The Enigmatic C2 Strikes Again

[Ranger33]

So I'm playing a PBEM QB as the Germans. I take a standard Grenadier company plus some support, including a medium mortar team. During setup I put the Machine Gun Section HQ next to the mortar team, but notice that they don't have a radio, so I to put the Company HQ there to be the radio contact. As the battle goes on, I call for arty from the mortar team, the minutes tick down and they fire the first spotting round. At this point things aren't going so hot at the front and I need every man I can get, so I bring forward the MG Section HQ, which I had forgotten about. Next turn I look to check on the arty status and guess what? The mortar is now out of contact for all platoon HQs and the mission has been canceled.

I look and discover that the mortar team is under the command of the MG Section HQ, even though I thought I assigned them to the Company HQ. Regardless, only the Company HQ has a radio, and they are still sitting in place by the mortars. Best of all, the mortar shows that it is out of contact with the Company HQ, even though they are practically on top of each other.

While it probably won't change the outcome of the battle, this is still extremely frustrating. I could have sworn it wasn't the case before, but after some testing it seems that a mortar can only be used to call in fire if it is in contact with it's direct HQ, even if said HQ does not have a radio. Say that platoon HQ takes a random hit and is knocked out; no more indirect fire from that mortar is possible by radio, even if you have the Coy HQ in the same action spot. If you have two mortar teams next to each other, one under the direct command of the Coy HQ, and one under some platoon under the Coy HQ, only the direct one would be considered "in contact" and available for other units to call in, which makes no sense whatsoever.

The C2 system seems needlessly complex and rigid. As it is, it seems that a squad that gets separated from it's platoon HQ cannot benefit from being near any other HQ. You can't send the company XO to an isolated MG team to bolster morale. Heck, sending the Battalion HQ there won't do any good. Obviously, units should get the most benefit from their designated HQ, but being near another HQ should be almost as good, at least keeping them in "in contact" morale. Having a simple "area of effect" for HQ's would work so much better, and in my mind be more realistic: HQ's give the same bonuses as they do now, a unit can only benefit from one HQ at a time, and priority would be given to the direct HQ, but if it isn't available they switch to the most appropriate one that is within contact (using the same visual, verbal, etc. contact system). Finally, any unit with a radio should be able to serve as a relay for indirect fire, the mortar team leader is the one doing the talking anyway! Just my two cents.

Okay, that's my rant. Maybe the whole mortar thing was already obvious to everyone else, but I had somehow never run into it before.

[Vanir Ausf B]

Heck, sending the Battalion HQ there won't do any good.

IIRC it does if the HQ is at least 2 levels higher than the unit and is in the direct chain of command. I.E. an infantry squad cannot get moral boost from a different platoon HQ or a company HQ from a different company, but they can from their own company or battalion HQ. At least that's how I remember it.

[stikkypixie]

Best of all, the mortar shows that it is out of contact with the Company HQ, even though they are practically on top of each other.

Taking it step by step, where do you see that the mortar team is out of contact with the Company HQ? Are you looking at the "dots" on the left or are you looking at the "eye, mouth, radio" part of the GUI?

You also have to remember that if both the MG HQ and Co HQ are present, the mortar units will receive C2 from the MG HQ and not the CO HQ.

[Ranger33]

Taking it step by step, where do you see that the mortar team is out of contact with the Company HQ? Are you looking at the "dots" on the left or are you looking at the "eye, mouth, radio" part of the GUI?

You also have to remember that if both the MG HQ and Co HQ are present, the mortar units will receive C2 from the MG HQ and not the CO HQ.

The MG section HQ is now 200m away, but somehow through a gap in the forest the mortar team has LOS to them and is showing "visual far" contact with a green dot for that HQ. However, they still have a red dot for the company HQ and are "out of contact" in the support menu for all other HQs.

[stikkypixie]

The MG section HQ is now 200m away, but somehow through a gap in the forest the mortar team has LOS to them and is showing "visual far" contact with a green dot for that HQ. However, they still have a red dot for the company HQ and are "out of contact" in the support menu for all other HQs.

They show a red dot for the Company HQ because the MG HQ is most probably not in contact with the Company HQ. You can verify this by looking at the MG HQ in command status.

The red dots do NOT show whether a unit has contact with a particular HQ (as unintuitive as that may seem), but rather show if it is possible to reach that particular HQ.

I *think* that if you make sure the mortars are not in contact with the MG HQ any more, they should fall under the command of the Company HQ and should be able to use them for fire support.

[Ranger33]

The red dots do NOT show whether a unit has contact with a particular HQ (as unintuitive as that may seem), but rather show if it is possible to reach that particular HQ.

I *think* that if you make sure the mortars are not in contact with the MG HQ any more, they should fall under the command of the Company HQ and should be able to use them for fire support.

I set up the exact same situation in a test scenario and played around with it a bit. Once the MG HQ is away and totally out of sight, the mortar does seem to come under the command of the Coy HQ, as the "visual far" icon switches to "visual close" and "voice" as soon as the MG HQ is no longer in the LOS of the mortar team. After that, they show red dots for both, which is indeed rather unintuitive, and are still "out of contact" in the support menu.

Like I said earlier, I could have sworn that I have left Company HQs behind to serve as radio links for all my on map mortars in the past, but I guess that is not actually possible.

[stikkypixie]

I set up the exact same situation in a test scenario and played around with it a bit. Once the MG HQ is away and totally out of sight, the mortar does seem to come under the command of the Coy HQ, as the "visual far" icon switches to "visual close" and "voice" as soon as the MG HQ is no longer in the LOS of the mortar team. After that, they show red dots for both, which is indeed rather unintuitive, and are still "out of contact" in the support menu.

Like I said earlier, I could have sworn that I have left Company HQs behind to serve as radio links for all my on map mortars in the past, but I guess that is not actually possible.

What I usually do is exactly leaving all the mortars behind with the Company HQ. So it is possible. The second thing you have to make sure off, is that the unit calling the fire mission can reach the Company HQ. This means that both the unit calling the fire mission and the Company HQ have an uninterrupted link to their closes parent HQ. Is this the case?

[Ranger33]

What I usually do is exactly leaving all the mortars behind with the Company HQ. So it is possible. The second thing you have to make sure off, is that the unit calling the fire mission can reach the Company HQ. This means that both the unit calling the fire mission and the Company HQ have an uninterrupted link to their closes parent HQ. Is this the case?

In my test and the original scenario I have platoon HQs with radios and not under fire, unable to call for that mortar once the MG HQ moves away from the mortar team. Test it yourself if you think I'm not doing it right. If you get different results then we will need to investigate further.

[Vanir Ausf B]

It is rather maddening. From the most important post in the history of this forum:

Setup 5: (Platoon) HQ is able to call for indirect fire as long as in close visual C2 contact (up to 100M) to (on-board mortar) AND (Section) HQ is integrated in the C2 network by any means except distant visual contact (mortar is available for the whole C2 network).

Setup 6: (Company) HQ is able to call for indirect fire as long as in close visual C2 contact (up to 100M) to MS-A AND (Section) HQ is integrated in the C2 network by any means except distant visual contact (mortar is available for the whole C2 network).

Setup 7: When distant visual C2 contact (LOS, +100m) is established between (Section) HQ and on-board mortar (directly superior), neither (Section) HQ nor any higher HQ will be able to call for indirect fire from on-board mortar (see SR-3), except SR-1 or SR-2 are in effect.

SR-1: Any HQ or FO unit is able to call in indirect fire from any onboard artillery unit inside a radius of 50m, regardless of LOS or C2 contact.

SR-2: Any operational, radio equipped vehicle, whether it is dismounted or occupied, in a radius up to 20m to an onboard artillery unit will enable all HQ or FO units to call in indirect fire from that artillery unit, regardless of LOS or C2 contact.

SR-3: No call for indirect fire will be processed by means of distant visual contact (LOS, +100m), even though it is a viable C2 link.

[Vanir Ausf B]

What I do to avoid all the headaches is group all of my on-board assets together and designate 1 radio equipped vehicle to park in the middle of them. That frees me up to do whatever else I want with the HQs and not worry about it.

[stikkypixie]

In my test and the original scenario I have platoon HQs with radios and not under fire, unable to call for that mortar once the MG HQ moves away from the mortar team. Test it yourself if you think I'm not doing it right. If you get different results then we will need to investigate further.

Having radios is not enough, they need to C2 as well. Your mortars lost C2 to the higher up parent HQ because they were linked via the MG HQ to the Company HQ.

[Vinnart]

What I do to avoid all the headaches is group all of my on-board assets together and designate 1 radio equipped vehicle to park in the middle of them. That frees me up to do whatever else I want with the HQs and not worry about it.

That is what I have been doing too, and it really is the most reliable.

In regard to what Ranger33 is saying with the Coy HQ not having access to a mortar when right next to it I have experienced that too recently, and it took awhile to figure out why. It was a QB, and I had added the mortar to the Battalion commander, instead of to the company. Still though when it comes to flexibility of C2 I felt Cmx1 handled it best. There officers could always take command of enlisted as long as they were in command radius, and the parent HQ was out of contact regardless of direct chain of command.

As far as CMx2 goes I have found no other use for battalion commanders beyond just being a communications hub. As stated in CMx1 the player could have a Bn. Co. take command of any enlisted unit if the player wished.

[Ranger33]

What I do to avoid all the headaches is group all of my on-board assets together and designate 1 radio equipped vehicle to park in the middle of them. That frees me up to do whatever else I want with the HQs and not worry about it.

Prepare for more confusion. So I set it up again and included some radio equipped jeeps. I added a forward observer section totally independent from the core battalion. I set the mortars (one assigned to Batt. HQ, one to Weapons Section HQ) in an isolated position and then test with the jeeps.

Get this, the jeep that is organic to the Battalion does not provide a link for the Battalion HQ or the independent FO, the mortars are "out of contact" in the support menu. The jeep from the independent FO section does provide a link and calling for fire is possible. So, the mystery continues.

EDIT Slight mistake there, I got my jeeps mixed up and one didn't have a radio. So, disregard the above. The issue remains, however, that an empty jeep with a radio can provide the necessary link, but the Battalion HQ sitting in a non-radio jeep with their own radio cannot.