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My MGs seem to have worse LOS than everyone else and cant fire at a "reverse slope position" regular infantry has no problem firing at. The reverse slope was behind a hedgerow on an otherwise perfectly flat area. Couldnt get them to fire behind the cover. They seemed to have LOS while on the march and had lost it once deployed.

Is this a known issue or working as intended? I had these poor guys walking just into a minefield trying to get LOS.

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"Predicted LOS" checked from a waypoint is always approximate. The "eyeball height" used is approximately that of the unit in its current posture, so if your MG team was marching when you set the waypoint and checked the LOS, it would have been checked from "standing" height, whereas your MG always shoots from "kneeling" height. LOS determination is also very dependent on exact conditions. If your rifle team isn't in the same Action Spot, it's going to have a different view of the target place. Even if it's in the same Action Spot, since it got there first, it'll have bagsied all the good seeing-points and your MG team will be trying to peer round the stupid rifle luggers.

However, if you can target a hedgerow, you can usually target the spot just behind it. Since you can't target the front of the hedgerow (it being a Reverse Slope Target - No Aim Point) unless the ground climbs radically behind the obstacle, you won't be able to target it. I suspect it's all down to the posture change from marching to deployed, and the ground perhaps not being quite the pancake it appears at first, or even the vegetation in the field between the shooters and the target... The rifle team that's able to shoot where you want the MG to shoot: are they standing to do so?

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There was a single engineer just one action spot ahead and one to the right. He was either doing buddy aid or lying on the ground marking the minefield.

An LMG team a little back and to the right could also fire into the position.

The ground is perfectly flat with some vegetation between everyone and the target. I had the MG walk from good cover way back right into the (until then undiscovered part of the) minefield because i couldnt believe it.

Edit: Just finished the game. The engineer was now busy on the ground marking the newly discovered minefield and couldnt get LOS, neither the MG. Everyone else did. Must have to do with stance. This means my men are more vulnerable taking shots just behind hedgerows?

Edit #2: Undeployed the MG, couldnt get los. Moved a BAR team in the same action spot, could get LOS. That doesnt seem right.

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It's ironic that we are given this huge "non-realistic" advantage of being able to check LOS to a target from any waypoint. But, then this is taken away since so many times when one's unit actually gets to that waypoint, one's unit actually doesn't have LOS to the desired target.

Ya just gotta learn to live with it. On the whole it's a huge aid to be able to see LOS from a waypoint as it usually works.

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Erwin, I seldom use LOS check thinking the game gives enough advantages, knowing the postion of every door and every hole in hedgerows in advance.

In the mentioned game the MG team was on the march and in the orders phase I checked and they had LOS. I let them stop and deploy and the LOS was gone. Annoying.

The reason I let the MG march forward was that everyone up front did have LOS to that position, but I didnt want to burn squad ammo and had the time to bring the MG up since I was stuck behind the minefield anyway. MG didnt get to fire a single shot. Annoying again.

The enemy abandonde the position without any apparent reason, adding insult to injury.

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LOF (not LOS) for a team with a heavy weapon is drawn, while using the Target Command, using the heavy weapon's precise location. If the BAR gunner sets up in a different place in the Action Spot to where the MG sets up, LOF may be different. You've got vegetation to consider; I'd imagine that's the issue. Crops and bushes are a blighter sometimes.

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We have long asked for a system that automatically shifts MG's (at least) so that the gunner would attempt to get LOS to the target. Currently, if the 3rd ammo carrier can see the target there is usually no way to get the gunner to see and therefore shoot at the target. It may be impractical to program this. But, it is one of the last glaring irritations in the CM2 system. In this regard CM1 works better.

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I agree that it can be very annoying when you have LOS only to find out that you don't have LOF. I'm losing count of the amount of times I've turned the air blue screaming at an MG team for not opening fire. I'll have to try keeping Womble's explanation in the back of my head.

Also, I agree that it did seem to be less of a problem in the original game. I suppose it is just something we will have to work around for the time being.

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I have already stopped to try to keyhole MGs for tasks like covering sunken roads. The "face" command seems to help sometimes but it is too much of a gamble.

The problem I had in this game wasnt with a wrong angle but that the MG couldnt fire down in the "reverse slope" created by a hedgerow.

All I wanted was to get the guys there to keep their heads down so that my scout team could ... ahm scout. I would have been perfectly happy with firing a little high over their cover.

As it was lack of recon cost the neighbouring squad dearly and brought me over the 10% losses limit. :mad:

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All I wanted was to get the guys there to keep their heads down so that my scout team could ... ahm scout.

You may have answered this already, in which case I apologize for bringing it up again, but did you try to area fire the hedgerow itself in front of the bad guys? After a minute or two, you might get enough penetration through the bushes to suppress them.

Michael

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You may have answered this already, in which case I apologize for bringing it up again, but did you try to area fire the hedgerow itself in front of the bad guys? After a minute or two, you might get enough penetration through the bushes to suppress them.

Michael

No didnt try that. I thought firing in front of the hedgerow wouldnt be off much use. Will try it next time, thanks for the hint.

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You may have answered this already, in which case I apologize for bringing it up again, but did you try to area fire the hedgerow itself in front of the bad guys? After a minute or two, you might get enough penetration through the bushes to suppress them.

Michael

I got the impression that the hedgerow berm/AS itself was "Reverse Slope", and hence untargetable. In terms of effect, I'm not sure there that targeting the spot behind the cover actually makes a great deal of difference to targeting the front. I still do it, though, because even if the bullet splashes are all in the same place and the berm's still in the way, it makes it feel like the fire should be more effective, even if, rationally considered, it's probably not.

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I got the impression that the hedgerow berm/AS itself was "Reverse Slope", and hence untargetable. In terms of effect, I'm not sure there that targeting the spot behind the cover actually makes a great deal of difference to targeting the front. I still do it, though, because even if the bullet splashes are all in the same place and the berm's still in the way, it makes it feel like the fire should be more effective, even if, rationally considered, it's probably not.

I get effective suppression by targeting "just" in front of hedgerows. Actually, if you take some time, you can often get the blue line just into the hedge itself.(Whether the game sees that as in the hedge or just in front of it, I don't know.) Relatedly, I rarely use tank main gun on units behind a hedgerow, unless it's an AT gun or another tank. Target Light the hedgerow and you will do yourself and your pixeltruppen a lot more good than a shell blast on this side of the berm (unless you can work the main gun blue line through a gap and to the other side of the berm).

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Must have angered the CM god by complaining. I just set up a HMG this side of a hedgerow and it cant target a single spot on the other side of the hedgerow. :mad:

Visually the MG seems to be perfectly set up on top of the embankment.

Edit: Found the reason. The gunner was cowering. I think that should not prevent from area targeting.

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While doing some testing for the MG effectiveness thread some time ago, I figured that MG area fire, targeted about 1-3 action spots in front of an immobile target, gets actually more bullets from a burst, right INTO the target right behind. Counts the more for german MG34/42, which does a lot of overshooting any target in direct fire mode. Bits of cheating maybe, but I usually get some good results, even for targets, that just got pinned and vanished form direct spotting. Anyway..it´s the only way to get effective fire to a target, that went out of LOS, but is yet assumed to be still in the same AS/area. Tested in scenario author test mode, so I know that it works quite well (all assuming that LOF is possible to desired area fire AS).

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While doing some testing for the MG effectiveness thread some time ago, I figured that MG area fire, targeted about 1-3 action spots in front of an immobile target, gets actually more bullets from a burst, right INTO the target right behind. Counts the more for german MG34/42, which does a lot of overshooting any target in direct fire mode. Bits of cheating maybe, but I usually get some good results, even for targets, that just got pinned and vanished form direct spotting. Anyway..it´s the only way to get effective fire to a target, that went out of LOS, but is yet assumed to be still in the same AS/area. Tested in scenario author test mode, so I know that it works quite well (all assuming that LOF is possible to desired area fire AS).

Cheating? Why isn't the point of area fire to suppress the area? Sounds like it works as intended. :D

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Ah' date=' the cowering gunner. I've had quite a few of them in my ranks too. Haha.[/quote']

Makes me want to court martial them or something. In lack of that possibility I had company HQ sit right beside them.

They were direct firing so effectiv germans left the position 30 sec before the mortars started to fall. Wonder if that was the binos, some moral boost or coincidence.

Great info! Thanks for sharing that.

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