Bulletpoint

Just started the Scottish Corridor campaign (late to the party, I know).. I have artillery available but I'm not sure if I use it in the first mission, I won't have it for later missions? In "Road to Montebourg" there were several missions where you had to decide to use artillery or not, and if you used it in one mission, you wouldn't have it for other missions. But it warned you about that in the briefing, whereas in this mission, there is no such warning. I just don't want to end up in a later mission that might be impossible to win because I don't have any fire support left.

Ah, right. Thanks. That movie was never big over here, so it's not really a part of our popular culture.

How much time does it really take to do a 3D model of a spruce tree with snow on it, I wonder?

Unrelated, but why do Americans always list three things and then end with "oh my"?

Actually it's even worse on summer terrain, since a real tank will dig nice big brown earth tracks that stand out against the green grass, but a track on snow is often just white like the rest of the snow. You can definitely see the track in the snow, but it's less obvious than on summer ground.

I'm pretty sure it happens because tanks are very often "partial hull down", which means the enemy tank will aim for the turret. At the short ranges of the typical CM battle, tanks are accurate enough to often hit what they aim for - the front of the turret/weapon mount, knocking out the gun. It only takes a quite small wall/hedge or bump in the ground to give the partial hull down effect.

I could swear it used to be like that. At least I remember keeping my halftracks buttoned and that they would man the MG when I gave a target order...

I also spent a very, very long time trying to get posters to work, and finally gave up. Don't waste your time.

If the claymore charge doesn't do the job, send in your veteran bagpipe platoon to flush them out of the forest

Something wrong with the tracers? And what's that bright white light?

Sounds reasonable, but I feel there's something missing from the argument. The more threat to the vehicle, the more chance of popping up to the machinegun to "defend" the vehicle. OK. But this defense is a bit meaningless, because the gunner is extremely unlikely to hit anything, and extremely likely to get hit, himself. The more enemy infantry, and the closer they are, the worse chances of defending the vehicle. The more suicidal the behaviour becomes. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe this is because the gunner receives no "micro terrain protection modifier", whereas the enemy infantry outside the vehicle does receive a significant protection bonus. Would you look into adding a protection bonus to crewmembers?

Yes I remember seeing this happen a lot in CMBN - especially annoying that it seemed to hurt infantry at even longer ranges than mortar shell explosions. Seemed like the AP shells were behaving like fragmentation shells. I haven't seen it happen any more in CMBN after latest patches though, so maybe somebody forgot to carry over this fix to CMFB.

You can also place any vehicle in the editor and then dismount it, and move the crew somewhere else. Might look better in your video if you're going for a realistic "firing range" feel.

@landser Did you read the amazon reviews of the book? Seems like there's some doubt as to whether or not this book is based on real eyewitness accounts or if it's basically fiction.

We don't know if he was talking about German or American panzers though. He could be talking about the Sherman tank with its mounted machinegun.

That's odd, I find that even crawling into position, the guys end up crouching at the end anyway... But I will experiment a bit with your suggestion.

When the map is supposed to be a historical battle, or based on a real location, but the map in the game doesn't really look much like the actual place... I probably skip it.

Thanks for the info. Will modify my tactics to take this into account.

So in your experience, firing the bipod MG from prone position makes it more accurate (in the game)? If so, in rare cases it might be worth it to place the gunner outside the protection of the bocage...

If the infantry is 260 metres away, wouldn't the best defense simply be to stay inside the tank?

Was this changed? I also remember using halftracks like that, keeping them buttoned, but that they will man the gun when given a fire order... If you need to unbutton them now before they will fire, that seems like a change...

Looking forward to seeing someone pop in to explain this as being a highly realistic feature based on an obscure real-life tactic of driving back and forth on bridges to clear them of mines or whatever

I noticed in a recent H2H battle that one (1) HE shot from a Sherman was enough to strip a tree of its leaves. That seems to be something new that was introduced in the latest patch (?) If my memory serves me right, it used to take several HE bursts to remove the foliage from a tree.

Is this issue due to a change to AI logic? Because I don't remember ever seeing a similar situation. In my experience, tanks will normally use their main cannon to kill anything that moves, even jeeps. I've never seen a tank "save ammo" by using its machinegun against lightly armoured targets before,

I am not complaining about the game, I am just asking because I am curious. Obviously in real life, guns have recoil, and the faster they fire and the bigger they are, the harder the recoil is to control. But as you say, real soldiers are able to control the recoil better by resting the gun on something to stabilise it. I am wondering if the game models this, or if it's basically completely random, so that as long as the MG is "semi deployed", it has a random chance to lose control of recoil. I always assumed that placing my gunner next to a low wall, a window, or bocage would mean higher accuracy. But I don't know if I am right. Maybe the bigger accuracy only comes from being prone (deploying the bipod)? Or maybe none of this matters, and every weapon only has one accuracy setting that is used for all situations (apart from "deployed" state)?