Zalgiris 1410

IME hidden units spot perfectly fine, infantry, tanks, guns, whatever; so hiding your T-34 would be a good idea, IMHO. Prevent rotating the turret is another since it defeats the purpose of hiding in the first place. Be carefull when setting a coverred arc.

I thought that that book was quite a good cheap book, although I must admit that I haven't read the others for a good comparative based recomendation. I will say that it lacks a lot of detail, but it was IMHO good for an overall account of the destruction of AGC, mostly from the German perspective. He did explain the basic Soviet strategic deception plan very well. I should look into some of the others I guess, especially any that cover in greater detail the lower scale of the fighting. That would be interesting.

Until then, pound sand. I'm sorry FaxisAxis but it's nothing personal, I just thought that it was a bloody good put down, like Fußball does. I find it very Blackadderish or somethink, I must say. Also I didn't expect such a good liner in this forum let alone thread from JasonC. I mean, cripes who knew our Master had such a witty sense of humour? I really must remember that one for Summer is coming on Downunder and to use it at the beach. (Or rather against someone else who can be buggered going to the beach!) However, I'll have to tweak it a little to make it mine, if I'm not entirely origional.

Returning after replaying the above bit with the Reg SS squad who got absolutely killed trying to walk it in over a fully shot down & suppressed Russian squad: I learnt a few things, my hunch that I had to stop the Reg SS Squad in front of the suppressed and starred unit in the middle of a little heavy building was the right thing to do. Thanks for the inferrance to do so Jason. I stopped its advance 10 metres in front of enemy unit, 15 metres, 20 metres, 25 metres & 30 metres. For each of these times this unit was stopped plainly in the open but fortunately it all went according to plan. The best resault however was getting the Reg SS Squad to advance straight into a creater 11-12 metres from the target, about 5-6 metres from the little builds' front wall! Man did my guys throw some grenades! I also noticed that generally the enemy unit rose up & started to attempt to fire once my infantry came 20-25 metres upon them in range. I don't know yet if this is a set pattern or not, but it may be a handy thing to know about and take into account when planning my moves I guess. While it was all a fairly one sided afair and the enemy unit (depleted aready mind you to be sure) was always destroyed while routing his arse off 15-30 metres beyond the back of the building, I still sufferred a causualty in the Reg SS Squad some times, even after it had got to its position including in the creater! It should be noted that while this unit always lost sight of the fleeing target shortly after it squirmed its way out and off through the rear of the building, I had other squads on the right flank of it only 20-30 metres away (also just moved up in a double story light building) who also started to throw grenades & fire at the target while it remained in situ, but more importantly had clear shots at it as it fled. This is what garenteed its elimination in each turn play, everytime. I say this because this is exactly just what I want to do to such enemy units that I've had to manuevre up upon in such an involved manner. The thing is that if these other units didn't have the full clear killing field view of it as it bolted, I can't see how it would be destroyed without a dangerous persuit having to be undertaken by the most forward unit- the possibly still very shaken such units as my Reg SS Squad that has just so galantly exposed itself fully to the target (& to every other enemy unit with a clear shot over its recent approach route) and judging by this experience, such units usually are gonna have sufferred a casualty or three in the fire exchange! :eek: I'm extrapolating from this to a situation that is more likely, I should think to come up, where your squads even if assisted by support weapons are going to be practically making having to make frontal assaults. In such situations, the enemy will almost always get away, skathed, but still able to be rallied, after all that work, because his escape route is protected by more builds or heavy cover etc. I'm not going to be able tactically to always managed to have moved other units up to flanking firing position that have within their fields of fire the rout route of the targetted enemy unit like as in the above example! Of cause this may mean that I need to think about it differrently and consider it as part of a three (or more) stage process. Suppress with fire the target, advance to within range & grenade the target with a squad or two , in order to flush him out for the final elimination of the grenaded target through the fire deliverred by units with fields of fire coverring his likely retreat route. (Thats right, what I've had so much trouble with is ultimately just the flushing him out stage in the process though the use of grenades & very close fire, but not riskful hand to hand combat in close assault environments!) :eek: [ September 10, 2006, 06:29 AM: Message edited by: Zalgiris 1410 ]

That killed me, it really did. I just had to uncomtrolably crack up hysterically laughing in a public place readng that! (I am in the Hospitals library, where I work.) It has been an interesting thread I must say. Yeah I think I get what Jason is suggesting. I'll have to do so tests, but I can see how to make it work in terms of spacing with minute/70-100m intervals between units. Troops run something like 150m a minute, move 70-80m, advance 60-70m so calculating in the command delay which can be anything from 4-25 seconds (or worse) for one order and adding extra 10 sec pauses will work. I like the idea of giving the next unit a an order and delaying its move using 5-6 pauses so that it doesn't start to move until the next turn. You can always adjust it or cancel it during the orders phase if you like. Of cause, it really makes it worthwild to do that while giving your units a whole series of orders though. These tactics based on depth (rally dependant) of Jasons' really seem to be the key to attacking with infantry, with or especially without HE chuckers. It is something that you don't pick up on from the AI, (or solo H2H) which is all that I've ever played against. It takes a bit to change ones thinking, I always tried to use width to accomplish advances with infantry dominant forces. (i.e. as many troops moving forward in the actual attack as possible while using HMGs, mortars, spotters, guns & armour stationary againsts targets that popped up.) It used to be a real slog esspecially in a close run thing or an utter failure. I've never relied upon rallying in the process before. I've always thought of rallied units as near useless backleggers, nice of them to rejoin & may be OK for following up and holding ground or for long range harassing fire but not moralely stable enough for any serious combat fighting again.

Thanks for the clear run down Jason, I didn't know that CM was designed to simulate the "opposed entry stuff" for units defending a building against attacking enemy troops. This though was not the problem I had in the insident above. Your right Jason, I was throwing the kitchen sink at 'em, may be not a full double barrel koscher kitchen sink with a HE chucker but a heck of a lot of small arms area fire mostly from less than one hundred metres, including MG and with squads moved up to grenade range, although not actually throwing any yet. As I said my 2 Stugs were busy on the left flank against his maxiums at the time and I was happy to leave them there for the duration. It was a very small senario so I wasn't worried about retaining ammo loads. I was practicing my tactics. You see, I thought that the enemy (lost contact stared) unit had actually become more than just pinned under all that incoming fire and was about to retreat or panick. That's why I thought that I could run him through with the bayonet. Obviously not and your explaination, well explains it all. What I should have done was before I was going to run him over was to have waited for so grenade action to have gone in against him with the guys that arrived in the large building 10 metres to his right front. So after that in the next turn I could have ordered the Regs to have charged him down or to have occupied his vacated building! I think I've still got that saved somewhere I might give that approach a go and see if that works more according to plan, hoping that it goes properly without fanatical resistance, which their should be none.

I've had a few practice quickies with this, bloody hell is it hard to stay in formation when there are buildings strewn about the place and other terrain features. It seems to me at this early stage of trying some of the above techniques that fire support is the dominating factor as to whether your troops are going to successfully manuevre or not and more important than moving in formation. Still I'd like to get it to work for me though. May be a move to contact order might be better when approaching expected oppostion especially in built up areas with a lot of two story buildings. At least that way when your troops meet resistance they will stop and fire back. That's fighting. This is what I want them to do. Dominate by fire, suppress and eliminate the enemy without sufferring too many casualties in the process. I know what I'll be testing next. Using the move to contact order will trying to maintain formations with 13-15m spacing and a second wave likewise. Let you know how it goes. I haven't used the move to contact order much at all before, I had better do a search for some tips about it. Anyway, to provide a glimmer of the trouble that I'm still experiencing I'll describe what happenned in a resent quicky test: I had a veteran Inf Company with two Assault Guns and 4 HMGs against an AI controlled veteran Platoon reinforced with 4 Maxim HMGs and two TH & two RR teams. Setting was early War, in a small town map at 400 points approximately. I don't recall exactly. Basically I was able to move out my 14m spaced squads in two waves with HQs sort of in their own third along with the Company HQ and 50mm mortars. Things went pretty smoothely, although one squad lost its' LMG & SMG gunners and broke & routed early on the far left. There wasn't much that I could do about that other than to keep it under command .It did rally so I sent it back in to make sure that some buildings were definately clear of the enemy that had shot it up and that then was smashed itself. It later also area fired from 150m at two differrent identified HMGs in small buildings until these targets were fired upon by one of the Assualt guns and 50mm mortars. That all did the trick! Anyway what really pissed me off was what happenned on the far right. Essentially all was going well, I had advanced two full Platoons (-one squad) & two HMG teams & one light mortar into the area. Each Platoon and a HMG were in their own two level heavy building. I fired up some unit at the bottom of the central two level building in the centre with that fire power including using the 50mm mortar. This eliminated the enemy Platoon HQ unit I found out at the end of the game. With no further opposition I tried to advance. There were three one story buildings on the right while behind the big central building was a whole row of buildings on immediatlely after the other along a road, which wentup the centre left of the map. Anyway, I choose to advance a Regular Squad from big building on the right near the map edge which was situated the far right top corner. As it moved to the bottom of the building and tried to leave it an enemy unit shot it up from the small heavy building 20 metres infront of it. It broke with a few casualties and moved to the back of the building. While everything else that could shot up the surprise firing enemy unit until it routed & ran off the regulars were rallied. Meanwhile an enemy Squad moved into the third little heavy building next to the row of big central buildings, most of which were light, but basically it become the focus of the fire from 6 full Squads, two HQs and one HMG for a few minutes. I advanced two squads into the other little buildings on the far right, the second was about 40m away from the occupied third one. (The enemy Squad was just outside of grenade throwing range from here. I had also moved up and into the central 2 level heavy building that the enemy HQ had been killed in the left Platoon. Though minus its' far rifle only Squad and one depleted Squad but with the other Squad from the central Platoon, so basically three Squads. Two of these also engaged the enemy Squad in the little heavy building on the right centre while the third advanced into the building beside it, all three had grenade range, also a HMG also joined them in the top floor of the heavy central building and joined all in what had to be area firing of the surppressed enemy Squad. I decided that the revived regulars deserved some lorels so I orderred them to advance into the enemy held building, something that they would reach within the next turn. So everything in the area is area firing againt the house, (my Assault Guns, two HMGs, Two Squads & two HGs were engaged against maxims on the left while all mortars were out of ammo) all to suppress the enemy who I judged ought to be panicking by now. The regulars should walk it in. But from about 5 metres out, WTF, the enemy fires at my approaching regular Squad, breaks it, understandably enough at that range, but WTF continues to fire at my regs and eliminates the whole Squad. How could that be? Sure being in grenade range of a couple of units while a host of others including two HMGs are all under one hundred metres away spelt death for the late firing enemy unit. But just how did it manage to eliminate my regular Squad with all that area fire coming around it and other troops arriving within grenade range next to it? How? This result of all my hard work was very annoying. It didn't please me much I'd like to say even though the enemy eventually surrenderred and I won a total victory. Fair enough, bearing in mind that I didn't have any heavy support fire immediately availiable in this instance; the only thing that I can think of is that may be I should have stopped the regular Squad ten metres or so away (in the open mind you) and hope that it IDed the enemy so that it and especially the other colse by Squads could have won the race to be the first to fire and thrown in batches of grenades as well.

To explain my tactics in moving [aggressively with vehicles], I believe it would be overzealousness with a hint of thoughtlessness. I forgot these 3 important facts: *Cover every area *Cover halftracks and light AFV's with ground troops *Know when to hold them, Know when to fold them </font>

Yeah, I guess I don't really look enough at my troops' morale states to a great degree, that's good advice to take heed of Jason. Your axiom about using fire to take ground is what I try to do and then actully move into it. The thing is it so far hasn't been all that pretty when I've miss judged things and found myself having to proceed against greater resistance than I anticipated. I mean defenders can also utilise the rally factor too of cause! (And come back to life! :eek: ) Also I'm thinking about the practices of the AI which just tries to keep moving and having to fire on the move, which is not the best method to fight with. Perhaps too I think of my firing-at-half-power moving troops as more effective than they really are. Must think of maintaining at least one firer in situ against identified targets, preferably more while only a few other troops move forward, even if only one squad that still has an LMG. Thanks agian Jason, I'm off to practice. Cheers Saul. [ August 18, 2006, 06:05 PM: Message edited by: Zalgiris 1410 ]

I understand your "blob" formations Jason and I follow your reasoning about the usefulness of countinhg on rallying units after absorbing enemy fire while others advance to replace the targets, etc. The thing is my problem areas are in under ruffly the 200m range and less. Indeed the closer that I try to get to the enemy the more trouble I find that I'm having in just ending up with a broken attack. It really is anoying when you are trying to employ "fire and movement" tactics and the manuevring elements keep flopping fully up. Again once the range drops to around One hundred metres my advancing troops just seem to melt into thin air! The only time that I've had a large amount of success while moving a body of troops over open ground is when I have overly shot up the enemy during the preparation phase. Then I conduct an anti-climatic walkover which looks and goes good but is a little too dully easy. Of cause, I may be a bit used to seeing things happen like that, not having worked hard enough at doing it in the face of moderate resistance with conducting an Infantry attack. Thanks again Jason you've explained your ideas thouroughly in this thread, I'm thinking a bit also along the lines of your losely set "blobs" as aposed to my set square "boxes". I guess it comes down to being willing to watch your troops take hits from enemy fire during an advance and thinking more about the whole process than worrying about the casualties as much as I do. Still, to perform an attack with Infantry forces over open ground will take a proper plan and a steady hand to manage for sure. Actually to be a little specific, I must say that I have real trouble getting say a platoon or two to get to grips with an enemy shooting unit or two holed up in a patch of rubble for example. Sure I might of had a 75mm gun or 81mm on board mortars to shell such likely placed opposition but lets say that the support weapon has been knocked out or run out of HE ammo etc; I'm still gonna have to advance to grenade range with a platoon to eliminate said enemy and to take that flag behind it or somethink. IME even trying to move up a platoon aross open ground even if into such places as shell holes, creaters, abondoned trenches or foxholes or even another patch of rubble approximately 30-60 metres away from the enemy firer often results in failure. I remember playing a resently enough quicky with a 75mm gun or two, and a re-inforced company against an AI enemy company in a flattened village; there were lots of shell creaters and all the houses were damaged down into rubble. My gun or guns fired a bit at suspected enemy positions along with a platoon of machine guns. After a little while I advanced the infantry type units: Squads, HQs and TH teams. I employed a bit of fire and movement with them as they advanced etc. Still I was only able to make it to about half way in the face of the opposition, which must have been a depleating company since the guns & HMGs had paniced a few and continued to pound the firing targets until they ran out of ammo. Eventually I had sufferred too many casualties and shot my bolt even with a couple of squads making it as far as about 20-40 metres away from some enemy positions a few times, but I just no longer had the fire power to suppress the enemy return fire. I found it very difficult to get those point units to advance closer upon the nearby enemy positions. I was doing my best to provide cover fire but trying to move one or two squads just gave the enemy one or two targets at a time and if they moved they were slaughterred. I tried to move Squads up to better positions but again I faced the same outcome. I'm pretty sure that my troops didn't even throw a single hand grenade for the entire battle! Basically I was stuck from dislodging the enemy and capturing the objective flags beyond and then finally the game auto ended because of the low ammo levels or somethink. I think that I probably still had twice as many men left, having inflicted about an even number of casualties but what was most anoying was checking out what the enemy firers still consisted of. His squads for the most part still had their SMGs and their LMGs enough to do real damage even their the squads were down to 4-5 men each on average. My Infantry unit had mostly lost their SMG & LMG guners during the bounded advances. Gauling to say the lest!

Thanks Jason I was thinking in terms of "boxes", what you describe as "blobs", although I would have a 2x2 & then the HQ formation. In the case of a 3 squad Platoon I would try to have a 2 up one back and then the HQ with any special weapon teams on the side of the third Squad. My problem remains the distance that I try to have between these units. I was going to ask about 10m origionally, but I think I've had problems with that distance before in the past. Of cause with a 25m diamiter or 12.5-13m radius for target and area fire effects then that is not very surprising. I have tried 20m by 20m boxes and deffinately had no major suppression problems with that. However, I've felt that that was probably a bit too far apart to achieve a sufficiant volumn of return fire or mass in an assault etc. Your explaination of the follow on effects of the second wave arriving into the fire zone landing on the first in front of it is something tat needs to be kept in mind too Jason. It makes a lot of sense to maintain a good enough interval between the first and second waves, although 30m sounds a bit far at the moment. OTOH I guess I will be titenning up the width of my formations with say 13-15m in between the 2 squads in the front rank of the box. This ought to increase the mass of the fire line, as it were, sufficiently enough for me to consider openning up a wider distance between the front and second waves as far as I find that to be neccessary. I might also even just try 15m x 15m boxes in close (coverred) terrain, but 15m x20-30m if I have to move across open flat ground. I think that I'll be keeping with my practice of holding the HQ as far back as possible though. You have to take into account command delays as well that mean that the HQs start moving quite a few seconds before the Squads do. That can really throw a formation out of order and sometimes mean that the HQ ends up ledding the Platoon like how the AI does it. (That is when it actually has a platoon deployed together!) Setting command delays helps to balance things out, but not always as precisely as one would like a lot of the time. Anyway thanks again Jason, 'cos now I feel rather a bit more confident about moving Platoons and companies across flat open ground in the face of hopefully only light small arms return fire! :eek: [ August 14, 2006, 09:34 PM: Message edited by: Zalgiris 1410 ]

OK, Andreas thank you for the clarity! My thinking was based on my understanding of the 3rd GJD or rather the one regiment part of it that was taken from Artic Finnland and deployed on the main front near Velikiye Luki and later further with AG South. I may be confussing things about the Heavy Artillery Battalions of GJDs, but AFAIK my earlier explainationof the reasoning behind why they were moterized as aposed to horse drawn is correct.

I am wondering what is the best distance to have between Infantry type units in CM when deplopying and moving in relation to avoiding suppression from light arms fire. I am asking what distance should there be between units in order to cut out having a unit get suppressed when the unit next to to it is target fired by enemy small arms fire. (Actually area fire needs also to be included here as well.) I am especially interested in how I should be deploying and moving Infantry Platoons and Companies on the attack. In Quick Battle set ups the troops that you bought start out at 20 metre intervals, is that the shortest that one should allow or should that be extended? Furthermore the minimum distance at which a player can deploy units close together is 4 metres between teams such as HQs, ATRs, THs, Snipers, Spotters and HMGs. While it is 8 metres from or between full squads. This means that in a single trench that is 20 metres wide a player can position five teams in it or a squad and three teams or just two Squads maximum. (I hope that that is clear enough.) But this seems a rather bit too close together especially in terms of the likelyhood of sufferring suppression. I would not recomend deploying your troops this close and definately not for moving an Infantry Company on the attack. My basic two CM grog questions in relation to this are these: 1: What is the distance or radius that target fire will either hit or suppress near by units, esp moving in the open? 2: Likewise, what is the distance or radius that areafire will either hit or suppress near by units, again when moving in the open but esp for guns &nearby units? I don't know the best way to conduct Infantry on the move forwards against the enemy in the open. I'm asking about how much distance I should maintain between my attacking Infantry units while I still want to achieve the punch of mass. I want to achieve this without consentrating my troops just to be totally stalled if not attrited by light return fire after I've pulverized the enemy etc. Help me please this is one thing that frustrates me about my CM playing tactics. [ August 12, 2006, 12:14 AM: Message edited by: Zalgiris 1410 ]

Crestline or ridgeline positioning defence! If you deploy your units like in the pic above then that is an example of 'crestling', where your units can see over the crestline themselves to fire at targets well over the hill, but are fully protected by the hill/ridge and out of both LOS and LOF of the attacker when they hide or take cover in CM. A forward slope position would have your troops & direct fire guns over the crestline and exposed to attacker LOS/LOF. They may be in improved positions in foxholes and trenches or in coverred terrain such as woods or buildings etc, but are all over the hill. A reverse slope position is having the main body of the MLR a distance behind the crestline be that 30 or 50 or 75 or 100 or 125 or 500 metres or more etc from the crestline. It may still have a portion of units either LPing or OPing on the crestine itself or indeed in forward slope positions or neither but the main body is behind the crestline with fields of fire up the reverse slope as far as the crestline. The difference in the distance can be described in terms of depth and by the sounds of it Corvidae your RSP is extremely shallow if your not entirely crestlining. As to weither there is any real difference between reverse sloping and crestlining before anyone asks is what the Germans chose to do on the defence in Italy. Rather than deploying as usual in reverse slope positions, they built themselves defensive fortifications on the tops of ridgelines rather than further back down the slope behind them. One good reason they calculated to do this was that the Allied artillery in front of the ridge would have a hard time accurately hitting such ridgeline positions with mostly either over shooting or undershooting such positioned targets. Another reason was that they would retain excellent LOS for their own artillery spotters. The Battles of Cassino attest to the soundness and effectiveness of this tactical reasoning. [ August 11, 2006, 11:19 PM: Message edited by: Zalgiris 1410 ]

CM does not distinguish carryiny capacity for foxholes but it does distinguish carrying capacity for creaters by the actual size of the creater. If it is big enough for a squad or team it will let you know that a unit will fit in it when you move the curser over it while you are plotting moves or seeing the units vision etc. However I don't know if there are different sizes at which teams and squads are allowed to fit into creaters and gain their protective benifits. I've never tested, but I think a team will be able to fit into a smaller creater than a full squad, but I'm not sure. Otherwise it is only from the same size and up of creaters that either will fit along with guns. Tanks can fit into creaters too IIRC, but only in the largest sizes.

I may be wrong Andreas but wasn't the 150mm field howitzer Battalion more of an attatchment unit to a GJD while the other three Battalions were pack animal drawn mountain guns 2 of 75mms & one of 105mm. I think that both these types were skoda makes. The heavy 150mm howitzers were Motorised because they were figuratively in some way a Korps (in a generic sense) asset to be assigned to their respective GJDs when out of their formal Mountain terrain environment. Also considering that this heavy calibre did not consist of brake down into pack animal portable parts like real mountain artillery pieces, when a mountain chain was breached by the GJD this battalion would have to travel around the chain to catch up at some point later. Preferrably as quickly as possible though since they will be then most needed in the openning terrain yonder. Therefore they needed to be more highly mobile as a consequence, meaning motorized.

Uberpickle; I think that you are mistaking Panzerfausts as Panzerwurfmines, but at least you know what's ruffly going on when the HC fist flies. IIRC only Pioneers (German Assault Engineers) and tank hunter teams are armed with Pzwurf's and that is only until the Pzfts show up in early-mid 43 AFAIK. Remember that your last AAR is set in early 44 as you said. Cool write ups, especially the 1st & 3rd ones. I would've liked to have seen you finish the last battle though. It's good to lise every now and then, you can learn things from doing so. You do seem to get very involved in your battles I must say, good to see. On the 3rd AAR: I think that the German infantry that you were seeing in the buildings around your units were ski troops. Ski troops lose their skiis when they enter any building or are shot at. (*Somehow they still use them going over rubble!) So your units were only making IDs of German Infantry not of ski troops in the snow. One thing I would like to ask you Uberpickle; can you please explain your tactics in still moving your vehicles about so far forwards in built up terrain after the ferrying phase in a meeting engagement?

Wow, the L/21 37mm R35 gun KOed armour! How very unusual. Actually I've used them a bit during 41 for the Rums because they are relatively rather effective against all that light obsolete stuff that the Russians started with. (T-26s & BTs) They are well protected in comparison and probably most importantly practically invulnerable to the ATRs, unlike the R2s / T-35s. However for all that I always found them to have a tendancy to run out of ammo too quickly in a stand and shoot out. PS: BTW DREVAK I think that the Rumanian trucks come with those cool skins IIRC.

Cool thanx for the pic Phil. Actually I really like going the Rumanians myself, then the Finns. That's why I was wondering. Do tell me though, did the R35 nab the BA & SU-76 or one of the towed guns? :cool:

Absolutely yes. The main differences are the lack of dust clouds in BB and the other countries that you can go in it. There's Rumania, Hungaria, Finland along with the Italians & Germans as the Axis against the Russians, an aweful lot of Russians. For something really different you can even play with the Rumanians as the Allies against the Hungarians or Germans after they switch sides :eek: ! The Germans also come from a wide veriety of differant branches, with a long Luftwaffe Field Divisions presence and a continuous SS one throughout the campaigne. My personal favorites are the Light (Jaegar) troops. You might also be very surprised at how the Russians vary in their equiptment and organisation to what you get in the Allies in CMAK. The coolest looking are the dark Navy clad troops, they are worth getting BB I tell you.

Out of interest, phil what kind of Rumanian units did you have exactly to deal with this AI force and when was the quick battle set?

Thanks for your response Martin, I thought as much. I'm not disapointed. I think that all that would very hard to simulate and possibly not necessarily the best thing to have to deal with in a war game. OTOH may be, it'd all be interesting for a training or historical simulation. So ToW is sounding mostly like an ultra CM/CC imporvement given these similar aspects which I've enjoyed so much. Fortunately my imagination is well flexible enough to continue handling this stuff! :cool:

Don't trouble yourself too much farther Paintball, but thank you very much about the info on the 24th PzD, and thanks for the linkies. I especially liked the OoB of the Divisions trapped in Stalingrad for the 28th of December 1942, I hadn't seen that before, thanks. :cool: I am farly well aware of the deteriating state of the German Divisions fighting on the Russian Front was in a general sense and how they were dissolved quite similarly to the run down shows of the Divisions in Stalingrad. Most looked quite similar if not worse, certainly they did as the war went on for sure. What I'm interested in specifically is how the re-equiptment of new and refitting Panzer Divisions went in terms of Panzers and other hard hitting hardware, at the expense of reinforcing the Divisions at the Front. That is I think will help me to gage the real fighting strength of PzDs, for example understanding the differrences in strength between the refurbish 6th PzD and the rest of the PzDs battling outside of the Stalingrad Kessel, etc. [ July 31, 2006, 04:55 PM: Message edited by: Zalgiris 1410 ]

Thanks for that Martin, that takes care of the Borg spotting issues as much as a computer game can I guess, however that doesn't cover how field communication between units is going to work except for how I'm imagining it to take place in CM etc. What I mean is that disregarding the abstracted ways in which the FOOs and vehicles that have radios communicate one had to really suspend a sense of reality somewhat in order to accept the way field intelligence communication with borg spotting occurred. While as you say the game players have omnipitant overviews of the battlefield situation far way above and beyond that which would really occur which effectively carries over some borg spotting glitches into ToW, however I'm still interested as to wheither say telephone lines & radio nets are actually going to be in ToW and the ways inwhich they might effect play if they are represented. I am thinking of ways in which the cutting of phone lines might create a situation in which a unit or group of units may become lost and 'fall out of communication' and fade to some statis like how surrenderring units do in CMx1. I am hoping that the effects of heavy bombardments might also be more accurately represented in ToW than in other games in terms of a slowing down or silencing of field communication. I am also still interested in how escorting infantry might actually be able to both locate and point out mines, ditches and obsticles to the AFVs that they are assigned to or tanks that they are riding on and assist them in ways that they used to, of cause training and experience could be a funtioning veriable to this. How about having runners that can pass on information to other units or groups of units about the enemy situation, firing positions, MG nets and gun emplacements. It would of cause have to be in a correctly handled fasion, say with runners only being able to run to & from HQ units and down & back to their organic units and attached assets etc, especially say look outs and special weapons. It would create a more realistic feel to ToW and allow for some really interesting game play such as how knocking off runners is going to effect things, IMHO. In short I would like to see a realistic functioning signals net in ToW, or will I have to continue to surrealistly imagine one! So I ask am I gonna get my fix or should I just start wishing for or howling at the Moon? :eek: [ July 31, 2006, 03:43 PM: Message edited by: Zalgiris 1410 ]

I hope that ToW is not at all in the slightest as unrealistic as I found the FPS Red Orchestra to be, the more like an ultra improved early CC (with pausing) the better. (A lack of fricking sporning will help obviously.) I'm up for both ToW and the WWII setting CMX2, CM:SF will have to do until the latter is developed and released though!