A Canadian Cat

Yeah s**t happens. Upon reflection for clarity we are talking about one HEAT round that hit and did not penetrate. One Stu42 was out of HEAT and the other one had 2 and its first round missed. I have had lots of good luck with 105 Sherman HEAT rounds - ironically against Stugs. So I am not down on HEAT in general - just frustrated that me perfect ambush did not work out. Agreed, and even though there is a current thread (that I added my 2 cents to) discussing the problems of urban combat, those Fausts and Shreks can be nasty in those environments too. In fact right now I am hoping that will save my face here. If I can get a significant force into the town and engage his tanks at close quarters with all the Shreks I have. I could make this interesting again. Yeah, it is pretty awesome. He often says he has more fun talking about it than playing. There are three of us that play CM and work here. Still working on the third guy to move him up to CM2x. We had a good laugh this morning because he was pointing out that in all our previous games I have kicked his butt; here we are in our first public game and he is the one taking names. Yes, that was my lame attempt at feeling better for getting my butt handed to me.

LOL - people are looking at me funny here at work.... No, no, no because I am laughing at my monitor.

Yes, your men will align up along the wall right now using the face command. What these guys want is a way to order your guys to either: Hug the wall and stay out of sight Hug the wall and look / shoot around the corner I will refrain from commenting on how the UI should express such a thing but will say that this would be an excellent Tac AI enhancement.

Those creek photos look *awesome*. Please, tell us how that was made.

I have not tried this yet - since I am not at home. But can I get a translation - what are "doodads" in this context? Are you referring to flavour objects? Or are they something else?

Good - hopefully I will not run into frame rate issues but it is not as big as this game I am playing now so hopefully I'll be OK. Yeah I just had coffee with Dungeon Tiger - man we talk to much sometimes - but it is fun to talk about the game. And you are right the tanks have taken crew casualties. As for HE vs HEAT. I think one of the Stu42s had two rounds but the other might have been out. Anyway the one that did have HEAT did connect with one of them (first shot was high) and it did *not* get a penetration. According to DT it was the shrek round that caused the most damage. He let slip that an Achilles had eyes on my ambush force - not good for me. One of the best parts of this game is how little you know about the shape and make up of the other guys forces. Don't tell your opponent stuff after all - loose lips sink ships. I really like Stugs, whenever I face them they shrug off so many rounds and they have such a low profile that they are hard to hit sometimes. They have served me well many times too. And I am not really having a problem with their survivability in this game it is there inability to kill Churchills that is causing me concern. I agree regarding the Firefly and the Panther's 75 HE and those 88s *are* damn scary. I have occasionally seen Shermans take a one or two hits form 75s but I have never seen one survive a hit from an 88.

Yeah I have a lot of respect for Churchill tanks and even more now. I have to admit I a feeling like I brought a knife to a gun fight though. Regarding Cromwells: I agree they die easily. But they are amazingly fast. I have a few in a QB I am fighting now. They raced a head of my Shermans and took up an excellent position that surprised my opponent. They did a lot of damage by being in the right place fast. That is there advantage. Interesting I am starting the gateway right now - I hope I fair better. In this game I sometimes get down in the 8-10 frames per second range when there are a lot of ground and lots of vehicles in view. The way I usually watch the frame rate usually stays in the 14-20 range which is reasonably playable.

Oh I know. They each had two HEAT rounds. All four used up to no effect - except a TC kill. I was hoping for a HEAT kill since the Stugs 75mm guns have had so much trouble with the Churchill tanks. That's why I sent the 42s around to hit them from the rear. My Stugs have been pounding Churchills and not getting KOs. If you look back in the thread you will see an earlier encounter where a Churchill survived 22 hits from Stugs before finally being destroyed by the 23rd.

At this point I am very concerned. I ambushed those Churchills almost perfectly and dealt them 6 or 7 hits. Not a scratch. Sure, I killed a tank commander who did not button up fast enough but I cannot win this game killing one crew man at a time. I do not get it what do I have to do to put down Churchill tanks!

At the bridge head the platoon will finish their advance to the treeline while the other prong of the advance will move to the other edge of the field. Since that mortar team still cannot see anything useful – reposition them again. Tighten the noose on those two Churchill tanks. The nearby Stugs are going to move to a hull down position behind a rise in the field while the Shrek team moves through the trees. At the same time the remaining Stug will move forward to avoid falling prey to the Achilles on the other side of the valley plus they will hug the treeline and try to get some protection.

The trap has been sprung. I am not a happy commander. The two Churchill tanks took multiple hits – none penetrating. None penetrating – again! The ambush looked flawless. The Stu42s came out of the woods and hit both Churchill tanks from behind. The first one hit moved away – towards my Shrek team but the other one stood its ground and took a pounding while it dispatched one of the Stugs. The Churchill tank the moved forward came very close to my scout team but the Shrek team behind them did not get a shot. Meanwhile over by the bridge more hell was unleashed on my platoon and Panthers moving to the tree line. The Panther took two penetrating hits with little damage and no casualties. Good thing some of my AFVs can take a pounding. The Panthers did manage to take out a couple of more armoured cars. The platoon took quite a few casualties but two squads almost made it to the tree line before the minute ran out.

The other issue with urban fighting is the problem with area fire. The fact that you can only area fire to the centre of an action square is ok when visibility is not tunneled down streets. But it becomes an issue when you cannot target the front of buildings two or three doors down. Clearly your men and or tanks can see the front of the building down the street but you will not be able to target them because the neighboring building blocks your LOS to the *centre* of the further building's actions square. This leads to frustrating occurrences when you have tank support and your infantry are clearing building by building. Your tanks cannot effectively suppress the occupants of the building down the street while your men move to the next house. Further more if the enemy is at the windows firing and your tank spots them the enemy can be fired at. So your tank has LOF to the font of the building down the street while the enemy are up and shooting but as soon as they duck you cannot fire at the front of that building any longer. Even though you know they are there because you were just shooting at them.

Indeed there are issues to deal with in an urban setting. I had an example of "you cannot give the right order" just yesterday. My opponent had a tank sitting in a back yard for several minutes. This tank had no infantry screen to speak of and I managed to work a team around behind and to its left side. Of course the moment they were in position and were given the order to pounce bad things happened. What I wanted to order was to sneak around that building behind the tank and close assault it from behind. But all I could actually order was a series of way points that went around a building and up behind the tank. The trouble was that the tank started moving backwards. So, my men instead of sneaking up behind the tank ran down the street right past it to where the tank used to be. As soon as they were in front of the tank they were spotted an gunned down. What should have happened, since the tank moved back towards them while they were behind the building, was step out from the building and take that sucker out. I know this is a hard problem. I would like to see work done in this area. After all what self respecting soldier would run in front of an enemy tank when you were already behind it.

5 Company’s 1 Platoon HQ tries again to call in some 81mm mortar fire on top of a Churchill tank. They tried to call off board 81mm but it was out of range. I have never seen that before but I guess if you are playing on such a large map it can happen. Anyway calling it from one of 5 Company’s own mortars is in range. One prong from the bridge head is set to advance to the nearby tree line. Here is the Churchill trap. On the left you can see the infantry moving up in the tree line. I have them being fairly aggressive but staying in the trees. With any luck the Churchill tanks will focus on them. While the two Stu42s on the right will break the tree line behind the Churchill tanks and then 10s later the two Stugs will crest the hill and come at them from the side. I really hope this goes well.

One more quiet turn; things will heat up again next turn. There is some excitement this turn. One of my Panthers advancing from the bridge head spots an Achilles and puts a hole in it. They see some crew get hit but the AFV is still operating as it backs behind the railway track and disappears. Meanwhile on the other side of the map The Churchill tanks 3 Battery have been working to flank spots my scouts and takes a pot shot. The Scouts are saved by a tree. Shortly after that the Shreck team trailing the scouts takes a shot. This time it is the Churchill that is saved by the tree. This is a good thing because those Churchill tanks are no paying attention to the wrong thing. While they are focusing on my infantry they are about to be surprised by two Stugs and two Stu42s from 3 Battery. Next turn is going to be interesting.

I just posted some screen shots and video of a German 81mm mortar team doing it in CMBN. They responded on their own when the Bren carrier approached. http://www.battlefront.com/community/showpost.php?p=1399471&postcount=631

In a battle that I managed to get a draw in (but it felt more like I lost badly) my opponent sent a Bren carrier forward towards my forward units. This mortar team acted on its own to stop the advance. Bren Carrier firing on my men. 81mm mortar rounds landing Video available here: http://youtu.be/VU58hru2NR4

With what little information you have given it is hard to help you. One thing that strikes me as a possibility is: Have you ordered the mortar to deploy? The mortar team cannot fire the mortar until it is setup. On the special command menu there is a deploy order. I usually select the final way point and then toggle the deploy order on.

Two Panthers, pictured here, heading towards the woods to bolster 1 and 2 Company’s strength, for an eventual assault on the town. The artillery is 5 minutes out still which should be enough time for them to arrive. Hunting forward to check for scouts, my teams found no additional enemy scouts in their neck of the woods. Minute 1:31 Orders: The Stu42s are almost in position. Next turn I will likely order that they pounce. 5 Company’s mortar team still cannot see that Churchill. Try repositioning one more time. Advancing through the field.

A team from 1 Company are ordered to sweep the woods where the scout team were spotted to clear out any other enemy scouts. Slight change of plans: It looks like the flanking members of 3 Battery can get behind the Churchill tanks. There is no one near their current position. Two Stu42s are sent to the rear of the Churchill tanks and the Stugs get ready behind the crest of the hill. 5 Company’s mortar team shift over to see if they can get eyes on the Churchill.

One of 5 Company’s mortar teams sets up but does not see the Churchill. In the woods the lead Stug spots and dispatches a loan scout. On the right flank elements of 3 Battery are ready to pounce on the Churchill tanks they are trying to flank.

+1 very happy to see the fixes int he list. @Vanir Ausf - they need to keep some bugs to work on:)

Yep - I feel the same way. I am sure you guys are using more reputable sites but the last two times I have been infected with a Trojon horse was due to similar sites (once was my son and once was my own fault). When I end up on a site that makes it hard to identify the real link vs the stuff I don't want or worse: my opening position is to close the site and revisit if I really want the software. Since this came from BFC I felt safe enough figuring out what to click on. Honestly though, I would rather pay more for the original game so I can download from a BFC server. Really I mean it

LOL, don't feel overwhelmed just work one model at at time. We will wait:-)

I like your plan - bold but not insane. I am looking forward to how it will turn out.