Maquisard manqué

Oh dear. That's going to piss at least one tractor off quite a bit: look at the careful sowing. How can the combine get around that safely?

I'm out of votes but +1. And on ths issue, it's a good job the US Marshal plan prevailed and not the (partly) French left's desire to completely de-industrialise Germany after WW2 - or there would be no Panzerfaust 3's going to Ukraine now. No EU President (from Germany) standing up and voting for the EU to buy and send weapons to Ukraine either.

Interesting that people finaly got out of Mariupol too. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-europe-60746557?ns_mchannel=social&ns_source=twitter&ns_campaign=bbc_live&ns_linkname=6230ed9a980bea49f4b7caec%26Almost 30%2C000 evacuated from cities today - Ukrainian official%262022-03-15T20%3A14%3A11.224Z&ns_fee=0&pinned_post_locator=urn:asset:85cf1cd6-92f9-4d12-91ca-cd72d7a05e33&pinned_post_asset_id=6230ed9a980bea49f4b7caec&pinned_post_type=share

That's a valid concern. If Putin or a similar replacement, er, replaces him - it could mean more of the same. But who is going to beat Russia back that far, much less occupy it? If Nato were drawn in, it could be plausible, but this way... nope. And TBH, Kraze's views (if at all widespread - hello Azov) are not going to make post-war settlement any more fruitful for peace on the Ukrainian side either. Versailles mk2 it could be...

There are no longer any legal ones! Anything not repeating the sanctioned line is illegal since last week (or is it 2?).

I don't think it's so simple. They've been brought up in a jar (you might even call it a psychotic one) - what better do they know? I can totally see why you're short on compassion for them, but they are no more than a product of their environment. You know, there was some talk of Orcs earlier in the thread. It struck in my mind that Tolkien regreted writing them so one-dimensionaly evil. But as i said, i can't actually put myself in your shoes right now. Clean hummanist hands are easier to maintain from distance.

I think there's a lot of observer bias in general. Maybe it's factored in by those with intelligence experience but I feel like I'm only seeing the super-salient bits that make up the possible "edge" of the real shape of what's going on, rather than the centre or actual contents of the shape. I am not used to consuming propaganda (or at least a different flavour of it) so what is coming out of Ukraine feels uncertain. Fog of War you might say. My thoughts are with all Ukrainians. I hate that their world is being shredded. I simply cannot comprehend what this trauma is like. I do also have compassion for the Russian conscripts, if i'm honest. They're only kids. Pawns thrown into the grinder.

So, the TB2s are still operating - along with other Ukrainian planes. Not sure what the calculation (or limitation for Russia) is behind not knocking out airfields. Interesting place to follow the crisis. I appreciate the various global perspectives here. Thanks to battlefront for allowing it.

You can estimate LoS from a map at least, or should be able to. Certainly easy to understand broad defilade/enfilade and where reverse slopes are. Agree in practice you'd need to confirm LoS at emplacements with scouts for the edge cases (e.g. when you're positioning behind the ridge line and hull down positions).

Not sure if this has been raised before. I ran a search of the forum but didn't find anything. It's certainly come up elsewhere on the forum though. I'd really like to see: Contour lines - either as an option to overlay on the "normal" map view (i.e. at relatively low angle to the horizontal, looking accross the map) or zoomed out birds eye view. Probably no distinction engine wise given it's all the same map, but there could be RP or realism reasons for a distinction/different options. I think we can all agree that reading the terrain is crucial but at present I find it really tricky: there is no colour gradient to associate with elevation (as there was with CM1) so I find I have to scoot the camera around at ground level to understand LoS, which can be time consuming and also feels most unrealistic as most commanders would have a map with some contours (not always, i concede) to support their recon & planning.

I was (and continue to) be talking what's proabbly a load of ill-informed nonsense anyway. Nonetheless, here's what I meant: The minister gave a speech (in the video) saying a lesson learned from Iraq & Afghanistan was that "mass" (i.e. tanks/AFVs) wasn't needed for a sustained time - briefly perhaps and then not. Which sounds sensible if you have a similarly asymetric conflict again. BUT, my point is that it seems unlikely that would be the case now as the UK and US both decided not to get on the ground (bar SFs/training) in Syria, the latest opportunity for such an asymetric conflict, or Ukraine either. Ukraine is perhaps a more tenuous link to an asymetric conflict (if Russia also got involved faced off to a direct challenge from Nato), but served to support my point on willingness for expeditionary front line conflict (bar SF & airpower engagment). The UK just published a new intergrated review of defence, diplomacy and development. I haven't read it but i thought the gist was that the armed forces were gearing up more for sustained high-intensity war with potential opponents like Russia or China. If that's the case, then what the Minster said when introducing the challenger 3 (about not needing mass for long) seems inconsistent. Which is why i said it sounds like the UK is preparing for the last war. In reality, I guess the speech was hogwash and the rationale is more likely to be a quesiton of cost and, as others mention here, responding to new threats like drones and (as they do mention in the Integrated review too) cyber and digital stuff (whatever that looks like).

Interesting. Two thoughts: 1. There's a difference in the hard prototypes and the graphic version, the latter having a very boxy gun mount which would surely have a very short shelf life. I'm guessing the more svelte angled mount in the model the bigwigs stood in front of is the real thing though. 2. (a reflection and a much wider question) It sounded like the Minister is falling prey to the old adage of planners fighting the last war, with his comments on stabilisation themes/mass only now being relevant for a very short time. Surely the UK debacle/lack of interest in front line deployments in Syria and even Ukraine was the death knell of that sort of tech imbalanced conflict?

I can see why you'd think that. Fair enough. I knew it'd be rash to ask and am now kicking myself for not researching it thoroughly. Again, I am glad to be wrong!

OK! I don't have the latest versions so am glad to be wrong. It seems a very easy thing to have right. I guess if asking the very question is so appalling then sure, close and delete the thread. I had searched and didn't find one with appropriate keywords though.

I approach the post question with some trepidation, hopefully unwarranted. You never know with the internet after all... Here goes: When the contemporary US (and UK) military have such a diverse ethnic mix in their combat ranks, and increasing gender diversity there too, and with CM striving for such high fidelity in its reproduction of the arms and doctrine of the armies involved, why on earth isn't the same applied to the colour of the pixel truppen's skin or their gender? I am not asking for the typical computer game's response to women (armour with boobs!) and I appreciate this reflects mostly on the modern CM titles, but I've not seen any non-white troops in WW2 titles where there most certainly were (North Africa, Italy). I imagine it's just been overlooked but seriously, when we might obsess over the angle of a glacis in a Jagdpanzer casemate, why not the people in the uniforms too? I'm sorry if this descends into flames. I ask this question with the best will in the world.

Yeah, true - that kind of fidelity could feel almost spurious. I guess the bee in my bonnet is the Fallout universe where there's a combination of fictional/futuristic stuff with scavenged realistic equipment (where existing CM assets could even be used) and fictional improvised stuff too. Arguably a bit like in the ficitonal worlds of The Postman by David Brin or A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter Miller. It feels like it wouldn't be pushing the CM enveloppe too much further than SF2 or BS have relative to the WW2 titles.

Yes, CM's engine is best suited to war of maneuvre fighting - but that's ok, you can engineer the fictional setting to that. Surely the CM games already do that too through a selective bias to certain encounters/battle types? e.g. I feel that the WW2 CM titles focus on rural combat more than urban, perhaps in a disproportionate way (Leningrad, Stalingrad don't feature heavily, but i don't mind). Then again, the CM engine arguably could model jungle and trench warfare already but the result would be quite frustrating (perhaps almost as much as it was for the belligerents in WW1, WW2 Burma and Vietnam?). I don't know what i'm talking about (!) but ambush warfare has got to be pretty nerve jangling even without the leeches, rain and poor supply. Oh and the drugs, although they were a coping strategy for most I think I heard... My understanding of the WW1 western front is that (to win in the attack) you'd focus much more on the terrain micro gradient, as well as suppressing fire - honestly in a way that CMAK and SF2's open and denuded landscapes forced me to anyway, having come from vegetation heavy Bocage in CMBO and BN. So maybe not so much of a stretch actually - just perhaps a bit grindlingly repetitive and frustrating? But, given the parlous state of C2 in WW1 on the western front (tank/infantry coordination, to name but one example) it would be pretty unbelieveable for current "perfect control" CM engine modeling. Then again, WW1 was much more than the trenches of France/Flandres - I was just reading Romel's Infantry Attacks and he had plenty of time in maneuvre type warfare in the Balkans and Alps (or at least when he used maneuvre to assault fixed positions). MGs and rifle infantry were what he had at his disposal 90% of the time, which lessens the grog/tank porn appeal I guess. Thanks! And as an alternative to what @Vergeltungswaffe posted, this - where Lady Liberty is the CM franchise?

Thanks! I still have to figure out how to use aerial assets properly in CM...

Hello, this is probably not the best way to start off in a forum/community and at the risk of upsetting the more grog minded, I wondered if a sci-fi or future war type setting had ever been considered for CM games? I can answer the question myself in that the CM USP is about simulation/realism, anathema to fictional settings. Lots of the player base (like me!) are presumably drawn to the vicarious fantasy of historical armchair generaldom. On the other hand, I've been playing a mod of Hearts of Iron 4 set in the Fallout universe (Old World Blues) and I've been having a blast with the combination of setting, mechanics and a mix of familiar and unfamiliar technologies. It got me thinking how a CM game would play in the Fallout universe, power armour platoons mixed with robots, regular infantry, irregulars and AFVs. Also, the notion of walkers etc like AT-ATs (for want of a better example) or others (and setting aside how silly they might be e.g. does this thing have a hull down mode?). Anyway, I'm sure its more likely the realm of a mod given possible licensing restrictions and I totally see it as a different direction for the CM brand, so most unlikely. Nonetheless, I'd be interested in the challenge of a more fictional setting with wilder units. Any thoughts?