Brille

Smoke:
1.)
If your avenue of advance happens to be the same direction as the wind you can use that to your advantage. 
Place a smoke fire mission (or lay smoke via tank smoke rounds or smoke grenades) and watch how the smoke "walks" slowly in the wind direction. If the wind is not that strong it will stay relatively dense for quite a distance. 
So you can advance your troops directly behind it. 
But be careful that those rounds are not WP (white phosphorus) rounds because those will disperse very quickly even without any wind. 
 
2.)
With vehicles that have "smoke mortars" or "Nahverteidigungswaffe" (for the germans) build in, you can lay lanes of smoke. Simply give one of this vehicles several short movement commands, each 20 to 40m apart and put on each of them a "pop smoke" command. On each way point it will pop out up to 3 smoke grenades. 
In comparison to external smoke dischargers (who have maybe 1 to 3 charges - ww2 standard at least), smoke mortars can be reloaded from within and they have a huge amount of smoke bombs. So you can put multiple lanes of smoke with one vehicle. 
 
Directing fire:
1.)
If a squad is in a house/cover you can direct/switch their fire. 
Give them a target command and a pause like 30 seconds. Then give them a movement command on their exact same location and draw another target on another enemy position. 
So they will fire for 30seconds on one enemy, then they move maybe slightly to get on target and then they will fire the rest of the turn on the second enemy unit. 
2.)
Always keep in mind that you will negate any cover arc or target command with the "face" command. 
The thing I often do is "hunt" into a position (like going up into 1 or 2 story building) while putting the hunter on a short cover arc to not reveal himself for distant troops or go prone on first enemy sight. After the unit has reached its position I either can give him another cover arc at the last way point or a face command, which means that he is free to engage on the spot. 
3.)
A rare thing players seem to be aware of or use is the cover circle, a addition or alternative to the cover arc. 
Especially if you don't know from where the enemy is coming from and you don't want to reveal your tanks to simple infantry, you can activate the "armor arc" and press shift. Now you can draw a circle around the tank on the distance you want. (or draw it over the entire map to be sure :D) 
It works the same with the normal cover arc too. 
 

 

Can't confirm this for sure, so only speculation. I would say morale is tracked individually per soldier but only the average squad morale is displayed. So let's say roughly over 50-60% soldiers of the squad are pinned, so the ui shows the entire squad as pinned. 
You also see individual soldiers "cower" for a certain amount of time (if only low fire is taken), while the rest of the squad members keep a look out as normal. But it will show you maybe only "cautious" in the interface because only one or two soldiers are effected, the rest of the squad is still operational. 
 
I also had it that I split a rattled squad only to discover that the smaller team went directly to "shaken" but were not under fire at this moment or before. 
 
So splitting a squad to "conserve" morale for the other team might work but you also get enough penalties for it: lower situational awareness (especially if the team has no binocs or radio), lower firepower (obviously) and they break more easily under fire. 
 
And do t forget that morale will reach other teams of the squad /platoon, especially when casualties are taken. So a squad can get rattled or broken even when they didnt had that much front line action. 
 
Reports of their comrades getting slaughtered elsewhere sink through the comms sooner or later and, depending on their experience and morale, is not taking lightly by them. 
 
I split squads into teams mostly just so they don't get demolished by one he round of a tank, especially in the modern games. 
Other reasons are for scouting purpose, to get a lower profile (either with a half squad or two men) or anti tank teams. 

In the older Combat Mission games you had something like hit percentages and probability of a kill through the various gun platforms. 
This kind you don't have in the Cmx2 versions but bfc set this on purpose. They want to give you some sort of feeling the troops back then would have:
 
Not knowing much about the vehicles you are up against while only knowing slightly more about your own weapon performance. 
The more experienced you get the more you know what works against what. 
Otherwise you can test things out via the scenario editor in each installment or read/watch about the hardware performance of that Era. 
In the editor you can set up a shooting range and play it in hot seat mode with the enemy forces set on tight cover arcs. 
 
This way I'll often test various weapon platforms on what they can penetrate or how good they hit anything on various distances. 
It is not 1on1 representative with an actual game but at least gives you a good direction if you are not accustomed with the various vehicles, tanks and self propelled guns. 

Squad Leader, Advanced Squad Leader (ASL) vs CMBN, CMRT, CMFI, CMFB
It is my impression that PEB14's experience and response to (frustration with) the CM titles appears to be 'typical' of long-term ASL players. I believe that I can reasonably make such a claim because two of my long time friends have also been regular (obsessive?) SL and ASL players from the first appearance of SL until today. One of the two quite playing CMBN after two games, the other still plays.
In my opion the contrast is between ASL's god-like 'control' and omniscience which includes positional awareness, the protection and armor value, combat odds etc. In addition moves from here to there only cover a few hexes and arrival at destination takes no time at all.  CM on the other hand is emphatically far more realistic in terms of the many unknowns. Just like in real life. Traditional ASLers have a difficult time downgrading from omniscience to the many unknowns. My good friends have grown accustimed to the like the chess like 'control' of ASL and get frustrated when things don't turn out they way they do in ASL.
The more I read personal accounts of Canadian soldiers in Normandie and Nederland, the more I learn that most combat takes place with uncertainty.
Learning to love CM requires some degree of learning to surrender to the unkown.  That's how I look at it anyway. Your views may well differ.
I love CMBN - warts and all. For better or for worse. Till death do us part.

Getting more units into action than your opponent can is a valiable option indeed. But regardless if you are attacking tanks or at guns, you should do it from different angles (if possible). So the gun (which turn very slow) or the tank have to turn a bit to get to another target. 
If your units stand close side by side and the enemy has their range it can turn out to be a turkey shooting. 
 
By the way units spot better to the front than to the sides or back. Tanks are even worse at this regard, especially when their commander is forced inside. They are nearly blind if something pops up to their side. 
 
In at gun engagements you first have to locate the at gun (obviously) . If you know it's position you either destroy them with artillery, close assault them with infantry or bypass them. Only if you have the forces to suppress them properly you may engage them with tanks. They are designed to ambush tanks so the least unit you want to engage them with should be tanks. 
And I guess it is regardless if you sneak them into position, they will almost always outspot tanks. 
One tactic I use (if I have no other option) , if the map allows it is to gather some tanks together, roll into a hull down position fast and area fire the guns position at a distance. Most of the shots will be misses, especially at flat ground, but they may pin and or kill personal. If the gun stands in forests it is even better since some of the shots will explode on a treetrunk over or behind it. Sooner or later it will be either abandoned or destroyed. But it may take several he rounds and a tank or two. 
 
Don't know about the probability of a tank kill with low caliber shots but I guess you just had bad luck. I had engagements with 57mm churchills against a huge Panzer IV fleet with different effects. Sometimes they seem to get no damage at all and sometimes the Panzers exploded in all its glory or were at least silenced very quick. 
Once I even had a one shot kill with an soviet at rifle on a Stug whereas it is very lucky to even get a penetration sometimes. (talking about the sides of course). 
 
Is2 or any of the ISU versions can be very frightening. They are tough nuts to crack for anything armed with a 75mm L48 and even for better guns at a distance while the 122and 152mmm cannons will obliterate most of german afv.
So you might think it is better to engage german armor at range, which is partially true. But you have only very slow rates of fire in the soviet heavies, so by the time they have the range, most German tanks may have already landed some hits at them. Though they probably may survive those, their subsystems will get degraded pretty soon. If you go into more close range you have better hit probability of course but you trade it with lesser armor protection. 
You can amplify the reloading speeds and hit chances with higher experienced crews so they may be valuable on range too. But you should outnumber the enemy forces, so they have more to shoot at while your other units may have the chance to range in properly. 

I've once read that firing on "move" command is still somewhat accurate because the game abstracts a firing halt. So instead of stopping the tank visually, firing at the target, drive on, stop, fire again etc., it's just one fluid movement. 
But I don't know if that's official or just wishful thinking. 
 
Well I can not complain. Most of the time the tanks don't hit the broadside of a barn but in some instances I have a holy effing Schulz moment of an seemingly impossible shot. 
 
But in my game a Tiger struggles to hit a cromwell at like 80m while moving slow... Hmm...  

If the AT gun didnt even got a shot of first then you either have really bad luck (maybe the enemy is doing recon by shooting) or you have chosen the wrong hideout for the gun itself. 
The at gun should always be first to spot because of the concealment it hopefully is in and the small profile. Bigger AT guns (even the 8, 8cm in Pak configuration) are hard to hide and can be spotted from quite a distance. 
Smaller at guns like the 57mm gun or Pak 40 are better for an ambush. 
 
Though I must admit that I have the feeling that at guns are easily spotted as soon as they have fired a shot...maybe a bit to easily. But that's just me. 
 
Once spotted though it is logically that the gun will have a hard time to survive... Stealth is its main protection after all. 
So if the enemy has the right tools for the job (either guns of his own or artillery/mortars) it is just a matter of time. 
 
The question is how experienced your crews are because if they are motivated and high experienced they can be quite sturdy, even when they take losses. (at least till the gun itself isn't damaged). 
Only advises I could give you (though you probably already know them) is to get the at guns more to the side of an enemy approach. Spotting at the front of an enemy tank is the strongest, while it isn't as good to the sides and back.
Try to keep enemy tanks closed, either by small arms fire or with artillery. 
Position your guns wisely. Don't go for maximum visibility on top of a mountain to observe all. Choose one or two small lanes it can cover (hard point). You may not see and fire on much of the enemy but also can he shoot with only a part of his forces at you. 
Put them in good concealment. If you put them in forests make sure that it has good undergrowth. 

I count myself to these people who have the opinion that no player input can determine  if a vehicle will unbog or get immobilized, at least not by simple move orders. 
If a tank/vehicle gets bogged you actually see that the crew starts its own process of unbogging: The tracks/wheels go forwards and backwards on the spot, while the beast rumbles a bit. 
 
So I would say (without knowing 100% of the facts myself though) to the people, who think that reversing matters, that they just have wishful thinking - no offense. 
The problem is that even intensive tests wouldn't bring you any believable results I guess... Maybe a hint in a certain direction but a real clearance not so much. 
 
In my games most of the time vehicles get unbogged by themselves, sometimes they get immobilized, sometimes more, sometimes less and sometimes they don't even bog once in a battle. 
So how does one determine if reversing really helps to unbog? 
To me they would have unbogged themselves, regardless for the additional reverse order. They are just 2 stand alone procedures. So if the process "unbogging" (if this one fails=immobilize) is finished, then the vehicle will go on with the next command which will be "reverse" in this case then. 
 
Some people also believe that a marked anti tank minefield heavily reduces the chance of a tank triggering a mine. (ok another topic)
But I can decline that because this one you clearly can test and I did. 

The reason you haven't witnessed it in the ww2 games would be simply because there are not that many roof mounted MG around. And even if you have any, they can mostly only be operated when the crew looks out or is not occupied with other things. 
Besides that there are some mounting configurations that makes it impossible or at least very hard to use these MG against ground targets. (M10, some sherman versions...) 
Most of the tanks in CMCW have a remote controlled MG on top or at least, in case of the M60, full armor protection for the operator/commander while using it.
I don't know if this is/was common practice to fire those at enemy armor but they can do quite some damage even to MBT. They can hurt/kill crewmembers, while they take a lookout or they can damage or destroy optics, smoke launchers and other externally attached equipment. 
 

I see your point there. In my opinion if it is not point blank range (like below 100m) you can benefit from a tripod. The MG is more accurate and gets out more bullets in theory (never tested, only from the feels). 
The biggest question would rather be if you have to turn the MG often to get to shoot at the enemy. 
If you need to then the bipod configuration is the way to go because you get on target quicker. 
 
Getting away faster if things are getting hairy is a valid point but the hmg should not be in the front lines in the first place. And even in urban areas you have some longer lanes you can cover in a narrow arc. Those are intended as point weapons after all. 
 
 

Here are some of my screenshots from recent battles...

So now I made a short clinical test via the editor. Again there are partisans, again it is around 21:30 in July. It is dark but not to dark. No planes available this time.
However there are some germans around of which only one straggler group can be seen by the partisans. They shot up some of the partisans so don´t you wonder the dead bodies. The germans have tight cover arcs, so they are unable to participate in any kind of firefight. The partisans however are free to shoot anything they like...
And I don´t have to wait long for the first results. In the first case I wanted to see if area fire has an effect on passing infantry, so I fired on the single house, while part of the formation is passing by.
In the second scene you clearly can see how one mp-gunner reacts to approaching soldiers and promptly opens fire, killing one of his own partisans. Note also how he changes his aim as new partisan soldiers arrive. So he is aiming for their actual physical presence.
 
Edit: It seems that the situation like in scene 2 can only happen if there is some kind of enemy activity or threat possible. So if the unit has been or is in some kind of danger, under fire or is firing itself, then there is the possibility of friendly fire. If no "threat" is near, it will not trigger, as it seems for now.
That makes about sense because you may have several casualties alone if some maniacs would shoot each other every now and then on the way to the front. But there has to be done several tests more to be more specific (or some bfc members could clear it up immediately, no ?! )

So now I made a short clinical test via the editor. Again there are partisans, again it is around 21:30 in July. It is dark but not to dark. No planes available this time.
However there are some germans around of which only one straggler group can be seen by the partisans. They shot up some of the partisans so don´t you wonder the dead bodies. The germans have tight cover arcs, so they are unable to participate in any kind of firefight. The partisans however are free to shoot anything they like...
And I don´t have to wait long for the first results. In the first case I wanted to see if area fire has an effect on passing infantry, so I fired on the single house, while part of the formation is passing by.
In the second scene you clearly can see how one mp-gunner reacts to approaching soldiers and promptly opens fire, killing one of his own partisans. Note also how he changes his aim as new partisan soldiers arrive. So he is aiming for their actual physical presence.
 
Edit: It seems that the situation like in scene 2 can only happen if there is some kind of enemy activity or threat possible. So if the unit has been or is in some kind of danger, under fire or is firing itself, then there is the possibility of friendly fire. If no "threat" is near, it will not trigger, as it seems for now.
That makes about sense because you may have several casualties alone if some maniacs would shoot each other every now and then on the way to the front. But there has to be done several tests more to be more specific (or some bfc members could clear it up immediately, no ?! )

I noticed this a while ago, note the incident in the below link is not caused by area fire but an intentionally targeting friendly troops.
 
https://community.battlefront.com/topic/138840-night-combat-friendly-fire-casualty-caused-by-hmg/

Here are some of my screenshots from recent battles...

Here are some of my screenshots from recent battles...

Well things I do constantly, despite telling myself I wouldn´t do this nexttime:
1.) Underestimating the spread of mortars (or arty in general). Therefore preventable friendly fire instances happen again and again.
2.) Forgetting to clear line of fire for canons/autocanons. For example my own infantry lay low in a forest line and directly behind them stands my Shilka. Those fools will almost always get peppered with small fragments as soon as the Shilka accidentally hits those trees, while engaging an enemy behind the treeline.  😅
 
But for my biggest mistake I have to explain further:
Red on Red engagement (syria) early in the morning, so visuals are bad (for those who dont have night vision equipment). I had a full company of T62MV. My opponent had something around a platoon of T90 lurking behind a small ridge. The firing distance was very short.
Me, somehow in strong belief that this black smoke from the soviet style tanks are somewhat multispectral blocking, letting those T62 build up a smoke wall to negate the T90s night fighting ability/thermal sensors. As I carefully planned and sent the turn to my opponent signs of misbelief grew inside me. So I looked up the facts in the forum and was totally shocked to read that my "knowledge" was false.
So the next turn I witnessed the best turkey shooting those T90 crews would have in a lifetime. Only one of my T62 could penetrate the smoke wall and demolish a T90 as it tried to reposition itself. But this T62 died the heroic death too soon after. God that was embarassing.

Well things I do constantly, despite telling myself I wouldn´t do this nexttime:
1.) Underestimating the spread of mortars (or arty in general). Therefore preventable friendly fire instances happen again and again.
2.) Forgetting to clear line of fire for canons/autocanons. For example my own infantry lay low in a forest line and directly behind them stands my Shilka. Those fools will almost always get peppered with small fragments as soon as the Shilka accidentally hits those trees, while engaging an enemy behind the treeline.  😅
 
But for my biggest mistake I have to explain further:
Red on Red engagement (syria) early in the morning, so visuals are bad (for those who dont have night vision equipment). I had a full company of T62MV. My opponent had something around a platoon of T90 lurking behind a small ridge. The firing distance was very short.
Me, somehow in strong belief that this black smoke from the soviet style tanks are somewhat multispectral blocking, letting those T62 build up a smoke wall to negate the T90s night fighting ability/thermal sensors. As I carefully planned and sent the turn to my opponent signs of misbelief grew inside me. So I looked up the facts in the forum and was totally shocked to read that my "knowledge" was false.
So the next turn I witnessed the best turkey shooting those T90 crews would have in a lifetime. Only one of my T62 could penetrate the smoke wall and demolish a T90 as it tried to reposition itself. But this T62 died the heroic death too soon after. God that was embarassing.

Here are some of my screenshots from recent battles...

Here are some of my screenshots from recent battles...

Here are some of my screenshots from recent battles...

Here are some of my screenshots from recent battles...

Here are some of my screenshots from recent battles...

It is pretty rare in my games that I see one of those get fired. So I tend to forget them very quick. But when they do get fired I almost freak out.
Last time it was in CMRT: A little T70 rumbled against my Panther David vs Goliath style. I was very amused by the looks of it. The little bugger then fired it's canister and turned the head of the commander, who was still looking out of his hatch,  into Swiss cheese. 
Panicked and shocked the driver hit the reverse only to drive its side right into the cross hair of a T34/85...well.... 
But in general it looks scarier than it is in my opinion. At least infantry in cover (forests, buildings) don't get that affected by it, though they are Instantly pinned or worse. 
I guess the most effective use is to hit infantry in the open, especially if they are on the move or at least standing or kneeling. 

Hello there guys and girls,
I was informed by 2 people that there might be an error with the CMRT demo file in the battlefront database.
They tried to unpack the downloaded file but failed to do so.
 
So I downloaded the demo myself (3 times now) and tried to unpack the file. It gets started as you would expect but after file "CMRT_Demo_Setup-1e.bin" my system tells me that 2 more files are damaged. (see attachement)
I´ve tried it 2 times even with deactivated active antivir protection, just to be sure. But it was of no help.
How to best contact BFC that they can fix this problem ? Or are we doing something wrong somehow ?🤔
 
Besides: I tried the exact same procedure with the demo of CMBN, CMFI, CMFB and CMSF2 (guess I have to much freetime ). All of them worked fine so far.