PvK

How does a 105mm HE round manage to knock out a King Tiger?

Yes. This does not explain what Ciril and I have mentioned here, but yes it did change in 1.05, to be more like the manual explains it. This also makes some scenario setups work more as intended - I think maybe it used to work this way and has been changed back in 1.05, but that's just a guess. Before 1.05, spotting through bocage seemed rather random, as if there were unpredictable holes here and there. A unit right in or behind bocage would have some thin open lanes, but most LOS through the bocage would be blocked. In 1.05, units right next to bocage can spot and be spotted through about a 90-degree arc, as long as there is no other LOS-reducing terrain in-between, as the LOS is highly degraded. Having played both pre-1.05 and 1.05 in bocage, I think the 1.05 system works much better, especially because it's more predictable and doesn't require huge amounts of checking and fiddling like the previous system. It also makes it possible to set up useful positions without masses of blind spots from behind bocage. It doesn't change the problem reported in this thread, however. PvK

Yes, in bocage country in particular, the way that ID levels don't degrade when a unit leaves LOS can have major effects. When maneuvering behind complete LOS blocks, it's one thing if the enemy hears something moving behind the bocage, but it's another altogether if for some reason they know which enemy unit it was, just because they encountered it and figured out what it was in another location. This also deprives players of the realistic use of fog-of-war to deceive the enemy as to their numbers by relocating. It's one thing to let units realize that an enemy unit that passes behind a house or small obstacle is the same one, but after being out of contact for a minute or so, I'd suggest that the ID level should probably be set back to zero. PvK

I suppose that's an idea, though I question whether it would be accurate if so, since Panzerfausts are one-man weapons, and in sneaking up to PzF a tank, in real life I wouldn't drag the whole squad along. I'm tempted to run a series of tests. I still haven't done this very many times. Last time I sent them in as a couple of full squads, and took two casualties, but maybe it was because (assuming Juardis is correct that PzF's won't be used while under fire), they were taking some fire and/or losses (although they weren't pinned or taking cover). PvK

It seems clearly to be a bug, which looks like it is counting knocked out vehicles (and perhaps soldier losses) at the end of each battle, regardless of which battle they were caused in. Wrecks from previous battles get counted as losses at the end of each battle. So, it's important to fix it for the next patch. It'd also be interesting if someone would do a test to determine if the score/victory-level is also getting messed up by this. That is, run a hotseat attrition operation and have one side take expensive losses in the first battle and let them stay on the battlefield. Then have the other side take approximately equal losses in the last battle, and see if the score is hugely slanted against the player whose losses occured first. At least, BTS should check this and fix what's wrong, since it does rather torpedo an important feature. Perhaps they could add a bit to the stats while they're at it. For instance, giving a loss estimate or at least own casualties level when playing with fog-of-war. PvK

Ok, I tried again to use a Panzerfaust. Last time, there was a Sherman on the other side of the bocage and we threw grenades and immobilized it. This time, I had three half-squads and a schreck team move up. All units were veterans in command control by an excellent leader with +2 attack and +2 stealth ratings. First, one half-squad ran in front of the tank, but behind the bocage - the tank either didn't detect them or didn't care. A few seconds later, the half-squad with the panzerfaust ran forward to within 20m of the tank and stopped, in the open facing the side, with bocage in the way but in LOS. This half-squad fired small arms at the tank, causing it to button up. A couple of seconds later, the tank spotted that half-squad and turned the turret and fired back with the coax MG, having no apparent effect. The half-squad with the panzerfaust was sitting in place at 20m facing the tank's side for sixteen seconds, receiving one burst of MG from the tank after a few seconds, but it never used it's Pzfaust - it didn't throw grenades either, nor did another half-squad without a pzfaust that came up on the other side. After the pzfaust had failed to fire for 16 seconds, the tank was KO'd by a panzerschreck team about as soon as it arrived in LOS. I wonder if maybe units that move won't fire panzerfausts. On the other hand, I've only tried this a few times, so even though I've always failed to get them to use pzfausts, I may have just been unlucky. PvK

Of course it's realistic if collisions could cause various effects. However it could pose problems for the AI, for players trying not to have their own tanks collide, and worst of all, for gamey tactics. I think the game can already get into some gamey overload issues when at close range with multiple tanks, because the human player can only enter orders once per minute, and the TacAI can only respond with a certain amount of intelligence. Without some sorts of limits (e.g. only by accident, only when the game determines a unit goes berzerk, or only when a severe morale check is passed to obey a ram order), I expect some players would tend to over-use this tactic. PvK

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by jshandorf: A sniper cannot burst fire his weapon but then how can he kill two men in 1 second? It just doesn't work. But a soldier with a Semi-auto rifle can fire 3-4 rounds in 1 second and therefore it works. But snipers use bolt-actions, atleast that is how they are described in the game, and therefore it is impossible for them to kill multiple units with one shot. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> No, the one shot represents one or more shots, spread out over more than one second. Similarly, squads represent several men spread out over more ground than is shown. A real infantry squad would tend to deploy quite spread out so they can't all be killed at once by automatic fire or explosions. They would also move in stages, one or two men at a time. So even if a unit moves across an open space to cover in less time than a sniper can attack twice in the game, it probably represents enough firing opportunities on multiple targets to reload and hit two or three guys. I'd say that because of this, it actually makes more sense to abstract fire the way it's done in CM, with each attack likely representing several shots, spread out over time. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> The whole thing about seeing the "tracer" shot from an infantry unit as an abstraction of them firing is confusing at best. So you mean to tell me that that when a squad is targeting another squad that they are firing when I don't see them firing and that the "tracer" grafix is only shown at intervals during this firing? Huh? I think that when you see a squad fire, it is firing. Period. And when it is not firing it is not firing. Period. There is no abstraction inbetween. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> One of us is confused, then, and I'm pretty sure it's you. To me, it seems obvious that the troops are firing even when they're not shown to. A WW2 squad didn't generally coordinate its fire into volleys, with pauses where the whole unit wouldn't fire. It seems clear to me that each shot of small arms means the unit is firing at that point, and for some time thereafter. It's just abstracted into volumes of fire, but it's not supposed to mean the men are actually firing in volleys between pauses. PvK

This has been brought up several times before but I for one welcome the point, and agree with it. I think spotters should be harder to spot in cover, and almost never identified as spotters. They never actually fight (another topic), and men just observing would not, I think, be likely to be ID'd as spotters and blasted as much as happens now. HQ's are a little more debatable, as Theron pointed out, because they could be seen to be giving leadership by yelling commands. However, although I think CM's abstraction of troops into units is a good idea for many reasons, the comparison to the real-life situation brings up some issues. Even if someone notices that a particular enemy soldier is acting like a commander, unless that unit is a sniper, I don't think that would equate to the whole force realizing "there's the command team" and being able to keep track of where it is and pick it off. In real life, each squad would be much more spread out (which is why when an explosion occurs in the middle of a squad standing in the open, likely only about one guy will be lost). You don't spot the enemy as units and know where their center and direction of movement is in real life. You don't know how many "units" there are, or that it was a 12-man squad that has taken 7 casualties. You see individual men, briefly before they scurry behind cover, and they're all spread out and doing different things. Anyway, my opinion is that spotters should be very hard to spot in cover, and almost never identified as spotters. I'd prefer most infantry units just be identified as infantry, with a guess at how many men and what weapons they're using, but also randomize their positions, number of units (a squad might seem to be two or three teams), and directions of movement when reporting to the enemy with fog-of-war, and if enemy troop quality is ever shown, make it a rough guess. That's just my preference though. It's extremely good as is, but that's what I'd recommend for CM2 or whatever. P.S. Wow what a busy thread - there were only 2 replies when I started writing. Regarding the large radios - if a high-level forward observer team with big conspicuous radar equipment was going to be sent to the front lines, wouldn't they tend to locate the big radio with task-force command or at least hidden behind the combat zone, and then send a couple of guys up with a land line or walkie-talkie to talk with that big radio? I suppose that can be represented by what's now my (and, I've read in other related threads, others') tactic of just hiding the spotters where they can't be spotted, and calling in unspotted missions. PvK [This message has been edited by PvK (edited 09-05-2000).]

Sounds likely. Also, I'd like to mention that when fog-of-war is on, estimated casualties for the enemy would still be nice. At the least, it would be helpful if the player's own causalties were listed. PvK

It seems to me another gamey trick would be to notice when an off-map barrage ends during the middle of a turn. Is there any way this would happen unless the battery was out of ammo? It would be nice if the number of rounds could be specified. Also, I've mentioned this before in other threads, but I'd really like to be able to specify single shots (or small arms bursts) for area fire and smoke, and order more than one per turn. Usually, I don't want a unit to fire area fire for the entire turn all at one spot, but often I'd like to just fire single rounds here and there for surpression or harrassment or "recon by fire," or to lay a well-placed smokescreen instead of jamming too many rounds into one spot (and likely getting killed while my unit is preoccupied firing smoke or just keeping facing a smoke target after ammo is expended). PvK

Why not just MOVE the irrelevant threads to a new "Irrelevant Thread Junkyard" forum? This is what I did when I was a sysop - worked quite well - not censorship, just putting crud where it belongs! PvK

* Germanboy said "...replacements are not modeled..." - The manual says they are (p.94, first paragraph), abstractly at least, in the sense that some units with casualties regain men between battles of an operation, and some of these are not just recovered but also replacements. * It seems to me that a more likely result would be that experience level would go up after losses, because the green men were generally much more likely to be the first to go, not having the experience to help them stay alive. PvK

I have a 16-MB Banshee too, and it basically works fine unless I set the resolution too high, when it apparently runs out of texture memory and the landscape can dissolve into a regurgitated Pepto-Bismol nightmare and crash. The smoke does have a funky rectangular outline, but that doesn't bother me much. PvK

Ah, ok. It sounds like my mistake (as far as the game goes) is trying to hunt with them. That is, I've been having my units move towards the tanks, instead of just facing them and waiting for them to come to me. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by 109 Gustav: I usually try to get pfs real close to the tank, like 10-20 yards, and by the tank's flanks or rear. It takes some time to launch pfs, too. The rest of the squad has to move away, and the soldier with the pf has to drop his rifle and get the pf off his back to fire. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Ya, I imagined my men realizing they were going to be needing to use the panzerfaust, since they could hear the tank, and thus spreading out in advance and carefully approaching the tank, being ready to attack it right away. I guess we tend to imagine our guys knowing what we want them to do. <g> Thanks for the replies, folks! PvK

Two things. One is I have the same general question with panzerfausts, which I just posted to the CM Tips forum. My limited attempts to use panzerfausts on tanks have all failed - my guys get spotted first, shot up, and then they throw grenades (which do work ok but take a while) while not using their panzerfausts at all. Maybe my bad luck. The other thing I've seen though is the tank commander using his top-mounted MG on my troops which are right there. Lorak advised to try to make sure that a tank is buttoned before close assaulting. This is good advice to avoid getting detected. However it seems to me that if you have an infantry squad at very close range to an unbuttoned tank, the tank commander better button up immediately since he's outnumbered by infantry with small arms. Instead, what I've seen in my limited experience is the tank commander shooting the nearby enemy infantry with the turret-top MG... seems possible but I think unlikely - in general, the tank commander would button up and order the tank to back away and fire. If he stayed around to fire the top MG, I don't think the odds would be in his favour. I also think it should usually be the case that a panzerfaust-armed squad coming into close range of an enemy tank would use their panzerfaust right away, and would probably get the shot off before the tank noticed them, turned the turret and started picking them off. PvK

Anyone have extensive experience getting units to use panzerfausts? Or is there a thread on it somewhere? My limited experience so far is that I have tried to have veteran panzerfaust-armed squads sneak up on tanks they or others have spotted very near by, when there is woods and/or bocage cover. I have them move towards the tanks, the tanks see my men, turn their turrets, use commander MG and generally get off deadly fire on my troops before my troops manage to attack, and then my troops start hurling hand grenades, which actually turns out to be fairly effective, after the lob & timer delay, during which time they are getting shot. They don't use their panzerfausts, though. In fact, the only time I've seen my men use a panzerfaust was on enemy infantry... :-P My experiences here were limited in number, so maybe I've merely been unlucky. Is there a trick to getting units to use their panzerfausts? Do the units need to not be moving? Are panzerfausts unable to fire through bocage? Thanks for any info, PvK

I realize that an airburst could be quite deadly, at least to people who weren't behind the other treetrunks and branches from the explosion. I just wonder about the frequency, as it seems quite high. If as Chupacabra says, they could go off on grazing a light branch, then I suppose the proportion could be right. I'd be curious to know what the actual percentage in the game is (seems like maybe 15% light woods, 50% woods), and what the reasoning was that led to those numbers. Of course, any other relevant info about fuses and statistics would be interesting, too. PvK

The percentage of indirect fire HE rounds that explode in the air (air bursts) when falling on areas with trees (all three types) seems to be higher than I would expect, thinking about the percentage of firm branches and tree trunk in the space above real-life trees and woods, and the resistance I _imagine_ an incoming shell would be detonated by. On that last point, I really don't know how much plant is required to set off a falling shell. However I expect it would take more than leaves and light branches to set off a shell. In play, it seems like woods can turn out to be rather less useful as cover than I would expect from my reading and from having been in actual woods and observing the huge amount of cover and concealment potential compared to an open field. So: What is the actual percent chance given for the different terrain and ammo types, that a round will explode in the air? What was this based on? Isn't it a bit high? PvK

To add a bit of wisdom from long experience playing the Tigers on the Prowl series PBEM, one of the best ways to get an interesting PBEM scenario is to have a third, knowldegeable player, create a quick scenario for them, loosely based on the player's requests. This avoids gamey purchase of only efficient and favourite units, and allows an impartial human to provide some balance in the forces, instead of the "rock-paper-scissors" problems that can happen when players pick forces independantly. Simple pre-game discussion of forces also helps. As for realistic armor mixes, I'd add that Sherman types were frequently mixed at the platoon level, where a Sherman platoon might have between zero and two 76mm Shermans of the full strength of five, when all five were present and working. 76's were rarer on D-Day and became more common as time went on. There were only a few Jumbo 76mm's ever created, mostly in 1945, all in field service yards from fitting guns salvaged from broken ordinary Shermans. JagdPanthers were employed in battalions, and there were directives prohibiting their employment singly - they were to be used as a battalion-level long-range tank-destroyer force. PvK

This is in patch 1.03. --- Issue 1: The manual makes a point about Sherman tank armor being low quality and thus getting an 85% rating. StuG and StuH get higher ratings, but Panthers and JagdPanthers get 85% armor ratings - surely the Germans did not cut corners on Panther armor, no? --- Issue 2: Panther Ausf G is shown as having a shot trap. The Ausf G mantlet was designed to eliminate the shot trap found on the Ausf D and Ausf A. Wouldn't it make sense to take this rating off the Panther G? --- Issue 3: Sherman AP ammo (not counting the already-mentioned often-very-generous supply of special rounds) for the 75mm seems to be generously rated. It seems not to include the weaker variety of APC ammo, and the ratings for zero-degree penetration seem considerably higher than trigonometry would suggest. Perhaps this is an intentional statement on penetration effects. However it seems to tip the scales for much German armor, such as StuG/H, late-war Pz IV hull, and (not included in CM) Pz III (late-war), which were all about 80mm. At most ranges encountered in CM, Sherman 75mm firing normal ammo, with these generous ratings, will usually have no problem at all with 80mm near-vertical plate - the Germans may as well have not bothered to bolt on the extra 30mm. My understanding had been that in fact, 80mm was about the point where you could hope to stop most 75mm Sherman hits. Given that these are some of the most common AFV's to meet each other (75mm Sherman vs. Pz III/IV/StuG), it seems like an important issue. I'd always thought the Germans added the armor to counter the T34 and Sherman guns with some success, and that the US 76mm upgrades were much-needed. In CM, the Sherman 75mm AP is no problem until you run into a Panther or Tiger or something. PvK

How do operations determine where the new lines will be, and which units will exist? I notice losing a few living units, and being pushed back even where the enemy made no advances, while the enemy seems to retain ground. Some new map space was added on my side of the map. Are the units being taken away because the scenario designer somehow specified they wouldn't be in certain later scenarios? Is the determination of where the sides will be allowed to set up something that players can predict, or that operation designers can influence? PvK

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Simon: Unfortunately it looks like 1.03 has only made the editor a bit LESS flexible, as you can no longer have an odd number of Teams, thus making battles in progress, atirition, or more realistic and historical unit sizes less possible.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> What do you mean by "odd numbers"? PvK

Example: My Elite Panther had 9 smoke rounds. I wanted a small smoke screen in a specific spot, and then for the tank to move on. I ordered a smoke target and then a Fast movement order after a brief delay. Result: the Elite hero decided that even while driving fast near known enemies, he should keep firing smoke all turn on the move, turning the turret towards the target and firing 7 smoke rounds in one turn at the same spot. "Well, that was a waste and risky, but at least he wasn't killed while doing that," I thought. A couple of turns later, he still had two smoke rounds left, and enemies were closing in on all sides. Remembering a tactic from Panzer Elite, I ordered the Elite tanker to fire smoke ahead of his position, and then drive through that position fast, so his rear would hopefully be covered. I figured he only had two smoke rounds left, so he couldn't waste the whole turn firing smoke. Wrong. He fired the smoke fine, and drove forward... and then stopped to turn. "Oh," I thought, "he must have detected that Sherman behind him, and being such an ace, he is turning to expect it's appearance - that's cool." But no. He kept turning back and forth, and despite having no smoke ammo, the smoke order was visible, and since he was trying to drive past it (on Fast, remember), he decided he should stop and keep the gun and the hull facing the target... which meant stopping and turning left and right, until an enemy tank saw him through the smoke and put him out of his demented misery. Ahem! Points needing fixing, & suggestions: 1) TacAI should not keep smoke orders after the unit runs out of smoke ammo. 2) TacAI should not have a smoke target order override a move order. Unit on move orders should not stop to fire smoke. TacAI should not turn hull to face smoke target in preference to moving or facing other threats. 3) TacAI should not fire smoke all turn but fire just a few smoke rounds at a smoke target, and definately stop when the area has a thick smoke screen in it. 4) Ideally, the user could specify the amount of smoke to fire - I'd suggest having multiple smoke targets possible per unit, with each one receiving ONE smoke round, carried out in the sequence they were requested, deferring targets that couldn't currently be seen. 5) The same goes for area fire. It'd be nice to be able to fire some area fire without using too much ammo. As it is, units will fire all turn at max ROF and waste a good chunk of their ammo on area targets, which isn't always desirable. Being able to order them one round at a time would make them much more useful. Being able to mix smoke and area targets would be good, too. (e.g., put a smoke round there and there, fire two HE at that house, one HE at that building, and then another smoke round in front of us.) PvK

Hmm, but notice in real life the US report mentions using a platoon of M10's, not a couple of Stuarts. My brief experience with pillboxes suggests that in CM Stuarts may be the weapon of choice vs. pillboxes, knocking them out quickly from 450m thanks to good accuracy and high rate of fire. Seems to me if it only took a couple of scout vehicles to KO a pillbox, they wouldn't be worth building in the first place. Seems to me like it could use some tweaking in the direction of either making slit hits less easy to achieve, or making them less likely to KO a pillbox. PvK