LongLeftFlank

1. Guys, Pericles is *not* making stuff up; everyone who's played CM has had WTF! moments like this. So no need to jump on him so hard. He's trying to help. OTOH, Ian et al are also trying to help, so do let's keep it civil.
2.  In CMSF, where BLUEFOR is (or should be) casualty-sensitive (to offset their massive FP advantages), losing half a squad to sporadic kamikaze behaviour may mean losing a game on vp. So this matters more than ever.
3.  But it doesn't sound like a straightforward AI 'bug' fix either. The cover-seeking AI has always been a bit of a black box, but clearly:
a. We *do* want unpinned squaddies to get out of a killzone, stat, not go to ground in place by default to get hosed down more.
b. But we also *don't* want them overdoing it by dashing pell mell for the nearest 'safe' place that happens to be 100 yards away across a beaten zone.
4. My personal view (fwiw) is that abstracted hard 'micro' cover seems undermodeled in general, even though that hunch is tough to confirm empirically.
In RL, it's unusual (and a memorable horror, think Omaha) when an infantryman doesn't have anything at all solid within a few paces that he can put between himself and bullets. That's why modern battlefields look 'empty.'  Incoming fire should normally encounter sharply diminishing returns after the first few shots, even in 'open ground'.
By boosting the number of perceived 'refuges' available to pixeljoes, it seems you could then reduce the chances of the TacAI choosing to run for a safe spot far away.

Those building textures are @Kieme(ITA)’s mods, not stock, correct?

Of course, guerrilla-friendly terrain is in no way restricted to cities, even in the 'arid'  Middle East. Consider a few square kms patchwork of vehicle-unfriendly marshy fields, dikes, walls and irrigation ditches unchanged since Assyrian times, with LOS broken up by unkempt orchards and palm groves, walled farmsteads and dense clusters of reeds.
Look closely at the second map, or go to Google Earth. This is incredibly challenging ground to secure, even with overwhelming force available. Not quite bocage, but close.
And as I've preached umpteen times, terrain is the "third player" in the game; it can equalize or cripple pretty much any force.

Of course, guerrilla-friendly terrain is in no way restricted to cities, even in the 'arid'  Middle East. Consider a few square kms patchwork of vehicle-unfriendly marshy fields, dikes, walls and irrigation ditches unchanged since Assyrian times, with LOS broken up by unkempt orchards and palm groves, walled farmsteads and dense clusters of reeds.
Look closely at the second map, or go to Google Earth. This is incredibly challenging ground to secure, even with overwhelming force available. Not quite bocage, but close.
And as I've preached umpteen times, terrain is the "third player" in the game; it can equalize or cripple pretty much any force.

Well, you don't always get to say nah, I won't fight here. Let's say your heavy mech is doing 'haul ass and bypass' to Damascus. But then a Syrian rifle company mixed with irregulars appears out of this dense farmland and shoots up a fuel convoy? You get put in command of a scratch force and get told to "go clear those bastards out asap". Which mostly means 'find them and then call in air/helo strikes'. You have insufficient forces to cordon off the area. So there's no alternative to going into the bush. The general wants the MSR secured, like yesterday! No more goddam burning fuel trucks on al Jazeera.... 
(I know you know this stuff btw,  just shootin' the breeze. Don't want to sound preachy) 

I think the basic building blocks haven't changed since SF1:
1. put a huge vp penalty on BLUEFOR losses to drive realistically conservative behaviours (and increase RED degrees of freedom).
... Of course this also means you can't whack BLUE right away with an unavoidable hi-cas ambush (unless you provide a vp cushion that provides for it). I generally just assume that on turn 1 the Big Bump has already happened, humvees are burning, etc.
2. Suitably constricted/compartmented terrain where BLUE can't instantly converge/call in their overwhelming fire superiority (*yawn*). Hard cover remains  undermodeled, so in the absence of robust strongpoints RED has got to be able to break contact and rally.

Have been thinking a lot about Opfor in general (sucker for an underdog), and how to approach this with CMSF 2, particularly from a PBEM standpoint, and trying to be somewhat competitive.

Doing some experimenting with CMSF 1:

The heaviest option for civilians in CMSF will allow Combatants (not Fighters (Mujahideen), but the guys in camo and jeans), and possibly VBIED (but not taxis) to remain invisible until very close indeed - it seems like if these are Move-ing along city tiles, these won't be spotted until around 2 action spots away. VBIED seem to have some degree of stealth, but nothing like as much as that. Usually that doesn't matter, since they cover a huge amount of ground pretty quickly.

They are not spotted directly, but the soldiers will still call out "SPOTTED AN ENEMY UNIT", etc. - so there's some contextual clues. Occasionally they might pop up with contact icons, but still nothing they'll directly fire at. Originally I thought this was a problem, but on further thought I think this might actually be okay - the manuals talk about spotting unusual behaviour in civilians, dogs etc., so this could be put down to that kind of observation. I was also originally of the opinion that this "stealth device" approach to modelling insurgents wasn't terribly great, but it does seem to match up to the tactical considerations quite well - hiding amongst civilians to get to point-blank range, etc.

Combatants do not have the firepower to go into a straight fight with any Blufor squad, at least with small arms, and they're mostly equipped with small arms alone. This means that I suspect the correct approach is to force them into something other that a straight fight.

E.g.:

The mission is to attack a US squad, inside a police station. The plan is to use spies to discover their location, infiltrate (whilst holding fire!) to locations surrounding the building, then give them a really good reason to leave the building - ideally a VBIED, but perhaps an ATGM, mortar fire, RPG volley, whatever.  The Combatants can then open up whist he US squad is fleeing the building, giving them the advantage that they need. Any technicals are ideal here as flankers - probably not engaging directly, but cutting off retreat routes.


The TC 7-100 series are the  recent OpFor guides for the US. 2 and 3 are of particular use:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/TC_7-100.2_-_Opposing_Force_Tactics_(December_2011).pdf
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e5/TC_7-100.3_-_Irregular_Opposing_Forces_(January_2014).pdf

The interesting things here are how generic these are (the same basic concepts work for Syrian Mechanised infantry battalion assaults, or a fighter group ambushing a few HMMWV's). This generally splits a plan into three sections:

Active Element - This is the element that will make the assault/carry out the ambush/manoeuvre onto the target.
Security Element - Early warning for the approach of reinforcements, possibly delaying or preventing this. Typically this might just be an RPG team, but could include spies, IED's, mines, ATGMs, etc.
Support Element - C2, Direct fires, Indirect fires and mobility.

Direct fires will be MG's, RPGs and maybe an ATGM. Mobility is obviously civilian transport.

The "C2" part of that is worth some thought. Irregular forces don't get much in terms of equipment, and I can't remember if there's much in the way of radios in CMSF. The Spy in Passage at Wilcox (CMSF 2 Demo) definitely has a radio, so there's that. I do wonder if it's worth using teams in taxis as messengers, sharing the spy spotting information horizontally? In any case, it's going to be important to pay attention to force (cell?) structure here, and a reasonable percentage of your force allocation should probably go on spies (or at least dedicated to spotting Combatants), since you'll need all the help you can get.


This does leave the Fighters in a slightly odd position. Without the stealth of the Combatants, they're mostly useful for having better equipment (including ATGMs), usually a little better training, and higher motivation. Whilst that means that they're a good choice for the actual attack, they don't have the same ability to get close without some thought - I wonder if they're best used from concealment as the assault element, after the support element suppresses the target? That would leave Combatants in the Security and Support roles mostly, I suppose.

E.g.:

The mission is to attack a US squad, inside a police station. The plan is to use spies to discover their location, infiltrate RPG teams (whilst holding fire!) to locations surrounding the building, then fix them in place -  unleashing a volley of RPGs and MG fire from multiple directions.  The Fighters can then debus from civilian transport and storm the building directly.

One idea I did read in the above manuals which I think could work well in CMSF is using taxis to form an impromptu roadblock - using them to block in either end of a street so that exits are impeded. The taxis will be destroyed, of course, but if it keeps the enemy in the kill zone longer, so much the better.
 

Some maps from the above sources, describing the Active, Security and Support roles in different contexts:


This is more than doable with the mechanics in CMSF - obviously the crowd/riot would have to be abstracted (flavour object? burning cars?), but it would work.

As a scenario it wouldn't be all that interesting, obviously, but it's nice to know.



More of a formal Syrian army hunter-killer ambush, but one that would work just as well with irregular forces. Given the obstacles, this wouldn't work in CMSF, but should work fine in CMSF  (ignoring the basements).



"Exit" objectives will help this kind of thing with CMSF 2


The above is probably what a typical irregular scenario should look like - attack a target, and get out before the reaction force shows up. Again with the "exit" conditions making this kind of thing possible now.


One thing that is notable is how small these examples are - most insurgent-only scenarios should probably be really small - Blufor getting a squad or maybe a platoon at most. That's pushing the lower limit on scale for CM, but I think it's workable.

The importance of Infowar elements in the above makes me wonder if there's something clever you can do with Spotting objectives.

After creeping as an anon in the forums for a very long time, this day deserves an actual registering in here to celebrate. Looking forward to playing SF in its new form. Refresh monkey mode can now rest, at least for a little.

Well, that sucks! Figures it'd come out while you were working. Well, good luck. Hope you are playing soon!
 
Mord.

Some more history and context.
On 13 July, the two attacking regiments of the 35th Division again scored only limited gains. The principal reason, not realized until later advance had cleared the ground, was a German defensive system described by XIX Corps G-2 as representing a "school solution" for the enemy's problem of stopping our attack.
Just west of the hamlet of le Carillon (Map 16) the Germans had organized on a north-south nose of higher ground, between two small creeks, in a fashion not matched elsewhere on the division front. Using every advantage offered by the hedgerow terrain, they followed the principle of defense in depth. The main enemy positions began 500 yards from the northern end of the nose, on the line le Carillon-la Mare; from here, for 1000 yards to the south, the rising ground was organized as a defensive base. From it, small combat groups worked out to the north and on both flanks to prepared outpost positions; if pressed, they could retire easily to the base. The nose was only 50 to 100 feet higher than the low ground on the approaches from the north, and less than that above the draws to either side, but this was high enough to afford good observation, and enemy automatic weapons and mortars were sited to deliver effective harassing fires over a wider radius. Heavy hedgerow dikes and a few sunken roads gave the Germans opportunity for movement under cover from American artillery fire. Enemy forces in this area were estimated at about a battalion....
The problem of cracking this German strong-point was never really solved; success on other parts of the front settled the issue during the next few days.
Buckley, The Normandy Campaign 1944: Sixty Years On
On 11 and 12 July the 35th Division assaulted a most elaborate defensive position at Le Carillon. The 2/137 found the armoured support provided [3 tank platoons of the 737th Tank Battalion and 654th TD Battalion] entirely ineffective. The tank destroyers were wrecked by mines and mortars, and of four tanks sent in, one was blown up on a mine and two became bogged in the mud. These misadventures reflect the German policy of always separating enemy armour from infantry where they could do so.
The 2/137 was more successful in changing tactical organisation and procedures for the infantry and their own and attached fire support weapons. Colonel O'Connell decentralised his forces, attaching a platoon of heavy machineguns and a section of 81mm mortars to each company. The rifle companies were ordered to abandon conventional formation and create attack groups of four or five men. O'Connell remarked, "The best tactic was to first place very heavy concentrations of mortar fire on all suspected enemy lines and then to follow this up with a liberal use of grenade launchers and hand grenades."
And here are some foxhole level memoirs:
. 

The word of the Mord! 
RESPONSE:  Thanks be to Bunker

Nice timing. With the patient assistance of @Elvis (his Aim is True), I got CMBN reinstalled on my MacBook. I am now trying to reorient myself on the project, in fits and starts between business trips (btw, last year I stayed at that hotel that fell down in the recent Indonesia earthquake/ tsunami/ volcano. Heartbreaking).
Here's a couple of historical photos of the vicinity of "Purple Heart Corner", on this French language site chronicling the WWII experience of La Meauffe and the Meauffois.
It seems even prior to D-Day the distillery had been bombed, as had V-bomb storage tunnels in the limestone quarries just north (occupied in mid June by 119th Infantry), along with several area chateaux housing German command staffs. And the Germans were demolishing bridges, fortifying churches, etc.


The granite "Gestapo Château" guarding the Fors crossroads (actually a Feldgendarmerie detachment guarding LXXXIV Korps HQ at St. Gilles):
The adjacent rail crossing. Yup, Purple Heart Corner fits the bill. 
 

Ok, enough history, what's going on with the map?
First objective: La Meauffe.
Vermanoir and Eglise St Martin, linchpin of the German left.
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.... 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."
. 

Work and computer power permitting, I am going to resume work on this long shelved BN base game campaign, which includes a 2 x 3 km master map of the east bank of the Vire River above Pont Hebert, from la Meauffe to the German fortified heights at le Carillon.... 
Below are a few key snips from the old thread... 
 
La Meauffe had been the front line since mid June, when 175th Infantry occupied it, then withdrew (under fire) to higher ground further north.
 
So I did some more research online and was gratified to find a French chronology of La Meauffe's war. And it turns out the elusive "Gestapo château" which anchored "Purple Heart Corner" is the Chateau Fors, commanding the key T junction and railway crossing at the south end of La Meauffe. Many historians place it wrongly at St Gilles, which was the LXXXIV Corps HQ, rocketed by Typhoons on D-Day and also heavily fortified.
So at long last I have confidence in the start lines and the July 11th objectives for 1/137.

Poor blighters.... 

All of CMSF2 is one big MikeyD mod.  Almost everything's been touched in the game and 7/8ths of it nobody had actually asked me to do. They'd just come in to work in the morning to find a Carl Gustav rccl gun skin uploaded or new telephone pole art. I'm surprised nobody yelled at me.

The Turkish YPRs are finished, or at least close enough for rock & roll.
It should be a hint how close the title is to completion if I'm puttering around with 3rd party mods instead working like a slave to get things finished.
 
 

No but punch in these coords into Google Earth and roll the imagery date back and forward (2014 is a good year to spot kit):
Tank Shed 1:   35° 9'8.27"N  33°36'59.30"E
Tank Shed 2:   35° 9'12.65"N  33°36'46.26"E
Tank Shed 3:  35° 9'4.66"N  33°36'48.62"E
All of the sheds are part of the same installation in Asha/Pasakoy Cyprus. This location is associated with the Turkish 14th Armoured Brigade according to various open source websites.
Now, while I accept that the Turkish garrison in Cyprus is a bit of an anomaly to that on the mainland, it seems pretty clear from the imagery that Tank companies number 13 x tanks. Dividing this by three gives you four and a bit. So my guess is that a Turkish tank company comprises either 3 x tank platoons of four tanks each, plus a company HQ tank or 4 x tank platoons of three tanks each plus a company HQ tank. My guesstimate would be the first of the two above.
I actually used to be the go-to-guy for Orbats in this part of the World in the late 90s early 00s but all sadly forgotten and most of it can't be told here anyway.
 

BANNED by Aunty Beeb in '67. But, luckily not in here.

And though the trolls were rather small / Steve had to ban them all / 
(kidding) 
 

Another futurist thought to kick around is for BFC to slowly 'merge' engine 2 CM Families to keep things fresh and interesting without all new projects as their focus shifts to engine 3.
So e.g., they update force sets and TOE for CMSF2 to 2020, then drop the barrier between it and CMBS to create a single modern warfare family taking in both temperate and arid. So Russians fight Uzbeks, Germans intervene in Latvia etc.
Or e.g. CMRT Berlin builds in a gate that allows paid up licensees to import select CMFB and CMFI forces and terrain sets, without needing to do separate end of war modules for the latter. Then you can get 'what if' Patton v Zhukov too.
Yeah, yeah I know, all easier said than done, based on what was supposed to be a 'simple' modernization of CMSF.
But it's either that or they ditch the 'islanded' engine 2 families altogether while we all wait on engine 3.
Fresh meat!

The word of the Mord! 
RESPONSE:  Thanks be to Bunker

Ok. I have read enough of your posts now, that I have to say this so that you will understand the concepts in CM. Firstly, YOU have to WIPE your brain clean of all the RTS nonsense. Take it out of your skull, squirt some Windex on it and give it a nice scrubbing. Now, put it it back in and away we go.
CM isn't gonna give you power ups,  weapons upgrades or healing/resurrection (they have their place in other game but not here). You MUST forget all that stuff if you want to learn. You have to approach it as if you are a real commander, on a real battlefield, with real men, using real weapons for the time period you are playing. It's more of a simulation than a game where exploits replace actual tactics. Battles can take place anywhere from thirty minutes to four hours, no tank is gonna get upgraded armor, no soldier who just had his leg blown in half is gonna get a magic bandage, or a green squad that just killed three Germans is gonna advance in experience, within those time periods. On the contrary, it would take a few days to up armor a tank, the wounded soldier would be shipped home, and the squad would slog for weeks before they learned everything they needed to survive. Think of it this way, if it doesn't happen in the real world, it doesn't happen in CM.
Once you rid your mind of the gaminess of other games you'll be better suited to absorb the nuances of Combat Mission. It's a whole different experience and very rewarding. Have fun with it. Most importantly read the manual! There is a wealth of info there. But don't hesitate to ask more question on what you don't understand. It's nice to have new blood playing the game.
 
Mord.

And though the trolls were rather small / Steve had to ban them all / 
(kidding)