undead reindeer cavalry

indeed. my intention was not to talk about CMSF at all, but about tactics in general. people say lots of things, especially on the net and especially when they are frustrated. it's very likely not as serious to them as it sounds to you as the game's designer. to tell them that they are wrong in their frustration is going to just annoy them more. and if the downplaying of their frustration is justified by what seems to them to be just a make-believe rationalization, it is likely to piss them off. in most cases if they heard "yeah, sorry it's pretty screwed up IN THAT WAY, perhaps we get to fix that in future" they would likely not only be cool with it but think more positively about the whole game and company.

the primary point was that Colonel's posts gave an impression that what he wanted to do would be atypical in the setting, while IMO that type of defense would be the norm.

to begin with the very fundamentals, prepared defensive positions should by default be invisible to the attacker. for example in operation Anaconda, in Afghanistan 2002, despite pre-battle concentration of very advanced surveillance equipment on a very small area, most enemy fire received by the US forces came from unexpected and undetected positions. another fundamental is the cover given to the defender by the prepared defensive positions. for example in Lebanon individual firefights could last a good number of hours, even with the firepower asymmetry. you don't take out a defender utilizing well prepared defensive positions by just returning fire for a moment -- you need to maneuver and close in with good combined arms coordination. Hezbollah was created by Iran, but its fighters are trained both in Iran and Syria just like for example Hamas. besides, it's been reported (by Israeli military intelligence for example) that Syria has invested into "Hezbollah-style" tactics. Lebanon wasn't really a COIN environment, except for Hezbollah firing rockets from civilian locations. the actual ground warfare was pretty much just conventional warfare (as much as a militia like Hezbollah is capable of waging it). Syrian forces committed to asymmetrical operations would almost certainly utilize MORE guerilla-like tactics than Hezbollah did, not less. there is a good paper about the question of wether Hezbollah fought a guerilla or conventional type warfare at Strategic Studies Insitute: "The 2006 Lebanon Campaign and the Future of Warfare: Implications for Army and Defense Policy". that PDF is a good read for anyone interested in the conflict. i quote it: in the end Hezbollah fighters weren't that special or good. what made their tactics effective enough was, like with al Qaeda in Afghanistan, the simple decision to make the positions concealed and prepared enough. add to that effective ATGMs and such. Syrians would very likely outperform Hezbollah. you don't need to create endless concrete bunker underground networks with tunnel passages to create the same end result. it's most of all a question of understanding the requirement for well prepared and concealed positions -- concealment & cover & dispersal instead of massing forces in open to be devoured by superior enemy firepower. the question about enemy routes of advance in Syria is a bit moot. the enemy arrows are obviously pointing at Damascus and there aren't that many routes you can take. considering the number of Hezbollah fighters and the area they covered, key Syrian terrain could easily be covered.

BTW not talking about CMSF, but tactics in general, most of the stuff you are talking about do not require brilliant creative adaptions from the Syrian commander, as that type of stuff is by Syrian doctrine. the Syrian side will take a stand on a well prepared battlefield of his choosing. buildings are fortified and specifically have stuff like planned & prepared escape routes (including, gosh, use of ladders). tunnel and trench networks (with overhead cover) are well camoed, just as are ATGM & mortar positions (in considerable depth in battlespace) and bunkers (which are strong enough to take air strikes). the whole idea is to not be seen, achieving a surprise by appearing at unexpected location and then melting away to alternate position (or cover) within the battlespace before receiving effective fire. the Syrian defender does NOT expect to have odds, he is NOT massing forces in a futile attempt to match enemy firepower superiority, he is NOT trying to ambush the enemy in an open battle. most of this stuff was talked about already back in 2005 (?) when this board opened. back then it was argued by BFC that the reports about above descriped kind of change in Syrian doctrine would not be succesful, because past attempts of changing Syrian doctrine would have failed. IMO that rebuttal became more questionable after summer 2006, when Hezbollah forces, trained & equipped by Syrians, displayed effective use of such doctrine in Lebanon against IDF. it is also worth noting how some Israeli commanders commented after the short war how they had been confused about what Syrians had been doing in Syria already for some years, but now after seeing the tactics used by Hezbollah understood what Syrians had been up to.

SF seems pretty damn good. anyone tried the demo yet?

i strongly suspect it will stay free because BattleFront has stated it doesn't intent to make any profit by selling (access to) user created content. a figure of 8000 active users was thrown earlier in this thread for a single fan site dedicated to CMx1 scens and mods. if BFC's depot had half of those for ALL BFC games combined, they would have 4000 active users. if active user would pay just 3 dollars / month, BFC would generate income of 3 x 4000 = 12 000 dollars per month. that would be extremely profitable, so i think the depot will have to stay free. on the other hand if there would be just 400 active users there would be no bandwidth issue and thus depot would be free as well. can't see how it would not stay free.

not worth it.

did a quick check: 2 for ICV, 5 for MGS. 5 (for A3) 4 3 3 1 0.5

have you updated the Flash Player plugin? there were some garbage collector issues that the couple most recent updates have partially fixed. without a working garbage collector Flash will keep eating up memory which will start freezing the computer (check memory for Flash in task manager if you are running Windows). i guess it's also possible that both 1917 and the Contraption use the same physics library (note how the soldiers fly in 1917) which may have some nasty bugs. regarding ASL and Flash, i guess the biggest prevention is that there is close to no money to be made with such a game. typically Flash games make money by showing those adds and i believe a typical Flash game generates only some 2000 USD. so to make it profitable you need to make craploads of games. a wargame would probably generate a lot less revenue (due to being a lot less popular) and take a lot longer to create. there are some Flash games that generate revenue more like standard games do, by being sold with a one time fee or as some subsciption based model. like that Advance Wars clone (called "Battalion" IIRC). if one doesn't want to make money (and still invest money in having a server for the game) there is nothing as such preventing one from making ASL in Flash. besides Flash you might want to consider Java (like VASSAL), JavaScript (with AJAX, like Vox Imperium), Silverlight or one of the numerous game oriented browser plugins (some of which allow making the game fully 3D). EDIT: tho at that point one probably asks why not make it a real non-browser based game.

i didn't download the setup file so this is judging from the pic. the setup doesn't make mobile defence easy, but i think the attacker made some bad calls which make it possible. the decision to reveal most of the armor cards by initial overwatch pose makes it easier for the defender to predict attacker's intentions. also it doesn't seem very likely that the defender would deploy his infantry in forward slope, which forces the attacker to maneuver his mostly turretless armor across the map, revealing soft sides and rear. furthermore the decision to create a left flank and separate armor and infantry main bodies makes his right flank very vulnerable to enemy armor which can easily maneuver out of the "bowl" by utilizing a protective smoke screen towards center and then advancing in the cover created by the woods on the right. such maneuver would most likely in itself win the battle. attacker's left flank is vulnerable to flanking armor as well to lesser extent (especially if there is strong armor force flanking on attacker's right, which forces attacker's mostly turretless overwatching armor to face right). but like said this is just from the pic.

two homogenous plates resist less than one, but two face hardened plates resist more. i'm not sure but i think those StuG plates were face hardened. i recall that Tiger plates were indeed different material (hardness and processes involved). Soviet armor quality varied greatly. some would be of dramatically lesser quality than German armor, some better than German. i think CMBB makes all Soviet armor quality considerably lower than German. the StuG front overmodelling / Soviet 76mm undermodelling is definately there. the 85mm undermodelling is real as well. Jason doesn't mention it, but in my experience Soviet 122mm is undermodelled as well. some Soviet ballistic caps are not the hard nose types which have improved effect against face hardened plates -- those ballistic caps are there only for aerodynamical effects. so one must be careful which are "real" BCs and which not. i also believe that overmatching is overmodelled.

sorry, don't know about locations for other graphs. you understood that the main algorithms are based on the British paper, right? otherwise: overmatch factor = thickness of armor / diameter of shell. overmatching occurs if the factor is less than 1. then, the effective thickness of armor is: (armor thickness)(1+(slope multiplier-1)(overmatch factor)) slope multiplier varies per type of ammo and armor, but one standard is: angle multiplier 10 1.01 15 1.03 20 1.07 25 1.15 30 1.25 35 1.37 40 1.52 45 1.69 50 1.89 55 2.13 60 2.5 an example: 75mm against 45mm@60 overmatch = 45 / 75 = 0.6 = overmatch! due to overmatch the effective resistance of armor is reduced to (45mm)(1+(2.5-1)(0.6)) = 85.5mm

see this thread: http://www.battlefront.com/community/archive/index.php/t-24792.html

Mike, you may find the following explanation by Charles about CM's armor penetration calculations interesting: here is one such picture: look familiar? i don't know what the referred paper is, so i can't direct you to it. perhaps someone else knows it.

yeah, Global Conquest has been begging a good remake for years. i am pretty optimistic about this game.

yeah the other branch is pretty complex, though i have played it only twice (back in late 1980ies / early 1990ies). i guess Empires of Steel leans a bit towards the complex branch, though free movement is closer to games like Command HQ. can't wait to get the demo of EoS into my hands. this game may well turn out to be a real time stealer.

there exists two different branches of Empire. one is the more well known, with the most recent (?) incarnation being Empire Deluxe. this game was popular among casual gamers. it was very simplistic. no economics or diplomacy, and limited multiplayer functions. the other branch was more commonly used in modem BBS -systems. it was much more detailed, with stuff like economics and diplomacy. it was also "massively multiplayer" by the standards of the day. then there were various other games of the same genre, some of which were superior to the original Empire games. e.g. Global Conquest and Command HQ (a tid bit: created by an ex-man who later bitterly regretted the sex change surgery). EDIT: links to the two branches: Walter Bright's Classic Empire Wolfpack Empire

heh yes. not very likely that map isn't in scale, it's just to give an idea. yes it was calculated it would take one or two 20kt strikes to take an infantry battalion ouf of the game, though because of issues related to the employment of nukes (e.g. takes time to fire, limited accuracy) the number of actual strikes would likely be higher. these types of massive strike plans belong to the early era. already back in those days military found in their trials (exercises like Sagebrush and Carte Blanche) that purely tactical battlefield use of nukes was not really all that feasible. even with very limited conflict areas, in just a couple of days, you would end up calling hundreds of strikes with the total yield calculated in megatons. the effects of such "tactical" fires would equal strategic nuclear warfare. this lead to higher sensitivity towards nuclear escalation and the likelihood of all sorts of gentlemen's deals with restricted nuke usage.

later Cold War era sample nuke allocation for a corps:

yeah serious kilotonnage was predicted during the early era. here's one way they would have used 600 kilotons on a divisional sector:

effective air-to-ground missions require planning and intel. scattering and alternate prepared positions makes it hard for the enemy to aquire good targets (both as a force and as validity of info) and thus hard to plan missions. the usage of battlefield nuclear weapons is a topic of its own and i'd rather not get dragged into a discussion about it. if you are interested in the subject i suggest you do some googling, as there are quite a number of papers about the subject around the net. NATO force (depeding a bit on the era) would use battlefield nuclear weapons when available conventional weapons aren't good for the task. targets would be stuff like an enemy armored spearhead that has smashed your forces, an enemy reserve group or a specific high value target (like a located HQ or nuclear weaponry). the yield of the nukes could be anything from sub-kiloton to 100+ kilotons. typically they would be used in groups ("pulse"). theoretically a divisional sector could have hundres of kilotons of goods, depending on era and situation. individual targets could be battalions and regiments in size (each receiving one or two overlapping strikes). it all depends. anyway, the idea is not to use nukes on potential company strongpoints at enemy security zone but against high value targets.

scatter the units. have alternate prepared positions. offer dummy targets. etc stuff that aims to conceal your force and guide the enemy fires anyway.

an Osprey booklet i have about flammpanzers gives the idea that the halftrack was more liked than the panzers. perhaps the grenadiers were just more familiar with close range actions or perhaps the extra mobility was a crucial component. IIRC commanders used the flame halftracks most of all for a shock effect at night and liked to have a siren installed on the halftrack for extra effect.

which relate to dealing with early Soviet tanks with obvious design faults. there are no Finnish "fish stories" what comes to later Soviet tanks which required real AT weapons. late war fish stories go more like "the defenders run out of Panzerschreck ammunition and thus were forced to just watch as the platoon of IS-2s stood at the battalion command post. as night fell the IS-2s withdrew."