dugfromthearth

correct Michael. Outflanking is useful if it serves the function of concentratig your firepower. That is a very small outflank though. Sort of a micro-tactic. As opposed to trying to do a napoleonic outflank.

in random battles against the germans with the AI choosing their forces I run into tigers with alarming frequency. and I would rather have more wasps then fewer.

"Err...how many squad types did the US Army actually have in 1944-45 NW Europe, incidentally? The Canadians and British had...err...exactly one type, the rifle section, with 1 Sten, 1 Bren and 8 Enfields. That is what came in CMBO." Really? Absolutely? Every infantry squad in those two years was equipped exactly like that, no exceptions? Rangers, recon, etc? It is possible I suppose but would be shocking to me to discover that there wasn't a squad somewhere that was different.

Assume you can choose either side, any time CMBO allows and any allowable combination of units. The restiction is you have 1,000 pts to spend and you know nothing about your mission, the terrain, etc. (Or supposed you have to use the same army list for a dozen random battles) My current army I am refining is: 2 challengers 2 wasps 2 armored cars 3 u.s. airborne platoons no artillery which is kind of a problem, so I am thinking about replacing the challengers with lighter armor that still has a 76mm gun. I will probably also pull the armored cars. all of there are currently regulars. I'm not sure if I want to make any veteran or not.

1) flanking with infantry isn't important as such. Concentration of infantry is important, whether that involves flanking or not. Given the slow movement rate and vulnerability of moving infantry, splitting infantry into center and flanks tends to create easily isolated units that get chopped up. 2) tanks are only really useful when they are forward and engaged. But then they are vulnerable. The goal for tanks is to spot theirs with yours hidden, pop-out and destroy their tanks, then use your tanks overtly to engage their infantry. Note that tank quality imbalance may render this unnecessary, but if players choose their own forces this imbalance is unlikely. 3) mortars should not be assigned to infantry platoons. They are support weapons whose major benefit is their long range, which is negated or turned into a liability if they try to advance with infantry. They are maneuver units, but they should be positioned to shoot at enemy moving to the point of contact, not enemy at the point of contact. 4) armored vehicles function as cavalry once the enemy tanks are eliminated. A scout car with a couple of machine guns can quickly move to wherever needed, making it far superior to infantry machine guns - if the enemy tanks are eliminated. Stuarts and other light tanks are fantastic against infantry. Wasps can move forward and instantly break infantry units with their flamethrower, making them ideal for "cleaning up" isolated enemy infantry units - if the enemy tanks are eliminated. 5) with combined arms your goal should not be to engage with your infantry. It should be to spot and fix the enemy. Then artillery should be brought down on their infantry and your armor should be used against their armor.

given that CMBO has one squad type for the U.S. army (not counting airborne) but 5 types of shermans, I think it is pretty clear that the devs are more interested in the vehicles then the infantry. And the Pacific war was almost entirely infantry. but with mods for uniforms, and the appropriate fanatic level you could make something like the Japanese.

were rolling barrages really used in company size fights in WWII? I think of rolling barrages in WWI. In CMBO I use artillery the modern way, which I thought was the WWII way as well. Move my infantry up. When I find enemy infantry dug in to a strong position, I call in artillery to pound them for a few turns until they run away or are too suppressed to fight back. Then I cancel the artillery and rush with my infantry. I never seem to have a problem with rounds landing on my troops, and they are usually under 200m away.

I am not a fan of balanced maps or scenarios as such. 1) it's not as if an army decided to attack figuring "its 50/50 I can take this town, so I might as well risk my army on it." and 2) an imbalance creates a dynamic so the battle should be dynamic. From a strictly gamey standpoint, just make maps that are mirror images.

The valley of Desciens first appears in history in Caesar's account of the Gallic Wars. Two maniples were dispatched under the command of the Legate Paesentius to deal with the druids who were organizing resistance around a temple at a sacred marsh. In the 2nd century AD the Governor Rufus Acrigola took an interest in the site and began major public works. The marsh was fed by a stream from the hills that was diverted into the many low places until it was only a trickle. Agricola had a quarry established in the hills and an aquaduct built to channel the stream to fill a small lake. The surrounding swamp he had drained and converted to farmland. A proper Roman town with paved roads was constructed around the lake, named Desciens after the waterfall at the end of the aquaduct. Agricola had a villa built on the low hill east of the town and had a Roman temple built on the site of the old Celtic temple. With the fall of Rome the woods grew back, the water seeped back into some of the old swamps, and Desciens was largely abandoned. There remains a small town, several farms, and a Catholic church built in the ruins of the Roman temple. The forest south of the town remains a barrier to armies and armor. The town and the surrounding hills and forest are the last redoubt before the open farmland to the southwest. If the town is taken and passed, then the forest will be cut-off and a major line of German resistance must be abandoned. Will the 3rd Reich live on in Desciens or will it be the graveyard of another fallen empire? http://www.the-proving-grounds.com/map_details.html?command=search&db=maps.db&eqskudatarq=27 Notes: Fictional map. 1600 x 1280. I am putting the finishing touches on a scenario set on the map for those who prefer scenarios. I just need to modify the British deployment.

are the mods just generally recommended? or should you actually pick and choose between them? are they just skins or other changes?

I am of the impression from my reading that the Soviets employed large armies of cossacks and others as shock armies that went ahead of the regular military forces and engaged in the toughest and bitterest fighting of the war. The soviets were quick to expend men instead of valuable materials such as tank. Of course they burned through a lot of tanks as well.

a more historic and possibly less frustrating approach would be to buy a ton of the cheapest conscripts possible and send them forward in a wave at the pillbox. they won't make it, but it will run out of ammunition. then you move your tanks forward.

I think... operations are done on one map. map contours can be set for 2.5m or 5m so you can double the height if you like. at 2.5m and 20 height levels you can do 50m of height variance. The "default" height is 7. You can make the map lower then that at its base (by manually setting all of the squares to height 1).

I would agree that asking people who played a single battle, seeing only their side, whether or not a scenario is balanced is going to get you meaningless data. How could they possibly know from that if a scenario was balanced?

thanks I also meant to ask for names/links to scenarios that have particularly good maps to check out.

I'm assuming CMAK will kill CMBO. New engine with American and British forces. It may not include Normany bocage but it should cover everything else you need for France.

I can't figure this out either.

I will try that. I too have been unable to get indirect fire out of my onboard mortars. The main problem I have with onboard mortars is that in places where they can directly see the enemy they tend to be at too close of range.

I am pretty sure off-board is better. On-board is just there for completeness an scenario design. You could have an entire armor force including its artillery engaged in a battle.

I have vineyards as rows of hedges. The scenario I am currently working on uses a tall land bridge to make an aquaduct, and stone walls and rubble to make ancient Roman ruins. I can make something like a waterfall just by using a big enough slope. but what are some other things you can do - in particular with farms? my friend suggested orchards by alternating rows of scattered trees with roads but it didn't look right to me. Although it might be because I didn't make a big enough orchard. also any little details - are stone walls used more for some types of fields or locations and hedges in others? Should farms have small ponds on them? Is there a good way of doing barns and pasteurs?

yeah, I know. I'm used to bigger paper and pencil wargames where a railroad is assumed to include a road running beside it. After I was done with the scenario my friend noticed no road into town. He hadn't noticed it until the end, so we decided it wasn't a huge problem. I should probably do something about it. I just like the map as it stands and don't want to have to move terrain around to allow for a road. It probably wouldn't be too bad. I should do it tonight.

uploaded it to the proving grounds. that's a nice site btw. http://www.the-proving-grounds.com/scenario_details.html?command=search&db=scenarios.db&eqskudatarq=137

any chance of Crete or is that too early? A hypothetical invasion of Malta would be cool.

sure (I'm knew too but know this much) Beyond Overlord (BO) came out first. It covers the western Allies vs Germany in 1944-45. then came Barbarossa and Beyond (BB) - the eastern front. BB has new orders for units, more unit types, and numerous tweaks and refinements including graphics. Which makes BB "better" but it does not include American and British forces. So there remains support for BO. Coming out next (it's in beta) is the Africa game. This includes North Africa and apparently Italy as well. It will have all of the upgrades BB has but will be Americans, British, and Germans (and presumably Italians). So one would expect that when Africa gets released it will kill off BO.

I hope two days of R&R was enough for your boys. You're not going up to the front, the front is coming to you. The airforce dropped the ball and once again it's the infantry's job to pick it up again. Let me give it to your straight. It's a nasty piece of work and you've got to know I wouldn't cut your rest short if it wasn't critical. There's a town called Pierric to the west of here. The town isn't important, it's so small there isn't a road in or out, but there's a railyard there. The airforce keeps shooting up the trains and the Germans take them to Pierric and put them back together again. The air corps tried bombing the railyard and they put that back together too. Then they took AAA fire and decided not to go back. So now we have to go in. And by "we" I mean you. The town's at a rail junction. We've already got a force headed there in half-tracks. Your boys will meet up with them at the junction and then you'll take command to take the town. I've managed to scrounge up a Sherman to go with you. But from the looks of the recon photos it'll do you about as much good as a condom at a church picnic. I'm mostly loaning it to you to make me feel a little less guilty about sticking you with this job. Something that should be more useful is the 81mm mortars I've assigned to provide you artillery support. They won't take out armor, but then only a jackass would send armor to a place like that. If you had the time I'd recommend just sitting back and letting the artillery wipe the town off the map. But the reason we're sending you in now is because there's word that trains are headed towards the place. You've seen the big map. If the Germans can move some armor across those rails they can launch an attack against our rear flank. Now if you take the town, the German armor would have to disembark somewhere in the hill country and we could be in Berlin before they could find their way out to our lines. You can look at the photos on your way. It's simple really. Railyard in the middle, your primary objective. Rail junction, of course. Then there's a big house on a hill overlooking the approach to the town and the usual picturesque church in the town for the Germans to dig in at and you to knock down. You may as well knock it down. Considering the assignments you've been drawing it's pretty obvious God already hates you. And if there's any Germans in it, send 'em to Hell. [i just finished writing this up, I have to add it to the scenario at home tonight and then I will post the scenario. I hope it sounds appealing.]