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Hi Folke, A small error for the Valentine III & V on the database, because they have 3 man turrets and not 2 man. I'm on a mission to comment the British infantry tanks at the moment (mainly because my usual TCP opponent is away...) so I'll keep waffling and uploading until it's done. Many thanks again for your work and quick action on this site [Edit] Whoops. There's a small problem with the Valentine VIII and Valentine IX as well. There should be no HE ammo and no co-ax MG either. [ October 10, 2004, 11:56 AM: Message edited by: Pheasant Plucker ]

I can't recall where I read it, but ISTR that when the suggestion was made to use the heavy AA guns in an AT role in the desert, the higher echelons turned it down. One reason given was that trials had shown that a large sand plume was thrown in the air when the gun was fired at ground targets, thus making it easy to spot it's postition. I'm not sure what the PBI thought of that as an excuse (not much probably!), but the suggestion was definitely made and definitely declined by 'those who know better' at the rear.

Folke, I just commented the Valentine X on your site and noticed that the gun stats are wrong. The gun has the correct HE stats but everything else needs ditching altogether. It is a 57mm/L50 and has the following ratings for penetration at 100m/500m/1000m/2000m: AP (APCBC shot) 823 m/sec. 0 Degrees 131/117/101/80 30 Degrees 100/90/78/63 60 Degrees 46/43/38/31 Tungsten (APCR shot) 1076 m/sec. 0 Degrees 187/153/118/71 30 Degrees 131/110/85/51 60 Degrees 46/37/31/21 Cheers.

Does anyone feel like commenting the American units? I play them only rarely and was looking forward to see what their strengths and weaknesses are from those who are more experienced.

Nope. Stick with the hyper-cheap 75mm stubbies. Trust me, they'll pay you back many times over in a QB. Their HC rounds can deal with most tanks and they obviously can deal with soft targets. All for 30-40 points IIRC. Much better than the big stuff.

Cheers folke, and the voting seems to be going my way as well . Can I ask another question. I would like to upload some Brit CMAK images to the database for the units. How do I do this? I notice Wicky has already started, but I think I have taken my extra stupid pills today and I can't see how it's done, or indeed if you really need it.

Sorry Martyr, you have the wrong geezer. My terrain mods are limited to an attempt to speed up framerates with 8 bit variations, and a set of low horizon mods for the desert.

I haven't thought of that scenario. Maybe if we moved the rating script to the comment form, so that the only way to rate the units would be if a comment was written the same time? What do you think about that idea? Well isn't that the ultimate fighting machine still in the twentyfirst century </font>

Just spent an enjoyable half hour on folke's site waffling on about various Brit pieces. Mike Dorosh and Dandelion have put some real historical information up there, together with some useful CMAK tips. My limited grogdom has confined my comments to the latter category. One comment I would like to address to folke - would it not be better to restrict the 'star' award facility to those people who have made comments about why they think the unit is useful or not in CMAK? I ask because the big 'glamour' units are already appearing with top ratings (Firefly, Tiger, 17pdr AT, 88 Flak etc.) but with no explanation. I think some of these units underperform in CMAK, and that they are probably just getting top votes from people because they are 'cool'. If you are going to persist with the 'star' rating - which I quite like - then it should be only available to those people who are prepared to say why it is good (or awful) in CMAK. Otherwise we'll get Jadgpanther fanboyz making people think that in a typical CMAK battle a Jadgpanther is a really very good idea. I would also love to hear the reasoning from whichever joker gave a Marmon-Herrington the top star rating :eek:

Folke, rather than clutter your message board, I just wanted to add my appreciation here for your fast attention to the 'latest post' facility which you have just placed on your site. Everyone else, please get on over to this promising site. We've all got tons of CMAK experiences we can share.

This might sound a bit daft, but can anyone please advise if the CMBB part of the triple CD game has the same very large install file (@600MB) as the single version. I'll get it if it hasn't because I miss the Eastern Front. (Yes I did try all Matt's solutions ). I suspect that the CMBB disk will be a straight copy of the old CMBB disk, but you never know.

(Serious) Placeholder graphics for units. It jarrs me to see something on the field which looks almost nothing like what it is supposed to look like, and knocks immersion out of the game. Fewer units done correctly please. Curved armour. Never has worked properly, is always paper thin, go back to CMBO armour if necessary. Too cheap and way over effective 20mm guns and ATRs. Mythical patches. All just MHO of course. (/End Serious) Free San Miguel Cuerveza tokens in the game box would compensate for any perceived shortcomings however.

If you suspect that the flyboys will be making an appearance, put your tanks into scattered trees at the scenario start and leave them on 'Hide' for as long as possible. You will avoid detection while hiding in scattered trees, and also quite possibly persuade the flyboy to look for a target on the other side of the map, much to your opponents dismay.

Ian Hogg in Tank Killers on page 260 has the following to say on rifle grenades: "With the arrival of the shaped charge a number of rifle grenades appeared in the course of the Second World War. The British No.68 was the first, but there were many others in German and US service. There are very few records of these devices being used in action, and even then they appear to have been principally used to blow holes in pillboxes and buildings." So it seems to me that AT rifle grenades weren't used much, and also that the Brits (and presumably by extension the Commonwealth) should also have them if they are to be included at all. Grogs?

Blimey, Tom is 25 feet tall! Looks great

Thinking about the points, those forces mentioned don't seem like they would cost 3,000 for a defender or 4,500 for an attacker. Do you mean battalions instead of companies?

FWIW I'd say you were too tank heavy, and too much off map arty. I would have taken a lot more direct support. As already mentioned Brit 3" mortars are very useful. If attacking, low price guns firing direct at the first reasonable thing spotted can force a defender to use his limited artillery, or reveal some major asset which would otherwise cause a lot of problems. If no clear sight is available at the start, tow them into the reverse of woods, and push them if you have to. If they are commanded by someone with a double morale bonus, they will take an awful lot of killing. I've had opponents empty on-map mortars without result trying to remove them, and it kinda reverses the whole attack/defense situation. Snipers and vickers HMGs with good fields of view are worth the money. Have a few independent Bren teams for scouting - cheap and can fight back if needed. Looking at the other side they are very gun heavy, and waste any AT capable purchases you make by not having any AFVs. However, a support heavy infantry attack should do well against them. If the opponent has a lot of tanks, with good visibility (check your air availability) and the terrain is open, then attacking him with only limited tanks and off map arty is a problem, but hopefully you will have some idea if this is likely to be the situation. Support and infantry is less of a gamble than tanks. I'd stick to the low ground, avoid anywhere that looks like a good 'reverse slope' location for the defender, and go with sucessive waves against the same point rather than in multiple places. Don't mass together, and don't split up attacking his line in several areas, rather attack in waves against the same point. First attack could be by part of a platoon with split squads, and then up the tempo from there with your direct support stuff overlooking the breakthrough area, throwing in new platoons every three or four turns or so. It isn't foolproof, but it leaves much less to chance and forces a defender to react to you. Tank heavy attacks are a pure gamble, and off map arty isn't as useful as it used to be in the old CMBO days. So max out your direct support and then put it into infantry, and perhaps save enough for a couple of tanks to be sent in near the end game, not before. Get used to attacking without off map arty, it's never worth the points if there is even modest cover available for you to attack through, and most opponents are expecting you to use it and deploy accordingly anyway. I bet there are other ways to skin that particular cat, but I hope that some of my ravings have been useful, FWIW they have done me very well [ June 27, 2004, 08:52 PM: Message edited by: Pheasant Plucker ]

D'oh! Thanks Wicky. Unfortunately I bought a CD cleaner and had a frustrating hour tonite trying out all three of Matt's suggestions. None of them worked. Tommorrow nite I will take the CD drive out of my other PC and give that a go, but I 'aint holding my breath as it didn't like either of the two drives already in this machine. Whatta b*gger

Having just upgraded my system I'm reinstalling my old software and although everthing else is fine, CMBB gets to the same place every time and stops. When extracting Wav\00091201.wav it hangs and gives the following message: Read error Data error (cyclic redundancy check). I guess the CD is damaged, but FWIW it doesn't look too bad to me. If anyone can come up with a workaround or suggestions I'd be grateful, I need to get back to the steppes! Thanks in advance.

I know I know, I shouldn't but... Any developments since Moon's comments a month ago? Sorry

In the area I stayed (SW of Bayeux) it was predominantly pasture for cattle. Dairy farming is the major type of farming in Normandy, IIRC dead cattle were a common sight in 1944. The modern fields seemed to be much bigger than the '44 fields though, but there is plenty of bocage left to see.

Yup, no doubt about it, the Peng challenge would be ideal for you and for all your PBem needs. Head for the Peng thread on this forum. Why not copy/paste your introduction in there as a start. If you enjoy an exchange of views with reasonable and open people, swing by the General Forum, and go into any thread with 'Bush' in the title. Welcome, you're going to fit right in!

Aaaaah - so this is why BFC have Australian Matilda's and Australian infantry winning at Beda Fomm. A cunning marketing trick indeed! If the Irish storm Omaha beach in the next game I'll know who their next DoD market is. (I should really have let this go by now shouldn't I )

Well for us Ken, in ME's in addition to the towed gun house rule, we also ban artillery On map stuff is fine, but no off map bombardments. Just our preference, not a right or wrong way of doing it. We rationalise that the situation is fluid and it is not immediately available, plus we generally think that pasting someone with a big artillery stonk is a cheesey way to try to win a game anyway. I guess we are on the 'suprise encounter' side of your argument, forces exploiting into new territory bumping into fresh units on the way up perhaps. However I'm sure there are many other explanations available for however people choose to play. We have no 'house rules' for any other kind of scenario, anything goes. But we do ban 'uber' tanks at times, specifically Matildas in'41 or before, and Tigers mid '44 or before. Not that they didn't fight of course, just for us that we've realised there isn't as much fun in winning or losing with them involved. Because we force the Commonwealth player to use cruiser tanks in the early war, we ban those ludicrously cheap Italian 20mm guns and ATRs, which for 15 points can knock out a full size cruiser frontally, and at long range, in CMAK. So two rules for ME's, and three based on time periods played. All arrived at after hours of fun TCP experience purely to give us a better game.

Hehe, I love bringing small-to-medium towed guns into an ME. Pushing them through woods isn't usually a problem, and they often cause all kind of problems out of proportion to what a jeep/carrier and the gun combined cost. Like others say though, they have to be towed at the start, it's only fair.