Erwin

There are a lot of "Syrope" mods out there. But, I don't think they were comprehensive and featured that many vehicles. Very exciting to see this developing. I note that is is circa 2000. Are there insufficient units for earlier date conversion - eg the 80's? (Maybe that's what Syrope was attempting.)

"the remains of a Spetsnaz soldier, face smashed in, teeth knocked out and fingers cut off to prevent identification" But, they left enough stuff to ensure he was positively ID'd as a big scary "spetznatz operative"????

I have tried it a couple of times, but when I open the 2nd file rar folder and try to copy the files into the first unzipped folder, I still get the error message "data error... ...\building004-floor (01)bmp" file is broken", and the windows are frozen. Is there a very specific series of steps one needs to follow rather than simple intuition?

***SPOILERS*** Am wondering if there are multiple defense set-ups as unlike sburke, my Co 1 didn't encounter any opposition whatsoever until already in the northernmost buildings of Froitscheidt. (Or, perhaps you went further north thru the trees hoping to turn east and attack Froitscheidt at its center (where the path thru the woods is)? Co 1's reserve platoon advancing S through the woods to flank Froitscheidt stumbled into US units in foxholes in that area. I decided to back away and focus on the town buildings. I will leave the US troops guarding the road for reinforcing units from one of the other companies. Maybe bring a platoon of Co 1 into action at that time, so the US are surrounded in the woods.) I am at about 2hr 19min on the clock (to go). Kommerscheidt is cleared. The way the VL's look I thought we get 250 points per section of Kommerscheidt. But, you have to own both to get 250 points. Co 2 has been trying to kill the US units that were position or retreated into the wheatfields north of the SE VL section of the town. These US units in the open (including some 60mm mortars) have proven a lot harder to kill than the US units that were in the buildings. Odd. (Am worried that maybe I shouldn't be doing this as inevitably my inf are getting light wounds even if not serious or KIA. Can't use armor here as I think there are TD's and ATG's with LOS to this area. Maybe I should be using my 81mm mortars to finish em off safely.) Overall, US arty is either atrociously inaccurate, barraging areas of the woods where troops were maybe 30 minutes ago, or where they never were in the first place, or scarily on target - so maybe there are some US TRP's. Nearly all my troops are in buildings so no serious casualties from being caught in the open as yet. But, there is attrition... one guy here and there when a blast is close to an occupied building. HIDING the troops seems to mitigate this. However, in WEGO it's sometimes impossible to do that unless a spotting round arrives at least minute before FFE. US arty seem to be a mixture of 60mm and 81mm(?) mortars and also some much heavier stuff. Finding a use for the Tigers (and Stugs) has been difficult so far. Lost one Stug to a flank ATG shot from the west hill. Arty landing around them damages the tracks. An ATG firing at the front of a Tiger's turret causes damage. Only one Tiger is completely unscratched. The other 3 have light damage to track, optics, radio etc. So, have pulled them and the 3 surving Stugs back. I think I will have to use em all as assault guns to blast inf out of buildings as the only US armor I have seen are M10 TD's (on the hill to the west) and I don't want to duel with them. Am hoping to kill em with arty, along with two 76mm ATG's that have been spotted in trenches up there. My dilemma is whether to send either elements of the fresh Co 3, or the fresh Co 2 reserve platoon, east to help Co 1 deal with the US inf blocking the woods path east to Froitscheidt. That way Froitscheidt can be cleared more easily. The woods east to Froitscheidt appear impassible to vehicles, so one must use the path. But, I can't send vehicles through the woods path with ammo resupply until the TD's and ATG's on the west hill are dealt with as I suspect they have LOS to the entryway to that path. (Or, maybe use smoke to hide vehicles attempting to reach the path entrance.) I also have to decide whether to commit to attacking and capturing the buildings and hill to the west and entering Schmidt from the west, or push everything through the woods and Froitscheidt and enter Schmidt from the east. The third option is to use arty to destroy or blind with smoke the units on the hill to the west and advance directly south to Schmidt across the fields. A 76mm ATG was spotted directly in the way near Schmidt, but I think my arty has KO'd it. But, a halftrack scout went up in flamnes thanks to a 57mm ATG in the woods to the south as well. So, maybe even more ATG's around. Decision, decisions, decisions - this is why I think this a terrific scenario.

You may want to let people know the full name, "Le Carillon 1 - Its Quiet - Too Quiet" as folks may have already got it from CMMODS. Your description re "road to La Meauffe" made me think it was a different game.

Even tho' it was a first person game, PE was definitely not a shooter... more like what CM would be if you could actually occupy individual tanks and fight em as a crew. The inf in PE was very much an afterthought however, and not done well.

John: Panzer Elite SE still has a current board/development???

Thanks for the clarification, akd. It wasn't only me who was confused re this, since there are actual "Section HQ's" that have no crewed weapon, as well as HMG's etc that also function as an HQ. Wish this sort of stuff was in the manual tho'.

One issue that is time consuming for no apparent gain in detail or gameplay value is when one wants to issue orders to a platoon (let alone a company) of vehicles. It's wonderful that one can issue multiple waypoints for all the units in one go. But, unless all the waypoints lie in a straight line, the waypoints do not keep the platoon/company in formation, and units will start hitting each other and generally acting like they're all drunk. Even though they may all end up eventually where you want them, they arrive in a mess, often facing in weird directions etc. (This can be a serious problem in WEGO.) Yes, we now have movable waypoints. But, it's time-consuming to go in have to move (say) 20 units worth of waypoints when each single unit may have multiple waypoints, and one can't simply click on a waypoint to access the unit. (That is a feature of CM1 that many of us sorely miss.) In CM2 now, one has to go back to where the original unit is and click on that unit, and only then can one adjust its waypoints. I am doing exactly that right now in the (xnt) CMBN Himmelfarht battalion-sized scenario (which I highly recommend for those who enjoy larger scenarios). Whether it be a formation order, or simply have the waypoints keep their relationship to one another so one can set a formation manually and have the units stay in that formation as they move, it would improve the gameplay.

Old Spike did a huge amount of testing of CM1 and I believe is still active on other forums. Hope he wasn't banned as well. It would be great to have the sort of comprehensive testing of CM2 that he performed to help improve our play skills.

I hear what you are saying, w. My experience with the game is that troops that are not HIDING can be seen a little too easily - esp by moving attackers. The default usually shows one guy on lookout and the rest in the dirt. That one guy should be hard to spot, and the guys in the dirt should be impossible to spot or shoot at. But, it seems as if the unit can be spotted as if all the guys are lifting their heads and rubbernecking. (I see this happening a lot in woods.) Certainly, when fired upon, the guys that appear to be prone in the dirt seem to take casualties as if the game system/AI can see all of the unit rather than just the guy on look-out. However, I agree that there are other issues that may be way more important.

"I should give a FAST order from one side of the street to the other (or whatever stretch of ground I don't want them stopping in the middle of)." Even FAST move may not prevent inf from stopping and firing in the middle. I accidentally found that my AT teams did that very successfully when I tried a FAST move from one cover to another in LOS of a tank. The tube guy stopped, aimed and killed the tank. I now use that tactic deliberately with success (when there is no better option).

Wonderful AAR. Thanks for taking so much time and trouble with pics.

The posters are terrific and add a lot of atrmosphere. But, yes, need to use em sparingly.

Downloading now. Thank you!

Thank you Marco!

I tried your (embarrassingly obvious once you mentioned it) suggestion and restarted a scenario so I could easily mix and match units in the set-up turn to see who can share ammo. For a German company with a 4th (Heavy Weapons) Platoon: ONLY the HMG squad (composed of two HMG teams) can share. Neither of the 2nd HMG squad teams can share ammo with the 1st HMG squad teams even though they are all under the 4th Platoon HQ. (The 2 Stummels in the 4th Platoon can't share anything even when dismounted.) So, only the HMG squad HQ and its team can share. The Shreck teams under the Battalion HQ can share. However, something weird happens. If you have 3 shrecks each with 6 rockets, the total comes to only 16, not 18. If you have two, the total is 11, not 12.

I didn't come up with that idea, Jon. I was commenting on someone else's suggestion. But, I did happen to enjoy "automated" formations commands in other games. And I am firmly in the camp that wants to spend its time on tactical decision-making rather than micro-managing decisions. There is a difference. And the reason that CM1 is still being played is that one can easily and efficiently play H2H with full regimental KG's/TF's on each side. I appreciate that some folks enjoy small scenarios and want more detail to make the small scenarios challenging. However, the earlier posts show that some of us like huge scenarios and CM1 has shown that they can be played easily if the UI is appropriate.

"In WeGo, it's not that big an issue for most ambushes." Have to disagree with you there. I have given up trying to attempt ambushes in WEGO. It's too risky.

AP does have v good graphics, but perhaps AP gameplay is more comparable to CM1 (but with a much less intuitive UI)? I tried to like AP, but just couldn't get used to its complexity and figuring out how to do things "right". It does seem a bit closer to TOW which I had similar problems with. CM2 is a much better simulation than either. So, apples and oranges...

I can appreciate the disadvantages that Womble mentions. But, the advantages of a simpler "universal" ammo sharing system (and the ability to ACQUIRE while adjacent to a vehicle) would be the lesser evil. Obviously, the micromanage approach has many fans here. I'm in the camp that considers anything that gets in the way of spending one's precious gaming time on tactical decision-making to be irritating (after the novelty of the micromanage opportunities has worn off).

That makes way too much sense, Jason. I find myself becoming a convert. (Damn.)

That is perfect timing. I now have something to do during a week's TG vacation in the desert!

oh... right... That hopefully will even answer my question re Stummel crews under the 4th platoon HQ as well.

+1 re Blazing 88's comments. Some of us really like CMAK (we still play). Wide open maps (altho' the terrain can still be varied and interesting with gullies, wadis, hills etc), lots of maneuver rather than one assault after another. Long range firefights.