe<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Not that I owe you any explanation, but we are on page two now, so expect to see me in about 300 posts.