ASL Veteran

That sort of thing wouldn't bother me in the slightest. If you had a balanced force you could stop a ridiculous force like that with little trouble. Lets say you bought a panzergrenadier platoon or something rather than one SP gun - what would the results have been then? I don't have the game (yet) so I can't see the point breakdown, but a balanced force should prevail over an unbalanced force (unless the unbalanced force has something you can't stop of course - but Bren carriers don't fit that description).

Actually, the Heftholadung (sp?) didn't even get introduced until 44 as I recall. It became more important later in the war because Germany was suffering a severe propellant shortage towards the end and they were looking very hard for ways to replace the Panzershrek. The ATMM, Panzerfaust, and Panzershrek were all used side by side ... along with the anti tank rifle grenade. Mind you I am just saying this off the top of my head (I am at work)

What really is the advantage of having something half tracked and half wheeled? To the best of my knowledge, nobody made halftracks either before or after WW2. I can't see how the two christmas ornament wheels up front could possibly force the tracks to go in any direction they didn't want to go. Why the heck did Germany (and later the US) make these hybrids? Why not just make a fully tracked APC, or a fully wheeled APC? It would seem to me to be a more efficient and effective use of resources to make one or the other.

I have to admit to being one of the people who “lit the fuse” on that whole explosion, although I had lost interest in that discussion before the “heavy hitters” got involved. It all started when the Talonsoft board became crammed with people saying that the infantry in the game were too powerful and they felt that the AT rating should have been lowered from a 5 to something less, like a 1 or a 2. After much heated discussion (with me more or less defending the data in the game since nobody had produced any contradictory evidence from published sources) I suggested that perhaps the entire combat routines were flawed and that it was not just focused on the infantry ratings. I created a test scenario were I had 3 pure tank units, 3 pure infantry units, and 3 mixed units of tanks and infantry which each had 100 items in them (either tanks, infantry or 50/50). I then put those nine units up against various “pure” and mixed units. One match up was 100 88mm AA guns vs 100 Matildas, another was 50 T 34s and 50 Rifle Squads vs 100 75mm AT guns. Anyway, I put the results on the board without comment and let the board review my data. Others began doing their own tests. If I remember correctly, someone later took 100 HMG vs 100 Tigers and posted his results. People then began using more and more ridiculous examples which eventually turned into the now infamous Jeeps vs Tigers battle. My main thing was to stress that the game results should be compared to “real” battlefield results that can be quantified, not just how it ‘feels’ to the average grognard. After stressing that numerous times, the heavy hitters really started getting involved as someone from one of the websites recreated the battle of … I believe it was Arras? … and compared the game results to the real results. Wow, what a discussion that was.

Japanese would have to have some national characteristics. In ASL they act like no other troops in the game ... and I love playing as them. I think ASL has Japanese absolutely pegged. Tough infantry, but a brittle force that tends to fritter away if you are not careful. Most of my friends have "Jap scare" because I have trounced them so many times using the tough Japanese infantry. They began to think of them as superhuman. Yep, you have to get into a completely different mind set when handling Japanese infantry. If you use them poorly you will run out of troops quickly. If you use them correctly - nearly unstoppable.

Actually, not only CM was based on ASL, but Close Combat was too. As I recall, Avalon Hill contracted Atomic to design a computer version of ASL, but there was a disagreement as to how to proceed. Seeing some of "Doug's" posts over on the Close Combat message boards I can see where Avalon Hill and Atomic may have had a falling out Combat Mission was Avalon Hill's next attempt to "computerize" ASL and appears to be a little more faithful to the spirit of the board game. I guess when AH was bought out by Hasbro they didn't want to continue their relationship with Big Time Software - or vice versa. ASL never really did armor very well, although it did the best it could in a turn based format. The simultaneous execution really helps armor act a little more "realistic". I have to admit that when my friends and I heard that Big Time Software was working on this we chuckled ... we didn't think the name of the company inspired confidence

If your stuff is being shipped by air, which I suspect the majority of these are, then it doesn't matter how far away you are from the place it is being shipped from. Air Freight companies have everything shipped to one central location where all packages are sorted. Once the packages are sorted they are then sent back out to the appropriate region. If I wanted to ship something from San Francisco to Los Angeles using Federal Express my package will first be sent to Tenessee where their central terminal is (if I remember correctly). It will then be sorted and shipped to Los Angeles from there.

when the patched version of the CD will begin shipping?