simovitch

I just got back from a week stay over there with my brother. we stayed in a small chalet outside Malmedy and spent 5 days touring the entire battlefield. We have both been students of the battle for the past 20 years. In the evening after studying our route for the day with reference books by Cole, Cavanaugh, Wijers, and Macdonald we would play a few turns of my brother's award winning "Ardennes '44" by GMT (a board game you say?... gasp!) it was awesome. It turned out to be kind of a research project for his 2nd edition wherein we analyzed the terrain and well known (and not so well known) german crossing locations and marked up his game map. We found the foxholes dug by Lt. Bouck's I&R platoon overlooking Lanzarath (those were hard to find, but oh man worth it!), Hiked down Rollbahn A crossing the Olef Bach and Jans Bach, followed Peiper's Route all the way to the bridge over the Lienne creek at Habiemont, as well as near Stoumont Station, drove through Wiltz, Cafe' Schumann crossroads, Bastogne, Clervaux, the museum at Diekirch (a must see!) the 116th bridges at Ouren, Dom Butgenbach and the Butgenbacher Heck, Rech, Poteau, The Prummerberg, Manhay, Grandmeniel, Houffalize, and on and on. Of course I verified the terrain on all my Bulge scenarios too... Weckerath, Krewinkle, Twin Villages... On the 18th we stayed for the ceremony at the Mardasson Memorial in Bastogne, talked to a few Vets, and then found the company E, 506th Rgt. foxholes in the woods overlooking Foy. There were Belgian kids in their 20's digging their own foxholes their to spend the night! I was most impressed that so many Belgians dressed up as GI's in Bastogne. There were a couple of guys dressed up as SS troopers (to the hilt in mottled-camo uniforms) walking around the museum in La Gleize. I missed the 50-year so this was truly a once in a lifetime experience.

I'm headed over there with my brother for the 60th Anniversary Dec 13th-Dec 20th. Rented a cottage outside of Malmedy about 2 months back. Just heard that Tom Hanks and 8 Vets from "Band of Brothers" will be at the ceremonies in Bastogne on the 18th. They couldn't find a place to stay until the Belgium officials stepped in. The press release was something like "Tom Hanks sleepless in Belgium" no joke. I cant wait! :cool:

With 20 reinforcement slots you could perhaps spread out what could amount to at least a company of paratroopers to "drop" at random times at what might appear in the game to be random locations. Maybe pre-set them to at least "panicked" to represent their state of unreadiness. just a thought

There are quite a few "Bulge" scenarios and a couple of OPs done for CMAK done by HSG on the SD, indexed by "HSG B ..." only one deals with Bastogne vicinity specifically though "HSG ASSENOIS ASSAULT" Joe Bob says check it out....

GJK, Look for the Lt. Simonitch leader in KGP II. my brother did the artwork for that one and Avalon Hill let him get his (our) last name on the unit! It's not a mis-spelling, simovitch is my screen name (yea, I know... real clever) A dream come true from our school days playing the original SL in the back in the '70s.

Just in time for the 65th anniversary of that little sideshow conflict...

You mention ASL, does that include HASL? If you can find them, Kamfgruppe Peiper I and II are very well done hex maps of the Stoumont-La gleize region of Belgium. Also Red Barricades for that part of Stalingrad, and I believe Pegasus bridge and the Arnhem Bridge was done as well. most of these are all still available from Multiman Publishing

Maybe I'm missing something (wouldn't be the first time), but that looks like an objective flag, not a reinforcement marker. :confused:

ok, Toms Ardennes mods are CMMOS based for CMBO. CMMOS is the best way to load these (and other) type of mods without manually editing the bmp numbers. 1. Go to the Combat Mission HQ 2. On the left side of the page, click the CMMOS button. you will have to download the CMMOS program. 3. Go the CMBO terrain section and download the terrain rule sets, and then the "All TBM Winter" mod. you will likely have to read up on the instructions for installing the CMMOS program, but it's pretty simple. note that not all mods are cmmos compatible any more. most if not all of the latest mods at CMMODS (the combat mission mod database)will not run with CMMOS. hope this helps, and happy modding!

ok, fair enough. I was getting a little jealous over all of warmonger's publicity and fame.

I'm an office manager, have a degree in engineering, 2 professional licenses, and consider myself a seasoned CM player. But I don't have a clue about what you're asking about! :confused: maybe it's about QB's which I never play. Hope someone can help.

just curious J2D, did you try Twin Villages yet? (now I feel like cheep a scenario whore)

HSG B Twin Villages V1.2. It's a historical CMAK Battle of the Bulge operation designed by me. filthy weather, filthy suprises, filthy krauts... should play ok pbem. [ November 22, 2004, 10:35 AM: Message edited by: simovitch ]

Will you be modding CMAK? Be careful! Toms original TBM ardennes terrain mods will need to be renumbered for inclusion into CMAK (and CMBB). They were origionally created for CMBO. You can get the renumbered mods from cmmods search CMAK mods by author->simovitch->All->Terrain there are 2 zip files to download. while you're at it it you can download my northwest Europe icon for CMAK too unless you don't mind staring at the italian boot while you play a bulge scenario I recommend getting the Mod Manager as well, It will make swapping the bmp's sooo much easier.

oops, wrong forum. "HSG B Fighting Withdrawal" is a CMAK scenario. pardon

jcosta, Try my scenario "HSG B Fighting Withdrawal" available at the Scenario Depot. Play as Americans and I think you will see the attacking AI give you a run for your money. No AI Bonuses needed .

for Impudent Warwick: I used your map (and gave you credit ) for my CMBO "The Prumerberg" scenario available on the depot. Thanks again for your work. For Stratos: Tom Klimisch Ardennes Terrain is renumbered and available at CMMODS for use with CMAK and CMBB as well. You can search by author (simovitch). For Ales Dvorak: I cant help but admire your attempt to sugar coat Roger Water's caustic wit , Although I love wargaming, I sometimes need to remind myself that those dead pixel soldiers don't leave behind pixel widows or pixel orphans...

If you like some "Bulge" scenarios, there are 20 of them at the scenario depot for CMAK alone. And I think even more for CMBO. Its all free. :cool: just do a depot search using "december", and "1944" and maybe "belgium". There are a couple of Operations that cover the Bulge as well, at the depot. When you really start getting into the online support of this game offered by the general public, you will find that there are some terrain mods out there at CMMODS that attempt to portray the winter terrain of the ardennes region as well.

yes, my brother Mark and I took a one day wirlwind tour of the battlefield in October 2000 (Echternach-Vianden-Dasburg bridge-Clervaux-Bastogne-Houffalize-Stoumont-Butgenbach-Rocherath) while the rest of our family toured Trier. One day was just not enough though. I plan to hike Rollbahn A from the Hollerath knee to Rocherath on one day, and up the railroad cut from Lanzarath to Bucholz station on another. Being by myself is the only way I can really do these crazy ventures that I always wanted to do, like a 5:30AM vigil on Dec. 16th with some veterens in their old front line foxholes...

Anyone heading to the Ardennes in mid December? My wife gave me the green light and I'm booked into a small ski chalet outside Malmedy for 5 nights. The local historical societies and governments have some cool stuff planned, check it out here Average temperature is about 37 degrees F. in December. should be alot of Fun! :cool: (yea, she thinks I'm NUTS...

Kingfish, Those 1:25000 Ardennes maps are identical style (Deutsche werke 1937) to the ones I photcopied from the UC Berkeley Map room about 20 years ago and used for my "Rollbahn A", "HSG B Fighting Withdrawal", and "HSG B Twin Villages Maps". They are truly outstanding pieces of Topographic Mapping. I think I used the Elsenborn and Losheim Quads, just south of Monschau and Schleiden.

McAuliffe, a humble request: Will you also redo your CMBO Stoumont Station scenario? I think you can justify removing the Pz VIb's from the OOB since I'm pretty certain that they didn't make it past La Gleize historically anyway. thanks

Do you mean downloading a pre-existing digital terrain model, or digital contours from aerial mapping (in say, dxf format) and then have the game create a map from that?. That would indeed be awesome. I'm not counting on Battlefront including this option, but... since pyewacket can break the code on the BO/BB/AK map editors I would think a third party program could be developed to read a dxf file that could be interpreted by the CM editor. It's all just X, Y, and Z coordinates... you would also have to generate an algorythm that will "fill in the blanks" between the hard elevations and then write it all to the CM map editor.

This is a great online source to start any research of the Ardennes Campaign. Battle of the Bulge Luxembourg was in the 5th Panzer Armee and 7th Armee zone of operations. Hope this helps.

I sent my donation concurrent with a barrage of requests to the admiral a few months ago. I agree that anyone who uses the depot should donate something; the SD is truly essential for the perpetuation of this hobby.