PanzerMiller

George -- What is the typical range at which the Brits and Canucks get their kills in your simulations? Is it reasonably close to the 900m and 150m, respectively, that the battlefield forensic analyses suggest? And do the Canadian kills occur typically after the Tigers have passed them by, as was suggested in the documentary (if we accept, of course, their conclusion that a Canadian shell drilled Wittmann through the left rear hull and into the engine deck)? I accept that this desired level of concurrence between the sim and RL may be a little too much to ask for, but as is the case with any simulation exercise, this can lend lots of credibility to the structure of the model.

Yeah, I thought this was a real interesting nugget of info from the documentary. I suppose that even after Villers-Bocage the Allies wouldn't have had detailed intelligence on precisely who was responsible for smacking them upside the head. And the whole "Black Baron" thing was interesting as well! I guess I need to read Agte...

No worries, George...I did stop reading rather abruptly when I came across that word, but I figured it was some sort of admissable warp in the fabric of reality... I seem to remember reading something when I was much younger about a Polish armored unit claiming to have taken out Wittmann...anybody else ever come across the same? Sorry I can't be more informative on this... EDIT: Just found this rather outdated discussion on Achtung Panzer: http://www.achtungpanzer.com/gen3.htm Polish 1st Armored wanted to stake claim to the kill...

George -- OUTSTANDING stuff here. Really fun to read about your use of the game engine to simulate various alternative scenarios regarding Wittmann's final moments. Yet another angle to this great game. Keep up the great work!!!

Could not agree more...I still fire up CMBB now and then to "get my fix"! Got it...I do remember reading the early days of that thread...will check it out now. Thanks again!

Hey George -- can you elaborate on this "Normandy Project"? Sorry if I've missed an existing thread. Given how much I enjoyed your Ostfront work, I'm intrigued with what you'll come up with in Normandy! Thanks alot...

Just to clarify my ignorance...So the 15-second pause will allow either/both of the Pz-IVs to make visual contact with the Sherman? Great AAR, by the way!! I cheered when that first T-30 went down...

Lots of controversy about this book...substantial evidence that it's fiction and not an autobiography...but still a good read. For more info on this controversy, check out sources like: http://members.shaw.ca/grossdeutschland/sajer.htm FWIW...

I read both books (Old Breed, Helmet) earlier this year, after many years of knowing about them but focusing instead on wading through Glantz's ETO books. Sledge's book is incredible...his descriptions of the horrors on the Shuri Line will stay with anyone for a long time. I also recently got a copy of The Pacific but haven't yet watched it...really looking forward to it... And all this with a 20-year Marine Corps Captain -- veteran of Guadalcanal, Okinawa, and the Chosin Reservoir -- as my father. He never talked about his experiences, and his memories died with him this past January. Strange (though not that surprising) that I have to read books and watch HBO miniseries to learn about this stuff...

I admit, I'm a little verklempt...sniff - sniff... Merry Christmas to y'all...and to all, happy gaming!

I'm a (relatively) old fart and I can only do WEGO...my Call-of-Duty-obsessed kid showed me how futile RT is in the hands of a thumb-challenged Dad who needs ample time for thoughtful analysis and reflection...it takes me hours to play a few turns of CM and I love every minute of it!

Good stuff, guys -- will definitely check out this book. Michael: Author typo duly noted.

Thanks, JasonC...I think. I'll assume the salty undertones flavoring your response were not deliberate. I certainly wouldn't blindly assume that any book with the most directly relevant title would by definition be the best. I asked for a consensus on the best book(s), not those with the most obvious titles. If Overby's book is indeed the best on the topic, then you score twice.

Here here. One could almost write their own thesis on this general subject from all the material that's been written here, across so many threads. Is there any general consensus on the best book(s) to address the "Why did the Allies win WWII?" question? I suppose that's yet another can-o-worms now opened, but...anybody?

Highly entertaining -- if not well-worn -- thread. The "historical psychology" of the Wehrmacht mystique is powerful indeed. It goes far beyond the size of a Garand clip or the relative stopping power of an M-10. Can't believe we haven't heard from JasonC on this one...

Thanks for this post! I didn't realize they fired the gun while still limbered on the wheeled carriage...

Right on, sburke...! Discussions about statistics can get a bit esoteric and jargon-y, eh?? Sadly I can't speak from too much experience here since I haven't played much CMBN (but I am an aged CMBB veteran). But it seems to me that there's been alot of discussion around here about people who will try a scenario, get their ass kicked a few times until they learn the mechanics and the more demanding tactics, and then (based on their long experience with CMx1) will begin to own the AI in subsequent scenarios (or iterations of the same scenario). That's gotta be a big factor here... Damn, I gotta start playing this game...but the learning curve scares me a little bit, and with a job, travel and two teenage kids, my trip along that curve could take awhile...

GaJ -- With all due respect, I think you're being a bit harsh on NormalDude here. I would agree with ND that you cannot make a truly meaningful comparison between 3,856 scenarios played in CMAK and only 80 scenarios played in CMBN -- especially when the individual actors that generated those two datasets have (no doubt) significantly different characteristics -- familiarity with the game engine being just one example. And there is a BIG difference between 80 v. 3,856 datapoints and 1,000 v. 1,000,000 datapoints. A BIG difference. In this case, a dataset with 80 events is too small to draw meaningful conclusions about hypothesized flaws in game mechanics, scenario design, etc. Sample size IS an issue here. Your later comparison of the first 80 scenarios from BO, AK and BN is starting to move down the right track, statistically. But the results from the full AK dataset indicate that the initial distribution is not fully representative of the "true" distribution and, therefore, difficult to interpret correctly on its own. These are really interesting data and a good discussion. But the jury is still out. What are your assumptions concerning this "theoretical distribution"? The width is not the real issue...it's the variance...can you be a bit more specific?

As one of those that has gone down this path, I say...don't believe the earnings hype. Trust me. By the way -- 49 years on Earth, about 40 of them playing these wonderfully maddening games. And my 13-year-old is soon to follow in his old man's footsteps...can't wait to teach him a thing or two about combined arms assaults...

Blackcat is exactly right. Siffo998, you need to run at least 250 trials -- and more like 500 trials -- before you can start drawing conclusions from your test results. Fifty trials isn't gonna cut it...

I'm in purgatory right now...have been a devoted CMBB player for years and can't shake my fascination with the Ostfornt (yes, DAF -- it has gotten under my skin!). I bought CMBN but I haven't warmed up to it just yet...and I don't want to go through the hassle of learning and unlearning UI features if I want to move back and forth between the games. I have the old Stalingrad Pack ready to go on my old XP machine and I'm leaning towards going back to that warm, comfortable blanket that is CMBB...

Well said. It all depends on how devoted to realism you want to be. Y'all should now begin to see where each of us would fall on that continuum. I for one am finding the C2 and Relative Spotting system wonderfully challenging and exciting, so I at least try to play with a close attention to realism...for better or worse. To each his own...

(sigh...)Aren't we talking about enemy units that are not visible to your own unit, and are also not known by that unit to exist?? That's what I thought we were talking about. If the tank doesn't know the ATG is there, and doesn't have communication with other friendly units to tell it that the ATG is there, why would it sneak around the field to take it out from behind?? What am I missing???

I just mean it's a different beast in terms of player-based fidelity to realistic gameplay, that's all. Nothing to do with logic, mechanics, UI, or anything else. Remember the scene in Band of Brothers in Carentan where the American paratrooper sees the Tiger in ambush position, then sees the British column of tanks beginning to move up the road? The trooper informs the lead tank commander of the location of the camouflaged Tiger, but is stunned to hear the reply "Well, I can't shoot him if I bloody well can't see him, can I?" He then proceeds to drive up the road, directly into the waiting ambush...watched in close order by the men of Easy Company. Try to recreate that kind of reality in your next mission...all the tools are there...!

Well...yeah, that could actually happen in RL if there's no way for the spotting unit to communicate with the tank. But we're not talking about movement in this thread (at least not yet) -- we're talking about fire. Steve said it perfectly a few posts ago: you need to try and separate in your own head what you see as the player, who has the entire map in front of you, from what the unit sees in front of him (and what those units with whom it has comm contact can also see). Unless I'm missing some subtlety that others have mastered, this critical distinction really doesn't seem too complicated to me. If the tank can't see the unit, and hasn't detected any evidence that a unit exists there, it shouldn't be able to fire at it...period. You as a responsible player should recognize the inherent realism of this situation and resist the temptation of exploiting a "gamey" way around the intended mechanics. Period. Now, movement in this context is a whole different beast. You would have to be a seriously dedicated student of realism to do what @Wrath of Dagon is suggesting: To drive a tank through a hedgerow, into an open field that you as the player know is covered by AT assets through visual contact by other friendly units, but is not known by the tank to have such assets becuase it is out of comm with those spotting units. Such player-based control of realistic gameplay would be truly hardcore! EDIT: Steve and I posted almost simultaneously...and as always, Steve said what I wanted to say so much better.