chuckdyke

I certainly hope I can do that when I'm 70. Remember that most people don't run at all. My wife's recently taken up 5ks and it's been great seeing her progress.

Like this


 

How about of the weapons section was with the platoon leader?  Presumably the leader would be able to locate the MG/Support Weapon in the best position before any other maneuver.

The idea is how far your formation can travel before deployment. To avoid premature dismounting or debussing. Study the map and its features. Company HQ + Security Platoon, HQ weapons +Observers. Determine your observation post, communications and firing positions. The Recon stops at the first contact, your advancement can start, and the leaders can observe the enemy's reaction. Even a four men firing team uses the same principle. The leader do the Recon, position his marksman, grenadier, and reserve. Here in British Mettle I could Position the Tac Air Control on the top as the dug in T55's were revealed by the snipers. The Forward Observer on the Bottom with the 2-sniper observing the suspected ATGM sites. As Challengers are more than a match for the T55's they complimented the Attack by the Typhoon Fighter bomber. The Challengers did a shoot and scoot mission as I am aware of possible ATGM attack. They revealed themselves but missed, this tactic works often the terrain is forested and the Challengers didn't stop fast forward and reverse. The Arty Observer called in a mortar strike , combined with the Airstrike and the Challengers. The T55's on the high ground were destroyed. Without the Leaders Recon Tactic this wouldn't have worked. Your security platoon makes sure the area is clear you operate in. Daylight just broke and the night vision advantage of my recon elements have gone. 

Scouting in CM (to me) is about moving to contact and losing as little forces as possible in that contact. @Bil Hardenberger has some superb guides about how to do this, and honestly it took me a lot of play to really grasp the subtleties of it. Covered movement really is important, and it's easy to forget to do it.
Vehicle recon (jeeps, universal carriers etc) is really handy for very rapidly finding out where they are, but just as importantly where they are not. There's a caveat though: If the vehicle is impervious to rifle fire you won't discover infantry until you dismount, which must be done in cover or the forecast is usually lead rain. Dependent on what side you play try and use units with binoculars, for some forces like the British it makes a huge difference for spotting. This means your HQ officers are at the front, as they should be.
I don't tend to use 'recon pull' very much, I normally have an idea where I want to go during planning and use scouts to proof the route.
After many hours playing vs. the computer you start to get a feel for how to approach certain tactical problems, especially given the AI's inability to organise any meaningful maneuvers. Human players are much less predictable. For a start the AI has zero fire discipline and will open up at any target, unable to consider the bigger picture.

I do agree with @chuckdyke to the extend that the LOS tool has some shortcomings that can bite. Norman orchards and the the effect of a reverse slope are a good example. In some scenarios you can test LOS over a field and see it blocked by a reverse slope, even if this is not quite evident from the '1' pixeltruppen view. Often, as the scenario plays out vehicles can be spotted well beyond this apparent limitation. Likewise I"ve seen actual LOS through orchards and multiple tree lines be surprisingly good. Often I hear myself saying 'well ****, they got LOS through all that?" 
That being said I still like it as a simple planning tool, but you learn its foibles through experience.

Agreed that sort of "shoot'n scoot" works for any kind of vehicle.  You don't need a recon vehicle.  My point is that on any map that is not more than 4 Km squared, there is little function for actual recon vehicles designed to run around flanks and into enemy rears.  Most of the time there is little function for any sort of transport vehicle and hence (for example) we use halftracks for support at dangerously short ranges - and then complain that the crews get shot up.

Recon the game I like is "Insertion and Interdiction" in SF2. You start with a Platoon Leader with a Squad of United States Marines supported by an Arty Observer and 2 teams of snipers (green) 2 AT teams also green. Your objective is a ridge with trenches in which are located batteries of Kornet ATGM's. Later your get LAV APC's and 2 Abrams and a Cobra attack helicopter. I play on Iron but you must patrol aggressively but not recklessly. Once your reinforcements arrive make sure you share the intel with them. I don't commit my Abrams if they have not received the intel, I use the C2 teams for that move him to the HQ Abrams and the intel will be shared. Patrol on overwatch and the reinforcements in the form of two sections of Marines come to the rescue. An old script but it is fun. 

So the Firefly from 1944 is a figment of BFC's imagination?

To fight British Commonwealth, you must admire the guys. Lee Enfield .303 much the same as the weapon in WW 1 as is the Vickers. The Churchill very much a WW 1 Infantry tank. With their tanks it was 1945 before they adopted the German Idea a modified 17 pounder in the Comet now a called a 77 mm Tank Gun. The Germans had the PAK 75 mm and put it in the Panzer IV and called it 75mm KwK. They did it in 1941-1942. Their artillery was superb we need an article of the 25-pounder field gun. The RAF had the Spitfire the Army the 25 Pounder. In the Netherlands there was a battle on the scale of Arnhem called the battle for Overloon. The British came to the rescue of the Americans, in final Blitzkrieg you can play the beginning of that battle a pity there is not the 2nd phase when the British took over. Meijel Mayhem is the start of it in Final Blitzkrieg. A platoon of Canadian Engineers took the town in the north of the country where my parents were at the time. They were all in the cellar when the Germans blew up the bridge, but the Canadians had their Bailey Bridge up in a matter of hours. Would make an interesting small battle but the Germans had bought time to get away. 3 weeks later WW 2 ended. 

I like the British squad, but it is just one part of a larger integrated unit.
The Enfield is an accurate rifle, so it has a longer effective range - the Bren is a good LMG; but you also need your scouts, who are well-armed (3 Thomsons & 3 Brens per section), your mortars, your nimble little carriers, your Vickers MGs, which can keep up sustained fire as long as they have ammo and are excellent at longer ranges, point-for-point an easy match for the MG42 (at range), and of course your mortars.
Commonwealth infantry (especially Motorised Infantry) are a really fun force to play - I love trying to bring all the elements together, and together they can be very effective.

They were equipped with deep wading/fording gear:

I use OBS to record video. Steam has a good picture function (F12) if you have SF2 on that platform.

This definitely works - and it makes sense. Walking in the door one-by-one is asking for trouble

agusto is spot on!

MOUT operations in CMx2 titles have always been pretty bloody if not executed without exceptional care. I can not make a statement regarding your specific situation, but what i ve observed in the couple of years playing CMx2 is that clearing a building occupied by hostile forces is
Best avoided if possible If avoiding clearing the building is impossible, destroy the building or its occupants using heavy fire power (tanks, aircraft artillery, what ever you' ve got). If destroying the building or it's occupants using heavy fire power is not possible, prepare it for infantry clearing by first spending a couple of turns suppressing it's occupants using at least a 3:1 force ratio and the target or target light command. RPGs and the like are wonderful tools for convincing an enemy in a building to leave it. After preparing the building for assault, keep suppressing it with a target-light command and a 2:1 force ratio an send a 1:1 force ratio troop into the building, carefully. Use the pause command and suppress each room with the assault element using target-briefly for at least 10 seconds before entering (this also leads to some grenade throwing, etc). If possible, send the assault element into the building using demo charges by blowing in a wall that has no windows and from the top most floor possible (because hand grenades work best if thrown from an upper to a lower floor). If heavy resistance is encountered in a room, retreat and try to destroy or at least suppress the enemy using your over-watch element from the outside. Using above listed steps, MOUT against an inferior force as the Syrians in CMSF2 can usually be done relative casualty free. Fighting an equal enemy such as the Russians in CMBS, on the other hand, will always cause you some losses, there is no way around it. Just accept it and keep pushing forward towards your mission objectives.

The AI plan is more like stand at the windows and get shot, until all the conscript and green units get rattled. 
As the human Blue, shoot at anyone you see for most of the game (call it getting fire superiority), then remove the Red in the flanking outbuildings, then advance on main building, then advance on deep flanking buildings.

They most certainly do! I'd say the reverse, the H2H labelled scenarios are very lopsided (in the sense that both sides dont have an even chance at achieving the scenario victory conditions, even if one side gets smashed in units killed).
See UK H2H British Armour Mix vs Syrian Armour mix, for instance which is heavily biased in favour of the Brits vis the victory conditions.

Did you play solo? I ask because that’s a head to head scenario and I don’t think those have AI plans.
Happy New Year to you too!

When one may be revealing info about the mission that could spoil enjoyment of another potential player one should write ***** SPOILERS ***** above one's text.
However, in this instance it doesn't appear that any valuable info was revealed.  Also, the low resolution of the AAR page means one has to work hard to even read that.

Done.

I'm drawn to posts like this like a moth to a flame. 

^There's an alternate version of that analogy but i'm gonna just be an adult
this time 

I don't care about QB point values in the slightest, but what is baffling to me is how anyone could think that anything hand crafted would be cheaper than anything mass produced.  The element that's missing in your ... analysis ... is time.  Let's say that two different manufacturers are producing toenail clippers.  Let's assume that each version of toenail clippers uses the same amount of steel per unit.  If company A produces one toenail clipper per minute and company B produces one toenail clipper per day well then the cost of company B's toenail clipper is higher even though the objectively measurable input of steel is the same on a per unit basis.  Granted, company A would be acquiring more steel because they are producing more toenail clippers, but if the manufacturing process is efficient enough then that cost isn't going to have a significant enough impact on a per unit basis since company A is producing so many more clippers than company B.  That's pretty basic manufacturing knowledge and it comes down to efficiency.  Unionized workers only cost more if two manufacturing processes are similarly efficient.  The slave labor thing is probably a little overstated in your comments as there would still have been specialists involved. 
However slave labor is notoriously inefficient since there is a distinct lack of motivation for the 'worker' to do anything beyond the absolute minimum to stay alive and in the case of German manufacturing how many times would the same part have to be reproduced because of sabotage or inattention to detail?  A slave isn't going to be working as fast and as efficiently as he or she could in order to support the war effort.  Maybe the slaves themselves aren't being paid a 'wage', but the guards and infrastructure that is created to support your slave laborers isn't free.  You still have to feed them something and you still have to house them somewhere.  At least with unionized workers they can pay for their own transportation, living arrangements, and food out of the wages that are paid to them by the company.  With a slave the state has to pay for all the guards, housing /camps, food, and transport for moving the slaves between camps and various work sites.  You also have to power the manufacturing site and run all the machinery and if that machinery is being powered such that you are making the same part over and over again because your slave labor can't make it right the first time or is taking an extra hour to do the same thing a union guy is making well then how efficient can you be?
So no, simply measuring inputs isn't necessarily safer - at least not in the way being suggested.  Without accounting for waste then perhaps more aggregate inputs would suggest greater aggregate outputs since more materials are probably being used in the manufacturing process, but then that would be reflected in the per unit cost basis as already suggested by using the Swedish currency.  In other words, the difference in the consumption of material inputs within the manufacturing process would be reflected by the difference in the cost basis through the use of a third party currency.  Measuring material inputs would not put Germany on an equal footing with America in WW2.  It would only reinforce the discrepancy in manufacturing efficiency between the two.
Sorry for the interruption - you may all get back to your regularly scheduled QB points discussion 😉