Bulletpoint

Thanks for correcting my post. I did not know the airborne version was different, as I don't have Market Garden I think my point about the HE ammo not showing up because the list can only show 4 items is still correct though.

I played the same mission yesterday, and while I agree it's a tough nut to crack, I saw plenty of cases where the AI ran into the streets to get cut to pieces. Somehow it's never as painful when it happens to the enemy as to my own guys I don't think they will ever fix this behaviour 100 pct, but I feel there's still room for improvement. A basic check to not let troops run towards known threats (contacts) might go a long way. And if there's no escape route without enemy contacts, then to stay. Staying put when under fire in a building might not guarantee survival, but it often seems the more "believable" choice. At least as I see it.

I'm going to risk controversy by saying CMBN is the best. Because it has bocage. Highly frustrating to fight in, but also makes for interesting tactical situations and puts more emphasis on flanking.

The mortar has both HE and smoke rounds. When you do a "target" order, they will fire HE. You need to do the 'fire smoke' order to make them use the smoke ammo. The HE is not visible in their equipment list because it only shows the first four kinds of ammo they have. By the way, I had no idea they could fire that mortar from within a building ...

That only makes them less fit; to get winded faster when running. Doesn't affect anything else, as far as I know.

Lesson learnt. Will take more care to stay exactly on the road next time.

I just played "A muddy affair". Lost 3 tanks to the mud, and the strange thing is: All 3 were lost on the edges of roads. I also cruised other tanks around the countryside, sometimes through hedges and walls, but none of those tanks were immobilized. Are road edges worse for bogging than regular terrain? I thought the roads were supposed to be the safe routes, and going off-road was risky?

Thanks @Chainsaw for taking the time to answer my question in detail. Appreciated.

I'm not sure Hunt gives increased spotting ability either. I think it works more like an SOP - it tells your guys to advance slowly and to stop if enemies are observed.

Would be interesting to have a "sleep deprivation" setting. It would make it possible to make a campaign that took place over, say, 3 days, where you start out with fresh core troops of high quality, and while they retain their veteran level and motivation etc. they would get more and more sleep deprived as the campaign went on. As far as I know, this cannot be accomplished by setting a lower troop level, because the troop experience level is set at the campaign start and can't dynamically change.

Jep, just tested it. I changed the snow in Die Patrouille from heavy to light. Fixed the problem. So, it appears the heavy snow effect has optimisation issues.

Nope, I'm running the game off the C drive, it's a pure SSD, no hybrid. Also it's nothing to do with sound. I found out a further interesting thing: I get the problem in the tiny "Die Patrouille", but not on the much larger "Breaking the line". Both maps have falling snow! The only difference I can see is that the former has "heavy snow" and the latter "light snow". So it seems to be a problem with the heavy snow effect.

I just bought CMFB and noticed I get lag when it's snowing. The snow will fall smoothly for about 10 seconds, then the framerate drops a lot for 2 seconds and then back to smooth framerates. It's not just the snow effect that lags during that time, it's the whole game. (also, when I move the camera, the snow effect will move with it, which looks a bit weird...)

I just bought CMFB and want to play the Peiper campaign. But I'm a bit worried it will be too easy with the artillery bug...

Maybe this seems like a stupid question, but I'm wondering: What was the actual purpose of a roadblock? Well, to block the road, of course. But a roadblock needs to be defended, or the attacker can just drive past it or remove the obstacles really quickly. And if the roadblock is defended, what purpose does the actual blocking of the road serve? Even without mines and hedgehogs, you can't just drive a tank through a village defended by a company armed with machineguns and AT rockets. Maybe roadblocks were not so much to stop an actual attack, but to prevent recon from speeding past in the night?

Don't worry, happens to everyone.

Definitely. But if the Soviets had lost the war, we'd now be discussing why Stalin could never have hoped to defeat the German war machine. We'd talk about the purges of the army leadership, the poor morale and training of the troops, the lousy tanks they used. Their bad planning and communications. Also we'd be talking about the impossible task of moving an entire nation's factories to the other side of the country and linking it all up with so many kilometres of new roads and rail, etc. in such a short time. We'd be talking about the paranoid Stalin and the many enemies he made. In actual history, there were several plots against Hitler, and they increased as the war situation became worse and worse. Who's to say there wouldn't have been sudden changes in Soviet leadership after such big losses? None of this is to say the arguments in this thread are not valid. But I guess it depends on how you see history. I think many things in life are not inevitable, but a lot seems inevitable - after the fact.

Funny how hindsight is so clear. The early Russian losses were enormous, and the task of relocating all their industry to the other side of the country must have been huge. If Germany had knocked out Russia quickly, like they did in France, they would have taken over vast resources and production capacity, while closing down the eastern front that ended up wearing them out. The Allies would have met a whole different Wehmacht in Normandy. Maybe the war could have gone differently.

Agreed. While CM games are graphically very primitive compared to some of the big titles today, I find they are really immersive.

I believe it goes like this: CMBN CMFI CMRT CMBS CMFB

What problems with the realism did you notice? Something about the gear or the tactics?

That's the whole East Front right there.

Some good ideas, but I doubt these are the reasons... If you make the whole vehicle 5 cm taller, you get a big increase in total silhouette. But if you only make the relatively small shield taller, the silhouette only increases by a very small amount. The shield would only be a bit taller, not wider or deeper. So it would not take up space from soldiers behind it even when turning. I think this might have some truth to it, but it would still be possible to stand up on the benches to look over the shield, and/or to poke the head out to the sides of it. A Sd.Kfz 251 weights nearly 8 tonnes, according to the wiki. How much more steel would be required to make the gun shield 5 cm taller? I don't know exactly, but it must be a tiny amount of extra materials and this investment would make the vehicle able to perform much better in its intended role. The US halftracks were never intended to be fighting vehicles, but the German ones were. Whether they were good in this role is a matter of debate, but obviously the intention was that the MG was to be used in a direct fire role, and that the gun shield was there for the specific purpose of protecting the gunner.

I wonder if they ever did field modifications to increase the shield a bit? The US tankers loved to put extra stuff on their tanks, so maybe the Germans did the same with their halftracks? I remember reading that they sometimes added logs along the sides to catch (spalling?) fragments, but haven't read anything about the gun shield.

I think you migt be on to something here. Just still seems a bit odd to me. Maybe it also has something to do with that bullets striking the very top of the helmet (at a really shallow angle) might bounce off? I know it's not thick metal, but due to the slope maybe. And I assume there's a liner or something inside the helmet that keeps a bit of distance between the skull and the metal part. The very top of the helmet as seen from the front might not be a critical hit area? So the thinking might be that it's a good trade-off to give the gunner the ability to pop up once in a while to see what's going on around him, then duck down again to resume firing? These are all just wild guesses. I'm no expert and I've never even been in one of these halftracks. Just curious really. The German approach seemed obsessed with engineering solutions, so I can't believe they just "forgot" to put a bigger shield on the gun.