sfhand

These guys get to shoot their guns too! Enjoy it while it lasts, fellas. Here's the pzschrck team leaving their deployment for their new assignment. If you click on this picture you will see more infantry in the field next to the buildings moving to support positions. I've played c3k before and know how quickly he likes to move his forces once he encounters a weakness in the defense. Great events are about to occur... The approach

The following screenshots highlight the minute in which I realize I have been completely fascinated by the flavor of my own BS... it starts with me moving some infantry to try and stop c3k at the road. The teams on the right and center are positioned to contest the road and parts of the adjacent plowed field... the team on the left is set up to contest the bocage "hallway" entrance should they cross the road. and then reality interrupts my fantasy... These guys are not properly supported for what is coming their way. You can see a pzrschrck, I'm not going to pull it over, so sir, I'm going to get one from the other side of the map and keep that one on the off chance he comes down the road... not that this decision will make a difference. In the mean time some of my guys get to shoot their guns!

I really want to like and use AT guns... however, I have had very unsatisfactory experiences (my values and expectations) with them. I'm not necessarily talking about guns set up during the setup, e.g., in Huzzar as the Amis one gets an AT gun as a reinforcement. I set it up behind a hedgerow with LoS to an enemy assault gun yet it never fired. I have also experienced way too many problems setting up MG's behind bocage. I have a hard time understanding why they don't set up with LoS when their waypoint says there is LoS from that location. I guess I'm saying I'm not sure if the "problem" is with the unit or the bocage modelling.

Well, even though it was a ruthless beat-down, I'm glad you chose to name a bit of terrain after me... Great AAR, btw.

Fionn, You don't know me but there was a time when I "studied" anything and everything I could find of your CMX1 writings. Not only did I get hours of enjoyment but I believe you made me a better player (not that I'm much good, but better is better). So, thanks for coming back and violating several forum rules in one great post... Hopefully you'll stick around.

I would wait, not because of right/wrong but because I would want to make sure I "got it right". I think you will get a support reply sooner than Monday, but if you need new activations you will usually have to wait longer because, in my understanding, those are only done by Moon and he is a busy dude. I too have been bit by a new driver setting off the DRM, hang in there.

Adapting the blast command, with it's waiting period, to include vehicles (can one already use blast on bunkers?) would be an awesome addition. That would simulate that it is not like throwing rice at a wedding. I would like to keep it's current use rather than replace it with blast because there might be times when one might want to throw a satchel charge.

if it is a steer you know more about it than you're letting on... (um... if WHAT is not on your grill???)

Down goes Frazier... He's not getting up from that... And the rifle team isn't falling back unscathed either... The pzrschrk team... and the rifle team... at the end of that turn.

This is just my side of things, for those seeking exciting action, I recommend heading over to c3k's thread, located here: http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=110256 In that thread he has outlined his plan of attack and after looking at my defense the outcome of this battle should be no surprise. His strength is applied directly on my most glaring weakness. Here's how our initial contact played out on my left flank... I had moved a pzschrk team forward along with a rifle team. I had used this strategy to great effect during our last battle (no glaring oversights in that one). Anyway, the forward rifle team spots some Ami's in the field and opens fire you can make out the red cross marking the first casualty of the battle Then the team spots more Ami's... Aside from the casualty they notice, at the end of the turn, Ami's are getting through. So they decide to fall back, notice the cowering pzschrk team member...

Bookmarked! I'm really looking forward to this, thanks Jon.

About the point thing... I would have rather not known about the points personally, for either side. But, as I said before, the points had nothing to do with my glaring oversight... I wish I could blame that on Ken... but alas, it is all on me

As the defender I knew I would be outnumbered and would have to rely on artillery to even things out. This seemed obvious to me based upon the amount of trps given. My plan was to slow the enemy at the first crossroad. I agree with c3k about the use of linear artillery strikes and yet I have no problem issuing linear fire orders between 2 trps (which I did during the game) primarily because they represented on call pre-planned strikes along the roadway, i.e., the crux of my defensive plan. Below are my trps with hindsight applied. In game I knew the jig was up as soon as I saw more than one tank heading toward the only place along my line that wasn't defended. right flank: left flank: This should conclude the "setup phase" of my AAR...

Before I get into the screenshots of the carnage I figured I'd put up a little bit of information that I feel played a part in my poor performance. When we (myself and c3k) were starting this game this type of post was all the rage over in the CMFI forum. Between this post: http://www.battlefront.com/community/showpost.php?p=1434093&postcount=1 and c3k's swaggering posts (posts that I greatly appreciate) I wound up believing I would be facing a straight on assault. This willful ignorance on my part coupled with my not understanding that from a points perspective c3k had a higher motivation to bypass the north most (right hand side of the map) objectives contributed to my flawed defensive plan. Hopefully I can mark this one down as "lesson learned", only time will tell. Yes, I buried my head in the sand and completely ignored the fast moving, quick flanking, and hard hitting offense I have experienced while defending against c3k before. The most galling aspect, for me, is that I examined the path c3k exploited rather closely but decided not to invest defensive assets there (a single trp could have changed the outcome of the game, or at least prolonged the battle) I will post more screenshots tomorrow and move on with the battle.

Sadly not the case...

It sounds like you've been hanging around c3k a bit...

Thanks Mac, I'm heading out of town for a couple of days, I will get back to this when I return. (objective point values are listed in red text)

The setup... I have listed the value of each objective area, with what I thought were universal values. Laboring under the misconception that they were universal values I set up my defenses with the idea of falling back from the rightmost objective after initial contact. I had trp's in the road from which to call in linear fire missions as I envisioned the enemy moving from objective to objective taking the most valuable first. The little red arrows on top right were my opening move advances (a pzrschrk team with a rifle team to guard their flank). All infantry platoons were split into teams and spread out along bocage with foxholes a bit behind them as places to take refuge should there be an opening round artillery strike. I set up some kill zones in the left most objective with mines, wire, and a trp (also LOF from units one bocage row back). I also put a squad, split into teams, of my forward line accompanied by a pzrschrk in the field south of the objective. Again with the idea being to establish initial contact and then fall back. My HMG teams and AT gun were set up on the road. I wanted to take advantage of recent improvements in HMG behavior so I set them up with LOF down the road covering the crossroads and beyond. edit, I have completely botched the images... I thought it would be fairly straightforward. I looked at the Bil and GaJ threads and noticed they both used flickr so I opened an account there. But one can't just post the image URL and when one is of limited intelligence one can't understand the instructions as given (non-existent). Anyone got a link or instructions for posting screenshots from flickr? Thanks

Macisle, It was v2.0 so you are right, I didn't know that. I'd love to be able to pin my loss on that bit of information, but my losing had nothing to do with that, as you will soon see. Thanks for a great scenario!

I'm writing this because Macisle, the creator of this scenario, requested those of us who play the scenario to do so. The map is a bocage map, inspired by discussions on the board about CMBN's depiction of bocage fighting. There are a couple of noteworthy aspects of the map, in terms of my limited understanding of setting up a defense. Firstly, there is no area in which to build up a defense in depth to engage the enemy before he reaches the first objective. Secondly, because of the potential for Rhino equipped tanks and/or breach teams, there are no clear avenues of approach to prepare for. Thirdly, due to the bocage, LOS is short in most areas (the roads provide the longest LOS on the map with one bocage keyhole exception – the only one I discovered at least). In order to win on points I can't outright lose more than the first two objectives. I chose to deploy my forces mostly forward in those two objectives, with my lead element being a skirmish line which I'm hoping to pull back after contact is established. I placed target reference points along the xroad (which means along the bocage as well) and will not use linear fire unless it is between trps. I also used a couple trps in the first objective with wire in hopes of catching infantry in case my oppo chooses a frontal assault. I have one ATG which I have positioned behind some bocage, in a very obvious location, with LOS down the main road. My two HMG teams are nearby, also with LOS down the main road. The rest of my defense is, hopefully, mobile behind the skirmish line. Macisle suggested the more seasoned player take the Germans, well, we didn't do that so I expect an uphill fight. More to come... Okay, those 2 paragraphs were written prior to the setup. I will be posting a few more times, because the battle basically broke down into 3 stages: initial contact, oppos plan ends up exploiting a glaring oversight on my part, the crushing of my force.

Weighing in ... re: Topic 1 - I think one of the best newish features of the game is the ability to brighten night time. I hated that I couldn't see my units at night before they added that toggle. I would hate to have to hunt through the fog to find my units... re: Topic 2 - I think seeing 150 meters in dense fog is generous... but I'm assuming dense fog is the pea soup variety.

I just uploaded a mod to the repository and GAJ's place to add the shoulder patch to Ranger units in the base game.

I'm guessing you are saying it is a systemic limitation then. For whatever reason the new unis don't show up in older scenarios with Rangers and not being a coder I have no idea why that is but I don't think it is unreasonable for a layman to think they might... I'm guessing if the old scenarios had their Ranger units deleted and then reselected they might get the shoulder patches? Perhaps I'll try that in a smaller scenario and post the results if successful.

Forgive me if this has already been discussed, if it has I could not find it. I've noticed that Ranger units in CMFI (vanilla) don't have the shoulder patches that Ranger units in CMFI Gustav Line have. Is there something on my end that needs to be fixed/altered or is this a systemic issue?

The problem with not selecting the unit is selecting the unit is the easiest way to see which of the player's units is spotting it...