tactics and learning curve

[bowlie]

I seem to be doing ok, but not great in most scenarios. Mortars seem to obliterate me and i have trouble taking out German tanks. I was wondering if there was a resource for tactics e.c.t. that would help. thanks

[Bradley Dick]

I seem to be doing ok, but not great in most scenarios. Mortars seem to obliterate me and i have trouble taking out German tanks. I was wondering if there was a resource for tactics e.c.t. that would help. thanks

Read up on what they did to deal with these problems in real life. A fairly good amount of real life tactics work well in the game. Look up threads which discuss tactics using the search function. There are tons of thoughtful and sometimes ridiculous discussions on these boards about what does and doesn't work.

Have fun losing because it gets more fun when you start pulling off some victories.

[Agua]

Mortars seem to obliterate me and i have trouble taking out German tanks.

And this differs from everyone else's game, how?

[Crushingleeek]

I seem to be doing ok, but not great in most scenarios. Mortars seem to obliterate me and i have trouble taking out German tanks. I was wondering if there was a resource for tactics e.c.t. that would help. thanks

score for CMBN realism!

[womble]

Mortars seem to obliterate me...

Couple of things people do to mitigate mortars:

• Spread out. If you can stomach the micromanagement, split your squads into teams and have space between them. If you want to keep your squads intact, make sure they're well spread out.
  
• Run away. If you see spotting rounds, pick up those feet and get the flock out of Dodge. Sometimes you'll run straight into where the strike actually falls, but you improve your odds of not being where the bombs are falling.
  
• Hit the dirt. If you're in the open, and running away is going to do you more harm than good, cancel movement orders, give your troops Hide commands and ride it out. Hide helps by reducing the time your pTruppen spend not lying on their bellies (before they're forced into "Cowering" by being in the middle of a barrage of HE), and troops stood up take far more casualties than those lying down, thanks to the burst pattern of most rounds. It's not so helpful in trees, because of treebursts.
  

...i have trouble taking out German tanks.

• Let your infantry find the enemy armour so you can plan your attack on the Panzers.
  
• Look for flank shots and ambushes. If you have to actively hunt them rather than letting them come to you, popup attacks can work well.
  

In general, take it slow, but not slow enough that their arty can catch you...

[Crushingleeek]

[*]Spread out. If you can stomach the micromanagement, split your squads into teams and have space between them. If you want to keep your squads intact, make sure they're well spread out.

+1. I always split squads into teams. (unless there is a narrow firing lane that I want to squeeze as many rifles into as i can.)

• Let your infantry find the enemy armour so you can plan your attack on the Panzers.
  
• Look for flank shots and ambushes. If you have to actively hunt them rather than letting them come to you, popup attacks can work well.
  

In general, take it slow, but not slow enough that their arty can catch you...

Right on. Against AI, really really take it slow. don't worry too much about arty finding you (unless its an FO or HQ. If you're like me, you have all teams, all spread out if you can help it and there are enough cover areas. A team or two getting peppered, while stressful, won't kill your operation.)

With superior German armor, sometimes all you can do is flank for a side or rear shot, while playing a cat n mouse game, moving a tank in for a shot, hiding behind cover, then alternating with another tank on the other flank moving in for a shot and then reversing for cover.

Bazooka teams at short range help too.

[Bil Hardenberger]

I seem to be doing ok, but not great in most scenarios. Mortars seem to obliterate me and i have trouble taking out German tanks. I was wondering if there was a resource for tactics e.c.t. that would help. thanks

A tactics forum would indeed be nice... you can browse through the CMSF tactics forum and learn a lot of techniques that will work in CMBN...

...or you can read and study After Action Reports (AARs), like the one linked in my sig, or the other BETA AAR, or any others created by quality players...

...or read BLOGs like http://kriegsimulation.blogspot.com/ or http://cmsfwarchest.blogspot.com/ . You can also read period field manuals.. there are many available on line.

The information is out there.. but you might need to dig for it.

[mjkerner]

The Few Good Men website has a tips/tactics type of area. It's worth checking out. Good people there, and plenty of campaigns, ladders and other pbem action, plus AI scenarios.

http://www.thefewgoodmen.com/thefgmforum/forumdisplay.php?160-Combat-Mission-Battle-for-Normandy

[Vanir Ausf B]

Some really good advice exists in the CM archives.

Remember to look for opportunities to exploit the relative strengths and weaknesses of German and Allied tanks. German tanks were designed for picking off distant targets on the Russian steppe. So don't get into long range duels against them. Utilize the Sherman's faster turret and gyro stabilizer.

[Erwin]

Here's a link to CMBN Q&A at WeBOB:

http://webandofbrothers.yuku.com/topic/13369/CM-BN-questions-and-answers-share-your-wisdom-here

[slysniper]

Couple of things people do to mitigate mortars:

• Spread out. If you can stomach the micromanagement, split your squads into teams and have space between them. If you want to keep your squads intact, make sure they're well spread out.
  
• Run away. If you see spotting rounds, pick up those feet and get the flock out of Dodge. Sometimes you'll run straight into where the strike actually falls, but you improve your odds of not being where the bombs are falling.
  
• Hit the dirt. If you're in the open, and running away is going to do you more harm than good, cancel movement orders, give your troops Hide commands and ride it out. Hide helps by reducing the time your pTruppen spend not lying on their bellies (before they're forced into "Cowering" by being in the middle of a barrage of HE), and troops stood up take far more casualties than those lying down, thanks to the burst pattern of most rounds. It's not so helpful in trees, because of treebursts.
  

• Let your infantry find the enemy armour so you can plan your attack on the Panzers.
  
• Look for flank shots and ambushes. If you have to actively hunt them rather than letting them come to you, popup attacks can work well.
  

In general, take it slow, but not slow enough that their arty can catch you...

Good Advice, listen to it.

[bowlie]

thanks for the help everyone. i have another specific question. i just played a quick battle and played as the allies. I saw a tank coming so i hid my squad of pioneers behind some bocage it had to pass by and gave them an arc. the tank rolled up to them, saw them, and turned to gun them down without them even firing a shot. why not? cant they use the demo satchels like that? what is the best anti-tank infantry?

[Bradley Dick]

As far as I know, you can't use demo on tanks. It's just for blowing up obstacles like walls and hedgerows. Infantry are pretty poor in an anti-tank role unless you arm them with shoulder-fired AT weapons. You can score some crew kills on unbuttoned commanders or open topped vehicles and you might be able to shake up the crew with grenades.

In Close Combat, you could swarm a tank with some effect by moving your infantry in close to use grenades. I've never tried it or seen it work with anything but molotov cocktails in a Combat Mission game.

[womble]

I saw a tank coming so i hid my squad of pioneers behind some bocage it had to pass by and gave them an arc. the tank rolled up to them, saw them, and turned to gun them down without them even firing a shot. why not? cant they use the demo satchels like that? what is the best anti-tank infantry?

Some people have posted screenies of Pioneers using demo charges in that mode. There are several possible reasons your Pioneers didn't fire on the tank, inclucing:

• To use a demo charge, I think you have to plot a Blast move up to the tank. Difficult to achieve on a moving target, especially because using Blast across more than one action spot edge will cause the command to fail, IME.
  
• If the tank was buttoned and did not come into the very adjacent action spot, the troops would not fire on it unless they had AT weapons (other than the demo charge, which I've mentioned above).
  
• If you actually gave your troops a "Hide" order behind that Bocage, they may not have spotted the tank (at least, not enought to positively target it with close assault, or small arms if it was unbuttoned), no matter how close it got. Hidden troops don't spend very much time "Spotting" and can be very oblivious. Also a Cover Arc is an exclusive order, rather than a directive one. It only restricts where they shouldn't fire, rather than requiring them to fire on anything in that arc, and Hide orders make staying Hidden a priority, so even if they do see the tank, they might decide to stay Hidden anyway. The moral of this is to be very precise about when you use Hide.
  
• If your troops were of poor quality they might have just decided that discretion was the better part of valour, and picked the wrong action ("Head, meet sand...")
  

There's some discussion as to precisely whether the situational awareness of tanks is somewhat overmodelled, especially when buttoned up. Against an AI opponent, there's no real way to be sure whether the Tank had help in spotting your ambush, and without running the turn over and over again, you'll be hard pushed to decide whether the result you got first time round was simple lousy luck with the GIs rolling badly on their "see tank" and the tank getting that 1% "notice ambush".

If you have the turn saved, go back to it and try it again, try some changes as to how you deploy your pioneers. Don't give them a Hide order, perhaps, or have another unit fire on the tank to distract it/button it up.

[Agua]

The Brit pioneer assault sections will attack tanks with demos on their own. I've haven't tested to be able to state the range, but they treat tanks as they would a attack a bunker. I haven't observed other demo carrying units so I can't say how others behave.

[YankeeDog]

Do not issue a "Blast" order to get a unit to assault a tank with demos. If anything, this will only make the unit use the demo on a wall or other terrain feature in the tank's vicinity. You might damage the tank this way by blind luck if it's close enough to the detonation, but it's not likely to be a successful tactic.

Any unit with demos can potentially use them on a tank. There is no player order to initiate this. If the tank is close enough, and the infantry team is in good order and has the chutzpah, they'll just do it. This is abstractly represented by the infantry team tossing the demo charge through the air, but IRL it would probably usually involve someone running up very close to the tank and tossing a satchel charge a short distance under the tank, or perhaps onto the engine deck or something like this. Satchel charges charges are pretty heavy and not really designed for throwing.

I don't remember the exact range at which a demo charge will be used on a tank, but it's very short; on the order of 20m or less, IIRC.

As far as units not using demos on nearby tanks, bear in mind that taking out a tank by close assault with a satchel charge is a desperate move of last resort. Satchel charges are not purpose-built AT weapons, and using them as such takes some careful preparation -- you're generally taking about setting a timed fuse, and then trying to find a way to place or toss the charge in such a way that it will be under or on top of the tank when it goes off -- not necessarily easy. And the chances of getting either shot by the tank, or taken out by your own demo charge are very high.

So you should not be surprised if your infantry choose to cower and hide rather than close assault, especially if they are not of particularly high experience or motivation.

Regular hand grenades can be used similarly to close assault tanks in CMBN, but the success rate with grenades is generally much lower than if you have demo charges.

[Bradley Dick]

Today I Learned that engineer squads will nuke tanks with demo charges.

[Redwolf]

I seem to be doing ok, but not great in most scenarios. Mortars seem to obliterate me and i have trouble taking out German tanks. I was wondering if there was a resource for tactics e.c.t. that would help. thanks

For attack/defense I think that CMx1 was closer to what you learn from historic tactics teaching. CMx2 has a few oddities that make historic accounts give the wrong impression. Late-war German defenses were very much not impressed by company mortars.

It's better to pick up tactics from here or study the game mechanics in detail.

[George MC]

For attack/defense I think that CMx1 was closer to what you learn from historic tactics teaching. CMx2 has a few oddities that make historic accounts give the wrong impression. Late-war German defenses were very much not impressed by company mortars.

It's better to pick up tactics from here or study the game mechanics in detail.

Eh? :confused:

[Crushingleeek]

yea, what he said. Eh?:confused:

[Childress]

For attack/defense I think that CMx1 was closer to what you learn from historic tactics teaching.

Nattering nabob of negativity! Back to the GameSquad forums with you!

[Redwolf]

Nattering nabob of negativity! Back to the GameSquad forums with you!

I am merely pointing out that a defense in CMx2 will not match the dynamics of a typical 1944 Normandy defense. Whether you blame game mechanics or simply the fact that only "hasty" fortifications are supported, historical defenses on the German side were everything but hasty.

Single PaK44s could hold up large amounts of tanks for extended periods of time, with nobody being able to locate the shooters and if so they without considerable amount of mortar fire. That isn't the case for guns placed in CMBN for a variety of reasons discussed ever since game release.

As I said you don't have to blame game mechanics, it's sufficient to say that it's "hasty defenses" and that what you learn from historical instructions deals with more permanent ones.

[bowlie]

ah ok then, they must have either not been close enough, not 'seen' it untill it wiped them out, or simply shat themselves. thanks

[Moon]

I am merely pointing out that a defense in CMx2 will not match the dynamics of a typical 1944 Normandy defense. Whether you blame game mechanics or simply the fact that only "hasty" fortifications are supported, historical defenses on the German side were everything but hasty.

Single PaK44s could hold up large amounts of tanks for extended periods of time, with nobody being able to locate the shooters and if so they without considerable amount of mortar fire. That isn't the case for guns placed in CMBN for a variety of reasons discussed ever since game release.

As I said you don't have to blame game mechanics, it's sufficient to say that it's "hasty defenses" and that what you learn from historical instructions deals with more permanent ones.

Or you could blame the players who are in general way more willing to risk a tank than the people sitting inside it would be in real life.

[JonS]

That isn't the case for guns placed in CMBN for a variety of reasons discussed ever since game release.

Actually, that is the case for guns in CMBN. At least, it can be. I’m in the midst of a PBEM, attacking as British with quite a lot of Churchill support. Several turns ago (10, maybe 15?) I discovered a German Pak on my right flank when it engaged a troop of Churchills as they emerged from an orchard. It took a few turns before any of my units even saw the PaK as an [?] (although I – as player - was able to guess the approximate location based on the terrain and trajectory of the incoming rounds). The gun isn't even in a bunker, or a trench, foxhole or sandbagged wall. It's just behind a piece of bocage, but the gun's location is out of range for all my mortars, and it dominates that flank of the map. It is, essentially, invulnerable. I tried a shootout, with the three Churchills area firing at the guns location, but after it wrecked that troop I haven’t sent anymore that way, and my infantry is effectively pinned down there too for the same reason. My advance on that flank has halted, and will probably continue to be until the standoff is resolved due to events elsewhere in the battle.

So, “Single PaK40s holding up large amounts of tanks for extended periods of time, with nobody being able to locate the shooters, and unable to move without considerable amount of indirect fire”? That is absolutely my experience. In CMBN CW.