Road to Montebourg

[Yggdrasill]

Slight SPOILER ALERT.

I recently finished scenario 5 or so, the one about Turnbull's stand (Neuville-au-Plain). It's a great scenario and I did reasonably well though Turnbull was killed by artillery falling on his building. I had two thoughts I wanted to share.

First, veteran and especially crack troops are, well, awesome. I rarely get veterans in QBs and never crack units. They do die just as easily though!

Second, I would love to read about how the original battle unfolded. The Americans have two AT guns and the Germans two PZIV and a Marder. Seems like you should not lose more than one AFV per gun. Once it's location is known, mortars should take it out. I understand why the AI doesn't do it that way (or at least not in a timely manner - those positions were shelled long after they had run out of ammo) but I don't know how the Germans lost that engagement with such overwhelming numbers. If just one AFV survives the defenders are toasted by direct HE fire.

[Paper Tiger]

though Turnbull was killed by artillery falling on his building

Almost historical. Tragically, Turnbull was killed by a mortar shell the following day.

First, veteran and especially crack troops are, well, awesome

Indeed they are but the US units in this mission were more than deserving of this status.

I would love to read about how the original battle unfolded

My main source for this was Keegan's 'Six Armies in Normandy'. (page 96-97) He was obviously deeply impressed by the Americans in this action too. You have exactly the same number of men under your command that Turnbull had thanks to the head-count reduction. I added a second AT-gun though as it was too easy for the US to lose it early on and therefore lose the mission. Otherwise, the US OB is fairly accurate. For the German OB, I jut guessed. The German tanks were likely captured French jobbies but we don't have them so I went with a couple of Mk IVs and a Marder III for the SPG.

I don't know how the Germans lost that engagement with such overwhelming numbers

Apparently, they were fooled into thinking they were facing a numerically larger force than they actually faced because of the volume of fire the Paras were putting out. The real action lasted nearly eight hours. A real heroic stand!

[Yggdrasill]

8 HOURS HOLY COW!

That's incredible. How on earth did it last that long? The ammo loads (in the game) for the US are way too small for that kind of extended battle but I assume there were other US forces involved?

[JonS]

8 HOURS HOLY COW!

How on earth did it last that long?

Battles are much MUCH slower than people think.

[theFightingSeabee]

After playing this,i too wanted to know more. There's quite a bit on him if you google him. it was interesting how the germans tried to fool them by marching straight down the road acting as if they were prisoners.

A far as the length of time, yeah, a lot if shootouts last for hours.

[Erwin]

"Battles are much MUCH slower than people think."

That is absolute balderdash! Has it not been proven in every CMBN scenario that battles are only between 1-2 hours at most! Silly man...

[Paper Tiger]

<tut tut> naughty.

Let's not bring that up in here, please.

[Lanzfeld]

Old thread I know but I have a question about this mission.

Should I exit my forces no matter how well I am keeping the Germans at bay or should I keep my forces on the map until time runs out? I am confussed about what is more important.

[BLSTK]

"Battles are much MUCH slower than people think."

That is absolute balderdash! Has it not been proven in every CMBN scenario that battles are only between 1-2 hours at most! Silly man...

Balderdash? Wrong game, my good man!

[sburke]

This is a good read and covers the fighting for St Mere Eglise in detail including Turnbull's stand.

http://www.amazon.com/Irresistible-Force-Lieutenant-Vandervoort-Battalion/dp/098471510X

One thing to keep in mind is battle length is a LOT of time spent just getting orders transmitted and coordinated. Our whole C&C structure apparently has our pixeltruppen using facebook as they all know our intent simultaneously. My pixeltruppen are best represented by Agent Smith in The Matrix (including the part where he/I lose).

What gets even more amazing is what the 2nd BN 505th did to this German force shortly thereafter. They definitely deserve the crack rating.

In 1990, the Army Command and General Staff College’s Center for Army Leadership selected Lieutenant Colonel Vandervoort as the outstanding battle commander of the Second World War.

The book also covers the fighting during MG so now is probably a good time to get this on your kindle if you haven't already.

[c3k]

Old thread I know but I have a question about this mission.

Should I exit my forces no matter how well I am keeping the Germans at bay or should I keep my forces on the map until time runs out? I am confussed about what is more important.

WHAT!?!?! Should I fight or should I run away? Bah. My men are aware of my standing orders: any man may freely move into the exit zone...AFTER all the enemy are dead!

This is COMBAT Mission, not some sort of bus schedule sim-city'esque game! Attack!

In the absence of real knowledge about the designer's parameters, the best bet may be to save the first turn, fight it out and see how you do. Then, just reload the first turn and exit. Compare results. Take the one you prefer.

Campaign "scoring" is a bit of black art to me. "I fights mit Seigel."

Ken

[YankeeDog]

Old thread I know but I have a question about this mission.

Should I exit my forces no matter how well I am keeping the Germans at bay or should I keep my forces on the map until time runs out? I am confussed about what is more important.

Been a very long time since I played it or looked at it in the editor, but I did look at the scoring parameters for this once upon a time.

IIRC, in order to win without exiting the majority of your force, you need to at least destroy the vast majority of the German force (as in 75%+) without allowing the Germans to touch any of the objective areas, and ideally cause a German surrender (which generally requires doing the former anyway).

So it's possible to stay on the map to the end and win, but the more reliable tactical goal is to give the Germans a good bloody nose, and then get the hell out of dodge.

On my first time playing through this scenario, I did manage to basically stop the German attack cold. I knocked out all of the AFVs and the German infantry was heavily atritted and bogged down about 200m short of the objective areas, pretty much incapable of moving any further forward due to low morale state -- I was able to hold them in place with just harassing MG fire. But I did decide to break contact and exit the map prior the end of the scenario, which gave me a pretty good score.

Afterwards, I went back to a save game about midway through and tried to actually force German surrender, but this was very hard to accomplish. Ammo supply became a significant issue; I just didn't have enough bullets to shoot all the Germans. You have plenty of M2 ball for the Garands and BARs, but you run out of rounds for the AT Guns, 60mm Mortar, Thompsons and Carbines more quickly. Once you're down to just .30-'06 ammo, it's pretty challenging to "wipe the board".

[Paper Tiger]

IIRC, in order to win without exiting the majority of your force, you need to at least destroy the vast majority of the German force (as in 75%+) without allowing the Germans to touch any of the objective areas, and ideally cause a German surrender (which generally requires doing the former anyway).

Not quite as absurd as that. The German Friendly Force Preservation bonus is set at 80% for 100vps meaning that you have to kill 20% or more to rob them of it. Further, the Allies have an Enemy Unit Objective worth 500 vps for the entire German force, so kill 20+% and you get 100+vps. On the other hand, the Germans have an enemy unit objective total of 100vps. However, and this is a big however, you must exit your forces before the German player touches either of the main farmhouses on either side of the highway. They get 500vps for doing this. Allowing them to do so will prevent the remnants of Turnbull's platoon from escaping back to join the battalion for the next 2/505 battle. Of course, you can stay and fight and inflict 300+vps of casualties on the German and prevent him from touching the objectives and win that way as well.

[malfuriouspete]

Its tough.. I just re-played this battle today. In my game, the Germans decided to ignore the center and right objective and head towards the group of houses on the left (where Turnbull and most of his crew starts). I managed to take out the marder and one of the PvIVs, but the other one decided to go along the road on the left and came across through the back of the houses. I managed to kill the tank and all its crew but not sure if this counts as the AI touching the area.. they don't actually have to hold it do they??

Gave as much of a bloody nose as I could, my mortar was super effective on the germans once they crossed the river.. and turned tail and ran but they got to the left objective anyways and I was left with a tactical defeat.

[BLSTK]

This was a most memorable battle, in which BLSTK managed to live and fight another day. That is more than I can say for the majority of my troops, as only three men remained at Turnbull's station. Sadly, he was not one of them. Although eleven German units occupied the complex at game's end (a staggering FORTY-THREE enemy soldiers), my forces were somehow able to achieve a Minor Tactical Victory. I am still baffled by this outcome, since the only Allies in the area (all three of them) had retreated to behind the back wall. It is worth noting that the squad leader was in the process of surrendering, while his two subordinates "won the day" by remaining in the green. Upon the final turn only six allied fighters had exited the map for the slimmest of margins of victory imaginable.

[Bulletpoint]

I think maybe my experience with this mission was a lucky fluke. By setting up ambushes I was able to grind the German advance to a halt - the three AFV's went straight into the line of fire of my AT-gun on the right part of the map, and were destroyed quickly one after the other.

The german infantry took some losses from the ambushes, but they could have easily crushed the defenders if they had continued to advance. The right flank was held by three men only, the center by 4 or 5, the main mansion with Turnbull was never approached.

None of the victory zones were touched by the Germans, their attack stopped dead in its tracks and eventually the time just ran out and I won a decisive victory. I was surprised, and thought it must be an AI problem of sorts... but maybe it was their poor morale?

The story of Turnbull the hero and the short poignant line about him dying the next day from a banal random mortar was food for thought.