accuracy/efficiency of machine gun fire

[JonS]

Difficulty settings over Warrior in CMx2 are totally underdeveloped. I do think that Iron (or Elite) levels could accomodate more 'frustrating' morale effects.

I was more thinking of experience levels, rather than in-game morale effects. As Apocal(?) showed in a previous post; when you wind down the experience level to Green or Conscript, then you tend to see the behaviour that some folk seem to expect. And some players do that and enjoy it, so all power to them. But there are still plenty of folk who expect their troops to - more or less- do what they tell them to.

EDIT: I'm not sure if it is 'extreme care' to wonder if one should approach the enemy position along a covered route or a route in plain sight of the enemy MG positions.

Ha well, that, but I was referring to the problems of trying to get rattled and broken troops to do anything useful. Every turn you have to go back and reissue orders, and herd them back to where they're meant to be. It's kind of ok in small scenarios, but in larger scenarios I just find it tedious.

[c3k]

Baseline: using the MG34/42 in defense, how can it spot targets at 1,000m? How important are range estimation errors at 1,000m?

What sighting equipment is it using, e.g. magnified optics?

What range would be the furthest at which a tripod MG could reasonably expect to drop rounds amidst a squad?

[Killkess]

CM MGs are killing about the right number of people.

The question of this statement is the "base" of the killing ratio you look at. While the ratio killed people vs time might be (under the described tactical circumstances i dont agree) alright what is simply way off is the ratio killed people vs. crossed distance or killed people vs movement type or crossed distance vs. time.

And yes i think JasonC is right that we speak about different tactical situations. If the platoon has reasonable cover/concealment to close the distance within lets say 250-200m i think a platoon has enough organic firepower to take care of a single mg. But as JasonC already noted covered terrain is not the tactical situation ideal for HMGs and I would not expect it be overly effective. But this is exactly about the situation where the HMG have every trump in its hand, much ammo, high rof, tripod for area firing and in case of german troops good optics. And we dont talk abut that HMGs are not capable of stopping a platoon, we talk about that it is usually not beeing able to stop a squad or even a three man team.

If we look at open terrain, like we often see in FI or which we will see most of the time on the eastern front, i have even stronger doubts about the current behaviour.

And no, sorry, you did the statement that a HMG in the described situation is a minor tactical problem for a platoon. Trying to flip sides by wanting me to proof otherwise is a bit cheap and i will not do.

[John Kettler]

ForwardObserver,

We're talking 4.2s here, not 60s and 81s. During WW II, 4.2s were divisional assets, with more firepower, round for round (larger bursting charge, better frag pattern), than the 105s. Am not up to speed on current U.S. TO&E, but I think that for WW II, incorporating those weapons into the regimental and divisional fireplans makes sense. I really wish we had an area tool for plotting fire concentrations, rather than the point target a TRP represents.

Regards,

John Kettler

[womble]

In terms of the mortars I don't think BF has even acknowledged the problem to their paying customers.

It's not like we should expect BFC (based on past performance and their own statements) to actually acknowledge anything very much. It's a rare bug that actually gets an "okay, we're looking at that", even if they actually are looking at it. Personally, I think that the "reasons" given for lack of feedback (not lack of release dates, just the feedback on bugstomping) are weak and if one staff member taking an hour a week looking at the development log and updating a closed, announcement-style "known issues" post is going to slow development, I find that wierd.

[Killkess]

Was any consensus ever achieved regarding machine guns in CM deliberately spraying around infantry instead of aiming at them, as demonstrated in the OP?

Nope, that argument was dropped quit quickly.

@c3k

As BFC simulates that hitting a small jeep at 1000 meters is not a big problem, hitting the area a whole platoon/squad takes shouldnt be much of a problem either. Do u realy have problems spotting 10 or more than 30 people at 1000 meters with youre own eyes running across flat ground? The magnification of the optics is 4X or 6X if remember correctly. While aiming/hitting individuals might not be to easy hitting the area should be quiet easy. I am not a ballistics expert but how much the bullet climbs and drops at 1000?

One of my points in the OP was that it looks like the gunner doesnt correct its shots. Basicly each burst have the same low chance to hit. So even if you miss, in reality u would try to correct you shot placement. The shot pattern should be visible for the gunner due to the tracers used. It looks like this never happens as the chance of hitting doesnt increase with ammount of bursts fired.

[Apocal]

Hi FO,

yeah, that's sort of the point I've been erratically edging towards. What is 'baseline', and what should the performance of HMGs be?

I'd like if HMGs could reliably chop up a platoon of infantry that isn't able to wiggle close enough OR provide enough firepower (HE or belt-fed) of their own. This would present a reasonable combined arms dilemma in which you have to use indirect or direct fire HE to clear well-positioned HMGs. In one case, you're using up mortar and arty ammo, which doesn't come back. In the other case, you're (potentially) exposing your armor to unspotted ATGs.

I don't really think that 'baseline' has a useful meaning in this case, because the outcome is so dependent on the variables. In other words, the expected outcome - or performance - of the HMG depends on whether it's dug in or not, the motivation of the enemy, etc. Not in terms of the number of kills, but in terms of whether it fails or succeeds.

For the basic combined arms relationships to function, given some advantage, defending HMGs should reliably win against infantry. They only do so now if given virtually advantage I can think of short of making the attacking pixeltroops outright incompetent (Conscript or Green infantry, Vet or better HMG). And even then, I'm starting to win as the attacker, since I've learned to split further back in the assault.

I realize now I forgot one very important variable to control for: Axis vs. Allied equipment.

mea culpa

Anyway, I've now run another five tests featuring an Axis dismounted Panzergrenadier platoon. This is a pretty powerful beast and having 2x MGs per squad makes it trivial to overwhelm even 2x foxholed American HMGs (either 30cal or 50cal variety). Against my baseline setup (single foxholed 50cal MG* with 3 TRPs, slightly elevated to maintain full LoS, regular/normal motivation for the MG, regular/poor motivation for the infantry platoon) any losses you take are purely the result of luck as AI troops will open fire at 700 meters with a MG rather than 500 meters for Garands and 600 meters for a BAR.

The suppression they get is more hit or miss, as fewer men shooting means that there is more opportunity for gaps in the fire, a bad string of shots to give the HMG time to collect it's wits, etc. But you apply it from further out and once it 'holds' you don't lose men to lucky hits nearly as often as with the Allied setup using Garands. The end result is that it takes longer as the 50cal has more effective range than the tripod-mounted MG34/42 so you spend more assaulting in split elements, but you still win.

There is basically one fairly clear-cut method to win as the defender: push your TRPs out a bit further than you'd normally fire, something around 600-800 meters. TARGET big enemy squads as soon as possible around these "long" TRP(s) in hopes of causing a casualty, any you cause here are going to be useful later as morale state "hits" accumulate. Preferably, TARGET *one* unit and don't just break a unit, *shatter* it. Once that squad is *shattered* the TacAI's normal spread of fire should suffice to force poorly motivated troops to ground now that they are closer, as well as diminishing the quantity of incoming.

You honestly aren't making too many decisions in this case, just emplacing TRPs and hoping for one or two early hits to work down morale. Obviously, this does not work against anything but poorly motivated troops. If you have not ground their morale down by around 300 meters for Garands (400 against a human player) or 500 meters against MG34/42, their incoming fire will degrade your own and it will slide downhill from there.

If you try to ambush them from close (300 meters or less) in hopes of shattering the whole platoon via 5-6 quick casualties, it won't work due to the lack of suppression to anything outside the specific unit being hit and any global morale state takes time to propagate. They will simply return effective fire, potentially with HE as well and they effectively recover faster, due to same lack of effective cross-unit suppression and simply having more weapons.

Assaulting this setup is standard drill. QUICK your whole platoon to around 600-800 meters, depending on threat. Break off assault teams and FAST them in short 30-60m, *diagonal* movements. Diagonal is important, rounds flying over the team's head shouldn't have the opportunity to take out multiple men in one burst (which can happen if you're running across the TRPs) and they shouldn't be potentially impacting anyone behind or in front of them either. As the assault teams reach the 500 meter mark, have them TARGET the HMG and begin FAST moving one base of fire team up to around the 500m mark as well. Move the rest in sequence, never have more than one moving at once or your effective suppression will drop and you'll possibly take losses.

Once the base of fire teams have wiggled a bit closer, the fight is basically over; the HMG should be solid pinned or near enough to it and you simply have to advance your assault teams forward (possibly base of fire teams as well). The HMG team normally evacuates before you reach the 200m mark.

* I chose a 50cal rather than water-cooled 30cal because the 50cal offers a very tangible range advantage over the MG34/42 which the 30cal does not.

EDIT:

Baseline: using the MG34/42 in defense, how can it spot targets at 1,000m? How important are range estimation errors at 1,000m?

What sighting equipment is it using, e.g. magnified optics?

What range would be the furthest at which a tripod MG could reasonably expect to drop rounds amidst a squad?

Are you asking this in game terms or RL?

In-game: Spotting targets is accomplished via the team leader's binoculars. They *can* get spots out to around 1km that I've seen, but will only reliably spot moving infantry at around 800m or so. I don't know what it's like when they lose the glass, but given that infantry reliably fire MGs at 700 w/o binos, it's a reasonable guess.

The range at which you can reasonably drop rounds amidst a squad is approximately 600 meters w/ TRP for the MG34/42. It won't be super reliable, but enough to make them think twice about getting up and probably bag one or two men out of squad if they hang around for two minutes.

As for RL stuff, I'm not really the dude to ask about in-depth WW2 minutia. But in broad terms, it shouldn't be difficult for a gunner to be "talked onto" a target at 900 meters with something like the MG34/42.

[dieseltaylor]

Baseline: using the MG34/42 in defense, how can it spot targets at 1,000m? How important are range estimation errors at 1,000m?

What sighting equipment is it using, e.g. magnified optics?

What range would be the furthest at which a tripod MG could reasonably expect to drop rounds amidst a squad?

I am not sure if this is ironic or a genuine plea!

A lot of information, as for what is baseline, surely is available from the contemporary studies. I know the War Office data has been mined by J D salt and that it is available. I assume that the US Army and the German Army all did similar work.

There may be caveats and changes post test that will be designer calls.

Here is to an entertaining link on artillery effectiveness/methods

http://www.balagan.org.uk/war/ww2/snippet/artillery.htm

[John Kettler]

Apocal,

In THE RIVER AND THE GAUNTLET, S.L.A. Marshall said the effective range limit was 600 yards. This was driven not by weapon range, as I recall, but by ability to see and deliver aimed fire. I haven't done any field observation tests myself, never mind in Korea, but according to the ArmyStudyGuide, there's a disconnect between what Marshall said and these numbers for the Ma Deuce.

http://www.armystudyguide.com/content/army_board_study_guide_topics/m2/m2-study-guide.shtml

Point targets Single shot- 1,500 meters

Area shot- 1,830 meters

Single shot

Place the gun in the single-shot mode and engage the target with aimed shots. The machine gun is accurate out to 1,500 meters.

Slow fire

Slow fire consists of less than 40 rounds per minute, in bursts of five to seven rounds, fired at 10- to 15-second intervals.

Rapid fire

Rapid fire consists of more than 40 rounds per minute, fired in bursts of five to seven rounds, at 5- to 10-second intervals.

This information may help with your firing tests. Theoretically, the telescopic sights on the HMG-34 and HMG-42 should give them a leg up, but that big .50 caliber bullet throws up enough dirt when hitting the ground that its strike can be seen from great distances, even without telescopic sights.

dieseltaylor,

A very nice precis, though mostly not from primary sources. Please share that link with LongLeftFlank, drawing his attention to the fortification protection factor chart. He can use that for comparison with what I ginned up from the WO studies. Best to leave my name out of it.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Lanzfeld]

JasonC,

I am replaying your excellent training scenarios for CMBB right now as I take a scenic tour of CMBB for all the things I miss that are not in CMx2 (fire, fog, indoor AT weapons, stealth, ect....)

I have to relearn my tactics again and it just feels "correct". Thanks for these as I enjoy going through each lesson one by one.

If we can fix CMx2 would you consider making applicable training missions again?

[c3k]

I am not sure if this is ironic or a genuine plea!

A lot of information, as for what is baseline, surely is available from the contemporary studies. I know the War Office data has been mined by J D salt and that it is available. I assume that the US Army and the German Army all did similar work.

There may be caveats and changes post test that will be designer calls.

Here is to an entertaining link on artillery effectiveness/methods

http://www.balagan.org.uk/war/ww2/snippet/artillery.htm

Well, my questions were not ironic or a plea. I was pointedly showing that long-range machinegun fire takes on a different characteristic than short-range fire. Both of which are very different than indirect machinegun fire.

Tracers and walking rounds on target: My personal experience with long range machinegunning is limited to some M240 time at 800+m, and only several thousand rounds at that distance. The target was a raised berm, about as wide as a bulldozer blade. Lying prone behind the M240, there was no way I'd have seen a standing man at that distance. It was flat ground with light grass, some undulations. Enough so that being prone blocked a lot of my LOS. 1:5 tracer to ball. The dirt and dust thrown up by the muzzle blast was sufficient to FORCE firing halts in, mostly vain, attempts to locate the impacts. Lateral aiming was easily accurate. The range was difficult to estimate, as was the required corrections. Yes, eventually I got rounds on target, but it was far more difficult than I had anticipated. Certainly it is a very different dynamic than rifle firing.

- No optics, no pre-ranged knowledge, no binos, no tripod, plenty of dust.

So, as laughably modest as my longrange machinegun experience is, at least it allows me to question some underlying assumptions in these tests.

Fall of shot "sensing" is CRITICAL to any engagement. Walking rounds on target is something that requires shot sensing.

(There are MANY accounts stating the major drawback to the 76mm Sherman was the inability to watch the round strike due to muzzle blast/dirt. So much so, that the powers that be wanted to have them operate only in pairs with one shooting while the other relayed corrections. That's something you don't see/hear much about.)

I agree that is _seems_ that CMx2 does not incorporate shot-to-shot corrections to machinegun fire. That may or may not be a true characterization of the game.

Should a squad be able to saunter up to an emplaced MG42 over open ground and win? Of course not.

In my mind's eye, if I were sitting on a raised piece of ground in the midst of a 1km wide parking lot behind my trusty MG42, I'd have a hard time believing a platoon could close with me to within effective rifle firing range (300m or less). (Given that they didn't know exactly where I was and that I had spotters, binoculars, magnified optics on the weapon, and plenty of ammo...)

So, perhaps you ascribe EVERY question to a criticism to being a "fanboi". Instead, you should realize that the questions are there to dig into the criticism. Call it a system of peer review. Apocal has done some good work.

The latest test, a German mech squad (I forget which one was used) vs. a US machinegun unit, is totally different from the initial test. Test 1 used "A vs. B". Test 2 used "X vs. Y". There can be no comparison drawn between the two.

Due to the widely scattered approach used by each individual tester/player, these results, are only useful as individual data points which indicate a modeling/result mismatch.

[Killkess]

- No optics, no pre-ranged knowledge, no binos, no tripod, plenty of dust.

Just for the record... with the height of the "Rücklauflafette" as portrayed in CM2 u will not have much dust kick off from the ground. And what do u think, how much easier would your training have been if u had a 4x scope (which effectively let u see the same target as if it was only 200 meters away), with a steady platform and precise range/aiming controll?

I dont see much sense to compare LMG and HMG experiences if it comes to long range shooting.

[JasonC]

c3k - the reasons you cite are perfectly valid ones against a bipod LMG being terribly effective beyond 800 yards, or even at that distance. But HMG teams always have a separate team leader, who is not the gunner, whose entire job is to watch the fall of shot through binoculars, and call out the corrections to the gunner. This is why HMG teams start at 3 men and go up from there - spotter, gunner, and loader are distinct jobs. Extra men if available are prepping and hauling additional ammo to the gun.

[JonS]

Just for the record... with the height of the "Rücklauflafette" as portrayed in CM2 u will not have much dust kick off from the ground.

Ah ... generally well set up MGs on tripods usually have the muzzle/barrel barely above ground level.

[Killkess]

Ah ... generally well set up MGs on tripods usually have the muzzle/barrel barely above ground level.

But those will also be very hard to hit compared to the CM2 HMG setup.

[Childress]

I know I read somewhere that on map assets aren't supposed to be able to perform anything other than point missions (even though the UI allows the calling of linears from them), and I've certainly seen some on map-fired linears that looked more like point missions than linear, though that could have been due to other factors like not having enough rounds in a "Quick" to really start drawing the line. Another item for the "things to test" list...

Yes, something to look into. If that's the case, you'd chalk it up to defective design because it should be apparent in the arty option screen. You don't impose restrictions on the player, even if realistic, without his knowledge.

I'm no grog, but it seems plausible that mortars could carry out a linear mission on the opening turn given enough prep. Even in the pre-computer, WW2 era. However, I seem to recall from desultory readings that mortars didn't actually walk fire down a line but were lined up in a pattern, or a square, and essentially produced the desired effect out of formation. Someone like JasonC would be more knowledgeable than on this subject than I.

[JonS]

Womble:

I know I read somewhere that on map assets aren't supposed to be able to perform anything other than point missions (even though the UI allows the calling of linears from them)

I've suggested, as a house rule, several times that on-map assets only conduct point missions. I don't believe that restriction has ever been part of CMs design though? Edit: by which I mean, CM on-map mortars CAN conduct linear missions, as a test just confirmed.

[Childress]

I've suggested, as a house rule, several times that on-map assets only conduct point missions.

Even on Turn 1?

[YankeeDog]

I think a better house rule would be that on-map mortars and IGs should not be able to conduct point missions unless they begin the battle deployed, and have not moved from their start up position. More difficult to enforce this rule, though; you'd have to take your opponent's word for it.

I have read of light and medium mortar tubes conducting something similar to CM's "linear" missions, but as far as I can recall only along the line of bearing. For example, I have read accounts of mortars launching a few rounds at a certain target point, and then increasing range a few times by 25-50m increments, firing a few additional shells at each increment, on the theory that the first rounds were likely to make the enemy attempt to retreat and therefore following rounds at slightly longer ranges might catch retreating enemy on the move. Note that this is a pre-planned thing, not a change of aim on the fly in reaction to observed enemy movement.

I've also read of the opposite, where medium mortars would shift the point of aim closer rather than further away during the mission. In particular, this seems to have been a technique used by the Germans to trap an attacking force -- first they would pin the attacking infantry with MG and small arms fire, then start dropping mortar shells behind the attackers to cut off retreat, and then gradually walk the mortar fire up onto the attackers.

Neither of these is exactly like CM's linear mission, because ideally the fire should "walk" along the line from one end to the other, and CM's linear missions don't do this. But the linear mission is about the closest you can get to these types of missions in the game right now. Plotting a succession of point missions would be too slow.

[John Kettler]

YankeeDog,

Here, per FM 23-91 Mortar Gunnery are the Sheafs available

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/23-91/ch4.htm#p1

The sheafs are then fired in several different modes, as detailed here. What you're talking about is Searching Fire (That pesky mortar behind the hill. Somewhere), in which the elevation is progressively changed to move the fire up or down in range. Traversing Fire uses the traversing wheel to move the sheaf laterally, but within the relatively narrow angular limits a mortar has designed into it.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/23-91/ch8.htm#p7

Some info here under "Mortars" and links to some of the referenced docs. Describes how several nations ran their mortars.

http://www.balagan.org.uk/war/ww2/snippet/artillery.htm

Regards,

John Kettler

[JonS]

Even on Turn 1?

It's up to you, really. It could be argued either way.

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showpost.php?p=1398253&postcount=118

(BTW, jogging your memory, you responded to that post)

Edit: in my previous post I said 'point'. I should instead have said area with a standard diameter (~35m radius is about right for 75mm, 25-pr, 81mm, and 105mm)

[poesel]

I'd like to point out that the difference between a point and an area strike may not be that big. It depends heavily on distance. At 860m point and 80m area look nearly the same (http://www.battlefront.com/community/showpost.php?p=1400952&postcount=228).

I would be very happy if BFC would drop point fire altogether and give area fire an automatic minimum diameter depending on type of weapon and distance. This would naturally cause endless bickering about what the actual minimum of specific weapons IS but it would also be a remedy to many problems and weirdnesses we have with the mortars.

[Childress]

It's up to you, really. It could be argued either way.

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showpost.php?p=1398253&postcount=118

(BTW, jogging your memory, you responded to that post)

No, I didn't.

[JonS]

yeah, you did

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showpost.php?p=1398344&postcount=122

[Apocal]

Anyway, I got somewhat bored adjusting different variables and testing stuff, so I threw together a small (two platoons) scenario quick-ish to see if the relationship between HMGs and pure infantry holds up when expanded to the typical situations you'd see in-game, interlocking fields of fire, normal motivation and experience, cover and concealment available, etc. I've only made a few other scenarios, published only one for CM:SF as an aborted campaign attempt, so any criticism and feedback is welcome.

EDIT: Once it goes live at least. Whoops.