Gamer58

You can't win on defense? A few hints. Study the map terrain. Re-position your units to cover kill zones in the approaches to the villa, and that are not in cover (eg crops, trees, woods etc). Ensure that you use the top floors villa itself to station machine guns for lookout and cover advantage. Cover all approaches. Keep at least 1 or 2 platoons in reserve to counterattack where the enemy decides to use it's strength. Ensure that your infantry rockets and at guns are kept silent until necessary. Use mortars, if available, to take out those Italian toy tanks. Don't waste your rockets against them, as grenades and even heavy MG fire can make crews bail. If you are sure of enemy probes and positions, use two squads to counterattack their flanks by using scouts and carefully advancing to their flank. Blast them in the flanks. Good luck. I will play the scenario again and give more pointers after doing so.

Well spotted! I stand corrected. Are these pillboxes the ones visible in the photo for Bad Day at Beach Red or were they generic and all over the island? How close were they at Biazza? Were they used at all there? Were they decisive at all to the battle?

Something called the internet. I used a site called Google. www.google.com I typed in battlefield and biazza ridge and pressed enter. http://www.armchairgeneral.com/a-journey-to-world-war-ii-battlefield-part-5-the-battle-for-biazza-ridge.htm http://www.battledetective.com/battlestudy18.html I'm not so sure about CM historical accuracy anymore.

Played it today. Did OK. But then researched the battlefield. The Axis had a circular pillbox there IRL. No such bunker in the game. Why CM, Why?

There's a bunch of others too. Published by AG.

Their weapons look antiquated like the Japanese ones.

You can see an interesting video here of these Italian weapons. The Brixia looks like a handful to operate. The 47mm reminds me of some of the Japanese light guns they used - it looks like it would be quite stealthy to operate. The way the weapons break down to be carried on the back is interesting too.

Not being able to play QBs makes me cry. Still having trouble (OSX version). It crashes on some selections. Scenarios are good - but QBs are sure quick to set up.

Some of the German PSWs have some interesting features for which I cannot see an Allied equivalent. 1. Dual Driver 2. The large shovel type attachment (see here) 3. Other features? What do you make of the German AFV design, and what was the shovel attachment for? Obstacles or extra armor? How was visibility on these things compared to the Allied M3?

But they are great reads for 10 year olds and grandma!

Watch the CSpan interview of PJB talking about his book, sources etc (it runs about an hour, used to be available on google video). PHB actually comes up with something interesting and original. Can't say I feel the same about Beevor's books. Also Beevor is just flat out wrong about MacArthur. We did win that war, didn't we? :confused:

That's got nothing to do with Beevor being wrong about MacArthur, but nice Alinsky like tactics there if that is what you are trying to do.

Exactly. Great for grandmas too. But frankly there is so much primary source material available on PATHE, Liveleak, YouTube and websites that I find reading anything like Beevor's accounts to be Mawkish. Compare Beevor's type of 'on the page' recounts with something like Buchanan's book 'Churchill Hitler and the Unecessary War' where the latter author actually does come up with something unique. Screw Beevor and his fit for strip mall bookshop bargain bin publications.

Yes the SS was critical. But for whatever reason at the time the command thought it wasn't enough to blockade or starve them - otherwise there would have been no plans drawn up for Operations like Cartwheel, Iceberg, Olympic, Coronet etc, only a long slow blockade. That quote comes from my earlier post. My reference to B17s was really a throw-away, but the B17s were used all throughout the theater, mainly to disrupt enemy shipping, also against enemy warships, but in reality the B24 was favored. However, everywhere in 1945 the superweapon - the B29 delivered the killing blow, and actually we only had enough material for one more pistol for an A Bomb. Two were delivered and had the intended result, but if they had called our bluff we would have used a third, and after that prayed for another 6 months of men going through the meat grinder until there was another fissile material ready for another A Bomb to use. What I don't get is how Beevor thinks MacArthur is an overrated leader. I thought the leader's job was to GSD. We did win that war, didn't we? And Beevor conveniently forgets Inchon? Screw Beevor and his gewgaw books.

Did I mention Inchon? MacArthur took Kimpo - by the way that is a land airbase - the most important one in the whole campaign - in two days. He took Seoul back too. Beevor is massively wrong about MacArthur.

Of course you can't do anything without ships if you are a country like Japan was/is dependent upon international trade/water/minerals/oil. Few countries can survive without imports, although the US and other continental countries like Aus could do better than most simply because of the vast tracts of farming land and fisheries. The point is that people actually had to dig the IJA from their bunkers, and as see at Saipan, Guam, Iwo Jima, Okinawa and other campaigns no amount of naval fire or air attack could do that (Okinawa had something like 2 weeks of bombardment). That means boots on the ground. Land based air won the war against Japan. Naval air/carriers/surface forces helped that happen but wasnt enough. The killing blows were all delivered by land based air attack - B17s and B29s. Russia isnt the same as the Chikes. Not at all. If you think that they are so well intentioned and that it's 'over' then why not go over there and work for the party. You need to understand that history timescales differ with a nation like that one. And it's not even 20-50 years from now. I guess you missed this little story http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304563104576355623135782718.html BTW, nice way to avoid my analysis of the island hopping. Mac GSD. Beevor can sell his books to grannys and armchair amateurs. But forgive me if I don't want to purchase his latest tome. After all this thread is about Beevor. Beevor says MacArthur was an overrated leader. Beevor is British and it probably irks him that his empire is finished and he is living in a white trash ridden, poor, riot ridden country with no significance except for tourists who like old buildings and the Square Mile and that MacArthur comes from a country that GSD. MacArthur - and men on the ground - won the 20 year war in 4 years, whether you like it or not. MacArthur was an effective leader. We did win that war, didn't we? Beevor is wrong.

Absolutely not true. And even if it were true, it doesn't make Beevor correct about MacArthur. There were many campaigns that people were peeved about. Iwo Jima. Tarawa. Peleliu. And as I recall the latter was ordered by Nimitz over the objections of Halsey. Tarawa, we took it and then left. But the experience gained was invaluable for later missions. You say that that wasn't a ground campaign? Shaking my head at that. What did those Marines do? Shoot the IJA from starships? It was a ground war (yes with an amphib landing - it's an island sure). And the J command never thought it could be taken "by a million soldiers in a thousand years" - we proved them wrong and they lost confidence = shorter war. Iwo Jima was necessary because there were no other islands between Marianas and Japan for emergency stops. Peleliu was costly but protect Mac's flank in the drive to Manila. Intelligence was not used correctly, and the operation lasted a lot longer than we thought it would. Carthwheel, Mac's plan, was actually one of by passing strong points on the New Guinea coast - but permanent neutralization was key. The Aussies (and Marines, Army, Navy and the rest of the world) didn't like costly operations - who does? But Cartwheel was a success. Naval war you say? NG not significant? Milne Bay, Rabaul, Coral Sea, Lae and northern coast, which means bases, supply route, airfields - and it was allied territory (Aus and Dutch) - are you serious? Yes, expensive, all of it was and useful too. The reality is that the navy didn't want to go anywhere that was not in range of land based bombers. The same land based bombers that brought Japan to its knees and won the war. You cannot fly a B29 off a carrier, try as you might. Unless you think that we should have gone ahead with Operation Downfall, which by the way is a land invasion - you still think you can take Tokyo using ships? SMH. :confused: And Inchon = masterful. Beevor = douchebag. PS Wait another 20 - 50 years to see how the Chikes act before assessing whether Mac was right about using the H Bombs.

Of course Nimitz did a lot (more than Halsey) but it was also a ground war - MacArthur's decisions re New Guinea were actually useful, if expensive. The Aussie generals didnt always like his showy style - who did? - but agreed with the idea - NG was actually Aus. territory at the time. It is only the second largest island on earth after Greenland, and the IJA committed a lot to it, and lost in the region of 100-200K men there counting all the islands (New Britain etc). Operation Cartwheel was a success. Mac GSD! Beevor just sold books to people who want to be entertained. Inchon was also brilliant. Time will only tell whether his call on nuking the Chikes when we had the chance was the right one. Beevor is just another fart in the history of the world. MacArthur won a 20 year war in 4 years. Against a country twice the population of Germany and nearly as advanced. Beevors books add nothing to the subject IMHO. But I'm sure he sells a lot of them books. He reminds me of Niall Ferguson, pablum for the masses.

Beevor's writing and gewgaw mawkish stories and reasoning do not sit well with me. I would say that he is overrated. He for example thinks that McArthur is the most overrated commander in WWII simply because he disagreed with McArthur's strategy and methods. That's a nonsense assessment right there. So a country like China with ten times the population of Japan couldn't budge them an inch, and yet McArthur (with the Aussie generals) managed to GSD - ie win the war against Japan - the same war everyone thought would take 20 years to win - in 3 and a half years. Beevor is an armchair critic, even if he was in the military.

What's your weapon of choice? M10 GMC? M3 GMC? Are they in the game? Can't see them - so if you know the missions let me know. My QB is defunct (see my other thread in the tech support forum). I need some M10 action

I tried the CMFI demo (first on OSX then on Bootcamp with Win 7 32 bit). The demo on Win 7 with bootcamp didn't appear to use all the screen but that could have been my res settings. Played the demo - purchased it immediately but guys, where are the Can and UK units? Where are the plain vanilla Heer (were there any on Sicily?).

Is there a definitive list of units in the game that's just a simple list and not the one in the manual (showing the variety of units). Thanks!