dieseltaylor

Because there are so many facets to playing well I think it is almost an art rather than a thing mastered from reading. Reading the assembled wisdom is very important but you have to have a feel that can only come from practice. Things such as speed of various tanks, terrain effects, rate of fire, morale, bonuses etc are all part of the total package. As in real war experience is invaluable. That is what makes the game so great - it is a learning curve but one where you can have a lot of fun on the way. : ) Bear in mind that you learn more from your defeats than from your victories - thats my excuse : )

You can practice this at home : ) You look through the keyhole and see a narrow field of view going as far as you can see. Now go 5ft from the other side of the door and see how much you can see through the keyhole!! Kingfisher should have added that you need to give cover arc orders and ranges also - keyholing does not stop your unit firing at silly targets!!

Way too much long walls. Keeping goats out of the veg patch and some animals in. Other than that walls are unnecessary and would interfere with the natives wandering about. Having said that you could place small blocks of wall at distances to delineate trackways - they could be stones extracted from fertile ground and put in heaps for later buildings a natural thing to do. Still a great and evolving map.

That is a bastard difficult scenario. Great for learning the benefits and drawbacks of shoot and scoot. And also using smoke to screen off some guns whilst you get another. And the power of the 25lber!

I disagree with Hans as the site is not a city but simply a halt on the line and a road junction. Linear development is therefore likely. The open water though is highly unlikely as it would be to precious to have evaporating away. I assume it is spring fed and would be inside a building or sub-ground If it is meant to be a town at an oasis then the building development would pre-date the railroad and the road and would be irregular. However there would be date palms etc around the pool to feed the natives : ) Nice map though .... but you did ask

I suspect it might be a case of I will remain out of line of sight and area fire my HE near to the M10! Who knows it might just work : )

It is possible, depending on terrain, to launch local counter-attacks within the game. As it is a tactic I intend to use again, and one I would hate to have used against me, I will not be too specific. Broadly then is that you actually earmark some force to be be active late in the game. It does require suitable terrain for best effect and sufficient defence force but I have done it two or three times. The best was I once an infantry squad/section to get 22 casualties for no loss. On a points basis very satisfying as it created a draw from a lost game.

Laudable as always. However, whilst I would expect to find it in the General Forum I regard CM as my escape from the troubles of the real world and prefer not to have appeals everywhere. : ) On a more practical note fundraising by major charities has been going really well here and I face the possibility of becoming seen as a skinflint if I distribute what I have given widely. It also raises logistical problems on how the claimed donations are collated and to which charities they should go to. And as a by product I would read about the appeal on every CM site I look into. : ( By all means contribute as much as you can, and if you think people have not heard raise there awareness, but please give us escapists somewhere clean of RL concerns for our relaxing moments.

Nope it is not funny and the jokers should desist. Not having CM games to give to potential players is a major crime in my book. You were very unlucky though - all my purchases over the Internet from Battlefront have come through without a hitch.

Much to my surprise I was able to use a platoon of Hornets[Hornisse] against the Russians and because of the range and the fact I was in trees he never got an ID on my firing positions. Range about 1000+. Possibly him travelling fast and the fact they only needed to fire about once each to kill and scare him away : ) Still left him with 11. He did try to race a Halftrack with the quad AA along a road towards me at top speed - amazing what a 88mm L71 shell does to a vehicles momentum. : )

Mace! "Censorship of various terms to comply with European regulations re Nazi terminology, mainly (eg Waffen Grenadiers rather than Waffen SS)." Hey its a German thing - nothing to do with Europe. "And IIRC, a bit more copy protection on the CDs." A BIT MORE ..... spit growl stomps feet! Very laborious about if it likes your set-up when loading. Of course no-cd patches make it bearable. Patches tend to be bigger than the US version [which fortunately is available in Europe being mailed from Ireland [Eire]] One of the CDV CMBB patches came in at 70MB. IIRC hte US version was 25MB.

There will always be newbies - especially as we convert our friends to see the light. And for sure experienced as I am there is always something new to learn and/or evaluate. Go for it - definitely a service to the community.

I bought it 'cos it was there! : ) You have to play all terrains and theatres to get the full feel of the kit and the forces involved in the European/Med . You know that the tactics are different and here you get to find out why.

Lovely post Dandelion

Two pounder not too bad either - in a scenario it knocked out 5 armoured cars and killed 11 infantry - nice.

I assume you have looked at the TCP offers in the Opponent Finder forum here?

Time you got the NOcd patch : )

Believe me if you ever had the misfortune of your CDV copy diliking your CD player you could be in for a very long wait when you booted up. Even more annoying if you had several different types of CM to play and swop in and out. I absolutely use CD patches [and apart from a single legit copy of CMBO] I have multiple legit copies of each game. All players of CM have a vested interest in getting their mates to buy legit copies as we all want CM3 : )

The idea of improving a position within say a 40 minute game seems a reasonable request but does perhaps reflect a benefit of borg spotting that was not available in RL. You could add I suppose an additional order and account for fatigue as troops dug foxholes or scouted for better cover. Somehow it just does not seem to me to be worth the effort ot bodge it into the game so that the almighty eye in the sky can work out which squads are likely to be assaulted and those rthat are not. I think that the game - as a game is a work of art - and has to overall reflect likely outcomes rather than include in precise reflections of real life but end up with a dissatisfying gaming experience. Please fudge the game if necessary to preserve the fun : ) I thank you. Not to say I would not like Time on Target : )

I assume that PBEMHelper's native format would be similar to zipping. The advantage , and a big one , is it keeps track of all your games automatically. It will tell you which ones you are waiting for a reply, which ones you have received and need to play, and the ones you need to send. The fact that it autopens your game and boots it to the camera is a purely incidental bonus : ). Mind you a lot of people swear by the TRUSTED mode where each e-mail enables two films and two plots to be made : )

I suspect there is a radius of danger in which the troops will fire at close units regardless of more valuable targets. I would imagine the radius is calculated on effective fire - a rifleman 50metres away is ignorable whilst a full squad at the same range is not. As for going for HQ's that is excellent tactics as you will severely disrupt the effectiveness of the platoon - and only 4 men to kill : )

I would have thought the the disease could work both ways : A: In the time frame of a battle, and with the adrenalin running, I imagine the troops would summon up the energy to fight. B: More importantly - if you are feeling pretty ill death might not seem so bad. Do you fight to the death in your foxhole I think it could happen.It takes less energy than running away. Surrendering will not cure you - unless you believe you can surrender safely and then get good medical treatment ..... bit of a longshot. I suppose from the Italian point of view that works : ) [Also I have been reminded that the Italians and Germans had been fighting each other 25 years ealier]

I have just finished a battle where two platoons of mine fought 2 german squads + HQ + panzershreck in 2 trenches in thick wood and after surrounding them one broke and was shot to death and the others surrendered. It seemed v. realistic to me.

Spitfire I call the AI smart. ATG's are there to kill tanks and if they open fire on any passing soft target they will give their position away and duly be killed. I suspect the AI gave them V arcs. Did your tank have a damaged gun , out of ammo ,? Junk Rationally the truck is probably a quick easy target to kill. In the game it earns you quick points - in real life it could be carrying ammo, more troops whatever so still kill it quick. You can have a long fire fight against another squad without dong much damage unless they are very close - seems a fair result to me.

Check out the Valentine in Russian service, from Jan 1943 IIRC. It has the 6lbr gun which is accurate and can kill STUGs, Tigers and Panthers from the side at range. It can kill Stugs at short range head on. My best had been just over 1000 metres rear shot on a Stug but last night in a TCP/IP I knocked out a STUG at 1584 metres : ) Very satisfying !! BTW terrain is very important to balance battles as the German rate of fire and optics plus good guns means they will always win (almost) if the terrain is open. Unless of course you are allowed to buy aircraft : )