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ALLIED : Gustav Line BETA AAR Round Two - Eye of the Elefant


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On to the turn.

I have to say that this was a turn of small disappointments.

My AAHT backed into view of the field in the centre right, and didn't spot anything. As predicted, my anti-recon-recon was whacked, and that put out the lights on my view of the area of interest... I have to assume that my AAHT's view of the field is cut short juuuust before where Bil's forward HT is parked.

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I guess I'll just have to wait lurking here...

(I can't imagine for a moment they will code trees being blown _over_. They will be blown _up_ into a million smithereens... )

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My mortar guys elected not to use the foxhole that I provided for them, and are of course under return fire now...

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... and they still haven't spotted the HTs in that field. Bil must be very cunning at hiding HTs behing tree trunks or something.

Similarly, my centre-right scout still hasn't spotted any infantry, but my suspicion that they are here was confirmed as ghosts moved past on the upper side of the slope, to a position that is now _past_ the scout.

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My scout was on "slow" this turn. It will be "interesting" to see whether Bil's ghosts detected him. If so, it would appear I'm about to have the lights go out on the right flank back approach route... I know what's there now, but I won't know quite so well when it's coming...

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It may be a good thing that you didn't spot anything this turn ... there is a good chance he wont see you either ... Of course he may see you even though you can't see him :eek: ...

Hold your breath and hope he hasn't spotted you, maybe he will move into you FOV this turn. I can't wait to see what the quad 50 does to his dismounts.

Be prepared to shoot and scoot because you know that tin can ain't no battleship ;)

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Suppose he has detected my scout. Then surely he will come and kill them. In which case, I will be - shall we say - immensely diappointed if the AAHT _still_ doesn't see the ghosts as they mow down my scout!

However, as you say, it is not a battleship, and a more prudent action _might_ be to pull it back till someone else can confirm that the area is target rich.

The downside of that is moving it again may increase the chances that Bil spots it: he only needs a sound contact that looks a teeeny bit like an HT to know what is there.

Such dilemmas! :) I'm letting this decision gel for the moment.

Meanwhile, speaking of lights going out, the lights have already gone out on the left rear approach-way:

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A shell landed near the Sunken Road foxhole this turn ... don't tell Bil, but the MMG has moved on from there :)

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Another landed in my left midfield. I had a sinking feeling that Bil's KW crew is spotting arty targets in there already, until I realised it _might_ be an overthrow from aiming at The Spur/Sunken Road. Next turn will tell I guess.

GaJ

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Bah! Just start area firing on the left and gradually sweep across to the right. The sounds of screaming will indicate the location of hiding infantry. The ricochets will show where his tanks are. Recon by quad .50. Get to it!

;)

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One of the problems with having destructible trees - if you blow one over, it now provides cover and obscurance at a different level. For example, that Brummbar might not be able to see or fire at anything depending on how the tree fell (writing code for that would be wayyy down any priority list - just the thought of the complaints generated... ugh.) Not to mention pathing and vehicle damage diffculties.

True...if we are insisting on extreme realism. But perhaps a permissible compromise would have the tree simply removed above the stump level.

Michael

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Bah! Just start area firing on the left and gradually sweep across to the right. The sounds of screaming will indicate the location of hiding infantry. The ricochets will show where his tanks are. Recon by quad .50. Get to it!

That might actually work. I have in the very recent past area fired on a unit I couldn't spot and must have caused at least one casualty and caused a survivor to bug out.

Michael

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Bah! Just start area firing on the left and gradually sweep across to the right. The sounds of screaming will indicate the location of hiding infantry. The ricochets will show where his tanks are. Recon by quad .50. Get to it!

;)

Good to see you're also pushing for the "linear targetting" area fire feature. Go c3k !

We're all behind you ! ( in spirit :D )

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Remember that this thing chews through it's ammo. There aren't _that_ many turns worth of area firing on board.

Movie 25, 0:46-0:45

I luuuurve Tommy guns...

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After being mercilessly mowed down by Bil's Sten guns last game, I had been really looking forwards to this moment :) Give me an army of these guys, I reckon.

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However, Bil hit me with his own surprises this turn: not one but two of my M10s are under surprise attack.

The first one is not actually that surprising. Once again, I have Bil's lesson in tank dodging to thank for my Tame M10 still being alive this turn.

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I looked at that tank while giving orders and thought "hmm - I imagined the bunker would provide more side protection, but actually it's low. And ... the M10 has been sitting still with maybe only trees between him and the PzIVhs. I carefully checked the LOS situation, and there were no blue lines over to the location of the PzIVhs, but... I got nervous, so I decided to dodge again. At first I plotted a pause (waiting for a moment to see if I'd spot the right flankers) and a reverse, but then I decided to just move back immediately. Wow... thank goodness for that!....

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It appears that Bil's right flankers have spotted the tank, and the PzIVhs can't _quite_ see it, but they area fired in right where it was!

OK - so that's not _too_ surprising, though quite a relief in the way it turned out.

The next one is _really_ surprising:

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Whoa!? How on earth does he know that this tank is there!?

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Good to see you've got some of that long-grass-concealment working for you at last.

Maybe that bottom picture was just an errant spotting round - I know my arty guys will drop spotting rounds miles from the target location sometimes.

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Yessir, I am gobsmacked by that one. Did KW-man jog past my anti-recon and is right now poking around in my back line? Did the sound of the engine waft over to Hill 130? Or was it a good guess? I'll look forwards to hearing about that one after the end!

The last piece of "new action" is an HT heading my way up the left flank:

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See how Hill 130 can see everything there:

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To tell the truth, at this point I'm a lot more worried about an attack from this direction than the other right flank stuff that has been happening.

As far as I can see, I'm going to have to let this thing come wizzing really far into my midfield before I can start doing anything about it. The defensive situation over here is much worse than I thought when I set up, due to the already discussed impressively penetrating view from Hill 130.

GaJ

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Oh - I took another photo while looking around: my mortar guys are now pinned and thus pretty much out of action... shells and bullets are flying around here from unidentified sources ... I can hear a mortar over near the PzIVhs, and a sound that might be the Brummbar firing as well.

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Wherever you move your M10: make sure you draw a "partial" or hull down target position from the threatened/attack area

Aside from presenting a smaller target (which is worth something), not sure just how much that helps since IIRC the turret has thinner armor than the glacis.

Michael

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Interestingly, I also opened fire with the AAHT on the spot where the first group had their casualties last turn. I know there was at least one man not hit previously, there ...

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... but I think that the bursts are too close/tight to be really good for recon-by-fire. There are heaps of them (hard to capture in a single photo), but they all go in about the same place. I certainly didn't hear any screaming from that part of the field, or see any red crosses this turn.

That's not going to stop me opening fire on where the bastards are that took out my Tommy scouts, this turn...

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Oh - and how about that? These guys can be seen standing up in the field, firing at my Tommy-scouts in the pictures above. The AAHT has a clear sight to this area, but can't see them yet, even as they are firing.... damn hard defending against something you can't see! I think the image of the LMG guy prone and firing shows why it should be impossible to spot guys lying down in a field: you can't even see him in the photo. What do you all think about the visibility of the guy who's standing up? Immediately after that photo was taken, he remains standing up and opens fire. The wheat seems to be about up to his chest. Maybe at 6-700m, an observer would need more time and more men to be popping up to really spot them. I'm not sure about that, but I am sure that my plan to cover this approach route from the West Ridge, with the HMG, AAHT and mortar, is looking increasingly hard!

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