campaign [Released] The Lions of Carpiquet - A CMBN Campaign

[Ithikial_AU]

Fancy fighting some big battles in Normandy?

Your Mission
The Canadian 8th Brigade is tasked with taking Carpiquet and the adjacent airfield. The 12SS Panzer Division stands in their way. Carpiquet is a fortress. Take command of a reinforced Canadian Infantry Brigade and crack the German defenses to the west of Caen.
- For those who love big battles.
- Lots of chances to use the Vehicle Pack 'Toys'.
- Perhaps the most explosions you'll see in one battle.

Included in this download:
• The Campaign File – Copy this into the “Campaign” folder of your CMBN directory.
• A ‘z’ folder – Contains compulsory mods that are already mod tagged and ready to go. If you do not copy this folder to your existing mod folder the maps will look really silly!
• Operation Windsor – The Overlooked Battle – A scenario ‘history’ document outlining my final thoughts on the battle and the concessions I had to make in designing this campaign. SPOILER FILLED! The Scenario designer notes if you will. This is a separate document so the in game briefing field can be spoiler free.
• 4 x blank Master Maps
• Northern Map covering the village and northern approach.
• Southern Map covering the southern hangers, airfield and eastern control buildings.
• ‘Clean’ and ‘Damaged’ versions of each.


Many thanks to the following community members for providing feedback for the early release version.
Mad Mike - FGM
David Harding-Smith
“Jofontaine”

And also a special thanks to Rambler - FGM, for making the briefings that little bit special and coming up with the title card theme.

Requirements
• Combat Mission Battle for Normandy;
• Commonwealth Module;
• Market Garden Module;
• Vehicle Pack;
• Upgraded and updated to at least version 3.11; and
• A beefy enough computer that can run battalion plus sized battles.

 

Grab a Copy
http://www.thefewgoodmen.com/tsd3/c...-battles-for-normandy/the-lions-of-carpiquet/

Edited January 14, 2016 by Ithikial_AU

[rocketman]

Thanks for making it - look forward to giving it a go.

Just need time for a big campaign in my gaming schedule.

[Big Boss]

I will play this as soon as I get the time over, look beautiful and sometimes its fun with lots of explosions. 

[verulam]

Thanks for this just finished the first mission, very well done.

[rocketman]

Started the campaign today. The start of the second mission is now probably one of my all time favourite CM-moments. Now I truly understand why soldiers suffered from "shell shock". Spectacular and frightening at the same time.

[Ithikial_AU]

Started the campaign today. The start of the second mission is now probably one of my all time favourite CM-moments. Now I truly understand why soldiers suffered from "shell shock". Spectacular and frightening at the same time.

Cheers, glad you liked it and followed the briefing. Look at pics from Carpiquet on the web after the battle and you can see that there wasn't much left.

[rocketman]

It's not everyday you bring down parts of a cathedral

Can you recommend any sources/books so I can read more about the campaign?

[Ithikial_AU]

A good start...

http://www.amazon.ca/Breakout-Juno-Canadian-Normandy-Campaign/dp/1771000678/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1455018965&sr=1-5&keywords=mark+zuehlke

The final book in his Canadian Army in Normandy trilogy though Carpiquet only gets a about two chapters.

For the Germans

https://books.google.com.au/books?id=zAbDS7uLVIMC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Hubert+Meyer&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiFgt2C0urKAhUMm5QKHRV-A28Q6AEIIzAB#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

It's a start. The PDF doco in the download pack has some more titles and my thoughts on the battle. (Spoilers)

 

[Splinty]

Just started this a couple of days ago. I am about 30 minutes into the second battle. I am thoroughly enjoying myself. Thanks for all the effort you put into creating this gem.

[iluvmy88]

Er mah Gerd i didnt even know you released this, watched all your videos and couldnt wait for the final product.

on a side note that AT bunker made me cringe as the guy way standing behind the breach lol.

me making the mistake (it wasnt really it was awesome) of finger poping a paladin. and the after math

[Ithikial_AU]

Cheers guys.

[landser]

Ithikial, I started this campaign and played the first mission no problems. I began the second mission, plotted the pre-planned arty and CM crashes when clicking the button. I have the included mods installed. Version 3.11, I have MG and CW as well as the vehicle pack. Is it possible to give an FO too many fire missions? Any ideas what could be the cause? Did all of that artillery kill every single enemy and the computer just couldn't believe it ?

And also, in the briefing you mention that the player will get a second crack at most attack missions. In the event of a second crack are you back to the start positions, or do you keep your territorial gains?

 

Edited March 24, 2016 by landser

[Ithikial_AU]

2 hours ago, landser said:

Ithikial, I started this campaign and played the first mission no problems. I began the second mission, plotted the pre-planned arty and CM crashes when clicking the button. I have the included mods installed. Version 3.11, I have MG and CW as well as the vehicle pack. Is it possible to give an FO too many fire missions? Any ideas what could be the cause? Did all of that artillery kill every single enemy and the computer just couldn't believe it ?

And also, in the briefing you mention that the player will get a second crack at most attack missions. In the event of a second crack are you back to the start positions, or do you keep your territorial gains?

 

Yeah bumped into this problem a few months ago as someone else hit the same problem. For them it was a corrupted save between missions 1 and 2. Unfortunately you'll need to start again, but luckily mission 1 is generally a quick affair. Never heard of an FO having too many fire missions during deployment but wouldn't hurt spreading them out. Worth a shot.

The second crack at the attack missions you will be a little forward from your current starting positions on both occaisions. Don't be sared if you are forced down this route either here or in Mission 3, as this is the true to history pathway for the campaign. If you fail mission 2, the second attempt is actually pretty fun with lots of Vehicle Pack toys. Best piece of advice I can give for Mission 2 is take your time and preserve the forces you receive in this mission trying to take the village. They'll be with you to the very end of the campaign.

[landser]

Thanks, I'll give it another go. The opening mission only took about 15 minutes so no worries. And thanks for answering the second question too. Looking forward to playing through your campaign. Thanks for creating it.

[landser]

Still crashing. So I replayed the first mission, and loaded the second and without issuing any orders just clicked the button to see if it would work and it did, the turn played out no problem. So I reload and issue orders and it crashes when attempting to begin the turn. So it seems to have something to do with the orders I am issuing perhaps?

Those orders are essentially move and covered arcs for half of the troops with quite a few pre-planned fire missions of course, this time spread out among the various platoon leaders and F/Os.

[Ithikial_AU]

45 minutes ago, landser said:

Still crashing. So I replayed the first mission, and loaded the second and without issuing any orders just clicked the button to see if it would work and it did, the turn played out no problem. So I reload and issue orders and it crashes when attempting to begin the turn. So it seems to have something to do with the orders I am issuing perhaps?

Those orders are essentially move and covered arcs for half of the troops with quite a few pre-planned fire missions of course, this time spread out among the various platoon leaders and F/Os.

Silly question, how powerful is your PC/Mac?

That first process for the fire missions takes a little bit. Perhaps hold off on the cover arcs. Just hope something in the 3.12 update hasn't don't something.

[landser]

This is a laptop. Specs are

 

 i7 4700 MQ

16 GB Ram

nVidia 780M

1TB SSD

Win 7 Pro

[Ithikial_AU]

Mmmm should be fine.

Anyone else having this problem with the latest CMBN version?

[rocketman]

I'm in the final third of the second mission and no problems, but a bit sluggish. Have similar specs but win 10 and a 970M card.

[landser]

I'll try again, but only issue the pre-planned artillery strikes and see what happens.

The first mission recon makes it quite obvious where the main effort should be and I wanted to get my troops shifted in that direction from the start, but I'll see what happens if I wait a turn to get them moving.

 

And as mentioned earlier, I'm on 3.11.

Edited March 26, 2016 by landser

[Ithikial_AU]

5 minutes ago, landser said:

And as mentioned earlier, I'm on 3.11.

That's the version the campaign was made in so cross that one off the possible fault list.

[Anthony P.]

Got an issue in the second mission (Where are the f***ing tanks?). The bunker outpost: After much sweat and blood to fight my way inside, my PIAT teams absolutely refuse to target the bunkers. I suspect this has something to do with the tanks that I spotted around the time they stopped engaging the bunkers.

[Ithikial_AU]

2 hours ago, Anthony P. said:

Got an issue in the second mission (Where are the f***ing tanks?). The bunker outpost: After much sweat and blood to fight my way inside, my PIAT teams absolutely refuse to target the bunkers. I suspect this has something to do with the tanks that I spotted around the time they stopped engaging the bunkers.

Scenario designers can't program the target logic of the individual soldiers so it's something in the game itself about when soldiers will or will not use their PIATs and other equipment. But keep going. Another solution for those bunkers will present itself. But if you want to be quick about it, and you feel it safe to do so, there is nothing stopping you from getting up close with grenades.

As I'm pretty sure I mentioned in my included notes, the southern attack was in my opinion a badly organised disaster that cost the Canadians total victory at the end of the day. The expectations on this weaker southern force were expected to do was simply too great. The whole first phase of Windsor at dawn on the 4th of July seemed to just toss all the lessons of combined arms warfare out the window and expect the infantry to carry the day.

[Anthony P.]

Ah yes, seen. Other means do work quite well!

Problem I have with grenades is just that they're so darn unreliable in killing pillboxes. Sometimes you get a freak grenade that destroys it all by itself, but mostly I seem to have my Tommies throw dozens to no effect.

Really liking the campaign so far, even though it's incredibly exhausting to just organize companies. Think I spent more time rallying scattered squads, platoons, officers, etc. than I spent fighting in the first mission! 

 

Edit: Good thing I mentioned the mission name, since I got the number wrong. I'm talking of the 3rd mission of course, it's easy to forget the tiny recce mission that started the campaign when you've spent hours organizing a thousand wildly scattered Canadians!

Edited May 18, 2016 by Anthony P.

[Ithikial_AU]

4 hours ago, Anthony P. said:

Edit: Good thing I mentioned the mission name, since I got the number wrong. I'm talking of the 3rd mission of course, it's easy to forget the tiny recce mission that started the campaign when you've spent hours organizing a thousand wildly scattered Canadians!

Yeah usual problem. 'Mission 0' is essentially just a check to see if you get early warning about a certain something in the big fight coming up. The Canadians knew roughly what they were up against going into the fight after overlooking the airfield for some time prior to July 4. I wanted to give the player some game like opportunity to have the same intel before going in.