costard

Genuinely confused here Vark - GaJ is like a mouthbreeding African fish?

Kettles, Tooze does read and cite Speer - and goes on to debunk his representation of the facts with reference to numbers and performance results of industry in the Reich. The facts turn out to be that Speer makes the most of an opportunity to self-promote (and, given the context of a leadership group of corrupt self-promoters, his actions can hardly be seen as surprising), just in time to reap the rewards of his predecessor's efforts. (I think the legal mechanism was a centralisation of control of production, a power base within the Reich leadership was created and sold to Speer). The idea that Speer mis-represents the facts, and represents himself in the same corrupt, self-promoting fashion after the war as he did before and during (remember, this is what the leadership selection process was in the reality of the Reich Mk3), is not a terribly difficult one to get your head around, surely? I reckon you're on the money with the cost benefits of the plate armour. Rolled mild steel is a one-factory job - the rolling mill (usually sited next to a foundry). Ship it from there to the front lines and the workshops on the ground can use it as necessary. Mesh requires a further step in the manufacturing process, so at least one more shipment and handling step, before the end result is achieved. As for the costs of different units - no cost component listed for armament? On an AFV? Big rifled barrels cost heaps, and the bigger and better ones cost more (more strategic materials usage, higher quality processes and quality controls, more demand for quality in the personel managing the processes and controls.)

Thanks mate.

I seem to recall reading ("Wages of Destruction"?) that it was the lack of alloying materials (manganese, chromium, etc) combined with the need to address the vulnerability of the MkIV to ATRs that led to the sub-optimal solution of added schurtzen being implemented. The scarce resources were allocated to the MkV and VI production lines rather than upgrading the MkIV - the idea being that the MkIV would eventually be relegated to a junior role in operations. Tooze proposes that the operational requirements of the the Heer and the economic circumstances in Germany were such that they could not afford to retire the production of the MkIV (or the MkIII or the 38 for that matter), so these obsolescent models were still being produced and deployed at the end of the war (the same is true of their aircraft.)

all your privacy is belong to us.

The reality: longer battles, boredom, flies, only about 10% of the men on the battlefield actually firing their weapons with any effect, lower tolerance for casualties showing up in the unit global morale. Entertainment value close to zero. The game: battles compressed in time, ~80% of armed men firing to effect (100% less cowering/pinned/broken units), no flies. Entertainment value much, much higher.

KingLee, I'm not sure if this applies as I run a PC, but I've noticed that installing some games screws the global hotkeys setting for the machine: I've had MS Office pick up some weird changes that I couldn't fix, only get a work around. I suspect there's a lack of quality control in the coding - or a need for a standardised method of coding hotkeys (most likely there already is one that isn't being followed for licensing or patent reasons).

Come to think about it, it'd be a neat feature for real time too - "traverse fire along that ridge line/through that line of houses, etc. while I set up the assault". We could have a paint pen feature to decribe the duration and intensity of the directed fire - multiple heavy scribbles over a particular area = concentrated fire, wafting grazes for harrassment. The art of war...

Or you could just give real time a go.

Heh, the donkey got you coming and going Mr Emrys. That Michael should be sensible to the wishes of forum members is laudable - but he's just making the mess bigger by giving in to these just demands. I propose he remove himself, as well as his sigs, that we may all go back to being profoundly ignorant of a universe which allows an Emrys to exist and happier creatures thereby.

As far as the apparent discrepancy in spotting goes, it's probably worth remembering that Bil is actively seeking intelligence that he can then build a plan around - he's had eyes out from the very start, a deliberate and broad sampling of the map with particular attention paid to his Areas of Interest. This would seem to have paid dividends. GaJ, on the other hand, has been largely static and passive with his eyes - and he has fewer of them. A significant proportion of them are keyholed and of no real use for spotting - a bunker setup in the real world would have prepared fields of fire; grass removed, microrelief filled, shrubbery managed. To expect it to perform historically in this context is a little unrealistic. The map would seem large and rough enough that Bil is having little difficulty finding covered movement and this would also contribute to GaJ's understandable sense of WTF? However it plays out, I'm looking forward to seeing how Bil plans on taking out GaJ's Rangers, and his reaction when he finds out about them.

Nor with smoking hulks, for that matter. That is a twisted mind you got there, Scunthorpe Mule.

Watching the videos, the B10 was fired with the backblast going out of a large hole in a street-fronting wall and was set up to fire through two more large holes in walls: well keyholed. The weapon isn't in a contained space for backblast effects. In effect a fortification has been built to accommodate the weapon. The RPG was interesting - again being fired through a large hole in the wall (the top corner of the building was rubbled), masses of smoke and we didn't get a look at the operator after firing: the two guys you see going into that small space at the end of the clip could well have been looking to help an injured man. I don't see any evidence in the videos that care isn't being taken to significantly minimise the effects of backblast. This would lend itself to the hypothesis that backblast from these weapons is significant, and that operators of these weapons take care to employ the weapons in such a way as to avoid injuring themselves. That operators do injure themselves when they don't have the opportunity to get an optimum result (enemy kill + zero self-harm) would support the idea that operators do take on the risks of sub-optimum deployment in order to get a sub-optimum result (enemy kill plus self injury). Morale and experience ought to play a role, weapon type and relative chances of success do too. Add in varied terrain effects (hell does rain have an effect on the likelihood of a shell turning on armour? Why not? - add in weather effects too.) Now, build a code that does all this -um. Not me, I'll be happy if someone else does it, even pay them for their effort but I recognise that BF need to run a successful business and this effort might be considered at a lower priority than those posting here. Battlefront, fix or do sumfink!

3rd floor is twice as far away as 1st floor, and has two more ceilings between it and the 'splody thing. If they're consistently not doing their thing in this case - attacking from the third floor - I believe you might have a legitimate gripe. chaos49, why not try a test with crack/elite troops? Present the results and you're more likely to be listened to and have some influence on the design of the game. I think what you're seeing is mostly about pixeltruppen not always being prepared to die, or be brave: morale modelling. I might well be wrong... I often am.

The instinct for self preservation is modelled to some extent. 'splody things, paricularly big 'splody things, aren't nice at close range.

Good to see you up and working early every morning GaJ - cheers. This AAR is one of the highlights of my day. Larger calibre - smithereens for sure. 50mm into 300mm trunks, not so much I'm thinking.

One of the problems with having destructible trees - if you blow one over, it now provides cover and obscurance at a different level. For example, that Brummbar might not be able to see or fire at anything depending on how the tree fell (writing code for that would be wayyy down any priority list - just the thought of the complaints generated... ugh.) Not to mention pathing and vehicle damage diffculties.

More FOW means more reward for the effort of using a disciplined approach to intelligence gathering - I think we're all learning more than a little bit about that. Bil, do contact icons fade more quickly in higher difficulties? Do you lose track of stuff? Again, thanks for your work - great stuff.

Stone Soup, Rock Broth, Tea on the Tiber, Spaghetti and Meatballs?

China-India border: link

Non-performers in a given civil society are unlikely to perform in an organisation based around that civil society (shared language, myths, populace, etc). So, unless there is a deliberate selection process for manifestly pathological traits, you wouldn't expect there to be an over representation in the armed forces of sociopaths. The level of trust required to get people to do things that require that they put their lives at risk is such that the risk is mirrored - bad leaders get shot by their own troops, poor performers stay at the bottom rank or get shifted out (e.g. sent to combat infantry or jailed (or even shot) for cowardice). You could say that a selection process working against the manifestation of socio-pathological traits is present. A problem lies with the fact that most modern militaries are in fact "led" by politicians with their claim of representing the populace as a whole. Banking and politics is a whole 'nother world in terms of selection for sociopathic behaviours. So far.

John, what's their metallurgy like? Something that light throwing something that big is going to break sooner rather than later. I'd be leery of buying one second hand, or putting more than twenty rounds through it.

Thanks GAJ - I like the clock and the turn number, either/or both is great. Best of luck with the Elefant hunting, though it looks to me as though you have a .303 Enfield when you need a double barrel .470 Rigby (or quad .50s for all that. Dunno that there'd be much ivory left...)

When I was about thirteen. I read the first two books in two days, the first books I missed meals for. They also taught me to slow my reading down, look at all the writing, but that didn't happen until I was about twenty-two.

Well, we can't let that momentous news go unobserved. A light, airy waft of hope for sympathy, perhaps? Or, ugly thought, congratulations? Here's to the next 20 000, Merlin. God help us all.