The_Capt

OK, I'll set it up and send you the Engineer Plan (ie obstacles) for 36 hours of work and good support from higher, maybe a hvy equipment sect (couple of dozers) and all the M&E we need. No pillboxes as they take weeks not hours to build. The 2500 points will be above and beyond and fit into the plan, otherwise you may have a platoon left out of the 2500 points to defend. You would be amazed at what 3 sects and 2 dozers can do going flat out.

Panzer Leader, I think you hit on a very important point...What is realistic does not make a very fun game. In reality trying to slog thru a couple of mine belts is crazy. In fact the assault force is usually so depleted that a breakout force punches in behind it. As to the real position, I would be more than willing to set it up. I could figure what an Engr platoon (with M&E) could do in say a 36 hr period (I'd get that from the pubs and my own experience) and put it on the map in support of a 2500 pt defending force. I think you might get an idea of why 3-1 or higher is needed in RL even on a wide front. I am not sure if it will help develop tactics for a CM defence but it may be interesting. There is a problem with flanking in RL as well...the fact that flanking units make it almost impossible. But again let's not go too far down the RL road. I have noticed that CM take tactics to it's roots and quickly strips away the non-essentials when small unit actions are involved. Infantry is most important followed by arty. Once you have sufficent numbers of that you can fill in the rest, AT, obstacles, armour but if you fail to cover the basics you are doomed. Make sure to mention the power of the Reverse slope. For the defence there is no other choice.

Now on that one Jak, you would be absolutly correct. It's called Bangalor and makes very short work of barbwire.

Panzer Leader, Your point as to composition of the c-attack is true. One does not have to use armour at all. As to mass armour, I really don't care what Rommel had, only what tactics teaches. You can do more with less but that should not be the "standard", nor should it negate an effort to use the basic principals. As to the frontages of a QB, I am afraid we will have to agree to disagree. At small point values (less than 2000) the frontages favour the attacker just a little too much for my liking A 1000m mine field is tactical my friend and can be put in place by an Engineer Troop in about 6 hrs. Or 1/2 the time it would take to build that MG bunker (depending on ground conditions). The two layers of which I speak is standard (in a prepared defence it is three actually) at the Bn level. The first is for engagement by longer range AT weapons while the shorter is for short range and infantry engagement. 30% coverage is a waste of time and effort and represents such a small amount of engineer effort that any Bn CO would flip if he received such a small amount (and probably did). You have hit my point squarely in the general ignorance of obstacles and there composition in support of a Bn, which would be part of a Bde and Div. Even in a hasty defence one could expect 1000m of minefield to your front, unless of course something has gone seriously wrong. It is not "absurd" or "out of the scope of the game"(well only in that nobody really knows) trust me on this one, I used to do this for a living. Now as you stated quite accuratly, this is CM and a game. So the defence within the game has an art all of it's own but detached from reality.

Hey Redwolf, The problem with your tanks is simple, you are violating the principle of mass. In the real world, tanks are not designed to be used in less than a Coy/Sqn formation. That would be 16(modern I think they had 14) tanks. You can violate that and use a 1/2 Sqn or 8 tanks in exceptional circumstances. An Inf Heavy Battle Group should have a Bn of Inf and at least 1/2 Sqn of armour. Now try your counter attack with 8 or 16 Tigers to see the proper result. 2 Tigers is commonly refered to as "penny-packeting" and is exactly how the Allies got their collective asses handed to them in 1940. Try taking 16 tanks in on an assault sometime and you will get the idea of how armour is suppose to be used. Now I don't know how this compares to actual numbers in WWII but then again I would hope to take the lessons learned from that conflict and use them today, rather than simply re-create them.

Jak, Please read my first post on this thread it might answer your last question.

Well I'd have to check but I do believe HMGs get a defence bonus while in building if for exposure alone. Fortification should be included. As to demolition charges, well much like Hollywood grenades they are far over-estimated. 6-12 bloocks of HE do pack a pretty good punch but not on a 100m of big freakin trees with their bases still attached to the stump and mixed in with barbwire and mined for good measure. You could blast at that all day and still have work left for tomorrow. Not even considering you have to try and keep the guys placing the charges alive long enough to finish the job. That is of course after you go back to Troop HQ for enough explosives to be brought up to try the job in the first place. As to the Brumbar(sp?) well they did include the AVRE so why not?

Oh this is gettin good. I havn't seen this much potential for a Grog fight since the Manoeuvre and Attrition slugfests. I have to agree with Jason here (yup I can't believe it myself). QBs and defence do not mix. Why? One reason..frontage. The frontages the defender is left with are way too large, you wind up in a half circle covering a few flags if you want any kind of "mutual support". Or you wind up with several coy/pl strong points which will eventually be surrounded and die. The only way to even come close to a fair fight is to conduct the attack on the "short side" and give a defender a realistic frontage. That's not to say that one cannot win a QB in the defence but the odds are really stacked against you and a lot has to "go right" in order to win. As to obstacles...don't bother. The cost in order to actually empploy them as they were designed is very high (30% of your force purchase if I recall) and that means you will sacrifice too much firepower in order to make them effective. You may get luck but in reality a defensive position should have at least 2 belts which effect the entire frontage. So at 10-15 points a buy per minefield/wire you can see how on even a 1000 meter frontage at 75% coverage x 2 belts you are going to have 750-1124 points spent on obstacles. So add in a Bn which can cover the frontage (say 1800 for German Airborne regular) and say 500 for Arty, 500 for Sp (AT guns and snipers) and finally 800 for a troop of armour to act as countermoves. You are looking at 4350 for an adequate "textbook" defence of 1000m. And it isn't even "adequate" as a Sqn/Coy of Armour is what one should be looking at and throw in a Covering Force as well. Someone can check but I think a 4350 point defence will give you a much larger frontage in a QB than 1000m.

On arty, Arty is one of the few weapons systems which is really close to the real thing in CM. The rest have varying degrees of success and have been bitched about enough. But arty (when it lands) is pretty effective. In the defence it is one of the few weapons which can do a lot of damage over a wide area to a lot of troops. Key point is getting it too land on them. In the defence, in my opinion, mortars are your best friend. They are cheap and effective against troops in the open. 4.2s and 120mm are devastating. They can shut down a coy assault..cold. As to how to ensure they land on top of the coy, well you can site TRPs on likely approaches but I have found the a "Three Stooges" plan is always the best. That is where you pick a spot for the enemy (ie woods) where a small force of your infantry can keep their heads down and force them to mass for attack. Kinda like hold a door and letting four or five people pile up behind it. Then drop a load of mortars on top of them (a bucket of water over the door) then have your troops F@$$ off at the high-port (open the door) and when the en spills out to avoid more buckets, have a second load on his likely exit points (a bag of flour) or if you really do it well a couple of "stay-back" flamethowers. If it works it can be hilarious to watch and pretty effect at scrambling an assault. And having been on the recieving end, I can tell you it works very well.

A good solution to the blind defence is not to use the QB function at all. QBs give far too great a frontage for the defender (ie attacks occur along the wide side). The frontages are simply ridiculous to defend with the points offered and as has been stated leave the defender (and attacker) blind until set up. In short in every QB def/attack, Div/Bde and in some cases Bn/Regt Recce have all failed miserably and both sides don't see the map until the boys drive onto it. In the Def/Off a scenario map should be generated so that both sides can look at it prior to unit purchase. Now the cries of "gamey" and " well the troops didn't get to pick the troops for the type of ground" are sounding but at this level the players each take on the role of Bde or Div comd. A Bde comd is not going to send an Armoured Heavy Battle Group into heavy forested terrain where infantry are needed (well he might but probably only once). So a force selection for terrain conditions does happen. Hell in reality a force selection based on preceived enemy happens (more engineers/arty/armour or less depending on what we think we might run into.) So create a map and purchase accordingly, you can even set some restrictions before hand (ie a Inf Bn with 2000 sp/arty/armour pts). Go by honor or a third party for unit purchase. You can then either attack on a wide front or (and more realistically) attack on a short frontage (along the short side). All of these steps will make an attack/defend game more realistic. In fact in these situations you may find that a 3 to 1 ratio is required just as in RL.

Gentlemen, The Roadblock represents (either by accident or intent) a myriad of "point obstacles" which are otherwise missing from the game. Abatis, vertical steel I-Beams, Dragons teeth, crater groups and improvised (ie booby-trapped tractor loaded up with jerry cans). All of these targets represent and engineer operation outside the scope of a CM game. The only exception may be a really long game (say 90 turns) where a 30 min engineer operation could be executed or as has been stated an operation. 30 min might get you thru dragons teeth and I-beams but you will need heavy equipment for craters and abatis. So my guess is that the boys said "Screw it" and made them all impassable. As to HE solving all of our wordly woes, whether delivered by hand or SP Arty, the reality is that complex and well made point obstacles are pretty nasty and take a lot of explosives to take out (ie you would be shootin all day). Sometimes you need a dozer/excavator. So there it is.

What the hell, count me in.

Hey ScoutPL, Downloaded your stuff for the latest TDG and got a virus warning WM97 something or other. You may want to check it out.

Actually it wasn't so much the loss of sleep and more the booze..

OK good to see that Madmatt et al earned their pay an got this ship afloat once more. Well I am back from a trip away and think that it is time again for some reflection. Yup, time for The_Capt to spout (or vomit) some more wisdom about the game we all love...Combat Mission. First you will notice I changed the title of the column, "The Bi-Monthly Lurker" was a little too close to the "Bi-Lurker; manifesto of a confused 30-something in search of..." So thanks for the e-mails but I am afraid that I am all man and though flattered, not interested. I am however a Lesbian trapped in a man's body but as the number of women who actually play this game can be counted on one hand, and still leave room to hold a smoke and change the channel, I will not hold my breath. Plus I am married and She is the light of my life, the air I breath, mother to those two pit vipers I call children, upon whom my sun rises and sets...blah, blah, blah. I fired PIPPU (for those new to the program he was my aide, a sock puppet who claimed to serve in the "Legion Estranger"), the little bastard kept surrendering everytime the Germans showed up and then demanded he be called Vichy-PIPPU and that I sleep on the floor. So I gave him to the dog..oh ya who's laughin' now! I have a new aide...Fritzy. He has a little Prussian helmet and a moustache. "My Germany includes the whole Vorld!" is his favorite saying. He's not bad but is beginning to make me nervous... Now the topic of this "once every two week" post is the Ten Commandments. No, not the ones that Moses trucked up a mountain for, so that the Big Guy could lay down the "house rules" and generally take all the fun out of life. I mean who doesn't feel the need to worship a graven image now and again or sleep with our neighbors wife? Well except me of course because, She is the cream in my coffee, my fresh ocean breeze, owner of half of my earthly belongings...blah, blah, blah. No these are "The_Capts 10 CM Commandments". "What unholy power gives you the right and authority?" you may say. Good question...you see after playing the game for 24 hours straight without food or water I was visited by the Spirit of CM. Yes, Fritzy was sleeping fitfully by my side muttering "Slodat, vhere is you flamethower?!" and "Achtung Loser!!". When suddenly the normal chatter of CM faded and I heard the clear voice of the Bn CO. He told me that I had been chosen to deliver a message. The Message. The Light that will show them the way!! So I got out a paper and a pen and here is what he said... "In no particular priority or order: #1. Be a spice upon the wind and rain which runs down their backs and into their underclothing" Which I translate to be: You can never lay down too many ground rules. Oh ya, Fionn's 72 short Purple People Eater modified for the TH CAL Sunday after dinner rule. No Volkgrenadiers, No Guns, no Landmines, no flamethowers, no trees, no building..nothing just an empty map. May the best man win. "#2. Look to the ants of the field..do they not dance?" Translation: I you get foolhardy and break #1; you can never have too much infantry. And I mean it. Beg, borrow or steal. Infantry are the stuff of life, the blood of any organization. Throw them away like rice at a wedding. You opponenet will run out of ammo eventually or just let you win cause the slaughter has made him ill. "#3. For my wind shall break like thunder accross there backs and they shall be sorely afeared." Translation: Arty rocks! Mortars when on defence and big stuff whille attacking. Even if you can't hit f@#k all, it is a hell of a lot of fun to watch. "#4. It's one a.m. for Gods Sake! Come to bed!!" Translation: Time on setup is never wasted. Get into every trench, site every AT weapon. You may still suck at it but it wears down you opponent in a TCP game...not so much in a PBEM. "#5. Verly I beseach thee to eat ruffage and love thine colon." Translation: Pass the salad and the rubber glove!!! "#6. Upon thine horses will rest the heart of thine enemies and in their eyes you will see the golfers (not sure about that) of my blood." Translation: Buy cheap armour, you get more and it blows up just as well as the expensive stuff. "#7. Upon the fields of glory lie the blood of both victor and vanquished" Translation; No matter how good it may be going, you still have time to screw it up!! "#8. Foresooth, I say! Hold thine enemy close to thy breast and squeeze." Translation: Never be afraid to try something desperate. Hide in the corners, run away and force him to chase you around the map till he runs out of gas. "#9. I was looking back on my life. And all the things done to me... I am still searching for all the answers..Still searching for the key." Translation: ? I have no freakin idea. Could be something about Int gathering...hell send something in. "#10. Yea, I say to thee that thou shall have no other gods but me." Translation: If you buy any other game after this one you head will explode. Well there you go. Feel free to pick whatever nuggets you can out of that one. I'll be back in a couple of weeks with the next one...still working on the premis but I think the title is catchy "Your Penis, Churchill and CM: A love story". Remember: Play CM until you go blind then hire a monkey to play for you.

You can take out concrete pill boxes with Arty but it has to be the big stuff and actually hit. I've done it, on the scenario where the American Airborne go after the Eagles Nest or whatever, I can't remember the name but it was a good one. I was using the 200mm stuff and knocked out two but it took more than a few rounds.

Also keep in mind that those three guys, "Larry, Curly and Moe," as I call em represent up to 13 men spread out over a piece of ground. Which means that when a tank or MGs are firing, your hapless victims are in fact ducking behind trees and rocks and folds in the ground. Not just kneeling or lying in the spot in which the boys currently are. This is by far the most realistic representation of troops in combat.

Love to and tried that but I get no response. I do know he reads this forum, hence the message. I'll let it drop now cause he'll either respond or not.

Hey Tank Man, If he does e-mail you, pass on my thanks to him for bailing on our Bde(Attrition vs Manouevre) Campaign Game without even giving the courtesy of a good excuse. He may be some kind of wargame god but that smacks of bad sportsmanship where I come from. Nuff said.

Well if that was in fact Fionn then we have been the victim of a "hit and run". Kinda like someone who bails out of a TCP game when he doesn't like the look of it. As he can't respond here I will leave it to you to decide but I for one am not impressed.

Dunee, Well not quite. The game pits the two schools of thought against each other in a Bde setting. On side will ise the philosophy of aufstrastaktic while another Befelstakic(sp?). The control methodology and mentality of the two sides will drive the tactics used. Now for everybody else, here is what has happened. The one and only Fionn Kelly had volunteered to command the Manouevre Bde while humble ol me commanded the Attritionists. We developed a system of rules and got players and GMs. We played 2 turns in which we caressed recce elements but no fights. Then Fionn disappeared. I had no note as to why, after repeated attempts to contact him. I can't decide if he is being rude or something serious happened, either way once the other Bde lost their Comd, they kinda sat around like sheep. People started to lose interest. Eventually the GMs were ready to call us winners by default. Needless to say we were all a little disappointed and pissed that Fionn after much interest would disappear. If anybody is in contact with him please pass on to him that he should have at least dropped me a line. Unless of course it was something truly devastating then I can understand. Fionn was very interested and active, so his dropping out was a little mysterious...he owes me a game too. Anyway, the Manouvre Bde is planning to appoint another Comd and drum up another player. My Bde is short two people for Bn CO positions, so if anybody is interested (we're Axis) I am taking names. I hope we can get this thing going as it showed real promise at the start and could be a lot of fun.

I hit him with a chair while he was out here, I guess he decided to slink back to his satin bed and weep into his silk pillow. I am sure we will all receive legal summons for the law suit from his ol man.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>RiffRaff??? I could buy and sell all of your sorry asses... <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Well let's be honest here, cause this is that type of forum but I believe it is your "Daddy" who could buy and sell us all. You have to wait until your snotty little ass turns 18 before you can get your soft chubby hands into that trust fund. Then you can buy a BMW and become the rich idiot, fate has in store for us. You know the type who run over the Butler, "but that's ok cause so did my Grandfather and we own the law firm". But lucky us! We get to read all about your early years here in our little corner of the world. May I suggest that you go back top whatever board your "super 2000 Ghz 21 inch Flatscreen Pentium 8, but I still threw a hissy fit cause it was the wrong color" computer use to take you to and leave us poor bumbkins back in the outer darkness we used to call home before being blinded by your colourful personality.

Wow what a well written and thought out post. My faith in the youner generation has been reaffirmed. Thank goodness.

Hey Phillies, E-mail me, maybe I can help you out a bit. I am no Rommel mind you but that kinda score crys out for help.