Vossiewulf

Sigh, yes, you're right, 4 man crew. As vacant as my mind was, the point stands...add another guy and you still have too few to operate a tank of that era effectively With a IV down to four crew, you still have enough guys to cover TC/driver/gunner/loader, no huge performance impact. Remind me in the future that if I want to state a number, to add one to whatever I'm thinking of first.

The most obvious difference would be what happens when the crew takes a single casualty. With a 5-man Pz-IV crew, the only thing you would lose is that someone would no longer be monitoring the radio full time. In a T-34, you now have just two guys trying to drive, spot, aim, load, and fire. As it is, take a single casualty and a T-34 behaves pretty much identically to a buttoned T-34- all you lose is some spotting ability because it won't unbutton anymore. At least I've never noticed the huge drop in efficiency that should accompany having just a two-man crew trying to operate a medium tank in combat.

It's the fact that that advantages of a five-man crew aren't fully represented in the game that short-changes the IV. Warspite, T-34s have a major weakness themselves- force them to button and their already poor spotting becomes abysmal. Sometimes I think a German tank has to drive back and forth for several minutes with sparklers attached to the turret roof before a T-34 will spot it.

From what I've read (correct me if I'm wrong Eichenbaum), it sounds like the unhandled exceptions are caused by CM not finding BMPs it requires- probably interface BMPs if I had to make a guess. So if one simply backs up their BMP directory before playing OSF, they can always copy it back if things fail, and they should be off and running with CMBB again.

Um, yeah, XI_Legion, lighten up. The guy asked a reasonable question, no need for that tone. Warspite, I understand what you're saying- yes, Pz-IVs in CMBB can die with frightening rapidity in late war scenarios, and if you're up against enemy armor and you DO have a choice (which the Germans in the war didn't), I would agree with you and take 4 Tigers over 8 Pz-IVs. In early/mid war engagements if you have a mix of Pz-IIIs and Pz-IVs, it's useful to lead (if on the advance) with the Pz-IIIs for the reasons you've stated- they can take turret hits that the IV can't. And if you let the Pz-IIIs be the targets, while your L43 IVs are the real shooters, things can work well. If you're up against significant infantry, however, I'd lean to the IV over the III. The III's 50mm gun isn't terribly effective against infantry, especially if you want to take buildings down. And even though the III can be as effective or more getting penetrating hits (especially compared to 75/L24 IVs) because of the higher ROF and accuracy, don't forget that Russian tanks will all too frequently shrug off a 50mm penetration with no damage. Basically I treat L24 IVs as turreted assault guns, primarily for infantry support. Mid war, with late model IIIs and L43 IVs, it's a tossup. The IV has a much better gun but dies more easily. Late war, again yes, the IV has to be used quite carefully against 85s to be successful. At least that's been my experience.

I call them Russian Tank Warming Teams. What's even worse is Russian Pioneers, that have satchel charges, and yet insist on tossing Molotovs to ensure that the German tank crews stay warm and toasty.

Interesting...you're right Flamingknives, they are both 82mm Mortar Spotter (Radio), but one is labeled speed class Medium, the other is Slow. The Slow one won't embark.

Good thought Spotless, but he's radio. I just checked again to be sure. He's identical to the other 82mm observer in the scenario, that embarks without complaint.

I've seen this bug, it seems to particularly hit Russian 82mm observer teams. I have two in a scenario I'm working on, and one of them will not embark on anything- tank, halftrack, empty truck, I could probably drag in the Queen Mary and he'd say "sorry, too small." If I had to guess, it would be that occasionally when a unit is instantiated, the team member number paramter is set to something whacked. No idea why it seems to hit Russian 82mm in particular.

MikeyD, wrt to shattering rounds, that's Jason's point- he's asserthing that they're using data on a non-capped round for a time period when the Russians were using capped rounds. The entire purpose of a cap (not a ballistic cap) is to prevent the penetrator from shattering.

And if that means asking here was a faux pas, apologies all around. One would think it would be easy to find a playtester for what is clearly, in my scrupulously objective view, the coolest CMBB battle ever;)

Have tried, with little success;) That's why I decided to ask here.

I've playtested it once against the AI (AI being Russian defender, which it does well enough for testing), and it worked nicely. I've made a couple minor tweaks and I think it's fit for initial consumption. It's German SS infantry vs. Guards Mechanized, fictional, 6/44, about 5000pts, 28 turns variable. It's infantry-heavy, and most of the armor is light. Lots of attention has been paid to the map to make it both vehicle and infantry-friendly, and to provide as many tactical options as possible. Thanks in advance to any brave sould willing to take a run at it;)