Hensworth

It took him a while to grasp though...

A note of appreciation

Thought it was about time this separate tourney got its separate thread. Kingfish, I realize you're busy wrapping up the original ROW, but I think you may need to do some maintenance work on the Overflow as well. Please note that posting the scores from another tournament will allow people to determine the balance of the scenarios and fight accordingly in the tournament still in progress. Here's my status : The Beast against Bullitt : done Rearguard action against Barrage : turn 25 of 40 King of Debrecen against Sgt Goody : turn 24 of 28 The Christmas battle against PBIman : turn 13 of 38 Hosszupalyi against Ivan_RU : turn 8 of 25 I have severe doubts about these last 2 guys ever finishing this tournament. I am getting fed up with having to wheedle each and every turn out of them.

We Belgians beat you both at weirdness and foreign languages. Ceci n'est pas un post.

I hide the units with covered arcs, but leave the HQ they're under unhidden. Thanks to the borg spotting the hidden units know something has come into their arc because the HQ unit 'tells' them. HQs are smaller units so they are harder to spot. They don't open up as readily as other units either, so you can get away with leaving them unhidden.

OK. This is what Babel Fish makes of it, roughly : Pic 1 More than 60 years ago this crossing was made... Pic 2 Almost 60 years ago this tank entered a pontoon bridge made up of metal boats from the far bank of the Neva Pic 3 Crew of 5, weight more than 48 tons, 3 DT machine guns, 76.2 mm gun, complete ammunition - 130 shells for the gun and bullets for the machine guns and side arms, repair equipment... Pic 4 Under cover of darkness they pulled the pontoon to the left shore. Almost on the shore, the pontoon evidently came under fire. The bulky object, weighing several tons, slid down into the water. Pic 5 Only now after 60 years has the tank completed its crossing. Pic 6 Can't make sense of it, something about rollers having been pulled to try and get the machine moving ? Pic 7 The system of pulleys with which the tank was drawn out of the water. Pic 8 General view of the salvage operation. Luckily, the water in the Neva was low, almost as in 1941 (according to eyewitness recollection). Pic 9 The tank was surprisingly well preserved. Under the growth (sic) is bright metal. Pic 10 Judging by its overall look, the tank had undergone a major overhaul. In the picture - scalded hole near the gun shield. Pic 11 "Unloading fire unit - disks" ??? Pic 12 Hatches above the engine. The metal shines as new. Pic 13 Hatch in the turret. Pic 14 In the turret it is incredibly tight. It's hard to understand how 5 people fit in here in warm winter clothing. Pic 15 Inside the turret. On the left the gun, on the right the sight (probably). Pic 16 Inside the tank, looking down. Seats are visible for the crew, to the left the gun. Everything is covered with a thick layer of mud or "solyarkoy" (?) (and therefore the entire tank was preserved so well). Pic 17 An additional find from the bottom of the Neva - an aircraft engine with fragments of a wooden propeller. Pic 18 Number of the engine. In principle it should be possible to determine the aircraft and when it was made. Pic 19 On the Neva five kopeck coin (?). Photograph from the entrenchment besides the former German positions. Pic 20 Souvenir of the times of war in the Neva. Pic 21 Neva "pyatachek" (?). On the shore : old gasmasks, boots. Size 43/1, something to the effect of it being a firm "runner". Pic 22 Remains of a light tank on the shore. Pic 23 Grenades, mines, antitank projectiles. Still life of the Neva five kopeck coin (maybe it refers to the area ?). Pic 24 Human remains are found next to the pontoon.

That is indeed the reason. I'm still on 1.02, can't see the scenario in the list. When I try to open it in the editor it says I need to upgrade first.

Just removed my double post to make V's next one look stupid [ April 27, 2003, 04:34 PM: Message edited by: Sgt_Kelly ]

I've downloaded all 3 scenarios. When I get around to playing them you'll see some feedback at the Depot.

Let me say first and foremost that this is pure speculation from someone who's never even been NEAR an AFV, but I think the reason you see relatively few tanks on fire in CMBB is because the only thing that will set them on fire is a catastrophic hit. This is probably not realistic. In war footage you often see tanks start to burn slowly (electrical fires ?). The crew abandons the vehicle because their compartment is filling up with smoke and the tank is probably immobilized. But it can take a while before the smoke really starts to belch out and any flames become visible. This would explain why you often read about and see pictures of battlefields full of burning wrecks but no massive losses among tank crews. Just trying to be helpful .

I was the first to see this gem. Unfortunately I had to suffer the unmitigated disaster that constitutes its subject as well . I did my side of the story, which is not quite finished yet. I'm knocking together a very similar kind of site to what Lou is doing, but like many suggest I want to put both sides of the battle up.

I've received some praise for my AARs. Check them out : Nordic Wannabee Tourney AARs Mine are near the bottom. They're from the CMBO days but that doesn't matter much I suppose.

Another point : the inner roadwheels are almost invisible. I think the shadow is a little overdone there.

Oh my god. I'm the one playing Lou and I'm LOSING ! Kindly tell your wife to mind her own business, NOW ! By the way, does she know about your little AAR-writing fetish ?

[Double post] Hey, it's my first ever. [ April 05, 2003, 05:37 AM: Message edited by: Sgt_Kelly ]

Of course this game will just be something to keep me occupied until the Second Coming of the Western Front (but then I thought that about CMBB too, and now it feels like I still haven't scratched the surface of it when there's already a new CM game in the offing). One niggle from the military ignoramus that I am : buildings. The square blocks with yards of open ground between them were completely unsuitable as representations of Western European style buildings. CMBB was a step forward because Russian villages are actually built that way. But there is no way in the world we'll be able to make those desert, Cretian and Italian villages look realistic if there's nothing else on offer but those same old CMBO buildings again.

I use a slightly different approach. I consider infantry caught in an accurate barrage while moving in the open an immediate write-off. It's one of those things you really don't want to happen. Discussions about what you can do with a rattled infantry unit 5-10 minutes later are of little importance IMHO. If the unit is so vital that you have to hold up everything until they've recovered, you've probably lost the game already. If it isn't that vital, push on regardless and we'll see if it has any further role to play (maybe it will be able to hold a flag or something). Plan without it. If the barrage is mostly off target than you can probably save them. I never run them through the barrage though, that's a certain demise. When in cover I always hide and stay put. You'll be surprised how much a platoon will take when they've got their faces in the dirt. It really takes a lot to break them. You'll take casualties of course, but normally these are not excessive. If you have really bad luck, you'll lose about 30 % (if you have really, really bad luck, you'll lose your entire HQ of course ). I consider a unit with intact morale and at 70% strength of more value than a rattled one at full strength. They will only start running again at the first sign of trouble. Maybe I just don't have the skill to get my men out of a pickle, but I've found that's the best way for me to make the most of a bad situation.

Anyone who fails to grasp what JasonC is banging on about, play the Jaegermeister scenario as the Russians.

We've made a suggestion to BTS. They feel it's not worth the trouble. End of story as far as I'm concerned.

Status report : The Beast v Bullitt : done Rearguard action v Barrage : turn 17 King of Debrecen v Sgt Goody : turn 8 Not heard anything for 2 weeks. The Christmas Battle v PBIMan : turn 11 Hosszupalyi v Ivan_RU : turn 5 Averaging about 3 files a month.

Thanks for the praise, Fionn. I was, however, trying to make the OPPOSITE point . Writing AARs doesn't have to take long (I do them while the game is in progress, hence some of the 'honesty', you can't gloss over mistakes until you KNOW they're mistakes ). Slapping that little site together certainly didn't take long. Check out Daffy Duck's site as well. Link is in his current post.

I've played my first few battles as well and find that I have been up against veritable hordes of Russian infantry and guns. In my first battle my battlegroup, reinforced by a platoon of 8 wheeled AC's, took out 6 guns and caused 196 casualties, suffering only a fraction of that themselves (I believe 11). I still only got a tactical victory because of the masses of Russians left on the battlefield. My troops had exhausted all their ammo. The second battle (immediate attack) was pretty much along the same lines, but the quality of the Russian troops was 1 level higher and there was no getting through them (very open terrain as well). Is this normal or am I doing something wrong rolling up the forces ?

Here is the AAR site I slapped together after taking part in the first round of a Tourney. I've posted the link a couple of times and have always had very positive reactions. It shows that something utterly stupid and simple can still be at least mildly interesting. As you can see I picked up on Fionn's idea (better call it his idea ) of trying to get both sides of the battle. It didn't quite work because many people didn't bother with writing AARs, but you get the idea of what I was trying to do. It takes up 9 MB. I've also had positive reactions to the format of the AARs I write. There are quite a few players out there who like to peruse this kind of stuff, get an idea of how other people experience the game. I think they could make up an interesting little sub-community.

Hear, hear. I always specify 'scenarios only' when looking for opponents and have never had any trouble. It has the added benefit of your being able to blame it on an unbalanced scenario if you lose. No need to go calling people names :cool: .