Tux

Turn 16 Turn 16 has come back and things have stabilised at 'going quite badly'. TFB's Sherman has a movement order which conflicts with the turret's attempt to rotate and engage the nearby infantry with HE, so none of the latter lands until Mylgas' men have mopped up the nearest of my troops and moved on out of the area. My lone half-squad springs its 'ambush' with a depressingly pathetic burst of bolt-action rifle fire. MP 40s and StG 44s instantly reply and as the minute finishes the half squad are up, routed and running. They'll all die in the opening second or two of Turn 17. For Turn 17 I have told TFB's Sherman to land smoke in front of the nearest Tiger and begin reversing out of the area entirely. It is now in an entirely untenable position, being within a minute of being crowded out by multiple infantry units and a Tiger on each flank. As it is it is going to take 2-3 minutes to get entirely out of harm's way, so I will have to work hard to stop the Tigers from gaining LOS during that time... TFA, as always, slog bravely onwards. I think at least two units in Mylgas' flanking 'platoon' are HMG 42 types, and so my orders for TFA's Sherman during Turn 17 are for it to blow the crap out of one of these teams. If I can eventually rout both of them that should significantly lessen the threat to my men opposite the flag. The one bit of good news really is that my IS-2 is a turn or two away from posing a real threat to Mylgas' Tigers if they try and approach my own via the road. With any luck it will also cut the Tiger nearest to the late TFB's position out of the fight completely, by making it too dangerous for it to pass through LOS to escape. One can but hope...

The orders phase for Turn 16 has gone in. TFB's Sherman is going to Area Fire HE shells as close as possible to Mylgas' Grenadiers, but its LOS is limited by the fact that it has to remain hidden from his Tiger. My final green Engineer squad, still with two satchels, is hiding with a 25m ambush arc set. I can only hoe he lobs a charge first and opens fire second - if he fires first he'll be suppressed instantly. An event I forgot to mention had happened during Turn 15 was that TFB's Sherman did actually come under fire from a Panzerschreck team ~150m away. Three shots missed by a fair margin, so I'm hoping the team is either green or out of ammo or both. Either way I have bigger fish to fry and the moment, so I'll have to leave that particular angle to fate. Finally, TFA's Sherman is going to move up to help hammer a few heavy hits on Mylgas' flanking platoon. With any luck I'll do more harm to him by hurting them than he will to me by wiping out my clan of half-squads...

Turn 15 The turn opens and TFB's Sherman goes for the shot. The result is, I suppose, unsurprising. The shot hits thick frontal plate and breaks up. My Sherman has had his chance and begins reversing away; none too soon either, as he breaks LOS a split second before the Tiger fires back at him. While this is going on, Mylgas' infantry assault the positions held by my green engineers. This should be suicidal. I would love to say they were ruthlessly cut down by my men, but they are, after all, green, and they simply cower and take the hits. They don't even manage to get a satchel out to disrupt Mylgas' men, who have taken full advantage of the small size and poor quality of TFB and removed it as an effective fighting force. As you can see, Mylgas' men have also been positively identified as Panzergrenadiers. I'm fighting Tigers and Stg 44-armed Grenadiers, lol. Great! TFA are still comfortable, and are slowly-but-surely occupying their positions opposite Mylgas' men on the flag. They are encouraged by the rumble of an IS-2 moving up behind them in support.

My orders for Turn 15 are twofold. First off, I want TFB's Sherman to take a shot at Mylgas' Tiger. The turret on that monster should take at least 30s to rotate 180 degrees and engage my Sherman, so hopefully I'll get at least a shot or two off. I can then hope for a rear turret partial penetration or similar, maybe even resulting in some dead crew members and a bail-out! Either way, after 18 seconds my Sherman is going to start reversing out of LOS, hopefully in order to break it before the Tiger can return fire. I am also ordering the nearby satchel-carrying half-squad to area fire his satchels at the nearby German infantry. I have always been frustrated by how reluctant Engineers in CMBB are to use their explosive charges in close-quarters fights. In fact, in my experience they never do unless specifically ordered to (and by doing so you greatly lessen the effectiveness of their small-arms fire and targeting routines).

Hopefully my combination of Engineers, IS-2, 57mm ATG and US 75mm ammo for the Shermans should be enough to waste two Tigers in this game, although I think it might be a challenge. Either way there are some interesting ideas there which I haven't tried often before. I won't say which ones in case any future opponents are reading, lol. Turn 14 The minute kicks off and, almost straight away, my HQ Sherman races to attack Mylgas' Tiger. Unfortunately Mylgas has foreseen my intentions and his Tiger grinds into gear as it attempts to break LOS to the corner of the road from which he has guessed I intend to take a shot. My Sherman is faster and quickly gains a targeting line. The turret is already facing the right direction, the barrel is levelled, but the Tiger splashes into the muddy open ground immediately ahead of TFB and breaks LOS even as my HQ tank's gunner is fingering the trigger. Talk about unlucky - I've been planning this flank assault for three minutes and then I miss the shot by less than a second! I also notice a second, bizarre order which Mylgas has given his Tiger; he has ordered it to rotate its turret fully to the rear! I don't know why he has done this, but it would have made my assaulting Engineers that little bit less vulnerable if it weren't for the close infantry support Mylgas has manoeuvred into position. These men keep my satchel-laden greens effectively suppressed for the entire minute. I therefore have one prong of my three-pronged attack left to stab with, and, just as the minute draws to a close, it moves out and gains LOS... TFA's minute goes slightly better. They are on top of things and have kept moving - Mylgas' flanking platoon has failed to cause significant damage thus far. As the minute finishes a German mortar crew has been panicked into retreat and my 57mm ATG has had its setup position suitably covered by the supporting Sherman's smoke rounds.

I'm enjoying this little sub-thread. So much so that I'm loathe to cut it short by posting the results of the actual manoeuvre under discussion! Personally, I have always been deeply frustrated by the fact that normal German infantry squads are so devastatingly effective at close-assaulting armour while the Russians are entirely impotent unless blessed with a specialist, late-war TH team who is lucky enough to have drawn an RPG. Even then the TH team has to be managed (and preserved) separately from the Russian infantry, making positioning of each that much more complicated. Added to this, by the time RPG-toting Russians appear, normal German infantry are beginning to sport Panzerfausts and Panzerschreck teams! I am prepared to accept this though, if it is more-or-less historically accurate. I would be happy to exploit the Soviets' quantitative AFV advantage and keep my infantry well away from German tanks, but I find that this 'advantage' rarely exists in the PBEM games I play. Perhaps I will discuss with future opponents the possibility of limiting Russians to 50% of their points spent on armour, and Germans to 25%? What do we think? I don't really want to start playing PBEM games larger than 1111 pts (10% casualties), so will 278 points be too few for the German player? I suppose it limits them to either one cat or two-three pretty decent lesser vehicles, which isn't too bad...

Here's hoping... Ok, I've just sent off the orders for Turn 14 and they're terrifying me just to think of them. I'm launching a three-pronged attack on Mylgas' over-confident Tiger. After five seconds my central (HQ) Sherman is racing forwards along the main road to have a crack at the Tiger's flank. (Hopefully) simultaneously a team of engineers are going to assault the tank across open ground and attack it with satchels charges and TFB's Sherman is going to complete a quick Hunt order to gain LOS at a Tiger that will, if all goes according to plan (LOL!), be either a) dead, facing my HQ tank and so exposing its flank and rear to the other two, or c) facing (and mowing down) the assaulting engineers and thus exposing its flank and rear to my two tanks. There are lots of 'if's here, and I can't pretend that I'm confident that I have all of my timings correct. TO make things that little bit more uncertain, Mylgas has attempted to cover his Tiger's inside flank by placing a mortar smoke round near where my HQ tank is intended to stop and fire. I don't think it will block LOS from where it fell, so I'm just hoping he didn't drop any more accurate rounds that have yet to go off... My two central MMGs, useless thus far, are going to pepper a patch of scattered trees that is within Panzerschreck range of where my HQ tank will be advancing to. I hope to discourage any AT units in this way. TFA are moving along with their plan, and their supporting Sherman is going to pause to drop some smoke rounds to cover my ATG's setup, because I have now been able to check the gun's LOS, and practically everyone can see it. Damn, lol. The Sherman will continue on its way to support TFA properly after a 10s pause. Finally, I am fast moving my IS-2 to a position in the centre of my forces, from where I hope to threaten Mylgas' remaining tanks and infantry. I think it's about time I made him play a bit more cautiously.

If I'd had a reasonable chance of success of course I'd have ordered a close assault. The Tiger isn't yet within range though - I'm afraid the pictures are a bit deceiving. In many of them the units are enlarged. I now know the denisty of troops that Mylgas has very nearby in the trees, and so I don't think I will be able to get my men any closer to it than they already are; he will have to come to them or they won't have a chance. I only have two squads in TFB and so they are both split to make them look like a full platoon. I have a half-squad with three green riflemen in it which I may use to button the Tiger next turn.

Turn 13 I have just watched Turn 13, and things are hotting up all over the shop. TFA's task is made a little easier by their Sherman's second smoke screen, seen below. As one platoon advances inexorably towards the trees along Mylgas' flank the other continues to provide covering fire, and one of Mylgas' units is seen turning and running, as marked with a red circle below. Unfortunately, the unit's 'run' looked suspiciously like an 'advance', and so I mustn't discount this unit rejoining the fight relatively soon... By the end of the minute, my MG-carrier has also made it to the end of the yellow arrow, and my ZiS-2 has begun to rotate in order to move into position in the blue circle. TFA's supporting Sherman is a minute or two away from being able to provide direct HE support to the screening troops, and hopefully from being able to uproot and rout them completely. My orders for Turn 14 will probably centre around making sure my gun is adequately supported in its forward position by continuing to move one platoon up into the appropriate forested area. TFB are under the cosh a little bit, unfortunately... Mylgas' Tiger is advancing irresistably towards their position, beating the bogging odds and getting closer to coming under attack with every second. Annoyingly, by the end of the minute it has stopped just the wrong side of my Sherman's smoke screen. It remains to be seen whether the smoke will be able to provide my units with any cover. To be honest, close assault is probably out of the question now. Mylgas' infantry have taken up advanced positions and look to be attempting to uproot TFB for good. The figures you see above are sound contacts only, so my men cannot return fire, yet they amply demonstrate the weight of fire my units have come under, and my conscript ATR is quickly identified and wiped out. infantry units are also advancing out of shot to the left, with the second Tiger providing static support (for now). For Turn 13 I will see whether I can line up a flank shot against Mylgas' foremost Tiger. If I can, I will have to use another unit to button the Tiger up. My thinking behind this is that I will have an unmissable opportunity to take out a Tiger for no return. In order not to miss it, I cannot afford to give the flanking Sherman a shoot 'n' scoot order, in case it misses it's first (and only) shot. I will therefore have to have it sit still at the end of its movement order and plug away until it kills the heavy tanks. It follows that the Tiger must be buttoned in order to allow my Sherman to do this without the Tiger spotting it and returning fire/ facing up with its frontal armour. I might even give TFB's Sherman a delayed movement order to allow it to take a flank shot at the Tiger if the Tiger does manage to spot and engage my central tank. As I said though, these are all big 'if's at the moment. I am awaiting the return of the orders phase so that I can check LOS, etc., etc.

Turn 12 TFA are stable. The worst news is that Mylgas' mortar has switched targets, and spends the whole minute landing HE rounds on the house circled below: He causes two casualties to the Pioneer section inside, who promptly panic but they keep hold of both of their satchels and the nearby Platoon HQ is unharmed, at the same time arriving just in time to stabilise the men's morale status. Unfortunately, another HE round or two is going to collapse that house, and I am unable to get them out safely. Their fates are in the hands of The Gods... As you can also see, the second Sherman has laid a handy smoke screen across one of the open areas my men must cross to close on Mylgas' flank. In the next turn I am going to get it to lay another few shells in the next gap to the right, in order to cover the movement of my gun-towing MG-carrier, which is just out of shot on its way to its new setup zone. On the left Mylgas' Tiger reappears and makes swift progress towards TFB's position. It is quickly buttoned by my conscript ATR however, and trudges blindly through a very narrow keyhole of LOS to my Sherman which I hadn't noticed earlier. My Sherman acquires and targets the Tiger, but doesn't have time either to fire (and so alert Mylgas to the fact it had gained LOS) or to panic and reverse before the Tiger is back out of sight. Conscript ATRs prove their worth yet again! In my orders for Turn 13 I am going to order my Sherman to lay smoke in the blue circle shown. Otherwise it will not move. I have calculated that the first point at which Mylgas' Tiger will gain LOS to this Sherman along its current path is just as it reaches the paved road. I have subsequently calculated that, should the Tiger get this far without bogging, I will be able to order my central command tank to race forwards for a flank shot along the red arrow shown. I will also be able to close assault it from the nearby trees, with a bit of luck, and so I am rushing a satchel-armed pioneer team and its HQ a bit closer to the area. They should then be able to take advantage of the newly-laid smoke to get up close and personal with the heavy tank in the next turn or two.

Glad you're enjoying them! Turn 11 The best laid plans of mice and men... TFA have run into what is probably a weakened platoon on my right flank. Thankfully they haven't hit me too hard yet - I think it's a screening force as much as anything. Indeed, it's my own men who get off the more determined shots as Mylgas' infantry attempt to reposition to nearby cover. Also, they are not far enough forwards to prevent my thryst towards Mylgas' main flank. All I need to do is screen against them myself while I continue my preparations. An additional minor annoyance however, is that they do have an 81mm mortar with them, which lands a few choice rounds onto the patch of trees circled below: Miraculously, it causes no casualties at all. The blue circle in the above picture is the area in which I have now ordered TFA's supporting Sherman to land some smoke while it is on its way to provide more concrete support. I just want a little cover while my men cross the gaps between houses. On TFB's flank little is happening, except that Mylgas' first Tiger has shown signs of movement. Near the end of the turn it had turned to face towards the inside of the map before my men lost sight of it in the fog (sorry, the laptop on which I am running the game at the moment won't support the game's fog graphics). For now I don't think my Sherman is under threat. It is actually remarkably difficult for either of Mylgas' Tigers to obtain LOS from where they are.

Turn 10 has just been sent to Mylgas. Nothing worthy of a screenshot occurred. The LMG took a potshot at an advancing green squad of mine, thus allowing me to make a fairly reliable estimate of his position. My orders for Turn 11 have kicked off the process of overwhelming and killing him. I hope that, once that is done, I will be free of Mylgas' pestering. Apart from some indeterminate infantry movement in Mylgas' rear area that was literally all that happened. I am slowly feeling more and more confident about the shape of the 'net' that I am ever-so-gradually tightening around Mylgas' positions.

Good stuff. Glad you enjoyed it.

Nah, I enjoy the challenge: The harder they come, the harder they fall! I stil haven't sent my orders for Turn 10, and I am very conscious that I don't want to be accused of soliciting 'help' from the members who respond to this thread, but I have actually been thinking very hard along similar lines, Rankorian. Off the top of me head I don't know the value of the flag, but I might just be tempted to array my assets against it and try and attrite Mylgas' forces as much as possible over the next 10-15 minutes. If I had a module or two of heavy artillery I'd be laughing, but I don't, so I'll think long and hard before I send my next orders phase.

Turn 9 has worried me: Mylgas knows of my flanking attempt and has units of his own directly opposite TFA on the hill. I hope that it consists only of a single LMG 42 scout. The sound contact which mowed down one of my green ATR point crew and broke his companion certainly fitted the bill (i.e. it was an MG 42 for certain, but didn't fire often enough or hit hard enough for the HMG variety). As you can see in the image above, several of my other units are also within LOS of the area from which the sound came. From now I must forget about stealth and get this attack going. As I said, I hope that the unit I have encountered was nothing more than an LMG scout, in which case I don't want Mylgas' Main Body (which I assume occupies the flag area) to have lots of time to reposition to face the new threat. I am therefore going to bring my other two Shermans into the fight as soon as possible to play what part they can in disrupting his infantry. I'm really feeling my lack of infantry in this one - I should have just bought a conscript rifle battalion or something!

Turn 8 has been played and, to my relief, both Tigers have stopped dead. For now I am safe and I can deal with them in my own time. On the negative side it appears that Mylgas may be content only to use them if necessary and not to risk them unnecessarily. I have changed little in my orders for Turn 9, except to let TFB's Sherman machine-gun some of the cover that Mylgas' troops have moved into.

I usually keep all the icons blown up to full size, but keep the camera at a much lower level (2 or 3), at which point it makes little to no difference to nearby units. I agree that the attack on the flag is now my toughest challenge, especially if I include avoiding slaughter at the hands of two Tigers in that task. The way I look at it is this: Mylgas has bought two Tigers which represent a significant portion of his overall battle budget. Now, if he is clever (which I fear he might be), he will hold them back, perhaps keyholed against my approach routes, and not bring them forwards until his infantry are under threat. The ball is in my court and he has no need to risk his armour by pushing it forwards yet. On the other hand, he may not be able to bring himself to simply 'waste' those points by not using the cats aggressively. Let's face it, when you have a pair of Tigers in a 1000 pt game you want to cruise across the map and wipe the enemy clean off it, no questions asked. If he tries this I should find more than one opportunity to punish him for it. The answer, I think, is for me to arrange a well supported flank attack as quickly as possible. If I can hit him before he is completely settled then I might be able to rush him into over-committing his Tigers to exposed positions.

His Tigers can't do much from where they are. Mylgas might be content with maintaining them as a threat just behind his lines and defending the flag with his infantry only. I hope to be able to bring enough HE to bear to change his mind...

Turn 7 The relative quiet of the battle so far is interrupted conclusively within seconds of Turn 7 beginning, as a hefty crash assaults the eardrums of TFB’s foremost men and forces their scout LMG to hit the dirt. It doesn’t take long for the men to take their best guess at what fired the shell and, if I was ever tempted to dismiss it as typical Allied over-estimation of German armour, the tone of the gun shot had already convinced me that they were correct: The dreaded name spreads through the ranks like wildfire, and no sooner has TFB’s Company HQ been informed of the presence of a Tiger ahead of his force than a succession of Area Fired HE shells rout his green LMG point unit and send them crawling for cover. To make things worse the panicked men have time to spot and call attention to a significant number of German infantrymen crossing the road towards the right of TFB’s position: Things get worse before they get better, and in the final seconds of the Turn my men spy a second Tiger inching forwards towards the edge of the map on my left side: TFB can thank their lucky stars that they suffer no casualties to Mylgas’ Tiger’s Area Firing, but he has effectively driven men to a position from which they will now quickly ascertain the composition and size of my feinting force. Added to that, even though it is under no immediate threat, my supporting Sherman is now in danger of being squeezed between a Tiger to his left, a Tiger to his front, and (potentially) Panzerschreck/ Faust-wielding infantry to his right! Unfortunately, my tank cannot now be withdrawn without exposing it to Tiger fire. It’s do or die... My plans for Turn 8 are thus as follows: I’m thinking that I have to make Mylgas work hard to neutralise Task Force B. That means, first off, keeping my Sherman alive as long as possible. To do that I am considering moving it along the red arrow in the picture above. That will mean that, if Mylgas wants to hunt the tank down with his Tigers, he will have to either come dangerously close to my satchel-laden pioneers near the left-hand edge of the map or drift out towards the centre of the map. In order to cover the latter I am going to hurriedly re-attach my ZiS-2 to its MG Carrier transport and zip it around, along with TFA’s infantry units, nearby the end of the light blue arrow above. From here the gun will be able to ‘close the door’ on the two Tigers’ movements much further inside the map than they already are. In theory I would like to force Mylgas to ‘discover’ both my ATG and my IS-2 in the same turn (in the process hopefully losing at least one Tiger), but I do not yet know how best to manufacture this. For now, I want to do what I can to retain some initiative. I am therefore going to rush my second subordinate Sherman to the tip of the dark blue arrow above. This position has been carefully chosen because it will, hopefully, allow Mylgas to spot my tank whilst making it look like I intended to keep it hidden. I want to create the illusion of a significant force moving up in the general area of the MMG he has already taken a pot shot at. I might then be able to ‘reassure’ him that, even if TFB is a very light force, the remainder of my units are not too far away and will be attacking along the main road. Anything to prevent him from suspecting TFA’s position and intentions, basically…

Turn 6 Thirty seconds in and swirling fog is preventing my Sherman from effectively engaging Mylgas’ infantry. This is bad – he now knows where and what my tank is without it having hurt him. I don’t like giving out free info like that. This thought has barely entered my head before a burst of MG fire rings out and my central MMG team throw themselves to the dirt. Now he has had his awareness drawn, if not all the way around to the direction of TFA, then far enough away from TFB to make him think more than I want him to. I now have to assume that it is only a matter of time before Mylgas becomes fully aware of my plans and moves to counter them. The rest of the minute passes quietly, until the final seconds of the turn. TFB’s green LMG scout is suddenly halted under a withering burst of vehicle-mounted MG fire. From the sound of it at least three mounted-MGs are firing, meaning at least two vehicles… I haven’t yet reacted to the tank sound contact. It is too imperfect a contact to do anything about in the orders for Turn 7, and so I content myself with moving men from TFB forward to gain better LOS towards Mylgas’ advancing infantry and vehicles.

You’re right, John. MY Shermans are, in fact, M4A2s. My mistake. Turn 5 Contact is made! My advancing feint on the left flank spies a lone German infantryman sauntering through the fog towards the flag. Even as Task Force B's Sherman spits MG-fire in his direction another Landser is spotted... and another... and another! What looks like at least a full platoon, with supporting units to the rear, is a few metres away from occupying the flag and setting up to defend the dense nearby trees: None of this surprises or disturbs me - ideally Mylgas will have his entire force on this flank for me to try and crush. It does mean that I might have to hurry up a bit though. In a few minutes he could have LOS to my rear left flank, the emptiness of which might convince him that I'm trying something ridiculous like a flanking attack from the central hilltop... With this in mind, my orders for Turn 6 involve ushering TFA along and preparing to launch my flank attack within the next five or so minutes. It is all about balancing haste with maintaining secrecy: Take too long and Mylgas will guess what is happening. Take an ill-advised shortcut and his men will spot my Task Force moving into position and have time to reposition to face the threat. I also decide to scoot the infantry component of TFB as far around to the left as they will go. Not only will this maximise the angular difference between their 'axis of attack' and TFA's, but it will help maintain the physical separation between forces which is probably the only thing preventing Mylgas from figuring out the size and composition of TFB up to this point.

Hi all. Turns 2 and 3 have been played, but nothing has happened yet. It's a huge map, and so my units are all about 3/4 of the way towards the tips of the arrows you see on the maps above. No contact has been made, my Sherman hasn't bogged, nothing! One thing I could mention: If you look at the map with all the blue arrows on it, there is a large church below and to the right of Position 1. Just below that church is a small patch of scattered trees. Over the last turn or two I have reversed my carrier/ ATG combo to a point nearby this patch of trees. The gun is ready to unhitch and push into cover should any of Mylgas' armour turn up on the far left of the map. It will be pushed the final stretch of the way to avoid blowing its cover by using a vehicle. As soon as anything else develops I'll get back to you - hopefully this evening.

I started on PSP and still work on PSP X. I've never felt the need to 'convert' to Photoshop when PSP is just as capable and, imo, more user-friendly. PSP can save to .psd format as well, so compatibility isn't usually an issue. Loving the mudmods umlaut. Keep them coming.

Fire away mate - the more questions the merrier! I am worried about it, yes. That's why a platoon of men are going to 'hover' near Position 3 in the map above for a few turns - I want them to notice anything that might be going on on my far right. Also, my AFVs are all being held back as a reserve force at the moment, so I'm not quite throwing all of my eggs into one basket. Basically, I decided that I didn't have enough infantry to properly sweep the entire map and secure my flank. That means I have to do what I can by keeping a good lookout and maintaining a mobile reserve to help fend off attacks from awkward directions. I can also hope that Mylgas has little more than a Company of men to command. If he attacks my right flank with a single platoon, my rear guard and AFVs should be sufficient to blunt it. If he attacks from my right with a much heavier force, I will know that he can't have many units on the flag, and so I will be able to try and stage a fighting 'withdrawal' from the centre of the map towards the flag, which I can them camp on and defend. Of course, none of these plans will hold up long once I encounter the enemy - first rule of warfare don't you know?

Turn 1 Right, well absolutely sod all to note at the moment I'm afeared. At least it gives me a chance to mention something which I inexplicably neglected last time; the weather! Above we see Task Forces A and B respectively setting out into the heart of the map. As you can see, it is foggy, rainy and wet. This punished me slightly for not having bought T-34s rather than Shermen, and was a factor in persuading me to limit my vehicles to paved surfaces only wherever possible.