LongLeftFlank
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Posts posted by LongLeftFlank
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Had flying Ali-Babas in CMSF too. Iirc, if you select a unit on a rooftop and then flip the camera view tomax elevation then back again, theunit floats. The bug goes away if you save and reload
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Towers are like trenches, foxholes and bocage. They're slaves to the underlying action square grid which the whole game runs on. There's a minimum size inhabitable building footprint. Catherdal tower, last time I checked, was the same footprint as a smallest square building (though it looks bigger). Any smaller and some of your squad will be hanging around out of doors because everybody can't fit in together.
CMBN did add a couple of little barn objects less than 1x1 in size, so it's clearly feasible... Just tricky to make work, I expect, for reasons you cite and maybe others too. As to the issue of excess personnel hanging around outside, all the better, since you wouldn't want units of more than 3 entering in the first place.
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An intermediate-sized bell tower (distinct from the 8 floor cathedral spire) is sorely missed, just as minarets were conspicuously missing from CMSF. The small square building type is an imperfect substitute for either, owing to its carrying capacity.... A 3 man MG or FOO team is about all you'd expect to fit in a church tower. I thought BFC could work up a special "bunker" type fortification (these are basically an immobile vehicle) with a multistory "turret" but they have other priorities.
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Unless his last name is Scott or Uhura, he's a goner. And I don't see no earrings.
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Nah, the British don't need help from the Yanks to handle this one. Captain Hurricane is on the job!
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Ah yes, the famed SPW 1968 Wodstuckhippistonerwagen, affectionately dubbed "Herbi" by its crews, when they weren't too stoned. Main armament consisted of rear-facing 120mm nitrous oxide dispenser.
Whose Thomas Pynchon mod are you using?
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* Shakes his head and goes play Zero Wing.
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Platoon 2 drives along dirt toads for 2km, staying in the middle of the road.
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!
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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.
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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?
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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.
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It is notable that as the Germans start to lose the war, these tales of teutonic daring do rapidly increase, wonder what the correlation is there?
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"
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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.
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Also, webbing was frequently worn over camo smocks so no problem with that. Only the early smocks were meant to be worn over the webbing and the equipment, which was rarely done though.
Ah yes, I see what you mean.
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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.
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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.
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East Yorkshire Regiment Is the only Yorkshire formation I know of , any more out there that you are aware of?
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....
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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!
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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.
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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).
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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....
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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".
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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.
New Soundmod in progress(with Problems)
in CM Normandy Maps and Mods
Posted
Ever notice th' funny sound those new zippers make, Willie?