gunnergoz
-
Posts
2,933 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Posts posted by gunnergoz
-
-
That's a good question all right. Also, it makes me wonder if there will be a replacement platoon leader "nominated" once the regular one is out of commission.
-
I don't at this moment have a source to quote, but I know many Russians and they invariably give me the figure for WW2 total losses (military & civilian) of 25 million Soviet citizens killed (a great many of whom were concentrated in the Ukraine and Byelorussia.)
This figure may reflect old propaganda, but I have no reason to disbelieve it either.
To this day, the former Soviet countries still encourage women to bear children, perhaps a holdover from the postwar need to re-populate.
-
Michael,
My favorite referece is Friedman's engineering history series (US Destroyers, Cruisers, Battleships, Small Combatants, Submarines.) They are pricey and hard to find, but they are the best in-depth analysis I know of regarding fleet unit design, evolution and combat analysis.
As to Brooklyn and other 6" prewar cruisers of that generation, their battery throw weight and volume of fire was phenomenal (as you point out) but was intended to disrupt enemy destroyer attacks against the main battle line, and was not meant to tangle with 8" armed heavies, which could shred a Brooklyn's light armor without too much trouble. The wartime-built Clevelands were mass-production cruisers, badly overweight and apparently were never considered overly successful designs. The wartime heavies (Baltimores) were a bit better regarded, having more built-in reserve to allow for the growth of all those late-war AA batteries that mushroomed on US ships, especially after the Kamikazies came into play.
Needless to say, this is one of my "other" favorite topics. Thanks for your comments, I always enjoy your own posts.
-
Michael,Originally posted by Michael emrys:...snip...Nitpick: The largest guns on American heavy cruisers was 8" in caliber. This was a pretty standard caliber for heavy cruisers worldwide at this time, although the US did have a class of CAs with 6" guns.
Michael[/QB]
Care to tell us which class of US CA "heavy" carried 6" ordnance? You can't be speaking of the pre-war classes with 5 triple 6" turrets? Those are universally regarded as light cruisers by armament, armor and fleet doctrine of the day.
By definition, WW2 era US Cruisers were classified Light with 6" guns, Heavy with 8" and Very Heavy with 12" ordnance (e.g. the so called "battle cruisers" Alaska and Guam).
One odd exception was the anti-aircraft cruisers (CLAA) with 5" DP batteries, which were an anomaly that happened to come in handy at the time, though they did not figure prominently in early pre-war doctrine or planning and some foreign sources later regarded them as a sort of super-destroyer or destroyer leader type of vessel.
I think you're way off base on this one, which is to say an unusual position for you I might add
. On the topic of rail artillery and CMBO/CMBB, nothing could bore me worse than a scenario where a railway piece would be lobbing one round every three minutes somewhere on the battlefield ... whether it was mine to use or not. This particular artillery was quite uncommonly seen in our scale of engagement. Yes, I know it was used at Anzio and at Sevastopol, but these were exceptional situations. I hope BTS doesn't waste any time on the subject, because I'd much rather see their resources go towards depicting the more relevant and decisive weaponry of the war.
-
This Gamespot gig was not one of BTS' better ideas but I don't know the whole story behind it so I'll keep my trap shut after I express my considerable disappointment...
-
Thanks Superted, I saw that afterwards...but I was nuts at the time and wasn't seeing too much else on the Forum.
-
I'll be waiting for my copy in the mail, assuming pre-orders will be taken. How about you?
-
AAAHHHHHH, So now we have a RELEASE DATE...Sept 20th! WHOOPEE!
-
I won't "need" a demo either, but the appearance of one will likely mean that the gold master is done or the game is shipping...
-
Very impressive screen snaps. Has me all excited all over again! I'm especially pleased with the 2nd floor view idea. Keep up the grand work!
-
Thanks, I've been away from the forum for a while.
-
The July issue of Computer Games has a BTS ad that includes CM:BB and has a masthead saying "download demos now."
Of course there are other games listed as well, which do have demos out now, but one can hope...
-
Bon Voyage, friend. Please come back when you can! Meanwhile, life is dealing you some lousy cards, I understand from experience what that is like, so best of luck to you!
-
Blah, blah FAULTS blah blah INACCURACIES blah blah UNFAIR blah blah UNREALISTIC blah blah ad infinitum.
That fairly sum it up?
Sheesh...he gets 150 hours of play out of a $50 computer game and complains about it...I have a closet with several thousand dollars worth of computer games that don't have a total of 150 minutes' play on them, let alone 15 minutes for many.
All I can say to critics like this one is: if you can design and publish a better game, DO IT.
Sheeesh...
-
Some versions of the StuG had concrete filler on the front armor. Look closely at photos of the diagonal surfaces, say above the driver's position, and you'll spot it.
-
In re: M-3's, it sounds like grunt grogs need to keep their noses to the ground and let airdale grogs have their turf to themselves...
-
Not likely from what I've read here...they have their hands full just getting in the Russian stuff and all the early German, not to mention Italian, Finnish, Rumanian, etc. You might be able to fake it with lend-lease versions of certain equipment like shermans, valentines, stuarts and churchills, however...but don't count upon seeing the western allied vehicles fully represented in CMBB...you were referring to that, weren't you?
-
To WBS...are you sure about the "M-3 .50 cal. machinegun" part? I'm pretty sure that the M-2 or "Ma Deuce" still reigns supreme 60 years after WW2. An M-3 .50 just doesn't ring any bells with me...and Lordie knows that the History Channel never gets anything wrong!
Seriously, the post-war versions of the .50 have had modifications but it is still referred to as the M-2 even after all these years. Perhaps they were referring to cannon-armed versions of the sabre mounting 20mm guns (IIRC the Navy Sabre, called the FJ Fury, had a cannon armament, for one.)
-
As our Prez' likes to say "Fabulous Job, JuJu!"
-
I heard it was a TD from the "99'th Fighting Fairies Brigade"...
-
Well, after all this talk about the efficacy of .50 cal rounds against armor, we are drifting away from the fact that the primary weapons that attack fighter-bombers were using were, after all, rockets and bombs. No question but that those were effective tank killers. Based upon the predominant opinion I've heard here (not without persuasive effect), strafing tanks with your mg's was perhaps a last resort or even just a matter of mistaken identification of the target. Either way, a hailstorm of .50 cal slugs as big as one's thumb is bound to shake up the crew, who are unlikely to know whether a particular jabo has it's bomb load left or not and may welll have bailed out upon first sighting the fighters (let's not forget that they hunted in pairs and larger formations.) Strafing a tank that has been abandoned by its crew might well wound or kill crewmembers who happened to get in the way, not to mention the damage done to external components (antennae, fuel cans, periscopes) of the tanks themselves. All in all, it was probably a most unpleasant and inconvenient thing to happen to any given panzer crew.
-
I think that there is too much emphasis being given to the presumed combat exposure level of the line grunts, and not enough credit being given to unit leadership and command ability (which would include the combat experience of the company/battalion and higer commanders.
I've come to think that units with more competent leadership at the company and higher level, whatever the level of experience of the line troops, had a better chance of successful conversion from "green" to "veteran" or better.
By the time of Overlord, most US Army units had been trained to exhaustion and were quite ready to fight. Some units did much better than others when they did finally enter combat...why?...because the commanders were generally not up to snuff and had to be relieved for cause.
Given that unexperienced troops can be shakey at best in their first few days, the quality of leadership they get (or that they perceive they are getting) is critical in developing self confidence and staying power that marks veteran units. Add sufficient aggressiveness and elan and you reach crack and elite status over time.
I think that the labeling of a squad as green, etc has utility, of course, but the squad is part of a platoon and that platoon's leadership qualities should be a key factor in how the squads react. CMBO models this to some extent, and I hope that this factor is further evolved towards more sophistication in the re-write.
In my ideal model, the quality of platoon/company/battalion leaders will to a great extent determine the "flavor" of the unit, and the experience/training level of the line troops will reflect this in their resilience and flexibility.
-
Which version of the Stuka could carry a "1000 kg" bomb? IIRC the Stuka carried a much smaller payload, on the order of 500kg or so. Can any aero-grogs illuminate my murkyness?
-
The FG42 does look cool, I'll grant you that :cool: .
I think I read somewhere that George Lucas used them as inspirations for some of his imperial troopers' weapons in the original Star Wars flick.
Why do these games only sell Online?
in Combat Mission Archive #4 (2002)
Posted
Sadly, the allmighty Buck (or Euro) seems to corrupt most anything it touches. When you commercialize a product and put it into the hands of the "financial/business/legal" whizzes, you just find them whizzing all over it, hence their moniker.
I once worked for some rocket scientists (literally, they were nuclear physicists) who opened up a little specialty Mac software store in San Diego. It was one of those labor of love things and I was fortunate to work there and to manage it for a while in the late 80's. Then the green-tinged monster moved in to our town (i.e. CompUSA) and shut us down pretty much. Our customers loved us but the big store could loss-lead us into oblivion, which it quikly did, leaving the customers without anyone that had our depth of expertise. Sure, we could speak with precision and knowledge about software and hardware, but the big guys won in the end because the dollar talks and the consumer is woefully short-sighted at times.
So, yeah, if BTS went and sold their products commercially in stores, you might find a bargain BTS title now and again, but in time the financial game would crush the life out of the company and we'd end up with sucky software.
If it works...don't fix it.