Glider

Are you really surprised by your results? In close encounters of inf forces of equal size the morale factor will always determine the winner. The side that pins and panics first will lose, and lose badly. If you have two halfsquads firing at a single squad the game engine will practically guarantee that the single squad will panic before it manages to panic *both* of the halfsquads.

The Russian pioneer squad: Russian pioneer squad The halfsquad 1: Halfsquad 1 The halfsquad 2: Halfsquad 2

The German Jaeger 42 squad: German squad The halfsquad 1: Halfsquad 1 The halfsquad 2: Halfsquad 2

Treeburst, I tried setting up a similar scenario and noticed something strange. When I split a squad into two halfsquads the sum of their firepowers remains equal to the initial firepower of the entire squad (at least according to info screen). Also, somebody said that splitting squad produces a global morale hit but the morale level remained 100% even after every single squad was split.

When I can, I play scenarios. When I must, I play QBs. Mostly, for some strange reason, people insist on QBs. The entire thread was not supposed to be dedicated to the weirdness of my gaming habits (though I see I am not alone in that particular asylum area ) but to the annoying fact that one can (in my opinion) increase the effectiveness of his infantry by practically doubling the amount of time needed to issue orders.

Well, you must make some allowances for us plebs who would like to know how level the field actually is before playing. Personally, Iraqi - USA 73 Easting scenarios never appealed to me, no matter how real-life they might be.

Well, the tactics is being used not because it is realistic but because it gives you advantage. Too much realism can damage playability, I don't think that anybody plays "two Guards tank regiments supported by a division of artillery against a depleted Germany infantry company" no matter how realistic they are. It is true that both halfsquads and squads have their weaknesses and their advantages. But advantages of halfsquads outweigh their weaknesses by far. In other words, you can have King Tigers and I can have T-34/85s and I can still hand you your head on a platter if you use them in a tactically unsound way. But that does not mean that KTs and T-34/85s are equal.

You may argue that splitting all squads into halfsquads makes the game look more like real life... and it does. Obviously, splitting them into single soldiers would make it even more realistic and I think that such one-man inf units would be even more effective than halfsquads. However, that would not be a very interesting game to play. In the interest of the gameplay quality infantry is abstracted, with the squad level being the default CM inf level. You might rationalize the decision to splitting all or most of your inf into halfsquads as an attempt to emulate RL, but all you are doing are sacrificing playability in order to achieve certain advantage. If this practice becomes universally accepted the result will be that all good CM players will be splitting all their inf into halfsquads, the advantage you had will disappear and you will still be stuck with ordering 60 inf units instead of 30.

Hmmm... I understand what you are saying, but that also means that a sudden loss of three men, which would incapacitate a full squad for a long period, will incapacitate only one of the halfsquads, leaving the other fully operational. I think that Treeburst has pointed out the true source of the advantage... the fact that, while two halfsquads can fire at a squad from two directions, the full squad, despite having the same number of men, can return fire only against one of the halfsquads.

Of course it will not always work. But it will practically *always* make a split platoon of any kind of infantry more effective than an 'unsplit' platoon. What a player can do with that advantage is up to him/her/it. Again, there is no *so*. They are more efficient and the degree of increased efficiency can be discussed. They use ammo much more efficiently and they can be in two places at once, thereby only half of the squad can be pinned by return fire that would otherwise pin the entire squad. They are also smaller/cheaper targets. Issuing orders to couple of inf battalions divided into halfsquads is much more time consuming than issuing orders to the same battalions in "whole squads" mode. I assure you that I wouldn't be sounding testy to you had you not sounded rude to me. If you are willing to tell me that I imagined this and that you did not sound that way, I will be perfectly willing to explain to you that I did not sound testy either

I don't say that it is gamey. But the vision of two players fighting a big QB and splitting two battalions worth of infantry into halfsquads... now that is just wrong.

Once again, this topic is not about my game. It is not about my obvious and pathetic attempt to convince myself and others that I am being defeated by a flaw in the game engine and not by a better player. It particularly is not about what I deserve or do not deserve, an issue that concerns you not at all. It is about the fact that there is a way to make one of the most important factors of the game - infantry - more effective (whether 5% or 20% more effective - that is another issue altogether). And that this way is making the game more tedious and time-consuming, without contributing anything to the quality of gameplay.

Obviously, our definitions of gamey differ somewhat However, it seems that we all mostly agree on the following: 1) In CM games halfsquads are (considerably) more effective than full squads. This makes them the default choice for all those who intend to win, except if such persons prefer to fight at disadvantage. 2) The game designers did not intend halfsquads to be default inf tactical units. Otherwise, we would be buying our inf units already divided into halfsquads and the designers would have provided us with "Join" command instead of "Split". 3) Dividing all inf squads into halfsquads contributes absolutely nothing to the quality of gameplay. It just makes order phases about twice as long and tedious, since you have about twice as many units. Perhaps the practice is not "gamey" but it is definitely not something I would like to see accepted as "just another good CM tactics" by the gaming community.

Well if they were fighting each other they wouldn't both be depicted as hidden markers now would they No need for a schematic, a few words will suffice. After overrunning both German flanks waves of Russian/Romanian infantry are enveloping the central flags still held by Germans. Though I never wanted to discuss *my* game, just the unfortunate fact that dividing all your squads into halfsquads seems to be improving their combat effectiveness quite a bit.

Thanks I will try it out now: This is the situation seen from the right flank (completely overrun, my Germans are forming a hedgehog around the two central flags) This is the top view. You can see the central group of German units being enveloped. My left flank supported by 2 Hetzers (no HE), after being dispersed, is trying to slow down the Soviets that seized the flag.

It is ME, so no TRPs. I did just what you said, it hurt him but not enough. Just what I am doing, both flanks caved in, I am surrounded, defending the two central flags with an inf company, two Hetzers and a 75mm HT firing in all directions at once. Most of the (empty) support HMGs, mortars and the FO withdrawn to the map edge and ready to be evacuated.

Hit to the global morale too? I did not know that... thanks, that is a really useful info. I made them and then found out that I cannot post them. I noticed that

I bought them because Hetzers can survive 85mm hits, Stugs cannot. They are 251/9, with 20+ HE rounds (one had 29 IIRC). They managed to fire off almost all of them from 100m-300m ranges, thanks to the cover provided by Hetzers. True. However, my AARs usually show that my 81mm spotter was able to kill 10-20 enemy inf. My average 81mm on-board mortar kills 8-12 and about 0.5 guns Ah, you see, it is a Meeting Engagement. It just feels like a Soviet assault because of the halfsquad tactics.

To answer the second part first, the problem is this - the bad is just a slightly more fragile morale, while the good... advantages are obviously quite numerous. As far as my armour is concerned, I managed to set it up so it is keyholed... meaning that my tanks see the flags area and approaches to them but they do not see any part of the enemy starting line (where hidden AT guns are deployed). So I can fire at his inf units. However, the combined HE capabilities of 4 Hetzers, 2 HTs with 75mm guns, 8 81mm on-board mortars and 1 105mm spotter were simply not enough to stop a tremendous wave of Russian/Romanian well spread-out infantry.

Damn it Sergei, you think like an engineer sometimes. </font>

I don't intend to I am not whining because I will lose, I lose quite a few battles and it does not bother me most of the time. I am whining because very soon I will be fighting my current opponent and 11 like him in a club-to-club challenge and I will be forced to use halfsquad-army tactics in order to have a chance of proving that they are not invincible. Tedious and unfulfilling to the extreme... As far as other games are concerned, I will happily forget about this "advantage".

I don't know whether they are *too* effective. They seem to be more effective that whole squads and that makes halfsquads the default choice and that is just annoying and doubles the time you have to spend ordering infantry around.

Hmmm, that is an accurate description of what is actually happening... every few turns I sacrifice a few precious HE tank or mortar rounds to disrupt his approach. Obviously, I will have less HE support remaining for vital attack turns but that cannot be helped. All your points are totally valid but can be applied to ordinary infantry advances, too. The main issue remains - halfsquads are just like ordinary infantry - but more effective. Their only drawback is the morale hit but it seems to me that advantages are far more numerous.

That is not a problem in games like these, we are both playing so cautiously that (and we are at the turn 20), all tanks on both sides are still keyholed at initial reverse slope positions, firing only at rare targets of opportunity. Back to "fire at 300-500m" issue, do I gain anything that way? With games of 30+ turns he has more than enough time to rally and push forward from cover to cover.

Open fire at 300-500 metres with inf squads? Would it not be just a waste of ammo?