Your -2 moments...

[Sgt Schultz]

While droning on and on(and on) about 1.11 and 2.0 is fun, how about we get back to the actual playing? hmmm?

What have you done in a battle that has made you feel like your personal leadership modifier should be a -2? Just how badly have you screwed your boys over? Come on, 'fess up.

My latest minor error in judgment turned an intact platoon into a ragged band of screaming survivors. My hidden defenders made contact, and then fell back in good order through some deep woods. A TRP'd linear fire mission was called in, that the defenders would cross over with time to spare, thus catching the pursuing enemy.

NOT.

I failed to take into account that variable nature of the fire mission timer, as well as the fatigue level induced by traversing that much wooded terrain on QUICK.

One missed orders phase of checking on both timer and progress resulted in sixty seconds of 120mm fire that caused me some minor wailing and gnashing of teeth, and my boys some not so minor anatomical re-arrangement.

I swear I heard them cursing my name.

----------

CM 3.0 needs a court martial option in the AAR screen for commanders who do things like this.

[Ultradave]

I'm an expert at sending my guys across a street in a town when I think the the opposition across the street has been cleared out.....

....now where did THAT machine gun come from?

[Mord]

I failed to take into account that variable nature of the fire mission timer,

Arty put the Murphy in Murphy's Law

Mord.

[Ultradave]

Arty put the Murphy in Murphy's Law

Mord.

We only do what is asked for. And we can't see you. :-)

Dave (ex - Fire Direction Officer, 2/321FA, 82d Abn)

[Mord]

LOL. That's funny and true.

But game wise...man, it can hurt!

Mord.

[Seedorf81]

Played a quick battle, German armor vs. German armour on hilly map. Computer selected a real nice force for me, with four(!) Kingtigers. And when they moved up, line abreast, I knew I was invincible. Over the crest in full speed, because nothing could harm me.

Ten seconds later three adversary Stugs had blown my Kings to pieces..

[ForcedMarch]

Usa vs Usa PBem. Managed to lose both my tanks in 30 seconds. 1st M10 moved into line of fire of an enemy sherman that I knew was there because I didn't check terrain properly. 2nd M10 disabled as I tried to push it through some woods into a perfect flank position. Ended the game shortly after that haha. I think a lot harder about how I move my tanks now

[altipueri]

For a game that's supposed to be realistic loads of people seem to like to do USA vs USA or German vs German. I thought I was the only one who did this.

So many men have died unnecessarily I've court martialled myself.

[John Kettler]

Sgt Schultz,

If it's martial disasters that you seek, you haven't read the John Kettler vs CMBN--The Learning Curve thread. The sad, sad story of 18 Platoon starts here. That, at least, was quick.

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=105379&page=15

Regards,

John Kettler

[Paper Tiger]

Discovered a German strongpoint in a complex of farm buildings so I called in a heavy air strike to target the position and waited... and forgot all about it, advanced on the position and engaged the defenders. The Germans were on the run, so I gave my guys the order to advance into the complex and...

BANG!

[Splinty]

Was playing Wittmann's Demise as the Germans, and at first contact, I caused Wittmann's demise.

[SmittyJ]

Playing one player as Americans I found my guys taking fire from a two story house. I sent a six man team to rush the place with supporting fire from their squad-mates and a Sherman. I neglected to specify "target light" and my Sherman lit up the side of the building with HE just as my guys were heading for the door. The blast wounded 1 guy and rattled the others. Then it got worse. Once inside the house, my team was instantly decimated by a flurry of gunfire from upstairs. When the turn ended I had three inside the house wounded and two more cowering on the floor. I really wanted that strongpoint reduced, so instead of trying to extricate the survivors I continued to blast the house with HE until the German squad broke. By then my ill fated assault team was thoroughly dead. This sad spectacle also marked the first and last time I was actually happy that CMBN doesn't model burning buildings.

[RT North Dakota]

Played a quick battle, German armor vs. German armour on hilly map. Computer selected a real nice force for me, with four(!) Kingtigers. And when they moved up, line abreast, I knew I was invincible. Over the crest in full speed, because nothing could harm me.

Ten seconds later three adversary Stugs had blown my Kings to pieces..

Hah!! I wish I could use CMBN as evidence in the Research Thesis I am doing on AFV design, because this exactly high lights one of the points I keep making. Big heavy tanks were basically a waste of time, even at the minor tactical level.

[Michael Emrys]

In order to come up with a truly hands-to-the-head-while-making-unpleasant-noises moment, I have to go all the way back to CMBB. I had just gotten it and the second or third game I planned to be a real doozie. It was alright, just not in the way I had planned.

The setup was that a Sov company, suffering a bit from earlier combat and in retreat sometime around July 1941 is defending a bridge over a small stream from a cluster of houses. Attacking it is an armor-heavy task group supported by Stukas. (You know what's coming, don't you?) The idea was that the Stukas would soften up the defenders and the task group would roll in and deal with the survivors.

Okay, so I set up my forces, a company of tanks with a company of infantry riding the tanks, and wait for the Stukas to do their thing. And I wait. And I wait. Apparently the damned Luftwaffe is busy with captured vodka and can't be bothered today. Okay, so I figure I have enough firepower that I can go it alone if I have to and I start moving my force up to its jumping off point. Just as I get there, the Stukas arrive with all the star-struck pomp of Hermann Göring himself, and I think, "Oh well, better late than never." Only thing is, instead of bombing the clearly designated cluster of building as requested, they start bombing me! One of those chowderheads dropped a 500 kilo bomb right in the middle of one of my tank platoons just as the infantry was getting down and forming up for their attack. Net result: one tank KOed, two more immobile, one platoon of infantry pretty much reduced to a couple of half squads with their morale in the dumper. Attack aborted.

That was the first...and last...time I ever used Stukas.

Michael

[c3k]

I had almost an entire company lined up behind one row of bocage. Sure, I had that nasty back-of-the-head tickle. You know, the one that says, "Oh, that is a really bad tactical deployment." I ignored it. Guns up. What could go wrong.

"Boom." Huh. A spotting round out front from the enemy. Hmmm, he knows I've got someone behind the bocage. I probably have 2 or 3 minutes before any arty comes close.

I left them there...for just one more turn.

That was the turn in which the linear mission came in on target.

Not too many men were left. An entire company wasted.

I wish that were a one-off bad decision. My men wish it even more.

Ken

[Seedorf81]

Hah!! I wish I could use CMBN as evidence in the Research Thesis I am doing on AFV design, because this exactly high lights one of the points I keep making. Big heavy tanks were basically a waste of time, even at the minor tactical level.

Don't know if that last sentence is entirely true, but I do know that Battlefront still gives me a genuine feel of UBERMENSCHSUPERIORITY when I advance with a formation of three or more Tigers or Kingtigers at full speed on an open terrain. The might of those beasts..

But it still baffles me how the Germans (Jochen Peiper and his men!) were dumb enough to use them Kingtigers on those small, crappy and everwinding roads in the Ardennes in dec. 1944. Somewhere on the forum someone pointed out an internetsite where you could trace Peipers advance (forgot which site, sorry), and there is at least some proof of North Dakota's statement. What a waste of awesome armor..

Oh, I nearly forgot: when I talked to a German veteran of the Adolf Hitler Leibstandarte, who witnessed several "human wave assaults" of the Russki's (He said: "Die, die Russen? Das sind untermenschen! Sie schicken soldaten ohne waffen zu unsere gutbewaffneten stellungen! Die hatten keinen chance!), I asked him if he wasn't afraid. "Nein," he stated calmly, "wir hatten immer unsere Panzer nah." He was talking of Tigers and Panthers, so for morale reasons they weren't a total waste of time.

[John Kettler]

Seedorf81,

Since your English is obviously good, why did you switch to German for the LAH quote? Either that, or why not give it in German with a translation? The gist of it, given my awful German, is that the LAH guy calls them subhumans, soldiers without weapons (as opposed to "our" (LAH's) well armed formations) and had no chance. "No, we always have our Panzers near." That about right?

Regards,

John Kettler

[Rokko]

"The Russians? They're subhumans! They sent unarmed soldiers against our well armed positions, they didn't have a chance!"

"No, we always had our Panzers close by."

Talking about veterans, I just read that Hubert Meyer, last CO of 12th SS Panzer-Division and last living division commander of the Waffen-SS died last month. He was the author of the really good divisional history of that division.

I wonder if he stayed a stubborn nazi to the end like so many others or not.

[Seedorf81]

Seedorf81,

Since your English is obviously good, why did you switch to German for the LAH quote? Either that, or why not give it in German with a translation? The gist of it, given my awful German, is that the LAH guy calls them subhumans, soldiers without weapons (as opposed to "our" (LAH's) well armed formations) and had no chance. "No, we always have our Panzers near." That about right?

Regards,

John Kettler

Yeah, I do am awfully sorry. Got some neighbour who is creating noisepollution like I've never seen or heard and it was so bad that I did not focus properly.

When I was 19 years old I talked to a German who told me that he had been in ww2 and that he fought in the battle of Kharkov. I knew a bit about that battle and asked him bluntly"Well, wasn't it just SS who fought there? (On the German side, that is.). His mate, 1945 Flakhelfer (Ack-ack assistent) turned pale because of fear of being exposed as Nazi, , but this WAFFEN-SS veteran knew that I had a genuine interest in his war experiences. At some point in the war he commanded a 37 mm Flakgun on a halftrack, and boy, if I ever saw somebody with some real frontline experience. One of the things he told me was that they had to use explosives to create foxholes because the russian ground was frozen to deep to use shovels or pick-axes.

I will never forget his stare when he told me about the Russian human waves attacks, when only the first one or two rows of seemingly endless conscripts had weapons and the following rows had to pick up the rifles of the dead and wounded. His expression was still full of disgust about this useless waste of life and I can understand, though not condone, his use of the word untermensch. He believed that a nation that uses it human resources in such a shamefull way, can't be really human. (Offcourse, I don't know how much this SSman knew about something called "The Endlosung", but being a LAHmember, it couldn't have been a real secret to him, so a little biased he would be!)

After sharing this, mostly self-centered information, I've got to give it to you John, you're right on the spot with you're interpretation of my crappy german interpretation. You're a clever Dickie, are you not?

[General Lee Irked]

My -2 moment ... every time I hit the red button.

[JonS]

He was the author of the really good divisional history of that division.

I wonder if he stayed a stubborn nazi to the end like so many others or not.

Well, that 'really good history' managed to completely elide any hint of warcrimes, so ... ?

[Seedorf81]

Being a devil's advocate..

Empathy: being able to understand someone's actions and/or emotions without concurring or condoning them.

I think I can empathize to people (be it Germans in WW2, GI's In Vietnam or Iraq/Afghanistan,Israel and Palestinian youth's and/or Libyans and Syrians in these days) or whatever and who ever in human history did commit "warcrimes", because they've been subjected to too much violence when they were young.

Maybe I'm too idealistic but even Adolf and Goring, Lenin and Stalin, Saddam and Assad (and Netanyahu) could have been reasonable people if only someone (their parents preferably) sometime showed them the possibility of love instead of resentment and fear, suspicion and hate. ( Boy, do I sound like some born-again Christian! Jeez, that ain't good at all!)

[Rokko]

Well, that 'really good history' managed to completely elide any hint of warcrimes, so ... ?

Well it's copious, comes with some great maps, covers the fighting on an almost daily basis, gives detailed casualty figures, goes into more detail on the opposing forces than many other works. Besides it is well written and structured.

Also, you're wrong, there is mention of war crimes, just none that were comitted by themselves. What do you expect? It was written by veterans, and their intent was not to please some grogs 40 years after but to give a memorial to themselves and clean their own names. And if the authors can be believed also reconciliation with their former enemies.

I also noted a tendency to push all blame for failure away from Hitler. Did I like that or the omitting of the Hitleryouth's own war crimes? Not at all, but it's still a great divisional history, despite not being completely objective.

[JonS]

I agree with all of (well, most of) that, and it's vastly more useful than that other Meyer's book. However my post was in response to your actual question, not some other imaginary question.

(Also, the book is touted as "detail[ing] all aspects of the division's history", and was written 18 years ago, rather than 40.)

[c3k]

Edited because it added nothing.