Spinlock

PC's are definitely the ultimate gaming machine... For my work though, I use a Mac.

What might be a nice piece of eye-candy for abandoned vehicles would be open hatches. It would be nice to be able to see the mickey mouse hatches on a T-34 open after the crew has bailed out. This might work for regular knocked out tanks as well. Also nice would be a big fat hole decal pasted on the model where the round entered. You could even use different decals for different round sizes.

In a recent QB with my coworker, I had to take out a lot of guns on a hill. He was German and bought something like 7 or 8 75mm AT guns and placed them on his end of the board on a hills forward slope that overlooked the whole map. I hid two inf guns (forget the caliber) in some woods, hid my armor behind some building and then used LMG's and HMG's to pin down his AT guns. When I had manuevered my infantry so that all the AT guns were hittable, I opened up with everything I had, moved the tank into place and the inf guns took out the AT guns one by one. I think the key was that I was at extreme range in good cover with the HMG's which were able to keep the gun crews down. Your mileage may vary with the map.

Hey I'm in the NYC area and would be interested in meeting other CM players. I'll drop a line.

In CMBB I find these little gizmos really effective against armor for some reason. Maybe just a set of flukes but in a series of QB's I started using these extensively and was able to take out a tank in each battle with them. Which, incidentally was a more effective kill/cost ratio than my "rolling coffin" T-60s and BT tanks.

It's been noted elsewhere but worth noting again. When playing QB's you often find that the reverse situation is true for your little battle from what was the historic situation. In early 1941, before the german's upgrade their weapons the KV-1 tanks spells absolute doom for the German player and T-34's cause mass havoc on the 50mm stubby PzIV and the puny gunned PzIII. In on TCP/IP game I played I lost two platoons of PzIV's and a platoon of Pz38's to one lone KV-1 which sat out of view of my immobile 88s. The most I did was immobilize it- and that was from an airstrike. Yet in 1941, the Russian armies were running pell-mell to their death and being swallowed up in huge cauldrons of death by the panzers. Changing over to 1943, the Germans are absolutely crushing my Russians with the Tiger. A lone tiger in a QB on a hill was able to stop my horde of russian infantry and two platoons of T-34's. Even in another engagement with T-34/85's I couldn't get them to engage Tigers (they just ran away to cover). By this time, the initiative was clearly in the russian's hands and post-Kursk, Army Group Centre was soon to be a gaping hole in the German front as the front collapsed toward Berlin. Strange huh. It must have to do with the scale of the conflict. Where in my little QB the blitzkrieg can be stopped in its tracks and the russian tide can be turned... if only for an instant.

Just finished reading John Erickson's excellent book Road to Stalingrad and am getting started with the follow-up to that "Road to Berlin". Absolutely illuminating. CMBB has really sparked my interest in the East Front. Highly recommend these two books- bit dense- get the version with maps or you'll be lost. Reminds me of reading "War and Peace"... Can never tell the difference between Russian generals and russian towns... gets confusing quick. Anyway, just wanted to say that there were many highly skilled Russian generals both pre-war and during WWII. Unfortunately, as someone commented, a lot were executed during Stalin's pre-war purges. Some names that spring to mind include Tukhachevsky - who was killed in the purges but seemed to have very advanced doctrinal concepts (Deep Battle, cimbined arms, Deep Operation) which were very advanced for their time (early 30's) and would have made him more than a match for the German blitzkrieg. Zhukov - Deputy Supreme Commander and hero of Moscow '41. He seems to have trashed the Japanese in Mongolia and then from there sped to fame (though being the most famous WWII russian general, is a bit overrated IMHO). Vasilevskii - Marshal of the SU. Again, in my opinion, one of the best generals of the war. He had great responsibility for the Stalingrad encirclement and Operation saturn. Kharkov was a bit of a blunder though... Vatutin - Front commander and also planner/executer of Saturn. Was unfortunately wounded and killed before the war ended. Saw action many of the large operations including Kursk. After reading more (also recommend When Titans Clashed - Glantz, Panzer Battles - F.W. Mellenthin) I have a much more healthy respect for the Red Army as it developed past Barbarossa.

One thing perhaps someone can clear up for me. Whenever playing the late war Russians I'm constantly frustrated by the IS-2's incredibly slow rate of fire. Playing a night QB with a friend who bought a platoon of Tigers, I almost ripped my hair out waiting for the IS-2's to fire at PB range. Luckily, I was able to ambush most of the Tigers from the flank and rear. Can anyone explain historically why the IS-2 had such long reload times?

Spinlock: I have another thread for you that you'll surely like. Head over to the Weird threads section at http://lindan.panzershrk.com and read the very first PENG challenge thread. did I mention it is 120 pages long? </font>

My god. I can't believe I just read this thread... :mad:

First post, Been reading up on my East Front and it seems to me that probably the number one reason (according to the sources I'm reading - Glantz, House, Erickson) for the less than lightning pace of Soviet advance was lack of logistical support. Basically soviet offenses seemed to have been stopped more by they inability to keep up supplies than anything else. In France, the allied advance also slowed appreciably when the supply lines drew thin. Headed into the Bulge, logistical supplies had to be carried cross country still from the channel which resulted in a slow down in the offensive. It appears the maxim that professionals talk logistics holds true in either case.