Rob Deans Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 I set up an experiment to test to see if grazing fire would work. Had a 1919 MG hide in house and brought up a platoon of Germans. They were deployed in open ground so that they were in a line with a spacing of about 75m from left flank to right. The MG was in COMPLETE enfilade when it opened fire. I was not impressed. The target selected was the farthest German section so that the MG fire would have to travel along the axis of the platoon before it got to the target section. Well, that section took two cas in the first two bursts. The others didn't even go to ground. They were busy firing at a bazooka in a building that was closer though not more dangerous. The MG had LOS to all German units so there were none in dead ground. The total German cas were 6 out of the platoon after about 7 min firing. The effect of enfilading fire by the MG was, in this experiment, inaccurately ineffective. Thanks Rob Deans Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest KwazyDog Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 Rob, although I cant tell you specifics about this case, I can tell you a lot has changed since the beta demo. For example just recently in a game I saw a whole platoon drop to the ground and take cover at a single burst from an MG 42 [This message has been edited by KwazyDog (edited 12-05-99).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkEzra Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 I wonder I you were the fellow who posted on the subject of MG fire on the TGN Steel Panthers BBS. If so I'ld like to tell you thanks. I learned a great deal about MG fire and tactics. In any event, when CM does come out I hope you'll post your views. The Steel Panthers MG post raised great points regarding computer programing of MG fire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Big Time Software Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 Rob, I am nearly positive that grazing fire is not in the demo. If you want, send me the file you used and I will see what happens with the latest build. Steve [This message has been edited by Big Time Software (edited 12-05-99).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rommel Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 the platoon wouldn't be nicely lined up for grazing fire, think of the scene in saving private ryan for example, when tom hanks and crew assault the MG position at the old radar site, they are spaced out, and the MG42 only got 1 of them, I think a lot of wargames overestimate the effectiveness of MG fire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SimonFox Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 Sincerely hope grazing fire is in the full version, good points Rob. All we need now is 'overhead' or indirect MG fire which was not as uncommon as some people think. Mark, What's the link to that discussion? ?What are you going on about 'Rommel'? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
howardb Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 I'm not trying to show disrespect here Rommel but I wouldn't set up my strategies after what I've seen in a film Btw do you remember the guys that they did hit, the guys that was killed before they came? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fionn Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 Let's not start trying to say SPR was realistic eh? My personal bug-bear was the refurbished T-34 masquerading as a Tiger .. They didn't even try to fake the roadwheels, they didn't insert vision blocks to protect from MG fire and leaping onto a Tiger is a mite more difficult than it is to do on a little T-34 . There have been some good movies which were pretty realistic. Some of the good ones include Cross of Iron ( I just really like that movie, and the book on which it was based) and some of the old "Combat" shows IIRC but MOST movies are utter trash. ------------------ ___________ Fionn Kelly Manager of Historical Research, The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trooper Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 Well.. bearing in mind that they couldn't find any working Tigers to drive around, I think they did rather well out of the job. (I think the only one left that has a chance is the one in Bovington being restored. Slowly). They did the same thing in Kelly's Heroes. Things have come a long way since the use of unmodified M47s and 48s in 'Patton' and 'Devil's Brigade...' Personally, I think they did quite a good job. Granted that the mock-up is a heck of a lot smaller than a Tiger, (Even then, you'd only notice if you've seen a Tiger and T-34 in the flesh and have a basis for comparison) but I can't see how they would have put fake overlapping wheels on the suspension and still kept it quite functional. Another good mock-up job was of the Australian Centurions used in 'Courage under Fire' I knew they weren't Abrams because they looked too clean, but it took me ages to figure it out. (I finally sussed it by looking at the track 'tread' pattern) As another aside, I knew some of the Irish army extras used in the beach scenes. One guy was in the lead LCU. His instructions were 'As soon as the bow ramp drops, die' On the 'second' wave, he was allowed get about 10 feet before falling. On the subject of MG fire, I can't speak for the MG-42, but I can for the .303 Bren and FN-MAG on the range, and if there were 30 one-foot-square targets 100m away from me, lying in open ground, after a minute of fire most would well be casualties. This is of course assuming that nobody's shooting at <me> at the time! I too would say that from the demo, the casualty rates sometimes seem a little light. However, I know the demo has been improved upon, so I'm holding my peace. And of course, field exercises are no substitue for actual combat, so I'm not exactly an authority! DWH Manic Moran Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkEzra Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 Simmon Fox: WWW.Thegamers.net/messageboards/discussions.html I have made a search and cannot find the files (the go back to Sept only). On an unrelated matter. I teased you on a post back in Oct. While I was absolutely not trying to be mean spirited, when I re-read the post later it seemed that way to me. I am sorry I wrote the "Simon Says" post. It was uncalled for and thoughtless. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
harley desrosiers Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 ya know id swear that tiger is the same one they used in the move kelly's hero's. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reverendo Posted December 6, 1999 Share Posted December 6, 1999 The same the good old Odball bought? P.S: COOL film (even the soundtrack from Mike Curb Congregation was good!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Major Tom Posted December 7, 1999 Share Posted December 7, 1999 Just a question here, I thought that most of the German armour was facing the Canadians and British at the early stage of the Normandy beachead? I was unsure about the length of time from the beginning of SPR, the assault on the beaches, and the point of the attack on the airborne, but, it couldn't have been much more than a few days. Tiger's were issued to the SS Armoured Divisions, along with Panzer Korps HQ's. Were the troops attacking the airborne SS soldiers? I know that eventually the I and II SS Korps positioned themselves in front of the Americans, but, was it this soon in the battle? I understand that there were Marders and other vehicles like them, but, I never really believed that there were Tigers in that region at that time. Plus, I think that the last scene of the movie wrecked the entire "war is hell and remember those who died" type theme which was predominant through the rest of the movie. I mean, when the P-51's came bursting out of the air blasting that Tiger at the right moment, and the hundreds of American troops charging to the rescue, it just changed into another "Go America!" movie for me. Not that I am bashing America, but, the movie was supposed to be a-political, focusing on the lives of the soldiers and the morality or a-morality of war. Now, a good soldier perspective movie, even though it is a bit old, and stars Mark Hammel, is "The Big Red One". Sure it used an American Tank with a Black Cross as a StuG, but, it made up with through plot. Another note about Tigers which I picked up somewhere. Even though they are officially Panzerkampfwagen VI, and the Panther is a Mark V, they were developed before the Panther. The King Tiger is much a better than the Tiger (even though it was too heavy for its on good!), because the Tiger was developed before the Germans went into Russia, and learned the value of sloped armour and engine reliability. The Tiger would have been so much better if it had the same heavy armour, only sloped. Just imagine meeting one of those on the battlefield! On the topic of working accurate war vehicles. Has anyone seen the epic "Battle of Britain"? I mean, they used a plethora of Spitfires, Hurricanes, Me 109's, Ju 87's and He 111's! Presently, I think that there is just one operational He 111, and that was originally Spanish! Too bad that moviemakers have been forced to substitute once plentiful machines of war for horribly matched modern contemporaries. What ever happened to those 50,000 Shermans anyway? The Germans didn't brew them all up... did they? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SimonFox Posted December 7, 1999 Share Posted December 7, 1999 Hey, don't worry Mark. My hide is as thick as a Rhino's you won't get any sooking or hurt pride from me. I like to hand it out so I can't really expect not to take it now can I? I'm always cogniscant that sometimes things don't always come out the same way that people intended so I make it a policy not to get offended too quickly and go off half-cocked. We've seen the effects of that around here occasionally Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Deans Posted December 7, 1999 Author Share Posted December 7, 1999 "Rob, I am nearly positive that grazing fire is not in the demo" Mmmmm,...Does that mean that it is in the main game? I recall that in a game of Last Defence I had a view from the left (as the Germans) accross the front to the right flank. My right had collapsed and American infantry were crossing the open ground on the right. My only thought was that I needed a machine gun on the left to deny the enemy the use of that open space. An MG firing on a fixed point on the far side of the field would have stopped the enemy from dashing accross and into the town. This is machinegunning. Traversing left once the Americans had gone to ground and I could have chewed them into tiny bits, forcing them back into dead ground (from my machinegun). This is the power of machineguns (and a reason for having a "rapid rate" order under "target"...I won't harp on that one again) "the platoon wouldn't be nicely lined up for grazing fire" I know that,...It was an experiment to see if grazing fire worked. "I think a lot of wargames overestimate the effectiveness of MG fire." On the contrary, most, if not all, underestimate it. This is based on misinformation and a lack of knowledge of how machine guns really can be, and are, used. Kudos to the guys here that they listen and discuss. Thanks Rob Deans Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Big Time Software Posted December 7, 1999 Share Posted December 7, 1999 Rob, a TON of stuff wasn't in the Beta Demo that is in and working fine now. And I know that MG drop (or whatever it is technically called ) is in the game too. Check out the demo I did using US squads charging HMG42. Uhm... I did that a week or so ago. No idea what the thread was called though! Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trooper Posted December 7, 1999 Share Posted December 7, 1999 When they were making 'A Bridge Too Far', they tried to grab hold of every Dakota and Sherman they could. The results weren't fantastic. My memory is a bit hazy, but I think they grabbed hold of 9 working Shermans (Some of which had the HVSS 'Easy Eight' suspension and thus was placed at the back), one or two duds, and a couple of 'plastic tanks' mounted on jeeps. The scene with the Bailey bridge used these plastic tanks because the bridge that they actually built for the movie wasn't rated for the full weight armored vehicle. Israel would have been a good source for parts, but almost all their Shermans had either been regunned with modern 105mm guns, or converted into SP artillery or the like. I'd say most survivors are now monuments, and all those Belgian towns would rather object to them being removed to make movies! DWH Manic Moran Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doug Beman Posted December 7, 1999 Share Posted December 7, 1999 Major Tom wrote this "even though it is a bit old, and stars Mark Hammel" Aw, c'mon MT! Mark Hammel is a great actor! When he shouted "NNOOOOOOOO, IT'S NOT TRUE!!!" I was overcome with emotion. Of course, helpless laughter may not have been the emotive response Lucas and Hammel were aiming for..... DjB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Major Tom Posted December 7, 1999 Share Posted December 7, 1999 Heh heh heh, I laughed until I stopped. Actually, I thought that Hammel was pretty good in that flick, for a stage actor in a movie... At least he isn't as bad as William Shatner! I bought a musical collection of him singing some of the great songs of all time "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "Mr. Tamorine Man", which made my ears bleed. Probably my most favorite movie, of World War Two, would have to be Tora Tora Tora. I mean, they actually got personal for both sides of the conflict! Just to show, that in war there is more than one side. How ironic that I bring this up exactly 58 years to the day of the event. [This message has been edited by Major Tom (edited 12-07-99).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darryl Posted December 22, 1999 Share Posted December 22, 1999 Hi all, Odd that a thread about MG grazing fire turns into a discussion about movie star tanks. LOL BTW...If anyone lives near my hometown of Benicia, California I can tell you where to find the hull of a Grant tank. Darryl Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Big Time Software Posted December 22, 1999 Share Posted December 22, 1999 Is that the one they used for the movie "1941"? If so, the guy is asking WAY too much money for it Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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