Cannon-fodder

hmmm, Russians vs. Americans equals two outcomes: Conventional warfare, pre-nukes, Russia sweeps through Western Europe. America and Allies take heavy losses, but ship some people out. Who knows what would happen then? More likely- with nukes, the Americans were in favour of 'massive retalliation' - where if there was any Soviet aggression, they would immediately respond with as many nuclear strikes as they could. No way Soviets could have survived. But then, the fact is that nuclear deterrent probably was the single thing which stopped the USA from fighting the Soviet Union...

Well, that's unlikely - you have to remember that with a massive main gun and 1/2 MGs, infantry are pretty unlikely to get close. Many modern AT weapons have difficulties taking out the latest breed of tanks, thanks to composite armor. I think you'd probably want between 2 and 5 hits on a modern tank with an AT weapon in order to take it out nowadays... back in WW2 it would have been virtually impossible. To be honest, given enough spare parts, a couple of divisions of Leopards Mk.II or Abrahams would be virtually unstoppable if used right. If the user just dug in, or concentrated on destroying the enemy forces, it would be possible for the enemy to win on attrition (though they would be so weakened they would lose the war anyway). If used to force a breakthrough, exploit it and push towards the hostile capital city, they could end the war in maybe a couple of weeks. The other troops in the army could then follow through in their wake. Just remember that modern tanks are INCREDIBLY hard to kill. Composite armor means that even when, say, a Leopard is duking out with a Abraham, each could probably survive a couple of hits. Coupled with vast tactical training superiority, vastly better targetting equipment, impossibly harder hitting guns, more than double the top speeds and with much lower breakdown likelihoods, modern tanks are utterly superior to anything pre-1970, and could sweep away more than ten-times their number, given some reloads:) Well that's my two cents:D Depressing, eh?

I hate aircraft:( I just don't like having things which are so uncontrollable, and very random. I've had very little success with AA guns, since its so hard to cover a large enough area with them to protect everything. I suppose it might be worth it, but to be honest, when I hear the roar of aircraft overhead, I just race my tanks in opposite directions and into cover like scattered trees. Hope that helps a bit.

I love you JasonC and hope to have your babies... we can create a race of super-generals! Seriously though, its great that you've taken the time to explain in such a coherent sense the workings of tactics:)

I want an internet connection... CMBB's good, but I need to play with other people in order to really enjoy it. AI just isn't clever enough or interesting. Since, I've now got an internet connection, I can now download any Mods I want at will!

stikkypixie try turning it into an ISO file, then mounting that onto the CD. That always works for me. Actually, it's too bad you need the CD in the drive to play BB and AK, since I then have to save all my music files to disk in order to play.

As someone who started with CMBO and then moved to CMBB, I must say that I was REALLY SHOCKED at how dangerous infantry versus infantry combat suddenly became. In CMBO, you very seldom managed to actually destroy a hostile infantry unit, or at least it would take ages. I must admit I always had serious issues with this. When you move to CMBB and AK, infantry die QUICK. you can't afford to let your infantry advance in stupid ways. Much, much better. As for armour combat, I wouldn't know too much about it since I'm not a grog. I can tell you that, IMO, BB and AK are hugely superior to BO, if only because of the infantry improvements. THere are also loads of other advantages. And, you get to play as the Ruskies! yay!

First of all, apologies Michael Dorosh, I didn't realise this was the case. Second, I don't think we're going to get any real agreement here, so how about people say at the beginning of the battle whether they consider half-squad hordes to be acceptable. This should at least save any nasty surprises. From the sound of your opponent Glider, he seems like the kind of guy who buys five platoons of tigers and the rarest, baddest-ass infantry he can get, and never mind the history, so you're probably playing with the wrong guy. Let's all be friends!

I'm 16 and I've been playing CM for about a year now. But I also play FPS's as well, and other strategy games such as Civilisation. Hell, I think Call of Duty is one of the best games every made - it's right up there with CM (at least the PC version is. The PS2 version is obviously gonna be worse). At the end of the day, I just don't consider the two genres in the same way - I can't get my mates to play CM, but they love CoD. Never mind!

I have to say that I agree with Glider here... I've never been hit by a half squad horde, but I tested it in an AI game and it was pretty unstoppable, especially with SMGs. The fact is that the developers included the split squad option so that you could conduct recconaissance without so much risk to yourself. In fact, the only non-Gamey uses I can see for splitting squads are recon and deception (making opponents think you have 2 platoons rather than 1 in a place). I think we should probably add this to the list of 'not done' things in CM as, after all, IRL squads operated as full squads, not as half squads (and yes, I know that nowadays they are divided into two sections, a Fire and a Maneuver, but it wasn't like that in WW2!).

Steiner, I think you've taken the Ariel Sharon quote rather out of context - he's saying that as far as the Middle East is concerned, Isreal controls America. Which is probably correct to a degree. Seems a bit strange to have a rather anti-Semitic quote on a WW2 game site though...

I like what Joachim was saying. Just to add to it, you should easily have time to get some heavy infantry guns in. Direct fire buildings to the ground, lure SMG squads out of cover and kill them with direct fire and rifle squads. In my experience the only reliable and cheap way to deal with Russian SMGs is to hit them with guns first.

well, if someone really wanted to, I'm sure they could hack it and cheat, but noone really wants to. Thing is, this game is almost completely a social game, and people tend to play the same poeple a lot, so it wouldn't pay to cheat.

I play at The Blitz, which is pretty active. I'm predominately a social gamer, so I don't mind the lack of competitivenes. I tend to get to know my opponents pretty well over a number of games, and I like it that way:)

Well, the main objects of flanking are 1) to suppress - you suppress units way quicker when shooting from multiple angles, and 2) to kill enemy armor. Either way you want plenty of cover, and a way to hold the enemy units facing the non-flanking units. Otherwise, all you'll do is change the way the battle is facing. The other advantage is that, if you can supress an area using flanking then, on a largish map, you can get 'pockets' - where you can just tighten the noose on hopelessly suppressed units. I've found this strategy incredibly useful against infantry and even armour.

I think you're confusing two seperate things there, Sirroco: operation level recon and battlefield recon. At the battlefield level you still want a large amount of information coming in. Personally, I use infantry and MG fire to suppress AT guns and then nail them with tanks. Mortars and smoke are also very useful.

I always use realistic, unless I want to quickly find a specific unit or can't see where my guys are etc. Then I use +4. Still, realistic is most useful because it is a much better judge of position and LOS.

I've always found that, in urban warfare, suppression is everything. If you can bring your units to close range while the hostile unit(s) are suppressed, you'll win every time. Therefore, I reccommend using smaller squads, since this will allow you to supressive fire units from lots of angles. Large squads are a lot less use in environments with a lot of cover, so small SMG squads tend to be more effective. Personally, I've often split SMG squads to 5:4 in order to get enough angles of fire on an enemy squad. I've found it very helpful in getting up close an personal with enemies, without them firing back;)

I've had quite a lot of success with embedding my zooks/fausts with squads. I find that on medium maps or above (and often on small maps too) it helps to have AT assets spread around all your units, just in case a tank pops up. I think the main trick is to realise that they can't really make dashes for the tank, or indeed move anywhere near it - they've got to ambush when the other player doesn't expect it. When this happens, you're bound to do some damage. Also, regular squads don't always have the AT assets earlier in the war, so later in the war zooks/fausts become less important.

I think that the only realistic purpose for using mortars against non-open top tanks is getting them to take cover. As for open tops, I suppose you could try, but it seems a bit pointless to me, unless you really have no other AT assets. There's a reason for Panzers, Zooks and the like:D Leopard_2, I think that the US Tankers have been fed too much propaganda:D Having said that, it all depends on what the bomb is made of... I don't think fertiliser would do the trick;) As for the tanks being vulnerable from the side and rear, I really don't think this is an issue. As far as I know, Iraqis would be relying on street fighting, geurilla warfare tactics - no targeting of tanks. If we look at cases such as Isreal, I can't think of a single case where a tank has been destroyed by Palestinian forces. It may have happened, but certainly its very rare... Has anyone else heard of such a case?

Definitely... Tarkus' Steel Interface mod is FANTASTIC. This mod improves one of the main issues I had with both BB and BO - the clunky interface. Tarkus deserves a pat on the back for such an excellent interface mod and, if you haven't got it yet, get it now!

Hmmm... but JASC is way better than Corel! Well, at least I think so... Doesn't this give Corel a virtual monopoly over vector graphics programs?

Okay, I've done a search and haven't come up with anything, so here's my question: How is it best to use mortars? I have had a lot of pretty serious headaches in scenarios trying to get these things working. Everything else I seem to be able to do, but not use mortars effectively... For one thing, how do you set up mortars so that they can indirect fire, using a platoon hq as spotter? I just can't seem to get this to work! Thanks in advance, TimG

Erm, stay out of it's LOS and take it in the back? Not possible every time I know, but you should think of it as your first choice. Remember, Pillboxes can't move/rotate, so if you stay out of its LOS, it's just a bunch of wasted points.

hehe, might be a bit unfair on the attacker otherwise:) I think the firepower advantage recommended for a strategic advance is between 1:4 and 1:8. Obviously, tactically its a bit different, but you get my point:)