White Phosphorus (I think I spelled it right)

[Sefchick]

Will White Phosphorus Ammo be used in CM?

[This message has been edited by Sefchick (edited 09-03-99).]

[Mike Oberly]

You may want to do a search on this topic(though maybe it was under the generic 'artillery' subject)-it was discussed exhaustively some time ago,in the end with a qualified 'maybe',I believe.

Mike

[Ben Galanti]

Also do a search in the forum on "Willy Pete". I think that was the thread that had most of the WP talk in it...

[Pixman]

Hi Sefchick. As I was the one pushing hardest for white phosphorous' inclusion in the game, I will quickly summarize where the discussion stands.

Steve and Charles (BTS) acknowledge the presence and use of WP in WWII. However, all evidence presented on this forum to date suggests that it was used in a very limited capacity:

1.) In 4.2" mortars, mainly in Italy which is outside the scope of CM1.

2.) In the bocage to flush machine gunners and AT gunners out of hedgerows. This obviously fits into the scope of CM1. But from BTS' perspective, this is still a very limited use and they feel that HE shells can pretty much simulate the effect of WP rounds. Of course, WP was used as smoke as well, but CM already has smoke shells. The other concern BTS expressed was that WP would be abused as a weapons load for AFVs in scenarios outside of the bocage which would violate the historic reality of the game.

The trade offs of putting in WP are pretty basic.

Downside: More development time, a slightly more cumbersome interface, potential for nonhistoric scenarios (this last, I countered, could be controlled by the scenario designer).

Upside: More realistic flavor of battle in bocage fighting, thus increasing historic realism.

The discussion was left with BTS sitting on the fence, but leaning toward leaving WP out. The only thing that will induce them to put it in, is more evidence of prevalent use of WP in the bocage.

So if you, like I, want WP in the game, then I recommend you help find sources that support its importance to the game design. Otherwise, I fear CM will be delivered sans WP.

Steve, if I have misrepresented your position here in any way, please set the record straight. It is obviously difficult to boil a 30+ post thread down to a few paragraphs.

Pixman

------------------

The enchanter may confuse the outcome, but the effort remains sublime.

[Mike D]

IT'S BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

EEEAAAAACKKKKKK, RUN FOR YOUR LIFE.

WHITE PHOSPHOROUS, THE TOPIC THAT JUST KEEPS ON GIVING, AND GIVING, AND GIVING. AND, JUST WHEN WE THOUGHT IT MIGHT HAVE RUN IT'S COURSE, STARTS GIVING AGAIN.

MIKE D

AKA MIKESTER

[This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 09-03-99).]

[Pixman]

No way Mikey boy. I just knew you could not resist getting your $.02 in!! And YELLING no less, lol.

I guess there are just enough of us out here who care about having WP in that it won't go away. While any one of us is not up to the Herculean diatribes you can generate to wear down our beloved design team (although I can give it a good try on occasion), our strategy is to collectively pepper this board from multiple angles until we get satisfaction. We prefer the straws on the camel's back approach over the anvil to the head that you seem to have mastered.

Important note: in deference to your firey temper, all of the above is said in good fun.

How about it Steve, have you given this any further thought or just tried to block it out like Mikester?

------------------

The enchanter may confuse the outcome, but the effort remains sublime.

[Mike D]

Pixman,

And I see you didn't waste much time either when the call to battle rang forth once again in the great crusade to get WP into the game.

Actually, I have no problem with this whatsoever. In fact I'm in support of it being in the game if it makes sense to do so from a historical and realism stand point. And I think one idea that came up in the past was to allow the scenario designer to give it the allies on a case by case basis so that it might be used in some areas where it was historically employed, like the hedgerows of Normandy, etc. (hint, hint, Steve) I just find it extremely interesting (even entertaining in some ways) that the topic just keeps on coming up is all

As far as strategies go, the "pepper 'em to death" one you guys have been trying here on the WP issue obviously doesn't seem to be working out too well Whereas the "anvil over the noggin" approach is a highly effective and deadly approach to getting things done. Assuming of course, that you don't miss Steve's head and have it land on your own foot (Ouch!!!!!)

Now if you want, I can be hired out for a small fee (payable in cash or beer) to write some good diatribes on the WP issue for you guys to finally break Steve and Charles on the subject so that they cave in and succumb to your wishes. My guess is that since you guys have already worn them down it will only take 1, or possibly 2, anvils to finish them off.

Let's see, I'd be looking for something along the lines of say 2 cases of good beer, that ought to do nicely. Just let me know if my services are needed. (Mmmmmmm, beer....)

As far as the "yelling" goes I assume you are referring to the ALL CAPS stuff??? Or was it the !!!!!! The all caps stuff is because I'm sitting here at work on my HP workstation doing CAD designs / drawings and engineers do all their drawing notations, etc., in all caps. So I just left the caps lock key on when I came over here because it gets to be a pain changing it back and forth all the time. Otherwise, as far as the rest of it goes, I was just having fun with ya!!!

Regards,

Mike D

aka Mikester

[This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 09-03-99).]

[This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 09-03-99).]

[Guest Ssnake]

From Fionn's postings about his fears of a tactical bomber ripping off his precious tanks, I presume that you model aircraft, too.

Now, does that include bombers, too - or just those aircraft that were assigned to close air support (CAS) tasks ?

If you had B-17s or something like that, they ought to carry incinerators - which, AFAIK, contained white phosphorus...

Mind you, so far I don't see the need for WP - as I don't see the need for heavy bombers, since they were assigned to other "honorable duties", mainly fry civilians in Dresden, Hamburg, and virtually any large German city.

well, maybe this was off-topic after all. But it contained the word WP !!!

;o)

------------------

PGP key ID: 0xBCD59BA1

I strongly recommend the use of encryption software for e-Mail contacts. Ensuring privacy makes people feel better )

[Guest Big Time Software]

Pixman, you did a GREAT job with the Readers Digest condensed version of probably the largest, longest, running discussion to date

Mike/Pixman, I laughed pretty hard when I saw the subject line too. "It's baaaaaaaak" came to mind first and foremost

Ssnake, only tactical aircraft as carpet bombing (and large scale artillery assaults) are outside of CM's scope. But you are correct, there was battlefield use of WP using medium and heavy bombers.

Steve

[Fionn]

Please, no medium or heavy bomber strikes..

I've got tanks to think of Steve.. Don't do it... Think of the POWS ;P

hehe

------------------

___________

Fionn Kelly

Manager of Historical Research,

The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers

[Mike D]

What Fionn? You are not looking forward to that allied carpet bombing run across your sector by 50 B-17's that Steve forgot to tell you was coming along on turn 30? Can you say bye bye Kampfgruppen von Kelly? I'm sure at least one of your guys should survive to surrender to Martin's forces in the town.

Mike D

aka Mikester

[This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 09-03-99).]

[Fionn]

Mike,

Don't joke about it, you haven't seen turns 18 and 19 ..

*Grumble, grumble, grumble*

------------------

___________

Fionn Kelly

Manager of Historical Research,

The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers

[Pixman]

Mike, thank you for making me laugh VERY HARD! I like your writing style (not the length mind you, don't want the posse after me) and am beginning to like your style in general.

Yes, I'm for the scenario designer having this tool (WP) at his disposal -- big surprise. Still not sure why BTS is so against it. It's not a huge issue, but it is historic and it would enhance the game if used properly. I tried to get Steve to come back out of his shell on this, but he did not bite. Maybe he was laughing too hard, or too busy dodging anvils. C'mon Steve, just say you'll do it if you can work it in. Don't make me work my fingers to the nubs too on "research".

Fionn, relax, Steve told us they are only Marauders.

SSnake, have you ever read the casualty statistics of Londoners, the RAF or the US 8th airforce?

------------------

The enchanter may confuse the outcome, but the effort remains sublime.

[Fionn]

Londoners: A maximum of 60,000 deaths (from memory) in 1940 to 45.. only about 30some thousand during the blitz. Dresden and a few other cities lost more than that in ONE DAY... Those raids were warcrimes of the first rank. They even used incendiaries and special bombs to ensure that the maximum number of fires would be created and the maximal number of people would be burnt to death...

RAF and USAAF 8th AF pilots and crew were soldiers so their casualty rates do NOT justify bombing civilians in the systematic manner which occured.

Perhaps there were other justifications. I'm just saying that pointing to soldier and airmen casualty rates isn't a justification.

IF they hadn't been bombing those towns and instead sat on chairs in England all day none of them would have died. Their deaths occured precisely because the Germans attempted to stop them hitting their industrial AND civilian targets.

------------------

___________

Fionn Kelly

Manager of Historical Research,

The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers

[Doug Beman]

Fionn, NO FAIR hinting and taunting with your future knowledge! Begone, harbinger of things that are yet to be!

DjB

[Paul]

This is taken from Charles Whiting's book

Siegfried "The Nazis'Last Stand"

--"Then there was one other thing. I remember [about the Huertgen]. We had put an awful lot of white phosphorus on the town before we got in for good, or whatever you would call it. That was the first time I ever saw a Kraut dog eating a roasted German Kraut. Later on I saw a cat working on him too. You wouldn't think a good German cat would eat a good German soldier's ass which had been roasted by white phosphorus."

-Ernest Hemingway

[Guest Big Time Software]

OK, we'll just put a stop to the multi-national warcrimes thing before we get so many posts that the BBS software stops working Bottom line is that once the RAF and USAAF wiped out civilian populations ON PURPOSE they lost their moral standing on the issue. Yes, the Allies had their reasons (many of which were purely revenge based), but so did the Germans. And the Geneva Convention, so far as I know, makes no mention about it being OK to slaughter civilians if the other side did it first. Therefore, there is no difference between the raids on moral or legal grounds.

Pixman, the problem is we just don't see it as an important part of the overall picture. Yes, it was used a bit here and there, and a wee bit more during hedgerow fighting. Same can be said for lots of little things, like magnetic tank mines or molitov cocktails, so WP is in good company

The way we look at this is "what happens to the game and its realism if we don't include it?" Answer is "Next to nothing" since HE and Smoke can be used instead. It's not like were weren't including air support or a thousand other little details that matter more. So on our scale of importance right now, it ranks way down there. In theory, yes, we would like to have it. But in reality we could keep adding things for the next year and there would STILL be things not in the game. WP is on The List (and always has been with LOTS of ? marks), but the chances of it going in are slim to none.

Paul, as for the WP in the Huertgen, there were 4.2 mortar batteries in the area from what I recal so it was probably one of them. Another valid, but irrelevant use of WP (i.e. the WP was not used to support a tactical assault of CM scope). I have that book, BTW, so if you think there is more to read in there, cite the chapter and roughly how far into it I should look (page counts don't work as books are most likely different).

Steve

[Mike D]

Pixman,

As far as length goes I think that has a lot to do with the fact that often times I don't have all the time I'd like to have to edit my messages where a lot of stuff would probably be either taken out and/or condensed down to a more succinct form. In fact with school, work, and everything else I've got going on I can bearly keep up with all the message traffic here on the board anymore, let alone find time to make any posts here. In any case, what usually happens when I commence to writing, is the thoughts just pour forth from my little pea brain in which all the little wheels and cogs are just spinning like mad. So that I capture as much of it as I can I just type like mad (surprised my fingers don't turn into bloody stumps myself sometimes ) while at the same time trying to give some thought to organizing all of it as it goes down on the "page". In any event, I think I will lay low with the long posts here for awhile. A) I really don't have the time to be writing them and if I don't have the time to spend to proproperly edit them, I am in some sense, wasting a lot of other peoples time. Most importantly that of Steve and Charles who really should be concentrating on getting the game done vs. reading my "diatribes" as you call them.

I believe it was Hemmingway that once said, "good writing is one part inspiration and nine parts perspiration." Meaning, coming up with the idea and writing it down is the easy part while editing the work to turn it into something of real worth is the hard part. An excellent quote from a great writer which rings quite true.

Regards,

Mike D

aka Mikester

"A fools wisdom knows no bounds other than the infinite space between his ears."

[This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 09-04-99).]

[Dar]

Are you sure that's Hemingway's quote? If so, it sounds like he ripped off Thomas Edison's quote about "genius" being one part inspiration, nine parts perspiration.

(not *trying* to be nit-picky, just curious)

Dar Steckelberg

[This message has been edited by Dar (edited 09-04-99).]

[Brian Rock]

I believe the Edison quote is "genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration".

(Just raising the nit-pickiness ante.)

Hemingway may have said something similar, of course. It sounds sort of Hemingway-ish.

I do know of one other Hemingway quote that seems appropriate for us arm-chair colonel types: "never mistake motion for action". Good principle for me to bear in mind when trying to coordinate that all-important but ill-conceived assault...

[Mike D]

Dar,

You might be right. I'd tried to remember that qoute from long ago and likely might have messed it up. I know Hemmingway, or one of those writer dudes said somehting to this effect, but I may have gotten that mixed up with Edison's quote. Oh well, I'm just a dummy Engineer so what do I know, right? Guess we'll have to wait for an English major out there to straighten me out.

Mike