SimpleSimon

There were precisely zero situations where a the commanding officer of a Panzer Division would ever want to go to battle knowing he was outnumbered, and careful observation of the Panzers in their victorious operations reveals a distinct preference for avoidance of the enemy main effort. It just so happened that after 1943 or so the Panzer Divisions had to be used all the time to plug holes where the frontline had been breached otherwise the whole line would get rolled up, but was far, far from preference that they be used against superior or even comparable numbers of peer enemies. Otherwise, the preferred enemy of the Panzer Division was soft infantry formations who possessed few means by which to stop 120 Panzers and associated infantry/artillery components rolling up on them. Even better would be no enemy at all and smooth sailing all the way to Moscow! Tanks of peer tonnage are very, very good at mutually inflicting heavy casualties on each other. The way the Wehrmacht worked you never tried to setup fair matchups or equal slugging matches between peer unit types. If it's infantry vs infantry, artillery vs artillery, and tank vs tank you're doing it wrong as far the Germans saw it. That they frequently had things this way after 1943 was a symptom of losing the war and not the sort of behavior they engaged in during the glory days of 1940.

The only cleanly 'superior' tank the Germans had during the war was the Panther. Everything else of which there were many of were often referred to as Ersatz Panzers and were not much appreciated by the Landwehr, but were better than nothing. The Tiger is often brought up too...but the Tiger was a Breakthrough Tank not designed for mass production. It was only intended to be used on occasion as a Corp asset like siege artillery... Desperation frequently led to its use in meeting engagements and defensive ops it was not well suited for. The MkIV which made up most of the Panzer Divisions' complement of armor right to the very last days of the war was a pre war tank designed in 1934 and was only 25 tons. It's hull was stretched to the absolute limits of what was reasonable in order to remain competitive while the Panther (never) caught up. As an MBT it had numerous troubling deficiencies though, the forward suspension was under almost constant strain from the added armament and protection causing early wear and failures of drive sprocket bearings. The hull armor was strengthened to a respectable 80mm during the war, but the turret face-plate never exceeded 50mm, and could be defeated by even fairly light guns. I don't know if i'd say the German possessed any kind of unique superiority in the Panzers thanks to their tanks. Indeed, this is not even a message the Nazis themselves pushed, as they did not like the idea of explaining their victory as thanks to a piece of machinery. Nazi propaganda was invested in its message of entitlement to victory being a product of the superior qualities of the Aryan Master Race...the Super Panzers stuff emerged after the war from western historians...

lol there's almost no way to address this sort of thing objectively because we're applying a very modern concept (medical psychology) retroactively to historic people's whos lifestyles and norms were incredibly different to our own.

The basic scenarios most of the time are pretty good, if a bit too dense with player and enemy units. For some reason the campaign scenarios tend to be far more uneven, and seem far too dependent upon scripting ie: playing out as the designer "intended" you to. There's a case to be made for some of the more pronounced set-piece style engagements requiring what is essentially puzzle solving to resolve. I just tend to think a few too many of the scenarios are oriented that way but it's honestly pretty easy to solve in the editor by just deleting or adding a few units to each side's toolkit. Even minor changes like a spare 105mm battery or an immobilized StuG can have a pronounced "butterfly effect" on the overall scenario, but more often than not there's just too much super-lethal stuff on the map. The designers think way too much in terms of punishing the player for mistakes and when trying to design for the artificial intelligence they think far too much in terms of "what i'd do".

Any squad armed fully with automatics has this problem though. It doesn't stand out as much in SF since we tend to have the Stryker, BMP, etc portering supplies around everyone but in theory a guy armed with an assault rifle could deplete his entire on hand stock of ammunition in seconds if all he did was mag dump. Naturally trigger discipline tends to be a bit better than that but I hold SMG and AR equipped squads to the same rule of thumb from my own experience. They have enough ammunition on hand for roughly one meeting engagement and then must be relieved for resupply. This sounds like the scenario designer's strategy for the AI is too limited. Only one plan considered, own-objectives are the same exact objectives as the player's and both are known to each side etc. Again, my own philosophy is that no matter what the context is, the AI must *always* have at least one plan set aside that is an attack. It can be a totally brain-dead and illogical but somewhere in there, whatever the AI and player are up too it's got to be there. If the player can always count on a passive AI, a predictable AI, or even a logical AI, the game won't be very interesting.

It's all relative. It might happen quite a bit if opposing troops are very close to each other, the visibility is limited and the terrain is favorable, ie: urban, jungles, trenches, night time, etc. Overall though it was a fairly uncommon event due to being a sort of niche emerging from a situation that was already pretty circumstantial, ie: infantry close assault.

I'm still holding out for a Move command that defaults to cover/prone when being shot at than "try harder to get shot"

Tbh this is kind of the irony of the game. I'm not sure there's anything you could've done much differently. Your main attack only exposed a tiny part of itself on a part of the river the Panther Turm happened to be covering. They took a hail mary shot into it...after a Sherman had drilled a few rounds into side no less...and killed a bunch of your men. That's just kind of the reality of fighting on modern battlefields populated by so many sophisticated and dangerous weapon systems that can project horrifying death from a mile away. The infantry were just doing their (unfortunate) job here of screening the rest of your force. Imagine if you'd sent your mortar teams or Battalion HQ up that way instead of some riflemen? This area looks very heavily defended, and it is if its got Panther turrets and other heavy weapons assigned to the defender. It's a set-piece battle with high force-to-space density. It'll be bloody no matter what you do.

The Panther turm had a clear shot on the river slot and could see your men moving up through it. Your troops probably couldn't see it, and didn't know it was there even if the Shermans did. Open and shut case if you ask me. I will say that High-Explosive is way overpowered in the game and squad wipes are common events with hits that weren't honestly near them.

"Hunt" just means contact imminent. It isn't a super-power, and your men will ignore contacts outside of a firing arc. They will drop if they're taking fire though. Unless there is a major disparity between the quality of your troops and the enemy, you should never send a man anywhere you haven't already sent a lot of bullets and explosives.

It's a shame but the scales of the previous games don't generally seem to require it. In just about all of BNs or FI's scenarios i'd order dismounts immediately anyway.

Engineers and specialized assault troops are the only troops in the game that can use explosive charges to "breach and clear". Rifle infantry generally do not have this capability. You can split teams or use the Assault movement order to compartmentalize losses but the reality is you should never send a single man anywhere you haven't already sent many bullets. Urban fighting or MOUT in American parlance is an ugly, complicated affair under all circumstances. Real life Commanders avoid engaging in city fighting as much as possible for many, many good reasons. Not the least of which is the potential for catastrophe such as the one you experienced, an example which stacks up rather well with real life examples such as Operation Gothic Serpent.

Artillery doc is hard to parse and often the differences are overstated, especially between the Allied Armies. In general though the Royal Artillery was known for its rapid response to Request Fires. This is a trait they picked up in World War 1, where it was important to move the guns right in trail of the infantry and be ready to fight off an immediate counter attack that could emerge from seemingly any direction. Destruction-by-fire proved elusive on the Western Front and the British began to prefer Suppression-by-Fire. All of this thinking was completely captured by the 25pdr field piece, one of the war's most superb Guns and so successful it is still in use by some Armies today. The 25 pounder's caliber and explosive load are too light to ensure destruction of anything tougher than basic entrenchments, that's not what makes the gun so valuable though. What made the 25 pounder valuable was its light weight, fully swiveling trunnion (allowing the gun a literally unlimited range of azimuth once deployed), and two piece shell and basic brass cartridge.* All of this translates into a gun with enormous operational flexibility and a constant state of readiness to commence fires on a ridiculous number of targets planned and unplanned. The light and uncomplicated ammunition it used was easier to transport and stock than fragile powder bags and heavier 105mm rounds in standard use by most Armies. The full 360 base mount meant the gun was also more stable than the average Field Gun, but the British didn't place as much premium on accuracy as they did on speed. British Forward Observers were attached to their Battery, but highly independent and mobile. FOs were given a truck (which could carry a better radio than a Jeep) and a map showing great detail in 1km sectors, they were additionally trained to make use of pre-planned or canned mathematic "rule-of-thumb" calculations^. The idea was to dispense with as much complication and thinking as necessary and to respond rapidly to attacks or targets of opportunity. Times from first call to first shot were still highly dependent on a host of factors but I don't think the average for the British Army often exceeded 10 minutes. I've heard of times as low as 2 minutes. Combat Mission is not an artillery sim, it's a tactical simulator. The nuance of the Field Artillery isn't distinctly visible in the game but it can be abstracted in many ways, through TRPs, FO counts and quality, and gun availability. If you know what you're doing you can actually abstract even fairly complicated stuff like the creeping barrage or zone-and-sweep. *Earlier in the war the 25 pounder's favorable weight and ease of use meant it frequently found itself pressed into anti-tank gun duty. The British were dependent on the insufficient QF 2pdr and the 6pdr was in short supply for this job, and the 25pdr had AP rounds issued to it (although I suspect these rounds were originally envisioned with bunker-busting in mind) that happened to be ideal for stopping tanks. Problem was this exposed the guns to loss, and worse deprived British infantry of fire support leading to "holes" in the crucial fire umbrella that the British picture their troops operating under as much as possible. ^For comparison the Americans dispensed with canned calcs and math formula fearing poor accuracy might endanger friendly troops. Instead a full time planning staff was retained at a Battery's Brigade HQ who would plan out firing solutions from potential sites and then feed that information down to Battalion HQ who would disseminate it to Battery commanders etc. The Americans wanted Battery and Battalion commanders to concentrate on their own movements and safety than to spend inordinate time planning fires. The Germans, due to a lack of radios, often made their poor overworked Forward Observers have to do all this planning. German FO's were highly trained to account for a ridiculous number of variables (including density altitude!) which ensured great accuracy but slow first-shot arrival. muh prose strikes again coffee time

Arguably there's plenty of battles where the AI shouldn't have fire support at all except for maybe mortars to punish some particularly visible and particularly immobile attackers. Anyway the fire support AI is yeah limited, biggest issue it has is that it's easily spoofed and can't discern between kinds of spots. It just shoots at the first thing it sees. An RNG of some kind would go a long way to mask its predictable scripting.

A lot of the time scenarios seem too light on TRPs I think. Especially if fighting in the area had been an ongoing or routine event generally the battery commanders would keep data on previous fires. I also think TRPs are a good abstraction for the quality reconnaissance flights you can achieve with air supremacy. Every US Army Infantry Division had a component of around 10 or so Piper Cubs-organic to their formation, not USAAF aircraft-who's job was aerial spotting for the Division's artillery. At this time most designers seem to emphasize TRPs in defensive situations and discourage them in offensive situations and they've got it backwards. Attackers have the benefit of initiative and planning, they are initiating which means the T junction at the back of the map was planned as a point of advance for your assault a week ago and yes there's a TRP for the player to use in his assault. Conversely, unless the Defender has had time to entrench and plan, he really shouldn't have TRPs as often as he does since attacks generally come as a surprise. For the Germans especially there was a tendency to husband guns and keep as much firepower in reserve as possible for the inevitable counter-attack to seize lost ground or more usually because of insufficient ammunition reserves.

Pretty sure that was normal for American and British forces from 1943 onwards too. The British suffered acute arms shortages into 1942 though. Just the year prior the garrison on Crete was short rifles, and many men were at the front with no weapons at all. An invasion of the island was fully expected once Greece was invaded as well. I know that for Italy's meticulously planned invasion of Yugoslavia it still reached Mussolini that the Italian Army had a critical shortfall of footwear let alone modern weapons. Even some of the nominally "modern" combatants like Germany suffered acute ammunition crisis, the one after Poland was so bad it probably convinced Hitler not to attack France the same year. The Luftwaffe and Army still hadn't replenished stocks by May of 1940 either. (Only combat or on-hand loads had been replenished.) Trouble is Armies in the early 20th century tended to mass mobilize, placing millions of men into uniform and service immediately was an impossible prospect for the transport and logistics infrastructure of many countries. Some of the combatant nations were suffering from various widespread shortages during peace let alone wartime. It's not an exaggeration to say that many thousands of men were stationed at frontlines across the world in 1941 without so much as a bayonet, and even envied a good pair of boots and rations that weren't toxic.

To add to this, I think supply issues are usually understated in most Armies and many men were usually marching around with a few rounds, not their assigned allotment. So yeah unless they happened to be within about 50 paces of a clear target they weren't going to just mag dump on a shadow.

It's a public access forum which pretty much means heaps of slacker posting, ****posting, venting, and advertising. I would be cautious about drawing any kind of sense or conclusion from such a narrow sampling of a consumer group.

This is a very good point. I think the Syrian Force count in the Hospital is large enough to warrant it as a legitimate target, but the presence of civilians and especially patients inside it would definitely make a direct attack on it pretty distasteful in any context. Ain't war hell? Yeah I figured that, I was going to highlight the F-18 as "loaned" from the Navy because Army Aviation assets are up with the SBCTs further inland. EDIT: So the Briefing states the Syrians occupied the building aware that its status as a Hospital would discourage the use of aerial bombing. No mention is made of whether its occupied by civilians or not but if the Syrian Commander is ruthless enough he might well chose to keep hostages in the facility to make that point. However, his force is very large and there are visible defensive fortifications around the structure. Perhaps i'll score destruction of the main building very harshly and encourage external objectives more since i'm enlarging the map. I've added a 3 story building down the road from the entrance (a "sniper house" the Defenders have been using to harass traffic) and low ground opposite the main entrance the Americans might want to move men inside of to discourage the escape of a such a large force or catch deserters. Realistically if such a situation presented itself I doubt either the original designer's scenario or my scenario would happen at all. Too much shooting around a large number of vulnerables with enormous potential for a humanitarian disaster. Just keep the place bottled up convoys will be routed down other routes etc.

Yeah I just loaded it up again to make my dream scenario with the location come true in the editor and I do remember now that it is explicitly a hospital. I'm still going to allow one of the F-18s in support though for use at player discretion with perhaps a demerit or points off for using it on the hospital. It won't be a failing grade by itself because I think the Syrian Garrison is plenty large enough to warrant the Hospital as a fair target, but i've also built the map up to include a potential outpost positions the Syrians may or may not be occupying dependent upon whatever plan the AI rolls. The new scenario is going to involve elements of a US Army Infantry Battalion + Engineers and Snipers. The Americans are partially dug-in and Battalion Heavy Mortars are available off-map for use. The Syrian Garrison I won't be changing too much in composition, but its AI plans will be more different and varied. I'm thinking most of their planning would simply involve hiding in the depths of the structure with their available heavy weapons (consisting of RPGs, DshK, and recoilless rifles) mostly oriented towards an off-map highway. The Syrians don't know when or even if the player will attack, although a minority plan will involve a potential break-out. The American AI for its part will be given mostly stand-off plans that the player can chose to thwart or just ignore at their own will. The American planning is mostly an "own objective" sort of thing while the Syrian Commanders are primarily concerned with the survival of their own force, and have secondary priorities in the form of inflicting casualties on the Americans and maintaining their hold on the Hospital to impede movement up nearby roads. As always, one plan will be a concerted attack involving all available assets and utter disregard for RoE. Chose wisely.

I think what stands out to me is how inadequate a Stryker Brigade is for the circumstances. The given battle is very set-pieceish though with lots of forces crammed into a relatively small space. It's not that the circumstances are invalid, but that the force composition and stated objectives lend themselves to a scripted blood bath that annoys me as always. If was the local XO i'd tell the Combat Team troops to just push on down their route of advance and then have infantry and engineers find ways to prep the site for later capture. Capture 1 is ground with good oversight on low ground West of the facility etc and will make it impossible for the Defender to just slip out. Objective 2 is a destroy/clear. A warehouse external to the site that snipers have been using sometimes to attack transports moving up the highway outside the map. You can vaporize it with the F-18s if you want, or save them for enemies revealing their location in the factory. If you're crazy you can engage the factory directly and try to clear it now but if you chose to give battle to the enemy's main body you will be scored harshly on own losses. The peripheral objectives are attractive in that they're less likely to cause a battle. You could have the F-18s just pummel the factory too but the enemy force is likely holed up in the very deepest parts of it. Or...maybe I randomized the spawn area so they're all on over watch at the highest floors waiting for you to go for one of the lesser objectives thinking its safer. If that is the case, then those Mk84s the F-18s are carrying will definitely ruin the defender's day. Decisions decisions...

Some people really seem to think clearing a massive factory complex packed with enemies is a single scenario thing ya know? The American Commander should reject the attack entirely if he has any clue what he's up against and should be prepared to take that all the way to a tribunal if need be. If he isn't very competent, you'll get this scenario. You could say "well it could still happen for reasons XYZ" but you'll never a find a good reason to explain why its explicitly a SBCT executing this attack and not follow on forces or Engineers with a couple of F-18s flattening the structure, all of whom might still be inclined to sit tight and wait out a few more days of desertions and mistakes on the part of the Defender before just trying to eat this sandwich in one big bite.

I despise even seeing forest objectives because the context for them is always poor. Who cares about 100m square capture in the middle of a forest? The enemy can have it and when they emerge from the forest in a few weeks from depletion of rations and ammunition or just fear of what the Partisans will do to them then you can capture the wood. Otherwise what sensible Commander would send men into such a place? To capture the enemy's supply of birch trees???

Biggest thing for me was the infantry behavior fix. It wasn't that they were retreating too much that bothered me, it's that they were retreating into the enemy's fire.

Also it's not tactical level but Unity of Command is an outstanding virtual board game too. Other cool thing about DVG is that many of their games are available for virtual purchase for use in Vassal Engine, and they're much cheaper than the physical editions! I might grab Warfighter that way soon. Lock n Load Tactical is also starting to show up on Steam and it's way cheaper than the $80 modules for the regular edition.