MOS:96B2P

This is a very valid method and good idea for learning game mechanics, becoming familiar with the user interface and establishing your TACSOPs. I still use it to update and train with my TACSOPs after identifying a weakness in a PBEM. It is a never ending cycle of fun.

Kieme(ITA), Very well done AAR. I enjoyed it. The call signs for the different platoons was a nice touch.

This would be cool.

Nice screenshots. The map almost looks to nice to trash by fighting......... almost...

This is interesting. In your experience what does the F/O leadership factor help? I didn't think it mattered for F/Os and always set their leadership at 0. For platoon leaders and company commanders I will give them a +1 if I can afford it.

Yep, I agree with all of this. The one possible problem might be how you want to use the US 155mm arty. IME using the US 155mm artillery in coordination with UAVs for precision artillery strikes and conventional arty strikes will be difficult since the Russians will shoot them all down (probably with a Tunguska). Now if you are talking about using the 155mm arty the old fashion way with a F/O spotting and calling it in I guess this might work............ and is probably the only choice if the Russians have a Tunguska (which they will).

When I play as the Russians I like to start with the Russian Battalion Tactical Group (BMP) from the armored tab as the base unit. I then modify it to fit the situation (attack or defend normally) I like T-90AMs for tanks. The Khrizantema-S Tank destroyer, if used correctly can be good. ADA: Get a Tunguska. Also buy a few Igla-S to back up the Tunguska. One Zala 421-08 UAV (Only vulnerable to AAA which the US does not have / needs air controller) Air Support: Frogfoot SU25 I have read that the BMP 2M may be better than the 3M if you keep a scout team in the vehicle to take advantage of the spotting system. Good luck.

This is my experience also. One Tunguska will destroy any Shadow or Raven UAVs the US player uses. The Gray Eagle is generally to expensive, in both rarity and purchase points for the US player to afford. On the other hand the Russian Zala UAV is a cost effective purchased and cannot be shot down by the US. If you are playing Russians buy a Tunguska, a few Igla-s for backup and a Zala UAV. Keep the Tunguska safe from direct fire (Just use it for air defense) and you can, in most cases, negate US air power.

Bil, Thanks for the Command Friction rule book. That answered a lot of questions. In addition it might be useful to see how units are initially plugged into the correct format. I noticed in the Force Command tab 1 PzG Co. HQ and 2 PzG Co. HQ are hyperlinked? (The blue line thing under them) How do you make that happen? Under the Company tabs the first row and column of each platoon are shaded. How is that accomplished? What if it was a platoon sized battle? Would the platoon HQ become the Force Command tab unit? Or do you always need Battalion and Company HQs as placeholders in the workbook? If I use the exact same order of battle that you use in the workbook and just change the names of the units I can probably make it work. 1 PzG Co. becomes 1st Rifle Company etc… But if I need to add an additional company or maybe a battalion level engineer platoon I am not sure of the Excel mechanics. Sorry for all the questions which are probably just basic Excel worksheet mechanics. I googled Excel worksheet. While I gained some exposure to “Count” and “Sum” and “Logic Function” I still don’t know how to shade a column or do the blue underline thing or put in a different OOB.............

+1 YES!!! Preferably set in 1980s Fulda Gap............

Thanks, John. I think you are right about the driver and Thompson. It is just portrayed a little different in the game. Probably for game mechanics or some such. The squad half-tracks in the game have their own two man crew. This crew is not part of the actual squad in the game. However the driver does have a Thompson.

Yes, This would also be cool. Combat Mission Tet Offensive CMTO. Everything from MOUT battles in Hue and Saigon, fire base battles, POW rescues, jungle warfare, swift boat operations in the delta............ moders would probably give us Dien Bien Phu............... Maybe tunnel rat stuff that would give the game engine the capability for sewers in MOUT warfare .................... A crashed burning Huey helicopter or two ......... lots of cool possibilities.........

That is a good point. It is also how I came to make this evolution/composition topic. Awhile back I thought 1st Squad was different with the platoon HQ attached compared to the last time I had used armored infantry in a battle. A bunch of us discussed it in the below thread. http://community.battlefront.com/topic/119294-us-armored-infantry-platoon-hqs/ I did some research documenting it with screen shots until I figured it out. (1st Squad was handled differently in different titles) So then I got the idea to do the evolution thing and expanded the work to all the titles, polished up the screenshots and shared them. But the original effort was focused on 1st Squad to determine why I remembered that the platoon HQ was separate from 1st Squad. I was remembering CMFI TOE while looking at certain months of CMBN TOE. But if my original purpose had been to show the evolution of a Squad of infantry 2nd or 3rd squad would have been the better choice. Now I know.

I have been playing around with the workbook some and noticed something with the game time on the command tab. If the battle is one hour and I enter 1.00 then and then hit save the task and initiative times are goofy. Same for a two hour battle. After trying different times I think the way to go for a one hour battle is to enter the starting time as 0.60 and for a two hour battle enter 1.60 on the command tab line. Or actually if you are playing any battle over an hour long you are eventually going to reach the one hour mark and have to enter the one hour time. Would the way I described above be the correct way to enter hourly times or am I missing something? Also I wonder if this system will encourage the use of mission type orders. In the comments field to the right of tasks you have the opportunity to give the commanders intent reference the assigned task. If 2nd Platoon is given an attack task and the comments field states attack and secure Hill 239 the 2nd Platoon Lt. does not have much wiggle room if the situation changes. Then he has all the resulting C2 delays for getting updated orders to match the changed situation. If instead the comments field stated attack in the area of Hill 239 in order to interdict the OpFor's use of Route One maybe there would not be as many C2 delays? The Lt. would have more latitude to use initiative? Not sure how this would play out just an interesting thought............

If I have time I would like to give this a try. In between PBEM turns I am playing The Road to Montebourg Campaign redux. I am in the middle of one of the battles so now would probably not be a good time. But when I start the next battle maybe I will use the workbook. It seems most of the work for the player is at the very beginning when all the units and soft factors must be entered into the workbook. After that you have to remember to enter the current game time on the Command Tab and then save which will automatically update task and initiative. (If I am understanding this correctly so far) Most of the other changes that you make are facilitated with drop down menus. So, I think if we can get through the set up phase the workbook does most of the work. Ninja'ed by Bil himself.

Target Reference Points (TRPs) also have changeable soft factors which of course don't change anything. I think rule of thumb is to look at the point cost over on the right side of purchase screen when you change the soft factor. The only time a soft factor is actually changed is when a change has been made to the cost. If you change a bunker from green experience to elite and the price did not change there are no troops that come with the bunker. I think only the anti-tank bunkers have troops that come with the bunker/AT gun. The normal bunkers have no troops but may have a MG. If I remember nine troops can fit inside a bunker. The first team of troops into the bunker become the "Bunker Crew" and operate the MG if one is present. You could put a three man scout team into the MG bunker, next a two man sniper team, next a two man F/O team and then a two man BAR team. The first team to enter (three man scout) would operate the MG. The other teams can shoot with the weapons they carry to defend the bunker. (troops can also acquire ammo from the bunker supply) Just like anything else the better the soft factors the better a team will perform as the MG team. I also found this on page 194 of CMBN equipment manual from the German perpspective: when purchasing bunkers, players have the choice between unarmed shelters, or bunkers equipped with M34 or M42 heavy machinegun positions. Most bunkers also provide an ammunition cache that can be used by infantry units to replenish/acquire ammo. Hope that helped.

I think this may explain some of the behavior I saw with BMPs while fighting in the woods. Next time I will try to put a scout team in the BMP with the two man crew.

What Sublime said. Plus I would add the Russian Zala UAV. The US cannot shoot it down. The other two Russian UAVs the US are able to shoot down. Because of this reason sometimes there are house rules against using the Zala. If a house rule does not ban the Zala it will be an eye in the sky for you. Also offensive use of smoke. I have not used this myself yet but I had it used against me in a recent PBEM game. (Sublime ) Some Russian vehicles shoot a smoke screen 30 or 40 meters? in front of the vehicles. They can do this multiple times. (I think the T-90AM can do the smoke thing three times) My opponent then advanced quickly behind multiple smoke screens with a lot of air burst arty to suppress/kill Javelin teams. Very impressive to watch. It was similar to an old Warsaw Pact training/propaganda video. If the wind cooperates this can be an effective tactic.

Thanks Bud_B. If we get NATO in Black Sea then the same thing can be done for British and Germans. If we ever got a CM Fulda Gap set in the mid or early 1980s ..................... A squad with M16s, LAWs, a Dragon AT and maybe a M113 APC in the background. I know Bradleys began to enter service in the 1980s but maybe the rarity for Bradley and M1s would be high so you would have a lot of M113s and M60A3s running around. Speak of a near peer fight..............

Welcome. Nice first screenshot. If one or more of those half-tracks were burning it would be even more destructive looking than it already is. Don't know if you have gotten into mods for the game yet but I have a feeling you would like Veins base markers from the repository. The mod changes the red X from incapacitated casualties and KIAs to a puddle of blood. (Light red for WIA, dark red for KIA) Now lets see some more screenshots.

SLIM, thanks for going into detail. This is good stuff. One common tactic I have read in different threads is to Slow fire teams into firing positions. It is interesting that you also used this. I think we are on to something here. Thanks again.

SLIM, thanks for the AAR. I have found woodland combat challenging. In fact I think of woods the same way as clearing a building: Don't go in if you can avoid it. However sometimes it can't be avoided, as in your battle where most of the map was woods. In the above snip from your post you seem to have found tactics that worked well in woodland warfare. Were you able to develop any type of TACSOP from your experience that you are willing to share? I would be interested in how you split your squads, what type of bounds, how far a bound (one, two or three action spots), length of pauses, area fire etc. You know, just the usual .......

CMBN September 1944 Armored Infantry Ten men (Up to three teams) with Platoon HQ in 1st Squad Weapons list: Eight M1 Garands, Two M1 Carbines Special equipment: Binoculars, AT grenade CMSF July 2008 Mechanized Infantry Nine men (Can only be split into two teams) Weapons list: Seven M4s, Two M203s, Two M249s. Special equipment: Binoculars, Nine night vision, One scope, Two AT4s CMBS July 2017 Mechanized Infantry Nine men (Can only be split into two teams) Weapons list: Six M4A1s, One M320, Two M249 PIP & One M25 CDTE. Special equipment: Binoculars, Nine night vision, Two breaching kits, Two AT4s Cool game.

The following screenshots show the evolution and composition of Combat Missions US Armor/Mech. Infantry. It follows 1st Squad from July 1943 to July 2017. I tried to get a screenshot whenever there was a change in the TOE. (I may have missed some.) In the screenshots I split 1st Squad down into its fire teams. I always used the same split. Assault team spilt off first (A-Team). When a second split was allowed it was Anti-Tank (C-Team). Leaving the base team (B-Team). Some months the Platoon HQ was part of 1st Squad. The squad’s vehicle is also shown in the screenshots. The screenshots not only illustrate the evolution of a US squad of armored/mech. infantry but also helps to show just how detailed and cool this game is. CMFI July 1943 Armored Infantry Nine men (Can only be split into two teams) Weapons list: Nine M1 Garands Special equipment: Binoculars CMFI December 1943 Armored Infantry Ten men (Up to three teams) Weapons list: Nine M1 Garands, One Springfield Special equipment: Binoculars, AT grenade CMBN June 1944 Armored Infantry Ten men (Up to three teams) with Platoon HQ in 1st Squad Weapons list: Eight M1 Garands, Two M1 Carbines Special equipment: Binoculars, AT grenade More to follow.

This system of handling C3 with the Lock-in time and resulting realistic delay based on multiple factors adds realism to the C3 process. It reminded me of a concept we had back in the day. It was called the OODA loop. Observe, Orient, Decide, Act. Command Friction increases the chance of a commander getting inside the OODA loop of the OpFor in the chaos of a battle. As in RL one side might bog down as events overtake the ability of a commander to get orders issued and executed before the situation changed yet again. (Order and counter order.) This is pretty cool and has a lot of potential to make the game more realistic.