Centurian52

Yeah. You can get away with it against the AI. But they're almost always one of the firs things I shoot at. One of the lesson's from Monty Python's "How Not To Be Seen" is that you shouldn't hide behind the only bush in the field.
 

This is reminding me of why it took me so long to even give H2H a try. I want a challenge. I want to face an enemy with human-like intelligence and flexibility. I just wish there was a way to get that without having to interact with actual humans (I'm not complaining about any of my current opponents, you have all been great so far). The only really satisfactory solution would be a better AI.

Yeah. You can get away with it against the AI. But they're almost always one of the firs things I shoot at. One of the lesson's from Monty Python's "How Not To Be Seen" is that you shouldn't hide behind the only bush in the field.
 

Yes! In fact that's one of the clearest signs that you're looking at a dictatorship rather than a true democracy. Democratic elections are competitive. Elections in single-party democracies* (a.k.a. dictatorships) are not competitive, and are really only conducted at all in order to provide the appearance of democratic legitimacy.
*A single-party democracy either only allows one party to run, or may allow other parties to run as straw-men but will only ever allow one party to win. Almost all modern dictatorships are single-party democracies. They provide an advantage over classic dictatorships if you are the dictator since you get a little extra legalistic justification for your rule, without ever really challenging your rule.

I regard pre-planned bombardment of choke-points, fords and bridges as part of doing good map analysis and would expect an opponent to do the same - it is fair game.  So, I would consider it to be sound tactics.
 

We all know that's not simple.  Oh hang on, you're talking about RL 🤣.
As for the Lone Tiger tactic, when I played George's version, I adopted a different approach.  And it worked.

6. The rest of the Pln were having breakfast but it was spoiled and they had terrible diarrhea so Wittman had to personally set off on a basic recon and he unexpectedly found himself doing a "Ride of the Valkyries".  

I have sometimes seen people refer to sending jeeps out front to get shot at as 'gamey'. That caught me by surprise the first time I came across it. Especially since I thought reconnaissance was one of the many roles jeeps were meant to fill. But it does feel like there's a difference between sending a jeep forward to poke at the enemy perimeter and sending a jeep speeding directly through a town that is suspected of being occupied. The latter really does seem like the sort of thing that people might more legitimately call 'gamey'. And yet we have a real world example of it (probably, I don't actually know for sure if the story is true, but it seems like the sort of thing that Patton would do). I suspect that most complaints of gamey tactics stem from people forgetting that soldiers fighting in real wars are often at least as creative and willing to experiment as Combat Mission players.

Yeah. You can get away with it against the AI. But they're almost always one of the firs things I shoot at. One of the lesson's from Monty Python's "How Not To Be Seen" is that you shouldn't hide behind the only bush in the field.
 

I like the video overall. It was a plausible version of events that mostly made sense. And putting everything on a map was helpful for understanding what was happening. The main issue was that there are already so many different versions of the story (this is apparently one of the most overstudied engagements of the entire war) that I would have liked for them to provide some arguments for why I should trust their version more than any other version I may have heard. Just hearing them tell their version, without them making any attempt to establish why their version is more credible than other versions, only left me knowing one more version of the story without giving me any real confidence that I now have a better idea of what really happened.
I am still curious about why Wittman attacked with just his own Tiger if he had a platoon of Tigers. Did his radio break so he couldn't order the others forward? If so, why didn't they follow when they saw him moving forward (or did they not see him moving forward?)? Did he order them to remain behind? If so, why? The need to attack quickly wouldn't have precluded calling a simple "follow me!" over the radio. The possibilities I can think of are:
1. His radio was broken, and the rest of his platoon didn't see him moving. I think this would have been perfectly excusable for all parties.
2. His radio was broken, the rest of his platoon did see him, but didn't think to follow him. This would reflect poorly on his platoon.
3. It just didn't occur to him to order the rest of the platoon forward. This would have made him a bad platoon commander.
4. He ordered the rest of the platoon to stay behind to provide security. I don't quite know why they couldn't have provided better security to his tank by staying with him, but it's conceivable that someone could argue that this made sense.
5. He ordered the rest of the platoon to stay behind because he wanted all the glory to himself. This would have made him an abysmal platoon commander.
 

I recall an anecdote. At some point following operation Cobra Patton's advancing army lost contact with the Germans. So he turned to his subordinate and told him 'Take that jeep and drive down the road til someone shoots you, then report their location back to me', or words to that effect. Patton's troops didn't like him much because he tended to conduct his battles like a CM player. 😬

Found it - @MikeyD
  
 

Yeah. You can get away with it against the AI. But they're almost always one of the firs things I shoot at. One of the lesson's from Monty Python's "How Not To Be Seen" is that you shouldn't hide behind the only bush in the field.
 

I meant to send this out yesterday, anyway my guess as to big announcement is that the next combat mission is going to be Combat Mission: Hello Kitty 40k. 
In the grim darkness of the future the is only rainbows and meows
 

Yeah. You can get away with it against the AI. But they're almost always one of the firs things I shoot at. One of the lesson's from Monty Python's "How Not To Be Seen" is that you shouldn't hide behind the only bush in the field.
 

I'm reluctant to use church bell towers for that very reason!

This little mini documentary shows how lucky Wittmann was.
Excellent work by the tank museum!!!!

Not gamey at all. Using fire to deny an area to the enemy is a real tactic. Free Whisky actually did a video on how best to use artillery in Combat Mission. He describes four types of effects that artillery strives to achieve in real life, and which can be recreated in Combat Mission:
Suppress: Keep the enemy's heads down.
Obscure: Prevent the enemy from seeing your troops.
Secure: Prevent the enemy from occupying a piece of terrain by making it too dangerous.
Reduce: Inflict casualties on the enemy.
There's no doubt a similar formal list of effects that you can achieve with direct fire, whether it be from small arms or tanks/IFVs. But as I haven't come across it yet, here's my somewhat less formal (and not necessarily comprehensive) list of what you can do with direct fire:
Suppressive fire: Keep the enemy's heads down.
Recon-by-fire: Find the enemy by shooting at suspected positions, baiting them to shoot back.
Secure: Make a position dangerous for the enemy to occupy by shooting at it.
Destructive fire: Inflict casualties on the enemy.
Fire is a tool. Ultimately we want to use that tool to destroy the enemy. But it has many other uses that can make it easier to reach that ultimate goal, or make it harder for the enemy to destroy you. If you can think of any way to use fire to manipulate the enemy into doing what you want (or not doing what you don't want), then that's a legitimate use of fire, and one that has probably been used at some point in the real world.
 

I have to echo @PEB14's point that the fewer house rules you have, the better. One or two rules might be necessary from time to time (no turn 1 fire into known or obvious setup-zones in meeting engagements makes sense to me). But the more rules you add the more it feels like a sport and the less it feels like a battle. I can see it easily getting to the point where you'd be walking on eggshells the entire time and unable to have any fun.

Ok that's definitely on me for not reading carefully enough. I still don't see the point. The enemy icons are there to tell you what your troops know. If you disable enemy icons then you know less than the game intends for you to know. It still just feels like a handicap for the sake of a handicap, rather than something that makes any sense from a realism perspective.

Yes! In fact that's one of the clearest signs that you're looking at a dictatorship rather than a true democracy. Democratic elections are competitive. Elections in single-party democracies* (a.k.a. dictatorships) are not competitive, and are really only conducted at all in order to provide the appearance of democratic legitimacy.
*A single-party democracy either only allows one party to run, or may allow other parties to run as straw-men but will only ever allow one party to win. Almost all modern dictatorships are single-party democracies. They provide an advantage over classic dictatorships if you are the dictator since you get a little extra legalistic justification for your rule, without ever really challenging your rule.

I often use a jeep in this fashion. To probe enemy lines and use it's speed as a defence. Then open up on any positions that fire at the jeeps with overwatching tanks.  It works 1/2 the time.  I didn't realize it was 'gamey'.
I am also notorious for using the Recon by Fire tactic.  I'm attacking a town in CMBN currently and one of the first things I did was hose down the church bell tower.

Not gamey at all. Using fire to deny an area to the enemy is a real tactic. Free Whisky actually did a video on how best to use artillery in Combat Mission. He describes four types of effects that artillery strives to achieve in real life, and which can be recreated in Combat Mission:
Suppress: Keep the enemy's heads down.
Obscure: Prevent the enemy from seeing your troops.
Secure: Prevent the enemy from occupying a piece of terrain by making it too dangerous.
Reduce: Inflict casualties on the enemy.
There's no doubt a similar formal list of effects that you can achieve with direct fire, whether it be from small arms or tanks/IFVs. But as I haven't come across it yet, here's my somewhat less formal (and not necessarily comprehensive) list of what you can do with direct fire:
Suppressive fire: Keep the enemy's heads down.
Recon-by-fire: Find the enemy by shooting at suspected positions, baiting them to shoot back.
Secure: Make a position dangerous for the enemy to occupy by shooting at it.
Destructive fire: Inflict casualties on the enemy.
Fire is a tool. Ultimately we want to use that tool to destroy the enemy. But it has many other uses that can make it easier to reach that ultimate goal, or make it harder for the enemy to destroy you. If you can think of any way to use fire to manipulate the enemy into doing what you want (or not doing what you don't want), then that's a legitimate use of fire, and one that has probably been used at some point in the real world.
 

Yes, agreed 100%. Keep it tight and simple. Preferably so simple there are none. A way more interesting and fun thing to do is introduce a few rules on how you manage C2 - for example the Hard Cat rules  (https://community.battlefront.com/topic/135087-hard-cat-rules-v2i-simple-to-use-command-control-rules-updated-01-june-2022/ ) Those don't create expectations that opponents will not do things to hurt you it just limits some of the god view flexibility. 
 
 
Yep, for me if someone reaches out with a bunch of rules it's a major red flag they are going to be no fun to play against. Not to mention I would hate to accidentally break a rule I agreed to because I simply forgot - I usually have a few games on the go after all. So hard pass if a new player starts saying "oh and do not this... and don't forget not to that...".
Now having said that, a long time playing partner who wants to experiment with something, that's a different kettle of fish I'm all in on trying something interesting. That's not what we are talking about though.
One of the great things about CM is rules lawyers are not successful because a truly impartial judge is keeping the game rules - the computer. One that you cannot wear down and befuddle. I suspect there are people here who have played war games with the people I call rules lawyers and don't want to repeat the experience. It used to be you were required to play with who showed up. Not any more 🙂

I think I've mentioned before that I strongly disagree with this one. You can't implement realistic tactics without area fire. Without area target you can't maintain suppression on enemy positions when the enemy takes cover and your own troops lose the spot, you can't conduct recon by fire, you can't use speculative fire on suspected enemy positions, and you can't use fire to deny an area that you think the enemy might want to go. Fire is a tool with a lot of uses. Only one of those uses is aimed destructive fire against clearly identified enemy units. If you disallow realistic tactics then what's even the point of playing the game?