Askovdk

Beside all the other usefull comments check out MZO Central, CM, strategy (You might have to choose 'Show all' from the lower menu to see all the old post). I've learned a lot about planning from reading the detailed AARs posted here, - and I've even posted a couple myself.

Just a quick notice, that I've posted an AAR of a great PBEM game at MZO. Storm Tide at MZO If you are new to the game and/or don't know about MZO, then it's my favorite site for AARs. They can be found at the CM-Strategy and the CM-WarCollege forum at MZO Since few people are posting there these days you should select 'Topics: All' in the buttom menu so see all the old good illustrated AARs; - the Knifefight at Cecina should be known by all.

I got through it with the following: 1: Wait for _all_ your tanks before you make contact. 2: Move them into contact all at once, - those that feel threaten will reverse on their own. If possible, move so you won't get shot by _all_ the guns. 3: If a tank end its turn with LOS to a foxhole, then don't give it any motion, but area fire the foxhole. Move tanks that retreated up again if they have no LOS to foxholes. The idea is to use the large number of tanks to first suppress the guns, and then area fire them. I surely did lose 2/3 of my tanks using this 'tactic', but I did get through.

Inspired by this tread (and my defeat at MZOs WC5) I spend most of the Sunday having the AI assault positions defended by a single squad, and I found a nice combination with a MG bunker, a AT gun and a building. The idea is to place a (wooden) MG bunker behind a building (or wood or hill) so it can see the wire fortification, but where its firing slit only can be fired upon by AFVs in positions threaten by a AT-gun. A platoon hides in trenches behind the wire. The MG bunker will slowly break the approaching infantry with long range fire and hurt infantry making it to the wire. I hold the fire of the squads as long as possible, - in the beginning of the battle I even let enemies in behind the wire before I open up to allow the MG bunker soften the enemy as much as possible. An example from a random map: I would normally try to find a position further away for the AT gun, but placing it together with the bunker was a new thing to try. The wire fortification is filled with AP-mines. The result: I hadn’t noticed, that there was fog , so the AI sneaked a couple of Stuarts down far map side and got control of two flags, - still the casualties are in my favor. Both MG-bunkers was KOed by tanks in the fog, - but I hope you still get the idea of the setup. I moved some squads backward in the final turns in an attempt to hurl grenades at the Stuarts. Not bad for green gun, and it did survive the fight. I can recommend these short 500 pts defense battles: Totally random except, that the human side has ‘infantry only’ and may choose the troops, the AI is in assault. I normally buy: One good (= many SMGs and men in general) platoon. ~150 pts One good AT-gun. ~100 pts 2 AT rifles / zooks as scouts and to help the AT gun. ~50 pts One (or 2 if I’m fighting with low quality troops) MG-bunkers. ~50 ~10 wires and ~7 AP-mines to create the zone of death. ~100 pts ~3 trenches in case I don’t get any buildings and/or for the AT-gun. 30 pts. I'll soon try a defense like this aganist a human opponent, - I guess I should add a mortar to silence any supporting HMG.

Yes, and CMBO, and CMBB, and the CM-anthology as Back up, and an extra copy of CMAK to give away as a gift, and thereby corrupting the youth I'm supposed to teach. (I have used CM in my physics class when we talked about projectile motions.) You can mail it directly to me: as@struer-gym.dk

Dandelion wrote: I would love to see this setup. It would be of great educational value to study and experiment with a professional setup. Couldn't you upload it with a note saying 'unplayable, but thoughtfull' ? BTW I'm slowly but surely filling my hard disc with saves of treads from this forum, and they are only getting better and better, - thank you all.

An example of how it shouldn't be done can be seen in: Askovdk's AAR at MZO (But don't read it, if you plan to do a AAR yourself) However it also contains some good discussion along the same lines as here. Finally, - the other WC5 scenario 'Hunkertown' seems to be another defense against an huge enemy force, so I'll try to use some of all these good advices in the next game.

I'm happy, that you like it. At BoB DrVonCool comments I can only agree, and emphasise that those flags should be placed at interesting spots (hills, villages, ambush zones) to help the AI.

I have found a new nice way to generate quick battles, and since I haven't read about this method elsewhere I will post it here. The idea is to create a partly random battle. 1) Create a random map with the editor and change it to make it more interesting if you want. I'm thinking about creating large woods, lakes or a river with few crossings. 2) Create a more interesting setup zone for the defender, i.e. inside forests, along roads to give the defender some good ambush points. 3) Choose the month and year for the battle under preferences. 4) Buy key units for both sides. I would suggest buying the rare units, that you want to try to fight with/against, - consider buying additional troops for the attacking side. 5) Save the scenario with a name like 'Axis_attack_june_44_Stug_vs_KV2', so you can reuse the step 1-4 for another battle. 6) Start a new Quick battle, where the time matching the one in the made scenario, and let the computer buy units for both sides, - you may/shold adjust the force mix though. 7) Import the map with troops! You will now have a battle, where you know some of the enemy troops, but not all, and you have the planned units, but also some randomly choosen, that you will have to utilise as good as possible. Some ideas for quasi random battles could be: AT-defense: You buy tanks for the attacker and ATG for the defender, and let the computer randomly buy additional armor and infantry respectively. Cityfight: You buy SMG/pioneer squads for the attacker and HMGs for the defender. Mobility: On a huge map you buy lots of transportation for the attacker and draw many possible setup zones for the defender, so the attacker will have to localize the defender and move accordantly. This have given a nice new life to QBs for me. When buying troops in the editor you have options to bias the battle strongly to either side, or buy more transportation/mines/LMGs/whatever for one side without giving the other side units, if these special extra units are not supposed to change the balance. I got this idea from RobOs campaign (great work, thank you Robert) and this is how I use it for QBs. And yes, 'why play QBs with so many excellent scenarios around?'. Well, personally I don't want to 'waste' a good scenario if I'm not sure, that I'll have the time/concentration to finish it, and these quasi random battles are also a nice way to test new strategies with the key units, but with the realistic challenge of improvisation when a unplanned Tiger shows up.

Protect and use your mortar halftracks. Place a stealthy HQ on the ridge looking for MortarHT behind the ridge, and you should be able to take out most of the guns as they reveal themselve. I had a great time with this battle, but using this tactic took so long, that I didn't reach the center of the village in time. I guess, that the key to this battle is not brute force, but stealth and proper response, - difficult and different from many other attacks.

Would it be possible to use the English wav-files? It might not be a perfect translation, but I would guess, that an English sound file can be found to carry the same meaning as the original. Couldn't this English wav-file then be copied to the corresponding non-English file name? I can't be so hard to find CM players of different nationalities, that can go through different parts of the wav-folder and post lists here at the forum like: 00061801 -> 00024023 00061802 -> 00024189 ... ... Collecting these posts in a Mod might not be the most interesting job, but it seems possible. - If the lists are written with a predefined syntax it might be computerized. The same kind of lists could be made to the other languages as well. However, - do we want this? In highly competitative PBEM-games this Mod could be used by one side without the other knowing, and thereby give the 'cheater' little advantage. :confused:

I like your idea. Especially if it means, that you don't have to micromanage the squards. I have had the same kind of thoughts about letting the player gain acces to the 'OpsAI'. (From the manual) In the first turns of a battle I often end giving many units 'move to contact' to somewhere deep into enemy lines, because it's such a slow start to give all units clever orders the first turn. Using your HQ-command I could order a company to 'move to this general area, the way you find best', and let the OpsAI calculate (and perhaps show me (and perhaps letting me modify)) the paths it suggest. What I'm saying is, that as I read the manual, then the HQ-command is what the computer uses, so it might be very easy to add (perhaps as an option). However, the AI is not perfect, and I would hate to have my men slaughtered because it stacks them in the same square of wood, so with the current AI most humans would become frustrated. Another way of using HQ-command and a good AI would be to let the player just have command of one company. I.e. the StratAI give you some general orders and timelines, and you should then have to carry out the orders as well as possible. This would properly be a great way to learn the game and use of combined arms, but requires an almost perfect AI. The current CMs are great games, but as a human vs. computer player I would like to have the option to play the battles in different ways, - at least if these options don't interfere with the well developed core.

I would like to add to the endless, but relevant, discussion about changes and improvements. I love the fact that you are not forced to follow a campaign, but can choose any battle, but I would like to have the option to have a campaign (like RobO's excellent Quick Campaign generator) inside the game. I also love how carefully many scenarios have been made. So how do we get hand crafted quality into a campaign? (A rhetorical question) I’m sure, that the already great random battle wizard will be even better, but my idea is to use the stand alone battles in the campaign. The user can as today download scenarios, and CM would then scan these scenarios for key information. After the start date and core force for a campaign has been selected the player will press the ‘scan for available scenarios’ button, and would be met by a list like: .................................. Point value...Force mix....Date.....Region East of Bryansk...............Excellent......Fair.......Terrible....Excellent Eberswalde Last Stand.........Good....Excellent.....Good.......Bad Emplacement Assault..........Good.......Bad.........Fair.........Bad End Game for Endemann....Fair........Terrible.....Excellent......Bad Enter the Siberians.............Bad......Excellent........Bad........Good Eyes and Ears................Terrible.......Fair..........Bad..........Good (the names were taken at random from ‘E’ at the scenario depot, and their marks are written at random, - and yes, I don't know how to make tabs in UBB Code) I.e. The user will see a list (that can be sorted) of the scenarios on the hard disk, and how well they fit with the current core force, the settings for the last battle. This should require very little coding and could be just one more optional way of playing the game. There is a lot of other nuts and bolts in the perfect CM campaign, but this idea would make it possible to add the hand crafted campaigns. The worst problem might actually be the rightly earned pride of scenario authors, - I for one wouldn’t like to spend days play testing the perfect force mix for an interesting battle, and then hear complains about how terrible it was, when a Stug company without support was imported from the campaign. Comments are welcome as long as you understand, that this is just ment to be one way of playing CM, - not the only one neither the best.

If you download the demo for 'TacOps v4' here at Battlefront you will in the 'Guide-user' at page 176ff find some very nice (and modern) tables of organization. They helped me understand a lot about the structures and support companies. TacOps is in itself a quite interesting game.

0 Except when creating 'artistic' screenshots, or following tanks in replay. Using 'view locked to unit' on level 1, you don't zoom upon the tank, but on what the tank is aiming at. - Nothing so sweet as the view of the rear end of a AP round going for the almost, but not entirely, hidden T34.

My first try with 'When Worlds Collide' was a disaster, but the map and force mix was so nice, that I had to try it again. The way I solved it was to have most tanks without tungsten sneak up in the hills to the north of the farm. It can be done unseen from Russian roads. A few tanks with tungsten went hunting in the vally south of the farm, where they can ambush with flanking shots. Finally I waited till the end of the battle before sending infantry into the farm. The idea was to 'Shoot & Scoot' with the tanks on the northern hill, taking out the light tanks and slowly some of the T34 before finally letting them overwatch the whole vally during the final assault on the farm. This was against the AI, - a human opponent would make this battle very hard for the axis. The AI seemed to love sending infantry down the hill the the east of the farm, just south of the main road, so the farm can be reinforced if you can have one or two tanks watching this hill unseen from the Russian tanks (the houses in the western farm suits the purpose). It was still a tough and interesting battle, even with this 2nd run 'cheat', but I learned alot about close tank assault with tungsten. If you are playing through the 'Stalingrad Pack' you have a lot of great battles in front of you. Follow up question to the forum. I lost all the 'tungsten ambush tanks', but only after they had taken out around 1 T34 each. It was fun to play these sneaking tanks, but _is_ it a good tactic for the Germans in 42, or were I just lucky, that it worked for me? I have played CMBB for 1½ year, and are enjoying this forum alot. Still I didn't feel I had anything to add before today, so yes, this is my very first post.