tactics and learning curve

[sburke]

And don't even bring up the topic of Tigers with him.

To JonS point, you can't just assume a Pak will achieve the same result in CM unless you set the conditions the same. This is where scale of map and terrain/visibility conditions come in to play. As I'd noted in response to a question about my Huertgen map, I decided to change the map to remain true to scale as altering the scale would alter how CM units performed. Too often our maps are too small. A blind person could figure out where a pak was at 300 m when it fired. A pack at 1000 meters concealed behind a wheatfield. Well that is a different matter.

[JonS]

And don't even bring up the topic of Tigers with him.

... or the topic of tall walls, which aren't quite tall enough :mad:

[c3k]

Actually, wheatfields don't do much for real firing. There are an amazing number of anecdotes about being able to see the path of a shell because of the way the wheat moves aside from the shockwave. So, the gun might be hidden, but the wheatfield would allow a viewer to see where the shell came from.

Ken

[Bradley Dick]

Actually, wheatfields don't do much for real firing. There are an amazing number of anecdotes about being able to see the path of a shell because of the way the wheat moves aside from the shockwave. So, the gun might be hidden, but the wheatfield would allow a viewer to see where the shell came from.

Ken

Not to mention weird little anecdotes to be found in books like "To Hell and Back" where Audie Murphy describes being able to see the Germans crawling through the field in front of them because they were disturbing the dew on the grass as they snaked forward.

[sburke]

Actually, wheatfields don't do much for real firing. There are an amazing number of anecdotes about being able to see the path of a shell because of the way the wheat moves aside from the shockwave. So, the gun might be hidden, but the wheatfield would allow a viewer to see where the shell came from.

Ken

LOL BFC my ap shells aren't creating a shockwave path in the wheatfield! Fix or do sumfink!!

As it is because we have our god view, JonS has been able to determine where approximately the fire is coming from. Unfortunately that hasn't helped him yet. BTW, who designed this scenario? Whomever it is, thank you. It is a really fluid battle. (In the Shadow of the Hill 8 30am)

[JonS]

BTW, who designed this scenario? Whomever it is, thank you. It is a really fluid battle. (In the Shadow of the Hill 8 30am)

Pete Wenman. There are a series of four very closely related In The Shadow Of The Hill scenarios.

[JonS]

you can't just assume a Pak will achieve the same result in CM unless you set the conditions the same.

This is a good point.

We've all heard stories about a single PaK holding up an advance, or read about Wittmann's exploits at Villers Bocage, or the extraordinary difficulty of rooting the defenders out of places like Tilly-la-Campagne or Falaise.

All of those events are replicable in CMBN, more or less, but it takes much more than simply throwing a Tiger down in the midst of a slew of Cromwells and pressing the "GO" button. Wittmann was successful east of Villers Bocage because he had a very good tank, and because he had a suitable plan, and because he was very good at his job, and because he was very determined, and because the British forces were horribly deployed, and because they were caught by surprise, and because Wittmann was quickly able to achieve a moral ascendancy, and because he was very very lucky. And probably some other sigfnificant factors as well. If you try and exactly replicate his exploits but one or more of those factors is missing, then you're likely to get a different outcome. That doesn't make the game "wrong", it just means you aren't as good or as lucky as Wittmann. Or that the scenario was set up in a way that makes it impossible to replicate no matter how hard you try.

[Redwolf]

Sure. Is that why the rilfemen associated with the gun still open fire at random things? And get the gun spotted because magically the enemy knows the sound of a rifle fired from a squad from the sound of a rifle fired by a gun crew?

I really hope this forum doesn't turn back into a pure fanboi zone. Every game has certain limitations to live with.

[George MC]

Sure. Is that why the rilfemen associated with the gun still open fire at random things? And get the gun spotted because magically the enemy knows the sound of a rifle fired from a squad from the sound of a rifle fired by a gun crew?

I really hope this forum doesn't turn back into a pure fanboi zone. Every game has certain limitations to live with.

Why? Because someone puts forward a different viewpoint or interpretation of in-game events. I think discussion and debate is good and healthy. However in that process there are bound to be diverging opinions - that does not make an individual a 'fanboi' or 'naysayer'. It's an interesting topic for sure and I find it interesting and thought provoking to read about how others perceive in-game events with RL.

I still keep in mind it's a game - a superb game but not perfect. Guess we are all looking for perfect and in that lays debate as to how best to achieve that nirvana!

[YankeeDog]

And get the gun spotted because magically the enemy knows the sound of a rifle fired from a squad from the sound of a rifle fired by a gun crew?

Guns are not "magically spotted" in CM when you spot a rifleman from the gun crew -- it is quite possible to spot a member of a gun crew in CMBN, but not spot the gun itself; I have seen this happen many times (something that was not possible in CMx1, I might add). However, since spotting a member of the gun crew usually draws units' attention to the location, other members of the gun crew and the gun itself are usually (but not always) spotted shortly after any one of the crew is spotted.

There is (IMHO) a flaw in CMBN in this area in that if you click on any enemy soldier, you'll see his unit designation in the UI. So with a little investigation, you can determine what kind of unit he's a member of, regardless of how many other members of that unit you can see. My solution to this is to simply not click on enemy units. So I never see their info display panel and I never know whether a rifleman is a member of a rifle squad, a gun team, an HQ team or whatever unless my soldiers have also spotted other clues, such as actually seeing the gun.

I do think it would be nice if BFC changed things so that enemy unit info didn't show in the UI, at least for Iron level play.

[womble]

Sure. Is that why the rilfemen associated with the gun still open fire at random things?

That's what a covered arc is for. If the gun isn't going to be in a position to shoot "Real Soon Now", it should be assigned a covered arc that's not going to let its riflement shoot at anything that's not a threat. It's not perfect, because in the timespan when you want the gun to be "weapons free", the crew can often fire at a suboptimal target, but if you judge it right, most of the time the gun's going to fire at its intended target within a few seconds anyway, so the enemy will know there's a gun about too.

And get the gun spotted because magically the enemy knows the sound of a rifle fired from a squad from the sound of a rifle fired by a gun crew?

I hope BFC are working on improving the combat intelligence model so that

a) when you click on an enemy unit you don't know so much about it

the icon for a unit reflects what you know about it (for both sides).

I really hope this forum doesn't turn back into a pure fanboi zone. Every game has certain limitations to live with.

What on earth does "It's a great game; don't let the niggles distract you from that fact" have to do with being a fanboi? Fanbois don't even accept that there are niggles.

[Redwolf]

Well I think we are in general agreement here. You just have to accept that you need to mix in a dose of game-specific knowledge into your reading of historical tactics. That was the point I was specifically making to the OP. In this particular game, if you are a defender in Normany, at this particular time with this particular code version you cannot deal with incoming light and medium mortar fire the same way that a German platoon in 1944 would. And you can't expect your towed guns to have the stopping power (be is physically of psychologically) that they are described to have in books.

[sburke]

Well I think we are in general agreement here. You just have to accept that you need to mix in a dose of game-specific knowledge into your reading of historical tactics. That was the point I was specifically making to the OP. In this particular game, if you are a defender in Normany, at this particular time with this particular code version you cannot deal with incoming light and medium mortar fire the same way that a German platoon in 1944 would. And you can't expect your towed guns to have the stopping power (be is physically of psychologically) that they are described to have in books.

I think that statement is simply too broad, just as it would be too broad for me to say, yes I can absolutely always duplicate the behavior I expect.

For example about the riflemen opening fire, yeah they will definitely do that, but again depending on circumstance. My crew and ammo bearers did not and still aren't revealing their position because they are too far. The gun is positioned tactically correctly. It is a long range tank killing weapon, I don't want it to have a field of fire that is 100 meters away. If it were, it would be dead now and yeah those riflemen would have given away it's position. (though at that range they wouldn't have needed to, as soon as it fired it would have taken care of that on it's own). In this situation though, they are not firing. The gun as JonS is finding is accomplishing exactly what we think it should be able to based on real world experience.

There are plenty of things the game probably is not spot on about. However to say the game has inherently broken issues and therefore you just have to accept you can never do something is patently false and I have a pak that is an absolute terror proving it. It is a complicated game and yes sometimes you do have to concede that there are items that may be really hard to duplicate, but impossible? Not for me so far.

[A Canadian Cat]

I hope BFC are working on improving the combat intelligence model so that

a) when you click on an enemy unit you don't know so much about it

the icon for a unit reflects what you know about it (for both sides).

+1 to both of those. Suggestion is brilliant - if you spot a member of the gun crew you see an infantry icon but when you finally spot the gun you see the gun icon. I would add that the icon should be centred over the members of the team that you can see. Right now it is centred over the whole team which means that if you can only see one member of a squad you can tell approximately where the rest of the squad is by the direction and distance of the icon from the spotted solider.

[YankeeDog]

In this particular game, if you are a defender in Normany, at this particular time with this particular code version you cannot deal with incoming light and medium mortar fire the same way that a German platoon in 1944 would. And you can't expect your towed guns to have the stopping power (be is physically of psychologically) that they are described to have in books.

Ehhh... I wouldn't say that either of these are generally true. I would probably agree that these statements may be true at times, in the context of certain specific tactics and situations, though.

With regards to mortars, there is no doubt that under the right conditions, light and medium mortar fire can be absolutely deadly; you can find accounts of this IRL and it's certainly true in the game. Defending the hedgerow as Germans, one way to deal with the mortar threat is to keep shifting your defensive positions so that the enemy can't zero you in with mortars. Hedgerows provide great covered lines for withdrawal and lateral shift. This works well in the game and it's one thing that the Germans did a lot IRL. So here, at least, the game emulates history.

However, there are other RL tactics that don't work so well in the game, and/or are simply not available in the game. To cite one example, I don't think the game presently models extensively prepared entrenchments right now. What we have in the game are really hasty foxholes and shallow trenches, but not the kind of really deep dugouts that the Germans had in some of their positions in Normandy. The in-game log bunkers don't really work in the way a deep hole in the side of a hedgerow would, either. So the RL tactic of "dig in and hide" to protect against mortar and artillery fire probably doesn't work as well in CM as it did RL.

With regard to towed guns, I've had single PaKs knock out entire platoons of Shermans, and finish an hour-long scenario with the gun still very much alive and in control of their sector. Similarly, and even when playing against the rather unimaginative AI, I have come up against AT guns that were damnably difficult to spot and knock out. On occasions, these guns have held up my armored advance for quite a long time. The first time I played the demo, one of those damn 50mm PaKs knocked out 2 of my Shermans and seriously damaged 2 more. I hit it twice with 60mm mortar barrages and thought I had knocked it out both times, only to have it come "back to life" and start shooting again. So much for "uber" 60mm mortars...

So even under AI control, a single PaK can most definitely have dramatic "Stopping Power", much like some of the most dramatic RL accounts I have read.

However, I do think there are some areas where the towed gun modeling could be improved. To cite one example, I miss a real "gun pit" entrenchment to lower the profile and protect the gun. Currently in the game, foxholes and trenches will protect the gun crew, but not the gun itself. The sandbag walls we have right now to protect guns don't really do the job, IMHO

A final thought regarding the effectiveness of AT guns : I think it is worth bearing in mind that across the war as a whole, AT guns, and even the big AT guns like PaK 43/44s, knocked out an average of about 1 tank per 2 guns deployed. Of course, it's very easily to lie with statistics and you have to consider the probability that this figure may be skewed by the number of AT guns that just happened to be deployed somewhere that they never saw or fired at a tank. Nevertheless, for every story you hear of an 88 that knocked out an entire platoon or more of Shermans and held up an advance for hours, there's probably another AT gun that barely got a shot off before being blown apart by multiple incoming rounds.

In the game, right now, you will see both happen. And this, at least generally speaking, is realistic.

[Pete Wenman]

BTW, who designed this scenario? Whomever it is, thank you. It is a really fluid battle. (In the Shadow of the Hill 8 30am)

@ SBurke

Glad you are enjoying it.

I made big maps to ensure standoff weapons like ATG's could be used as they should.

My crew and ammo bearers did not and still aren't revealing their position because they are too far. The gun is positioned tactically correctly. It is a long range tank killing weapon, I don't want it to have a field of fire that is 100 meters away.

Yep this is how it is supposed to be, and it sounds like you are reaping the benefits

P

[Georgie]

Pete Wenman. There are a series of four very closely related In The Shadow Of The Hill scenarios.

JonS can you tell me where I can find these scenarios. Thanks in advance. georgie

[Pete Wenman]

can you tell me where I can find these scenarios

They came with the CW module, so if you have that you have them already

P

[Georgie]

They came with the CW module, so if you have that you have them already

P

Thanks Pete, I ordered the CW module today. I enjoyed "The Crossroads at Monthardrou" and could not find anymore that you had written. Good to here that there are some in the CW module.

Ray

[Pete Wenman]

Ray - the four "In the Shadow of the Hill" missions are all mine, plus "Breaking the Panzers", but the others guys did some great stuff as well.

I think you will be pleasantly surprised with CW

P

[sburke]

Ray - the four "In the Shadow of the Hill" missions are all mine, plus "Breaking the Panzers", but the others guys did some great stuff as well.

I think you will be pleasantly surprised with CW

P

or unpleasantly. I think JonS is feeling he just ran into Michael Wittman about now. We have a Tiger on the rampage.

I have played exactly one scenario before this with a Tiger (Valley of the Shadow) so wasn't sure entirely what to expect. Right about now there are two things going on. 1.)Sheer awe at how deadly they are and 2) a dangerous tendency to assume they are invincible. Tell me this game doesn't come close to reality omfg!!

Georgie you will not be disappointed.

[Georgie]

or unpleasantly. I think JonS is feeling he just ran into Michael Wittman about now. We have a Tiger on the rampage.

I have played exactly one scenario before this with a Tiger (Valley of the Shadow) so wasn't sure entirely what to expect. Right about now there are two things going on. 1.)Sheer awe at how deadly they are and 2) a dangerous tendency to assume they are invincible. Tell me this game doesn't come close to reality omfg!!

Georgie you will not be disappointed.

Sometimes in CMBN an unpleasent surprise is the just what you need to get you to thinking.

[sburke]

@ SBurke

Glad you are enjoying it.

I made big maps to ensure standoff weapons like ATG's could be used as they should.

Yep this is how it is supposed to be, and it sounds like you are reaping the benefits

P

I have to say, all credit for placement goes to you. I looked that over for a while and I think you have it set they can't be moved at set up correct? Good thing as I could have only picked a less optimal location. I could see the intent, but wasn't sure how that would play out. It has far exceeded my expectations and taught me a lesson or two. For a number of turns there I was absolutely reeling and looking over my shoulder desperately hoping reinforcements would show up. Now it is a no holds barred knife fight. One of those games where you just want to see what every dang one of your pixel truppen is doing as it is so astoundingly good. Win or lose doesn't matter, I am just enjoying the spectacle. Guess that means we've already won.

[Pete Wenman]

I have to say, all credit for placement goes to you. I looked that over for a while and I think you have it set they can't be moved at set up correct?

I had to check again but the ATG is in a "set up zone" so you have some degree of flexibility. Having said that its default position was one I selected with care.

As I mentioned above ATGs especially, but also heavy tanks come into their own on large maps with areas of long LOS. They also mean that it's much harder to rely on the map edge as a secure flank, as in some cases it's a long way away !