Eddie

No longer active but still around.

I agree with Erwin and Pazuzusmiles. I wish you all the best in 2012.

Hi Vin, Thanks for posting this very extensive AAR. It is to bad the mission ended in a Tactical Defeat. Despite this result I think you enjoyed the mission since you played it to the very end, even when you knew you would not win. The Americans had overwhelming numbers in men and material, and they used some good tactics as well. I know there was a failed artillery strike on WN 411c earlier in the mission. Had this strike been succesfull the battle could have ended in another way. I think you did not do bad at all. I'm going to watch your videos now. Thanks a lot for making these, and for describing the events at the different objectives!

To Fredrock1957: I checked my file and the HQ's in the NW were clocked on 3:00 hours playing time. So I don't understand what happened. I'm beginning to have doubts if I send Vin the completed file. Anyway, I have got to stop saving the same missions under different names. But I wont make any changes to the file. I'm glad you enjoyed the fight and thanks for the compliments. To Sakai007: Thanks for posting your AAR, and I'm not laughing at you because of the difficulty level you were playing the mission. Your explanation for playing on that level makes perfect sence to me. You had 45 more points then the computerplayer, and Fredrock1957 had 30 points more. So you have scored 15 points more, this would make the difference between a Tactical Victory and a Major Victory. I see you have used your recon units in the right way by letting them pinn down the Muja's while calling arty on them at the same time. The opening bombardment should give random result, at least it did during testing. Sometimes a few casualties would occur, the other times there were no casualties at all. So I guess you had some bad luck with this. I understand the Muja's did their best to capture that Eagles Nest, but your defending skills made this impossible. You have made the opposing force pay dearly for trying to capture that hilltop. Congratulations on your victory.

Thanks for the feedback on this mission. Fredrock1957: good work! Only four men killed and two wounded, you got a better result then I did myself. Thanks for posting your AAR. You say the HQ's appeared as reinforcements? How can this be?:confused: This was not supposed to happen, I will take a look and see if I made a mistake somehow. No need to thank me for creating this mission, you are welcome. By the way, Vin suggested the idea for this mission so he deserves credits as well. Erwin, I agree with you. Fredrock1957 scored more then twice the points then the computerplayer, so this tactical victory should be a minor victory at least.

It could be you only selected the description "1st Platoon Air Assault, 2nd Platoon Air Assault or 3rd Platoon Air Assault" of the 9th Company in the list of Activated Troops. In this case one can read that these units have a "Full" headcount. If one opens one of the platoons and selects any of the squads, Rifle teams or HQ's it will turn out the units have a headcount of 50%, well, this should be so anyway. So all units on the map already have a 50% headcount at the beginning of the mission. I agree with you on this one.

If the headcount for a unit is set to 50% it seems to me the ammo load out is about one third of the original, in this case anyway. The Soviets had only 38 men left when this attack started so I had to cut the size of the purchased units in half to get to that number. Maybe I could have tried to do this in another way since I did not take into account this much loss of ammuntion for the HMG's. But you were wise to set small cover arcs as you will need your ammo. And thanks for the compliments on the map!

Your scenario has a start time of 17:00 on July?:confused: I checked my file and it says 7 Januari, so I don't know what happened here. Anyway, I have used some other information for this battle then wikipedia. According to this information there was one attack at 15:30, one at 16:10, one at 17:35 and the main attack took place at 19:10. I used the last time at first since this is the attack that I attempted to simulate. But the Soviets (player forces) could not see anything coming because of darkness. The same goes for the computerplayer forces. So I had to change the time. Since there has already been some fighting before this mission there should be less ammo for some units. So Fredrock1957 is right on the 50% headcount and thus low ammo.

You are all welcome. I hope you will enjoy or have enjoyed the mission.

I meant discuss ofcourse.

Yes, this was the intention, the mission is meant to be an infantrybattle mainly, with support of tanks and artillery. If you come to the conclusion some things in the mission should, or could be improved just let me know and we can disuss the matter if you wish.

You are welcome, and you are right.

Well, a little bigger and a serious outift actually.

:cool: Hi Phantom Captain, That is a nice collection of automatic rifles you have there. I would like to have these too. Do you think it is possible one could order them via the Internet and have them shipped over by special delivery (or something) to Europe? But seriously, you have got some beautifull rifles in your collection. And you just may have inspired me to make another CMA mission in the near future. It probably will involve more units then one company though, which I know you prefer. But you could always give it a try.

I my reply of yesterday I did not mean to say you managed to neutralize all BDF tanks in the first minute but indeed just that first wave. I did not look close enough to see this sentence could also be interpreted as if I meant to say you managed to destroy every BDF tank on the map in one minute. I agree with you on this. Maybe it should be more like taking an educational test, the more difficult it is the harder it should be judged and vice versa which affects the endresults in a certain way. I totally get your position on the campaigns. And I think you are right to say there are actually three battles taking place in one mission and this could give you the idea that you are not just playing one mission but some sort of campaign. Very usefull and timesparing information, thank you!

I must have been distracted while watching that video because I really thought the sniper hit two targets, but I'm sure you are right it were three. And don't worry about the limited view, it was real fun to watch the clip. I understand your hesitation, you had already suffered enough casualties while capturing the Right flank. I think I would have done the same thing. If you managed to neutralize all the BDF tanks in the first version even when plaing real-time, this confirms their orders were no good. So I'm glad you also think their orders have improved in the second version. You are welcome! So I did not surprise you with this script in such a way that it caused you any serious problems? D..n, then I failed miserably in my plans...:mad: Ha, you have had your share of trouble in this mission allright... You are most welcome, and I did not know that playing on a certain difficultylevel could influence the calculations of the endresult. Anyway I really think you did a good job playing the mission the way you did. Is this a good or a bad ? And thanks for sharing the information how to make combinations with mods. Placing an extra Z folder in the Z folder to use sound mods is something I never heard off and I'm going to try this too.

I just took a closer look and saw that you managed to secure objective Center, destroyed unit objectives 1,3, 4 and 6 completely, unit objective 5 apperently was partly destroyed and you failed to destroy unit objective 2. You also managed to achieve the parameters for enemy casualties and for friendly condition. You had a total of 73 points and the BDF had a total of 70 points, who by the way failed on all objectives: ground, targets and parameters. Since you scored three points more then the computerplayer (73 vs 70) I think you have won this mission by a very narrow margine, despite the software calculating a draw. I think you did a great job on this tough mission, congratulations!

Battlegroup Ivanov 1.1 AAR Part 3 - the Last 30 minutes plus 8 minutes overtime Because of the size of the map and the impossibility to use the APC's to transport your units I can understand why the soldiers were exhausted or fatigued at a certain point in the mission. I think you made a good decision to keep your tanks and APC's where they were because if you had lost more of them you would have certainly lost the battle as there are unit-objectives. And as I understand the BDF tanks moved into a death trap you setup for them, very clever. I advanced to about the same point you did in the trenches. My units came under fire from the enemy's mortars and I had to withdraw them for a while but could easily move back into the position I occupied before. From there I did the same thing you did and just let the infantry stay where they were to defend the ground captured. I watched your video and if I counted correctly your units took out three of the defending forces in the trenches without taking any casualties. And I really liked the crackling of machinegunfire and explosions in the background. B Company Infantry - Hill 232 I'm glad to read the HMG gunner was doing the best he could to keep your forces from advancing toward the three buildings. When you posted your AAR of the first hour some weeks ago I thought that I left a huge gap in the defensive lines of the BDF which would allow the player to easily move toward Hill 232 without being engaged. Your decision to let B-Company cross the river and to try and attack the BDF from the back turned out to be a good one. You managed to get B-Company in a safe position and engage the BDF from there, well done! I liked the video with the sniper taking out his two targets, but the video with the soldier throwing a handgrenade toward the trench I liked even more, this was some excellent combatfootage! I think you were right to give B-Company a break as they served you well. Their mission was to cover the road toward Ikashim with their ATGM's but you gave them the extra task of capturing the buildings near the road on Hill 232 and attack the BDF trenhces from the back. So I think the survivors of that company deserved to just hold out in the buildings until the battle ended. A Company Infantry/All Armor Platoons - Ikashim/Right Flank/Center So even after one hour had expired the BDF units still had the spirit to engage your BTR and managed to disable and destroy it. And you certainly did take a huge chance with the BMP. I think it was a brave move but, just as you thought yourself, without to much chance of succes. If the rough ground would not have been there the BMP could even have made it to the command center but unfortunatly it did not. So you took two chances and unfortunatly both failed, this makes perfectly clear that the BDF was really well prepared for an invasion from the USSR in this valley. Yes, the tank is positioned in such a way that it is rather difficult to get a shot at it with your tanks as it will most probably hit and destroy your armor first. This indeed leaves the player with the possibilty to send in RPG soldiers which you did, but in the end this turned out to be an impossible task for them. To bombard the tank with your artillery is the same thing I did but I ordered the artillerystrike before entering Ikashim with commanding units of A-Company when they detected the tank on their approach of Objective Center. There are so many places for the BDF units to hide in Ikashim and the Right flank so it is very difficult to detect them all and secure the objectives. But you did manage to take out all defenders on the Right flank except for the one you mentioned which prevented you from securing that objective. Ha, if that's not frustrating I don't know what is. The same goes ofcourse for the lone BDF tankcrew member who was hiding in some remote corner. It is nice to read the BDF armor did its best to execute their orders which resulted in some interesting combatsituations. In the first version of the mission I found it to easy to destroy the BDF armor in the early stages of the mission. And again your sniper turned out to be a valuable unit to detect BDF units in the trenches and take them out, well together with armor and other snipers. I think the BDF High Command decided some 17 minutes before the battle ended to try and finish off any Soviet armored units that were occupying their land and send their tanks forward. But this time things had turned around and they became targets. The video showing the advance of the BDF armor which then was destroyed by Soviet armor was the best video I have seen from this battle. Really nice! In the first version of this mission the BDF tanks were also moving toward this side of the map but they just moved on without waiting and defending for such a long time. In this version they stay put to prevent the player from advancing untill they counterattack which gives the player the chance to take out BDF armor. But if the player has no armor left in this area or has positioned them in such a way so they don't cover that part of the map who knows what could happen. I know this situation would not be very likely to occur but one can never know... I liked this video even better then the other one which showed a BDF tank being destroyed by Soviet armor!:cool: The Center is indeed relatively easy to capture if it is prepared with artillerystrikes. And you are right, the Center is somewhat isolated from other BDF strongpoints which is why there were not to much BDF units hiding in the trenches. An exodus you say? I figured the player might have some units isolated on the field of battle which could become targets for BDF units if they were coming from all sides. It made little sence for the BDF units to stay where they were since the trenches from which they are counterattacking are no objectives for either side. One can never know what happens in case of an unexpected counterattack even if it is conducted without any armor and is executed by infantry only. Originally I did not intend to create this mission to let the infantry take the objectives. I wanted to create a mission in which infantry and armor would advance together and support each other. But during playtesting I noticed the armor had very little room to manouvre and this was kind of interesting also, so I left everything as it was without the intention to make things tougher or more challenging. It was just the way things turned out once the defenders were positioned. But I prepared their positions with great care, especially the BDF armor. And it is funny you say the mission reminded you of a WWI battle with trenchfighting. A few years ago I watched some documentary about the situation in Nagorno karabach in Azerbaidjzan (I don't if I spelled this correctly but I think you know what I mean). The documentary showed the way trenches were build and how far they stretched. The ground the trenches covered was largely a wide and open space which was covered with ATGM-teams, infantry, artillery and tanks that where placed in prepared positions. Any advance by armored units would be extremely dangerous and I used this as a basis for the defensive positions I made in this mission. I think this is a good score taking into account the deathtrap waiting for the Soviets. I will take a closer look at the AAR's which are presented at the end of the mission to see the exact results. Thanks for your extensive and very detailed AAR, and ofcourse all the videos you made available on Youtube. It was really funny and interesting to read your battlefieldreports and to see your combatfootage!

Playing on iron level I think you really did a good job and this is the second time you managed to prevent defeat at the last moment. I'm looking forward to your final AAR with the videos. There's no need to thank me for this CMA mission and I'm glad you experienced the mission as quit a challenge.

Hi jeep, Thanks! Congratulations on your victory, well done! So you managed to recapture 411c despite the US defenders, including two tanks, being all around the objective. Good work! I see you made good use of the wide space on the map when you staged the attack from the road. I tried to put US defenders so that they would cover most routes toward the objectives, but in the end the AI decides how may units go to a certain area so there will always be a less defended area which the player can exploit. I think the antitank capabilities for the player would be sufficient to beat the US armor if used properly and I can tell from what you have written you did. But the Marders are vulnerable to the Sherman's and even machinegun fire as you have experienced. You are correct the paK-38 at 411c has no chance of survival. But I thought this fitted good in the scenario to picture the situation the Germans were in that day. And I know what you mean when the AI sends in tanks right into enemyfire so I figured I will help the AI a bit by giving them the orders I did. Glad you liked this. I think you were right to try and counterattack on the right side of the map, just to bad you did not succeed. I like the way the AI uses artillery as it can really be a threat to the playerforce and influence things that are happening on the map. I made as much openings in the bocage as I thought were needed to give the player the possibility to retreat but this has to be done in time. The same goes for recapturing lost terrain/objectives but I had to make some restrictions to give the AI the chance to stop the player's counterattack. But I'm sure that in real life the Germans would have made better lines of retreat. The attack on the WN 411a (the center) will never take place. I have tried to let US infantry attack this position but they could not make it as I sprayed them with lead from the MG's in the trenches. If I would have given the tanks orders to get closer to this defensive position without infantrysupport they could become easy targets for panzerschrecks. The US infantry constantly routed and retereated when they were fired upon by my MG's. This would mean the tanks would advance on their own, and this seemed somewhat incredible to me. Besides, the length of the scenario had to be much longer too and I figured 01:50 hours was long enough. As for the forces on the right side bocage that came as reinforcements, they were there for defensive purpose only to keep control of objectives the US captured there. This way I tried to make sure the player could not succesfully conduct a counterattack everywhere. Thanks for your feedback Jeep, and its nice to read you managed a minor victory on your first try, great work!

To bad you could not withdraw the PaK-40 in time. But if you ever play the mission again I have a tip for you. Spoilers Spoilers Spoilers If you let the PaK-40 face the paved road where the Sherman's are coming around the corner when they are moving toward that farm the crew will fire on them automatically. No need to set a fire arc. And maybe you can try to make a German human wave to defeat the defenders of certain objectives they captured earlier. Anyway, thank you for your feedback and the time you spend on my mission.

Sorry Vin, I overlooked your reply, these eyes of mine and/or my brain sometimes let me down lately. I will send a PM to you right away.

Taking into account the overwhelming numbers in infantry and tanks for the US side not such a bad result in my opinion. Well done! Then you did at least manage to fend of the US attack on WN 411b and you are correct, the AI does position a lot of forces in front of 411c in order to defend the objective. It could indeed be you stil lost even if you had regained WN 411c as the loss in units is, as you probably know, also a factor which calculates the endresult. And you are correct, there are unit objectives for both sides; tanks, mortars and AT-guns. The times I tested the mission the PaK-40 fired most of its projectiles on hard, and soft targets. I let the AT-gun hide until it could engage targets that were clearly visible. The moment I noticed the AI artillery started to fire rounds at the PaK-40's position I withdrew the gun with the truck to deploy it again after the artillery barrage was over. I could have even deployed it elsewhere if I wanted to. During playtesting the Marders fired on the Sherman's and they sometimes managed to penetrate their armor and sometimes they did not. If the Sherman's were hit they withdrew to safer positions and by doing so became less of a threat to the Marders or other units of my forces. The Marders are indeed very vulnerable, it takes only one shot for the Sherman's to knock them out so they must be positioned very carefully. The US human wave is almost impossible to stop without the artillery but I can't confirm there is not enough left over to undertake the counterattack. I completely used the mortars that came as reinforcements for softening up the US defenders at 411c. The result was a bit dissapointing because when I counterattacked I discovered that the bombardment had very little effect as my forces came under intensive fire from the defenders and my units routed. I understand your position on the German artillery, this is something I maybe could have done in another way. I think the PaK-40 and the Marders are decent anti-tank capabilities but I admit the Marders are very vulnerable in a dual with the Sherman's. If the PaK-40 gets a shot at the Sherman's and manages to hit it, it will cause significant damage in most cases. But I understand the Sherman's are difficult to hit because of the orders I gave them. During testplaying I managed to knock out a Sherman on two different occasions with the PaK-38 at WN 411c, those were lucky shots I guess as most hits simply bounced off. As for the Panther, there were no Panthers fighting on the Cotentin Peninsula except maybe for the one that belonged to some SS division but this is not sure. I could have given the Germans an 88 but decided not to since I thought (and stil think) the antitank capabilities were (are) good enough. To bad you ended with a tactical defeat but I hope you stil enjoyed playing the mission. Thanks for your feedback and if you ever want to replay the mission, but want to change the forces for the player to make it easier you may ofcourse do so.

A wise and understandable decision. I don't have this problem since I have not played any missions at all in the last few months. You should most definitly play Fredrock's campaign as it looks very prommising. I have a question for you which might seem a bit strange but I have a very good reason for it to ask. Would it be possible for me to provide you with the .btt file of any future mission(s) that I create in an other way then the repository? My question has to do with private reasons which I will not discuss on this forum.

Yet more usefull information, thanks!