Jump to content
Special Upgrade 4 Tech Tips

Probus

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    1,169

  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    11

 Content Type 

Posts posted by Probus

    Some Minefield and Assault Tactics Findings

    in Combat Mission - General Discussion

    Posted

    4 hours ago, Bufo said:

    In almost all my battles I have casualties caused by friendly fire - mainly because of RPGs, grenades and underbarrel grenades.

    For me it was always like this. What would be surprising for me if it wasnt like this.

    I've only been playing CM for a matter of months now, but I learned really quickly that not only was there friendly fire (from a tank shell wizzing through trees over the heads of my infantry and finding a trunk of said trees).  I also learned quite painfully that tank shells can go right through a vehicle, knock it out, and continue through to a second vehicle and explode.  I've seen several dual kills.  I've yet to see a shell slice through 2 AFVs to kill a third.  That would make a good video clip though! (if its possible).

    (Gets on soapbox 🧼↗️😮📢 ‼️) That also brings up my 2nd pet peeve with CM.  I could see a shell going straight through a half track and destroying a Sherman behind it.  I cannot imagine a tank shell going through the side turret of a Challenger 2 tank taking out the APC behind it.  Can that really happen IRL?

    My 1st pet peeve are reinforcements being able to pop up like they were transported down from the Enterprise AND THEN shooting up a column of tanks all on the SAME turn.  Reinforcements should arrive and both players should be able to at least react to them in some way.  Even if it is just sound contact markers right before they materialize.  I'm not sure if its poor scenario design or limitations in the engine as it is.

    (Gets off soapbox 🧼↘️😁 🦗💤)

    Really, that's not very many pet peeves for a game.  I'm sure others have others.

    0

    Some Minefield and Assault Tactics Findings

    in Combat Mission - General Discussion

    Posted

    Well I thought I would play around with assault tactics.  Here are a few things I have found out so far:

    • Detected minefield marker is (of course) red.
    • Marked minefield marker is yellow.
    • Engineers (Pioneers) sitting on  a minefield does not necessarily detect it.
    • Engineers moving slowly through a minefield can still set off a mine.
    • Engineers hunting through a minefield seems to find it faster. 🤨 Re-re-checking this.
    • Engineering squads split up into some team types can loose most of their minefield abilities.  One they keep is the ability to set them off. 😆
    • Have not been able to get the "Clear Minefield" function to show up in anyway other than in the hotkey list outside of the game.🤔

    Related Assault findings:

    • Attacking a bunker from the side is much easier to destroy than in the front it would seem.
    • Flamethrowers do wonders  at suppressing and destroying bunkers.
    • USE FLAMETHROWERS BY THEMSELVES!!! 🥵

      • Using a platoon to assault a bunker using various tactics.  Squad 3 in rear providing suppression.  All three had flamethrowers in their squad. When the rear squad (3) decided to use the flamethrower to suppress the bunker, I found that squads 1 and 2 went from 20 soldiers total to 1 wounded soldier and 19 corpses.  HQ went was left with 1 wounded soldier and 3 corpses.  Squad 3 was just fine and also completely knocked out the bunker.  23 KIA and 2 WIA in ONE shot.  Wow, I am happy I learned that in testing.

    giphy.webp

    See the troopers running away from the flametrooper.  They have learned this.

    2

    Community Campaign Created by Multiple Contributors, Historical or Hypothetical

    in Combat Mission - General Discussion

    Posted

    31 minutes ago, The Steppenwulf said:

    I did a snapshot examination of what vassal could do and how it might integrate CM battles. My conclusion is that vassal is well suited to the development of an operational game.

    How an operational campaign works though is a fundamental question. I've thought about this once before when I first ever considered how it would be done. I don't think there's any way to avoid this fundamental question and I reckon if you start a project like this it's worth working this bit out first, or else you can get tied up in game design knots. So here's my synopsis...

    a) Is it a campaign game that monitors specific movement and regulates all actions within the battle space. This would be a game like John Tiller or GG type game where abstractions are minimised

    b) A campaign game that is abstracted in terms of how one battle leads to another. An operational board game like the COIN series of board games would be a good example. and something I looked at.

    This is no doubt subjective, but in my view after much consideration, CM battles are best suited to b). The reasons are too involved probably to outline in this thread but it's fundamentally about the campaign would/can "interface" with CM battles. I'd be happy to discuss this, in all its detail, in a online chat perhaps. Some scoping of different operational war board game left me to believe that mechanisms within the board game BCT Command Kandahar and Battle for Fallujah fall within b) and are well-suited to "interfacing" with CM battles. This does not mean adopting this board game to use as an operational game (far from it) but simply using it as an idea to consider how it can be done, using a similar approach and similar abstracted mechanisms/rules.

    Having established these two starting points, I started noting down lots of detailed ideas for abstracted mechanisms. So up to the present I've got 3 4 pages of notes. These are based around abstractions of operational factors that can be translated into variables affecting CM's actual battle starting assets/factors. That sounds obscure perhaps but again if I were to describe precisely what I mean here, I'd be writing an extremely long post. These things are much better to relate and debate in a voice chat. I also used FM military documentation for scoping and ideas, FM-05 Army Planning & Orders Production is particularly informative for developing this type of operational wargame.

    Now I won't necessarily have the detailed abstractions down exactly right, they are just ideas at this stage and they need distilling, reviewing and further refining, but I think the approach is probably sound. Of course I'm open to the whole idea being critiqued. Obviously if there are other ideas at the same stage of development then there's no point in exploring this idea further (esp because my angle in looking at this also has focused specifically around modern warfare and not ww2), but at least I've put my cards on the table in this post and if anyone is interested (even anyone who come across this post) can at least hear the detail and debate it with me in a skype call if interested in a campaign game project.    

    Very nice analysis. Let me study it and see if I have any questions. Vassal is definitely the software I thought would work well for this application. 

    Looking forward to this being my first "retirement" project (just hope the wife doesn't see this post). 😆

    0

    Community Campaign Created by Multiple Contributors, Historical or Hypothetical

    in Combat Mission - General Discussion

    Posted

    I've been working on getting retired (last day is Nov 6th) and now we are still running on generators in my part of Oklahoma due to the ice storm.  Joys of living in a rural area.

    I've personally tweeted Elon to see if I can get in on that Starlink trial but haven't heard back from him yet. 😁 

    All that being said, I'm gonna try to get a trial campaign going before Christmas.

    I've gotten a lot of good feedback. About 6 players is all I'll need for the trial. Leaning towards CMRT but nothing in stone by any means. We've already had several volunteers. Please post here if you want to participate.

    If we get more than 6, I will randomly set a player to MIA for X turns to test rules for folks going on vacation. The object of the test campaign is to beat out a set of basic rules (folks have given me some already) not to beat the opposing team. I will cut the test short (unless we are having too much fun) once the campaign rules are good to go. 

    More to follow. 

    0

    Has anyone written a guide or an exceptional good thread on QB?

    in Combat Mission - General Discussion

    Posted · Edited by Probus

    3 hours ago, Bulletpoint said:

    QB against human: Thrill.

    QB against AI: Dud.

    I agree. Some QB etiquette:

    1. No Arty or airstrikes on the first turn. Setup areas are too exposed. Prolly ok during assaults but make sure both sides agree. 

    2a. May take 2 or 3 trys to get the QB game going. If one party isn't happy with some aspect(s) of the setup, just try again so that both parties will have fun.

    2b. The more a player is on defense, the less they have to do. Gravitate towards meeting engagements. 

    3. Talk to each other during the game like you were playing table top. Increases the fun x 2. If they ambush you or get an amazing shot, make sure you praise them for it after you get done screaming at the screen. 

    4. Chat, but don't give away too much information. If you do accidentally, consider it battlefield intelligence and have the appropriate pixeltroopen shot. 

    5. Don't gloat. Generally not a good idea. 

    6. The more modern the game, the deadlier it is. Slightly larger games balance lucky hits or near misses. 

    7. Avoid randomizing QB settings for PBEM games. Plan the fun, don't depend on luck to make a good game. 

    8. Keep difficulty at Veteran or higher for better fog of war. 

    2

    Community Campaign Created by Multiple Contributors, Historical or Hypothetical

    in Combat Mission - General Discussion

    Posted

    You could also mix and match VASSAL engine modules to track the campaign (if someone hasn't already done this).  For instance use:

    http://www.vassalengine.org/

    Use the counters that are company sized from something like PanzerBlitz/PanzerLeader:

    New_pzbpzl_screenshot.gif.aa8f39294a1cf5be447ebdc9641c05f0.gif

    http://www.vassalengine.org/wiki/Module:PanzerBlitz

    And make your own map collage from CM maps or use something representative like the map from NATO:

    NATO_Web_Splash.thumb.jpg.22c5609bb10420a60e62662612f50725.jpg

     

    VASSAL would let the game master(s) track the entire campaign electronically.  I believe there is a fog of war mode included with VASSAL.  You could give each side's 'General' his forces to deploy on the map:

    PL1.thumb.png.98728a931b97790c2876440d8b5abf94.png

    You could also draw from one of the included scenario's for the campaign:

    PBS7Kiev.jpg.934d747605ce14b54492d83c8bb4fe3c.jpg

    I'm sure there are better wargame examples that would make more sense, if anyone knows of one off the top of the head?  Anyway, just some ideas.

    0

    Community Campaign Created by Multiple Contributors, Historical or Hypothetical

    in Combat Mission - General Discussion

    Posted

    Just now, Erwin said:

    Have to echo Ithikial's points.  We tried this in CM1 days at WeBOB.  The problem is that there is always at least one player who can't keep up the pace/momentum and everyone else has to wait impatiently.  Then a 2nd person has a problem.  The more folks you involve in a project like this when there is no way to compel "work" being done, the complexities and frustrations also increase exponentially.

    So, good luck at trying it.  Maybe you will find a way to make it work.  Just be aware of the pitfalls and that generally, folks cannot be relied on as gaming is a low priority.

    Yes. I think that should/would be clear in the rules. 

    In RL I used to be a Project Leader. Now I'm a Program Manager and I couldn't agree with you more.  

    0

    Community Campaign Created by Multiple Contributors, Historical or Hypothetical

    in Combat Mission - General Discussion

    Posted

    9 hours ago, Ithikial_AU said:

    Five Lions was a CMSF2 narrative campaign that actually went through to completion and had a Syrian campaign victory. CMSF2 and to a lesser extent CMBS are lopsided in favour of blue force so the trick I used here was to have varying and secret campaign objectives for both sides. You'll have a more balanced approach if you go with the WW2 titles I'd imagine.

    As for a mass community event, all I'll say is good luck. :) Part of the reason this went through to completion was the small number of players (4 per side) including one overall commander. Plus there was a fixed end point to the campaign so a limited number of campaign turns that everyone knew they were working towards. For a mass community event setting up a system where players just need to play a battle and report the outcome by a certain date is a lot safer, and all the umpire needs to do is record results as they come in. Trying to have a true campaign with operational level movements with dozens of players on each side will boil down to a lot of forum posts, not a lot of agreement and growing apathy as it goes on or runs into inevitable delays as players wait for others to finish battles.

    Sorry to be blunt, just seen many of these campaigns fizzle out before. :( Know what you are trying to do up front and have everything prepped. Going big may sound and look great but also bloats the workload on one or handful of people.

    I agree. In fact I am going to play in one first to see how it's done before I try anything at all. It does sound like a fun game. 8-10 people should be more than enough. 

    1
×
×
  • Create New...