Halmbarte
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Posts posted by Halmbarte
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I beat RR as the Sov and I'm pretty pleased. Potential spoilers below.
I did something somewhat unconventional compared with how I've seen the scenario played out in various videos. I wanted to solve these two problems:
1) Find and attrit the enemy.
2) How to hit the enemy with maximum concentrated force.
Given how your units dribble in over the first 30 minutes I wanted to wait until I had my whole force together before trying to cross.
My plan was:
1) Don't try and cross the river until the last rifle company arrives (they will go straight from march to assault).
2) Dismount some of the ATGM battery vehicles and tank crews and use them as scouts to get early spots.
3) Plaster the mid depth of Rumpenheim with a 152mm contact fused barrage from the start until the 3rd company is crossing.
4) Hit the side of Rumpenheim facing the river with VT fused 122mm barrage right before contact (heavy/maximum) to suppress any defenders hiding in the building.
5) Any exposed targets get hit with the 120mm mortars as they are seen, paying particular attention to ATGMs and tanks.
6) 1st and 2nd rifle companies dismount while out of contact and move up with their BMPs and the tanks. Any enemies that fire back have a tank company and 2 rifle companies with dismounts all looking for them. The BMPs are easily penetrated by pretty much anything that hits harder than a slingshot but this way I only loose the crew and not the whole squad.
7) Smoke. Smoking the riverfront would just isolate 3rd company from their supporting fires on the other side of the river. I biased tanks and 1st and 2nd companies towards the left and I did use a 120mm smoke mission on the right flank to keep the swimming BMPs from taking flanking shots.
8 ) 3rd rifle company crossed the river and seized the castle. After that they pushed deeper into Rumpenheim. This gave them access to the cross streets and they were able to kill the units fleeing 2nd and 1st companies when they crossed and grabbed their chunks of Rumpenheim. 3rd was also able to interdict the reinforcements as they tried to get to the riverfront.
9) 1st and 2nd companies crossed one after the other and grabbed more riverfront before pressing inland.
The plan pretty much worked. The river was crossed, there was FISH & CHIPS, mouses were holed, and all that good ****e.An observation is that the BMP and Sov infantry squad is a pretty lethal urban combat team. The scouts find the enemy (usually by being shot/shot at), the squad suppresses, and the BMP rolls up to the contact having an idea of what to exterminate because of all the green tracer heading out. Stalking enemy armor is another nasty trick the Sov can pull off better than the Americans can. The Sov squad has more RPG rounds than the Americans get LAWs and has another set of reloads in the track, so they don't run out of their organic AT weapon as fast as the Americans do.
Against a human I would have had a tougher time, particularly as my supporting force could only move so much and remain, well, supporting. I did have > 50m dispersion between units and when I did take artillery from the AI I was able to move the affected units out of the bombardment by shifting them around some.
No Soviet AFVs were sunk in the making of this post...
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1 hour ago, Simcoe said:
This was great! Would you have preferred a motor rifle battalion with attached tank company compared to a tank battalion with motor rifle company? I think Soviet handheld AT weapons are highly underrated.
The AT7 and AT4 are great ATGMs. The AT7 is as good as the Dragon if not better and the vehicle carries a lot of reloads. The AT4 has almost as much range as TOW and is much more portable with a lot of reloads on the vehicle. Either will wreck a M60 from the front.
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8 hours ago, Rinaldi said:
Think you misread. He's saying when he is commanding M60s he's never had their armour defeat Soviet rounds; so in that case he might as well get the same firepower in a nimbler package.
Yeppers, that was what I was trying to communicate.
I haven't never had M60s bounce a Sov round*, but it's like getting a rare bonus. Great when it happens but don't count on it.
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*I'm remembering a few solid shot that have been deflected by the armor on a M60, and a few HEAT that got penetrations but managed to miss anything vital. Those cases being the exception much more than the rule and the TacAI does seem to fire more HEAT with the 100 and 115mm main guns when sooting at M60s.
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1 hour ago, Codreanu said:
Has HESH ever been modeled in a CM game? If not, the Chieftain would be stuck with nothing but APDS and maybe a smoke shell, right?
I'm pretty sure the Challengers in SF2 have HESH.
I like HESH as a multipurpose round. It's great for mouse holing entry points for infantry and blows up infantry and light vehicles decently.
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1 hour ago, holoween said:
I have yet to bounce anything with m60s so leo1 having the same gun performance (no idea about the fcs) but being smaller and faster should if anything be an improvement.
I doubt that in all of history anyone has ever snuck up on anyone in a M60.
8 hours ago, chuckdyke said:Going earlier than that is the .50 aiming gun on the Centurion. It was effective up to a mile for first shot hit probability. It outgunned the T55 and was roughly on par with the T62. I would love a game from that period.
If I'm remembering right the early marks of Chieftain also used a spotting rifle.
And I was wrong earlier, Chieftain did have a composite armor package available that was deployed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stillbrew_armour
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4 minutes ago, chuckdyke said:
The Brits came up with Chobham Armor and I don't think the M60 had laminated armor yet.
The Chieftain was all steel. I'm recalling the Brits developed a 'special' armor package for the Chieftain but decided not to field it because it would be too expensive and the Chieftain's cast turret wasn't amenable to the flat plates of the special armor package.
It would be interesting to game out if the German's were on to something with the Leopard 1. Since steel armor can't keep out HEAT anyway keep the armor light and the tank fast. I'm thinking 70's era fire control would make that a losing proposition but it'd be fun to try it.
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Wikipedia says the Brits used the Carl G 84mm until it was replaced by the LAW80 in the 80s, along with the LAW.
I would be happy to get either the Brits* or the West Germans. Both have some interesting kit and using Marders to kill BMPs in Shock Force just isn't the same thing as a central Europe throw down.
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*Although going up against T64s with Chieftains is not a prospect I'm really looking forward to. I'm kinda expecting the Chieftain to be like a heavier, slower version** of the M60 series when facing the T64/T72. Pretty much anything can kill a M60 from any aspect and all the armor does is make the tank slower.
**At least CM doesn't model engine reliability...
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1 hour ago, THH149 said:
So, essentially, the Soviets plan for some serious artillery fires. In the CM world some things seem to be truncated - access to artillery pre attack is limited for instance. So CM is a reasonable but not a perfect analog of the real world.
To make CMCW a little more realistic a player in a QB could spend more on artillery than they think is 'fun' so better emulate Soviet approach, eg a 1/3rd at least on artie, its cheap and plentiful. Some of the scenario's aren't great at CW soviet tactics, they limit the degree of artie. The pic below is perhaps extreme (IDK but its from the relevant US FM, but shows an artillery battalion taking on a platoon.
A counterpoint is would US tactics work in the attack in CW? Given the defenders advantages and unreliance on artie, I'd be surprised if they did!
Anyway, the lack of perceived success with the "Active Defense" doctrine (limited to the universe of the immediate battlefield itself) led to the Air Land Battle doctrine which expanded the battlefied to include the logisitcs train of the Soviets as the place where the US could win. But then long range fires is not the monopoly of the US either.
Depending on what exactly is meant for 'defensive position or emplacement' that's not an insane tasking. If the defenders are entrenched with overhead cover and with bunkers dug in for supporting weapons and armor the artillery will need to be concentrated to get good suppression on the defenders so the attack can go in.
I know we don't get overhead cover and good bunkers in CMCW but...
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There was a bug with the Gill missing that has been fixed a while ago.
Never underestimate the abilities of conscripts to make a hash of things, like locking the Gill's seeker onto a hot rock instead of the tank they were trying for.
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A good first thing is to flip the map around. If I was the enemy where would I put an ambush, a ATGM, a FO, and so forth.
Once you’ve identified potential trouble spots resolve them as above. Personally I love to target fantastic FO positions with artillery. Live by the tube, die by the tube…
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Noticed this tank platoon HQ doesn't have radio communication. It's from Rumpenheim Rumpus and the tank hasn't taken any damage.
Save game here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/nbiswwucuvplsx9/Rumpenheim Rumpus 007.bts?dl=0
Did the tank commander sell the radio to buy decadent rock music records and blue jeans? We will get to the bottom of this foul corruption and those responsible will be punished!
On further investigation, three tanks in the company in two different platoons are missing their radios. Is the company commander in on the thefts or is it the supply sergeant*?
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*We all know the company commander is funding a dacha for his mistress but the supply sergeant will end up taking the blame.
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Just because as the Sov you have mass doesn't mean the only way forwards is a frontal assault. There are other ways to win that don't involve sticking your dick into the meat grinder until it jams. Recon routes that bypass the enemy, the Germans never have enough troops, guns, and/or tanks to cover every avenue of approach. Infantry infiltration is a thing.
Take you time*, don't be in a rush to die. You'll probably run out of people, tanks, and/or ammo before you run out of time.
When you attack, attack! Don't poke with one finger at a time. Make a fist and crush the enemy with overwhelming force.
Use a platoon to crush a squad > use a company to crush a platoon >> use a battalion to crush a squad. Fair fights are for suckers.
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*Time spent on recon isn't wasted even if it may feel like it
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I have a late model Mac (arrived 2 weeks ago) and no problems when I transferred over, just had to reactivate using the key code.
OP hasn't been here since 27apr so he probably figured it out or gave up.
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13 hours ago, absolutmauser said:
I have an ancient Mid-2013 MacBook Pro and all the CM 4.0 engine games on it. They run fine. Sometimes I have to dial down the settings a bit because I don't have a dedicated graphics card in it, but I've played all the games on it!
2014 MacBook Pro here too but I am on Big Sur (last OS I can run on this hardware).
@IronwulfAlpha You know you can run pretty much any arbitrary OS in a VM? Make a Catalina VM for your locked in software and upgrade your OS (or vice versa).
I've got a Windows 7 VM to run some software that's only available for M$. Setting it up was pretty easy.
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My understanding is that the FO shouldn't be able to call 2 fire missions at once. Neither of the fire missions they are running was preplanned.
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Nah, I've gotten plenty of FOs killed before. The FO was still alive, couldn't adjust fire, but could cancel it.
Restarted from a save point before the arty went wonky and all seems to be working at this point.
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This one is artillery related. Observer has called for fire but can't adjust it? And he's got 2 fire missions running at once that didn't start as pre-planned fire. Anyone else seen this type of behavior? Link to save game here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/3mb5ugvlhl8qnw2/Brutal! mod2 007 problems with artillery .bts?dl=0
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On 3/16/2022 at 8:04 PM, nox_plague said:
Can someone add those uniforms to CM Afghanistan, lol those are great.
Need a chest hair and mustache mod...
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On 3/16/2022 at 11:24 AM, IanL said:
Bummer. What scenario or map is this?
Brutal!
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On 3/14/2022 at 7:49 AM, IanL said:
Ouch. @Halmbarte, how did you get that guy in between those buildings? Was it during setup? I am wondering if the game has decided that alley way is to narrow to drive through but did not make the same judgment during setup when you were placing units. Yes, that would be a bug.
I have seen some gaps between buildings, especially angled ones that looked big enough to drive in but the game would not let me. I have not seen those same alleys allow you to place vehicles in them though.
I tried various reverse or forward orders and I could not get it to move either.
Yeah, I hid it in between the buildings during setup.
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4 hours ago, Erwin said:
I would first check if the route you have chosen has impassable terrain. If the vehicle cannot cross the terrain you will see exactly the same "cancel" phenomenon.
It all looked good, also tried to back out in reverse, no joy. I will try rotating in place. H
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This APC has had orders to move up (to resupply ATGMs) several times. For the last 3 turns I've give it orders to move up and it doesn't move and the orders are cancelled by the next command phase.
Any ideas? Link to save game here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/yiogteqqot3oslu/Brutal! 006.bts?dl=0
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14 hours ago, panzermartin said:
Something just struck me that probably the Russians send a lot of green troops ill equipped and I'll prepared to pretend they are a larger force and cause UKR to surrender more easily. When this didn't happen those naturally dissolved, with no ammo, fuel or specific mission. Maybe that 40km long convoy is the same case. Also I have read reports that indicate they used green troops in the start in several occasions, as probes and reccon to reveal enemy defenses and now more experienced troops are taking over. Sounds cynical but I think CMBS shouldn't try to portray this stuff in the core design , they are easily editable mission specific things
That does map onto how the Soviets started fighting the Germans in WWII.
The problem was the Germans didn't win quickly enough, so they ended up giving the Soviet army a pass/fail education in effective combined arms operations.
The result of the final played out in Berlin in '45.
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3 hours ago, Bulletpoint said:
I think the only lesson learnt here is that if you attack without logistics and a proper plan, and with extremely poor morale, you're not going far.
If your plan is heavily dependent on the defending army throwing down their weapons and their leadership buggering off to the West you're going to run into severe problems when those two things don't happen.
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I Can't Wait For The East And West Germans To Arrive
in Combat Mission Cold War
Posted
The Milan in SF2 has a very long minimum distance of 400m if I remember right. It can be hard to find places to deploy it even in the deserts of Syria.
I do want to play around with the HOT version of the RakJPz.
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