Chibot Mk IX
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Posts posted by Chibot Mk IX
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On 12/31/2022 at 11:43 AM, Lethaface said:
To be honest I'm having quite some fun with the battle, getting to the point where my gambling tactics have paid off
My opponent in his USSR game didn't bet on the zergling rush and is now facing my hulldown TOW front.
My Zergling rush failed miserably. I probably create a record. Before the end of turn 3 I lost all four tanks plus five full loaded BTRs (and all the platoon leaders are gone). My opponent put most of his firepower on one wing so that caught me in the open. On the other side, my AT-4 platoon was troubled by gun smoke and bad luck, so they only achieved 5 kills (1 tank+2 M150+2 M113) before expending 80+% of their ATGMs. I hit surrender after that.....
If gives another chance, I am thinking a deliberate, slow advance plan for Soviets player. Let the US player rush to the VP, Soviets will attack at the later half of the game and claim two of the VPs. That requires a firebase buildup on the left wing, and need smoke to cover the final assault.
On 1/8/2023 at 9:51 AM, BFCElvis said:We are advising everyone to NOT complete each battle. Play until there there is 1 turn (or as far as you can go) left in each battle. If everyone were to play their battles to completion all scores would match the end game AAR CM score. But, until then the higher scores will remain. Anyone looking to "game" the system would only need to stop playing to have a higher score than players who complete each battle. That's why we (and Matrix/Slitherine) have decided to post this advise. Matrix/Slitherine will be making a similar announcement on their forum and the Discord channel. For good or ill, only half of each pairing needs to be reached as long as 1 player stops playing toward the end.
There is a tiny chance that a hot fix will be created before Round 1 is finished but I wouldn't count on it.
We understand (and share) anyone's unhappiness about this. No one is happy about this. No one.
Ahhh.... Sorry, didn't see this until now. I have hit surrender during my Soviet game before the new year eve.
My US game also ends, my opponent hit surrender yesterday, so I guess we are even now.
Proud to be the first one finish Round 1......
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Scenario Czechmate has some Bradleys, although it is the M3 version from 2nd ACR
10 hours ago, Halmbarte said:US infantry doesn't have that much organic anti-armor capability. They have a mediocre ATGM with poor warhead, short range, and an absurd failure rate, and a few one shot M73s that are better volley launched at ranges much over 75m, further reducing the number of kills they can make against Sov armor.
The one flavor of Soviet infantry squad comes with an organic BMP that has a lot of potential armor kills on board, as well as providing reloads for the squads organic RPG7.
The BTR flavor loses the BMP's anti armor capability, but makes up for it with AT-7s and AT-4s.
I think of AT-7 as being what the Dragon wants to be, while the AT-4 is pretty much a shorter range TOW that's man-luggable. Either can be devastating in the defence or if pushed forward on the attack. plus the carrying BTR for either carries a large number of reloads.
Sov squads aren't as flexible as the American ones and they really need their carriers to be very useful but they are organized to perform their function in the Soviet combined arms army.
H
I think the Dragon is underestimated here. With a clear FOV, Dragon can achieve 66% hit rate. Probably that means nothing to a T-64B, but to T-55/T-62 and soft skin BMP/BTRs that is deadly, so in many cases you can just make it hold fire, manually select soft skin AFV as its primary target. Dragon is also the only ATGM that can both see and fire through the smoke. A well placed smoke and a salvo of Dragon ATGM can turn the table. When not shooting, you can just use it as a scout assets, team up with tanks. They should spread the spotting information with unbuttoned tanks very quickly.
Short range could be an issue. Especially considering many of the CMCW scenarios have very large maps. So you will need M113 or a Jeep as the platform to maneuver.
Just think about these scenarios
1, in a large map deploy 4-5 dragon teams forward as a screen. When Soviets forward elements show up. If it is recon force, you can destroy it before it reveals your Tanks and TOW ATGM position. If what you meet is soviets' main effort, fine, fire the ATGM then jump on the M113 that is waiting behind. Retreat toward the main defense line and spread the information through radio network. Enemy retaliation fire will hit the empty ground
2, take the risk and send a Dragon ATGM + some other infantry team on a M113 infiltrate the enemy's flank. Hide in a patch of woods, identify the high value targets. the other infantry team deploy smoke grenade. Then the next turn Dragon ATGM open fire, taking a flank shot under the cover of smoke hopefully.
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Watching the SACLOS ATGM slowly flying towards its target is the most the anxiety but super exciting experience in CM! Forgot about those fire-forgot ATGMs, those are sissy!
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Bakhmut is just like the campaign of Malaya Zemlya (Little land). Irrelevant to the Eastern Front, but to the great leader Brezhnev's reputation that is everything.
4 hours ago, Kinophile said:Every tank goes pop when hit correctly.
RUS ATGMs are no joke and if used correctly can totally take out any Western tank, super-duper OP God Mode Abrams included. Western armor is probably better but it's not invincible.
I guess the two factors affecting the kill rate are 1) Quantity and 2) Usage.
RUS does not appear to have enough units in use, in comparison to UKR. I've seen this noted in some OSINT circles, and it's odd. They're not hard to make, the electronics did use some Western stuff but nothing irreplaceable and they must have had a large pre-war stockpile.
One interesting idea I read was the state of RUS training - because their infantry wasn't strong after training, the churn was high and dedicated contrakti not very numerous. So perhaps the smarter higher ups put emphasis on aggressive armored mech attacks, with vehicles providing the hitting power to the spotting infantry, who were emphasized to urban assault, support and not long range tank sniping. This created an officer corp and mindset that focusses on mech, ie vehicle formations.
This used the plethora of barrels available without the onerous actual training of infantry. Like with all corrupt organizations, the easiest way wins out, every time.
Of course, that was while RUS was on the attack. I suspect we'll see a lot more ATGM use when UKR starts assaulting prepared RUS lines.
I'm also curious about ATGM usage during the defense of Kherson...
Russian is hurt by lacking a new generation ATGM that can be assigned/reinforced to Platoon and Squad level. On UKR side, they have Javelin at Company, NLAW at Platoon, then mixed with RPG-7, Panzerfaust and disposable AT rocket launchers that is a lot of "pikes" in their ranks. Any "Caverly charge" won't end well in the wall of pikes like this
With all the available video, it gives people an impression that Russian used their ATGMs just like how UKR used their Stugna-P, engaged in long range hunting kills mission. It might effectively build some pressure on UKR side, prevent UKR to deploy the AFV too forward. In some other infantry skirmisher video, I remember saw several cases that the overrun RUS position have one ATGM. So, it is likely the Russian's forward defense position can be reinforced with a 9M111 or 9K115.
Overall it seems that during the Kherson campaign, most of the UKR AFV lose was caused by mines and artillery. When the nimble UKR tank raid team (1-2 tanks + some armored cars) infiltrated the Russian position, Russian ATGM had a hard time to catch them.
Regarding the training. Hundreds pages ago, someone (maybe it was Grigb?) mentioned that it will be very hard to get the trained radiomen and ATGM operators into the frontline. That was discussed before Sept mobilization.
BTW, where are the mobile ATGM platforms like Khrizantema-S and Shturm-S? So far I only saw one BRDM anti tank version fired its 9M113. Even MT-12 Anti-tank guns have more video on them.
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it has been a while since I played this scenario, but I remember I concentrated all the force on the right wing
Sent 1-2 scout team to peek over the ridge. Then "one two three, on my mark", all the PzG infantry team leap forward (I split the squad into teams), in the meantime all the sdkfz 251 dash forward and area fire partisans' position.
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Hmmm, just noticed that Dragon's speed is also about 160m/s
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13 minutes ago, Haiduk said:
I add very important thing, which wasn't told in this article. But first of all about some other tactical things.
Main tactical unit of Wagner is so-called "assault detachment" (rus. "sturmovoy otryad") - it approx equal to reinforced company in 120-150 men (though, other sources say this is battalion-level unit). Lower level is assault group. Groups are froming due to current task and can be from squad to platoon size.
In many cases assault groups attack in some different way, than was described above. For example if suprize attack is need or arty support is not available, than assault groups try sneak under cover of terrain or in the night, fog, rain etc as close to UKR position as possiable and wait command. Then they divide on subgroups of suppressive fire (MG, RPG, RPO, RShG) and attackers. Latter rash to the UKR positions on the distacnce of grenade throwing and just rained it with grenades, which they carry in big number. If they can shock opponents with grenades they burst into trenches and clean it.
But main reason of Wagners effectiveness is not their human waves, which having huge losses eventually degerade opponents defense, but in their battlefield control system and experienced commaders, which unlike in Russian army feel free in achievment of goals. For control over the battle Wagners detachment commander use drones and special software on the any gadget. If Ukrainian soldiers use own small tactical drones like Mavic only for recon and arty/mortar targeting, but very rare for control over the battle (this do mostly special drone teams like TERRA and other), than Wagners widely use commercial drones for battlefield command.
Thanks for the info.
So they went back to the glory days of WW II Soviet Sapper tactics (and Sturmtrupp tactics) ?
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Or gambling on one wing. Zergling rush!
How to check your opponent's email address? I would like to have a direct contact with my opponent, so that I can let him know just in case I am away from games for couple days.
Thx
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4 hours ago, Lethaface said:
it feels a bit more like gambling than tactical warfare.
+1
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Ahhh, crap, that hurts.
I usually play CM on a laptop. That laptop is a very popular item in my family during holiday season. My wife and kids love to use that laptop to watch movie and TV show.
And it is very hard to find 4 continuous hours to finish the planning and deployment. Party, friends and family are going to occupy most of the time.
On the bright side, these are relatively small size scenarios, company size battles. But the first couple turns still need a lot of time
Looks like I got to run the CM on a low-end desktop in the basement. Keep the game running all day. Issue order to one squad at a time, whenever I can spare time in the basement. Hopefully kids don't press the power button when I am away from the desk
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I took half day off, spent 3 hours at home and finished my US game first turn. Hopefully I can finish my mirror game's first turn tomorrow.
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Hi , I am not very familiar with how the CM games work in PBEM++ server.
Last night I opened the turn 1 file, spend some time to deploy the 1st platoon and plot the waypoints for them. Hit save, go to bed.
This morning I loaded the save file, all my work on deployment and waypoints are gone.
So PBEM++ doesn't support save game?
Thank you
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CMCW US 1979 campaign mission 3. The Soviets Motorized Rifle Battalion (BMP) has been totally annihilated before they reached their first objective.
It's a great victory, but reading the wounded to killed ratios is a shocking.
310 KIA vs 9 WIA. Is that normal in a modern mechanized warfare?
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14 hours ago, danfrodo said:
yes, you are right! and yes I did! And the russians were really well hidden and didn't open up until they had tanks in sight. Also, I can't see some of the offending russians -- they are hidden in bushes trees but my dismounts can't seem to spot them. It's a fun challenge and I found a safe passage forward using terrain and with a little pz4 smoke to cover a narrow kill zone.
Thanks for the heads up. I got to be extremely cautious when I play this scenario
14 hours ago, danfrodo said:And when the T34s opened up I figured I would easily outduel them at that long range. Nope.
Maybe George MC put a bunch of Elite +2 T-34/85 on the map? lol
Maybe he put recon platoons hiding in some forward position (Soviet recon plt leader has radio). Company CO sit together with Tank Bn CO so any spotting information can be shared with two branches.
I played some PBEM involve long range engagement between Pz IV and T-34/85. So I would say, Pz IVs are the underdogs here. 7.5cm kwk40 is a powerful gun in 1943 but in 1944 era it has some problem to penetrate T-34/85’s turret (especially when Soviets tanks are coming in an angle, the AP could hit the side turret armor at a small angle impact). 85mm are as accurate as 88mm at long range. When they hit, your Pz IV is dead.
The long range gun fight in CMx2 WW2 title seems to be too accurate. I remember in CMBB it will usually take 3-5 shots to hit a tank size target at 1000m (initial hit rate range between 25%-33%, then with each shot slowly improves to 70%), in CMx2, it needs only two shots. At 1500m, 3 shots then it begins to hit. So the long range engagement can be decided in less than one turn. Everything will be over before you have a chance to revise your plan.
My strategy to increase the Pz IV's chance to win is:
Pz IVs park behind the cover, PzG inf move forward, identify the target, share the information with Panzer formation.
ID some keyhole position, or use smoke screen to isolate part of the T-34/85 force. The target is to bring a superior firepower to engage a small portion of T-34/85 at each time
Move PzIV forward, better to have at least 3 IVs to engage one T-34/85.
Of course, it is easy to say than done.
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1 hour ago, danfrodo said:
ah, good point JoMac. I just checked and my german tankers are mix of veteran, regular & green. I don't know what the russians are, but dang they've been good. I don't want to add spoilers but I am getting set up nicely for a big bag of payback.
feel bad for you. I haven't got a chance to try this one, but felt that sending the panzergrenadiers forward first for the spotting duty should be a better solution.
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On 12/12/2022 at 8:16 AM, LongLeftFlank said:
(marshy woodlands south or west of Kreminna, this past week)
"One thing I learned in Vietnam is how vulnerable feet are, both in cold and tropical climes."
Wait, how old is he? He must be in his 60s....
A while ago , I did alot of CMBS QB battles . Tiny to small force on a large map. dense forest. Infantry heavy scenarios with no more than 2 AFVs on both sides. It was like a green hell. Battles in forest are devastating.
On 12/12/2022 at 8:42 AM, LongLeftFlank said:That's what I have been thinking, down at the CM Tiny battles end of the combat spectrum. Forget the Big Push that bogs down and gets blasted by arty or air: it's five thousand ambushes or envelopments, all along the front, on average yielding a RU:UK casevac ratio of, say, 3:1.
The Russians have been hugely short of combat infantry throughout this war; that was by design (career soldiers were mainly specialists, to be augmented by mobik grunts). To me, that's the essence of why the BTG failed, hard.
They've clearly learned since April that screening and patrolling around your positions and vehicles is NOT optional.
But their VDV and spetsnaz have been worn away, and it looks like Wagner is going that way now. Where are the cadres to train the new guys in fieldcraft and get them to survive the first bumps?
No infantry, no army.
I am wondering what it looks like if we port some of the CMRT scenarios into CMBS.
Dead of Night, The Woroblin Bridgehead, Dawn Patrol, AD Interlock OP. Oh yeah, don't forget "Garden of the Iron Cross". These are small scale scenarios focused on infantry actions on a rough terrain. They are fit into current war theme
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Ahhh,
good to know, thx
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Mission "Dollbach Height". yes, my bad. That is Mission 4.
I think I got the answer. The Mission's map direction setting is not correct. After reading the Soviets mission brief from standalone mission "Dollbach Height", I think their plan is looking like this
Attacking towards Uttrichshausem.
The road on the map is A7 and it is a north-west to south-east direction.
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Why the Soviets takes a west to east direction?
Are they retreating due to the defeat at Neuhof?
Or attacking towards an unexpected direction?
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18 hours ago, Haiduk said:
An article (in Ukrainian) how Ukrainian volunteers-engineers from Respeechers and i3 Engineering companies and programmers, serving in 125th TD Brigade, created AI warning system ZVOOK (from UKR. "zvuk" - "sound"). This system allows to complement possibilities of Air Defense radars to detect approaching missiles and kamikadze drones - it's sound sensors listen the air, select suspicious sound, AI analyzes it and if the signal is matches to threat sound, it transmits alarm via cell phones towers to Air Defense datacenters. By the placement of activated sensor, AD can decide to react on that direction.
This system had been developing four months and was set up immediately after AI could detect true signal at 50/50 level - because we had a lack of radar covering - on the meeting develppers with Lviv oblast administration, representatives of cell phone operators and militaries they got permission to launch the first trial systems. Gradually engineers enchanced sound mirrors, electronics and could learn AI to work almost without mistakes. Interesting, that most problematic was to learn AI to differ a sound of cruise missile from cows mooing.
In present time 40 ZVOOK sensors already installed on more critical directions, but developers say there are need 600 sensors throughout all country in several echelones to be effective complement of radars.
That's brilliant!
SOSUS , The Sound Surveillance Sonar array System come into my mind. Yes, the more of these devices the better, as the target can be triangulated.
QuoteIn plans of developers - to make the system capable to determine a coordinates, speed and course of target. Now it can determinate approximately a bearing and elevation angle. Also developers want to scale the project and turn it in future to commercial product.
I guess Ukrainian engineer should have already know that, even with the bearing itself it should be able to calculate the coordinates and course.
If a target can be quickly classified with sound signature then we will know the speed. Then distance and course can be calculated with the bearing rate changes.
Right now the sensor is in a shortage, but later it will running out of cellphone towers to install the device. Maybe in the future the engineer can explore the option, hanging the sensors on a balloon?
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US 79 campaign mission 3, a M150 detected a BRDM at 3200m. It took gunner 6 seconds to aim the target. a TOW missile fired at 58:51, hit the target at 58:31.
20 seconds flight time. Average speed is 160m/s.
Does that sound correct? I have seen a lot of reference put TOW's max speed at 320m/s, average speed at 250m/s
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looks like the bug has been fixed with the latest patch.
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On 11/8/2022 at 11:32 AM, Grey_Fox said:
The target tool isn't a LOS tool, and it's drawn from an arbitrary height as opposed to where the gun or commander is. The reason you can't target the ground is because from that arbitrary height (which I think is equivalent to the head height of a standing soldier but am open to correction on that) the patch of ground you are targeting isn't visible.
A tank is usually taller than that, so could probably see another tank.
On 11/10/2022 at 9:03 AM, weapon2010 said:100% correct and this is a game engine limitation that causes players to misinterpret what they are seeing and they say "LOS is broken". It isn't broken , but an engine wish-list would be to have one elevation lower, the current lowest level is 1, which is about tank gun level or the height of a normal soldier .A level 0 would be ground view or what a prone soldier can see, this level would cut out most of the "LOS is broken" chatter and would be really cool.
Yes, I am aware of that. And I hope the future engine can provide los tools based on different elevation level.
Like I mentioned at the last part. After reviewing the save file, I believe this tragic event (to me) is caused by a small gap between the woods. The gap is no more than 1 action spot. See the pic below.
Although it doesn't show a light blue los line, the "Reverse Slope - no aim point" line indicates a clear LOS can exists between two AFVs.
I haven't talked to my opponent, but from next few turns I believe he has 2 T-34/85 in that section, one of them just arrived in the spot circled in red. It stopped there, detected and destroyed my JPzIV in the same turn.
What a bad luck.....
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On 11/8/2022 at 11:42 AM, George MC said:
The JgPzIV really needs to be unbuttoned to spot well. Its low silhouette also poses issues as whilst the unbuttoned commander can see the gunner might not. As noted by GreyFox there are some limitations with the targeting tool. Also in this mission the Soviet tankers are generally pretty higher experience levels than the German AFV crews.
In this scenario I suggest trying to hit the Soviet from the flank - you'll have better luck with the JgdPzs that way. Head to head will be a tougher engagement.
Thanks for the tips George
That’s what I did for most part of the game, put infantry in the front to be the eyes and ears. Identify Soviets main thrust then share the information through radio network. Unbuttoned JPzIV station behind, keep looking for some good fire position, move in, wait for Soviets get into the ambush zone, take flank shot, then smoke out and maneuver to the next fire position.
In this PBEM game my JPzIVs took out 7x T-34/85s, only two penetrated through front, the other five were taken out by flank shots. However the imbalance of this scenario plu some pure bad luck and missteps smash my resistance ability pretty quickly. Now it is getting close to the end of the game, I guess it will end with German side minor to major defeat.
I want to also add some other tips, you got to find a hull down position for JPz IV. There are several problems of JPz IV.
First , it’s low silhouette doesn’t give it any concealment advantage in CM. I did couple tests in Mission Editor, looks like there is a very high chance T-34/85 will spot JPzIV first (they are setting at the same experience level, both keep at station, unbuttoned).
Then, Second, CM’s long range tank duel is very likely to ended with hits on low hull part. For JPzIV, that fatal possibilities seem to be very high. I have seen majority of 1000m duel ended with 1st round 85mm fell short, then 2nd round penetrate through low hull, kill everyone inside the JPzIV.
However, even assume JPzIV is in a hull down position, it is not immune to a quick, un-recoverable damage. It has fragile gun, anything hit the gun mantle will cause a damaged gun. In my experience, anything hit upper part will have 50% to damage the gun. So for German player, you should avoid the exchange fire with Soviet tanks fleet. Fire couple shots, smoke out, retreat.
But that leads to another problem of JPzIV, poor mobility. It moves as slow as a snail. When you are still half-way to the next defense line, the T-34/85s have outflank your position already.
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Actually, you can use the combination of pause and withdraw/fast order to make a poor-man's shoot & scoot command
But I also hope shoot-and-scoot be added into future CM game (Isn't this command in CMx1?)
AI Friendly Fire
in Combat Mission - General Discussion
Posted
I also noticed that a while ago
https://community.battlefront.com/topic/138840-night-combat-friendly-fire-casualty-caused-by-hmg/