Tero
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Posts posted by Tero
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>Not allowed to climb into it, unfortunately.
I thought as much.
I looked up the translation and it means most definitely also the viewing prisms.
I also found one interesting remark concerning the viewing prisms. Apparently the Finnish combat experiences during the summer of -44 showed that the cellophane protective cover sheets should be taken off the viewing prisms to enhance visibility. A directive was given in early July -44 to alert all crews of this fact.
I never knew there were any cellophane protective sheets on the prisms.
Can you verify they were used ? Or were they just to protect the prisms during transit or in storage. I would think that a detail like removing a protective cover after install would not go unnoticed during training. IF it was in the procedure that is.
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Omar Bradley
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>This is just an extereme example to
>demonstrate that quality itself doesn't
>necessarily mean much without further
>qualification and quantification. A real
>example here is how "superior" the German
>sights were for determining range. But
>apparently during the winter of 1941/42
>they froze up solid because they were too
>complicated. Meanwhile, the "inferior"
>Soviet optics were working just fine. So
>in this case, as was typical of many German
>mechanical things, they were over-
>engineered.
This is true. Then there are the few instances during the battle of Stalingrad when the T-34's assembeled in the city rode into combat without any sights whatsoever installed. Are you going to model that ?
>If we just gave the Germans an across the
>board bonus, then the T-34 at 60 below zero
>in Scenario X would be at a double
>disadvantage. Not only would the German
>sites be better that the Soviets, they
>woldn't be penalized.
Is that -60º F or C ?
Below -10 - -15ºC the Germans started having problems with the lubricants, fuel and other stuff as well so wouldn't it be better to render the German armour virtually useless (immobile, unable to fire etc) during the winter of 1941-42 to circumvent this snare ?
How ARE the sights related factors modelled now, exactly ?
>So I find the big problem to be relating
>this "quality" to real world aspects of
>gunnery. In some situations the German
>optics might shine brighter, but in another
>situation they might be on a par, and in
>another still at a disadvantage.
Are you going to try to simulate the effects of athmospherics separately or are you going for a package deal that applies in all situations ?
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>AFAIK the Sfz14 could be used from inside
>the Stug. Are you 100% proof-positive that
>he is not talking about it?
I'll look it up.
>I have looked through the prisms of a
>Panzer IIIN in Bovington and was not
>impressed.
And then you of course climbed into the T-34 and.... what was your impression on the viewing prisms on it ?
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>Yep - but that is Sfz 14 or whatever the
>real name of the Scherenfernrohr was and
>not your bog-standard tank gunner optics,
>and IIRC there is no conclusive evidence
>(although Jeff Duquette dug out some
>pictuers) that this was in widespread use
>on tanks, as opposed to Stugs (which were
>part of the Artillery).
I think there is a difficulty in translating the term here. What is being referred to are the viewing prisms of the TC and other crew members along with other viewing devices, not the forked artillery range finder.
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>The Grog elite have begun...
"Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition - our two best weapons are attention to detail, willinness to defend our point of view and the speedy typing of a secretary. Our three best weapons are...."
>tero, that practice is a lot older than the
>Red Army and as recent as Bosnia.
I am aware of this. But as we are discussing CM2 it is relevant. And is definitely inside the CMBO/BB scope.
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<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by The_Capt:
If want to make Engineers more relevant to the game the answer is simple...lower the cost of the current obstacles or make them bigger.
The mine fields are too small for what they cost when compared to other units in the game. This would allow more use of mines and AT obstacles which would force the attacker to use his engineers as engineers and not infantry.
Another key addition would be to include armoured engineers such that existed during WWII.
Sig your idea has merit but the "realist Grog elite" will lay eggs at the suggestion. "Ford tiles and corduroy road!!! Just how in the Hell did they do that in front of my position?!" will be the cry. But again as with most things in CM you can always mutually agree to use or not to use.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
Then there is the Red Army practice of digging trenches towards the defensive lines so that they could spring up right in front of you when the assault starts...
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<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by David Aitken:
This is a flawed interpretation of your data. Just because the tank got a few hits at the beginning and less for the rest of the time, doesn't mean the hits it got were somehow 'wrong' or 'lucky'. (Luck is considered to be a good thing, so 'chance' would be a better term.) By your logic, it could equally have been 'luck' when the tank missed. Maybe it should have hit all the time. Were the results not 'random' enough for you to believe them? Does 'random' have to be 'regular' in order to be credible? Think about it.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
The fenomenon could also be attributed to some of the variables involving and pertaining first shot hit propability and cross section targeting and not just the stabilizer.
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>Actually I was thinking more about the
>GErman tanks... where supposedly the
>instruction manual says for them to move
>like mad halt fire, then move like mad...
>
>can't be good for the engine!
Way better than on your complexion if you start just sitting there.
The tank is helpless when it is reloading so why not throw the other guys aim off by moving while you reload. And for the better part of the war the German TC had the edge in visibility over the rest of the participating TC's.
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>As was noted in a previous post, naval guns
>hit at far beyond 2 second flight time, try
>30 seconds!
Whatever it takes for the shell to travel some 20+ kilometers. With no radar fire control mind you.
>But they use bracketing, and it would be
>interesting to read whether that 2 second
>rule considered bracketting.
They also fired salvos from multiple guns making spotting the splashes that much easier as the groupings were easier to spot. IIRC the Japanese even used something to colour the splases so each ship could ID where its salvos hit if many ships engaged the same target.
>It is also difficult to face all that has
>been said about German optics superiority
>and deny its existence. While American
>tanker comparison in Europe hits on same
>conclusion as scientific fact (German sights
>better in low light conditions), and
>suggests that they tested under similar
>conditions, there is so much other anecdotal
>and published report data.
Why do you think the loss figures for Allied armour have been so elusive and contradictory ?
>Regarding the "how do we quantify gun sight
>advantages when it is basically
>unquantificable", BTS answered that. It is
>the same as hit % diff between 88L71 and
>50L60, and between elite and average: think
>about how it would impact the results and
>how it fits into game system and input a
>modifier based on overall consideration.
Furthermore: how should it affect the first shot hit propability ?
>If better German sights are more effective
>during an overcast, they would boost hit %,
>as would the tiny little triangles for range
>estimation. But maybe it would be better to
>decrease % for sights that are inferior.
I think it would be more appropriate to examine the differences in crew training and go from there. Was there any differences in the gunnery training of the different armies ? I am sure the training manuals reveal the methods each country deviced to utilize the optics they had at hand.
>Since CM does not use trajectory analysis
>and range estimation models for hit
>probability, results are not based on
>equations. So gun sight modifiers would fit
>in with everything else based on
>consideration of overall factors, wouldn't
>they?
Hmmmmmmm.... the modifier we are discussing here is moving very close to the "national bias" modifier BTS is so vehemently opposed to because it implies inherent superiority of soldiers a nation over those of another nation. There has to be a mechanical, quantifiable solution to this or all hell brakes loose if the flood gates are opened...
>Does the opposition to German optics quality
>input into game mechanisms sound a little
>like a fear that the panzers will fight more
>effectively?
Look at it this way: if the problem can be solved easily for CM2 how long would it take for people to start demanding the modification be implemented to CM ?
BTS dug its heels deep into the ground in the western front. They have to keep their guard up or they will get one in the chin if it turns out their reasoning has been motivated be a "national bias" in favour of the western Allies.
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The Soviets made makeshift underwater bridges by driving turretless tanks into the river.
And depending on the type of battle the work of the engineers is not always done before the CM scope battle begins.
Also, could the road block tiles be made in the fashion of edifice tiles ? They would act like a very, very narrow (or then again not so narrow) building or a stone wall and they could be reduced to rubble making the place they locate passable to tanks and vehicles. The way they look is just a matter of visual presentation.
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>I have told this earlier, but
>lieutenant-colonel Pekka Kantakoski (the
>writer of 'Red tanks - Red Army armoured
>forces 1918-1945', in Finnish only) makes a
>very interesting point about the LOOKOUT
>equipment in the German Stu-40 (Stug III)
>assault guns. According to him the equipment
>was the best he has ever used, even better
>than that in the much later T-72M1 tank !!
You mean being able to having better visibility while buttoned up ? That is true.
IIRC our guys modified at least one T-34/76 -43 by installing some extra periscopes on turret roof to improve visibility to the sides. Or was it one of the KV's ? I think a trip to the Parola tank museum is in order.
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Can the construction of the different gun mounts be measured quantifiably to ascertain how it affected the accuracy ? Are there any (seemingly) unrelated factors that come into play here ? For example the quality of the steel, the design desicions made that directed the construction, shock absorbion gear in the vehicles running gear and the gun mount etc.
Other factors: things like symphatetic vibration caused by the platform, the mount itself during the actual firing etc. Also such seemingly self evident things like alignment of the sight and the gun come to play. How much did the recoil upset the aiming (and possibly even the alignment), was there much need to adjust the aiming after firing so that the time between aimed shots would increase dramatically ?
All the elements would seem to indicate that the differces in the optics were not as critical as the the quality of the mount and how the sight acted in relation to the gun when the gun was being fired (eventhough the Finnish tankers were of the opinion that the Soviet optics were of much poorer quality than the German optics).
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<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Slapdragon:
US gyros were designed to fire on the move, but they only handled vertical motion, not horizontal, which was handled by the gunner who kept the tank gun trained, and whose controls were fin enough to track objects. Accuracy did go down since the gunner needed to vary the lead on his target , but hit could and did get made (I should not that firing on the move was usually the realm of the TD units, whose training at that was much more extensive. This is especially true with the M18 crews which were considered elite and had the highest training standards, but this would be modlled by changing the crews experience rating, not by changing how the tank fired).
As to speed and gyros. Gyros work at any speed. The only question for a gyro is does the weapon it is attached to have a moment arm capable of swinging through a full range of motion that bumps in the terrain are putting it through. On very rough terrain, the answer could be no, and the weapon will not track a target because the gryo cannot physically make the gun do what it cannot do, fire above or below its fixed depression.
It is similar in a way to skeet shooting. A shooter can hit a slow or fast flung skeet, but only if they are lead by the promer distance. So moving fast over everything but rough terrain and moving slow should make no difference to the gyro. The issue is how well crews were trained with the gyros in the first place.
I think that the issue is not that US vehicles hit to often, but that players in QBs choose regular and veteran crews too often, making them better shots on the fly and leading to a potentially gamey tactic. If US players used green troop more often, to represent less experienced US tankers prevalent during 1944, it would not seem like the Shermans were so good (they are not all that good anyway, merely ok).
Allied TDs are a different story.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
Can you provide your source ? Every account I have read states that the Allied tankers disengaged the stabilizer because when it was malfuctioning it would jam the gun at the set elevation (which never happens in CM
) and/or to facilitate reloading and that they were as a rule, if not ordered, then exhorted to stop for firing to increase the chance of hitting the target. -
>“It is always difficult to be specific about
>the ranges that should be considered “short”
>or “long”, but as a rough guide, for tank
>engagements, 0-1000m is defined as short
>range, 1000-2000m as medium range and
>2000-4000m as long range.”
>
>How one “backward converts” the above
>opinion from modern 120mm, laser FCS to
>75-88mm, WW2 sights is anyone’s guess.
Somehow I can not envisage a tank duel at 1000 meters between two WWII tanks as being fought as a close range knife fight.
One criteria could be the speed of sound. If you can get an aimed shots out and you get one more in the air before the opponent hears the first discharge then it would be close range. At a muzzle velocity of, say, 800mps (and the speed of sound is around 300 mps) that would make the treshold for close range around 400-500 meters with a reload cycle of 2 seconds.
Another criteria could be below the point where your armour simply can not stop the opponents ordnance ie. when the kinetic force alone can hurt you when there has been no slackening of the muzzle velocity over distance. If you pit a T-34 against a Tiger the treshold would be under 300 meters, or thereabouts.
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Forgot:
Stugs were credited with 80+ kills, the T-34's with 3, IIRC.
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Here is some relevant data based on the subjective opinions of the end users of both products:
The Finnish army operated both the T-34 and the Stug-III during WWII. The tankers rated the Stug ahead of the T-34 (both the 76 and the 85mm variant) because
- the German optics were better
- the gun handling was easier (lighter) and more precise on the Stug
- the Stug cannon was better in penetration power
The only things going for the T-34 were better armour and cross country mobility.
8 Finnish Stugs were lost to enemy action while the number of T-34's rose from, IIRC, 7 to 18 during the Soviet summer assault in 1944. None of the "original" T-34's were lost. Normal engagement distances ranged from 30 and 1000 meters for both vehicles.
After the war there were plans to mount the German 75mm gun on the T-34's. These plans were dropped however. The T-34's were phased out while the Stugs, after they were phased out of active service in the mid 1960's, went on to serve as static gun emplacements until the 75mm ammo became unstable and too dangerous to handle in the late 80's.
[ 06-20-2001: Message edited by: tero ]
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Funnily enough the spotting is supposed to have been tweaked down for moving vehicles but not the aiming and the first shot hit accuracy. An oversight ?
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>I read somewhere the actual game engine
>can't modelize multi-turreted tanks... I
>think this will be solved after the
>re-writing of the engine (CM Beyond CM2
)One way would simply be to place a gun in place of the hull MG. That would work for the early Churchill models at least.
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>As for the 3in and 81mm FOOs I guess it is
>ammunition quantity which makes the
>difference. IIRC there is no "availability"
>factor in CMBO pricing.
I thought so too but check out the price tag on the German CAS....
Either they are VERY effective when compared to the Allied CAS or there is a penalty imposed on them because they'd arrive once in a blue moon to fly over the front anyway.
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>I would say so uncommon that you can't find
>a single reference in writing to one
>instance in which a single squad faced off
>against another squad.
I think that is more due to the fact that the books talk about companies, regiments and divisions more than individual squads. And autobiographies are vague as the guy seldom knew how any adversaries he was up against.
>I would say the fire team is, actually;
I stand corrected.
>German, Canadian, British and American
>squads were all trained to fight in
>"maneuver" and "fire" groups...
The term used by the Finns was half-squad.
>Refuse to carry out the operation or lobby
>for more fire support.
>
>Failing that, wait for the artillery
>preparation to stop, then cross himself and
>take the first step past the start line.
Here is a reason we seem to be talking past each other. Different pre-conditioning.
I was thinking more in terms of defence, not offence. If, nay when, a Finnish commander had to go over the start line without much fire support he would not go in frontally but he'd find a nice spot through which he'd infiltrate his forces to outflank the defensive position.
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>Tero, you make some very bizarre statements
>about the MG 42.
I think we have a missunderstanding here. Nothing more.
>Firstly, you say that gunners were trained
>to fire 3 round bursts (I find that amazing,
>since an MG 42 fires 20 bullets in a second
>- and everyone knows Germans are no good at
>fractions....) lest they give their position
>away.
I should have perhaps used the term "short, controlled burst" instead of "3 round burst". That is a carry over from my national service. But the fact is I can not believe a platoon or a squad commander of ANY army would risk giving away the location of his prime asset. Inexperienced gunner going trigger happy is one thing, experienced gunner remaining cool and collected another.
>Then you say that an MG 42 would be at a
>severe disadvantage in a squad to squad
>fight since the second it opens up it would
>draw heavy fire.
All the Allied narratives I have read never fail to leave out the MG-42 opening up. I can not believe a platoon sargeant of ANY army would leave it at that without trying to suppress the sucker before anything else is done.
>That's a lot of unfounded supposition to
>make.
Well... I do have 11 months of national service under my belt and some lessons sink in deep. One of the is "never go full-auto unless you told to do so or if the situation is REALLY desperate. When you go full-auto every weapon in range will single you out".
>I mean, every man is going to react
>differently under fire, and I will bet many
>Germans let training go out the window (even
>if your "3 round burst" theory is correct)
>and simply clamped down on the trigger once
>the adrenaline started pumping.
If we assume it is a green recruit fresh out of boot you are propably correct. If we assume it is a combat hardened veteran with 2 years of Eastern Front under his belt I can not see him wasting ammo needlessly (and revealing his position in the process) by throwing a full belt at a single guy he saw ducking behind a cover.
>Secondly, I don't doubt that heavy fire was
>indeed brought to bear on enemy MGs, but it
>wasn't anything like instantaneous - I
>should expect the first thing I would do, as
>an Allied soldier hearing an MG 42, would be
>to get my ass down, find decent cover, and
>check the crown jewels. Maybe then I would
>try and locate the source of the firing.
Depends how you define "instantaneous".
By your definition ALL Allied infantry within earshot should duck and cover every time a MG-42 opens up. Which would not be that unrealistic BTW. But once they find out it is not they who are being fired at they will start to look for the sucker and if they see it and it is within effective range they WILL open up on it to suppress it.
>Finally, how often would a squad vs. squad
>fight even take place? Allied platoons
>operated as platoons, with supporting fire,
>tanks, etc. Section and platoon objectives
>were usually quite limited, and I suspect
>that situations where one complete squad
>faced off solely against another, complete,
>squad were very rare (in real life -
>happened all the time playing the card game
>UP FRONT but that is another story....)
Situations I can envisage are street fighting or fighting in the boggace. Not that uncommon situations in France, I would imagine.
>Really, the entire conversation seems beside
>the point.
It is an offshoot from the subject that took a life of its own.
>I think Slapdragon and I have discussed much
>of this before in some long forgotten
>threads - inevitably SLA Marshall gets
>dragged in, and while I don't want to invoke
>MEN AGAINST FIRE or whatever it was,
Soon the movement to ban landmines would intervene. What a mess.
>I do rather think that discussing squads as
>tactical entities that faced off against
>other squads rather silly.
Not in my opinion. The squad is the most basic tactical unit of any infantry formation.
>In fact, any kind of "balanced scenario" of
>the kind we love to play in Squad Leader or
>Combat Mission was something of a rarity in
>WW II. Any decent commander will prefer to
>attack with the odds slanted heavily in his
>favour.
But of course.
>I don't think many battalion commanders
>placed faith in either the MG 42, or the M-1
>Garand, to imbalance the scales in that
>manner - and inevitably looked to artillery
>first, then tanks and air support, to ensure
>an unfair fight.
I think the question is rather what a battalion commander would do when he KNOWS his opponent has the edge on him in the fire support department.
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<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by PzKpfw 1:
Anyway compare Sokolov's yearly IR loss total to Krivosheev's IR yearly loss totals, their appears to be a major difrence on IR loss data. & again this is an example of what I was trying to show here before anyone decided 1 source was the bible on this subject.
[/QB]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
One aspect into this seeming inconsistency is the way in which the Red Army losses are tallied. For example the loss figures for Winter War listed "frostbitten" - or something to that effect - as a separate gathegory. There was a joint Finnish-Russian team of historians who went through the list and it was found out that those frostbitten were actually killed but they were not listed in the ledger as KIA, for reasons best known to the Russians. Most propably to bring down the total number of KIA from ~130 000 where it stands now.
This is why the Soviet archival data is so controversial, even for the Russias. It can be said the numbers are there with a certain degree of accuracy but the man who is tallying it up can excert his own preferences when he is compiling the data. The conclusion can be very different even the same archives are used. And contradictory results can be said to be true. From a certain point of view.
ADDENDUM:
Do the POW's killed in captivity show up on the Soviet/Russian total figures as MIA or KIA ? Or at all ? Stalin had deglared them non-persons so are they listed anywhere after the war after they had gone MIA ?
[ 06-19-2001: Message edited by: tero ]
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Will the bunkers and pillboxes still get spotted with sound contacts ?
) and/or to facilitate reloading and that they were as a rule, if not ordered, then exhorted to stop for firing to increase the chance of hitting the target.
Quality of T34/B sights.
in Combat Mission Archive #3 (2001)
Posted
<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Username:
I always thought that -40 is the same for Farhenheit and Celcius?
Can you Cite an equation slappy?
F=C*(9/5)+32?
C=-40 then (-40)*9/5= -72 and -72 +32= -40 F
Its really a good example for an iterative technique problem. If you take the equation and just plug in a guess and then take the answer (F) and plug that back into the C, you will iterate to the common answer of -40.
Lewis
Lewis<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
-40F is -8C. Right ?
I hear a similar millimeter/inch conversion problem was the reason an American copy of the MG-42 (M-60 ?) did not get finished before the end of the war.