Military Appreciation Process: Are a People Using the MAP in Combat Mission?

[apoll]

The titles says it all; are people using a military appreciation process to plan their attacks/defences/battles in Combat Mission? If so, what steps are people using? I have watched the Armchair General series, and note that the ugh there is using OCOKA. But apart from using a terrain appreciation process, are there other steps that can bring a rational approach to planning and conduct of a battle? And once the action starts, I'm finding that any time consuming appreciation process is too long, when decisions need to be made. Do real world appreciation processes actually work in this game?

Grateful views and opinions. Just trying to make better decisions on the battlefield and, more importantly, trying to bring more rationality to combat the instinctive reactions that seem to dominate my planning and conduct of battles.

Apoll

[Oddball_E8]

You know, it's kinda funny.

I never knew of those terms and I never knew of those procedures, but that's how I've always done it.

I think it's just the logical way of preparing for a battle.

[kuri]

I definitely need some more practice in pre battle planning, while i try to evaluate terrain, intel on enemy troop compositions etc and make plans accordingly, most of the time i still end up improvising on the move.

[apoll]

Yes Kuri, would be useful to see what people here, especially the vets of this game, are using in terms of a structured approach to planning, and then once the battle starts what process, if any, they use. Or do they just 'wing it', and hope for the best. Of note, where I'm from, Australia, I read a recent article in the army journal about how junior officers in the Australian regular army generally have a poor understanding of the MAP, don't use it, or don't think there is enough time to use it in operations. According to this article, a lot of junior officers are instinctively reacting to enemy contact, which is very interesting, if it is true. That got me thinking about my own approach to planning in this game, and in find that I am also reacting instinctively, and I gotta say it us not working too well for me at present. Getting my butt kicked most times, and while some of it I'd still working out the cameras and game 'rules/mechanics', a lot is also a slap hazard approach to planning, and 'gut reaction' upon contact. This game seems so realistic that it got me wondering whether the MAP might actually help. Hence my post...

Apoll

[Destraex1]

Interesting apoll considering even privates in the AU army have or had fairly good map skills. You would think the officers would be experts and quick to boot.

I would love a map in this game to plot things on. But I guess that is what we have essentially with our od like advantage.

[Combatintman]

A lot of it depends on the amount of information in the briefing and the complexity of the battle. It is difficult to go through the process properly for instance if the 'Friendly Forces' paragraph doesn't give you much detail about the forces available for the task.

I wouldn't say that I go through the complete process every time I play, most situations can be covered by either balancing your force or concentrating it. Push out your recce and then just crack on. All you need to do is rule out COAs that don't work in time and space and that don't give you enough flexibility to bag the objectives to win.

The natural tendency is to plan at the highest level and then 'wing' the lower level stuff and that is the approach I take - otherwise you end up spending more time planning than playing. A good plan will get you a long way towards victory but in many cases, the difference between defeat and victory will be down to your patience and how you micromanage your troops in contact.

[apoll]

Yes Destraex1, check the article out:

http://www.army.gov.au/Our-future/LWSC/Our-publications/~/media/Files/Our%20future/DARA%20Publications/AAJ/2012Summer/Decision-Making-AAJ-Vol9-No3-Summer-2012.pdf

The author makes the point that the junior officers are often using SMEAC, the quick orders format, as a substitute for the steps of the MAP, because it is easier to remember under pressure. But this is a way of communicating the results of the decision process, NOT the process itself.

Thanks Combatintman, I'll give that a go. Just need to bring some more planning to the process...

Apoll

[z1812]

I spend a lot of time planning and checking the map.

What most concerns me if I am attacking are the effects terrain may have on movement, covered approaches, proper areas to conduct observation, and areas where I can gather my forces to organize them in advance of an attack.

If I am defending then I look for choke points, covered areas with good lines of sight, terrain that will impede the attackers advance, a central area to hold a reserve, and good spotting for fire missions if they are available.

I always want to know what the conditions are as well. Is the ground damp? Is there haze? Etc.

Fallback positions are also something I consider.

I try to divide my battles into small segments. I will identify which areas I want to hold or take and then set about doing it according to what the map shows to be expedient.

[Tank Hunter]

I usually prefer to have a plan for bigger scenarios. Without a General plan I tend to become confused and have difficulties plotting the moves for each and every unit. My plan is often general in the way of helping me with my main thrust and might look something like this. I pixelated the map behind just so I don't spoil the battle for anyone.

I look at my forces and create a symbol counter for each formation. I pick the venue of approach based on the map, scenario description and forces available. Each formation gets an arrow with unique color, circled areas are that formation's objectives. Some formations with S above their counter are in supporting role.

In the screen above you can see that 9th and 167th Co are to attack first from the deployment area. They are to lead the thrust and seize 2 objectives. The 1st Tank Reg and 4th Sapper Company will support once they reach their first objective.

Once the first objectives are secured the 7th Co will deploy and attack 2 objectives in the south with the support of 4th Sapper Co and the MG Co. If possible they will also be supported by the 1st TK Reg hence the dash line. The 8th Co Counter is placed at the bottom right with an R indicating that it is reserve and may be deployed at some crucial stage of the battle. Once the battle starts I often try to stick to the general plan as much as possible but I always let the situation and time dictate the advance.

[mjkerner]

I spend a lot of time planning and checking the map.

What most concerns me if I am attacking are the effects terrain may have on movement, covered approaches, proper areas to conduct observation, and areas where I can gather my forces to organize them in advance of an attack.

If I am defending then I look for choke points, covered areas with good lines of sight, terrain that will impede the attackers advance, a central area to hold a reserve, and good spotting for fire missions if they are available.

I always want to know what the conditions are as well. Is the ground damp? Is there haze? Etc.

Fallback positions are also something I consider.

I try to divide my battles into small segments. I will identify which areas I want to hold or take and then set about doing it according to what the map shows to be expedient.

^^^ This is basically the way I approach it, too.

Tank Hunter...that's an impressive approach, but I'm too lazy to go that far!

[ScoutPL]

Go to my tutorials (in my tag at the bottom). I use CMSF as a model but the method is the same. I lay out a step by step process based on the US Army's Military Decision Making Process (MDMP) only simplified for a gamer.

Also check out Bil Hardenbergers stuff (tagged in the stickies on the CMBN forum).

I am sure there are others out there, but these are the two that I know of that are aimed right at CM. If you just pick up a field manual you will get lost in the jargon and acronyms and have difficulty applying it to CM.

[ridethe415]

I usually prefer to have a plan for bigger scenarios. Without a General plan I tend to become confused and have difficulties plotting the moves for each and every unit. My plan is often general in the way of helping me with my main thrust and might look something like this. I pixelated the map behind just so I don't spoil the battle for anyone.

I look at my forces and create a symbol counter for each formation. I pick the venue of approach based on the map, scenario description and forces available. Each formation gets an arrow with unique color, circled areas are that formation's objectives. Some formations with S above their counter are in supporting role.

In the screen above you can see that 9th and 167th Co are to attack first from the deployment area. They are to lead the thrust and seize 2 objectives. The 1st Tank Reg and 4th Sapper Company will support once they reach their first objective.

Once the first objectives are secured the 7th Co will deploy and attack 2 objectives in the south with the support of 4th Sapper Co and the MG Co. If possible they will also be supported by the 1st TK Reg hence the dash line. The 8th Co Counter is placed at the bottom right with an R indicating that it is reserve and may be deployed at some crucial stage of the battle. Once the battle starts I often try to stick to the general plan as much as possible but I always let the situation and time dictate the advance.

I recognize that map , in the middle of it right now. Like your idea of plotting units on the map. I tend to write them down, but maybe seeing it would be better.

I downloaded the the Official Briefing Graphics Templates from the repository for CMBN /CW. Doesn't have soviet colors but still workable.

[A Canadian Cat]

The natural tendency is to plan at the highest level and then 'wing' the lower level stuff and that is the approach I take - otherwise you end up spending more time planning than playing. A good plan will get you a long way towards victory but in many cases, the difference between defeat and victory will be down to your patience and how you micromanage your troops in contact.

That is where I usually fall as well. During setup I have a good look at the avenues of approach, cover etc. and make my basic decision of who goes where in what order. Once contact is made I try to win the firefights as the come up.

Having said that if things are not working out I will reconsider and change the plan but even that is not really going back to the beginning since that new planning takes into account the reality on the ground.

[db_zero]

Interesting stuff. In all honesty I'm not so methodical. I'm a more on the fly type of player. I also have 10-14 h2h games going on at one time so I don't think I can take that sort of approach.

I'm used to getting information shoved in front of my face and forced to make quick decisions with imperfect data. Trade stocks, options and forex. Some say playing games like this can be useful if you do that sort of stuff and many companies are using game theory exercises to train employees.

[cool breeze]

This post by JasonC helped me:

"I will explain how to think about recon. How to do recon mostly follows from that, though there are many small tactics one can learn after getting the big picture stuff right. But it is more important to have the big picture stuff right than to be a wizard at the small tactics stuff. Not that you can't strive for both eventually.

I restrict myself to the recon that attackers do for a real attack, since that is the issue that arises most in CM and where the right big picture goes farthest. Defenders do recon in a sense too, but have different problems; static probing where neither side has the local edge to press is again a recon-ee situation but not on point here.

The big picture starting point is what you are trying to do. And I don't mean a mission briefing or something that changes from scenario to scenario. What you are trying to do when you are attacking is destroy the enemy force. You aren't trying to get across a field or into a village, you aren't trying to locate the enemy position, you aren't trying to go around the enemy. You are trying to kill him. Everything you do, including recon, is directed to that end. After the enemy is dead you can take any crossroads or waltz across any field you please.

I point that out because, if you already knew exactly where the enemy was and the answer was right over there in those buildings, you wouldn't send 2 scouts ahead or even need to break cover. You'd just shoot the living daylights out of them from right over here where it is safe, they'd die under your superior firepower (you are the attacker, right?), and you could take a lunch break after the battle before anyone had to walk across 10 meters of open ground.

The reason you are moving in the first place is to put guns on target, and for that you need targets. Notice, this underlying objective makes it kind of pointless to find an enemy who can move off at his leisure if you aren't in a position to murder him right after you find him.

The next thing you will notice, as everyone has already commented, is that thorough and cautious, well overwatched recon takes time. And time is what turns kittens into cats. Let's the enemy move around, detect your plan, perfectly align his forces to address it, get out of the way if he likes, call for artillery, etc. So good recon needs to be fast.

What is the fastest possible recon method?

Perhaps surprisingly, the answer is - mindreading.

No, I don't mean holding seances or staring through cards with blue squares on them, I mean getting into the defending commander's head and anticipating what he already did two hours ago. Nothing will ever be faster than a flat-out guess that is dead-on correct.

Recon starts with you as the commander thinking through the enemy's own command problems, and seeing what his reasonable alternatives actually are. Then guess which he did, with the main alternatives in the back of your mind. Guess with confidence and audacity. Don't worry that you can't be sure - be fast, not sure.

The defenders do not have enough forces to be strong everywhere. You have the strength advantage, he is trying to make terrain or your movement and exposure even the odds for him. Not every spot on that map can perform those services for him. He needs to avoid your superior long range firepower -same comment. If he doesn't do these things and thus does the unexpected, it will be unexpected because it is also stupid, and you can kill him for it without too much trouble.

So he is going to be in naturally strong position A or naturally strong position B, or split between them 50 50 or 75 25, but he isn't going to be off in Timbuktu or in the middle of a field overlooked by cover on your side or any of the other stupid places.

You made a guess about where he is, his whole defensive scheme. That implies he is really weak or just not present at all at a whole bunch of other locations. Send the minimum number of eyes moving as fast as their legs can carry them to go confirm that hypothesis. Where you think the enemy isn't, it doesn't mean you don't scout. It means you scout fast and kind of reckless. You want to know if your guess was wrong as soon as humanly possible, at a minimum cost in blood and time. Sweep such unimportant areas to reduce the range of unknowns left and to turn your pretty sure guess into a known fact.

That leaves the areas where you actually expect to find enemy. The issue with those is you don't know how strong the enemy is in each of them, and which specific line he picked - this far forward, or back here, with a platoon or a whole company, etc.

And we ask again what you are trying to do, and the answer is destroy the enemy. So these are the places you want to cover with overwatch thick enough to shoot down anything there. Notice, I didn't say anything yet about sending anyone toward them. It isn't the cover where the enemy is that counts for this, it is the cover that can *see* the spots where he is. That is where your own machinegun is going to set up to cover that treeline or interdict that road.

Scouts go to those before the main shooters do. They go more carefully, but still "traveling". Meaning they are on move to contact but are not pausing to listen and watch for minutes on end, they are moving moving moving unless or until somebody shoots at them or similar.

The purpose of those scouts is to ensure your overwatch set up locations are not ambush zones, or minefields. It is also to "put out" any prying enemy eyes that might see you setting up and call for the artillery.

Still no one has moved on a position believed to be occupied by the enemy in force.

So you've verified your guess or mostly so, you've picked your overwatch set up cover, you've scouted it and sent said overwatch firepower to said cover, and now the place you think the enemy is has been covered by your gun barrels.

Next question - shock or fire?

Shock means moving at speed onto the enemy to kill him with close range firepower.

Fire means sending HE and other area effect firepower at the enemy to multiply his losses from each shell.

You shock only where the enemy is already thin. You fire anywhere you know he is thick.

No enemy believed to be there? A few scouts pass through at speed.

Enemy believed to be there but thin? Shock, run them over with 5 times what they are prepared to handle.

Enemy believed to be there and thick? Fire. Call the artillery. Area fire with the tanks at every building. Hose the treeline down with the coaxials. Bullets not bodies make the trip.

The second two each have their own recon aspects. If you are attacking by shock, the recon is a small element leading the main body, close enough for immediate firepower from the main body to hit whoever shoots at the point. But so that the point arrives at enemy cover while the main body is still far enough back that it can reach cover while replying, not get caught in the open.

If you can't see a way to manage that geometry it means you picked the wrong approach route. That is exactly what you are looking for in an avenue of advance.

With fire, on the other hand, you just want to send a few bodies to force the enemy to reveal himself, to make your ammo expended more effective. If you have more than enough ammo, you don't need to bother - just blow the heck out of the place. But that rarely happens. Instead you send a half squad, and if the enemy does not open fire the half squad sees them, and you open fire. If the enemy does open fire, oh well for your poor bloody half squad - avenge them.

Now I know what you are thinking - how can I tell whether they are thin so I should plan for shock or thick so I should plan for fire?

Mindreading. It's the fastest way.

When in doubt, plan for fire. But don't always be in doubt - have some audacity. It will catch the enemy napping sometimes, thinking they will get 5 minutes notice and a spotting round before anything really heats up over in sector two.

The most important takeaway is that recon is not trying to find every enemy position for you, or provide you as the commander with a luxurious certainty before you make a single decision. You as the commander have the job of just flat-out knowing what the enemy is going to do, and directing all your soldiers accordingly. The soldiers don't work for you to make your decisions easier. You work for them, and try to use your cleverness and insight and ability to get inside the enemy's head, to save their lives.

So recon reports are always about checking off a hypothesis as correct, or telling you that you guessed wrong and must adapt and change your plan. They are not there to tell you what you should plan, or even worse what to make a plan about. The time to make a plan for your attack is not 15 minutes after the fighting begins, but 15 minutes before, at the latest.

Sure you will be wrong about some of your guesses. So, make a flexible plan, one that has ways to adapt to likely enemy courses of action. Have a reserve, or a quick way to change the roles of elements of your force. So if the enemy main position happens to be at X instead of Y, then your force A isn't the attack group but a screening element, and group B is a flanking element instead of a reserve - or whatever.

Learn from those fast scouting expeditions which if any of your guesses were wrong, even as your plan steams ahead in the confident expectation that you guessed correctly. If you were wrong, adapt, adapt just once but violently, and in a way you had some plan for or inkling you might need. Have three or four chess combinations waiting up your sleeve for the likely ways you might be wrong.

But have a plan, believe in it, and do not wait to execute it until you are supposedly certain. Nothing is faster than mindreading."

__________________

[ridethe415]

Wow, that is really good.

[JonS]

A lot of it depends on the amount of information in the briefing and the complexity of the battle. It is difficult to go through the process properly for instance if the 'Friendly Forces' paragraph doesn't give you much detail about the forces available for the task.

Funnily enough, I try to work backwards from the MAP when creating a scenario - especially writing the briefings - to try and make sure that there is enough of the right kinds of info for any players so inclined to conduct a worthwhile MAP.

In general the briefings – including the imagery – serve one important function: it allows players to develop a reasonable plan to achieve victory. In order to develop a good plan the player needs to answer several questions: –

1) what must I do? (objectives)

2) what forces do I have? (on map, off map, and reinforcements)

3) where must I do it? (terrain, weather, and environment)

4) how long do I have? (scenario length)

5) what is the enemy trying to do? (what are the enemy objectives)

6) what forces does the enemy have? (on map, off map, and reinforcements)

Cognoscenti will recognise that as a slightly bastardised 7 question combat estimate.

Not all of this needs to be explicitly or lengthily covered in the briefing. The player’s on-map forces only need to be given in outline, since they can be studied intimately on the map, although off-map artillery and any reinforcements are worth detailing. The map can also be closely examined by the player, so there’s no need to go into that too much. It is, however, worth highlighting any particular map settings, such as how soft the ground is, what the weather and especially the wind is doing, since that affects how easily vehicles will bog or smoke will form, and also note when sunrise or sunset will occur if that is due to happen during the scenario. Scenario length is another item the player can discover for themselves, but still worth noting. Related to duration is an indication of time and space issues – if the attacker has a long way to go, but only a short time to get there, it might be worth mentioning how long it will take to move between key locations when using the Move command.

Explaining the objectives to be achieved in order to succeed is relatively straightforward, and can be done via the briefing graphics and by explicitly noting the value of terrain objectives on the 3D map. I used to think it was a good idea to be coy about exactly what a player had to do to win, and used vague wording to try and imply a sense of relative importance between difference objectives. I’ve changed my mind about that, and now tell the players exactly what each objective is and what it’s worth, down to the point. It’s easier and clearer that way, which allows players to develop better plans.

Providing information on the enemy is crucial, tempered to retain FOW and surprises. In general, I think it’s a bad idea to outright lie to players, but that it’s okay to be vague or to omit some information, although the broad outlines should be correct. Particularly important here is the approximate size and composition of the enemy force – is it a company, or a battalion? Is it drawn from an armoured division (in which case there’ll probably be tracked fighting vehicles of some sort), or an infantry division (in which case there probably won’t be). Has the enemy been using artillery in this area, and if so what sort, how much?

Also important are the enemy’s intentions. I don't provide a detailed list of all the enemy’s objectives, but I do include the main idea of what the enemy is trying to achieve – seize or hold a nominated hill or town, inflict casualties, exit in a particular direction, and so on.

Knowing what the enemy has and is trying to do, even roughly, allows the player to develop a meaningful plan. Their plan doesn’t have to be perfect – players should expect that they will have to adjust in response to developments during the battle. But modifying an existing plan is quite different to scrapping it and starting over because the initial information was so bad.

[Combatintman]

Aye to the above - I am much more methodical when designing scenarios than playing them and go through a similar process.

As JonS says, getting the briefing right gives the player the best chance to come up with a decent plan and therefore requires the designer to jump through planning process hoops from both sides. By doing so, the mission brief pretty much writes itself which is a reflection of reality because of course one of the main outputs of planning is a set of orders.

This ensures that the scenario is workable, balanced and achievable by the player.