OberGrupenStompinFeuhrer!

I'm thinking that the original point limit of 1000 in a QB was BTS's way of keeping the purchases more historically accurate. The increase to 5000 points was a response to popular demand. But if one player has loads of points to spend on Jagdtigers', then the other player has loads to spend on things that will kill a Jagdtiger. Unless one is trying to recreate an actual historical engagement, where the OOB is predefined, it's prolly not a big deal IMHO. In a PBEM, you could always stipulate a point limit lower than 5000 anyway. Cheers, OGSF

There is a tutorial scenario called "Grafenhau". There is a set of training instructions to go with it, I *think* they can be found on the CMHQ web site. Well worth the effort to go through this tutorial, I think it will help you. Also, something I picked up from more experienced players on here regarding mortars and heavy machine guns. When buying troops, or playing a scenario, get a Company Commander and place the mortars and HMG under his command as a heavy weapons platoon sort of thing. You can then use them as a fire base to support your regular troops going forward. With the Company Commander "spotting" you can keep the mortars back and out of sight. Anyway, the Grafenhau tutorial scenario will help you with your setting up phase and planning your attacks. A search on this BB for "infantry tactics" and "tank tactics" et al will turn up much useful information for you. Getting thrashed in your first PBEM should motivate you! :^) Cheers, OGSF

Aha! Now Maitland, nows your time!!

I have "Blood Tears and Folly" on my shelf, I started reading it a little while back but got distracted. :^) A good little Penguin book I recently finished is "Six Armies in Normandy" by John Keegan. In it he "describes the massed armies - American, Canadian, English, German, Polish and French - at successive stages of the invasion." It covers D-Day up to the liberation of Paris. Well written I think and worth a read. Another book I have on my desk right now is "Road to Berlin - The Allied Drive from Normandy" by George Forty. Bags of photos along with a week by week summary of the "Beyond Overlord" period of the war. Again, this one covers a broader spectrum of the Allies than only the Americans or the Brits. Good pictures of various guns and light / heavy armor in action. BTW Vincenzo / Leclerc, I ordered the HPS book from the web site. Thanks for the tip. OGSF

See? This is what happens when my PBEM opponents are off having a life.... TeAcH, was the KT unbuttoned? A grenade down the conning tower would take out the Tiger I should think. But if it was buttoned, well then maybe someone left the cover off the Nahverteidigungswaffe - that thing which lobs 92mm HE rounds into assaulting infantry and blows them all up... *ROFLOL!* Sorry, couldn't resist - someone will come charging in here now! :^)

Thank you for taking the time to reply.. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by David Aitken: Rather than waiting for a reply, couldn't you have gone and tried it for yourself? Well, yes David, that was one of the options available to me. Why do you ask? I sincerely doubt there are any vehicles in CM which could be used to un-bog a tank. There are gun tractors, but tank tractors? Have you seen a tank tractor? They are FREAKING HUGE!! You can tow a gun with a half-track, but it takes something rather bigger to tow a tank. David<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I haven't seen a *real* tank tractor, but I have some photos of them. Yes, now that you point it out, I can see how a tank tractor would be *waaay* too big to fit in this game. So I assume from your sincere doubt that the answer is "No, you can't use a tank tractor to unbog a tank because a tank tractor is not in the game. And you can't use a gun tractor because you need something rather bigger to tow a tank." Thanks Dave, have a good one! [This message has been edited by OberGrupenStompinFeuhrer! (edited 07-29-2000).] [This message has been edited by OberGrupenStompinFeuhrer! (edited 07-29-2000).]

"The book may be bought online from HPS site," Vincenzo, do you have the URL? Can you post it please?

Hello, Through smoke and flames and crunchy bits I wend my foolish way to ask this question: Can tank tractors be used to free bogged tanks / vehicles? And if they can't, and battles are too short to use them to recover knocked out armour, is their only purpose in CM life to drag guns around ( or act as cheap squad taxis - I saw one post about that)? *Respectfully doffs cap to Germanboy* "I dun a search an' I couldna find nuffink". Thanking you humbly for your insights. OGSF

Okay Shooter, this is a bit of a shot in the dark (no pun intended). I'm thinking that you are running out of video memory on your laptop. How much video memory does your laptop have compared to the PC at home? It might also be that you are running the laptop at a different video resolution than the home PC, but I kinda think that's not likely to be the problem. Definitely sounds like a resource issue to me, and my best first guess is video RAM. Cheers, OGSF

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by OberGrupenStompinFeuhrer!: Sure I sent it, I've been waiting for you! Here it comes again! <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Doh! My bad! It's on it's way.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Lorak: Yep OGSF, you love those PBEM games.. Now if you would send the next turn. I'm waiting for you to contine into my "Ditch of Death". Lorak <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Sure I sent it, I've been waiting for you! Here it comes again!

Well my Wife's way cool. Let's me spend untold hours at the PC playing CM. I try and make sure she gets enough of my time as well. But she has shown no interest in the game. Even when I showed her a movie where a Sherman turret was swinging around to kill my PSW 231/3 and I nailed it with a second to spare - I was on the edge of my seat, and it had no effect on her at all. A few years back we tried to play deathmatch in Terminator, but she wouldn't shoot me - "I can't shoot my Sweetie!". However she did lay into me with an axe in a game of Quake. I smacked her with an axe, she smacked me, I smacked her again etc etc. But that was a one off. The only time we have played anything like this for any length of time was as a team of two in a co-operative game of Doom II. *sigh* I remember getting to the end of one level, loaded to the teeth with weapons and ammo. I'm about to push the button to end the level when *BLAM* - everything goes red and I start the next level with a pistol and 25 bullets (like level 18). From her networked PC behind me I hear "Sorry! Sorry!". Her finger had slipped and I had gotten a rocket hit in the back of the head, right as I ended the level. I'd love to play CM against her, but she just isn't interested. Suffice that I play against my PBEM opponents as much as I do! OGSF

Here's my opinion, FWIW. I think CM has done a good job of "negating" gamy play in several ways. First, the point allocation keeps things down to a dull roar. You just can't buy a sqillion MG carriers. Second, even if you do, or more plausibly, buy a squillion Kubelwagons (SP) and then run them all over the map like squirrels, they will get killed very quickly for no gain, except...... ..you will locate the opponents military assets. But having spent your bucks on Kubelwagons, you'll have less of the "real" stuff to take out those assets. Fourth, if I was the driver of a real Kubelwagon, or MG carrier, there is probably only so much I would do for the Fatherland before I bugged out of there. The morale is well modelled in CM so at least a proportion of your units being so used will likely not be too effective. Having said all that, I reckon the "desparate measures" described are not gamey. Charge me with MG Carriers and I'll kill them. What else you got? The opinion of a talentless CM grunt. :^)

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by chrisl: Just to be difficult: How about some topo lines... <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> This thought has occured to me before, as I'm sure it has to many others. No idea if this is possible or practical, but topo lines on say View 8 might be useful. I wouldn't want them on every view, for the same "aesthetic" reasons as grids. But on view 8 or 7, topo lines would perhaps mimic the battle maps available to commanders in the field. Another .02c, which makes .04c

Okay, my .02c as well. I was so thrilled to learn about CM and discover the 3D terrain and the lack of hexes. The ability to "get down and dirty" with the troops and spy out the lay of the land. Check LOS and immersively interact with the environment when planning tactics. This is what made CM such a revolutionary game, at least for me. Will the grids take all that away? Probabaly not, and definitely not for me - cos I won't use them I reckon. I'm sticking with the revolution. If I want hexes, I'll go and play Panzer General again (not). But if my opponenet(s) want to use them, what do I care? I'm still pitting my "real terrain" tactical skill against him/her. So I'll just get my butt kicked either way. :^) Bottom line, I think the grids are a step backwards - but so long as I am not forced to use them then it's for someone else to decide what suits them best. Guess I'm with the Captain on this one. OGSF

G'day tank_41, Welcome to CM and the board. Your issue has been raised many times and I think it is being at least partly addressed in Patch 1.03 , due out in a few days time I think. Stand-by for several follow up posts suggesting you "do a search". :^) OGSF

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Germanboy: I think Doubler in 'Closing with the Enemy' sheds some light. Unfortunately our library is closed at the moment. Anyone with the book cares to comment? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Page 46, Doubler, Michael D, "Closing With the Enemy"..... "The First Army Ordnance Section Assembled all available welders and welding equipment to complete the project and used scrap metal from the German beach obstacles to construct most of the hedgerow cutters. In a prodigioius effort between 14-25 July, First Army welding teams produced over 500 hedgerow cutters and distributed them to subordinate commands for installation. By late July, 60 percent of First Army's Shermans were mounted with the device." QED

If it takes half a chicken half an hour to lay half an egg, how long does it take a chicken with a wooden leg to kick the pips out of a dill pickle?

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Big Time Software: Troop quality is directly related to their experience level not their type. In other words, a 'green' SS unit is no better than a green Wehrmacht unit. If you want to see top-quality SS troops, make sure to set their experience rating to Veteran or higher. Charles<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> OGSF hangs his head in shame, wilting under the accusing stares of a horde of veteran hamsters clad in stained uniforms. Scuffs his foot in the dust...."mumble, mumble" "WHAT?!" cries a hamster, streaked with dry tear tracks, "We can't HEAR you!!" "I wuz just saying that in that case my veteran SS-hamsters were just poorly led by "someone"....or up against a fiendishly cunning and resolute PBEM and AI opponent.....or both" A collective "humph" of satisfaction from the red-eyed SS hamsters. OGSF wanders off, vowing to purchase nothing but SS-hamsters in future, and to run them all straight at heavily entrenched machine gun positions. [This message has been edited by OberGrupenStompinFeuhrer! (edited 07-17-2000).]

Well Charles has made it clear that the only criteria for a units morale performance is it's experience level. A "green" SS-hamster will perform similar to a "green" Volkssturm. The only way to get "superior" morale performance out of troops is to up their experience level. Which is quite sobering from a player-performance point of view (well, my performance POV). :^)

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by BorderBill: What a tactic! I'm going to petition BTS to add a Dismount crew button. That way I won't have to waste my time getting all my tanks killed before I overwhelm the enemy with killer tank crews!!! <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I don't think it's funny BorderBill! (Well, maybe I do,but still...) When one of my little panzershreck teams actually gets up the gumption to knock out an enemy tank, I get kinda attached to the little guys. And then the crew, like a bunch of sour infantry wannabee hamster touchers, start popping away with their Webleys.... *That's* why the panzers in the bocage scenario keep wanting to target bailed out crews instead of tanks.....

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Mark IV: My god, that's brilliant (I had been thinking about a funnel-and-garden hose contraption)! When did you find time to go to the hospital?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> ROTFLMAO!!!

Those sure are purty screenshots! I think the detail in CM is way good on the vehicles - remember what has been available before! As for scaling CM up to division level, I prefer the horrifying intimacey of the company / platoon level tactics. Playing on divisional level would be more like a game of RISK, I think. "This model represents an armoured brigade, this model represents a battery of 105mm". But CM with the graphics in the screenshots - it'll come one day! :^)

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Henri: The safest beef in the world, according ot the UK government... Just makes you mad, doesn't it? ______________________________ Not unless you are a British cow Henri<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> 1st Cow: "This "Mad COw Disease" is terrible! Whole herds area being slaughtered, whether infected or not! Why, we could be next!" 2nd Cow: "I'm not worried!" 1st Cow: "Not worried? Why not?" 2nd COw: "Cos I'm a tractor!"

I am thinking that my expectations of the SS troops were more along the lines of "fanaticism" than being more "elite". I *did* have a couple of squads hold their ground and kill a lot of American squads, but they were an exception. Because of them I ended up with a "tactical victory". My subjective gut view is that I have gotten at least similar, if not better, performance out of regular Wermacht infantry. As someone said, it could just be my unrealistic expectations of SS over Wermacht, not something for BTS to address. If the price difference represents the better equipment and smarter uniforms than I guess that's okay as long as I realize that. There must have been some differentiation between Wermacht and SS troops at the recruiting level, and possibly training. I had always thought the SS were better trained and more highly motivated - like comparing British Paratroops against regular British army. If there was a difference in training and motivation, I am not seeing it in the game. Which could be more a symptom of my fervent desire to have my troops crush all before them, than what is really going on. Oh, and the scenario is set in October 1944, after the Falias gap etc so the troop quality may be down. If this is in fact being modelled, I guess I'd like to know that. Oh, Oh...someone asked if the troops were under the benefit of command and control. They would have been, except the PL burst into girly tears and ran away looking for mummy. OGSF