Zaffod

I feel your pain, Ubermac.. I have been in similar circumstances. Little hint.. after i played (or should say attempted) the Villars-Bocage operation I was screaming at the monitor "Whittman did it with one.. i cant f@@@ing do it with 6!!!!! what gives???!!!" One thing i think alot of us negate here is that most exchanges of fire in CM are taking place pretty damn close range and that CAN make a big difference with heavy armor.. though i must shake my head sometimes when i see tigers and panthers go down in what seems improbable shots and ranges... What grinds my gears so far is the ease in which the AI squeezes off bazooka shots from out of nowhere and manages to hit my tanks in the first or second shot. I just have trouble with this.. i dunno, it might have somthing to do with lobbing 88mm HE shots at them only to see the zooka teams quickly resond w/ another shot.. has happened more than once. I think all the AI AT teams in CM are Congrssional Medal of Honor holders or something... once in awhile is understandable.. but more often than not.. is a little much for me.. anyway, thank god CM put the save feature in between turns Nevertheless, its all great fun... Zaff'

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Also, correct me if I'm wrong as it's been a few years, but wasn't he with a supply unit that drove supplies the grueling thousands of miles on the Eastern Front?? GI Tom <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> GI, yes... Sajer started out in a supply column and after a year or so joined the Grossdeutschland unit in the Wehrmacht. That is where all the action is. I dont recall the quote on the hand warming technique, the book was rather lengthy... There was a scene where they raided an officer's quarters of all kinds of food n alchohol and told all the officials to go to hell.. that was rather amusing.. Another good army book to read is The German army 1933-1945 by Matthew Cooper. Very descriptive account of the german army and the way it interacted with the Nazi party. Even interesting if your not into the military aspect... Another one Ive been wanting to order is "When the odds were Even", or something like that.. its about the Vosges compaing and looks at the style and results of fighting between evenly matched american and german forces.. sounded very interesting... anyone picked this one up?? Zaff'

Very very udeful info, Andy... I was just going to post a question regaurding the 'invulnerability' of american halftracks to german small-arms fire. On many occasion, the german halftracks will simply up and leave if they get fired too long from even a tiny rifle squad! On the otherhand.. ive had an MG42 and 2 SMG squad sit and pepper an American HT to death (at around 150mtrs) with no effect at all!!! This is very frustrating. Since the SPW crews bail at the slightest hint of trouble, youd think the American HT crews would do the same... they seem a bit overconfident Historically speaking, do you think this was actually the case?? And HMG 42 HAD to have been able to penetrate an American HT at close range! I guess im begginning to realize the pros n cons of each side more n more... Zaff'

One of the best books i have read or ever will read about WW2 is 'Forgotten Soldier' by Guy Sajer... It is a very dramatic, human account of a german soldier's life throughout the entire war (i should say it is an autobiography, btw)... Kind of like an 'All Quiet on the Western Front' during WW2. First person accounts are always my favorite... This book gives you the war in all its destruction, violence, irony, humanity.. you name it. He really is a good writer, you almost feel like you know all the characters and that you are part of the platoon. The tank action that he sees on the Russian front goes on and on.. its gritty. action packed.. horrifying.. everything you could ever want out of a war story. I still have yet to find a story that equals this one. The only downside is that the translations are down rather haphazardly. So many military terms will be either misplaced or used in English in one chapter and used in german in another... Anyone else out there read this?? Love to hear your takes... Zaff'

My whole point is that you have to click here and there to find how many casualties there are. It would just simply be nice to see some evidence of a unit taking damage as its happening... Oh well... i tried...

I just had an idea about a possible way to improve CM imeasurably (no that anything is sseriously wrong!!). The only REAL thing that just got to me when i first got CM, was the fact that 3 individual soldiers represented a whole squad.. and that you NEVER knew if they were taking casualties unless every 3rd one fell or you personally clicked on them. In some ways... the thrill of combat games is KNOWING and SEEING the carnage your dealing out.... (No... i dont have anger problems and No I dont want to see a recreation of the Maldamay massacre ). I mean, in flight simulators, when you blast a fighter.. you dont want em to just go plop nose down do ya? I like seein flames n a big blammo and debris all over the freakin place!! Anyway.. I was thinkin, a good way for the units to represent a casualty would be for the set of sprites to literally 'drop' a dead firgure. These figures are 2D, right?? If they are 3d then that could be a problem, i understand. But wouldnt that be cool if you actually got to see the full effect of a close combat action? With CMs unit representation, it really kind of masks all the caranage.... There doesnt have to be blood or anything like that.. Just a simple little fallen figure for each casualty.. the units will still be representative of 3 soldiers per man, just that each squad can drop 9,8 or 10 or whatever # of "casualties". Has this been thought of before?? I think there would be other ways to do this too if it causes system slow-downs... Like maybe just having the squad that suffers a kill blink red.. or maybe just a more pronounce yell ala close combat. Any thoughts?? Am i the only one that thinks like this?? Should I mail BTS and let them know?? Zaff'

Thanks for all the info guys... I have this formula stuck in my head - get the vehicles closer and the enemy will run.. Which totally isnt the case. Keeping HTs in scattered trees at a good distance has worked for me the best so far. However, invariably a HT WILL succumb to enemy fire if a)it is near the front line for a sustained period of time and b)if you do not hold the decisive advantage in number of arms to bare... Having them retreat when they are needed seems senseless to me.. so i usually take the risk... I still would have rather been the dude that had to cut the barbed wire before an attack rather than an HT crew member.. thnx again.. Zaff'

Sounds interesting... I hope a window between 5pm and like 1 am would be ample to conduct a few games.. Id like to give it a try. At heart, im a rts man that loves raw incontinuous action.. but i think i could get the hang of this down purtty easy.... Any condidates who live in Eastern or Mid US??? Zaff'

Are you SURE??? I cant belive that.. they were the most common tank on the battlefield for a portion of Barbarosa and N Africa!! I find it hard to believe that they would all be 'gone' by the time the westerners invaded. I guess they all could have gotten 'used up' in Russion though... wow... i learned somfin new today... Zaff'

Yea.. i think it was Last Defence... Any thoughts as to why this happened??? uhhhh anybody????????????????? Zaff'

Tiger... Damn.. you work fast Looks great.. though i dont think any went on the top surfaces (ie along the engine intakes etc.... other than that... Im impressed... Maybe you can start getting into like hasty paint jobs which became common near the end of the war.. those would actually be easier cause they were simpler and quickly done... Ill just sit here and give the assignments while you do the work.. Zaff'

I dunno if it was common or not.. but i did see some D-Day movie (late 60s or early 70s) with a scottish battalion comin off the beachheads w/ their bagpipes... it amazed me actually... an old fighting tradition like that still was going on after centuries of combat... Zaff'

Ok.. I was playing a scenerio (cant remember name) with an SS company accompanied by a Tiger is attacking a weakly defended village w/ an American force of roughly the same size. I had a tiger about 80 mtrs from a zooka team in the brush 12 o'clock ded ahead of my Tiger. They squeezed off one round and blammo... no more tiger... Now this was slightly infuriating.. what made it worse was I had just played the Ramelle SPR scenerio and had a zooka team smak in the rear of a tiger that had gotten immobilized.. they were no more than 40 to 20 mtrs from the thing and spent all their ammo hitting it in the butt to no avail. Sorry, but somthin's wrong here. I know theres about a 5 % of ANY penetrating hit from a zooka on a tiger.. but in the rear.. it should be near 100% in 50 mtrs or less. Any ideas or similar instances experienced out there??? Zaff'

Heres a challenge... Try getting a skin on a panther or tiger w/ a zimmerit texture.. Im pretty sure there werent many after '44 w/ zimmerit, but it would look neato if done well... Zaff'

Hey... big thing here i just realized the other night!!! There aren't any Panzer mark IIIs in the game!!!! What gives.. yea, most were in north africa.. but there had to be a good number left on the mainland by the time of the invasion.. afterall, there are Pz IIs, right?? hmmmmm.. i might be missin somthin historically, but BTS may have left out a major unit... Hey, there aren;t any Tauchpanzers either!!! I wanna be able to cross the channel!!! Zaff'

Hey all.. Quick question, I know how the basic format of PBEM goes... But how long does it take most people to play a full game?? Are you expected to dload your turn like every so many hours or does it go 1 turn a day??? man.. a simple 20 turn game could take an eternity.... I am definatly interested in PBEM... If someone wants to gimme a try, my email is stinky6@eathlink.net I can garuntee you it wont be an easy fight... Zaff'

Sorry to sound dumb.. but what is a FSAA??

Take off, you Hoser Bob n' Doug ruled!! BTW, i think "Cpt. Kirk" (Shatner, yah?) was from Iowa... maybe he grew up in Canada.. i dunno.. As far as the accents are concerned.. i have zoomed in on british squads and have heard them yell "Bawstuds!!" when getting mauled... I couldnt believe it.. sounded just like a monty python clip! it was great.. I especially like the enthusiastic "JA!!!" when a german tanker scores a kill... nice little add ons like that prevent a game from getting stale.. beatuiful work... Zaff'

I have to try the flame HTs, havent used em yet... NOTHING was better in Close Combat than to sneak one of those jobs up on a bunch of infantry in a building and hearing that 'whoo-hhoooosh' and then watching the entire squad go down... just a liiiiiittle too effective... In CM they seem to merely suppress the enemy... ive never seen flame do an extraordinary amount of damage to anything. I wonder if that is accurate.... hmmmmm Fionn???? Zaff'

Dirt and muck on the soldiers helmets.. The ability to see the expressions on soldier's faces.. Tanks with individual unit numbers.. Not one identical!!! Footprints where soldiers have been, espeically in rainy weather! Birds and bugs visible at scenerio beggining.. Properly placed antennas on Panther tanks!!! Legnth of MG barrels be corrected to acutal legnth (2 inches shorter) A different whoosh for the panzerfausts.. they were a semi-tone lower and 'faster' sounding than schreks or bazookas!!!! (common knowlege) my .00002 cents woth anyway. Zaff'

Ok.. ive had the game for over a week now.. and i am certain for one thing... if i was a halftrack driver/gunner back in the big one.. i would have written my last will and testimony as soon as i was given the assignment... If halftracks are good at one thing.. ITS GETTING BLOWED UP!!!!!!!!! Even in close combat... you CAN NOT make an armored car, halftrack, recon vehicle successfully support your troops for the duration of a scenerio... Think of getting them remotely close to enemy infantry (even beyond grenade range) and they are toast as well. I wont even get into the battles ive used thim in trying to flush out infantry in dense forest... What is a good employment of halftracks and ACs after deploying troops etc. SHould they stay well out of reach and if possible go to a hill and MG from long range? should they be always speeding accross the battlefield to and fro distracting enemy fire??? ARRRHGGHHHHH!!!!! ANy info would be appreciated... Zaff'

This has probably been done already.. in fact, it may even be a ascenerio that came with the game... but i was thinking it would be a good idea to make a scenerio depicting the German attempt to breakthrough at Falaise. This was a rather large operation, so it could even be an operation! If nobody grabs at this and i get the time.. i may try it myself.. Correct me if there already is one like this though... id like to see it. Zaff'

My kudos to you as well!!! Before i even got on this forumn and had gotten my copy of the demo.. I said to mayself: Damn!!! Im gonna make me a battle from the final battle in SPR.. Of course I got on the CM HQ site and saw it there and was overjoyed... The aerial action took me by total surprise!! lookin forward to more in the future.. keep it up. Zaff'

I feel your pain, brother... If you want an exercise in total unrepented frustration (and rage!), try the Chambois scenerio as the germans... overall.. the map is layed out where you can hammer the Poles in the corner of the map of which they came.. just dont think of flanking or getting close to them... I lost no fewer than all 4 or 5 of my mk IVs and a panther what seemed like an invisible mine field. After the 3rd mk IV bought it.. the blast from the at gun FINALLY showed up... Turned out to be a 6 pdr concealed in some trees about 80 mtrs away... and this thing didnt fire like a normal at gun.. we;re talking at a rate about one would fire a single shot rifle!!! I think the allies could have won the war had they nothing but these things.... jeeesh! i was pissed... Zaff'

I was playing the Ramelle scenerio by WIld Bill (kudos to you, btw) and halfway through the scenerio, much to my surprise, heard a low flying aircraft approaching and then saw a speeding shadow fly right by followed by explosions everyewhere... Of course I was hootin n hollerin with excitement.. The angels on our shoulders had arrived (miraculously, none of the closeby explosions even touched our troops). I was wondering if this was an added bonus in the scenerio editor?? is it just a chance bonus to get air support or can you actually select it in certain circumstances??? im very curious.. Zaff'