engy

Ok. Downloaded it. Comment: You couldn't have placed the VL in a more difficult spot for the infantry to hold--right out in the middle of nowhere. No cover around the flag for a good 100m. The 8 halftracks become armored MG positions due to the lack of any AT capability on the German side. I played Axis and let the AI take the US. Results: Turn 20, American Auto-surrender. 6 Halftracks already knocked out, other 2 are running for the hills. I lost 65 casualties. My tactics? Sit in the woods/brush/rough and shock/button every halftrack. Then using rough move orders ('boxing' 6-8 units at a time), I sent them moving to locations in front and behind each halftrack, so when it wanted to move away, it had to move past/through a group of infantry. Starting with turn 10, I knocked out about 1 halftrack per turn. engy [This message has been edited by engy (edited 02-19-2001).]

I agree that it does look rather strange, however, it's nothing new...I have seen the "diagonal zigzag" since 1.05

Sorry, Jeff, but you're wrong... According to the Official Troll vs. Fish Manual, a post by a fish revealing the Troll scores a point (so 3 points for you so far). Furthermore, although Pvt. Ryan didn't actually come out and say it, I think his post about the weather shows his keen discernment of the state of the thread. So, the official tally: Troll: 24 Fish: 4 Edited because this initially made no sense, and it isn't much better now. [This message has been edited by engy (edited 02-13-2001).]

Hey all... I have a sluggish video card, but I've found that installing the mods lo-res works quite well. I've taken several of the high-res mods and shrunk the .bmp's one at a time (using Paint Shop Pro), but it's quite tedious. Does anybody know of a program that would batch convert .bmp's by a certain factor (ie tell it 50% and it shrinks a directory full of bmp's by that factor: a 256x256 to 128x128, a 64x32 to 32x16, etc)? I've seen some that will batch convert to a given *size* (which doesn't work, because the .bmps all start out different sizes), but not by a given *factor*. Thanks for any help in pointing me in the right direction. engy ------------------ "He who makes war without many mistakes has not made war very long." Napoleon Bonaparte

3 1)1 2)5 3)5 4)0 5)0 6)0

3 1) 1 2) 0 3) 6 4) 3 5) 2 Edited to include Big Dog's 4. [This message has been edited by engy (edited 02-06-2001).]

The "Finding Opponents" section can also be used to find PBEM opponents (if you scroll down through the list you will see other people who have done so.) Also, there are several ladders that keep getting advertised here in the forum. Although I'm not a member of any of them, the two that come to mind, from having seen them most frequently, are http://www.tournamenthouse.com/CM/ and http://www.rugged-defense.nl/ Or, you can always drop me an email (address in the profile) and I'll gladly give you a game. engy ------------------ "He who makes war without many mistakes has not made war very long." Napoleon Bonaparte

~New York Giants impersonation~ *punt*

Wow, Kip...good work, and a very clearly written post. Well done. Whether I agree with your conclusion ("put it back to the old way") or not is somewhat irrelevant to the point I would like to make: There have been several "home-grown" scenarios reported on in the last few weeks to either prove or disprove the success of the new hull-turning algorithm. Unfortunately, that is the problem: I can create a valid, historical-like scenario and if it reinforces my argument, I publish it. However, someone else can create a scenario that is just as valid and historical-like and it might come to the opposite conclusion. (I believe it was Bullethead who published scenario results right after the furor broke out 'proving' that the new way is better.) For example, let's take your scenario and modify it a bit: Scenario: AT gun at 11 o'clock opens up first. Possible response of tank: Method A. Turn turret only to engage. Method B. Turn turret and hull (completely) to engage. Let's examine both methods under 2 different conditions, taking your assertion that the AT gun is possibly/probably lethal when firing from the Panther's 10 or 2 o'clock position. Condition A: Another AT gun at 1 o'clock then opens fire. Obviously, Method A is better, since the front of the hull still obliquely faces both targets. Method B is likely to result in a dead Panther. Condition B: Another AT gun at 10 o'clock then opens fire. Method A now possibly results in a dead Panther, but Method B has the hull front obliquely facing both targets. (And no doubt, we could go on all day rearranging the AT guns to favor 'A' or 'B'.) So, which is better? I think it completely depends on the situation. There are other factors involved (eg, the "hull-turning method" brings the gun to bear more quickly) which add another layer of information to be dealt with. To sum up, I am not sure that isolated cases, no matter how carefully designed and tested, are able to prove the argument one way or another. engy ------------------ "He who makes war without many mistakes has not made war very long." Napoleon Bonaparte

Way OT... Ok, call me an idiot (every village needs one), but I must have missed something somewhere... The Background: It seemed like all of a sudden one day these posts full of extremely technical information started popping up all over the forum. I've searched all of Rexford's posts, and to the best of my ability, I never even saw an opening "Hello, I'm uber-grognard Rexford and I'm armed with data...". The very first post just opened with more physics than my high school curriculum contained. So, the questions: 1. Who are you, Rexford? 2. Where in the world is all this data coming from, anyway? 3. Often in your posts you use the plural form "we". Who is "we"? Sorry for being extremely nosey, but this has intrigued me for a couple of weeks now. If curiosity killed the cat, I just used up about 8 of his lives... engy ------------------ "He who makes war without many mistakes has not made war very long." Napoleon Bonaparte

I'm going to stay away from the historical discussion here and give one CM example of a *very interesting* surrender from a current PBEM. (In fact, this just occurred on the movie this morning.) Situation: Fog, I'm attacking. Defender (German) has set up a platoon in an isolated clump of woods and thrashed me with a vicious ambush. However, I have troops he hasn't seen on the left and right of his ambush. I run a Company HQ and 1 squad into a building *behind* the ambush (it's fog, remember, so he has no idea I'm there) and begin to attack the ambush platoon with the rest of my forces on the left and right (which include some armor) and some arty. The German squad at the rear of the ambush breaks and retreats toward the building I have just occupied. My men open up, the German squad immediately surrenders (with very few casualties) and begins walking back toward the rest of the German platoon. As soon as the surrendered squad is in range of his comrades, the other two German squads (the rest of the "ambush") also surrender. I've never seen it before in CM and wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't watched 3 times. Roughly 25 men surrendered based on the knowledge that they were surrounded (and, at least it appeared that the first squad to surrender influenced the other two). engy ------------------ "He who makes war without many mistakes has not made war very long." Napoleon Bonaparte

CM does not seem to model the psychological effects of a pending flame attack.. "Pending" flame attack? As in, I see a flamethrower about to let loose at me? The psychological effects of that would be every single man in my squad firing everything he has in the direction of the flamethrower team. it seems to only kill, and not more effectively than say a normal squad at the same ranges.. CM does model the morale effects of having been a flamethrower target. Just check the status of the roasted infantry...it certainly will not read "OK" and the infantry flamethrowers are so slow and vulnerable in CM...I suggest they allow it to move fast for short periods Slow and vulnerable in real life, too. There was a thread not too long ago about what it took to strap on the tank, carry it, and get off a shot, and it was not an easy thing. I don't have the thread name right here, but it should come up with a search. that they are useless except on the defensive which is unrealistic cause it was an offensive weapon. You just need to be very methodical in the attack. I have gotten flame teams into effective position on the attack, but it's not as easy as sprinting a rifle squad down a city street. Infantry needs to be in place, providing suppressive fire, in order for the flamethrower to have a chance to get close, because once seen (and rightfully so), it becomes a very high priority target. I suggest that and not fire off bursts miles off target. I've actually had flame throwers get into range and then fire 45 degrees off to the right. What a joke. Never seen it, so I can't agree/disagree. But I would suggest not throwing out phrases like "what a joke" unless you can show us that flamethrower teams, once in place, scored a direct hit with every single one of their shots. Remember, flame teams are people, too, and just like any other infantryman, they will duck (reducing the effectiveness of their attack) when faced with significant suppressing fire. engy ------------------ "He who makes war without many mistakes has not made war very long." Napoleon Bonaparte

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Silver Stars: my big problem with collapsing buildings is the fact that it invariably leads to people shelling entire towns into rubble for no reason. ...snipped... <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Read any good account of Operation Market-Garden, specifically about Col. Frost's(I think) paratroops trapped in Arnhem. The Germans ordered their Tiger tanks, IIRC, to "shell each house floor by floor until they completely collapsed". As you can expect, it wasn't a healthy enviroment for the British paras.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Henri: Actually I was thinking mostly of US doctrine of the period (I forgot the word for it), which consisted of avoiding casualty-heavy fighting in favor of exploiting the US greater firepower and control of the air. This was modeled in teh US module of Squad Leader which caused a furor when it came out, because US units would break somewhat easier than their German or British countgerparts. Don Greenwood and the designers of Squad Leader had to write an article in The Avalon Hill General (I still have the article) explaining why this modeling of US behavior was historical, and did not reflect an inferiority of US soldiers' fighting ability but rather a difference in tactics. <snip> Henri<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Ahh, I see where you are coming from now, and knowing that makes your original statement make a lot more sense to me. *Tries very hard to remember the SL squads...* German 4-6-7 US 6-6-6 How did I do? I'm thinking that I have both "morale check" numbers (7 vs 6) correct, and I remember how *huge* of a difference that one point made for a 2-12 dice roll result! [This message has been edited by engy (edited 01-18-2001).]

To answer your 3 conclusions: 1. I agree. 2. This completely depends on *which* German infantry you are talking about. German Rifle 44/45 vs US Rifle 44/45 and you are absolutely correct. Take a Panzergrenadier squad, and it's equal. Ah...forget the verbiage, let's do the numbers... Squad Type..........Firepower at 40m ----------..........---------------- US Rifle 44...............209 US Rifle 45...............230 German Rifle 44...........161 German Rifle 45...........178 Ger. Panzergrenadier......215 Ger. Volksgrenadier SMG...288 Ger. Fusilier SMG.........324 US Para...................231 US Glider.................257 Ger. Gebirgsjaeger........315 Ger. Fallschirmjaeger.....281 US Engineer...............209 Ger. Rifle Pioneer........131 (BTW, using an old Excel CM database, and I did not check against 1.1 for accuracy.) So, it completely depends on the type of squads in the battle, for the advantage can go to either nationality. 3. I'm going to nitpick on this one, but in general what you have said is true: due to the larger squad size for the US, they are more able to take casualties then their German counterparts. However... ....#1. I've played PBEMs when my US squads literally would not advance without panicking/breaking under moderate fire ....#2. Again, "historical fact" might be debated...are you thinking of US Green troops under fire for the first time compared to seasoned Germans, or should we compare '45 US troops vs "old men-young boy" Germans? engy Edited because I used spaces the first time for the table, and they seemed to be deleted when the message was posted. Any help to be offered? [This message has been edited by engy (edited 01-18-2001).]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by CavScout: If the German knows he has an advantage in infantry assest and a disadvantage in armor assests, why is he engaging with the armor first? You don't have to lead with armor, you do know that? Right? If a player who insists on playing the Germans, as you could play the Allies in an ME, you can insist on a ARMOR force mix over a combined arms. Why pick combined arms when all you want is tanks? Seems people are complaining when there seems to be a rather simple fix. Cav <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Wait one second. Please show me, in my previous post, where I said either of the following... 1. As German, I'm leading with my armor. 2. I want only tanks. 3. I am biased toward choosing Germans in QB's. You cannot, because I did not say any of them. I have tried to make the point that the artificial transfer of points from Armor to Vehicles restricts a German player from purchasing a historical force mix in which his armored force would be comparable to the opposing Allied armored force (and, I know that others here are campaigning because of the play balancing issues strictly pt. vs. pt., but I am not going there.) And a point by point rebuttal to the above... 1. For you to assume that I'm in this argument only because I am ignorant of combined armed tactics shows an extremely poor grasp of the subject, or a trite reading of the posts so far. 2. I have no desire for "only" tanks. I frequently play Mechanized/Infantry battles, and often spend my Combined Arms armor points on "support" units (Priest, Wespe, etc). 3. I play Allies *at least* 50% of the time. So, instead of making accusations based on assumptions you have made, get back to the point...the transfer of points to Vehicles shifts the German purchase *away* from what was historically in the field.

Cav... I'm not talking about vaccuums! 100 points advantage in infantry is not the same as 100 points in armor. Oftentimes, with armor, 1 shot=kill, and my armor points are gone. Not just shaken/cautious/half-strength, but gone. However, it's very rare (although it has almost happened), that I lose an entire platoon (~ 100 pts, roughly) in one shot to another platoon. So, pretend for a moment that the US does gain an advantage from this 100 point armor differential. As US, the infantry battle is not *immediately* effected by being 100 pts down (but it would show after a number of turns), but as the German, once I come face to face with 100 extra points of US armor, I can be finished in a moment. Once that happens, the German 100 point infantry advantage is completely offset by US Direct Fire HE.

I have to disagree, Slap, but only slightly. In a Marder/Sherman fight, a hit=kill both ways (except for the uparmored M4's, which only helps my argument). There is no way that a non-turreted Marder can be as effective as a turreted Sherman, so the Shermans win this one. So, you suggest the Germans add 'shrecks? US adds 'zooks, which go through the front side of a Marder like it isn't there. Germans add a 75mm Halftrack. Ahhh..my point exactly. You were much more likely to see another Marder/Stug III/Hetzer than a 251/9, and I prefer to buy my forces in the "more historical" type of look. (I've never bought a Puma, and out of 15 PBEMs I've never bought a King Tiger, or JagdPanther, or JagdTiger, and only 1 251/9.) So, I add a Stug III instead. Uhhh...errr...can't do it. Not enough points. I'm forced to pick some rarer vehicle instead of what the Germans actually put in the field.

This may be a bit of a redirection of the conversation, but I'll let fly anyway... Assuming that some of the German Armor points were placed into Vehicles (I don't have the 1.05 to 1.1 breakdown to know if the Vehicles points were raised or not), the question really becomes, from a historical perspective, why? There is very little in the German vehicle list (excluding the basic model 251/1) that was anything but rare, or even very rare, on the Western Front for this time period (eg Puma, 251/9, 251/16, etc.) It seems that if anything, the points should get plowed back into the Armor from a historical perspective, as the German tendency toward turretless TD's increased. Or should the Germans have a separate colums for armor: Armor-TD and Armor-Tank. (I know it's not going to happen in CM, but I inserted it to emphasize my point). Historically, taking our 1000 pt ME for an example, I wasn't likely to see 1 Panther and 1 Puma in every battle (which is what the German Armor/Vehicle balance now forces), but I was a whole lot more likely to see several TDs. Can it be done as the Germans now? 1000 pt ME gives Germans 200 pts Armor: (points given for Regular) 2 JPz IV = 240 pts. NO. 3 Marders = 217 pts. NO. 1 Panther/Tiger + anything (even a Marder!). NO. In the above example, using the Marders, the German can buy 2. So, giving the Allies their 300 pts, we are saying that 2 Marders vs. a M4(76) type and an M4 is a balanced fight? Forgive me for the stream-of-consciousness style of arguing. I normally don't hop into these discussions, but this one has me riled. Next time I'll try to get a little bit of order to my logic. engy ------------------ "He who makes war without many mistakes has not made war very long." Napoleon Bonaparte

Another cook jumps in to stir the pot... On the RAM issue, I think one warning might be appropriate right about now: Not all RAM is created equal. As has been mentioned already, Mushkin, Kingston, and Crucial (Micron) are top notch (in my book)--Samsung has also been recommended to me, but I've never looked into it, so I can't vouch for it. However, there is some RAM out there that is just a problem waiting to happen. Compare the prices at Crucial/Kingston/Mushkin (for their "value/standard" RAM), and you will see that they are fairly close. Be wary, then, when you see some shop at 30%-40% below those prices: *some* of it *is* substandard and will give you less reliable performance. In fact, on some sites that sell memory you will see a disclaimer somewhere that their advertised bargain basement RAM is not intended to be partnered with the latest line of Intel/AMD chips. My advice: Stick with big-name RAM (an extra $15 per 128MB right now for Crucial/Kingston/Mushkin over bargain-basement) and you won't regret it. ---oops...sorry Bruno, just reread your post ("RAM with mustard on it") and you've said it already. Oh, well. Edited to apologize to Bruno. [This message has been edited by engy (edited 01-16-2001).]

bump=nudge=punt... When a topic drifts off the bottom of the first page it is well nigh dead, so often times people will give what they believe is a valid/important/overlooked topic a "bump". That "bump", being a new post, sends it to the top of the forum again. On some forums, a self-bump is considered extremely poor etiquette, but here it happens commonly enough. engy Edited to include "other forum etiquette" ------------------ "He who makes war without many mistakes has not made war very long." Napoleon Bonaparte [This message has been edited by engy (edited 01-12-2001).]

Wow. Good detective work. (I guess I should have read the list of fixes.) Hmmm...maybe we could change that little extra bit of code to not include "\" (or actually even "/", which is how I usually typed it, being only recently weaned from unix. ) engy

In my cmbo\PBEM directory, I have a number of sub-directories for saving my PBEM files of different opponents eg. cmbo\PBEM\jim cmbo\PBEM\joe cmbo\PBEM\bob Until 1.1 final, when I was asked to provide a filename, in the appropriate box I would type "jim\jim01" which would put PBEM file jim01 into the jim directory. Now, in 1.1 final, if I type "jim\jim01", I get a file in the *PBEM* directory called "jim jim01". I've tried it over and over, and then went back to 1.05-1.1b24 and verified that: 1. Yes, I used to be able to do this. 2. No, now I cannot. It's not showstopping, but I've got a bunch of PBEM's going on, so it is irritating. engy

Topi-- Ok, since you twisted my arm (ouch!) about it, I'll mention my SMG troops... SMG troops. That's how I got my 3 points. Henri-- I was just about to mention how glad I was to see you posting again around here, but then you bring up this court-martial business. Off to the wastelands with you again... And lastly, I forgot to mention the more ominous part of this story. My last PBEM completed: a 94-6 loss to Dschugaschwili (which makes a total of 9--count 'em--9) points *total* in my last two games). It looks like I'm in a vicious downward spiral. Maybe I should go back to playing CC2.

Ever played a game of CM when you haven't just been beaten, but you've been *embarrassed*? Today I played my first TCP/IP game with a guy I've been regularly playing PBEM's with (Topi, from Finland). 1000 pts, armor, lots of trees and hills, random weather=fog. I chose 2 Panthers, a Tiger, a JPz V/70, and a Marder III; 3 Panzershrecks, and a platoon of infantry. In boxing match style, I'll give you the round-by-round summary... Round 1: No shooting. [both boxers size each other up. Round Winner: Draw.] Round 2: My Panther, moving fast down the road over a 30m clear stretch to get behind some woods, gets nailed in the side of the turret. [Ow. He lands a jab on my eye. Winner: Topi.] Round 3: My 2nd Panther, sitting in overwatch on a ridge in some woods, never even gets off a shot against an M18 moving in the open toward it. The M18 plugs its first shot right through the Panther's turret. [ugh. An thumping uppercut and another jab to the eye leave me dazed, with my eye nearly swollen shut. Winner: Topi.] Round 4: My Marder III misses a shot at a different M18 from 9m (yes, "9", as in, less than a first down in football) and gets nailed by the M18 it just missed. My JPz V/70, seeing the commotion, fires at the M18 and...of course...misses. The M18 puts a round right through the front armor. [i'm getting pummeled. Left hook, right hook. I collapse to the mat but make it up before the 10 count. Winner:Topi.] Round 5: My Tiger sees the M18 that killed my Panther coming up the hill toward it. One of my 'shrecks also sees the M18, penetrates the front turret...and nothing. It lives, it breathes, it continues moving and firing. The Tiger then fires at it and...misses. The M18 then toasts the Tiger through the front turret. My 'shreck fires at the M18 again, misses, and sets his own building on fire, so he runs out in front of the M18 mg. Dead. ["Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee?" Not me. More like "Hit me hard, I'm a punching bag." Blood streams from a gash on my forehead; my eyes barely open wide enough to see. My trainer wonders if he should call 911. Winner: Topi.] Round 6-8: One of my 'schreck teams misses 5 (yes, 5!) straight shots and runs out of ammo. The other one never gets a shot off and routs away under fierce HE fire. [i muster my courage and my little remaining strength and come out swinging. Must be the blood in my eyes, but I don't land a single punch. Winner x 3: Topi.] Round 9: Gruesome HE death to my infantry. Alt-U. I surrender. I hang my head in shame and burn myself in effigy. [Knocked Out. Comatose on the mat. Notify my next of kin. Match winner: Topi. Score: 97-3.] My signature seems ever so appropriate now... engy ------------------ "He who makes war without many mistakes has not made war very long." Napoleon Bonaparte [This message has been edited by engy (edited 01-10-2001).]