Abn_Ranger87

Not sure how this affects victory points in the game but... A Probe is an offensive "reconnaisance" used to determine the enemy disposition and reaction time. Can be used to gain S-2 for future operations or as a feint to draw off reserves from actual avenue of approach. An Attack is a general offensive action along an axis of advance (specific route) or geographical area with the purpose of killing, capturing, or routing the enemy. Called a Movement to contact now... An Assault is a deliberate attack on a specific point or location where the enemy has established a defence with the idea of capturing said area and destroying it's defenders. Hope this helps...

If you want fire-power, go with Sturm-geewhiz-whatever their called or Falshirmjaeger squads. Both have 2 LMGs and can be devestating during mid-range engagements. Machine guns teams function well when employed in the supporting role. A pair of them can easily route a platoon if positioned carefully with good fields of fire and time to get set in.

One thing that would contribute to the higher rate of fire is if a "heavy" barrel was mounted that could sustain more use ere needing to be changed.

T-55 series (which developed from the T-54) also had a fixed 7.62mm MG mounted in the bow at waist level. Driver simply pulled a lanyard connected to the trigger mechanism. Possibly the idea was to provide grazing fire during the attack, my own opinion was that it was to make the driver feel better by giving him an outlet for his stress...

I'm under the assumption that the "heavy" team is employing the MG42 from a tripod (more stable) while the "light" is simply using the attached bipod. There should be an increased ammunition alloment with the larger team as well.

Panther G, Thanks for the suggestions. I ended up making a triangular shaped block of "pavement" elvated 5 above the waterline with 75mm bunkers protected by walls at the apexes. It looks fairly good with the right terrain mod in place and, more importantly, affects the scenario in the desired fashion.

Radar, The presence of concertina, like most obstacles, is very obvious in practically every enviroment. Only after a few months of "weathering" does it start to rust. As Hanns wrote and I can attest to, old wire left behind by some lazy REMFs can really ruin your night if your wander into it... Wire, log-cribs, AT ditches and the such are what's called deliberate obstacles with the goal of either delaying, channelizing, or distracting the enemy. They will force an opponent to deploy early, change his axis of advance and utilize assetts prematurely. Unless covered by direct and indirect fire an obstacle might as well not even be present because on it's own it will be only a minor inconveniencs. For example, wire can be breached by something as simple as one guy with a folded blanket. When I first got to B 2/75, our SOP for hasty concertina crossing was to have a "volunteer" run up with his foam sleeping pad and jump on the it. During my first field problem this task was assigned to me (cherry's always get this distinction) and I still have scars from it. The wire was triple strand, pegged down with engineer stakes and had a supporting strand of barbed wire stretched taunt inside the top roll. I jumped on it and bounced sideways landing backfirst, pad up. They rest of the platoon just ran over me and the last guy peeled me off... Good thing we were able to DX uniforms then, my BDU's were shredded along with my back and legs. In a way it was a good thing, seemed to impress the older guys and I was let off the hook from some of the psychotic hazing other newbies were subjected to...

Thanks for pointing me to those two scenarios. What I'm referring to is where older fortifications were incorporated into the defensive plan. Check out this website, it's a really good referance for grognards and military history buffs. http://alainlecomte.free.fr/ Anyway, the concept I'm working on is the tactical problem of a heavily invested battery overlooking bridges and/or fording across a water obstacle. Since the primary axis of advance for the attacking side is across an open engagement area, other more stealthy means of neutralizing said strong point must be employed (such as a crack airborne company...)

Michael D. I bounced the question on the use of overhead cover off some of the WW2 vets in my VFW lodge (4 of them were present during lunch today.) All agreed that German positions usually had it and only one said he never used it (gentleman in question was a tanker.) The others (2 ETO, 1 PTO) said they used anything they could get their mitts on. You are right about the tendency for current soldiers to think that things have been done the same way in the past as now. However, remember that techniques in use now are the result of experiences of those who've gone before. Things get modified over time but what works usually remains unchanged. A bit of sad news, a long time member of the afor mentioned organization has passed away at age 84. Al Fedorowicz was in the original cadre of the 10th Mountain Division. After being wounded in Italy he returned home, got an education and had a successful career with Pratt & Whitney. He was a very quick witted individual with a heart of gold. Guys, even if your not a member or eligable to join a veterans orginazation, please volunteer your time to seniors and get to know these men who answered the call to arms then rebuilt the nation. They are a living part of our heritage and will soon vanish into dusty text books. Listen to them and carry their stories on for following generations.

My experience with hand grenades only encompasses the current M67 "baseball" model. To put it mildly, I hated working with the damn things. The fuzing is notoriously unreliable so "cooking" one off is not an option unless you happen to be a suicidal masochist. They do have their uses though, especially when it comes to clearing fortified positions. They also don't produce a location revealing signature so some teach that they are effective for night fighting (I strongly suspect these individuals because I have yet to see an instructer who says this with a patch on their right shoulder or a CIB.) Our old MOUT techniques used to rely heavily on their use. Not so anymore, now a rifle squad has to clear buildings like a SWAT team and hope no civilians get hit by accident. As far as implementation goes, while one troop readys Mr. Bang the rest of his team/squad either pulls security or is stacked and ready to clear said bunker or building. Besides the ever so difficult to pull pin (that John Wayne thing, hope you have a good dentist if you try that hollywood horse****) there is a safty clip that holds the spoon to the body that must be popped off. While running a range on Ft. Campbell, we had to call in a very irate EOD fellow who was complaining he was too close to his ETS date for the task presented to him. One of our snuffys forgot to remove said safty clip and otherwise made a perfect through with his grenade. Pretty as a picture it sat next to an E-type silouhette unexploded. Needless to say the forgetfull troop was much abused by his NCOs... Oh one other thing, as a few guys from 10th Mountain found out the hard way in Haiti, using a grenade on a third world shanty or hut is not a good idea...

This actually was a nice surprise. For those of you who haven't had the pleasure, stringing rolled concertina wire across any sort of brush (let alone thick forest) is a delight best left to inmates serving hard time... Not fun at all and a real drain on band-aids and BDUs if you get my drift. In a way, wether they meant to or not, the designers have sort of incorporated the clearing or terrain required to actually emplace a wire obstacle. You don't want the OPFOR to be able to simply waltz up and breach without being spotted so this "feature" actually makes sense. One thing that does bother me though, if real life wire can easily stop a tracked vehicle if it rolls through it. It winds up on the return rollers and drive sprockets causing the track to slip (another good job for inmates, replacing thrown or broke track is inhumane labour.) Oh, as far as spotting goes, one can easily rig wire with mechanical detection devices from trip flares to cans with pebbles in 'em.

Have been fiddling around with the map editor and decided to try recreating the famous island with it's causeway. Has anyone else attempted this? Yes, I know it's not a historical battlefield (at least in WW2) but it would be a rather difficult objective if defended thus the interest.) The other thing I've been working on is a realistic river fortification (based on pics I took when stationed in Germany of one on the Danube river near Ulm. Finding the parapet a little awkward for using direct fire and it seems to be scaled larger than the original. Any ideas or advice would be appreciated.

The U.S. Army considers the 12.7mm machine gun to be for use against enemy equipment only. We always interpreted that to mean his helmet, LBE, buttons, etc...

Concerning stages of and advantages of the defence. To answer Mike D's question about the use of overhead cover in the ETO during WW2. A good position with all the neccesary elements came be completed in a little over three hours if the troopers are serious. Digging in after every movement is tedious and exhausting but it was deemed a neccesity as well proven by the massacre of 2/115 Infantry at Le Carrefour (the unit just did the rucksack flop at the end of the day and were rudely awakened to the reality of war by the 352nd Kampfgruppe.) I can garauntee that anything at hand that was usefull for cover was utilized. If the materials for overhead protection were available you can be certain G.I.'s used it. Hollywood doesn't like the fact it's not camera friendly for the hero's to be obscured in such a way so this bit of accuracy is usually omitted. Anyway I wanted to write about the timeline for defence and what could be expected (based on two men per position.) 1 hour (+/-) Hasty positions about 12" deep with sector stakes (just sticks or tent poles sunk in to define the position's sector of fire.) Range cards complete, copies of which passed to the PL so he can create the platoon's sector sketch. LP/OP (listening post/Outpost) with landline put forward of position. Crew served weapon positions given priority over individual ones. 2 hours (+/-) Positions are at least waist deep with the dirt forming a burm for forward cover (most units have an SOP for each troop packing a half dozen empty sandbags for this purpose.) Platoon sketch finished and a copy given to the CO so he can finalised the company sketch. TRP's plotted for key avenues of approach, natural lines of drift, deadspace, etc... V notch stakes placed in conjuntion with sector stakes to assure accurate fire into critical locations as well as marking the FPL for crew served weapons. 3 hours (+/-) Fighting positions are armpit deep with grenade sumps and construction of overhead cover begins. Details for establishing obstacles start work (concertina wire, mines, log cribs on roads, etc... All should be covered by direct and indirect fires and just outside hand-grenade range from friendly position, around 45 meters.) Company sketch finished and passed to battalion. Alternate and secondary fighting positions scratched out. 4 hours (+/-) Overhead cover complete, camoflaging begins with vegetation and sod taken from behind the position. Work continues on obstacle placement and construction of alternate positions (usually not more than hasty 12" ones unless area to be occupied for several days.) 5 hours and beyond Primary positions complete, obstacle emplacement finished (improvements made over time if needed.) Local security patrols conducted by squad/team size elements (ongoing until position attacked or abandoned.) Anyway, in a nutshell the above is abasic outline of what occurs. How does this relate to CMBO? Well, certain advantages that aren't really apparant in the game and will hopefully be included with CMBB are as follows... Accuracy, units dug in will have knowledge of the exact range to their targets and from which direction they'll be coming (passive obstacles such as tanglefoot or concertina wire are effective for channelizing the enemy into the kill zones for your most casualty producing weapons such as machine guns.) Protection, relative invulnerability from light indirect fire such as 60mm & 81mm mortars and airbursts of larger systems. Concealment also falls under this catagory. To illustrate how effective a well made position is, during an exercise at Ft. Campbell my old platoon got tasked to be the OPFOR against two companys from 3/502nd. We were given a day and a half to dig in then faced numerous probes and aerial reconnaisance before a night attack was conducted on the third day. End result, a couple hundred "Widowmakers" sitting on the OBJ with their helmets off and MILES gear beeping. Why? well, their scouts were compromised and waxed by our patrols and the Apaches and Kiowas that overflew us at night couldn't locate our postions, even with thermals. So the "good guys" did not have an accurate picture of our arrangement. When their prepatory fires began, they were well away from our actual location and on false positions (during this sort of exercise, an Observer/Controller or OC who acts as sort of a refferee will get the grid coordinates from the fireplan and using a GPS will go to the spots and throw a few arty simulaters around then use his MILES god gun to assess casualtys.) The attackers support position was masked by trees from our true location and had to reset itself, then their assault element came in perpendicular to our MLR and found itself enfiladed by no fewer than two M-60's and four SAWs... Of course, after the intial attack the OC's rekeyed all the "good guys" and they got a second chance at us. All these years and I'm still a little ticked about the "notional" M136 that took out my position. The bastards weren't even carrying the sand filled tubes that are used to simulate the weight of live ones let alone the training verison with it's signature producing (ATWES) cartridge...

Ah! The old Ma-Duece M2HB 12.7mm machine gun... Perfect weapon system, will probably still be in service 50 years from now... During all my years in the Army the newest one I saw was stamped 1953 on the receiver.

SpectreX, Here are some thoughts on spotting from real world experience (12 years of service in the Infantry.) The first thing the human eye picks up is movement, camoflauged or not, at 200 meters you WILL be seen or heard in even fairly dense woods unless your crawling carefully or using a cover/concealed route (like an old stream bed thats probably been marked as dead space on some troopie's range card and coverd by the appropriate weapon system ala M203 and a claymore or two.) The second thing your beady little human eyes notice is what we call contrast to color. No pattern of camo is effective in 100% of enviroments it's used. For example, the standard "woodland" pattern is fairly dark (especially once wet and grunts usually are soaked from incliment weather) and will get you noticed fairly quick in places where the brush is or a lighter shade. Try sneaking through a stand of connifer trees in Germany where there is no ground foliage, I have and it's not easy... This isn't to say the stealthy approach doesn't work, it's just a lot more difficult than Hollywood would have you believe. When big things go "boom" everybody and their 2nd cousin who isn't buttoned up or underground will know where exactly it came from. This doesn't just apply to anti-tank guns. It's almost humerous how many M60/M240 teams I've seen become the focal point of OPFOR fire once they engage. If you have the loudest toy, your going to attract the most attention. Fighting postions or "foxholes" as depicted in CM are more eloborate than a simple hole in the ground. Most armies have some sort of standard design that incorporates overhead cover (amazing how quickly you can dig one of these when properly motivated/scared) U.S. Army's baseline model has 16" of logs, sandbags or what have you. More than enough to protect the occupants from smaller caliber indirect assets such as 81mm mortars. Remember that rounds are usually set either quick (proximity) for airburst or delayed for rooting out moles (that's one of the things that should be incorperated into CMBB.) Either fuzing with light artillery requires almost a direct hit to neutralize dug in personnel. While a unit that's been entrenched for a while might have advantages, they also get too comfortable. No matter how well constructed, bunkers and such usually can be spotted. Troops get lazy when static and depending on their level of disipline will leave traces of their presence. Dead foliage is the first such give away, after 24 hours bushes wilt and are very distinguishable from surrounding vegetation. Trash sometimes accumulates and noticable paths develop within the same period of time. I've seen defensive positions fail for many reasons, from unburied commo wire to hanging laundry. Thing is, once spotted, a dug in unit is easily fixed and destroyed with artillery, especially now a days with such things as IDPCM submuitions...