DerKommissar

Khabour Trail

The Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry Battlegroup
Tall Tamir & Al Hasakah, 2008
 

The Light Infantry approach the Urban centre of the Al Haskah Governate.
 

Syrian Irregulars are engaged, near a Retirement Home.
 

Ambush! The Jihadists organize a deadly maze. The advance is slowed.

This is weird. I experience this with CM:SF2 but not CM:BS. Both are at the latest version, as far as I remember.

There is a second map, as well (from the big map, which can be cut down for these things)- that one covers the Reichstag, Adlon Hotel, and a bit further in.
There is a typo (Lehrter Station) that won't be in the one everyone plays.

The idea to have the 'Key People' occupying Key Terrain. Key Terrain permits the observation of the objective and area of operations. . From there the leader can bear the fire power of his units upon the enemy. 

Solution 1 works as it is advertised 
 
Here is a edited scenario, I put one Recon Co. (bmp) and one Tank Co. on the map.
WEGO mode, Iron difficulty 
Pic 1
beginning of the game, no one knows what is on the other side

 
Pic 2
Recon Inf disembark and moving forward

 
Pic 3
Beginning of the turn. Recon Inf under heavy fire immediately. They can ID couple M1A2 on the other side of the map. the Recon Plt leader, who is sitting in the BMP 10m behind, begin to yell in the radio about enemy contact

 
Pic 4
50s into the first turn, Recon Company commander got the report from his plt leader, he begin to distribute the information, first he tell this to his commanding vehicle crews. 

 
 
Pic 5
at the same time, the Tank Company commander still knew nothing.

 
Pic 6
but in less than 5 seconds, he saw the Recon Co. commander waving hand and yelling at him. then He got the update that there are a lot of enemy on the other side

 
Pic 7
when 1st min ends, the 1st plt of the Tank Company still don't have a clue.

 
Pic 8 
But his commander's warning get through radio net at 2:43 
 
 
 
Pic 9
one of Plt leader's subordinate quickly got the update from him

 
Pic 10
the other one is a slow boy, he has hard time to understand what's going on.

 
 
Anyway, by the end of Min 4, every Syria units on the map got the news . "American Tanks are coming!"

I recommend Island of Fire, by Jason D. Mark. It's a day-by-day coverage of the German assault on Stalingrad, from both Wehrmacht and Red Army perspectives. It's jam-packed with real maps, photos and reports. The focus is put on the tactical and operational levels, but not without strategic context.
Perfect to get you hyped for urban, and prepared for winter, operations on the Ostfront -- that we'll hopefully see soon in F&R.

It looks like they're still very much busy putting the module together. I think they'll need some time to test, even after all models, textures and campaigns are in-game. Not to mention that Christmas is around the corner, and the Devs may take time off to spend with their families. As such, I have a feeling that Fire & Rubble will be delayed from early January -- possibly into February.
Hopefully we'll get some showy AARs before then.

Check your vehicles.....They can be acquired by units in Nyala MRAPs.
 

Formations & Units
 
The Combat Mission scenario editor has a lot of customisation for formations and units built into it from the get go. Morale, experience, fatigue, ammunition, headcount can all be set to meet your requirements. Then there’s the ability to tweak formations themselves by deleting and adding single vehicles/infantry teams. It’s a boon for a historical scenario maker.
Much of the hard work has already been done for you prior to a game or module being released. The amount of effort that goes into ensuring the Tables of Equipment are as accurate as they can be is immense. To give you a sense of the detail and questions asked before it appears in a final game here is a rough outline of one such debate over a formation appearing with the Fire and Rubble module and in this campaign. There was back and forth debate over the composition of what small arms specific squads should have. When one researcher found the digital scans of the original 1944 paperwork outlining the design of the new battalion and how many rounds of a certain type of bullet would be required for the formation to be adequately supplied… it settled the matter.
What this allows you to do when researching a campaign is to have confidence that when you read that a German Fusilier Battalion took part in the attack, you can select that same battalion in the editor and it will likely match perfectly or very closely to what took part in the battle you are trying to recreate. It’s a strong base that you can tinker at around the edges to account for casualties or additional units that were attached for the engagement.
A big problem you’ll come across reading military history books outlining the course of a campaigns is that in many cases they rarely go below the battalion level or provide regular updates on the status of the unit. It may look odd at first glance when you read that a battalion seems to be in two places at once or a full battalion is required to move in and take an area the size of a hamlet. In reality it’s likely elements from that battalion were spread out to achieve multiple objectives or some elements were held in reserve. This means it’s always handy to have at least two difference sources, one focusing on the campaign plus additional sources focusing on unit histories (or failing that campaigns from only one sides viewpoint). Unit histories and indeed a number of websites that provide unit-based information and diary like content will likely help you far more in creating your own order of battle for the campaign you are designing. Read them in parallel and plot important information onto the timeline noted above.
These are the questions I ask when pulling together information on formations I need to include in a campaign (for both the player and the opposing side):
-          Starting condition at commencement of the wider operation
o   Are they fresh off the train from the training depot or are they already battered from earlier fighting?
-          Starting condition at the commencement of the fighting you are focusing on
o   Potentially different compared to the start of the operation. Vehicle breakdowns, earlier skirmishers you aren’t including etc.
-          Condition before each engagement/scenario you will be designing (if possible)
o   Helps you gauge how much of a challenge each prior scenario was for the formation historically.
o   For example, if A Company had been in two prior scenarios and went into their third engagement historically at 80% strength, but your campaign testing shows that even with good tactics they are usually going into the same engagement at around 40% strength; then you know your balance is probably off or something in earlier scenarios is not lining up to history.
-          Condition at the end of the operation (or end point of what is being recreated)
o   As above. A good gauge for measuring how hard your individual scenarios are and perhaps appropriate victory point allocations for units.
o   For example, if the force was a shell of it’s starting strength but was still slapped on the back and told “job well done” before being removed from the lines, then perhaps victory point allocations favouring the survival of units is not the best approach.
-          What happened between engagements?
o   Another engagement? Is it worth creating a scenario for?
o   Did they have time to rest and refit? Did they get any replacements? Did they replenish their ammunition? (Do the work now and it makes Campaign Scripting a whole lot easier)
o   Would the ability to have a rest and refit be only possible if they had won the earlier battle? (Start thinking now how your individual scenarios will link together and branch out).
It’s very similar to designing an individual scenario in my opinion, but it’s perhaps more pertinent that you ‘get it right’ up front, particularly for helping with overall campaign balance when the same force is going to be following the player through multiple engagements.
For Tukums I default back to MS Excel again to plan out what the historical force and visualise how it may look inside the editor. More on this when we get to the Core Unit File creation. See the table below for the planning for the German force. Something similar was done for the Soviets but I won’t go into detail there given spoilers. All I will say is it did change a few times and again required a detective’s caps to work out what units were where and at what time.

Example of linking Formations back to Timelines
 
The worst thing you can do as a campaign designer is throw in all this hard work and not see anyone finish the end product or bail because it’s led them down a branching path with no prospect of having any hope in hell of achieving victory in follow on scenarios. How many times have you loaded up a follow-on battle in a campaign and been expected to clear a map with the same battered formation you just fought with, and this time it’s urban warfare?
This is where plotting the formations and units involved on a timeline really helps. It allows you to see how much combat (and the number of Combat Mission scenarios) each formation is expected to face. If a company of infantry is expected to fight through eight scenarios without any chance of replenishment and then the last fight is in an urban environment, how realistic will it be and how realistic will it be for a player to have that formation in fighting shape by that last mission? Even a genius commander is slowly going to take casualties.
In the end remember this is aiming for a hyper realistic wargame simulation, but it is still a game. If you make things appear impossible you will likely encourage a ‘save scum’ mentality because the player likely doesn’t know what this formation is meant to tackle next.
For Tukums it was actually quite easy to answer this question given most of the player’s formations would have to fight through no more than two engagements each. There’s still a lot that can go wrong but a strong chance the player would always have a chance right up the third and final scenario that determines if the player is victorious or not.
In the end…
 
I have a clear idea of the geography I need to map out in the editor (3920m x 2000m in this case), with no real wasted space the player will have no interest in at some point. I have a timeline of events that I’ve filled with content and a detailed core unit file. You get a rough idea of how time progresses and where the flow of the campaign should go between each engagement. You get something like this…

Mmmm. Looks a bit like a campaign script doesn’t it.
A Special Note on Fictional Campaigns
 
As you can probably tell, all of the above is focused heavily on a historical based campaign where I have limitations and boundaries for every question. No matter how hard I try I can’t justify adding a company of King Tigers to the players force since none where present.
Just because what you maybe designing is fictional doesn’t mean you have a free reign on to do what you want. Well technically you do, it is a game after all, but what I mean is the game itself is designed first and foremost as a realistic strategy game. Keep your fictional planning within realistic proportions. Some examples of what I mean:
-          The mission is to take a hamlet held by a platoon of militia and civilians are confirmed present. Better give the player Corp or Army level artillery assets to assist.
-          It’s time to take the centre of the city in a tight urban warfare. I’m the player only needs a pure armour force and no infantry support.
-          Congratulations on winning your last mission. For your next mission your force has been transported 100 kilometers away to over the course of 30 minutes.
Combat Mission is designed to reflect the real world. Situations like this drop players out of the narrative very quickly. Remember your players are the same bunch of wargamers that will pipe up when the angle of the Panther’s front armour is one degree off. They like realism.
Though I must admit I’m still waiting on a science fiction based Combat Mission: Earth vs Mars type of setting. 

If somehow the rights to CMA could be crowd funded and bought would BFC consider updating it?
Yeah, it's a long shot. But what would Snowball care. They abandoned the title in less then 6 months after it was released.
 
Mord.

Aye. P3s are my favourite panzers. I think they're a better tank than the T34/76. P3 had an excellent 5-man crew layout, great observation and 2 fantastic MGs. It's no wonder they became observation and command vehicles.
Will the Ausf. N variant be included?
I've found them to be excellent support tanks, in CM:FI. Better suited for the job than a Panther. Like Rommel said, let the artillery take care of enemy tanks. If push comes to shove, there's always the HEAT round.

Like the old bar sign says: liquor in the front, poker in the rear.

I've enjoyed all the stock campaigns, that I had the pleasure to play. I loved the Kampfgruppe Peiper Campaign for CM:FB, the most. Here's a few things that make it stand out:
1. It's a massive campaign with a lot of branching paths. It really felt "dynamic". You had to make the decision on what to capture, because the next mission would depend on it. 
2. It has a diverse OOB, that persistently shows up. I prefer combined arms missions as opposed to spec ops stuff.  You get to know your units, as most of them show up frequently.
3. It's very authentic to the historical events and locations, but also gives you the freedom to make your own timeline. This got me really immersed and engrossed in both the game, and the history.
I even made an AAR for this campaign, showing its grandeur. Honourable mentions to Khabour Trail and Highland Games.

3.6km x 2.9 I think. Don't quote me on that.
Shhhh. There's been a lot more since then and a part of this series is planned to cover the additional research information that you may not really need for individual scenarios but helps create campaigns. Never under estimate this community, there is a grog for everything.
Sorry very slight spoiler but no partisans here.
I will explain the Panzer III's in a further part while talking about unit selection depending on how far down that rabbit hole I can go. Seeing behind the scenes I'm honestly amazed at the level of detail some of the TOE discussions get down to.
Short version, most Panzer III's were pulled from front line units after Kursk and were sent back for conversions into StuG's, though a few were sent to Panzer Schools as training vehicles. The Germans in August 1944 were throwing everything they could at the Soviets as Bagration ran out of steam at the gates of Warsaw. At the same time the Soviets cut off Army Group North from their land route back to Germany at the end of July - a larger German force than what was trapped at Stalingrad. This included emptying training depots with their trainee crews from Germany and sending them east. They had guns and tracks. One of those units was sent to Latvia at the start of August.

1 – Outline Campaign Concept
“Wars begin when you will, but they do not end when you please.”
Niccolò Machiavelli
 

 
Step one of making a campaign: quit Combat Mission and start planning. This first and the second section of this write up will all be done outside of the game itself. A Combat Mission campaign is a project with many moving parts that need to talk to each other ideally in a seamless way to make a great experience for your audience.
Before properly begin, I want you to go through this checklist and ask these questions:
- Have you made a scenario yet?
- Are you inspired? (This is going to take a while)
- Can a Combat Mission Campaign do what you want it to?
The third one is a bit fuzzy for some so that’s what we’ll be answering below in this part, but hopefully you’ve said yes to all three. The first is paramount as designing a scenario from scratch has enough to learn on its own without adding on yet more to learn. Considering campaigns are single player only, you will have to know how to create AI plans. Is that historical series of engagements grabbed your attention? No way around it, you’re creating a bunch of scenarios on the same subject matter so it’s going to take time.
Jon Snowden started his Scenario Design DAR/AAR stating: “Scenarios usually begin with a hazy idea of what I want to do.”
Campaigns usually start by having a hazy idea but then also wondering what would come next? For historical based campaigns there’s usually a series of engagements that line up that you want to re-create. For fictional campaigns it’s usually a bit more creative such as “The player has taken the hill, so what should I place on the other side?”
There are always more inspiration and ideas… one day. (And there are no Battlefront secrets in the screenshot, I’ve checked).
 

 
What is a Combat Mission Campaign?
It’s a pre-determined series of linked scenarios that can track and carry across the same units between multiple engagements. That is it.
Combat Mission is still a strategy game and campaigns do no introduce any role-playing elements such as units gaining experience after ‘x enemy kills’ or the like. The campaign must be a self-contained within the same game family – so a campaign can’t begin in Combat Mission: Battle of Normandy and transfer through to Combat Mission: Final Blitzkrieg. Though there is nothing stopping a designer from breaking this one, the focus of tracking specific units between battles does naturally lend the system to favouring short time scales ranging from a few hours through to a week or so of combat. If you look through all the stock campaign releases that have come with every base game and module, you’ll see they largely follow the same pattern where you command a handful of formations through a number of trials over the course of a few days or weeks.
So back to my third question:  Can a Combat Mission Campaign do what you want it to?
Idea: I want the player to command Army Group North in its defence of Riga. I also want to throw in a hypothetical scenario around what would happen if an additional Soviet Tank Army also joined in the attack. I want a pony.
Ithikial’s Response: Combat Mission is the wrong scale for that type of wargame. I also want a pony.
 
Idea: I want the player to command the 2nd Battalion, 506 PIR, from D-Day through to the end of the war.
Ithikial’s Response: Well that’s doable on paper, but before you begin that’s already two campaigns across two titles that can’t ‘talk’ to each other. It’s also likely dozens of scenarios that need to be individually built and have planned out branching pathways. Have you considered what happens if Lt Winters is killed at Brecourt Manor? What does that mean for Easy Co. at Bloody Gulch? I promise you’ll burn out and the project will never get finished.
 
Idea: I want the player to command 3rd Battalion, 116 Infantry Regiment in July 1944 as it fights towards St Lo. The campaign will end once they manage to link up with the 1st “Lost” Battalion east of the city on the city.
Ithikial’s Response: I want to play that. There’s a good chance it will work.
 
The message here and for most of this first part is that campaigns can spiral out of control very easily if there is no time, force composition and geography limit you place upon yourself as a designer to keep the project workable and a player interested.
What if I said the Battle of Tukums actually started out first as a seven-scenario campaign tracking the Panzergrafs’ units from their jump off at Saldus in western Latvia, through to Tukums and then onto the Riga outskirts themselves, plus a few more scenarios as they widened the corridor they created over the following days. It was too big with the major set piece battle around the town itself occurring in the front half of the series. Everything else would quickly become filler. So the campaign turned into a large scenario merging two of the earlier planned engagements of the campaign that were to occur concurrently in the timeline. Then when I realised there could be potentially over 1,500 moving pixeltrüppen at one time on the screen with 100 plus tanks… I really didn’t want to be the cause of melting CPU’s and complaints back to Battlefront help desk, so it was split up again into three distinct parts ranging from 0830 hours in the morning through to around 1400 hours in the afternoon.
The green square is what this campaign is focused on. The purple boxes are what the first cut of what this campaign would of looked like and I still think would of played worst for it.

So, remember when I opened this part saying the first thing to do is “Quit Combat Mission”? All of the above was done through a few forum posts (behind the scenes), ongoing research and planning, and (because it’s me) a spreadsheet or two to organise my thoughts. There was no time wasted in the editor making maps and creating scenarios that went nowhere which is a path to losing interest in a project pretty quick.
Now there are going to be some unique terminology that I’m going to keep coming back to in every part of this series so it is prudent to get this out of the way up front:
A Glossary of Terms
Core Unit
Any unit (on both sides) that will take part in more than one scenario and where it’s end condition
will transfer from one to another.
Non-Core Unit
Any unit (on both sides) that will only take part in one scenario or where the unit’s end condition
does not matter for follow on scenarios.
Campaign Briefing
The first briefing the player will read once commencing the campaign and will likely refer back to throughout the course of playing to review the overall objective. In most cases contains high level information on overall situation, objectives and a high level of detail on units under their command. (A part will be dedicated to this).
Campaign Script
[Cue spooky music] The behind the scenes code that tells Combat Mission what to do between scenarios. The branching ‘road map’ the player will go down between individual scenarios and the information about what should change for the core units transferring into a battle. Has been known to cause designers to cry, scare away newcomers and cause marriage breakdowns*.
Core Unit File
A master file that is the central collection point for all campaign level elements. It is also the file that is used to compile and create the final campaign. Will include all Core Units, the Campaign Briefing, Campaign Briefing Imagery, the Campaign Script (sort of we’ll get to that).
 
* There may not be any tangible evidence of this one.
End of Part 1.
 
Your homework to be posted in the comments below:
-    Is there a Stock Campaign that has come out with a product release that sticks out in your mind as one you really enjoyed?
-    Why do you remember it and what makes it stand out?

Here, here! Toss the dogs of war a bone.
I'm, still, holding out hope Fire & Rubble will be released before Cyberpunk 2077.

yep...that will be surely welcome from all of us poor little desperatly waiting guys...

Yes, completely true. Therefore should be a complete non-issue to add it to the other NATO countries.
However, if you currently play a quick battle as the Canadians you won't get an option to purchase anything non-Canadian.
To best honest, I'd rather get an option to select "All Blue" and "All Red" forces as combatants in a quick battle setup. That would then also allow multi-national NATO ops, as well as a Syrian Army+UNCON mix, with the side-effect of giving Canadians and the Dutch some UAV's in QBs.
  
You're right - the MQ-1C might've been developed in 2004, but seems like it wasn't operationally deployed until 2010.

Hello everyone,
 
I just discovered this wonderful application
 
https://www.map.army
 
It allows you make your own maps laying military symbology (2525b) and GIS vector and raster data, over a map of the world. Allows saving the maps to their proprietary format, collaborative editing etc.

Lemme' steal some photos 😄

I was playing a TF Thunder scenario with a lot of close range encounters. This was about 150m and there was an enormous explosion and 3 smoke columns. I could not see the vehicle behind the targetted tank, just its smoke. I guessed it was either an IED car or a BMP, but the review showed this...

Note the hit decal over the first road wheel, there is one on the second tank (you can't see it) on the right hand side.
I'd heard of this happening but had never seen it. very impressive.

In an offense mission, the Player can rush or take it slow. In a defense mission, the pacing of the gameplay is entirely up to the scenario's designer. Defense missions must take extra effort to set up AI plans and such. Maybe that's why we see less of them?
I did enjoy the defense missions in Combat Mission: Afghanistan -- they felt very thematic. CM:SF2 Highland Games also had a very fun mission, where you hold off a Soviet-style mechanized assault. With QBs, it varies widely from "too intense" to "waste of time".

A defensive campaign will do nicely 😊...
With brancing options...to hold current terrain for one more battle or fall back ...?  To defend in place or try to launch a local counter attack...some night raiding or recon missions perhaps...

Yep, that's my conclusion, too. Marines are also losing some attack helicopters, on top of artillery and tanks. USN sees themselves as the primary defensive arm and don't see the need for USMC to spearhead a breakthrough, against a prepared defender. If the Marines encounter determined resistance, there will be a "Oh, that's why!" epiphany (like CEFCOM had in 2008).

MBTs are not going anywhere (China's armoured forces are growing substantially). The USMC failed to get their 20 percent women ratio and implementing co-ed training.... and will suffer the consequences of not fully participating in the US millitary social experiment. Sorry, if this offends the easily offended. The Marines will be reduced to a USN controlled overall mission with a light infantry concept (Where as the old Marines were heavy infantry). It not only lost it's armored battalions, it also lost most of it's artillery. The new Commandant of the Marines is willing to sacrifice Marine Corps customs and traditions to bring in the new age of peace with appeasement. I have a feeling the old Marine Corps will return soon enough.