Tris

Wrong. This happens continuously and the yellow "sight lines" almost always appear. Apparently, the Hunt command will not allow for the AFV to "stop and engage" ground troops the same as it would it's opposite number (if it ever did--I forget what it was like back with v1.05), and this might or might not have a connection to the infantry engagement tweak((s) made along the way. No matter, Hunt is not a good command to issue willy nilly to an AFV if this vehicle is headed into terrain which might well contain infantry assets with anti-armor capability. Best to first sweep (and hopefully sanitize) that area beforehand with your own groundpounders. (I've "learned" that the hard way . . . several times now. ) [This message has been edited by Tris (edited 02-04-2001).]

Looks better, Nicholas. I'll try it out as soon as Maximus posts the batch files.

I don't know what source(s) you might be working from, Jason, for your appreciation of d'Erlon's attack but I'll quote mine: The Campaigns of Napoleon by David Chandler and Napoleon As a General, Vol. II by Count Yorck von Wartenburg (with West Point Atlas maps). The grand battery was placed opposite the lowest point of the ridge, left to right, and in front of Picton's position. Its fire routed one brigade rapidly, and that sector continued to lose men. In order to avoid losing men repeatedly, the line had to be moved back about a quarter of a mile. The area along the front between the main part of Wellington's position, and Picton's part, was thus disunited somewhat - at the front. Step one. The Allied brigade that was routed was Bylandt's, originally placed in error along the ridge in full view of Napoleon's artillery and allowed to remain there through a rare tactical oversight of Wellington's. Except for Bylandt (and a few guns placed along the crest of the ridge), however, the Allies suffered little from Napoleon's initial battery fire as most of the shells flew harmlessly overhead, and those few that did manage to land somewhere in the proximity of the Allied positions on the reverse slope were swallowed up whole by ground turned soft from the rain, thus eliminating any effects from ricochet. You say the infantry in this area were ordered back a quarter of a mile, but this is not so. The line was ordered to initially position itself just to the northern side of the ridge line where it was out of sight of the French battery yet well-poised to contest actual possession of the ridge line itself with any French infantry attacking up its southern side. This was typical of the sort of reverse-slope tactics Wellington had employed with such great success in the Iberian Peninsula. To have ordered Picton's formations to move a quarter of a mile north would have ultimately placed this force in a place from which it could have exercised no sway in the affair whatsoever; furthermore the ground at this place on the battlefield is in places low and was probably boggy on the morning of June 18 after the previous day's downpour. The ground in front of Picton's position is steep, and there is tons of dead ground there. On the reverse slope means unable to dispute the passage of the French infantry to the forward slope. Then both infantries are in reverse slope to each other; there is nothing to choose between them, and certainly no advantage to Picton or the British. That is step two. There's plenty of dead ground along the southern slope for any troops positioned along the northern side of the ridge, and d'Erlon's advance benefitted here and there from ground folds and irregularities as his four divisions made their advance, but mainly the defenders had unobstructed view of the French approach and took a terrible toll of this force as it trudged up the southern slope. Also, I would not typify this slope up to the crest line as steep but rather more shallow--a steady, gradual climb. The next stage is to move the infantry onto the crest itself, and to dispute only the immediate area with the Brits. Understand, the Brits cannot advance to the crest, or the grand battery just starts up again. So the crest is empty. The French infantry only needs to push the Brits back a short distance, and then they can stop pressing and defend from the crest. That is step three. That washes. It was fully expected the Brits might try to use cavalry to get the French off the ridge again. That is why 3 cavalry divisions supported the attack, ready to countercharge. It is also part of why the French moved in formations that could form square rapidly, to repel cavalry. In most cases in Napoleonic warfare, the counter-charger has distinct advantages over the initial charger, in cavalry vs. cavalry fights, and that was the planned use of the supporting cavalry. Well, counter-charging cavalry had its own demands and intrinsic drawbacks, but that's beside the main point, which is: the attack was not planned properly in any manner, shape or form, at base, and it was supported not by three cavalry divisions but a mere brigade (General Travers' cuirassiers) which was positioned on the left of General Donzelot's infantry division. Once that was accomplished and the crest line made even remotely secure, the grand battery was not going to sit still, but move right up onto it. There is no additional ridge line and little if any dead ground from that crest as far as Mount St. Jean. Nothing would be able to stand on the back slope anymore. And remember, the rest of the defenders over to the left, cannot easily come across to support, if the left part of the grand battery hasn't displace yet. Moving the Grand Battery up onto the ridge would not have been a snap. It took the French all morning to site it in its current position south of the ridge line and to move it again half a mile north, under fire and the threat of Allied interference, and at that across ground made marshy (the southern approaches to the ridge were nothing short of a morass in places and with extremely soft ground all over) would have been a magical feat. Indeed, had Napoleon succeeded in gaining firm grasp of the ridge as early of 3 o'clock in the afternoon Wellington, in all likelihood, would have been obliged to forthwith fall back to the ground directly in front of Bois de Soignies, taking his extended left flank with him. This, at best, would have left the Allied line in a kind of fish hook, with the bend approximately around La Haie-Sainte, assuming that bastion managed to hold (and it is doubtful it would have at that juncture). Effectively, Wellington's position would have been shattered had Napoleon crested the ridge and assumed control of that high ground. What would have then happened is anyone's guess, as by that time the first columns of Bulow's IV Prussian Corps (30,000) were emerging from the high ground to the east around Chapelle-St.-Lambert, but the pendulum of the battle would certainly have swung dramatically in Napoleon's favor, and given the polyglot nature of Wellington's force I'd venture to say the day (if not the campaign) would have been lost to the Allies. Then the ridge is turned and rolled up right to left. With the reserve - the Guard and plenty of cavalry - available to hit it from the hidden side of the hill, too. (Same location they were eventually used). The immediate "reserve" was Count Lobau's VI Corps (10,000) which had already been committed to the line facing eastward running from Plancenoit to the Bois de Paris, along with the cavalry divisions of Domont and Subservie (these two latter formations might well have been allocated to the close support of d'Erlon's attack had the prussians not intervened as early as they did, though such orders were never, in fact, given). The Guard, too, was drawn more and more into the holding action versus the onrushing Prussian horde, as the legions of Pirch followed hotly on the heels of Bulow's boys. The cavalry was either spent (due partly to Ney) or helping to hold the fort along the threatened eastern flank. By five o'clock or so there really wasn't much left save part of the Guard infantry and what scattered remains d'Erlon and Reille could haphazardly scrape together for that last mad scramble up the hill. That was a very dangerous plan for the British, and it could very easily have worked. Why didn't it? First, Picton's troops put up an excellent fight, but they *were* pushed back. They even counterattacked in places, into thinner parts of the French blocks (screens between two denser columns probably). But the infantry was not winning, and that part of the French plan succeeded. Not quite, though one French infantry division did enjoy some local success. (More on this in a moment.) But the fight with the infantry had spread some disorder through the French infantry. And the British heavies charged at the exact moment some of them had chosen (probably unwisely by the way) to try to deploy into line. Although you may not realize it, there were proper intervals between the attacking columns, which are supposed to prevent a crowd-like press, even if one column breaks up. But at the moment of deploying into line, these intervals are being filled. It was also about the only time they could not have easily made the changes to form square. The French were already in line, so to speak, which was the problem. You see, three of d'Erlon's divisions had been drawn up and then awkwardly advanced in colonnes de bataillon par division, or in other words divisions of battalions with massive, unwieldy 200-man battalion frontages. This decision has been argued exhaustively down through the years and it isn't even known if the formation chosen was in error or a concession on the part of d'Erlon to the lack of drill training many of his soldiers had received. In any event, a worse formation could hardly be imagined for the task at hand and any "maneuver" on the part of the three divisions so ordered was out of the question before the first battalions stepped out. If the attack succeeded it would literally be due to whatever shock value might be derived from their sheer weight of numbers on the thin Allied line, and of course on this day that wasn't enough. So, three French infantry divisions of I Corps arrived at the Allied positions along the extended crest already in "lines," only the problem was they were ungainly lines with no chance of quickly evolving into any other formation, say, into squares in order to repel horse; indeed, such was the extreme blocky nature of the formation chosen that unusually high French casualties were suffered along the route march itself, and the only division to experience anything like success was the one drawn up in the more astute and tactically flexible colonnes de division par bataillon. This unit belonging to Durutte was sent into the battle on the far right flank and (perhaps not surprisingly in any event since it faced the least opposition, a relatively thin screen of Nassauers) enjoyed the greatest success. That is the state they were in when the British heavy cavalry hit them. That was one of the most successful charges by cavalry against infantry in the entire Napoleonic wars, from end to end. There was nothing "deterministic" about that outcome. The Brit cavalry got lucky. They came at the right time and I'd ascribe that more to good judgment than luck. Bad judgment was exercised in the control of these chargers shortly thereafter (this was an old problem for British cavalry, by the way), with the end result that Wellington's mounted arm was effectively crippled for the remainder of the battle. On balance the charge served its purpose, though, as d"Erlon's attack seems in hindsight to have been the only French maneuver on the day which offered even scant chance of ultimate success. Their charge also carried them through part of the French grand battery, which caught up many of the French artillery's horses in the press. The idea of moving the grand battery forward became much harder. Then they also hit the Cuirassiers that were there to countercharge them. And broke them, which is a case of "wow", considering the disorder they were already in from the fight with the French infantry. Again, the Grand Battery per se was going nowhere within the time frame of this battle. A few horse batteries would have moved up onto the ridge after its capture, surely, and some of the I Corps' artillery might well have been manhandled there eventually, but in the main this battery's sole work was to prepare and then cover as best it might the assault undertaken by d'Erlon in the early afternoon. The British cavalry then overextended itself and was decimated by the French light cavalry riding them down on blown horses. But they had practically won the battle. I agree with that, though the battle was lost more on the 17th, and even if it was not lost that previous day it was all but lost the morning of the 18th as Napoleon dreamed away time and idly reviewed his troops, meanwhile totally ignoring Grouchy (for the second day in a row!) over on his strategic right flank. As for the charges and Ney in command, Ney did not support the charges with infantry because he couldn't find any that was effective and not committed (outside of the Guard, which was off-limits to him). Napoleon was seeing to the deployment of the reserve VI corps and young guard opposite the arriving Prussians. (It is, incidentally, a myth that he didn't know they were coming - he knew that morning, though not in what total strength). Napoleon undoubtedly assumed that some of D'Erlon's infantry would have reformed already, or that Reille would not have committed almost all of his forces (in sequence, not at once) at Hougemont. He therefore assumed Ney was supporting the charges with infantry. In fact he wasn't - all of D'Erlons men that had reformed were trying to take La Haye Saint, and Ney did not move them from that task (which he probably should have, but they may not have been enough anyway). That was a fog-of-war and unity of command stuff up, no question. Which again hardly fits the picture of it being dumb to have attacked frontally. It isn't clear Napoleon was at first even aware of what Ney was up to at all; during periods of the battle the Emperor was said to have lain prostrate on the ground in pain, oblivious to all around him. Your final remark brings us back approximately to the thesis at hand. I'd add quickly that Ney was not the man to command on the day (Napoleon's staff moves throughout the course of this short campaign have come under heavy critical review and there seems little point in further bashing him at this date re that) and he hadn't a clue. Truth is, Ney was never too bright in his prime or even all that loyal to Napoleon when it came down to it. A brave soldier, yes, and under Napoleon's close supervision he served a purpose on more than one occasion, but to give someone that thick-headed independent command at such a moment was unwise to say the least. Napoleon had many times been let down by Ney's intellectual side (if one could call it that) when left to his own devices, and the Emperor ought to have known better. But then the entire campaign was one of what-ifs and so on and it was probably doomed on its face given the political climate in Europe at this time. Wellington, who was there and running his army and counting his reserves and seeing who wavered, was not so confident that he had nothing to worry about as your description would have it. He needed and got outstanding performances from Picton's force (he died on the field leading one charge) and from the British heavy cavalry, to escape danger. There was nothing written in stone about it beforehand; it depended on a few critical passages of arms. With this conclusion (again, keeping our main thesis in mind) I have to agree 100%. In spite of Napoleon's errors, in spite of Ney and Grouchy and all that, the main French battle plan was not hogwash in principle, had much to recommend it and was fairly dictated by the ground and circumstances faced by l'Armee du Nord on the morning of June 18, 1815. At that juncture Napoleon could have either fought on the ground of Wellington's choice or retired from the field, with an eventual concentric Allied assault of overwhelming force on France, similar to the one undertaken a year earlier, in the offing. For Napoleon that choice had to be easy. [This message has been edited by Tris (edited 02-04-2001).]

I would suppose Daniel understands that, Vanir, and I believe he has based his comments on the vast majority of CMBO scenarios in which 1) the forces come "equal" and 2) the maps restrict (channel) movement (play) into avenues which run rigidly in one direction with no recourse in the offing other than a straight fight. True, it's possible to design a huge map over which to fight a small battle and thus have a chance to exercise reasonable tactics of maneuver (if you have the horsepower to move all the graphics), but I've only found a precious few of these types of scenarios--I could just about count them on one of my hands, and two of these I've designed myself. The truth is that the common battle in CMBO is pitched and attritional. (How could it be otherwise with such vague command considerations? Or to put it another way, without command integrity to disrupt or knock out, what's left to go after except troops and material?) Also, in my experience at least, casualties absorbed on both sides in this game are considerably heavier than what was historically considered acceptable for the reason that this is the only practical remedy open to either side except in the very rare case. CMBO is a very entertaining game, I think, and a decent simulation in some respects of what warfare was about from the period; it still has a long way to go before it reflects even the reality you describe as its intent, though, much less WWII combat in general and of every description. With what we have to work with model-wise at present the latter isn't on the cards. That isn't a knock on the title, just a sober check of everyone's reality. [This message has been edited by Tris (edited 02-03-2001).]

I'm gonna grab it right away. Part one was fascinating. I appreciate your insight immensely.

Pillboxes/bunkers are laughably vulnerable and it doesn't seem to matter what gun fires at them, what the range is or even if the gun firing is on a moving platform with intervening terrain to obstruct LOS. A slit hit always seems to be the result within a few shots, usually with dire consequences for the defensive work. The only question left which seems worth articulating: why hasn't BTS moved on this issue yet? (ithinkiknow) (inanyeventilltaketheansweroffline)

As an aside, I’m guessing a number of grogs probably mocked CM when they first heard of it, saying the designers were just trying to make a flashy RTS knock-off You may well be correct, though in my case the initial impression evoked less "mocking" and more skepticism that the final product would one day arrive as software of a "serious" nature and intent. Happily, I was mistaken. For the rest of it: you seem to have your fingers on the pulse of reality. More's the pity that you do not represent the mean intellectual attitude in this forum.

Great organization, Todd. Any chance we could get a glimpse of the actual ground beforehand to better justify your schematics?

My opinion is that your site is, on balance and for the work it undertakes, the best around, Garry. And it took all of a week to make it that way. I'd hate to see it just fade away, so I hope someone with similar ability and enthusiasm takes it over from you.

In this building is already two suppressed squads which have taken 2 and 3 hits respectfully. One squad stays suppressed for almost the duration of the turn. The other seems to carry out the orders it was given after about 13-16 seconds. It runs out of the building to a location (in the clear) and rotates and hides ( I assume this was the orders given). After a few seconds, it too receives MG fire and it also runs for the nearest cover, which is the building. The one squad which followed it orders was not ordered to run out into the clear and just sit there and you know this, Matt, because we've just concluded an exchange of some half-dozen emails to that effect. In truth, the squad in question was ordered to run some 20m to the northwest (i.e., away from the enemy panzer shelling it) and to then hide behind a knoll of earth 3m high and itself "protected" from view by the house this squad came from, which lies directly along the LOS of the enemy Pz IV which had been shelling the house. It's more than a little incredible that the panzer could see the squad behind that knoll in the first place in order to put its MG to use. Furthermore, the squad, which had been SHAKEN inside of the house, returned to a relaltively better status of CAUTIOUS once it reached its ordered hiding place behind the earthen knoll, with the implication here being that the AI recognized this place as relatively safer than the place whence it came. Therefore: 1) the AI would appear to be confused as to its proper behavior when it comes to determining sites of relative safety, 2) the AI LOS routine is off loads in some cases (this has been questioned many times before) and 3) even when units are directly ordered to leave unsafe structures (the light housing in question had two asterisks appended) they might immediately return in spite of orders to the contrary, which itself suggests the AI has no "memory" with re to the relative safety of sites (remember, the squad went from SHAKEN to CAUTIOUS when it reached the knoll, an improvement in its morale), which is not even to get into its rather worrying disregard for said orders. For the platoon HQ to run to the severely damaged light building when it had been ordered to move to the rear of the protective knoll it had before sat on top of (and in an exposed position) is even more inexplicable yet. This unit was only at a state of ALERTED so its behavior, which amounted to something akin to panic, seems to make little sense and further suggests that individual units act in relational information "vacuums" (they are perfectly ignorant of most events around them--this doesn't surpise me, by the way, just making the point for the record in case anyone else doesn't see this). NOTE: You went on to say that the building in question was not actually being shelled (with regard to units understanding that it might be in danger of collapsing soon), though in fact for the two previous turns it had been shelled by the Pz IVG, so we can see that units also do not have "memories." Finally, the building in question resides closer to the enemy than the protective knoll. And now the pattern becomes all too familiar: infantry units losing their cool and charging toward the enemy instead of away from the enemy (in this case its objective is a flimsy house about to collapse, but it could as well be bocage or woods or tall pines or even an enemy-occupied foxhole) and thus into a potentially more dangerous situation in terms of geography and proximity to enemy fire than where it previously sat. This is neither news nor something good. It is a problem. Why should this be difficult to grasp? Why can't we just admit there's a problem in this regard and either try to fix it or admit that it can't be fixed, for whatever reason? What I can't understand is this effort to explain this behavior away as being somehow rational. It isn't rational. It's foolish. It's deadly. That much should be intuitive to human beings. Now whether we're able to get the computer to act as intelligently as we do is something else. [This message has been edited by Tris (edited 01-02-2001).]

That's what you get for playing with the FPS crowd. Or didn't you know? <g>

In this case I'm dead sure BTS knows about this issue already. My post is merely to accentuate that.

I wish I had seen your post to start this thread earlier, Ed, and I'd have simply added my "Dilapidated housing" report to this piece. Oh well, no damage done harping on this issue as it causes serious disruption to play. I would say if anything infantry behavior in v1.1b24 is more retarded than it ever was.

Agreed.

If I recall there was discussion earlier re a tweak in the beta .EXE to cause infantry to leave buildings which are close to destruction and seek better cover elsewhere. In a current PBEM (Chambois, I'm the Poles) I've twice ordered units out of a light house with two asterisks attached only to see these assets turn right around and return to said building (intermittently under fire from machine guns and a Pz IV) immediately of their own accord. This last turn was the worst, when not only did the squads I ordered to leave return to this hazardous structure but their platoon HQ, ordered to hide some 35m away behind a perfectly good fold of solid ground where it had safely resided before, got it into its head that this light structure which is about to collapse was a good place to hide itself as well! Bottom line: now I have the two squads and the parent platoon HQ cowering in this flimsy structure which is closer to enemy threats than where I've ordered these unit to go. Now maybe I'm mistaken re previous discussion of this and no tweak has been made re such a scenario; if so I'd say there needs to be because such behavior on the battlefield defies common sense. ]

I'll be mildly interested to see if this model can work. I know it can for the reason it already does in some venues, but I doubt that it will work on a site of this kind. There simply isn't material there of such specific and necessary nature to persuade me (or likely many others) to pay each month for access. Consider this: as it stands now the site uses reviews as loss leaders for the discussion of its boards. So, you read the review, then when you try to click on the link to jump to the forums you're told it will cost you x-dollars and cents per month for this access. Would you willy nilly sign up? If so, please tell me what's going on "in there" these days. [This message has been edited by Tris (edited 12-30-2000).]

Tell you what, go to the site and just try to access the forums.

. . . may she rest in peace.

Some fellow got ahold of me this afternoon on ICQ with a hearty "Hola!" and right away I knew I was in trouble. I struggled to oblige my new friend, who lives in Argentina, but my poor Spanish just wasn't up to the challenge. Exasperated, this person finally bid me farewell, saying "Me parece no hablas espanol." Hell, I tried to tell him that first thing! As for the CMBO manual: it's not the best I've read, but then again it got me up and running in a heartbeat. If the author speaks a different mother tongue than mine then I say hats off! [This message has been edited by Tris (edited 12-29-2000).]

I'd definitely check around, as you never know what else might not be available now. My ViewSonic is the PT795, purchased a year and a half ago. With a GeForce2 GTS w/64 MB DDRRAM I've no trouble at all running constant resolutions of 1280x1024x32 @ 85MHz screen refresh rate. That should give you a reasonable idea of the kind of performance you're shooting for, or at least the sort of thresholds the current state of the art will afford. As for "flat" versus normal CRT's: the former handle reflected light and glare better, but will cost you a few more bucks as a rule. For me it was worth it, but then again the one thing I take in life seriously are games, so what can I say? [This message has been edited by Tris (edited 12-29-2000).]

Interesting debate over there. Glad to see there are at least a couple of intelligent people on the scene to give Hasbro what-for, and in no uncertain terms. The spin artists will have their hands full with them.

In that case think ViewSonic flatscreen.

Surely it is. And don't call me Shurley.

Since my games didn't actually crash I didn't think the errorlog would note any problem. I'll send it along next time it happens, though. No problem.

I've got a similar question as Aussie Jeff regarding upgrading. Currently my system is ASUS MB w/ Intel 440 BX Chipset PIII 450 Viper 770 Ultra 32mb I'm looking to upgrade to PIII 800-850 Annihiliator 2 Ultra AGP Will my MB be able to handle these? Not sure about the processors, though I believe that your MB will acomodate those CPU's. But that's not what worries me. The Intel 440BX AGPset was no good with USB internally-powered hubs in mind (for instance, if your monitor serves as a hub you're out of luck), and if you're talking an ASUS P2B-F MB it's only AGP x2 so what's the point of keeping that with a great x4 card like the Annhilalator? The last thing you want to do is create any more video memory bottlenecks for the GeForce cards--that's their only real drawback now. This is not an especially good time to be upgrading; since the system you have is plenty powerful enough to run anything CMBO has to offer don't be hasty. The huge scenarios will process somewhat slowly, true, but your TNT2 card's a honey (Diamond was the best) and can push even all hi-res .BMP's at a fairly high screen resolution. I'd advise you to wait until the good AMD boards get into circulation, then decide whether you even want to stick with an Intel chip to begin with. Your best bang is from AMD, and it isn't even close if you want to know. (For what it's worth, I own a PIII 450 the same as you so it's not as if I'm just claiming "mine's" the best. Check out Tom's Hardware for an ongoing discussion of all things Intel vis-a-vis AMD.) Even if you do go with an Intel CPU the prices will be lower come March or April all across the board, to include that video card upgrade you have in mind, as the new nVidia chip generation should be out by then, so again, don't be antsy.