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Plenty of footage of the Irish "Troubles" showing British Land Rovers (with added mesh over windows) getting pelted with Molotov cocktails and still driving away. Hell, I had a buddy DRINK a flaming Molotov cocktail in college. Okay, the burns on his lips and chin were a great reminder to all of us about how stupid he'd been...but a lot of the effectiveness of Molotov cocktails is driven by Hollywood imagery. The best effect MC's have on a tank is to blind it so the close assault teams can rush up and place the demo charges on it. Ken

Excellent idea!

Ah, the silent pond has ripples which presage that which is yet to occur! The moon laughs at the owl. The maiden's silk nightgown sighed its lamentations as it lay on the floor. All of which is to say...this is a known issue.

Try anything other than a BA-64 to be in command. Known issue.

Take that lappie and an hdmi cable to your nearest big tv store. Go to their biggest, baddest display tv and plug that puppy in. The 30 seconds of gaming goodness that you'll get before security hustles you away will be well worth it...

Well, except for Mary Ann, of course!

^^^ A winner!!!

I hooked it up to my 110" high def projector with my home theater surround sound. My men never died so gloriously! That was only a temporary "proof of concept" hook up. I shall have to make it permanent at some point. The various hi-res mods really make it pop. As do the sound mods. One of my computers is set up with multiple screens. (A pair of 24" 1920x1200.) It would be sooo sweet if we could get CMRT to scale across multiple displays. I'd like a 27", or to upgrade to something like the 1440's or the 30"+ with 2560x1600. (FWIW, I think that 16:10 (1920x1200) is FAR superior to 16:9 (1920x1080) for game playing and work. The extra real estate makes a difference, to me.) The UI covering 1/3 of the screen: do you have a screenshot? That sounds like an excessive amount of space given up to the UI. Ken

Those 42 were the ENEMY. LOL. They only lived because I offered them the warm embrace of comradely respect for the battle they had fought. Baranovich is an outstanding battle. Many kudos to the map-maker/designer. Ken

Played it through once... If you'd like details, I'll share. But, to me, part of the fun is trying to puzzle it out. (And I did some "testing" near the end, not totally hard-core playing. No, I did not even look at this during beta-testing. My first look was at the public release.) Now, if I share, you can't go telling other guys what I did. My reputation of driving my men to their deaths would take a bit of hit... Ken

Well, if I had to be in one of those tanks and fight from it, that would be different than if I had to choose which group to command! In the time period in which the Panther and T34/85 fought one another, a gross generalization would be that the Soviets were advancing and kept the battlefield. Meaning, a broken down T34 would be recovered (not that the Soviets were famously known for that!), but, more importantly, any damaged Panther could no longer be recovered and repaired. This would drive up the German losses. (Drivetrain issues had been pretty much resolved. Fuel was critical. Minor battle damage which could be repaired was a moot point if the tank was left behind during a retreat.) For a gross approximation of effectiveness, look at the production numbers and the surviving tanks at the end of the war. The Soviets produced and fielded around 30,000 T34/85's during WWII. (The numbers quoted vary quite a bit. 30k is the upper bound. 22k would be the extreme lower.) The Germans produced and fielded about 6,500 Panthers. (Upper bound. 6k would be lower.) I'd have to go through every formation's strength returns to come up with a number of surviving tanks. No thank you... If you count up the number of Soviet tank brigades left on the roster (and multiply by some sort of reduction % to come up with actual strength vs. paper strength), you can get an idea of numbers. For the Germans, I'd give 'em half a dozen Panthers left for every Panzer division they had listed at the end. That should give a very rough idea of relative effectiveness.

^^^ This seems to be exactly what the OP is experiencing. Thanks for the link.

Every building? Or is there one you're trying to enter and they won't? If the latter, can you take a screenshot or describe it?

Augustow Boil and Baranovichi SPOILERS follow (very light and very brief) YankeeDog did a great job explaining one reason why Augustow Boil players should not follow the Soviets into the woods. Another battle which presents an excellent conundrum to the player is Baranovichi. In that battle, as the Soviets, you have to choose whether to use the cover of the woods or stay in the open. end SPOILER segment Either way (to go into the woods or not), knowledge of effective woods fighting techniques are needed. If you know what is needed to fight in the woods, then you can decide whether or not you should go in. JasonC alluded to one of the requirements: massive firepower advantage. His comment about artillery is not applicable to some scenarios. A unit advancing ahead of the fixed artillery (or out of communications with it), cannot use map coordinates to call in fire. Without map-grid arty calls (which will not destroy units, only suppress them or knock them out of the fight for a period of time), use tanks. You can keep the tanks around the edge of the woods, but since this is about fighting IN woods, you can also enter the woods. Ensure they are surrounded by friendly infantry. In addition to firepower, you need a lot of manpower. Every team that goes into the woods needs ~2 teams behind it. Squads are better, but obviously increase the headcount requirement by 2x or 3x. The techniques have been discussed. It involves a lot of ammunition. Moving by HUNT, laying down area fire, and recognizing it will take... TIME. To fight in the woods is a slow affair. Stopping and listening is crucial. HUNT one or two action spots and then wait. Next turn, move the overwatching units forward even with the lead unit. Then repeat. Every sound spot should get deluged with fire, and also the action spots next to it. Then move forward to mop up. When you're done, your units will likely need ammo resupply. There was a reason why so many partisan units and bypassed Soviet army units went into the woods and lasted so long. The Germans fought the East Front on a shoestring. They had nowhere near the resources needed to clear the vast forests in Russia. In our battles, you've got to decide if you can commit your units into the woods. Once they go in, they'll be committed to the task for awhile. A small copse and a platoon? Expect to give up 8-10 minutes. Can your battle plan go without a platoon for that long? Ken

Why go into the woods? Why? To KILL der enemy. If dey are hiding dere, dat ist vere you must go! Hunt dem down, track dem by der schmell of dere fear, und slay them! If it takes every last man under my command, I vill find dem and KILL dem!!

Waiting for CMBN v3 may take awhile. I have NO inkling about the planned v3 upgrade, I'm just basing that statement on past history. The learning curve can be steep. It's best to get it done early. Once you get the game installed, play the tutorial a bunch. You'll be bored with it eventually. That's when you should try bizarre commands and combinations. THEN move on to the first small battle. Repeated play will get you ready for the meatier ones. Ken

LOL. To prove a thesis, Bil and I are playing a deep woods mano a mano submachinegun platoon battle. He's soooo weak. He waited. Bah. I advanced! Okay, I told my men to advance! Anyone moving dies. Hopefully you've got some eyes behind the scout team. They'll at least see the tracers or maybe a spot icon. Then you've got to pour fire on that area while ANOTHER team moves up to engage with cold steel! Of course, they'll advance just a wee bit more than the scouts did, so the next set of guys will cut them down. Meanwhile, the first set of enemy has spent that turn running away, like the cowards they are, to hide behind their friends, so no one is where you spotted them. That is how it is done. You must lay a carpet of your men's bodies across the forest floor, then you may freely walk the woods, as is your divine right. Ken

The same people would let you know that all the captured binoculars would have been smashed by their owners before capture. Orders, duh! The Soviets in the summer of '44 had some very capable kit and the factories were putting out a lot of it.

If the image in my head matches what you saw, then, yeah, it seems like having them bail would be better. Ken

Scope on rifle?

Don't forget the chance that the round killed someone, but the survivors "berserked" and stayed on task. A lot of possibilities...

LOL. I've done that more times than I can count. I've also done the Alt-K smoke toggle and forgotten about it. I blame all my losses on errant toggles. I sleep better that way.

Just played a battle where 9 T34/85's stumbled upon a single Panther at ~250-300m. The Panther knocked out 3 of my T34's. (They were glad to absorb the Panther's fury for me, so that I might destroy the hitlerites by other means. My men are always glad to do this for me. ) One of my flanking T34's got two hits through the side of the Panther's turret, knocking it out with the first penetration. Between the first penetration and the second, the Panther showed that it was still operational (death clock). My remaining T34/85's fired about 4 shots, each of which ricocheted off the glacis. (The Panther was on a slight incline, which added slope to the glacis.) The results certainly seemed about right.

The most likely result (and use) of mortars against tanks is to force them to button up and MAYBE get some systems damage. Another outcome is to enshroud them in smoke and dust, forcing them to move to gain LOS. That buttoned up, damaged, moving tank is less likely to spot your defense. (The mortars also strip away any enemy infantry which may help spot and suppress your defense.) Ken

Mistaken manuals or not, english as native tongue or not, and chips on shoulders or not, I stand by my understanding of Target Light as being the one true understanding. However, since there have been errors in the manual in the past, I will test the ammo use of various squads under the various orders at various ranges. I do this for various reasons. Ken (The comment about neglect and malice did not put words in anyone's mouth, for what that's worth. It is a saying that means that you should not jump to conclusions about the intent of others' mistakes. Often they are just due to oversight, not a desire to mislead.)