Agentorange

They sound pretty interesting, I'm not to worried if they don't cover other countries - after all they are the histories of the American army how detailed are they?. The official british histories vary but some get down to almost company level detail of actions, whilst others cover the broader sweep of the campaign as it were. I'm considering forking out to buy these.. would you recommend them to someone trying to get a good detailed set of literature on American military activity in WW2?

Coming from the wilds of Britain I have a question for y'all. Are these the official US war war histories - similiar to those published in Britain by HMSO for the british forces ?

No, not books about Barbarossa , but a shameless plug for a book company I bought some stuff off of recently. Alas, no website at present but they may be found at barbbook@dircon.co.uk tel: 01621 810810 fax: 01621810888 Zhukov house, 14b Maldon road, Tiptree, Essex, CO5 0LL, England Besides a large stock of other publishers they have their own publications focusing on obscure Russian/soviet armour Spoke to the owner recently and he said that the new catalogue is nearly ready. Stuff I've bought from them include their own books on the T 28 and T 35 each about 96 pages packed with photo's line and coloured drawings and fold out plans for the modellers amongst us -works on the soviet Shermans and Soviet river gunboats are in the pipeline. I've also bought some polish monographs on armoured trains and a joint bulgarian/english book about Bulgarian armour from about 1920 to 1945. Not to be confused with the American company of the same name. And before anyone asks I'm not connected with the company I just like their books and feel it's important that we support these specialist dealers/publishers else they'll disapear....

Could you club someone to death with a bazooka? ( without damaging it of course )

I thought that's what they did but wasn't quite sure. Just getting the tank to button up is as you say handy in itself.

Just curious, if I order a sharpshooter to open fire on a unbuttoned tank ( or other armour )does it just blaze away at the vehicle, or does it do the sensible thing and try and pick off exposed commanders and so on ?

@ michael emrys, doh! yeah sorry, a bit remiss of me not to post the title: 'Smashing the atlantic war ( surely they mean wall ? ): The destruction of Hitlers coastal fortresses' by Patrick Delaforce found it on amazon.co.uk, if the synopsis is accurate it seems to fit the bill - reading the synopsis I get the feeling it may be a translation, certainly the english is a little odd in places. JonS thanks for the suggestions , sound as though they might be worth looking at. In fact thanks to anybody who's chipped in. Much appreciated. [ June 18, 2002, 06:07 PM: Message edited by: Agentorange ]

I think there may be a answer to your question in the CMBB forum/thread somewhere - I'm pretty sur one of the designers ( can't remember which ) said two floors only, however he did also say that they were trying a sort of 'modular' approach to some of the buildings so you could produce vast factories etc a la the tractor factory at Stalingrad.

Well, I found one on Amazon that looks as though it might cover this precise area - roll on payday. Just thought it would provide a source of scenarios, something a bit out of the ordinary. Vis a vis offial histories, I know what you mean, it's very hard to find them here in the UK as well. Luckily my uni library had the full set, so whilst I should have been studying Piagets theory of child development I was actually getting to grips with all six volumes of "The war in North Africa "

The various battles and sieges conducted by the allies against the German garrisons holed up in western France and the channel ports, after the allies had by passed them in 1944. Any ideas ?

Thanks for the replies everyone. I had a couple of reasons for asking, firstly I've just DL'd the Village des Moulins scenario which has a french tank in, and that got me to thinking about the whole thing. secondly I've recently bought a copy of Chamberlain and Doyle's 'Encyclopedia of german tanks of WW2' which has a section on French armour - it's good for technical stuff but a bit short on combat history. Looking at the book I was surprised how much stuff was taken into service, either as was or converted to SPG. Shame they couldn't get some more of these into the game, especially when you consider that they served almost exclusively on the western front, and CMBO is by definition a western front game, would have added more flavour if you see what I mean. A couple of likely candidates are: 7.5cm Pak40/1 auf GW Lorraine Schlepper (sdkfz 135 ) about 130 still in service in 1944. 4.7cm Pak(t) auf 35R(f) about 110 in service in 1944 When you consider that the Puma ran to about 100 vehicles on both fronts and that's in the game.... Still i suspect that this is very old ground so I'll stop now ps just noticed that Schiffer have one of their 48p series on this.... probably buy it come pay day. [ May 19, 2002, 04:28 PM: Message edited by: Agentorange ]

I was just wondering how much French armour was used by the Germans? Can anybody suggest a couple of sites or books on this. Specifically how much actually saw combat ( and where ) as opposed to internal security etc thanks in advance

Thanks for the info guys, I was curious as I knew that British troops held onto the Boyes AT rifle long after it was effective since there was simply nothing better on offer. Nice site Matthias !. had a quick peek, but will investigate more later, is it part of a bigger site ? Couldn't see any links to one.

Just a brief question. AFAIK the panzerfaust and panzershreck came into service in 1944 ?. What did german infantry do before that, did they hang to anti tank rifles on the basis that even a rubbish AT weapon was better than no weapon at all, or did they abandon them and rely on AT guns and artillery for defemse until the PF and PS came into service . Just curious

Ok, thanks for that, I'll give it a go and see what happens. As for the patch, I didn't realise that as you guessed I do have the retail version -I'll try a reinstall and see what happens

Ok, in the scenario editor the units don't take on the colour of there zone, this only happens in the scenario setup, when you start the battle. If they are German they will stay gray in the editor, if Green they are American etc.[/QB]

What happens is that once I've pressed Go, it comes out of the preview and goes back top the main editor, so far so good. However all the writing, the wind rose and any other lettering has taken on a peculiar mottled effect - like a weird campflage scheme. if I quit out of the editor and into scenarios the same has happened to all the scenarios, they become almost unreadable, and the briefings appear over the top of the scenario list. I've got both the additional CD loaded and the patch as well. Any ideas ?

I'm a bit stuck trying to make a scenario. It's not a serious one for the net - more of a test bed for learning stuff, but I've got a couple of problems. 1] How on earth do you get from the Preview screen back to the main editor ?. Can't see a hot key listed, tried enter, etc but nothing doing - only two ways out I could find a] ALT Q ( really don't want to do this ), b] press GO ( makes CMBO go all funny ) Please tell me I'm missing something really obvious. 2] I've set up my initial zones in zone mode and allocated units to where I want them to start, however no matter what I do, they won't take on the base colour of the appropriate zone but stay resolutely grey ie : neutral - I've evidently missed something but again I don't seem to be able to find an answer in the manual. Any help gratefully received.

Now, I understand that the max number of units is 256 in CMBO, but I have a question, which is: When designing a scenario you set your on map and reinforcements during the design stage eg Reinforce 1, Reinforce 2 and so on imagine if you will that you get to Reinforce 3 and you hit the Max units - no more can be bought on to the map... But of course during the course of the game your start up forces and Reinforce 1 have been heavily mauled - now of course you have 'free' slots available, you could bring on extra forces. But since the units are allocated during the design phase you can't do so, even though you no longer have 256 units. is there a way round this? That is some way of allocating reinforcements but them only becoming available during the game if there are free unit "slots " available? Hope you see what I mean, even better I hope someone knows the answer

mmmm.... is that 256 units across the entire scenario, or just at any one point?. What I was thinking of was this: You set your start up force and several sets of reinforcements. Half way through reinforce 3 you hit your limit - no reinforce 4 is possible. But of course by the time reinforce 4 was due to hit the map your initial forces and reinforce 1 have been heavily engaged, so of course you could now bring on more. However as the limit is hit in the scenario build you can't actually do so. Can you see what I'm getting at, and is there a way round it ? many thanks in advance

Sounds good, link?,address?, telephone number ?. Also is this their only publication - if there's more where that came from we could be on to a good thing

I have searched in the scenario talk section but keep getting the "wait for 5 minutes whilst searching - and disconnect "...... So for the record what is the absolute maximum number of points that can be spent in designing a scenario.... more precisely on UNITS, not experience levels etc, but actual number of units ?

Yeah, I probably will after all they're only a £ a go - so it's not like I'll be spending a fortune I might order some tommorrow, there's a couple of books on the site I like the look of, If I order them I'll get a couple of the TOE's. I've got a scanner so if I do I'll get an image and post it ( but don't hold your breath )

Like I said I haven't bought any myself yet, so clicking the link and having a look would probably be the best thing - when you get to the site choose the first button ( Book catalogues ) and then the second from bottom on the next page. There's a description of what they are all about and a list of what's available, hope that helps.

I suspect this may be old news but I noticed that Helion books www.helion.co.uk are selling Micromark TOE's giving breakdowns of various divisions into their vsrious junior formations ie so many brigades per Division, battalians per brigade etc etc right down to squad level giving details of weapons used attached heavy weapopns etc. Hell they explain it better than I do...go and have a look each looks at a specific unit type eg tank division etc, mountain division etc and are £1 a piece. Thought they might prove handy for scenario designers. I'll probably buy a couple come pay day out of curiosity, let you know what I think