Slapdragon

I tried fördermaschinen because my book says (p.89) "German speakers are usually tolerant of 'made-up' composite words. If you do not know the proper word, combine two that you do know. You will usually be politely corrected if the word is in error, and you will often get it right the first time."

Oberst Stendling saluts his commander, "My General, the ground is like soft poop. My King Tiger is stuck up to its turret top! General Kammier looks about the staging area. "That Kublewagon seems ok, it is not stuck in the mud at all." Oberst Stendling waves his arms and exclaims, "That is because it is sitting on my Jagdtiger my General!" The General looks thoughtful, then grows a big smile. "I know what we will do, get rid of the Tigers, bring up those H.39s command sent us as a joke!" The Colonel starts to get excited, "Yes, that is great, and we have a few captured Bren Carrier too!!" Suddenly, a messenger comes running in. "Heil Hitler, General Patton wants to call a three month cease fire. He does not like idea of only figting in T-8 APCs. The General gets up and stomps about the room. "No! We will fight. Throw me my mud shoes. On to Washington!!!" [This message has been edited by Slapdragon (edited 09-22-2000).]

Hell with Babelfish -- I used "Advanced Conversational German Ninth Edition". I do not have the language at all!!!! However, I was forced to just guess on some of the stuff. Fördermaschinen is "machine that carries or lifts", I have no idea how to say personnel carrier!! Eu compreendo o português, minha esposa sou de Brasil! Good thing you did not say that in English So I am not pretentious: here is little scene as I wrote it in English (note to translator: it does not work 1-1, I had to fudge a lot of stuff!): -------------------

The stove pipe has possibilities.

The two most effective weapons against Tigers were the Gerbil and Hamster of course. The question we should discuss though is which one was more effective. [This message has been edited by Slapdragon (edited 09-22-2000).]

Of course only the first shot would explode above your head, your ok from then on. Err, except you might not have a head....

Yep, many German units would turn in their King Tigers and draw Lynx tanks when the rain started pouring. Oberst Stendling saluts his commander, "Herr general, der boden ist wie weiche Scheiße! Mein König Tiger wird bis zu seiner Kuppel in ihr gehaftet! Was tue ich?" General Kammier looks about the staging area. "Dieses kublewagon scheint gut. Es ist nicht im Schlamm gleichmäßig! " Oberst Stendling waves his arms and exclaims, "Es sitzt auf meinem Jagdtiger meinen General!" The General looks thoughtful, then grows a big smile. "Ich verstehe. Verlassen Sie die Tiger. Jeder erhalten im H.39s-Zubehör sendete uns als Witz! " The Colonel starts to get excited, "Wir haben Mein Herr, einiger Truppentransporter Bren!" Suddenly, a messenger comes running in. "Heil Hitler, General Patton möchte einen drei Monat Waffenstillstand nennen meinen General. Er möchte nicht mit nur Truppentransporter T8 kämpfen. Der Schlamm hat ihn überzeugt zu stoppen!" The General gets up and stomps about the room. "Nr.! Wir kämpfen! Senden Sie für meine Schlammschuhe! Auf nach Washington!!! " [This message has been edited by Slapdragon (edited 09-22-2000).]

Has anyone run the Carbon tester on CM? Just to find how far off Carbon it is.

As long as they don't stop to brew up

I actually know they did not test the armor on the tank whose picture are shown : If they did it would be cut apart instead of shot apart, unless Soviet steel anealing process were real advanced back then. And in the excerpts from the report they do not mention it. They claim to have tested a KT in 1944 but no data is offered in this piece. In science, you become a skeptic to keep from publishing tripe like "The Bell Curve" by Hernstien and Murray. Not a critique on PzK whom I do not think is this way, but in an era with crystal power, psychic testing, herbal remedies, personal angels, and "trickle down economics" science has been lost on many, and turned into a dirty word by most. If I claimed my personal angel told me the resistance factor of german armor I would be believed much more readily than when I apply skeptical inquiry into a subject. If I do a replicable experiment I can get slammed by people whose knowledge of science comes from Star Trek -- not because they do a counter experiment, but because "that is not how the world works". To judge any empircal study you must know: What model is being tested (in this case penetration on the KT), what factors get fudged (if they ignore humidity in the tests I can give them a pass because humidity in theory would only change penetration a small bit), and precise details on how the test is set up, plus some definitions like what is the definition of penetration? (Sound silly, try and come up with a definition of "violence" for a study on television psychosomatic effects that sticks and covers all the bigger bases). Then I present my data. How far away, what angle, and what charge. If you don't read it in the report, it is not always so-- you have to be skeptical and assume it is not so, and if the report is not the internal report or in a peer reviewed location: (Example: Journal of Soviet Ground Forces) then you judge its aegis for possible fudge factors. And yes, a US armor test may be just as biased if it is in the wrong venue. Look at the 1981 US Defense data used by the White House and the 1981 ISS data for that same year and you will see that bias in a public report intended to make the politicos happy compared to a peer reviewed defense study. Also, just because this report is flawed, more like "fun fun on the range", does not mean the Soviets never did good work. They launched people into space afterall, and had an industrial society. It just means that many reports from the USSR are redacted, worthless, or missing (no real Freedom of Information act there), and the source and validity needs to be looked at closely in addition to the scientifc merits of the report.

I also find American published data on many military subjects suspect and would avoid test data published without first looking closely at their assumptions. One manual we unearthed at TMC discussed the safe diving depth of the Los Angeles as "in excess of 200 feet." Anyone who buys that is silly, more like "in excess of 800 feet" and possibly much much deeper in emergencies. The fact is many of the traditional Soviet abuses of the manufacturing system were simply not open to public scrutiny like the west. Even minor manufacturing problems in the west become known, even if in the classified trade press, and are quickly set to rights, but manufacturing problems in the Soviet Union were all on the censors list of even the highest level of the Soviet military industrial complex. Then you have the issue of testing. Basically, you can do it two ways, right and wrong, perhaps adding different shades of rightness or wrongness if you want. There is really no "Soviet way of testing" and "American way of testing" like there is a "Soviet way of making tea" and an "American way of making tea." testing of any problem involves a distinct set of steps that you either follow or come up with worthless data. The report in question at http://history.vif2.ru/library/weapons7.html shows a set of weapons tests on an in place vehicle and bases it conclusions on those firing tests. The report does not report a hardness number for armor plate tested. The report has a nice set of claims about unreliability that I would take into account with a grain of salt, but would probably give the nod to because it follows other reports of motive problems with the King Tiger but not too serious a nod because we do not know that the crew had ever been training it King Tiger upkeep and repair. The subjective shortcomings are probably the most valuable data in the report (or the part that is given to us). A simple look at their methodology of shooting the tank full of holes makes this report unnacceptable. Still, it makes a good beer and pretzels argument if nothing else And the pictures are funny. Now, data with photographs of the first shell firing would be useful.

Why Scott my friend! I have one accidental fog scenario going and yours, but I am about ready to write a manual on it. After I hose those silly TDs of yours with my Nashorn and push you kicking and screaming from the board yelling for mercy I will let you know if I am still practicing or have perfected it ! [This message has been edited by Slapdragon (edited 09-22-2000).]

Actually I know that many people want the whole battle as a full 3D playback file, but I would just like some genius coder to use the Quicktime layer to build a "save clip as QT" command to grab 10 or 15 seconds from a particular camera angle. Hooking the RGB out of my computer to a RGB / NTSC monitor and then into a DVCAM deck works, but it is bulky and time consumung and records NTSC illegal colors. Many 3D applications have a save as quicktime option, such as my Infini-D, but I have no idea how hard that would be to code. It may be more of a 3rd party hack than a BigTime job since I am not sure how many people want to edit the videos - or have Nonlinear video editing experience and the hard drive space to spare.

I have OSX Server and never had the will power to take my streamer off line to try it. OSX comes next week and once I am done with my paid beta testing (more work than you can imagine if you do it right) then I will move on to my free time beta testing and give it a whirr. Steve Jackson [This message has been edited by Slapdragon (edited 09-22-2000).]

Well some things: If both players use random forces then the system works great. I like that anyway since you cannot tailor forces to the environment. In ladder play equality is the goal. In historical play I don't expect to win, only to see what the historical commander faced. For Americans, I am developing my fog fighting skills .

Soviet industrial testing is not only considered suspect, but is often considered worthless (note I am not referring to weapons in particular, the information I have does not cover that, only production by heavy industry) because they failed to follower generally accepted industrial testing methods that any Western 4th year Engineering student can do in their sleep. The Zil design group is an example. When testing prototype Zil trucks the Zil line would take the first example from the production lot and send it to a special refinishing team who would pull and replace almost every part, essentially building a new car -- sometimes using a different engine and new body panels. They would then turn it over to the design team management who had everything to loose from it failing. So the driving test would get done by driving it around a race track with a repair team on hand. All that matters was that it did the right number of laps, not anything else. In the west at the same time a random selection of vehicles would be pulled and tested by a quality assurance group not responsible to the design team (which is why events like Firestone tires had to have inside knowledge -- testing regimes are pretty good in the car industry). In most cases, Soviets were lying to themselves more than they were fighting a propaganda war. Zil plant proved that problems in the Zil Limo were caused by poor metals provided by Kiev Heavy Industries, while Kiev proved that problems withthe Zil were caused by manufacturing mistakes, and the tests done by each district tester proved no fault of their own. The funniest quality control document in the library in one that says Zil vehicles tested out with a 1% rejection of quality control, but that the "minor problems" with delievered vehicles were caused by end users slamming doors "to hard" causing inferior Ukraine metals to break. An example of shoddy testing is what they did to that King Tiger. If they had really wanted to test it, they would have cut it apart and done a series of armor tests in static test rigs - done impact hardness tests -- done all sorts of lab tests. This is exactly what the US did with Soviet tanks and led to the adoption of the L7 105mm. Parking it out in the field and peppering it with repeated shots assures that only the numbers for the first hit were valid as armor looses its stregnth with penetration.

This whole thing came up when I faced an opponent who gave Scott's game parameters: Open map, no air, I play Germans on defensive. He parked 3 King Tigers onto tall hills and then had the nerve to ask for a restart when I got an A-Kill on one of the KTs by using three tanks (actually a TD and two HMCs). (If this has never happened to you: just wait -- on ladder or tourney play you have a small core of German only players who insist on open maps. In the ASL convents you use to have to run over them, and they would get into a position and then stick their. It is not a problem on most ladders anymore -- but they are a pain in the buttox. I offered a rematch at night in the fog and the guy declined -- so I know he only plays must win scenarios). I finally figured that the Americans, on an open map, are nearly unwinnable -- I have only fought one real player, Abbott, to a single standstill by positioning a Jackson in a hard to kill spot and corralling his Tiger. On a heavily forested, night, or fogged map, I think the numbers are dead on. So the ladder choice is quit playing open maps, quit playing the German only or I wont play gang.

Sure, but for every zook you buy, I can get a check that is really killer and not that much more expensive. Add to that in open terrain a couple of MG42 HMG firing down board and your mass zook get clawed out.

Olle: Rout means run away. A routed unit is one who has recieved fired and panicked. Swedish is not one of my languages but if you know French or Spanish I will give you a better definition in those languages. Or perhaps we have someone who speaks Swedish that can help?

I should also say I think the random QB are right on -- especially in smaller contest. You get all sorts of funny German units that no one buys otherwise, and you have to make this heap of oddball units work for you -- it can be very fun.

Well, first -- my plan was not all that special. I had four tank groups:two with Panthers and Hetzers, two with MIV and Marder to simulate a Feb 1945 and set them to leap frog eact other until they double covered two forest breaks heading to a meeting objective while my infantry scampered through the woods through the snow. Plus I had a couple of scouting units to stir up trouble and possibly take a HT column on the flank. His E8s engaged my Hetzers seemingly stupidly positioned after a fast move, my Panthers collected the E8s as they busily shot away. The MKIVs never came into it since they were on flanker ambush. I think you are right about the cost of the A3 if the German has no heavies and if the board is closed. I like Germans in fog battle now because it becomes a mellee of the lion and the maus with evenly matched MKIV thrown in the middle. Then the points seem right on. The only counter I have found to the US dilema in open ground is to always buy a Jackson and park it in a hidden spot that can target the hills. In a gun to gun it dies, but it can keep the hills clean for enough time to move forces in.

I just finished up a game with Grumbling Grognard "Scott". He is a good player, with a good gaming record on the ladders, who knows the game. He took US and I had Germans. The map, by luck, turned out to be open, which often spells doom for the US player, and I slaughtered him with fire from my Panthers as he tried to sneak up to the objective. He had E8 Shermans while I had early model Panthers, plus I had a few other cheap German TDs. A look at the price shows that the Sherman E8s and Panther are close on the price list, while Tigers are right on par. Other 76 armed tanks are right in there also, loosing some points for lower mobility and less armor. The trick is though Scott should have been able to get more Shermans -- it would have made for a better game. As it is I am finding when I play Germans only at night or in closed terrain on meeting engagements are the battles really balanced on buy your own. With more Shermans I would have been forced to duck into the woods more and possibly if I positioned wrong defeated by an envelopement. Some of us have already discussed the ultimate sucker challenge: "open terrain, no air, I play Germans" which is merely an expression of this. I think by lowering the price of the Shermans a bit across the board many suicide QB challenges would become competitive, and make the German side more fun to play in these battles. This will be even more important in QM2 where hordes of Russian tanks, powerful but really poorly handled, are faced with the well handled but few Germans. Another possibility to even open air battles is make Jabo's more likely to strike vehicles on heights. This would have an unintended consequence of keeping the US off easily spotted mountain tops also -- which is realistic, since US tankers were as scared of US dive bombers as the German's were.

I am not qualified to argue about ballistics, but I can say that at 1500 yards the 88L70 kills E2 Shermans 50% of the time (I am rounding from a test). Saying that a 1500 yard kill on a Jumbo lacks punch is like saying a 70mph train hitting my car lacks umph because it only threw it 80 feet instead of 89 feet. Now, maybe some of the later war Soviet tanks are going to give this thing a pass at a kilometer and a half, on most Soviet tanks this thing is going to shoot sunlight through them, not to mention American tanks who are in danger even when they are hiding behind another tank I do think however that BigTime is correct in asking a supported mathematical model before changing what is already a killer tank gun. Avalon Hill never did that with its kill tables in SL!

I used to love Aussie beer while it was still in the big liter cans. Now they have it in screw top bottles, so sad. And Dittohead, I directed the video of Matt in his underwear. It is very artistic, but I never knew he would stoop to making a profitt off of it. Some people are just money grubbing. Of course, my favorite scene is not of Matt but of Fionn in the pasties.

Actually Jeff is taking the heat for me. I noticed on the "sledge on MadMatt" schedule that yesterday it was my turn, but I totally forgot. Jeff took my slot, or else I would be in the fire. By the way Craig, the schedule says you are it for next week, I hope you can tear yourself away from the games to come up with some good flames to get Matt with. ------------- Fir those lacking in sense of humor the proceeding was a joke.