chuckdyke

I did some experiments with hatches opened and closed on vehicles from different battalions (So no vertical information sharing) to observe how horizontal information sharing was affected.  The experiment was done in CMFI v2.0 Engine 4.  The following is a summary of the results followed by screenshots:
Maximum horizontal information sharing range is 32 meters (4 Action Spots)
A vehicle must be unbuttoned to horizontally share (report) information from about 9 to 32 meters.
A vehicle can be buttoned & horizontally share (report) information if it is within 8 meters of the other vehicle.
This one surprised me: If two vehicles are 9 to 32 meters apart with one buttoned & the other open the open vehicle will share (report) information to the buttoned vehicle.  However the buttoned vehicle will not share (report) information to the open vehicle.
Infantry may horizontally share (report) information to a buttoned vehicle when within 32 meters.
The Screenshots are from CMFI v2.0 Engine 4.
The M4 Sherman from 3rd Battalion has a tentative armor contact. 

The M4 Sherman from 1st Battalion has a tentative infantry contact

The M4 from 1st Battalion was ordered to move within 32 meters (but not closer than 9 meters) of the M4 from 3rd Battalion so they will be within the maximum horizontal information sharing range.

Both M4 Shermans are within the maximum horizontal information sharing range of 32 meters however both tanks are buttoned so the information about their different tentative contacts are not shared.


The M4 from 3rd Battalion opens its hatches.  It does not receive the tentative infantry contact information since the 1st Bn. M4 is still buttoned.

The M4 from the 1st Bn. is still buttoned but received the tentative armor contact from the open hatch 3rd Bn. M4. 

 

Thanks everyone for the input, it helped a ton! So to sum it up:
- all games have some training tutorial missions which i can follow while reading the manual
- all games have the ability to create custom Quick Battles with custom maps and forces
- scenarios can be sorted by their size in all games
- CMBN Big Bundle has the best price/content value
Looking at the Big Bundle ... 110 EUR .. wow .. never paid for a "game" that much .. ever .. are the DLC's worth it? Do they add a campaign or is it about single scenarios? What about the units? Are they added to the original campaigns somehow or just to the DLC scenarios? Should i go for the units if i plan to use mods? Do most of the mods require the DLC's?

If you like WW 2 I would go for Final Blitzkrieg. My reason infantry can ride on tanks which was widespread practice in WW2. I work my way through SF 2 as the modern stuff is fascinating for me. I am 70 years old soon I will be 71, I found CM realistic as you can apply real world tactics. I find it money well spent. If you buy the SF2 bundle for example it will keep you going for a couple of years. Yes, there is a learning curve and as your first games stick to the tutorial games. There are five different levels it will keep you busy. 

For what you spend compared to the amount of time you'll be playing it comes out to less than a few pennies (or Euro cents) per hour.

PS - My main advice.....Do not be afraid of the editor.  Your $110 will go many, many times futher once you are designing stuff for yourself (& us too, hopefully).
PPS - Welcome to the war! 

In any of the games, you can sort the scenario list by size, and then just start with the smaller scenarios. However, keep in mind that small scenarios can be fiendishly difficult too. And all the CM games are in general really hard.

If you like WW 2 I would go for Final Blitzkrieg. My reason infantry can ride on tanks which was widespread practice in WW2. I work my way through SF 2 as the modern stuff is fascinating for me. I am 70 years old soon I will be 71, I found CM realistic as you can apply real world tactics. I find it money well spent. If you buy the SF2 bundle for example it will keep you going for a couple of years. Yes, there is a learning curve and as your first games stick to the tutorial games. There are five different levels it will keep you busy. 

+1  Would be a good option.  Also wish we had more options for splitting squads.  In 7 member (or less) squads, once on splits off a 2-man scout team, one is left with an unwieldy 5-man team.  Wold be nice to split 7(or less) man squads more than once.

2 hits and 0 shells left... time to RTB 

yes bunkers are knocked out to easily, I feel all defensive works don't give enough protection and need to be tweaked in favor of the defender, that goes for trenches, foxholes, and sandbags

I don't know about WW2 but one of the armor field manuals specifically mentions the TC dismounting to check corners at city intersections. There's a couple of scenarios in CMSF2 where this would be very welcome if you don't happen to have any infantry nearby (for whatever reason).

You can do that now with the whole crew - Bail Out command. Are you suggesting just the TC dismount alone like a split squad for crew. That would be cool actually. But would the TC go alone on such a mission or would another crew member join them or would it be more common for the whole crew to go?
I am curious about the historical practice.

A: morale is on cautious B: There is no plan to exit the building. C they can't keyhole their target (Sure they can fire and tank B can take them out.) Plot your fire in the last 15 seconds of the 60 minutes turn. At the new turn they can do an exit from the building. Have an assault team popping smoke on the end of their turn. Just a few suggestions. 

Fifty or so JS2's pulled up in front of a suspected PAK 75 mm position. The PAK 75 mm didn't fire, and nobody could blame them. Always plan for an exit if you don't have one you didn't plan right. How many people reverses an AFV after you plot a firing order? I watched YouTube videos and not many do. 

It could also be a LOS issue.  It is common in CM2 that one can eyeball a situation and think one has a clear LOS, and perhaps the ammo loader can see the target (hence the targeting line), but the gunner cannot see the target. 
The opposite is when you think that you have safely parked a unit behind woods with no LOS to enemy units, but the enemy AI can find that one-pixel-wide gap that enables it to shoot through dozens of meters of dense woods and kill your unit(s).  (It's a lot more fun when it's YOUR unit that finds that one pixel gap and kills an enemy.)

The other star of Factory Outlet ...

Star of Factory Outlet - see the AAR ...

The screenshots in the original C2 and Information Sharing topic were destroyed by Photobucket. As a result a REDUX C2 and Information Sharing topic was created with new screenshots. Some mods that will show up most often in the screenshots are, user interface (UI) and floating icons:  
Floating Icons – Cat Tactical Icons CMFI
User Interface – Juju’s TweakedUI CMFI V5
Some interesting topics have been started about how information moves through the C2 chain both vertically (up & down the chain of command) and horizontally (directly from one team to another team).  As a result I did some experimenting with C2 & information sharing.  Below are the results with screenshots from the experiment.  If anyone can offer a correction or additional information please do. 
Additional useful information and supplemental C2 rules:   
4.0 Engine Manual page 66 Command & Control.
@Bil Hardenberger Command Friction 2.0 -  http://community.battlefront.com/topic/125172-command-friction-20/
@Peregrine Command Layers - http://community.battlefront.com/topic/110861-command-layer-in-ai-battles/
 
 
The distance information can be shared vertically (chain of command).
Voice C2: Up to six action spots, approximately 48 meters. If either unit is on Hide then the distance is reduced to approximately 16 meters.
Close Visual C2: Up to 12 action spots, approximately 96 meters. This is also the maximum distance a higher HQ can fill in for a lower HQ. Example: Company or battalion HQ fills in for a platoon HQ and provides C2 to the platoon's fire teams. 
Distant Visual C2: As far as the unit’s line of sight.  (In the experiment I had units in distant visual C2 at 40 action spots, approximately 480 meters before I stopped.)
Radio C2: Entire map.  In the WWII titles, CMSF & CMA - C2 via backpack radio is lost during foot movement. C2 is maintained during foot movement in CMBS.
The distance information can be shared horizontally (directly between teams).
Up to four action spots, approximately 32 meters. (Sometimes a team had to move to within 3 action spots)
Can information be shared horizontally between teams from different battalions?
Yes
Can information be shared between two different HQs that do not have a common higher HQ?
Vertically: No (With no common higher HQ there is no bridge for the information to pass over) 
Horizontally: Yes
The experiment was conducted on skill level Iron in CMFI v2.0 Engine 4.  I used two different US battalions on a custom made map for the experiment.  The 4th US Tank Battalion on the west (left) side of the map and the 1st US Infantry Battalion on the east (right) side.  A high ridgeline divided the two battalions.  HQ units are blocked from C2 Voice, Close Visual and Distant Visual with other HQ units. At the beginning of the experiment no units of the 4thBattalion were in C2 with units of the 1st Battalion.  An immobilized German Tiger and a destroyed Tiger were used as the OpFor unit to be spotted and reported.  
The Area of Operations (A/O) for the experiment. Note the highlighted scout team with no C2.   
 

They have Abrams for mine clearing in RL. Talking about mines I wish I could equip troops with Claymores. Just to get even, knock on a door and run away after leaving a little present behind. 

It is 2IC (Second-in-Command) not 21 C which would be an entirely different C/S.

@chuckdykeIt is the ww2 titles that gave me an understanding of the assault gun. I could not underrstand really what it was for, until I started regularly assaulting buildings with little artillery prep...Having a big HE thrower is very handy. It's a shame you can't open walls with them, like the breaching charges because that would open up many possibilities. Sure, you can blow out an entire wall, but that's not quite what I'd prefer. An infantry-sized hole would be great.
The Bradley's 25mm cannon is quite excellent for sweeping floors. Be careful though, it will easily kill your men (ask me how I know...). Make sure there's no AT enemy in the room as a covering Bradley will happily light the room up even with your guys in it. The Russian BMP-3's 30mm autocannon is similarly powerful, and that can handle tanks surprisingly well too. I'm a big fan of the BMP-3. Sure it explodes like a box of dynamite sometimes, but it's a pretty versatile beast.

Yes, your initial approach makes sense.  However generally, we players tend to agree that in RL one would demolish buildings from where enemy was firing effectively and killing our pals, and to hell with the points loss.  In most CMSF missions you lose a lot more points for losing friendlies.
This is especially true in campaigns where force preservation should be important.

I never bothered playing Iron as I couldn't see much difference from Elite, but if one plays the C2 "game" it looks interesting.  The big problem iwith C2 in the game is that the C2 system only works in a hierarchical manner and not per RL.  You can have a bunch of units sitting on top of each other, but if they are not from the "right" formation(s), they will not talk to each other.

I ran some tests of airburst artillery against armored vehicles. In particular T-72 AVs and BMP-1s.
 

O:10 for artillery call in

2:25 artillery strikes

3:00 review of damaged/destroyed BMPs

8:10 review of vehicles

What I found using a massive amount of artillery is that while it was possible for artillery to destroy the BMP-1s it was unable to do any damage to any subsystem except tracks furthermore no amount of artillery would detonate or disable an ERA block. This seems incorrect to me and likely to be a bug of some variety. Even BMPs that took penetrating hits and crew/passenger losses would not have any subsystem damage. Please watch the linked video and you will see enough artillery to destroy every BMP and level every building on the block. Yet this massive weight of fire does not damage or disable any external system. Not a single DSHK, smoke launcher, AT-4, vision system, ERA block, etc... takes any ounce of damage while multi-story buildings are leveled.











PS: I recently made another post but wanted to create a new one that more accurately identified the issue.

Yes, thanks for the correction....