Talespin Jim

Wow, thanks all. So much great information. I'm glad I asked the question.

Ah, I always forget about that because it seems to not work so well, so I don't use it, but for just an approximation it would help. The problem is not so much determining the no aim point though, it's determining how much farther the distance will be to a Sherman than it is to the ground. So I can use the no aim point to figure out the pinnacle of the gradual peak that will serve to give the Sherman the hull down position, but somehow I have to calculate how far beyond that I can still shoot at a Sherman, which is standing, what, maybe six feet high? The slope is so gradual that I know a Marder makes 102 meters past the no aim point for the AT Gun, but how much farther will the top of a Sherman first appear than the height of the Marder's gun? Usually an eyeball with a tool like that is close enough. But in this case, we know that the difference in height between a Marder's gun and an AT gun makes a 102 meter difference as to where you need to place your units. How much more difference will the top of the Sherman make? it could be fifty, a hundred meters or more. That's a big margin of error when the decoy has to be a slow moving infantry unit close assaulting a tank. Eyeballing it won't cut it in this situation. Ian, you also make some excellent comments. This one is the most intriguing to me, because it shows something about how I think. The appeal of this spot is more than what I've said. The spot also fits my thinking for things like AT Guns and sometimes machine guns or other direct fire weapons. I sometimes like a limited lane of fire. If I put the AT Gun where it will sweep the whole board, it will get one shot or two, then something, somewhere will suppress it or destroy/kill it. But if I put it where it can only see or be seen from one narrow direction, then it can only be shot at from a few targets, probably just one, that can see it too and it then it lives to fight another day. So this gun protects a side road, on my right flank, through the forest that the enemy is unlikely to use, but if they do use this access, they have to go down this road, single file. Nothing else can see them there, they won't be able to see anything else, because I won't waste any more units there. But if they did go that way and I didn't protect it, I would get blind sided. This way maybe I can slow them down or even deny them access this way. To make this even more perfect, there are some guns in the center of my line, which the enemy absolutely has to destroy and then take their position for the victory points. I am definitely facing an overrun no matter what I do. So if I turn this little 50 mm gun 90 degrees to the left, it has a tight lane of fire to the center of my line where those other guns are and where the enemy must go to get the victory points. So even if the enemy never goes down the road this gun is protecting in the forest, it will still get a flank shot on something going to the center of my line--maybe infantry, maybe tanks. It will become important one way or another and will not go to waste. In my opinion, it is the perfect situation for a gun of this size.

I have a question that someone might find intriguing to answer. The reason I'm asking this question is because I'm interested in the reasoning process that leads to your answer. I'm setting up my units and have a 50mm anti-tank gun that I've found the perfect spot to decorate with. It's among a couple of trees right behind a small gnoll, just big enough to make it hull down. It's also inconspicuous because there are actually more obvious placements for it, so chances are, the opponent won't immediately be looking for it there. In my defensive planning, it becomes pertinent that I know at what point the AT gun will be about able to fire at approaching AFV's, such as a Sherman. From in front of the gnoll the ground elevation slowly falls maybe five meters in elevation over 200 meters, then it begins to rise again maybe seven meters over another 100 meters and then very slowly begins to drop back down a couple of meters over the next two hundreds meters. Thus there is a point between the AT Gun and where I expect a Sherman will eventually travel at which both the gun and the Sherman will be hull down from each other and some meters before it reaches that point, the Sherman will not be visible at all. (Note: these approximations of the slope and distances from where the slopes change are pretty wild guesses, or it would actually be a snap to calculate an exact answer.) I can calculate, using the targeting tool that I can shoot the ground from the AT gun's position at exactly 300 meters distant and no further. But when a Sherman approaches, it will rise up from the ground perhaps what, maybe six feet or so? So without finding an old geometry schoolbook, how do I get a guestimate as to how far the AT gun will actually be able to see a Sherman approaching and shoot at it? Now, I've also used another AFV I've been given, a Marder II, to determine that it can shoot the ground at an approaching Sherman at 402 meters, were it placed where the AT Gun will be. This gives me some idea of the effective difference in range a little height can mean. If I remember right a Marder II has a lower profile and the gun is lower still. So I'm guessing maybe the AT Gun's gun is 2.5 or 3 feet off of the ground and maybe the Marder's is 50% higher, increasing the range to ground by 100 meters. Therefore, as the slope continues to decline at an even rate for a long distance, I'm thinking the top of a Sherman would be maybe 50% higher than the difference between the height of the Marder II's gun, compared to the height of the gun of the AT Gun. Thus I'm guessing that maybe I could hit a Sherman at a maximum of fifty meters further than the Marder II could hit the ground were it in the AT gun's spot, and that would be 452 meters. That's where I want to set up my ambush, the maximum range the AT gun can possibly snipe a Sherman. I'll put an infantry unit in the woods there to distract the Sherman so maybe the AT Gun can get a few shots off without being noticed and with any luck I'll fool the opponent into thinking the infantry unit somehow killed the Sherman and thereby maybe I can get another kill with the gun before he waxes me good. How wrong am I? Hint, the answer is not "You can shoot the gun any time you like, but you'll never hit anything because you're Italian." I would not find such an answer amusing and I would never say such a thing. It's not the average Italian's fault it was probably Mussolini's or many other people, far up the ladder from the average man on the street, who were making a lot of really bad and even corrupt decisions that all contributed to making the very brave Italian soldier's, who did not even want to be fighting in the war, or for the side they were on at the time, fight less effectively than they would have been able to, had they had the weapons, tactics, structure and leadership, optics, etc., of many of their counterparts. Still, I know some of you devilish souls will come up with that very comment. Oh, and Oddball, the answer could be something other than, "This is not a tank simulator." Lol.

Yeah, I'm ADHD on top of the bipolar, plus diabetic, bad back, high blood pressure, high everything else, blood clots if I don't take blood thinners (rat poison), fat, bald, ugly, glasses, flat feet (I forget what else) and my wife thinks I'm faking it all to get out of mowing the lawn. I also have a twisted sense of humor, which is really a bad mix with ADHD/bipolar/pain pills/14 other drugs/general ugliness--and it doesn't go over very well at my church. I think everyone else thinks I'm a total heathen. But I really do try to fit in. I'll most likely earn the same reaction here without trying to be weird. That's why I apologized when I realized my post, that I thought was funny at the time, probably came off as snippy. So again, sorry if I offended you in any way. It was an accident, but I'll most likely do it again, though always unintentionally. Sooner or later, I offend everybody.

I've seen a lot of your posts Oddball. I know you are a great person and very knowledgeable. I was just having fun with you. Those quotes were all from Kelly's Heroes, but you probably know that. I'm assuming you are a fan. It's one of my all time favorite movies and Oddball has a ton of great lines. But you know that, I can tell by your signature. I kind of had to twist what I was saying to fit the quotations, so it may have seemed snippy now that I look back at it (the whole movie has a lot of snippy remarks), but that was not the way I meant it, I was just trying to make my reply funny and in character with the quotes. So sorry if it came off abrasive. I can always fall back to my favorite excuse, "Sorry man, I'm bipolar."

Thanks guys, I appreciate all of your responses and I actually learned a lot from them. From the gist of it, me being new, it sounds like most of my problems will have solutions that come with experience. For example, right after posting this, I did just happen to figure out the idea of aiming right behind the obstacle. Unfortunately my green crew would not fire their weapon. And now I'm realizing their green-ness is more the problem than the game engine limitations. They have yet to fire their weapon by opportunity or by order, or follow an order to completion. They won't even fire smoke, but have now chosen to run out in plain view of an enemy AFV and just stop, when I was trying to tell them to cross the street. Twice they've had flank shots at the enemy who was unaware of their presence and refused to shoot over multiple tuns and orders, They're probably going to get themselves killed by stupidity, As for you, Oddball, "Hey, kid, they haven't got you in the nut ward again?" --I'm not trying to play a tank simulator, in fact I prefer playing with infantry at this point, it's more challenging. I used tanks as an example, but most of my questions could be used for any unit except those questions about armor piercing ammo specifically and those could apply to any anti-tank weapons. Further the questions hold true for any thinly armored vehicle as well as tanks. "Definitely an antisocial type." "Now go on, get down into your hole."

An enemy tank or AFV is hiding behind a bush. I know he's there. My armored unit watched him move there. I know about what elevation the ground must be because of the terrain all around it. Yet, if I target the ground in front of the bush and fire, my understanding, and watching what the crew reloads the gun with, it appears that it will always shoot HE (High Explosive Ammunition). The question is, why can't I tell my tank to use AP? For that matter, why can't I tell it to use its APCR? Actually, since APCR was to only be used on tank destroyers I can kind of understand that one, maybe it should be left up to the tank commander--However, I've yet to see a tank fire APCR. It's my understanding that the only way to tell it to fire armor piercing is to use "Target Armor". But in that case, my tank doesn't fire at all unless they actually see something in their Armor Targeting Arc, even though they know there's a tank hiding behind a bush. Why don't we have a Target Armor command that will cause my unit to fire repeatedly with AP ammo at a target that it does not have a clear line of site to? It's just silly that a tank cannot be damaged because it is hiding behind a bush. I've even tried blasting the bush into oblivion with HE, to see if I could get a line of sight that way, to no avail. For that matter, why don't we have a full set of commands that will always default to HE unless the unit knows it is shooting at armor, as we do now, PLUS a full set of commands for AP if the unit is carrying AP weapons and ammo? I'm finding this unrealistically limiting. For example, why am I limited to giving my tank hunter team a 180 degree armor arc when I want to give them a 360 degree armor arc, or a 270 degree? There is a good reason why this is important. You set up your bazooka or panzershrek/faust so that the enemy armor can only approach from one general area. You know the frontal armor is too thick to damage it with a bazooka. So you need to insure a flank or rear shot. Therefore, while the enemy armor is coming at you, you don't want to shoot at it, you want to hold your fire and hide behind your obstacle until it begins to pass either to the left or to the right of you. Then you fire with a flank shot. This means you need a 270 field of fire and nothing else will do, so you can shoot at vehicles traveling any direction near you except straight at you. Or you need a button that says "Flank or Rear Shot Only." Another thing I don't understand, is when we know the enemy is behind a bush, why do we have to target the ground in front of it? Why can't we just target the bush? That's what you would do in real life. While I'm at it, when you create a way point and then select it so you can use the target command to check line of sight, why isn't the line drawn from the waypoint instead of the original position of the unit? And since it is so hard to figure out from the color scheme of the target line drawn, where the line of sight is actually blocked, how about having a little arrow point to the exact point where LOS is blocked? Better yet, there is a really simple way to do away with checking LOS altogether. Instead, when you click on a unit, everything that unit can see, including terrain, could be slightly illuminated and everything it can't see could be darkened as if in the shadow of a tree, and things it can sort of see could be somewhere in between. That's what is natural for us. That's the way our mind works. You know instantly what you can see. No more drawing twenty lines from each place you can move your unit to, to see if you are setting your unit up in a good spot.

Yes, that is a staggering number of foreigners in the SS. However, I might suppose that foreigners would include Austrians, Chzechs, Denmark, etc. Also, there were a lot of Scandinavians who came to help them. And then as you probably know, they were taking for years prior to the war, as all nations did and America continues to rely heavily upon today, volunteers from all over the world. They specifically amended their whole Aryan Nation nonsense to include those adopted in so they could try to attract more people to the armed forces. They even used POW's to fight for them, though they usually didn't fight hard. The reality was that the SS was built on a multinational force that was not ethnically pure except in the propaganda. Unfortunately, the only people who have ever really believed that propaganda were not so much the German citizens it was aimed at, but rather a sect of really stupid, ill-informed American thugs.

I see. I hadn't taken it happening ALL the time inconsideration into my argument, since it has not happened to me yet but maybe twice and then in not too threatening a circumstance. In fact, I've had just the opposite problem. I use unneeded truck crews or squads with only one man left or such odds and ends and use them to clean up the battlefield when I can, but I find that I have a hard time getting the troops to render buddy aid. In fact, this morning, I'm watching this one soldier laying across the body of a wounded soldier for several minutes, not an enemy in sight and he won't give aid. I'll pay closer attention. Maybe it is happening all the time and I just have failed to notice. I've only been playing CM2 for a month. At this point in my learning curve, most of my troops are too busy running in terror to give buddy aid. I assumed earlier posters were exaggerating when they said it was happening all the time, I didn't realize they meant literally every single time. At least you can say this for the game--It may not yet be a near perfect modeling of battalion level tactics in WWII, but it's good enough that when you try to explain it to people they don't say, "Oh, is that like Risk?" Why do people always say that? It gets so infuriating.

возмутительно! я не шпион, но ваш акцент дает прочь. вы узнали России в учебном центре ЦРУ для одаренных обезьян Bah ha ha!

спасибо комиссар, самый почитаемый я такой, чтобы найти и уничтожить немецкую заставу. (How's that for authentic? Best I can do, not speaking Russian and all)

Two points: First, Combatentman makes some really great points and validated by real life experience. However, I think in some haste and frustration, he invalidates anyone who has not been in real life combat as having a valuable perspective. I resent this and I think after he gave it some thought, he might accept that those of us with no such experience can gain a semblance of an intelligent understanding by having studied numerous accounts from people who really have been there. If he were not to accept that as a valid point, I would have to point out that he would actually have had to be a World War II medic to have a valid understanding and not a simply modern medic experience. Furthermore, even if he were a WWII medic with real combat experience, he would still have to admit that his memories become tainted after years and further, that his experience may not represent all such experiences, or even the majority of them. To top it off, I don't believe in the original question we were even talking about "medics", but rather buddy aid and whether they give aid is not even a question of reason and logic, it's often a purely emotional decision. It is my understanding that medics were not as available on the line in WWII and that when we are talking about buddy aid, we're talking about an individual soldier's decision to render aid to the wounded instead of fight and that he may not have a logical reason for doing it. Here's an example. It's my understanding, purely from a lifetime of study mind you, that snipers routinely wounded the first target they picked, instead of killing him, so that other members could be lured out into the open to render aid to the wounded soldier (and in fact, the Japanese used small caliber weapons for the reason that they realized it was more beneficial for them to wound and incapacitate an enemy rather than kill him, thus tying up many more personnel and supplies in saving him, transporting him to a medical facility, caring for him, feeding him and then shipping him home). Anyway, the idea was to draw others out into a sitting duck position in order to get an easy clear target and slowly get everyone in the squad. Of course the sniper's enemy knew that this is what the sniper was doing on purpose. They knew they were being baited. Yet they routinely fell for the bait anyway, even veterans. Why? Because the desire to save the wounded soldier overcame any rationale to kill or drive off the enemy first. Now let's take the case of a medic. Medics feel not only compassion for the wounded soldier but also an intense drive to do their duty and fulfill their purpose and job and go save that guy (See? And you thought I could not understand). But we're talking about someone with even less reason than that medic. We're talking about the one guy in the squad who the wounded soldier had the most camaraderie with. Most likely there was a guy or many guys in the squad who owed their lives to the wounded guy. Most likely they felt they needed him desperately. They loved him. They spent every day, all day in the most dire of circumstances with this guy and they depended upon him all the way and he did his best to deliver. We're talking about the one guy who felt the most kinship and brotherhood with him, perhaps his best friend and a relationship that is literally closer than brothers. It does not matter what the enemy threat level may be, or how imminently he is dooming himself and his whole squad, emotion is going to drive him to drop everything and help that wounded soldier. So the sniper gets two for one. This tactic worked. Or so I am told. Sorry I wasn't there to tell you from personal experience. So I think buddy aid is working exactly like it was supposed to. Another point I read earlier that I thought was a little off, was the one about nine men in a squad doing nothing while another one is giving buddy aid. I once read about a WW2 study that showed that for any nation, with even the most experienced troops in a squad only 30% would be returning fire at any given time, at best. Some men, even the most battlehardened, will sometimes cower, others are trying to unjam their guns or load them, or deploy a weapon, or giving orders or trying to get others to fire, or in Kelly's Heroes the one guy was off taking a dump while all the explosions are going on. It was a comedy, but the study revealed that there was some truth to it. In a green squad only one man or perhaps none would return fire. Lambaste me all you want for my lack of experience or the fact that I was not there, I'm just telling you what I've read from statisticians who were there. So the point is, that I think it might be very realistic not only for the giver of buddy aid to be kneeling but also to be giving buddy aid in the most dire circumstances when common sense dictates that he should take cover and return fire now to save all their lives, and give aid in a few minutes. But what do I know. P.S. Thank you CombatantMan for your service and thank you all who served. Further, I can tell from your remarks, you are a man of character, and I appreciate that.

The half sentence given about it in the instruction manual made no sense at all until now that I've read your explanations and gone back and read it again. I discovered it by accidentally pressing the return and Tab key at the same time, and then I saw "View Lock" and thought, "Oh great, now I've messed the whole game up." After that I was trying to figure out what it does and every unit I selected and pressed Tab-all caused the camera to turn ten degrees South of West. I figured somehow I locked it to West. Now I realize all these units being infantry, and I'm in the setup phase, it wasn't apparent that they were all facing the exact same direction, so that's why the camera kept facing just off of West on every one of them. I lept to a whole bunch of wrong conclusions. If I'd happened to discover it during a replay movie segment, it would have been obvious from the get go. Yes, your beer induced description made perfect sense. Even the bit about Unit Lock. Thanks again. I'm kind of obsessive about knowing how everything works and I literally will stay up half the night trying to figure something like that out.

(Sorry if you see this post twice, I think I put it in the wrong place the first time.) I'm struggling to grasp what "View Lock" does, which is activated with the Tab key while a unit is selected (having accidentally discovered it). Apparently, it locks the compass position of the camera when you have a unit selected. So I'm not sure how I locked it when I fumbled the keyboard, but I think the first time I select a unit and press Tab the view becomes locked. Then, for example, if the camera were facing due West when I locked the view, every time thereafter, when I have any unit selected, I can press the Tab key and automatically face due West. Is this what it does? Next, having accidentally locked the view in a totally useless position, how do I clear the lock so I can relock it in another position? Also, what is "Unit Lock" and how is it used? I found it by selecting a unit, clicking Tab and then moving the mouse pointer to the right of the screen. But I can't seem to make it do anything. Thanks in advance for anyone who is willing to help this poor noob.

Moved to Red Thunder Forum

Actually, both of your comments are particularly useful and Bil's primer looks like just what I need. Any other links to reference material would be appreciated. I tend to eat this kind of thing up. Sometimes it's more fun than actually playing the game. Can anyone answer my last question about how to add a single truck onto a formation and designate it as a weapons truck? I'm kind of thinking that it can't be done.

Hi guys (assuming there are no females interested in this stuff). I'm new to Combat Mission and new to this forum so I could use a little advice. I just bought the whole tamale for this version of Combat Mission and decided to start off learning version 3 as the Russians. Considering my prior gaming experience, both computer war simulation games and Squad Leader back in the 70's, I'm having a surprisingly hard time catching onto it. I keep checking this forum for answers that I can't find in the manuals and I'm not having much luck. I'm wondering if I'm missing some vital part of the forum or some addendum or wiki somewhere that explains details of playing the game. For example, right now, I'm wondering how to make my snipers work right. I never had any experience using snipers in any other board or computer game, and I can't figure them out. I try to sneak within range of the enemy and have them take a shot, but I keep ending up with dead snipers. So I search the forum threads for a little advice. What I find on the forums is typically discussions of whether the snipers are overpowered, or underpowered, why their range should be over a mile distant (you know, there's always this one time when something bizarre happened in Russia, ie in this case it would go, "this one time in Russia a sniper took an SS General's head off from over a mile away..."--you know how those conversations go) and whether the color is off on the little pictures of the German sniper's buttons, etc. What I don't find is things like, what is a good range for snipers, how do I get them to act like snipers instead of submachine gunners, what can I realistically expect to effect upon the target, etc. This has been the case with almost everything I've tried to search for information for. Richly opinionated discussion, but not much "How To" stuff. Understand, my question about how to get sniper's to act right is secondary to the larger question of is there someplace I should be looking for the How To discussions. Also, can someone tell me how to buy a single truck and designate it as a "weapons" truck? Here's what I want to do. I want to buy a company of, say, riflemen. Then I want to give them a platoon of light mortars and give the mortar platoon a weapons truck so they have some extra ammo. The only way I've so far found to get a weapons truck is to buy a brigade of motorized riflemen, and then some of the trucks will be designated as weapons trucks and by using the options tree just right I might be able in some cases to change some of the weapons trucks to regular ammo or vice-versa. But I don't see how I can buy a few light mortars and assign them their own weapons truck (and incidentally, in no Russian formations do I see any light mortars used anywhere, which I recollect they had in abundance, but that's been decades since I've studied that kind of thing, and now my brain is old and full of fat and cholesterol--I seem to recall using a line of heavy machine guns to direct fire and then putting light mortars right behind them to lob shots onto the enemy units right behind the enemy's front line). Thanks so much, in advance, for any advice you give me.