Rob Smith

Now that I have run around the block several times screaming my frustration to the winds, I believe I may be able to discuss this topic "unemotionally". Many of the posts in this topic have been helpful in realizing that I am not the only person suffering from the hopeless goal of obtaining a "realistic and accurate" simulation of wargaming. Although I believe CMBO to be the best example of the genre, I have once again been disappointed by the high claims of peerless realism. I was hoping for a game that would be more intrinsically driven by real world tactics than "random number generators". Even with the chaos of battle, I find the combat resolutions to be uneven and, at times, inexplicable. I have studied Military History and hardware all my life (read NERD). I have even experienced the honor of interviewing some of the participants of the holocaust that was WWII. Infantry, Armor, Air Forces and Navy... from both sides, Axis and Allies. I currently maintain acquaintances with a few of them. I was reading specs on WWII hardware even before the first grade and have had some limited (thank God) experiences in Special Operations during my tour in the service. Enough of the knuckle dragging, macho, self-laudatory crap... I set up a battle containing the classic Axis quality vs. the Allied quantity scenario. It pits King Tigers and Jagdtigers, with some small FJ infantry support, against nearly overwhelming Allied numbers in armor and infantry; M-18's, Sherman Jumbo 76's and T-26 Pershings. Even though I set the Allied experience at "Regular" and the Axis at "Elite", the performance of the Allied tankers in hitting AND spotting is disproportionally high. With all else being equal, i.e., unit location, terrain and distance, the performance advantage is still overwhelmingly in favor of the Allies. Even with a full klick separating the combatants, the computer will hit its target three to four times more often per unit than I can, regardless of my positioning. I can somewhat chalk this up to silouette factors, but I can tell you that if someone were shooting a cannon at me in the open, I would certainly be able to localize it after at least a couple of shots. The damage to my units is also unbalanced in comparison, especially considering the superior ballistics of the Axis' guns. Even with the gyrostabilizer on the Allied tanks, this is hard to explain. The manual states that it is a good idea to let your units pick their own targets in most cases, yet I have watched as my KT targets a tank several hundred meters away, posing no immediate threat, while a M-18 sitting 119 yards away in the open takes three shots, killing my precious with a front turret penetration. I won't even get into how seemingly easy and consistently my units get their guns damaged. This being said, CMBO is still the best representation in this genre by far. If I can keep from screaming obscenities at the computer at three a.m. which results in several blows to my head from my sleeping wife (maybe that's the source of my limitations), I will stubbornly continue to play it. Any suggestions, except the obvious clinical ones would be appreciated as I have only been playing this game for a short time. My apologies for the filibuster...I feel better now, really. Thanks