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I would check your ammo status. Please post a picture of the ammo tab. Keep a savegame, if you can. A screenshot showing the entire vehicle UI, especially crew status (spotting, aiming, etc.) would be helpful. Ken Just noticed: if this is the same vehicle, the lower screen shows some damage to the radio and tracks. It must've taken a few hits. That points more towards crew morale. Need more pix.

You can save your existing install as a copy with a new name, to a different location. Use THAT install to continue your pbem game. Install MG over the original install. THAT allows you to play with the upgrades. There =may= be DRM conflicts (MG's drm is different than CW's drm). Check the forum for threads on that before you try this.

Re: bayonet charges. I've got a book floating around called "Battle Tactics of the Civil War" by Paddy someone or another. (My apologies to the author.) Great work on how the regiments actually fought. Ranges, effectiveness, etc. Anyhow, the gist of it regarding bayonet charges is instructive. At one point in a battle, a unit will gain enough emotion (call it "bloodlust", "anger", whatever) to want to physically kill the enemy. Fixing bayonets and charging helps induce that state of emotional fervor. The odds of BOTH formations (friendly and enemy) being in that state of hyper-aggressiveness at the same time are quite low. The result is that one unit, with bayonets fixed and running at the enemy with a deranged wide-eye scream, is ready to kill or be killed. The other unit is in the fight, but not quite so committed. They'll take their chance with marksmanship, but not a knifefighting, clubbing, choking, gouging melee. Rather than stay there, most units would then pull back. The bayonet charge works. If you can close ground so that the receiving unit has no doubt that you will arrive there, intact, and ready to gut them. In that case, if the receiving unit has not upped their emotional state to the same level, they leave. Hence, despite the prevalence of bayonet charges in the US Civil War, the low proportion of bayonet wounds. Most units run away. Ken

That was a failure of mine in the meta-game, represented by the quickbattle purchase. I thought my tanks would be good for anti-tank use. Oops. Plus, in general, ATG's are tough to use in meeting engagements (which is what this is). So, my fault for not buying any. But, yes, the British 6 pounder is a sweet little thang. Especially against light armor.

Exactly! Without the planned sacrifice of my tanks, Bil would not have been so over-enthused and exposed his halftrack gunners so recklessly. My plan worked!

I like LLF's comment. The rest comes down to mapmaking. If the designer puts a gap, or destroyed wall section, or low section, or gate, into the wall, that would allow entry. I understand that vaulting over 8-9 foot walls isn't hard to do. Doing it without knowing what's waiting on the other side, and being the first man to drop down into the courtyard with slung weapon (or calling for your buddy to toss it over to you!) does not sound too practical. Driving a vehicle up and standing on the hood? Sure, but now the TC or machinegunner can see over the wall (depending on elevations). Also, why not just nudge that vehicle forward a bit and knock it down? (Hmmm, I forget if we can do that with tall walls.) Ken

I (obviously) haven't read Bil's thread, but he did just email me. Real life is squeezing him a bit. At least, that's what he says. We all know that my unstoppable para defense, characterized by raining piat bombs, is what has really squeezed him! 19 minutes... No Germans with 100's of meters of the town. Well, discounting tanks anyway. Let's see if he can find some time in his real life to devote to the AAR... Stay patient. Meanwhile, let's dissect my mistakes! Go! Ken

Hopefully my Assault Jeep will have this type of invulnerability at is it attacks Jaggie 241. Yes, something to be looked at.

Get a brownie pan, fill it with ice, and set your iMac on top when you use it. That should keep it much cooler.

If he had HE, that would work! I've actually drawn a lot of SMOKE target lines towards some of the open-topped vehicles Bil has. I'm waiting for a valid LOS. I'd love to drop a smoke round inside a halftrack (or Wirbelwind). Right now it seems that the only ammo my 2" mortars have is SMOKE.

Photo of reenactment above shows that the gunner is more exposed than the men behind the wall.

During this slight pause in the action, I thought I'd mention another task I need to undertake: as long as Bil's Jaggie 241 is trundling in my backfield, I need to pull away from it. My mortars are the vulnerability I'm most concerned about. Of course, that concern may be moot if my Assault Jeep plan works as I hope. (However, not one of my anti-armor plans, as of yet, has worked as I'd hoped.) That will cause a slight pause in the support the mortars are giving, mostly in front of the town. I may have a couple of the mortars drop a smokescreen in front of Jaggie 241... Ken

Luftwaffe FO appears 3x because the game strips out subunits from their formation and lists them. There are some duplicates. No game issue. (It could be cleaned up and eliminate duplicates. Thanks for pointing it out.) Kriegsmarine is NOT present with Luftwaffe. Look closely at the screenshot that you posted. The "Kriegsmarine" is the label under a button which doesn't exist. Just like "German Army", "Waffen SS", and "Luftwaffe" are all labels under their buttons. Because you selected "Luftwaffe", only that icon is visible over the label. Does that help? Ken

Check the ammo loadout in the SPW's. You'll see some 7.92mm AP rounds there. I think BFC has differentiated the loadout.

The retro improvements are due to tweaked behaviors. MG does not change the installed games, it changes the executable which operates on the installed games. (In a non-technical kind of sense.) Does that explain it?

Thanks. It indeed is a map of the Eerde Dunes area. I'm glad it's included in the release.

Two items: - German halftrack armor was thicker and harder than US halftrack armor. It also had significant vertical sloping. Deflection angle due to vehicle facing would be the same regardless of US or German halftrack. The compound angle due to the vertical sloping was beneficial. This led to the fact that Germans were safe behind their armor at ranges much closer than that of US soldiers in their halftracks. There's a bunch of thickness, brinell hardness numbers, and ranges which back that up floating around in several threads. (As well as various books.) I don't recall the exact numbers so I won't post what I "think" they are, so as to avoid cluttering the thread with misinformation. - Vulnerability to small arms by the gunners. Yes, it's been extensively tested. Rounds counted, charted, hundreds of iterations, various ranges, different halftracks, etc. I know. I did them. The shields provide a significant protection. Now, those tests were awhile ago, and several builds in the past. Could something have changed? Sure. Not likely, but it could have. Do I want to spend another week redoing the same mind-numbing testing because of a feeling here or there? Nope. What I suggest is taking a halftrack out of a battle and putting it on a test lane. See how often the gunner gets hit when the enemy riflemen are unsuppressed. Now see how often he gets hit when the enemy is suppressed. Next, repeat with US hafltracks with no gunshield for the gunner. Ken

The map was created by Jaws. I don't know if it is included in the released version of MG. If not, contact Jaws and see if it's possible to get him to post it.

Most of the hits my paras in my aar have been getting against Bil's mgers have been flank shots. Fwiw.

Sure that's not the PF30, the range in meters?

CS Tank: there doesn't seem to be a cupola, just a single periscope, at least for the TC. The Brits used some funny openings for their crew vision systems. I thought survival with poorer spotting would be better than improved spotting and death. No area target for the tank. I want it to acquire targets of opportunity. After I see what's up, then I may assign area targets... A mea culpa: My afv knowledge is weakest with regards to British tanks. (At least, among the major belligerents.) In fact, this was my first time using any of these vehicles, in any guise, ever. Did it show? Not an excuse. I did push them BOLDLY forward. You get a feel for tank abilities and spotting behavior the more you use each specific model. Combined with my lack of familiarity with these tanks and tactics which stress exposure over safety (<-- UNDERSTATEMENT ALERT!), they did not do well. (Nor did I.) So, for now, I'm learning as I go. I NEVER experiment with units which I have in a game. (Not quite cricket, wouldn't you agree, Giap?) After the game, sure, then I'll explore characteristics which I found interesting. But I don't like to take a virtual time-out and fill my knowledge, Matrix-like, with information which I didn't have a minute earlier, game time. We plunge in! Forward! Always press, and the enemy line will buckle. When he flees, the slaughter will be vast! (In line with that philosophy I'm infiltrating a team at a time up the Dune Gully. Not impressive looking, but effective.)

Aye. I thought of that but figured the first mg42 burst would leave my tank permanently incapacitated via tc being decapitated.

Final Screenies. 20:00 to 19:00 Plans for 19->18 and beyond 1. Hunt the Dune Lucky Panther. 2. Envelop and take the Windmill. 3. Inundate the Woodsman's Lodge with 95mm goodness. 4. Use CS tank to backup the Town. (Jaggie 241 is in the way.) 5. Therefore, KILL Jaggie 241. Somehow. 6. Town, adjust defense as needed. Ken out...

YES, there's MORE>>> 20:00 to 19:00... Whew...

20:00 to 19:00 More...