jacobs_ladder2

Hey guys, just looking for some good suggestions. I have finally decided to spend the money and put together my own resource material (so as to avoid numerous trips to the distant library). What I would like to have would be some detailed info on the German Army in the East during the initial period of the Russo-German War. My main interest is the Battle of Smolensk, but I suppose will have to have a look at the Border Battles on the Bialystok-Minsk axis as well. I have all of Glantz's work on the subject, but lack a detailed examination of the German forces and how they were employed (i.e. these mysterious Kampfgruppen). Cheers Paul

You rang? We (Canadians) put them on crooked - not necessarily point down. Just crooked, so we didn't look like 'Mericans. </font>

Are we talking about the joker that came up with G.I Combat? I might be mistaken but I thik it was one of the same guys who designed Close Combat. G.I. Combat was the biggest pile of poop since that meteor hit the earth 65,000,000 years ago. Cheers Paul

What's the story behind this one?

Matrix Games has some interesting stuff. One called "Combined Arms" or some such will be a game similar in scale and shape to Panzer Campaigns but will have a much more advanced engine. Check out the website. Hex-based but with simultaneous turn resolution, multiple campaigns and theatres and a few major battles to be in the release version. Apart from that you have Panzer Campaigns which varies from excellent to questionable depending on the age of the release (although I do agree with many of the criticisms of this system). Apparently Tiller and Scott Hamilton are working on a WWII version of the Point of Attack II engine, but who knows when we will see that. But, I agree. There is a gap that needs to be filled by a more advanced operational level game (TOAW is aging quickly) based on an honest attempt to portray WWII as it more or less was. Cheers Paul

Just out of curiousity, how much better were the air cooled MGs? Cheers Paul

Yes, that'll do nicely. Thanks a bunch. I see now where I went wrong. I neglected to factor a bugler into my calculations. I shall have to learn from this lesson and include a set of bagpipes when I get to the Scottish regiments later on. Cheers Paul

JonS, I have Balkoski's book on the way (the miracle of ebay). By the way, I have been trying to account for the 166 men normally accredited to a 1944 heavy weapons company and have come up short every time. Everyone seems to agree on the weapons loadout (6 81mm mortars and 8 MGs), but what was everyone else doing? Counting officers, spotters and other assorted personnel I can't even come close to 166. Any ideas? Cheers Paul p.s. No more pesky questions for at least 24 hours. I promise.

Well, that solves that one nicely. Thanks a lot for the info JonS & Roach. I came across a paragraph or two in my research that described the engineers being prevented from doing their jobs by the passing infantry (implying they were already there), but I wanted to be sure. Cheers Paul

Hmmm, well that leads me to ask another question. If there were six boats to a company (as the author states) with an average of 32 men per boat then isn't the 116th drastically understrength? According to my math, you divide the infantry from the engineers and you get roughly 1/3 engineers and 2/3 infantry (which sounds about right to me, tactically). Let's say about 60 engineers and 120 infantry per company allotment of six boats. In the case of the engineers this number sounds accurate but an infantry company has quite a few more men. Could all of the missing men be accounted for by the "headquarters section due to arrive later" mentioned in the passage? Cheers Paul

(Sorry, this is a bit off topic in this forum.) Just a question for any Normandy buffs out there. This is an excerpt from the Omaha Beachhead book printed by the War Department way back in the 40s and 50s. Excellent source for information by the way. "The Army-Navy Special Engineer Task Force had one of the most important and difficult missions of the landing. Their chances of clearing gaps through the obstacles in the half-hour allotted were lessened by accidents on the approach to the beach. Delays in loading from LCT's to LCM's and in finding their way to the beaches resulted in half of the 16 assault teams reaching shore 10 minutes or more late." This is the force that interests me. Here is my problem though. "The infantry companies in the first wave came in by boat sections, six to a company, with a headquarters section due in the next wave (0700). Each LCVP carried an average of 31 men and an officer. The 116th assault craft were loaded so that the first to land would be a section leader and 5 riflemen armed with M-1's and carrying 96 rounds of ammunition. Following was a wire-cutting team of 4 men, armed with rifles; 2 carried large "search-nose" cutters, and 2 a smaller type. Behind these in the craft, loaded so as to land in proper order were: 2 BAR teams of 2 men each, carrying 900 rounds per gun; 2 bazooka teams, totaling 4 men, the assistants armed with carbines; a mortar team of 4 men, with a 60-mm mortar and 15 to 20 rounds; a flame-thrower crew of 2 men; and, finally, 5 demolition men with pole and pack charges of TNT." So, did the engineers of the 121st Engineer Combat Battalion and the infantry of the 116th come in in the same boats or were they separate? My problem is that I cannot account for a large part of the engineers supposed to have participated in the initial assault wave. Any ideas? Cheers Paul

Just a question for any Normandy buffs out there. This is an excerpt from the Omaha Beachhead book printed by the War Department way back in the 40s and 50s. Excellent source for information by the way. "The Army-Navy Special Engineer Task Force had one of the most important and difficult missions of the landing. Their chances of clearing gaps through the obstacles in the half-hour allotted were lessened by accidents on the approach to the beach. Delays in loading from LCT's to LCM's and in finding their way to the beaches resulted in half of the 16 assault teams reaching shore 10 minutes or more late." This is the force that interests me. Here is my problem though. "The infantry companies in the first wave came in by boat sections, six to a company, with a headquarters section due in the next wave (0700). Each LCVP carried an average of 31 men and an officer. The 116th assault craft were loaded so that the first to land would be a section leader and 5 riflemen armed with M-1's and carrying 96 rounds of ammunition. Following was a wire-cutting team of 4 men, armed with rifles; 2 carried large "search-nose" cutters, and 2 a smaller type. Behind these in the craft, loaded so as to land in proper order were: 2 BAR teams of 2 men each, carrying 900 rounds per gun; 2 bazooka teams, totaling 4 men, the assistants armed with carbines; a mortar team of 4 men, with a 60-mm mortar and 15 to 20 rounds; a flame-thrower crew of 2 men; and, finally, 5 demolition men with pole and pack charges of TNT." So, did the engineers of the 121st Engineer Combat Battalion and the infantry of the 116th come in in the same boats or were they separate? My problem is that I cannot account for a large part of the engineers supposed to have participated in the initial assault wave. Any ideas? Cheers Paul

How did the yanks deal with them in the Ardennes? I remember seeing quite a few KTs (relative to their numbers) among the AFV losses even from the first days of the battle. Either the KT was vulnerable or those grunts were fast learners. No comment concerning the squirrels. Cheers Paul

Thanks John for the info. That and the website from bone_vulture are two things I can really use. Oh, and thanks for putting the reference to your source in to the post as well, John. Very much appreciated. Cheers

Good game, but frustrating to play. It looks to me like they're trying to develop a new system and are hitting problems with it. Like, for one, where is the enemy? It's too vague to just throw a generic marker down and say, "the enemy is here somewhere." It seems to me that they took away some of the bad points of other games (excessive control options, overflow of information, useless detail, etc.) but didn't balance it out with many other things that were also "realistic". Like air support (be it recon, CAS, carpet bombing or whatever) and detailed orders. In other words, they increased the fog of war to simulate the problems a commander might face and simultaneously forgot a lot of the tools that a real life commander had. In short, they did half a job. But of course, they're still working on that one so who knows where they'll take it in the future. By the way, I think it would be great to put railguns/large calibre guns into a game. The Germans used them extensively and to great effect in the Crimea during the siege of Sebastopol. True they weren't all over Eastern Europe, but I think railguns are one of those things that are just kind of cool to have in a game. As long as you remember that they required hundreds of men to fire, a couple of days to set up and fired 9 tonne shells.

For example, and this is way off topic so I won't elaborate, but when I see pictures from WWII I notice you always see infantry working alongside armour. In most of the books I've read it looks like it was fairly common practice to have a platoon circle a tank and protect it or use it for cover or whatever. Yet this is not an option in CM. Why? [ April 02, 2004, 07:42 AM: Message edited by: jacobs_ladder2 ]

That's just the point. Depending on how you implement it, almost anything could be good for CM (or for any other title). FOs in half tracks? What the hell. Chuck em into the mix and see how they do. Off map artillery spotting? Fine. In the end you can balance it with something else if that's what worries you.

I believe the Germans used tracked FOs, but I could be wrong. I know they used converted SPWs for their forward air observers in Poland and France (not sure about later). I'm not sure about this whole "sitting duck" argument. Seems to me that an FO could operate fairly efficiently from a half track depending on how close he got to the action and what kind of AT weapons the enemy had. I think it's important to remember that CM gives the impression that there were herds of tanks and AT guns all over Europe while in reality infantry was far more prevalent. Also, an FO does not necessarily have to be as "forward" as he does in the game. With a decent pair of binoculars and a vantage point he could do his job from a relatively safe distance (perhaps not even appearing on the map at all). Another point that might be covered would be the role of artillery spotting from the air. This is something that would be applicable to a CM scale battle. During operations in Normandy (Cobra and after)the Americans used converted Shermans to carry around spotters for the fighter-bombers and the concept existed as early as 1942. In Italy, I know a lot of observers drove around in lightly-armoured vehicles or even in jeeps. According to what I have read, it was a very effective means of moving from one vantage point to another. Of course, Italy's terrain is suited to that kind of thing. Cheers

Logistics and command appear to be what most people are saying. Actually I expected more complaints about the lack of reconaissance, but the point is well taken. Command and logistics are usually left to simplified methods or the AI. I would like to see more penalties for not maintaining a tight command structure. It all works together. The better the system for logistics and command, the more realistic the effects of disrupting them. Mixed with a realistic air system (or some partisan units) this could pay big dividends in a game. Any thoughts on how Fog of War could be handled?

My thoughts exactly. Cheers

CM is excellent for the scale it covers. It's a good tool for understanding small unit tactics. I have most of the stuff Matrix Games has put out and am a regular at their forums. Thanks for the suggestion.

I am designing a hex-based game and want to know if anybody has any suggestions. What do you think is always missing from WWII games? Is there some feature that you think designers always overlook? If you could design a game what would you want to include? This game is a personal project of mine that will probably result in no money, but will bring me a lot of satisfaction. Realism is my goal. The first step will be to build a hex-based environment that will change according to weather conditions. Here, I am referring to snow accumulation, varying degrees of mud, varying rainfall, visibility, wind speed, blizzards, rivers that get deeper and wider or vice versa, ground and air temperature, terrain, tree density, etc. Math, my friends, will allow me to do all of this and more. Anyways, if you have any suggestions, let me know. So far I've run into a few areas that will require some pretty serious research. Supply, command structures, air recon, intelligence and rail transport are a few of the things that I am all but ignorant of. Any help would be appreciated. Also, if you know of any websites or sources of info that I could use, they would also be appreciated. I'm thinking about doing mostly East Front battles from 41 to get started. Cheers p.s. Hex based with 500m or 1km hexes, regiment or company sized units (in case you're wondering).