Thermopylae

Realistic auto force selection! Select your basic components (e.g. guards tank battalion vs. heer reinforced rifle company) and the program uses the year and formations to determine the OOB from a realistic set with possible variations, as well as experience levels!

Perhaps bailed crews shouldn't be placed under direct control of the player? In real life, they would be more or less on their own, with a basic notion of survival being their main goal, especially since that notion would have been infintely heightened by having their vehicle turned into a flaming pyre of death.

Mensch when someone becomes your squire, do they have to bring their own white flag? It would only seem fair, seeing as how your own supply must be running low, as indicated by your cowering like a frenchman. Send me a turn you worthless product of 33 beers and a broken condom. Due to Mensch's apparent inability to work anything as complex as a commercial e-mail system, or for that matter a pointy object (hint: keep away from eye), I extend another challenge from beyond the pool to your very own sheep-shagging Mace , despite my fear that he will spend far too much time spreading vegemite on his naughty bits (followed by attempted acts which are physically impossible) to send turns in a timely fashion. Pick the fight Mace, and send me a setup.

To what I'm sure is all your utter dismayMen's Room has exchanged initial set ups with me. We are now locked into mortal combat in a city that resembles the Konigsberg Dillemma. Of course, I can hardly expect any of you to know what that is, But I assure you the map resembles it.

Mensch, Berli went out and made you a scenario within moments of your accepting my challenge. And while it is fully possible you accepted said challenge while under the influence of crack cocaine and/or an overdose of hormones that rushed to your brain when you saw the neighbor's french poodle go by, you are still pledged (for whatever your word is worth, i.e. about one dead lizard and 2 lbs of excrement) to take up arms. And I realize you do not look forward to kissing your own ass, and so might be stalling. It'll not save you, so send the damn thing already you incompetent pile of rat intestines.

All sorts of fast metal objects designed to punch holes in things or blow stuff up tend to be fired at tanks, and in great quantity...not the ideal place to be without those 1000mm of armor...

My previously described realistic random force generator... And maybe a "hide until targeting armor" order for AT guns...

Heres how I see it 5.56 You can carry alot of it. Low recoil, high velocity, increases accuracy in snap-fire situations. High velocity, tumbler effect, gives the light round adequate hitting power. 7.62 Its a heavy round, causes damage. For purposes of aimed single shots/short bursts its highly reliable.

CM CM, Uber alles... (harsh guttural praise of the game, etc) Voted. Figure I owe it after all these months.

BTS Bumping fun... I think seeing the map and core force selection have to be mutually exclusive. A real commander WOULD know what he was attacking, but then again he'd be stuck with his command and some support, not being able to ideally pick.

Yes, this method would take a considerable amount of research, particularly for troop quality likelihood, but I figure for the TO&Es you wouldn't have to do every battle group, just take an example division from that time period/branch and use its equipment as a reference. Heres another idea BTW, how about in the early war only partially armed soviet squads being an option? You know, the quarter million man armies that were commissioned without rifles. The troop count would be the same (or higher) of a normal russian squad, but they would only possess around half the weaponry of a normal squad. This would further inspire use of mass. After all those extra bodies count in a close assualt, but are useless at a rnaged fight

Presenting a solution to the long argued gamey issue: If BTS would incorporate a "realistic" computer pick option in CM2 as compared to mere automatic selection. The players would select a generic force composition (combined, inf, etc.) as well as branch. Using these givens, the players would select the size of game they wanted to fight. So you would pick a "reinforced company" size game, and the computer would crank out a realistic TO&E at random from the branch of service selected, the size being naturally upped for the Russians and the attackers, and then modified by chance (since no unit was precisely at TO&E). Experience levels would then be randomly determined based on unit (fallschirmjaeger being more likely to be of high quality than say, volksgrenadiers) . Appropriate armor/artillery levels for that force would be doled out, with the actual tanks/batteries being detrmined by the likelihood of them appearing in the given force. So Guards and SS might be more likely to possess newer tanks/more of them etc, with of course modifications for the attackers. With this system there is a chance for a realistic, but not completely foretold, confrontation.

The wooden ones have a high tendency to die when shelled, but those concrete buggers can take just about anything you can throw at them. Usually The tank-box approach doesn't work so well because there's always at leats one AT gun somewhere waiting to brewup your threatening tank. I find slipping a rifle sqaud or team behind them (they're usually used as anchors in the line, so infantry supporttend sto be sparse) will kill them off nicely and for minimium risk. (if they are supported, well you can afford a half squad more than a tank)

There are two major factors that are being severely understated here that contribute to why this is not done in real life. 1) Relative firepower. CM firepower ratings indicate the effectiveness of a single weapon being fired at a point target. It is naturally expected that the target squad/team is dispersed realistically over a given portion of terrain, and is moving using whatever cover it can to preserve itself. If you have a tidal wave of men rushing forward, significantly less time has to be spent aiming, and the chances of hitting anything at all are increased many fold because there is quite simply a lot more to hit. Garands, Thompsons, and BARs would all have exponentially higher firepower ratings, since they are now essentially shooting at a civil war battle line. In addittion, The terrain is now cluttered with onrushing men. There simply aren’t enough dips, bushes, and stones to hide them all as they run forward which means some of them will be very exposed an easy targets. CM firepower reflects none of this. Lets not even get started on the effects of HE and shrapnel on tight formations. 2) Blue on Blue The Onrushing horde pours out an amazing amount of firepower largely because eof the same assumptions. I.E., the squad is functioning in typical manner. IRL, all those neat automatic weapons become a liability when there’s 40 of your own guys ahead of you. As such the defenders would be significantly less supressed/suffer fewer casualties because not all the weapons are firing, only the ones near or at the front of the wave, especially in the case of WWII SMGs. Also, the support guns wouldn’t dare fire anywhere near the advancing infantry, because quite frankly you don’t want to accidentally blow apart 15 friendlies with a misplaced shell. (Russian accidents are brilliant proof of this) As for the argument about Korea I’d have to point out a single marine division in retreat and cut off held 500,000 Chinese using this tactic at bay, with significant Chinese losses. Good as the marines may be, this has to speak for something. Also, the east front proved time and again that this type of attack doesn’t work until you’ve laid a carpet of dead.

Contour Lines?

Anything on the other side of the bridge that has been identified as enemy should have at least a MG and a rifle squad or two firing at it. And your men should be moving forward into an artillery barrage that you stop only before the final rush, a chance of a shell landing on the bridge is very limited, but if you want to be safe, you can fire in the rear areas. And as a rule of thumb, don't do it at night (operations only), the bridge will still be open enough that your men can be spotted despite their best efforts, and you no longer can call on firendly fire support.

Hmmm...I'm surprised I've evaded counseling this long, if thats enough to get you shrinked. Welp, 1.5 more years to go...lets just hope they don't overhear one of my conversations with the video guys over what lovely fields of fire our auditorium has

Hmmm...I'm surprised I've evaded counseling this long, if thats enough to get you shrinked. Welp, 1.5 more years to go...lets just hope they don't overhear one of my conversations with the video guys over what lovely fields of fire our auditorium has

Whoever thought up this post had a definite evil streak to them... Which is not to say that mimary herself isn't real, just saying that it was deliberately placed for reaction. Of course all posts are put up for a reaction of sorts, but there was a clear and undeniable point in the first message that "This post is going up because I want to point out that I'm a Female, and I play CM, therefore I am special." (the post itself is evidence of that motive by the way, just look at the topic line) Seems like a pretty good way to get people to bite. And bite they did. Obviously the gods of irony are having a fun time at this too, because merely by posting I'm falling in line with the lot of you. Oh well.

The name ocming from that eighties game where you scurried around blatsing holes in the ground and climbing ladders and such?

My 2 cents on the mobile defense...(wich I'm almost sure will look nothing like Pillar's) Tere's of course the obvious anti-recon elements which are usually MGs or ligt vehicles that require the attacker brign up armor or a larger infantry force to displace, that operate well ahead of the mian lines, or failing that have large fire zones capable of slicing up potential recon. (and nothing seems to draw tanks up better than a light vehicle) And of course the pre-sited AT defenses. Since these elemnts are essentially locked into position (the skirmish line almost always falls back, but for te purpose of the MLR it cannot be considered a flexible force), the real mobile elements are the infantry and te armor. Since it fairly obvious how to move your armor around, Lets continue into the ifantry. The intial positions of te infantry should be in positions that can utilize the awesome defenseive onus of foxholes. Tis bonus allows you to save the truly good ground for your fall back. essentially creating two MLRs. for your use. Diggign in on trees on the forward of a slope, and then using the reverse as a a fall abck means you can shift troops to and from equally defensible positions, same thing for villages and towns. Counterattacks can be launched from the front MLR or the Second MLR, and reserves can be shifted without any fear of being caught off gurad because wherever they are is a position worth fighing from. Once these two main postioins are established , the infsntry can be whipped around to anywhere on the battlefield. i seem to have gone long winded again..welp 2 cents anyhow..

Though it would be pointedly biased not to mention that TH has a stigma of gaminess associated with it...and some people (of whom you can find any number by searcing up one of the epic gamer v. historian debates) believe that the battles there are really won in the force selection screen. (does not nessecarily reflect view of the poster, altough I do tend to be more historically inclined)

Hmmm..whaddaya know, I disappear for a few days and a discussion has begun and died w/o me knowing it. Welp..suppose I'll ave to start another post on command virtues often ignored.

AAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!! I've never seen you before...

Every single time one attacks, one develops a general plan outlining their axises of advance, what forces will be dedicated wherever, and all that good stuff. Most often these plans involve getting to jump off points/ cover. And around these areas the entire attack is committed. It is common however, that the defneder will construct your plan in his head as well. After all, he is being called to defeat it. Too many times people will lock themsleves into their plan despite being outguessed, and will continue to attack directly into prepared positions becaus ethat is wht the plan says to do. This can be alleviated simply by withdrawing, and red deploying to another position, another axis, even if it isn't the primry one. I'd go on further..but study hall just ended.