Last Hussar

Do spotters that can see the target area radio in corrections, making it more accurate over time? I can't find any ref to this. Watching the odd shot of your own 25lb'ers drop behind you makes an exciting (?!) spectacle.

You have to be careful with those AARs- you can't hit the return button at a leasurely pace. In the same way every brit fighter was a 'Sptfire', especially early war, a fact that really annoyed Hurricane pilots in 1940 (IT WAS NOT A SPITFIRE THAT SHOT YOU DOWN, it was ME) the Allies saw every tank as a Tiger, and every gun as a 88. Think about it- at 100-150 yards a tank is no bigger than your thumb at arms length ( a man is about the size of a dime/10 pence at arms length) Even with optics 1600 yds is still a LONG way if you are bouncing around in a steel box. The brain tends to go with the pschye of the owner. Also with the best will in the world, and everybody being honest there is likely to be overcounting. - 'We shot at it- it brewed, therefore our kill'- ignoring the 3 other tanks all doing the same. result 1 dead tank- 4 kills claimed.

What would be nice was if views 7 and 8 were in the style of 1:25,000 maps. I have to use the intermediate levels as I can't spot the contors, on the 'flat maps' and putting an AT gun in a Hollow is a bit annoying. No thats not gamey- what do you think real CO's use?

Think I really must stick up for dandelion here. For a 'free' press US media appears very one sided to those of us in Europe. Hollywood isnt going to produce anything that shows the US military in a bad light. Mogadishu was a screw up, born of that 'white man' arragance we in the west have about the 3rd world. The US wins wars by having the largest most technological army in the world- in the WW2 they simply outproduced the Germans, plus the Germans were led by a mad man. If you are going to sneer at the military of other countries then I suggest you don't do it near any British soldiers- you may find yourself in for a rude awakening.

No- I'm painting a platoon of WWII brits. The Royal Green Jackets were formed from mergers of various Light infanty units over the years. They claim as one of their antecedants the 95th.

How do I kill a concrete pill box with infantry in CMBO? I ran 2 sections rount the back and had the 2m from the back door, firing, and hit with all 6 rounds from a PIAT- and the bugger doesn't seem to have noticed. :confused:

Okay okay- maybe I overstated. :-0 However stukas were always very vunerable

To go back a bit. The Ju87s didnt do any thing after May '40, because that was the last time the Luftwaffe had air superiority- the Battle of Britain caused stukas to be pulled out from front lines wholesale as any enemy air resistance caused horrific losses. While FACs dont exist, Panzer Lehr and the 21st both suffered losses moving to the attack. These were enough to take the edge off when they did reach the front- though this is Operational rather than Tactical air power, and so out side the scope of CMBO. The Ardennes offensive was planned for a period of bad weather- so the allies could not fly. The break in the weather is one of the reasons sited for the offensives failure. Speaking of the Ardennes there is compelling arguements that SHEAF knew it was coming, and where. The German attack fell on the weakest part of the line. They forced a corridor which was lined by much higher quality defenders in natural defensive positions. (Brits north,Yanks south) The germans were chanelled until the trap sprung behind them! The Brit creeping barrage method is accurate- and the move it slowly method is 'historical'. A freind of mine recounts how in the late seventies he walked as part of a line behind a creeping mortar barrage while on exercise. He is full of admiration as to how the Sgt co-ordinating the 'tubes' kept it moving forward at the same pace as the troops, with them just out of the blast radius. They basically would have hit any enemy just as soon as the shells stopped falling. I suppose with heavy enough armour, and light enough shells you cound get REALY close to the blast radius, and shoot at they cower. What a pity CM doesnt let troops hide behind vehicles.

'an unprincipled contemptible person; scoundrel' (Collins concise dictionary) A cad or bounder. The quote is Napoleonic- I think an Austrian Hussar commander.

Ho Ho Ho. That Teutonic sense of humour. 'Ham' was the codeword to say the canal ('Pegasus') bridge on the Orne had been captured intact, 'Jam' the same for the river bridge. 'Jack' (canal) and 'Lard' (river) meant captured but blown by defenders. Maj Howard always signed off replys to his 'fan' mail 'Ham and Jam'. The film 'the longest day' doesnt show 7th Para arriving to reinforce, just Lovatts relief. Richard Todd- who plays Howard, was one of those in 7 Para.

Some simple rules on the attack: Bring overwhelming force to bear on one point.- even though the attack defend ratio is only 3:2 the attacker has the initiative as where the battle will be fought- so he can pack that area, with just enough left elsewhere to slow/stop a counter attack. The defender does not have this advantage- he must defend the whole line. 3 to 1 ratio is Good. 5 to 1 is better. (Obvious- but dont forget it) Re-inforce success, and only success. Use fire and movement- while one section moves, other sections from the same platoon cover. Repeat this idea up the chain of command- platoons covering each other. Use fire and movement to break the task down into managagable chunks- e.g.- to capture E -- 1 squad captures A, covered by 2 squad. 1 and 3 squads cover 2 squad as they advance to capture B (to cover objective D). 1 and 2 cover 3 sqd as the move to C, which also covers D. Finally 1 sqd captures D. Be prepared to get in close WITH OVERWHELMING FORCE. The average range of decisive infantry combat in 2000 is the same as 1930- less than 30 meters. The rest is just suppression. You can shoot all day and get nowhere near. A bayonette makes an intensly personal statement- that of 'only one of us gets out of this alive. I'm prepared to take the risk- are you?' Seize and keep the initative. Make him respond to you- not vice versa. While he is dealing with your plans, he is not actioning his own. Use combined arms, and assign tasks to those units good at them. (this sounds obvious, but we all do it- who's local, rather than who is best.) Here endith the lesson

In the immortal words of Elmer Fudd 'Be wery quiet- ahm huntin' Stuarts'

Mind you thats not as cowardly as the sherman crew in the training mission who abandoned their vehicle as soon as they saw a Pz IV- I swear they were never even shot at

A thread for all those strange things that have happened in the game. I'll start. I was on the attack in a quick battle. I was doing every thing by the book- fire and movement. I was then faced with the problem of 100m to the next bit of cover- a 2 storey house- on my right flank. After doing every thing I could to supress the germans I rushed a section to the house. They got there ok- maybe with 1 casualty. Using them to cover I then rushed the other 2 rifle sections in the platoon up. The first got there. The second about 10 mtrs behind got to about 20 metres from the house, decided the fire was to heavy, turned round and rushed back 80 mtrs to the start position- all the time under fire.

Ignore above- I've found the problem. On the DVD case version the disc always goes to install not the game, and my step son had installed a second time with out me knowing- the short cut was to this second one- not 'my' files. Sorry!

further to the above- what game version will I have- are there any patches etc I should down load? :confused:

I have the CDV two disc version, with the second disc stuffed full of the .BMP mods. I put the mods to change the 'Order menus' to appear as clip boards, except they still appear as the originals. They are sitting in the BMP folder of my CMBO Folder under files 1600 to 1687. I actually overwrote the 'standard files' that sat in these spaces. Have I missed something somewhere? Cheers.

I have the CDV two disc version, with the second disc stuffed full of the .BMP mods. I put the mods to change the 'Order menus' to appear as clip boards, except they still appear as the originals. They are sitting in the BMP folder of my CMBO Folder under files 1600 to 1687. I actually overwrote the 'standard files' that sat in these spaces. Have I missed something somewhere? Cheers.

There is a saying 'Assume makes an Ass of you and me' (Ass/U/Me- geddit). Sounds like the mistake was not incorrect labeling, but you assuming that 'crew' meant 'tank crew'. The makers of the game have been at pains to point out that this is different to your normal wargame. I work on the basis that anyone with a gun can do me damage- even if more by luck than judgement. The point is that on the battlefield you can not tell the quality of the opponent, even if you do have a label (the phrase 'Republican GUARD springs to mind!)

Lee- 20mm is the minature scale I am currently painting - approx 1:72. Dandelion is on the right track. D company 2nd Battalion Oxon Bucks light infantry are the allied forces that can claim they got into combat first on D-Day at 'Pegasus Bridge'. Maj Howard and I both have worked for Oxfordshire police force (though it is now known as Thames Valley). According to the guy in the Terratorial Army (reservists to non Brits) his old Regiment- the Royal Green Jackets- who have barracks in Buckinghamshire identifies them as one of the units from which the RGJ were formed With such a historic unit 'on my doorstep' how could I not choose them? I can highly recommend Stephen Ambrose's book 'Pegasus Bridge'. 'Ham and Jam' every one

Ah- you copy my minatures gaming technique then! I seem to be quite successful at BFBO- I think it's because someone (something) else is rolling the dice- I seem to attract '1's. On the psychology factor of Tigers I understand there is a Solo board game where, until identified, every tank is a Tiger, every gun is a 88.

I'm still waiting with barely contained anticipation to get my copy delivered by Amazon. However I am looking forward to getting my hands on a 'Firefly', 'Cromwell' and 'Churchill'. BONUS QUESTION How has my Home address (I live in Buckinghamshire) determined which unit I am painting in 20mm (It is a famous one) .

From what I understand a 'standard' Sherman would have problems KOing a Tiger. The 17 pdr on the Firefly however was a different proposition. Col Eadie's quote re the Staffs Yeomanry illustrates this '...they [the Germans] will drive ... out of range of my 6 pdrs [about 1000 yrds], make a quick plan...They will form up their squadrons ... then drive straight for their objective. What they do not know is I have 3 troops of Fireflys' (Carlo D'Este, Decision in Normandy, pp139-140). This is effectively what happened, and the Germans were hammered, with the germans not expecting such a powerful response. The British were keen to disguise the Fireflys- even ordering the extra gun length be painted white so from a distance they looked like 'standard' Shermans. The advantage that Shermans did have was the US economy was untouched and larger, so could produce at a ratio of 5:1 to the German tanks. The reason why Tigers were such a defensive tank was their unreliability. A statioary tank is a dead tank. This combined with their weight, making movement difficult, especially across bridges, meant that it was easier to use them as SP Pill boxes than tanks.