Der Alte Fritz

When selecting units for your scenario in the top right hand corner of the screen where you set their EXPERIENCE level is a button for setting a percentage casualty rate, applied across all the units selected.

Just finished playing this as Russians vs AI. My T-34/85 brought death to the King Tigers, sneaking up and kicking them in the behind. Scouted ahead with the lesser T34s. Stalin II a complete waste of time - two of them fired at a Pz4, missed and in the next two moves, he wasted both of them! 1st shot misses by a mile and they take so long to reload they are dead before they can even from cover. Great herds of them wandered around the map getting shot up by all and sundry! Is there a good Stalin tank version in the game? cheers

That is a cool looking Valentine. Is it a mod and if so which one? cheers

A technique I use when wheeling Russian divisional guns around the map by hand (very slow work) is to attach a rifle section and a sniper or ATR team to the gun who can lead the way. The section will draw any fire that might kill the gun and the sniper can use their binoculars to get the LOS while the gun team huff haul the gun into position.

Great stuff. In another thread and at TPG we have been trying to build a typcial Kursk kind of defence based on a detailed map of the 375th RD and this ties in very well with it. On the map the main line of defence is two continious trenches with a third about 4-500m behind. This is a highly prepared position with lots of wire and mines. I have modelled this in a game at TPG and it works quite well. Moving on from this project, I wanted to know what kind of trench system the Russian would dig if they had time to build more than fox holes but not the months that they had to prepared before Kursk. I have seen references to "star" shaped trenches. Patently it would follow the principles outlined above but what would it look like? cheers

What does a typical Russian company sized defensive position look like? One that a reasonable amount of time has been spent on. How did it fit into the overall scheme of defence? cheers

Hi Can you recommend standard works to read on the ETO, both British and American and from the German side as well. cheers

Hi My experience was quite good as I used about half Totenkopfs strength in tanks and artillery and two infantry Bn for the attack. Crossing the river was time consuming because the tanks could not get forward because of the mines and the infantry could not clear the mines because of the machine guns. Mine fields claimed a few tanks as the pioneers did not clear all the mines in the path due to the anti personnel mines. Got the infantry over thwe wire and the tanks over the river by about move 30. Started to chew up the Soviet front line and destroyed most of company A. But a TH killed a Tiger. Got to the crest and the infantry was pinned down by fire from Company B in the rear and Company C on the left flank. Tanks moved up to silence the Soviet infantry. When the tanks crossed the crest they were engaged by all the AT guns and many had flanking fire positions. The first platoon and a Tiger was totally destroyed. The rest of the tanks came over in a rush and a fire fight started. Most of the Pz4 were killed and just two Tigers left by the end of the first game. The infantry were reinforced by an armoured company and the Pz3s. These and recovered Tigers finally crushed the remaining two infantry companies and AT guns. Moved forward to the next crest where a firefight developed with the AT strongpoint and the mobile AT guns position. Again lost some Tigers to good flanks shots and the Pz3 had to hide below the ridgeline. Finally overwhelmed the strongpoint and moved forward but Germans now so low on tanks did not bother with final games. Shows that you really need to husband your strength as Germans as the attrition rate of this position is quite high. [ September 01, 2007, 10:25 AM: Message edited by: Der Alte Fritz ]

What sort of density are we talking about? 1944 German Infantry Regt = 2 Battalions (probably at 75% strength if lucky)over 6km or 1 Bn (4 companies) over 3km. So a map 1km wide would contain an outpost line a company position and a bit of a reserve (say 2 platoons) for a counter attack and artillery of 11 x 105mm (say 3 wire spotters) which is not unreasonable for a CMBB game. "Russian Offensive 1" at the Scenario Depot is this size. Attacking force is a Russian Battalion and it is tough going against these defences. Compared this with Russian front line at Kursk: 1 Regt occupies 4km, battalion occupies 2km with half bn reserve. Say 5 companies so allow per km 2 companies in front line with reserves. ie double the German concentration. This is quite tight in CMBB terms and I have an experimental layout at TPG under "Kursk First Day 375th Division". Not the thickest Russian defence - this Regt 1245th had 3 bn in front line and no reserves (the other Regts in the Division had 2 bn up front and 1 in reserve)

You statement about one bn per 6km seems about right but be aware that German defences increased in DEPTH during the war and a 20km deep defensive zone was not uncommon. See the article below about the evolution of German defence to mid war. The Imperial German Army evolved 'elastic' defence to deal with break ins and this evolved during the start of the second war. However this failed to deal with Russian offensives post Kursk so depth was increased to soak up the enemys reserves and momentum. Standing Fast: German Defensive Doctrine on the Russian Front During World War II; Prewar to March 1943, Wray, Timothy A. http://www-cgsc.army.mil/carl/resources/csi/wray/wray.asp The Russians used a battalion every 2km at Kursk with another half battalion in reserve in a position 6 km deep but had three defensive 'belts' like this spread over 30-35km with 5km gaps between belts. Does not sound much but this was regarded as a very heavy defence on the Eastern Front. cheers

Just finished Royal Opponent - great battle and i was able to finish off one group of King Tigers and was just stalking the other group when the battle ended. I felt that perhaps the grounds should have been a little softer so that the KT were confined to the road more. They seemed to wander around even scattered trees without bogging. cheers

Hi Have posted my operation at TPG as "Kursk Front Line 375th Rifle Division". http://www.the-proving-grounds.com/scenario_details_link.html?sku=1340 Have used the 1st Bn 1243rd Rifle Regt as the model as they are on the far west of the 375th position. These guys held off Totenkopfs attack and ensured that the German advanced was on a narrow front. The remnants of the 52nd Rifle Division to the west fell back on this position. 52nd RD was attacked by most of 2nd SS Panzer Corps. Further to the west 67th RD was attacked by GD and the Panther Brigade. So this section of front would have similar terrain and defences to the one I have depicted. One point is that the 1243rd RR was obviously on a strong position as it had few AT strongpoints or Regimental AT assets and had all three Bn in the front line. The other two Regts of the division only had two Bn in the front line and about double the AT assets. Anyway let me know what you think. cheers

[ August 19, 2007, 09:40 AM: Message edited by: Der Alte Fritz ]

Hi you need to look at CMMods.com and search under Salvaged Scenarios, author birdgunner. There are about half a dozen zip files with all the scenarios from the Scenario Depot chase. For CMBB look under author padivine cheers

I use the 375th because it has really detailed maps of its position. I must admit that the 1247th position is a bit stronger than the rest of the regts but that was because it sat on a road. The 1243th to the north of the line was more typical with a battalion strongpoint with 4 76mm ZIS3 4 76mm Inf Gun 8 45mm and 18 ATR behind that is AT position 2 with 4 ZIS3 and 4 45mm and a mobile battalion of the 1/193rd with 76mmZIS3 and another battalion of the 2/93rd with 122mm How in the village to one side. So two "lines" rather than "three" but you could have the Tank Brigade coming along as the 3rd line. Will post the map in a couple of days cheers

Thanks for this great information. Has anyone done a scenario of this action? What were the essentials of this action that allowed the Russian tanks to be so effective? 1)The King Tigers being limited to the road. 2)The Germans attacking and hence moving into fire from concealed tanks. 3)Lack of supporting troops? cheers

Hi Yes it does. It has about half a dozen zip files that make up all the CMBB scenarios from before the crash. They are listed as "Scenario Depot Salvage" under the author padivine. Same for CMAK cheers

Hi Does anyone have an account of the action 11-13th August between King Tigers and 53rd and 52nd Russian Tank Bde and 71st Seperate Guards Heavy Tank Regt? cheers

Hi Had a look at the operation. Looks good but the force density seems too low. Taking the 375th position, regimental positions seem to be around 4km wide with 2 bn in the front line and 1 in the second in battalion strongpoints. So for the 1247th Regt at the southern most part of the line, we can see strongpoints number 5 and 6 each about 1.5km wide and 1km deep, in a line of 4km. So I think your map should have a single battalion position in the first line with some space on either side? This should have 8 76 ZIS3, 2 76 How and 8 45 ATG and 27 ATR. Then 1.5km behind that another position in a village with a company dug in. To one side there is a big AT strongpoint No 1 with 20 ZIS3 and 23 ATR so allow about half of that operating on this battalions frontage. Behind that another 2 km is another village with another company and strongpoint No7 with 12 ZIS3 and 8 ATR and 1 km behind that is AT strongpoint No3 with 8 ZIS3. This is where the 96th Independent Tank Bde is based 61 T-34 and there is a mobile AT gun bn ready to move into position to counter German tank breakthroughs. Likewise a pioneer company ready to lay mines in the path of any breakthrough (perhaps using DC to represent these?). Artillery in the position is the 3/93rd and 1/93rd artillery battalions with 122mm howitzers. Also in the remainder of the regts position to the south, they have 263rd heavy mortar bn with 120mm mortars who could help our battalion out. So quite a lot of firepower in a 2km by 6km deep slice of a Kursk position! One way to limit this is to have the terrain as a series of "humps" about 2km apart, with the AT gun positions in the valley so that the 45mm engage at 400m and the 76mm further back engage at 800m. When the Germans come over the crest they are enaged at the right range by the Ai. Have done a map laying this all out so can post it on TPG if you want. cheers

Hi This is what my Russia terrain sets look like in summer and winter. cheers

Great I will have a look this weekend. cheers

What are the problems do you think? When I looked at it, i was able to map out a slice of the 375th Rifle Divs position quite accurately but the whole position was about 6km deep. So this would mean a pretty long winded scenario as there seemed to be quite a lot of space in between the individual positions. So I was torn between that option and one of a long thin battle map, say 1.5km by 4km on which a series of 4 battles was fought one for each position. This latter approach would cut out the 'dead ground' between the positions. What are your thoughts?

Hi Have finished moving house now, so thought I would catch up with you regarding progress. Have you got the map sorted out yet? cheers

Hi that sounds a very good list. I would add to that Pats trenches; MikeyDs grass, "Dodads", winter roads, rubble, terrain bases; Strontium Dogs trees, winter water; Uncle targets steppe and Phillipe's intro screens. Personally I do not like Deys stuff as it is too white and so use the ordinary snow or GAJ hi-res snow if I need to see the terrain. Get McMMM mod manager too! cheers

Great stuff! I will go and get them right now cheers