SimpleSimon

As long as it involves a major expansion of the depictions of Italian Armed Forces i'd absolutely be in on North Africa. 

As long as it involves a major expansion of the depictions of Italian Armed Forces i'd absolutely be in on North Africa. 

One of my big wishes (Cold War) has been granted. Here's to hoping history will predict the future and we'll all get Combat Mission Blitzkrieg
*whistles*

One of the most understated issues was that the Red Army-like every Army of the interwar period-was in the middle of a huge re-armament program. Aside from the obvious dangers posed by Fascism, observations from the Spanish Civil War, especially the debacle in Finland all made it clear that the Red Army was in a lamentable state in the 1930s. Stalin just gambled that Hitler was more rational than he was, believing at one point during the opening of the invasion that Hitler didn't even know it was happening-that a group of rogue German Generals were behind it! Sounds familiar doesn't it? 
The author of this article crucially points out the often unstated degree of consent and even collaboration there was to be found inside the rank and file of the nation for Stalin. No authoritarian-even totalitarian-could truly rule without some degree of cooperation, Stalin was just really good at masking how much of that there really was, and as a result-it was hard to trust peers and colleagues.
The whole event was definitely bad for morale and squashed a lot of interest officers might've shown in low-level initiative. If this would've enabled the Red Army to suffer Barbarossa a bit better i'm unsure, but initiative and independence among Junior Officers was never much valued in the Red Army. The twisted byzantine political games of Stalin's Soviet Union implies to me that the whole purge might well have been orchestrated just to take down one guy-Tukhachevsky-we will never know for sure, that's just my own observation. 

I tend to think that new people expect way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way too much of light rifle infantry conducting unsupported attacks. 

Some of the scenarios involving attacks in bad weather seem pretty dicey to me regardless of the conditions. It's bad enough if you stand to lose any vehicle to bogging, but when the scenario also involves an attack right into the teeth of the enemy defense with no prospect of maneuver and scores you viciously for failing in spite of these conditions I rapidly lose patience with the scenario designer and whatever his intent was and head to the editor. Weather is great contextual stuff, but the scenario designers need be aware that it can radically and unpredictably alter the circumstances of the scenario. That's fine as long as the expectations on the player are reasonable...

Phil, with what will be available in F&R, we might even be able to move North Afrika a bit further back as well.
Inquiring minds would like to know more about what background workup (and mock-ups of vehicles and stuff??) The Capt and Bil H. did in order to convince BFC to Green Light CMCW.

Right. Exactly what I described. That's the kind of thing we trained for. Along with of course, intervening in the Middle East, or Central America (rebels in El Salvador, for example), rescuing hostages, evacuating US civilians from some hot spot or potential hot spot (El Salvador again comes to mind in 1981). We pretty much had to be ready for any eventuality, without any notice at all. "Wheels up in 8 hours, come as you are"
Turns out the "intervention" we did in the Middle East was peacekeeping duty in the Sinai following the Camp David Accords. 
Norway was definitely another possibility both for the 101st and 82d, not to mention the 10th MTN and the 9th ID (just covered the XVIII Abn Corps - except for the 24th ID). Norway is a prime location for the use of light infantry, assuming that like most WW3 potential stories, Norway is invaded by the USSR. Just need to provide enough choppers for mobility. And air cover to keep from having them all shot down. 101st has lots. The rest do have a complement of choppers but they'd need to be augmented to move around. That's a bit beyond the scope of CM, however, it could be simulated as lifts arriving at periodic intervals while the LZ is secured, similar to how the paratroopers arrive in Road to Nijmegan campaign in BN. (this applies to wherever they might be deployed - kind of getting ideas for some potential scenarios here while thinking back to real life, but it's going to be a while). 
Dave

100%. Stuff like this is usually the result of script-style thinking in scenario design. Some fixed stuff is reasonable but most of the time tiny deploy zones and what's outside of them are really frustrating to see. The deployment phase is literally the most important thing going for both players and if there's a reason we have so little control at times it had damn well better be a good one. 

I have great respect for the amount of time and work goes into making a scenario, and I'm sure you all strive for stringent accuracy, and with all do respect please don't fix things in place so that we can't not move them during the setup phase. Such as mines , obstacles , gun placements . Please give the player a little flexibility in the decision process in the setup phase.To me half the fun is deciding where and how this minefield should be setup, or where I want to place this gun.So I guess what I'm saying is to have setup zones a little more flexible as to not restrict movement.Example, if you want an 88 flak in an exact spot , maybe give that 5 action spots in all directions for set up.

Some of the scenarios involving attacks in bad weather seem pretty dicey to me regardless of the conditions. It's bad enough if you stand to lose any vehicle to bogging, but when the scenario also involves an attack right into the teeth of the enemy defense with no prospect of maneuver and scores you viciously for failing in spite of these conditions I rapidly lose patience with the scenario designer and whatever his intent was and head to the editor. Weather is great contextual stuff, but the scenario designers need be aware that it can radically and unpredictably alter the circumstances of the scenario. That's fine as long as the expectations on the player are reasonable...

It's a movie made by guys with pretensions of fidelity but is really fairly by-the-numbers American Action-Melodrama. The action sequences in it are certainly problematic-but I think the biggest problem is that they're not very exciting and are badly planned. Why are the Germans in X treeline? What's the reason for approaching them head on? When I watched interviews with the Director and Producer years ago they both seemed to have a very foggy idea about the kind of film they wanted to make. In the end the whole film really just feels like recordings of re-enactors fighting mock battles you could see at...well...your local re-enactment group. 
By comparison Saving Private Ryan and Thin Red Line are both way better movies in just about every sense-with Directors who understood that their first objective was a compelling drama merely backgrounded by-the Second World War. That's where Fury just totally fumbles to me. It's a movie that's trying to be about World War 2...a subject far too dense to confront with a 135 minute film by itself. This confusion of setting for story and story for setting is the underline to me. 

Works for western HQ's, but Red forces like Syrians have large HQ squads that have 1/3 of the firepower of the whole platoon, so may need to be used.
AT the very start, it's also good to try as much as possible to have all your units out of sight of any potential enemies so your oppo (AI or organic) can't get any early spots.  Also, start them on HIDE. 
And also when moving into possible enemy LOS, it's also useful to have you inf end their turn with a HIDE command, as that can help break any unexpected enemy contact.

It's a movie made by guys with pretensions of fidelity but is really fairly by-the-numbers American Action-Melodrama. The action sequences in it are certainly problematic-but I think the biggest problem is that they're not very exciting and are badly planned. Why are the Germans in X treeline? What's the reason for approaching them head on? When I watched interviews with the Director and Producer years ago they both seemed to have a very foggy idea about the kind of film they wanted to make. In the end the whole film really just feels like recordings of re-enactors fighting mock battles you could see at...well...your local re-enactment group. 
By comparison Saving Private Ryan and Thin Red Line are both way better movies in just about every sense-with Directors who understood that their first objective was a compelling drama merely backgrounded by-the Second World War. That's where Fury just totally fumbles to me. It's a movie that's trying to be about World War 2...a subject far too dense to confront with a 135 minute film by itself. This confusion of setting for story and story for setting is the underline to me. 

I tend to think the problems with fortification visibility make them surprisingly handy for dummy positions myself...

I tend to think the problems with fortification visibility make them surprisingly handy for dummy positions myself...

It's a shame we don't have horses in the game. Quite a few armies were still using them-Cavalry Divisions especially-in reconnaissance. Germany had at least one Cavalry Division at the start of the war and it was still around during Operation Barbarossa I think. Not sure how its Aufklarung might've looked or if it even had one. 

I've considered designing a few scenarios when the module is released that basically incorporate a combination of exit zones and touch objectives to better convey what recon is up to than stuff like the explicit "probe" rules. Exit zones in particular seem very important to me as recon would rarely be camping anywhere for very long. The pressure is to push on forward and outwards and continuously verify the Division's path ahead. As we can see from your demonstration, armored recon need not much concern itself with scattered infantry remnants-probably most the Division won't either. Infantry Divisions in the next echelon can handle that...

A pleasure. Do you happen to know what the Infantry Divisions would typically have in the way of a recon? How it was configured etc? Were they expected to behave differently from their armored counterparts? 
I guess the doctrine split could be expressed as "Russian School" and "African School" and was influenced a bit by the way in which German Officers observed the Russians using tanks in their recon squadrons. What better way to shut down the enemy's recon than to just kill it right? That's the Red Army for you. "All or Nothing". It's not that the Russians didn't do recon, it's just that when they did it was pushed quite aggressively and seriously or just not done at all. 
The Sherman was favored for this job because its mobility and rubberized tracks made it a great road cruiser-the Valentine was also handy because it was tiny. Both of them were becoming surplus as the war went late...
It doesn't seem that armored recon in the Red Army was ever up to local or Division Commanders though, it was a General HQ asset. Although there was always a Division/Corp recon group-it seems to have been quite small. The Russians had a very atypical approach to battlefield intelligence gathering it seems. They didn't seem to value it much since they figured it was a waste of time-the Front's assault was meticulously researched at higher levels and all they want subordinates to do is execute time tables without much thought as to whatever is in their way. This kind of top-down imposition of control is still pretty alien to western observers who see the "two way street" of interaction, communication, and feedback between commanders and subordinates. 
So i'm to take it that "African School" of doctrine resembles something much like the lighter armored-car and infantry style reconnaissance of the early war period. You're not expecting to fight predominantly-just find the path of least resistance. So it's pretty handy when you've got something like the Luchs that can sneak through someone's backyard and give no hint of its presence until you see the tire tracks it left over the rose garden next morning. 
Off-topic a bit but the Americans seem to have generally rolled up reconnaissance into the Combat Commands-which operated in theory like Kampgruppen but not nearly as well in practice due to the way the Americans seem to have been unable to divorce themselves from old Cavalry traditions. Kampgrupper were tailored formations designed to match a highly specific scenario-Combat Commands existed for their own sake and about the best they managed a lot was...not getting killed? Since they were Armored and Mechanized they were hard to kill but if they ran into something like a full-strength Infantry Division they were too small to overrun it and most of the time their story ends with "withdrew to own lines-reattached to Division and fought as 7th Armored". Anyway I promised myself i'd stop looking for opportunities to roast the Combat Commands but here I go lol. 

Interesting discussion here, recon is not subject of CM scenarios often.
@SimpleSimon, you are right in principle, Abteilung means department. But here it is different, in the Wehrmacht it was used for battalions when applied on tank or armored recon forces, e.g. Aufklärungsabteilung 33 (in short AA33). The recon forces had and still have a strong relationship to the cavalry and their traditions. The 24. PzDiv (sign see above), which was converted from 1 . Kavalleriedivision in 1942, retained words like Rittmeister instead of captain and Schwadron instead of company.
I served with PzAufklBtl 1 of the German Bundeswehr from 1979 to '83 and as far as I know, in '79 (Heeresstruktur 3) it was organised and had the same doctrine like its counterparts at the Wehrmacht from 1944 on. In the late war, the PzAufkl grew heavier and heavier and the task shifted from scouting and road recon (Viel sehen, ohne gesehen zu werden - See much without being seen) to the ability to fight for information, flank security, and rearguard on delay operations. The AA and later PzAufklBtl was always a divisional force and did recon to some 40 km depth. There are always leichte Spähtrupps (light recon troop) of two eight-wheelers (SdKfz 234/1 (2,3,4), later Luchs) and hvy. recon troops (StuG III, later three Leopard1 - you fire into something, if it fires back, it is enemy occupied). The AA were often misused as line manoevre element, because it was a complete all-arms battalion (in '44 and '79).
The vehicles were precisely built for these tasks, the Luchs is so quiet, you hear nothing from 1 metre distance, except breaking twigs. Eight wheel drive to operate on soft ground, rear driver, powerful radios, and even able to swim (Luchs). So, nearly no problem to infiltrate enemy lines at night.
During the buildup of the Bundeswehr, there were two doctrine fractions, the russians and the africans. First the russians prevailed with the M-41 Walker Bulldog as recon vehicle, later doctrine changed to the african model, therefore, the Luchs.
For information on recon procedures, see 3 part video from 1957 below, narration is in German language, but there are a lot of informative drawings used, also.
The next two days it will rain here, so, I will try to set up a Quick Battle with CM:RT, for recon behind enemy lines. Objective is to reach opposite edge. Huge map, meeting engagement, low force concentration, two or three light recon troops.
Maybe later one for infiltration at night.
Might be interesting and thanks for all the tips and tricks.

A lot of that is basically available in the HUNT command. Again, we're playing a game that is heavily focused around facilitating set-piece battles and sieges. The CM games can do maneuver well enough, but the designers don't seem to have a very good of picture of the sort of "day to day" routines military forces follow that don't match up to the "pitched battle for hill 235" picture they usually hold. 
German Armored Recon had a saying that went like "see much and be seen little". The motto was an overall abstraction of their training that emphasized avoidance all but the most helpless of enemies and even more importantly, that it was preferable to avoid danger entirely than to "fight it out" against enemy forces. You don't really know how strong the enemy force is, and fighting will be a distraction from the Panzer Aufklarung's job which was to find safe avenues for the rest of the division and potentially save the formation too if it turned out they were walking into a trap. That may sound like what all recon does, but tbh there's quite a bit more nuance in each Army's approach to battlefield intelligence gathering than we often picture and a given designer's inability to distinguish between kinds of recon that could be either "searching" and "screening" or something else kinda just highlight's my point about how much myopia there is about this lol. 
I think sources are sort of hard to parse too because while there's plenty of guys who wrote books on their experiences in recon or armored recon the overall context of what they were doing and what they were up to exactly is hard to place without some "high level" understanding of the local situation and the routines. Then of course there was a lot of overlap with main bodies and such like the infantry who were expected to be both searching and screening everywhere they went but what exactly that involved between Rifle Infantry and dedicated Recce Troop could be substantially different. 

Another word, the full title for German reconnaissance formations was Aufklarungsabteilung which was something of a translation complication in western circles for years because the term abteilung is used frequently in German documentation and has no direct English translation-but generally means office of  or administration. So the whole term could properly be thought of as "Office of Reconnaissance" but native German speakers are more than welcome to correct me on this.
In theory the Panzer Divisions would always have an armored recon attachment with attached infantry and anti-tank guns too, sort of functioning as a "mini division". Posting in the Aufklarung was considered both prestigious and risky and they had higher-than-average casualty rates even in good times. Many of a given Division's best Officers and staff would be assigned to it, and the combination of talent pooling and mechanization frequently and unfortunately meant that as the war went sour Panzer Aufklarungs would frequently be asked to serve as Armored Infantry-aggravating the casualty rates of such valuable troops. 
Aufklarung's were predisposed by training-and reality-to prioritize evasion and subtlety over direct fighting. Being armored meant that there were many kinds of threats the Aufklarung could in fact-ignore and bypass like outposts or suppressing artillery fire or enemy light recon-much of which for the era might well just be some guys on horseback or on bicycles. Otherwise, priority was on finding the path of least resistance through enemy lines that the rest of the Division could exploit later on. As is well known, the Panzer Divisions were ridiculously good at disappearing and seemingly reappearing out of nowhere, taking catlike advantage of the narrowest unobserved ground between enemy observers to appear abeam or even behind enemies before leaving them in the dust of a glorious Blitz. That ground-sometimes no wider than a single dirt track-had been inspected by the Aufklarung ages ago and the reason you can't get through to your Regimental HQ is because by the time you all realized this had happened the Panzer Division had already overrun your HQ. 
As the war went on it got harder and harder for the Panzer Divisions to gather reconnaissance. The Russians checked German recon formations by putting battle tanks in their recce groups when able-squadrons of Valentines and Shermans as much as possible, especially as the lend lease stuff wasn't as critical to compose Mechanized and Tank Corps anymore.  Which also had the effect of confusing German commanders as to where the main body of Red Armor actually was. Increasing head counts and frontline densities meant that the fighting became positional again-in many places resembling 1918-and there was little use for armored cars in such circumstances. Any road you pick is likely to be under observation...
Loss of air supremacy meant that the Aufklarungs were frequently restricted to moving at night and were more likely to stumble into bloody disasters without the Luftwaffe providing advance warning of local enemy Armored Divisions. Then of course they were favorite picks of all those Kampfgruppen commanders who needed them to serve in rearguard duty-another great way to get them all killed... 

Another word, the full title for German reconnaissance formations was Aufklarungsabteilung which was something of a translation complication in western circles for years because the term abteilung is used frequently in German documentation and has no direct English translation-but generally means office of  or administration. So the whole term could properly be thought of as "Office of Reconnaissance" but native German speakers are more than welcome to correct me on this.
In theory the Panzer Divisions would always have an armored recon attachment with attached infantry and anti-tank guns too, sort of functioning as a "mini division". Posting in the Aufklarung was considered both prestigious and risky and they had higher-than-average casualty rates even in good times. Many of a given Division's best Officers and staff would be assigned to it, and the combination of talent pooling and mechanization frequently and unfortunately meant that as the war went sour Panzer Aufklarungs would frequently be asked to serve as Armored Infantry-aggravating the casualty rates of such valuable troops. 
Aufklarung's were predisposed by training-and reality-to prioritize evasion and subtlety over direct fighting. Being armored meant that there were many kinds of threats the Aufklarung could in fact-ignore and bypass like outposts or suppressing artillery fire or enemy light recon-much of which for the era might well just be some guys on horseback or on bicycles. Otherwise, priority was on finding the path of least resistance through enemy lines that the rest of the Division could exploit later on. As is well known, the Panzer Divisions were ridiculously good at disappearing and seemingly reappearing out of nowhere, taking catlike advantage of the narrowest unobserved ground between enemy observers to appear abeam or even behind enemies before leaving them in the dust of a glorious Blitz. That ground-sometimes no wider than a single dirt track-had been inspected by the Aufklarung ages ago and the reason you can't get through to your Regimental HQ is because by the time you all realized this had happened the Panzer Division had already overrun your HQ. 
As the war went on it got harder and harder for the Panzer Divisions to gather reconnaissance. The Russians checked German recon formations by putting battle tanks in their recce groups when able-squadrons of Valentines and Shermans as much as possible, especially as the lend lease stuff wasn't as critical to compose Mechanized and Tank Corps anymore.  Which also had the effect of confusing German commanders as to where the main body of Red Armor actually was. Increasing head counts and frontline densities meant that the fighting became positional again-in many places resembling 1918-and there was little use for armored cars in such circumstances. Any road you pick is likely to be under observation...
Loss of air supremacy meant that the Aufklarungs were frequently restricted to moving at night and were more likely to stumble into bloody disasters without the Luftwaffe providing advance warning of local enemy Armored Divisions. Then of course they were favorite picks of all those Kampfgruppen commanders who needed them to serve in rearguard duty-another great way to get them all killed... 

Another word, the full title for German reconnaissance formations was Aufklarungsabteilung which was something of a translation complication in western circles for years because the term abteilung is used frequently in German documentation and has no direct English translation-but generally means office of  or administration. So the whole term could properly be thought of as "Office of Reconnaissance" but native German speakers are more than welcome to correct me on this.
In theory the Panzer Divisions would always have an armored recon attachment with attached infantry and anti-tank guns too, sort of functioning as a "mini division". Posting in the Aufklarung was considered both prestigious and risky and they had higher-than-average casualty rates even in good times. Many of a given Division's best Officers and staff would be assigned to it, and the combination of talent pooling and mechanization frequently and unfortunately meant that as the war went sour Panzer Aufklarungs would frequently be asked to serve as Armored Infantry-aggravating the casualty rates of such valuable troops. 
Aufklarung's were predisposed by training-and reality-to prioritize evasion and subtlety over direct fighting. Being armored meant that there were many kinds of threats the Aufklarung could in fact-ignore and bypass like outposts or suppressing artillery fire or enemy light recon-much of which for the era might well just be some guys on horseback or on bicycles. Otherwise, priority was on finding the path of least resistance through enemy lines that the rest of the Division could exploit later on. As is well known, the Panzer Divisions were ridiculously good at disappearing and seemingly reappearing out of nowhere, taking catlike advantage of the narrowest unobserved ground between enemy observers to appear abeam or even behind enemies before leaving them in the dust of a glorious Blitz. That ground-sometimes no wider than a single dirt track-had been inspected by the Aufklarung ages ago and the reason you can't get through to your Regimental HQ is because by the time you all realized this had happened the Panzer Division had already overrun your HQ. 
As the war went on it got harder and harder for the Panzer Divisions to gather reconnaissance. The Russians checked German recon formations by putting battle tanks in their recce groups when able-squadrons of Valentines and Shermans as much as possible, especially as the lend lease stuff wasn't as critical to compose Mechanized and Tank Corps anymore.  Which also had the effect of confusing German commanders as to where the main body of Red Armor actually was. Increasing head counts and frontline densities meant that the fighting became positional again-in many places resembling 1918-and there was little use for armored cars in such circumstances. Any road you pick is likely to be under observation...
Loss of air supremacy meant that the Aufklarungs were frequently restricted to moving at night and were more likely to stumble into bloody disasters without the Luftwaffe providing advance warning of local enemy Armored Divisions. Then of course they were favorite picks of all those Kampfgruppen commanders who needed them to serve in rearguard duty-another great way to get them all killed... 

A lot of that is basically available in the HUNT command. Again, we're playing a game that is heavily focused around facilitating set-piece battles and sieges. The CM games can do maneuver well enough, but the designers don't seem to have a very good of picture of the sort of "day to day" routines military forces follow that don't match up to the "pitched battle for hill 235" picture they usually hold. 
German Armored Recon had a saying that went like "see much and be seen little". The motto was an overall abstraction of their training that emphasized avoidance all but the most helpless of enemies and even more importantly, that it was preferable to avoid danger entirely than to "fight it out" against enemy forces. You don't really know how strong the enemy force is, and fighting will be a distraction from the Panzer Aufklarung's job which was to find safe avenues for the rest of the division and potentially save the formation too if it turned out they were walking into a trap. That may sound like what all recon does, but tbh there's quite a bit more nuance in each Army's approach to battlefield intelligence gathering than we often picture and a given designer's inability to distinguish between kinds of recon that could be either "searching" and "screening" or something else kinda just highlight's my point about how much myopia there is about this lol. 
I think sources are sort of hard to parse too because while there's plenty of guys who wrote books on their experiences in recon or armored recon the overall context of what they were doing and what they were up to exactly is hard to place without some "high level" understanding of the local situation and the routines. Then of course there was a lot of overlap with main bodies and such like the infantry who were expected to be both searching and screening everywhere they went but what exactly that involved between Rifle Infantry and dedicated Recce Troop could be substantially different.