Sgt.Squarehead

But they didn't, you did.
I'm already messing around with them in the editor.

Four Fireflies? 
Looking forward to seeing how this pans out, @George MC's map is an absolute masterpiece.

Finally decided to try my hand at scenario design in Red Thunder. I'll be starting with this small, 800mx640m map based on a large section of 2 ASL maps. and based on that, I'll probably keep armor to a minimum. There is more sloping terrain than the screenshots indicate but the western bank of the river definitely has a pretty large open area in the center.  

Do your family require a callsign and codes, so that you can identify yourself? 

Really? 
Care to explain this:

That entire area was heavy forest just over an hour earlier.....You clearly haven't been trying hard enough! 

Yepp...preferably with an Iran module (maybe complemented with some additional gulf states or...perhaps Israel)....
But a current day CM-Asia game would be even better ! 😊...Korea, China, Taiwan...That would be nice !
 

I'd much rather see CM:SF2 thoroughly patched and brought closer to the CM:BS timeline.
 

Hey, of course it is not perfect but FINALLY I can make a small scenario about this famous painting....I have always wanted to make a tiny scenario about what the story would be behind this image.

Four Fireflies? 
Looking forward to seeing how this pans out, @George MC's map is an absolute masterpiece.

I'd much rather see CM:SF2 thoroughly patched and brought closer to the CM:BS timeline.
 

That mostly works as an Ausf E (bar the fighting compartment):

In game, against opposition such as this, IS-1s dressed as KV-1s might actually work OK, assuming you could somehow find a model to dress them in. 
 

Yes, I expect a very bitter fight for it regardless of how the rest of the battle pans out. 
Hmmm...Cromwell profile picture...not a fan of an Irishman. I'm seeing a theme...
***
Friendly Forces
My battlegroup is primarily drawn from units of the 22nd Armoured Brigade, 7th Armoured Division. The heavy hitter of a British Armoured Division, in reality by August '44 most Commonwealth armoured divisions rarely fought in their typical brigade formats, the BHQs acting more as tactical headquarters for mixed BGs of 1 armour, 1 infantry battalion + misc. elements. The 22nd is no different, but the stresses of keeping a cross-channel supply line up to snuff, plus nonstop combat since early June, makes the BG a bit more shambolic than its paper ideal.
For example, the entirety of A Squadron, 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoon Guards (the junior armoured regiment) is currently struck from the order of battle due to material and manpower losses. Surviving crews and 'runners' have been absorbed by B and C squadrons, who are near full strength as a result. We are borrowing "A" Squadron from the 8th Kings Royal Irish Hussars (the armoured recce regiment) to fill out our combat strength. While this expedient solves the power of combat strength, it complicates greatly the horizontal transfer of timely information between fighting elements. 
The balance of the battlegroup is filled out by the divisional motor regiment, the 1st Battalion of the Rifle Brigade. A halftrack mounted regiment, they are hovering around 70 percent strength and most of the rifle coys have disbanded their scout and anti-tank troops to make up the strength. The sole exception to this is A Coy, who have managed to hang onto these elements, for what worth that may prove. The support company provides us with two heavy machine gun platoons plus a mortar platoon (off map) with 4 x excellent 3 inch mortars. 
A single troop from the 11th Hussars (confusingly, yet another recce regiment, but more traditionally organised) provides a point element for the entire force. They are divided into an armoured car section and a carrier section. Alongside "A" of the 8th Hussars, they have long been in contact with the enemy and we are joining them. 
Fires are provided at the higher level by an entire battery of Sexton self-propelled 25lb guns. They possess a prodigious amount of ammunition in excess of 800 rounds, plus ample smoke - perhaps the single greatest asset in WWII titles, imo. A platoon of 4.2 inch "chemical" mortars round out the fire support, notable for their high amount of white phosphorous rounds - again allowing for prodigious and near-instantaneous obscuration fires. 

Enemy Forces
The balance of the enemy forces in Normandy are nearly surrounded further to the south. The shoulders are being held, in the main, by shattered remnants of enemy infantry formations of earlier set-piece attacks (e.g.: Op Totalize, Tractable) who now find themselves on the outside of the forming pocket. Additionally, battle-group sized elements from an SS-PanzerCorps are in the area, trying to punch a hole in the perimeter, or holding open hacked-open escape routes. Smartest thing is to assume I will fight an all-arms force, not greatly dissimilar to my own. Having been in contact with the enemy for some time now, forward elements have produced a fairly comprehensive intelligence picture: 

Not surprisingly, enemy concentrations of infantry appear to be all along the river itself, and concentrated primarily in the East village. Farm 001 and 002 (Obj "TOM") are also clearly occupied, and are supported by some type of anti-tank gun. The lone infantry contact in between Hill 202. and Pt. 201.7 is almost certainly an OP or LP. Nothing in this disposition appears to be reinventing the wheel, its a competent deployment at a glance with ATGs on, perhaps, obvious positions, but with dominating fields of fire over the centre rolling terrain.
Courses of Action
What to do? What to do, indeed. The rather milquetoast enemy deployment doesn't immediately proffer a dynamic solution, there's no smoking gun or yawning gap that I can see. Any movement down the middle is going to invite disaster, even with the many small hills and valleys I could probably use for cover. I'm going to have to go up one of the flanks, which means potentially putting a strong force in a complex bottleneck. 
To minimize that risk I will be conducting a command pull. I've identified two potential courses of action:
 

1. Moving in the dead ground formed by KT1, assault or infiltrate across the water obstacles in the vicinity of Farm 001 and attack to seize OBJ "TOM", then use the ridge formed by Hills 205.2, 204.1 and 202.7 as a springboard for a general attack; or


2. Maximising use of dead ground on the right, skirt around hill 207.8 and close up towards Obj "OAK", attacking either towards the East Village or punching deep towards Obj "DICK" before rolling up the enemy flank. 
Either route will have to be probed and recce'd to see which one is held in greater force and is easier to force. This brings me to...
Unit Tasking
Either COA, being generally variations of the same plan, can therefore result in somewhat uniform tasking and organisation. I will divide my battlegroup into three distinct elements. A forward element drawn from the 5th Troop of the 11th Hussars, an infantry-heavy company team following in close support and a heavy reserve which can be 'pulled' to whatever route I decide is the most viable. 

The recce will be deployed in their organic sections, UCs on the left, as the terrain is more complex and closed-in and dismounted recce will be more necessary. The troop 2IC moves with them. On the right, the armoured car section, with the troop leader in tow, will probe on the right, which is generally more open and will likely need more firepower and survivability (a relative term) to probe forward. 
Moving  behind either of them will be a company team from B and C Coy of The Rifles, supported by an intimate-support troop from C Squadron of the 5th RIDG. This will allow these forward elements to fight for information and overcome minor resistance encountered, and equally fight for room to deploy my main element on whatever route I deem the most feasible. Equally, the company team that does not identify the main effort will remain a useful screening force and perhaps confuse Draper as to my actual intent and main effort. I've made them infantry heavy as either route ultimately favours a boots-on-the-ground approach to overcome initial complex terrain, mainly the river.

Finally in reserve or in long-range support is the balance of the battle group, seen below:

The balance of C Squadron will deploy in battle positions on the many hills and points near my line of departure and can provide direct fires on the high ground on the far side of the river. In the event the enemy has a lot of heavy metal of their own, this fire may be of dubious value beyond keeping the enemy interested and under fire. Their HE, however, will be useful at any range against soft targets and built-up areas. I can also, if the opportunity arises, add to this firepower with the anti-tank troop organic to A Coy of The Rifles. Likewise, how I employ the MG platoons will be decided in the moment, either massed as a pseudo-indirect fire weapon at longer range, or broken up into intimate support of the platoons. The point here is to be flexible.
I got to be honest here, I got a gut feeling I'm reading the situation wrong and I'm already feeling like the first course of action will be the most viable.

Try the Scourge of War Series.

Know it by its baleful glare:

And a welded turret, as opposed to the cast turret of the earlier T-90. 
 

Sometimes it's like beating your head against a brick wall mate. 
Ask @Combatintman. 

Sometimes it's like beating your head against a brick wall mate. 
Ask @Combatintman. 

My post wasn't intended as a criticism of your tactics, more a comentary on the difficulties of using an infantry light/armour heavy force to physically sieze an objective (as opposed to just blowing it to bits).....At some point the meat has to come out of the can and that's usually when it gets chopped up! 

Grand Tactician The Civil War.  Its on STEAM.  

It seems like your pixeltruppen are being whittled away. 
 

I can at least speak to the Canadian Cold War era procedures. I've mentioned before but since we're discussing, I did an exchange program with the Cdn Parachute Regt. Their procedures were VERY similar to ours, and so I assumed (obviously correctly) the British are also very similar since the Canadians were very British Army oriented. 
My background - FIST Chief A/1-320FA(Abn), with C Co, 1-325 Inf(Abn), Fire Direction Officer B/2-321FA(Abn), Fire Support Officer, 3d Brigade, 82d Airborne Division, and Assistant S-3 and Battalion Fire Direction Officer, 2-321FA(Abn).
I think when I was editing that previous post, I left out the part where for the Infantry CO or Plt Ldr to call the artillery, they would pretty much have to grab the dead FOs radio and call the battery using his own callsign, not knowing the battery callsign. The battery would force him to authenticate, which his own RTO would be able to do. All this is going to take some time, ASSUMING the FOs radio even works after he is killed. Somehow in reformatting I ended up deleting that part.
As @DougPhresh says, anything else requires the radio request to go up-over-down to get to the battery Fire Direction Center.
Dave 

The Seventy-Fourth Minute
Objective ROT

Before:

SBF
The infantry get into cover safely.

Another round lands further down the stream, I'm pretty sure this is an area fire on the SBF position by now.

Tiger 1 that took a mortar round starts to head over the bridge to join Tiger 2.

2 Zug
More Landsers advance across the road.

2nd Gruppe (for he is nur ein Mann) spots the Maxim team in D2 and takes him under fire.

With predictable results. Scratch another MG team.

1 Zug
3 Gruppe who were staring down the barrel of that 61-K last time pull back as fast as they can.

The gun opens fire, it hits the fence with its first shot but the second is true.

They weren't fast enough and yup, another MG gunner goes down and the other gets a slight nick.

The Zug's 251/17 has LOS onto the AA gun's position and is ordered to area fire. We lose sight of the gun once 3 Gruppe moved away from the window so I don't know how effective the fire is.

Meanwhile 1 Gruppe leapfrog up sector B.


The lead element spots one of the retreating HQ teams we saw earlier in D3 at the back. Shots are being traded as the turn ends.

After:

The Right
The SPW reaches position at the edge of the scrub. The infantry will get out and scout ahead.

SITMAP

The screw continues to turn. I'm going to rush the HQ Tiger forward to 1 Gruppe's position and fire on D3 as I suspect there is more than one bunch of Ivans in there. 2 Zug will continue to probe through sectors C and D.
MMM

Agreed! 

The T-80UK has it all.....General T-80U coolness AND glowy red eyes! 

Know it by its baleful glare:

And a welded turret, as opposed to the cast turret of the earlier T-90. 
 

This makes a very decent substitute in the interim: