Heinrich505

Really good read. Thanks for posting this. Heinrich505

George MC, Ach, a wee one. Lets see...sleepless nights, "me" time for mom, "It's your turn to feed/change him/her." Some of the highlights, eh? Wouldn't trade those memories for anything. Congratulations on the baby. Just don't blink. They grow so fast and next thing you know, they have their own family and you wonder where the time went. And yes, start the wee one early on CM. Mine never took to board games like ASL. ;-( Heinrich505

IICptMillerII, Does it make a difference on the fleeing behavior if you are playing at different skill levels? Will this behavior be exhibited to the same extent if you are playing Iron or Elite? I apologize if I missed it earlier in the thread. I just went back through and didn't see mention of the level of play for your side-by-side. The reason I mention this is that I've been playing at Elite against the AI in all the games, and sometimes I see the entrenched enemy flee right away in 4.0 but sometimes they don't. I just finished a vicious campaign battle in CMBN playing Elite and I pasted a town with offboard artillery, the heavy stuff. Several turns passed where the arty was hitting the town and various buildings. I figured the 4.0 effect would have the town vacated by this time. But, when I started assaulting the town, there were plenty of enemy defenders waiting for me. Yes, I found some were behind buildings but many more were still in the buildings. I had trouble taking the town. I thought I would ask. Sorry if I missed where you mentioned the play level. Heinrich505

+1 Directing and editing were superb. Yes, Rylance was most impressive. Heinrich505

I'll add that it was an exceptional film. As Erwin said, "an art war film." Very well done. Kenneth Branagh plays his part so well in the movie. Highly recommended. Heinrich505

Erwin, Quite understand. I worked out of Seattle and lived in Tacoma, Washington for 10 years. I know all about gloomy and cold, icy rain. Was there for five days before I realized there was a huge volcanic mountain - Mt. Ranier - looming over us, because it was so cloudy and rainy. That mountain is so beautiful, when you can see it. Just amazing. As for Operation Clipper, lots of rain, clouds, muddy terrain, and Gloom. But, it is a really cool campaign. I'm pretty sure you would burn out after the first few battles, but I highly recommend it. Heinrich505

Erwin, Dragonwynn's Operation Clipper is pretty amazing too. Heinrich505

Splinty, Thanks for the kind words. Always appreciated. Heinrich505

IanL, You are quite right. The crowd here will know the difference in how it is pronounced. I've always liked how it sounded, and it seemed an interesting way to distinguish the Commonwealth forces from the Americans they were supporting in this battle. When I looked up the ranks online, it was always spelled Lieutenant in literature, but I knew it was pronounced Leftenant. I'm glad you liked my choice of "literary license," heh heh. I couldn't find anything definitive about why it was pronounced differently, other than some vague references about trying to distance themselves from the French pronunciation of Lieutenant, that being "Loo" and the British going with "Left" to make it completely different from the French. Interesting stuff though. Glad y'all are enjoying these AARs. Heinrich505

John, Just checked it out. Pretty slick. Thanks for sharing. Heinrich505

Sgt. Squarehead, Glad you liked it. The Crocs are truly terrifying beasts and I've always wondered how armies assigned men to flamethrower duties. In the case of the man-packed ones, I think it usually came down to the biggest guy getting stuck with the job, because they were so heavy. But for armor, I wonder if the Croc crews were volunteers or just pulled from the next list and assigned there, whether they wanted it or not. I didn't know that about the spelling for Lieutenant for the Brits. I'd always figured it was spelled differently as well as pronounced differently. I wonder, should I spell it differently in these small vignettes or go back to the correct spelling and assume the reader will affect the correct pronunciation? Heinrich505

IanL, Thanks for the encouragement. It is always appreciated. Heinrich505

Dragonwynn, Thanks. Knew you'd like it. I'm gonna need all that fuel. The Germans are not giving up the trenches easily. Heinrich505

Pillbox At Beeck, Germany 1944 Damn this Seattle weather, he thinks to himself. Cold rain, geez how he hates it. Mike Ryan has grown up in the Pacific Northwest and feels he has had his share of cold miserable rain. When he was made a Lieutenant, he hoped he would be sent to the desert, or anyplace, for that matter, that didn’t remind him of wet, cold rainy forests. What does the Army do? Sends him to Europe. He gets the tail end of a summer and then…cold miserable rain and forests. Frigging Army. Figures. Lt. Ryan has gotten his platoon – well, most of it – into the wooded copse on the right flank. Beyond that is the ridgeline that he has orders to secure. It was harrowing getting across the open ground. He lost quite a few men to minefields and enemy fire in the process. His radioman and his second in command were both wounded, but they’ve stayed with him. He is cold, wet, tired and angry. He knows his men are too. They are trying to take the area around the lousy German town of Beeck. First Battalion, his, has the ridge line and Second Battalion gets the town. Everyone gets the cold rain and stinking mud. On their mad dash across the field he saw a British Churchill tank take two shells to the front, knocking it out. The shells came from the woods. He has steered his men into the woods away from where the enemy shells took out the tank. There has to be an AT gun in there somewhere. And now he sees what they are up against. A frigging pillbox with an AT gun sticking out of it. Damn their luck. Where are the engineers? he wonders. They were with his men when everyone started their rush across the open field. They got lost somewhere. He turns to his wounded command staff, telling them to get word to bring up the engineers. There are plenty of tanks all around but they are apparently worried about something up on the ridge, so they stopped to concentrate their fire. The men know what comes next. Their Lieutenant orders them to break up into small groups and start moving towards the pillbox. They are wet, cold, and miserable. They grudgingly comply, but only because it is LT Ryan. Anyone else…well, they’d be dragging their feet. The word goes out that engineers are being summoned, so there is hope they won’t actually have to assault the damn pillbox. Sgt. Voight quickly moves out first, bending his squad around to the flank of the pillbox. His men smile to one another. Because he moved them out so fast, the other teams will have to move to their right, directly at the maw of the pillbox. Sgt. Faulkner slithers through the heavy underbrush, leading his small group and getting fairly close to the front slit of the pillbox. His thought is that he might be able to toss a grenade through the opening, but the heavy underbrush and thick trees will make that a risky move at best. At worst, suicide. As if the gun crew was reading his mind, the enemy cannon opens up, the shells going over his head and exploding further behind him. He hears screams and knows that other teams have been hit. Men are yelling for medics. He holds his position, waiting for further orders. LT Ryan had finally located the engineers and sent them forward. There must have been too much movement in the woods, as the AT gun spoke and broke the assault, for now. As Ryan’s hearing comes back to him from the near miss explosions from the enemy cannon, Bradley, his second in command, is gesturing wildly. Now Ryan hears it. It is a damn tank. Miracles do sometimes happen, he thinks. The tank is one of those wild contraptions the Brits are so fond of. This one is pulling a trailer. He is not sure what that is for – maybe extra shells – but he could care less. A tank means he has a chance to save his men from some crazy assault that has only a small chance of success. Leftenant Lear has seen the wild arm gestures from a large crowd of Yanks at the back edge of the woods on the right flank. He knows exactly what they want. They want the Brits to bail them out of some tight fix, as usual. He orders Stanley, his driver, to veer away from their present course, that being their attempt to stalk a Panther on the ridge. Lear is sometimes referred to by his crew as “King” Lear because he reads Shakespeare in what little free time he has between battles. Lear has confidence in the armor of his Churchill VII Flamethrower tank. But, he’s seen Panthers do some nasty things to tanks of all sorts, so this little “diversion” might be a good idea. Gets them out of the nasty line of fire for a moment, eh wot? The Leftenant knows that there is a lethal gun of some sort in the woods. He saw Artie “buy it” on the right flank as his Churchill was gaffed by heavy AT fire earlier. Now he wants payback. Artie was a good bloke. He hopes the Yanks will provide some covering fire as Stanley crunches their tank over a wall and steers into the wood along a small path. “Stay close to the Yanks,” Lear tells Stanley. “We don’t want any surprises from Jerry.” Stanley steers slowly down the wooded path, trusting his fellow crewmen to direct him around the squishy friendlies. Stanley has a terrible fear of crushing soldiers of his side – he has no problem driving over Germans though, living or otherwise. The tracks start to slip. Dammit, no bogging, not now! thinks Lear, as his stomach starts to rise up his throat. “Stanley,” he cautions in a low tone. “No problem,” Stanley calls back on the intercom. Lear can see that Stanley is sweating more profusely than usual for the inside of their already warm tank. Stanley gently slips the gears back and forth and the tank suddenly lurches forward as the tracks make purchase. Just outside of the tank, Sgt. Voight’s men see what is about to happen. Gus is directly in the path of the tank and his buddies scream at him to get up and move. He has time. “Move Gus, DO IT NOW!” Surely he has to know the huge tank is right behind him. Gus is actually paralyzed with fear, shaking uncontrollably and unable to make his arms and legs move. Stanley banks the tank to the right slightly to get away from the soft ground that bogged them momentarily. He can’t hear the Yanks screaming to get his attention, as he has engaged the lower gear and the roar makes it hard to hear anything on the intercom as well. Now Gus manages to get out a high pitched scream but it is too late. The tank rolls right over him, the forty-ton monster mashing him into the mud. He turned his head at the last minute and that saves his life. Incredibly, Stanley has managed to steer his tank over Gus, with the treads coming inches away from tearing him apart. Instead, he is squashed into the mud and with his head turned sideways, his mouth is still above the mud. Gus stops screaming and concentrates on breathing and surviving. Eddie Fox, the flame operator, starts smacking Stanley in the arm, yelling for him to stop. Eddie sees the pillbox, directly ahead and maybe around 30 yards shy. They don’t usually get this close, but the underbrush and overhanging trees were blocking their vision. Leftenant Lear can just barely see the pillbox through overhanging branches from his elevated position in the turret. He trusts Fox to stop them when necessary for matters involving their terrifying weapon. Lear’s gunner opens up with the machine gun in the turret. They have no bow machine gun as that is where the flame nozzle goes. He does this as ranging shots to give Fox an idea on how to arc the flames. “Do your worst, Red” Lear sings out on the intercom. They all call Fox “Red,” due to his flaming red hair. Fox gets to the task of unleashing Hell with brisk businesslike motions. He charges the fuel line and with practiced authority, he releases the fuel flow while triggering the igniter. Sgt. Faulkner sees a gout of flame launch from the British tank, splattering against the side of the German pillbox. Lear can feel the back-wash of heat from the ignited propellant at his station well back in the tank turret. He wonders how Fox can handle the heat, sitting right behind the nozzle and controlling the spray of fuel. What none of the crew know, or will ever know, is that Fox is silently mouthing a prayer for those about to die and asking for Divine Forgiveness for his actions. It is how he keeps from going insane from seeing the horror he unleashes every time he ignites the fuel. In the space of mere seconds flaming death splashes against the side of the German pillbox. Fox moves the nozzle slightly and the flames wash towards the opening where the gun protrudes. Feldwebel Griess hears a peculiar hissing sound and his last coherent thought is wondering what is making that sound. The front opening of the pillbox suddenly lights up with an unholy brilliance as heat, followed by hideous flame, washes into the pillbox a second later. The hungry golden flames slosh through the pillbox slit, sucking all the oxygen from inside the enclosure, and igniting the Feldwebel and the closest men to the gun. They have just enough time to scream in agonizing pain… …when the ammunition stacked near the gun goes off in a massive explosion. The air vents are blown out and the entire crew is consumed with the explosion. It is all over in seconds. LT Ryan watches the explosion, along with the wounded members of his command staff. He is very pleased with the results of the British tanks flame attack. It has saved the lives of many of his platoon. He glances to his left and sees two of his men who were not lucky this time. Sgt. Voight’s men have all ducked when the pillbox exploded. They watch silently as flames roar from the vents on the top of the pillbox and from the rear door that was ripped open in the blast. One of the men whispers, almost reverently, “What a hellova way to buy it.” They did hear the screams. Several of Gus’s buddies have pulled him from the slippery mud. They wipe him off as best they can. He is only slightly scraped and cut from the belly of the Crocodile, but his mind has stopped working. Two men walk him back to the back edge of the woods where they will flag down some medics to look after him. Gus has used up all his luck in one fell swoop. “Well done, Red,” Leftenant Lear congratulates his flame gunner. “Alright lads, it’s off to the next target. Stanley, see about steering us out of this forest, eh?” And as a cheerful afterthought, “Do be careful of the Yanks. They are everywhere.” Eddie Fox quickly and carefully wipes the tears from his eyes with his uniform sleeve. His fellow crewmates think he is just wiping the sweat from his face from the backwash of heat. Then he sets about re-pressuring the fuel hose and resetting the igniter. It is better to keep busy than to relive the horrifying visions he sees on a regular basis. The war goes on. Heinrich505

Erwin, Still laughing. I was going to post something but hit enter before I typed anything. Then I couldn't figure out how to delete it. Ugh. Having trouble with Tinypics. I can't upload the screenshots for a short vignette I just put together. Tinypics won't upload my shots. Kind of frustrated. Heinrich505

MOS:96B2P, Hah, I played that map a while back. My Brits went right up that hill too. Ah, but not NATO Brits. The lads had Brens. If only I'd had a Bradley...would have made the battle so much easier, haha. Nice conversion. Heinrich505

Dragonwynn, I sent you a PM. Heinrich505

Dragonwynn, This looks really great. I've downloaded it and am looking at it for now. Since my name came up in the named units on the left flank, I'll have to play this one to see if my character survives, haha. Your work on this is impressive, as usual. The designer notes are huge too. Very nicely done. I am still working my way through Operation Clipper so I won't get to this right away. Clipper is keeping me totally involved. That is such an excellent piece of work as well. Damn pillboxes and soggy ground. There is a trail of immobilized tanks across the map. That should give you a clue on which battle I'm fighting, heh heh. Didn't want to give away too much in case someone was reading and might want to take a crack at that CMBN campaign. Thanks for so much hard work and effort on these campaigns. They are truly a labor of love for this game system. Heinrich505

The release of Hell on Earth. Heinrich505

Mark, Nice shots. Interesting composition. Heinrich505

Pericles, Very nice. Fun to watch, even with the garish greens. I played the battle before seeing this. I wanted to get my own first impression. Ended up pretty much like you - but my casualties were higher. I cleared the orchard finally, after walking my lads into a vicious ambush. It was ugly. I took the farmhouse and started to advance a little, but all my armored cars were dispatched by that blasted enemy gun or some really good panzerschrek gunners. Dang it. Thanks for putting this together. It was a tough battle. Heinrich505

Dragonwynn, Glad you enjoyed it. Your campaign is excellent. The battle is still going on. After all the Major's grousing about bogging, Major Semken's driver managed to mire his tank several minutes later and they are out of the battle...unless there is another tank rush on their flank, in which case they'll be sitting ducks. Corporal Kevin "Killer" Ward's Firefly is still in the game. They have slowed up their advance and are waiting for the left flank to reduce some big AT guns there. Heinrich505

Sgt. Squarehead, I love it. Heaven help us all if I ever do a story with a Scottish unit. Heinrich505

NPye, Stunning. Your work is really amazing. So nicely done. Can't wait to start setting up ambushes for the Russian tanks, heh heh. Some of my favorite battles in CM1 were the desperate struggles in and around Berlin. Really looking forward to this. Still enjoying your stellar work with Stalingrad. Heinrich505