LongLeftFlank

* Shakes his head and goes play Zero Wing.

Your typo reminds me of a tale from my Lonely Planet backpacker days. One night early in the monsoon season I was riding a motorbike in Northern Thailand. The tarmac roads were wet but still warm from the sun which seemed to make them irresistible to hordes of tiny yellow frogs. So there I am, driving through the paddies watching one frog after another take a magnificent leap in my headlight to land perfectly in front of my tire -- Pop! Pop! Pop! for miles on end, grossing me out the entire way. So if we are indeed reincarnated, I'm pretty sure I know what I'm coming back as in the next life. Selah!

Wait -- isn't Kampfgruppe an ersatz combined arms formation of multi-battalion size roughly analogous to the US "Task Force" . Combat Commands were permanent regiment-sized formations within certain US armoured divisions.

Steiner14, I don't intend to click these links in light of your past record on this board, but they wouldn't by any chance happen to be yet another attempt to deny, justify or whitewash brutal Nazi crimes, would they?

The one I always get hung up on is the difference between brigade and regiment. I believe that in all WWII armies regiments were nearly 100% dependent on their parent divisions for all forms of support including arty (other than company-level mortars) armour, supply, etc. Distinct from battalions, Regimental command staffs were large enough to plan and execute their own operations,drawing on higher echelon support as needed. Brigades in contrast, while also comprised of battalions were more like mini-divisions in that they were organized and staffed to function without a parent division. I'll let others build on / refute that though.

Playing defence plus personnel shortage plus totalitarian regime collectively increase the chance for "heroic" outliers (although you also have mass surrenders which didn't occur much for the Allies after 1942). Superior German equipment also plays a role in the case of tank "aces", though secondary IMHO. The USAAF could afford to pull their top ace, Dick Bong, out of combat and make him a test pilot. In contrast, there's a reason Adolf Galland's memoir is titled "The First and the Last"

Rokko -- No sarcasm intended. I'm no uniform grog -- just seen a lot of photos and tend to go by what I thought I saw.... until I don't :b And as to haircuts, after a couple weeks in the field I'd think your average Tom would be lucky to get a shave in, much less the old "short back and sides" (aka "high and tight" for the Yanks). Happy to be proved wrong though.

Ah yes, I see what you mean.

And harking back to one of the perennial "Will There Be A PTO Mod" threads, these Para helmets fitted with a coarser web pattern should do well enough for the Japanese.

Well the Paras pictured in the OP seem to have smocks, so we can hope.... But on closer inspection, all the landser are wearing the webstraps, which they wouldn't wear over smocks (at least not that I've ever seen). On a separate note, I guess there's no way we'll ever get an animation where the soldiers carrying something other than their small arms (e.g. MGs, ATWs) move with them across their shoulders. Doesn't seem that hard an animation to create, and would definitely look less awkward. Priorities, I suppose.

I long ago lost my copy of Brigadier Hubert Essame's "Battle for Germany" (outstanding source material for many an ASL scenario in my youth btw), but ISTR a unit in the S'Hertogenbosch battle in Holland delivering "a typical Yorkshire welcome" to a German counterattack around the rail embankment. Possibly part of the 53rd Welsh or 52nd Lowland Divisions? Perhaps that triggers someone else's memory....

Are those the long-awaited SS camouflage smocks or just a camo pattern on the default tunic? Also, the maps -- especially the settlements -- show noticeable improvements in authenticity over many of the CMBN maps -- everything looking much more like Normandy! Great work!

Based on TaL's comments his mod set should be released around the same time as my LaMeauffe - Carillon monster map. Which is awesome because the majority of the stock textures for both Modular and Independent buildings are only suitable for chateaux or the posher parts of towns, not the villes/ countryside which are the venue for most CMBN fights.

Another fidelity check, for the 2.5 of you fellow deviants who care about such things.... "Le Vert Manoir" (Vermanoir) and L'église St Martin, La Meauffe -- my version And a fin de siècle photo of the same spot. Note that the pond in the foreground looks like it was filled in for pasturage by 1944 (but will remain boggy ground for anyone who thinks they can roll tanks in there to fire point blank into the Kraut positions).

Thanks! I'll sign off on the "maze" part anyway. Even without most of the bocage fields filled in on the master, the settlements are starting to look suitably creepy and "closed in" -- the few exceptions like the church tower, the chateaus and the dairy really stand out. As was true on my Ramadi map, gaining LOS (and overwatch) to a specific point on this map is not a simple matter. You kind of "stumble" upon locations nestled in the terrain, just as the veteran accounts of Normandy describe. And that plus the unrelenting AFV-unfriendliness of this map (consistent with historical accounts) is going to deliver a very different CMBN play experience than what you're (mainly) used to. Once I get around to actual scenario design, that is....

On to the next settlement: Vermanoir la Meauffe and Eglise St Martin, linchpin of the German blocking position along the main road. According to the 137th unit history, the thick-walled sandstone church and cemetery "bristled with firepower and atop the bell tower was a German machine gun nest that commanded the approaches to the area. Close behind the church was a chateau, another thick-walled building with excellent facilities for fortification. To this building the enemy added embellishments of his own devising. A labor battalion of impressed Russians had been forced to build heavy reinforcements and a bomb shelter of concrete with walls three feet thick." Moreover "every house and shop had been converted by the Germans into individual pillboxes." Here is a (low res) aerial shot of the village: A slightly farther away shot shows the thorny tactical problem assaulting this village poses for the US: with the road bridge across the St Martin stream blown, there's no easy way to get armour in close for direct fire. The position is anchored on its left by the Vire and on the right by open fields; the far right flank and rail cut are covered by the St Gilles chateau and AT guns. There's a reason this place was dubbed "Purple Heart Corner".

The infamous "Gestapo chateau" at St Gilles. With its thick walls "studded with MGs" and commanding fields of fire, this complex anchored the right wing of the German defense along the Vire river. It had to be close assaulted over 2 days by two US battalions supported by TDs. The Cherbourg - St Lo railway cut is visible in the background. The opposite view, showing the gentle slope of the grounds to the Vire towpath (those fields will of course be mined and wired). Note that the already shell-resistant properties of the Cathedral building type have been further enhanced with "decorative" high and low bocage. This also limits the number of access points to the main chateau. A stables and paddock is visible on the left. I wanted a suitable terrace for the guesthouse overlooking the river. A 24m Urban bridge does very nicely. I will playtest this to ensure it doesn't do bizarre things to infantry movement.

Merci for the info, but the CMBN building set isn't quite that granular. For the Modular building types, the in-game roofing options are restricted to a single option (see my Buildings Gallery thread for more on this). To sum it up: - The large square structures and the medium (2 x 1 square) rectangles have metal roofs. Also, on the latter, if you ctrl+click the roof the chimney will switch to the other end. - The large rectangles and small square (1x1) have black roofs, although the "diagonal variant" on the former has a metal roof. - The medium squares and small rectanges have red roofs In contrast, the Independent buildings do allow you to toggle the roof colour. At some point, I might try to mod up some additional rural building textures, but no time for that right now. Also, Broadsword56 posted a useful little guidebook to traditional Norman architecture. It notes differences between techniques and construction materials used in the marshlands (nearer the beaches) vs those in the higher ground of the St Lo area. For example, mud walls (mud applied to a framework of wood and straw matting) is a lot more common in the lowlands, while fieldstone is more common in the uplands.

More screens, for those interested. Also hoping to provide inspiration to other map designers to make their buildings and settlements look a little more Norman. First up, the Laiterie Claudel, a Calvados distillery at the north edge of La Meauffe that had converted to making Camembert. Another potential OP for the US, although the actual factory had a tall smokestack (not rendered here since I don't want troops climbing such a structure) that was a German aiming point. The sleepy little railway station: One of the farmsteads along the main road to the fortified church. Although the viewpoint is elevated to show the Vire landscape (sans vegetation), notice how the buildings are "sunk" slightly behind the hedgerow enclosures rather than sticking out way above them. Medieval Norman farmers preferred shelter from the elements to a "room with a view".

Thanks. Once I've finished La Meauffe, I am going to flesh out a stand-alone submap scenario depicting the original (re)capture of the eastern part of the town by 1/119th Infantry on June 18, as described in the battalion journal: 18 June. The 119th Infantry sent one platoon to La Meauffe to relieve one platoon of the 175th Infantry, but upon entering the town found it occupied by enemy. At daylight on the 18th, Company "B" was sent to occupy the town, and at the close of operations, la Meauffe east of the RR track was occupied by the 1st Battalion. 0500 175 Inf moved out of La Meauffe before the 1st Bn relieved them. Enemy moved in and 1st Bn unable to move into this point. Skirmished all during the night. 119 began attack 0530 this morning to take this point. 1200 Col McDaniels requested that the Bn of the 119th Infantry move and occupy high ground south of La Meauffe 1845 Inf jeep blown up. La Meauffe in our hands 1840. 1945 Civilians state that Germans have mined road at 493762 reported by K Co. 2000 La Meauffe - counterattack in progress. 49537280 - house with IGs and snipes being fired on. 469775 - Enemy CP in house, Ln 1, 1940. 433763 suspected battery position fired on. 2040 Town of La Meauffe is now in our hands. Enemy is still in outskirts.

Still plodding ahead on this project, although I am hampered by frequent 36% OOM crashes on both my PCs. It is my intent to model the layouts of the various settlements in as much detail and fidelity as possible on the master map (though not flavour objects). That way, it will be relatively simple to finish the scenario submaps by laying down the bocage checkerboard and related vegetation and deepening the irrigation ditches. I have confirmed that what the engine has the biggest trouble coping with is ditches or any other kind of steep-sided embankment, including large amounts of bocage. Vegetation and buildings haven't proved to create a noticeable problem yet.... they just add to the load time. As to fidelity, check this out: View north up the road leading out of La Germainerie (the "newer" northern part of La Meauffe, clustered around the dairy and railway station). The reason the marsh weeds stick up through the little bridge is that I can't deepen the irrigation ditch they're in without crashing the map (that'll happen on the submap -- the ditches will also be lined with vegetation. And the corresponding Google Maps image of the same spot today: And here is an overhead view of the same farmstead, looking southeast toward part of the German-defended rise. The upper windows of that barn could make a dandy perch for a FO, as he can both look right into the town (SW - not visible in this shot) and across the valley at the German MLR. This spot is one of the few "elevations" available to the Americans early on. The outline of the bocage fields isn't visible at this resolution, but those dark green lines are irrigation streams/ditches -- good cover, but tough slogging. And Jerry can be expected to have them both zeroed and possibly mined.

Really? I don't recall ever having problems area fire targeting upper building levels or rooftops on my CMSF Ramadi map, where 95% of the buildings have high walled compounds enclosing them.

One of the many awful things aboit mortars is that they don't make as much noise when falling to earth and therefore give less warning (I'm sure someone here can explain the physics which I forget -- Angle of drop, rotation and sound barrier or sumfink) The vertical drop plus the impact fusing and casing design made mortars far more lethal over an open area relative to (non-air or treeburst) shell impacts, which tend to lose a lot of fragments in the earth. So that, their high rate of fire and their subordination to the frontline formations (Coy, Bn) makes them ideal defensive weapons for driving enemy attackers to ground and pinning them there. But on the other hand, mortars are far less effective in killing infantry that has already gone flat and/or interposed even an inch or two of solid cover between their flesh and the showers of fragments. Even shallow scrapes provide all-round protection against anything but direct hits at the same level. That's why for dug-in infantry with overhead cover, regular mortar "stonks" were more an annoyance than a hazard. Unless they had left their holes of course.

This is the best CMBN video I've seen yet, even including the "mockumentary". Really captures the flow of the action. Very well made bocage map too -- great "feel" of the green maze of hedgerow hell. The mass casualties -- especially all the fatalities -- under those mortar barrages do confirm my general sense that the pixeltruppen need a quicker "Hit the dirt!" reaction to incoming. Nobody should still be standing or taking a knee. You'd still get a lot of decimation and panic from the barrage, but not whole squads massacred to a man... or anyway, that outcome would take a lot longer to achieve.