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Soviet Infantry Battalion Attack


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Generally I agree with @SimpleSimon  Excepting that I did win it on my first go. It was years ago but I recall moving my entire force up a board edge for most of the playtime and then coming in on the objectives. It wasn't fun and frankly I would have enjoyed having an artillery barrage far more as there would at least have been eye candy. Really the worst part is that Soviet assault tactics are actually quite interesting and playing them out would be an enjoyable challenge. Not least of which because most players will not have carried out an attack like that while playing CM.

I did not complete the campaign, making it to the fourth or fifth mission, but generally the whole experience reinforces my dislike for the CMx2 campaign system.

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On 6/15/2020 at 10:07 PM, com-intern said:

Excepting that I did win it on my first go. It was years ago but I recall moving my entire force up a board edge for most of the playtime and then coming in on the objectives.

Bingo. Cheesing map edges enabled you to win in the first round. That's a way to play, but it's not doctrinal or in spirit of the game. If you had tried to play doctrinally as many would be inclined to the mission was going to be murderous and this is the first mission in the campaign. Can't ask the player to think out-of-the-box before they've had a chance to even see the box. Can't run before you walk, etc. Simpler explanation to me is just that the scenario designer just didn't know what he was doing, and based his scenario design on an ugly Cold War stereotype. 

You might be able to achieve victory in the scenario by pooling your machine guns and SU-76s together....but this force is extremely fragile and its fire supremacy could easily be lost to any single one of the threats it's facing on the map. You're virtually bound to lose half of the assault guns to bogging and mines they can't avoid. If you leave them behind to skirt the forests then they're out of play entirely. One of map's three entrenched Pak 40s could stop every one of them and the Pak40s can see most of the map. This attack is just insanely fragile to me that it's totally not doctrinal for the Red Army and completely out of character. If it's not a serious attack then you'd have far more modest objectives, and the engineers and assault guns wouldn't be present at all. They'd be supporting the main attack somewhere else. The briefing and objectives are clear that this is an assault and you are expected to achieve your assignment but you're given a fraction of the tools necessary to achieve this. Your force resembles a Task Force or a Combat Command not the Red Army. The attack just doesn't make sense to me, it looks like it was planned by...well...an American. 

I personally like modding the scenario with tons of artillery, more assault guns etc because that's me. I want to be the star of the show and I want my attack to be the real one. There's a credible way to mod this scenario without turning it into a major offensive that is completely doctrinal for the Red Army though. Make objective line 1, the line immediately across the river a Victory objective. All you're doing is pressuring the German defense then. Tying down 200 men with your 600 is not efficient but the Red Army has no shortage of men the Germans do so just by getting your force across the river intact you've achieved your objective. You're contributing a lot to the People's Victory by simply pressuring the German defense. Slap that cease fire and move on to the next scenario.

If you're really plucky and don't care much for the importance of following orders in the Red Army you can press onwards for that Total Victory you want by reaching the touch-lines on the rest of the map. This is risky, you're not following orders now and don't have a lot of support. If it was me i'd dispense with most of my force and concentrate on getting platoon size groups between weaker sections of the German defense. Unlike the original scenario you are penalized for losing the Motherland's valuable manpower resources however, so the risks are quite high and the overall reward is just a better victory endorsement ya know? You can do it but your superiors would be less pleased than you might think. If you get bitten next time trust the briefing, execute your tasks as assigned from now on Comrade. 

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I wonder if there's a way to contact JasonC? The way he talks sounds like he had a formal military education and had access to the documents we can't get on the internet. 

He was on odd guy. I don't think he was banned per se? He just sort of left. Everything he got sounds conspicuously to me like it came from Zaloga's Red Army Handbook which is available digitally on Amazon. Some other stuff came from the Osprey series books. He might have some texts or such in his man-cave that haven't been digitized or are out-of-print...but most of the best stuff on the Red Army is recent. Much of the 1970s texts and earlier are not usually in good faith, and frequently anchor their entire narrative on...German accounts.

One thing I agree with him about though? Commanders who justify attacks by excusing heavy casualties as "planned" are in fact excusing their own ineptitude. They wouldn't last long at the front. They'd be removed and given an administrative position before long...if they didn't mysteriously turn up dead in a ditch somewhere first. By 1945 the only men in the world who associated victory with lots of their own troops being dead were the Nazis and Japanese Empire. 

 

 

Edited by SimpleSimon
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Agreed...  Your criticisms are valid regarding not always being able to use RL tactics to achieve objectives, rather one has to learn to play vs the game system.  But, that is true of pretty much all COTS wargames. 

The comments I made earlier are about helping players win missions they find hard/impossible and still have some fun (hopefully).  I have rarely found that slavishly following accurate doctrine works that well in CM.  Unless one is spending many millions on a pro simulation that requires dozens or hundreds of techs to supervise one won't achieve the high level of fidelity that some may be looking for.

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Yes, @JasonC left here of his own volition around 2015.  He still posts regularly on a variety of boardgames and historical topics over at BGG.

I don't recall him citing Zaloga much, but a great deal of Glantz.

I got a lot of value from his stuff personally, although I've been at the pointy end of his lovable manner too. But then, I'm also married to a know-it-all, so that all doesn't bother me so much.

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Yea I always enjoyed JasonC's posts. I don't mind people being fiery as long as they are posting good content. Too often you don't get that combination but JasonC would call you an idiot and then layout in detail why you were one which is valuable in a lot of ways. In the discussion on tank gun damage I would be interested to see his input for example.


 

On 6/17/2020 at 9:41 AM, Erwin said:

The comments I made earlier are about helping players win missions they find hard/impossible and still have some fun (hopefully).  I have rarely found that slavishly following accurate doctrine works that well in CM.  Unless one is spending many millions on a pro simulation that requires dozens or hundreds of techs to supervise one won't achieve the high level of fidelity that some may be looking for.


From my perspective I don't necessarily want to (or always) follow doctrine to the the nth degree but playing out a scenario in a way that is close enough to doctrine can definitely be enjoyable. I recently finished Glantz's Leningrad book and recall a passage describing a Soviet assault where essentially had a rolling barrage ~200 meters (maybe 300m) in front of the infantry. The logic being that yes you are going to lose men to short rounds but this allowed the men to be on top of the Germans as the barrage passed over.

I wouldn't want every scenario I play to be that sort of attack but it would be interesting to mess around with it in a scenario or two. And for my money I'd kinda  prefer the campaigns to be a bit more generic in their scenario structure. Too often I feel like they try to throw curveballs at you and while I don't mind that in one-off scenarios I find it quite annoying in the context of a campaign. Which getting back to the Soviet campaign in Red Thunder I felt that too many of the scenarios were not giving you adequate equipment to complete them in a reasonable fashion.

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46 minutes ago, com-intern said:

I don't necessarily want to (or always) follow doctrine to the the nth degree but playing out a scenario in a way that is close enough to doctrine can definitely be enjoyable.

Yes, understood and agreed.  We do have to appreciate that the CM2 system is a brilliant effort given the small BF team and budget, but as a result there are many issues that would be nice to have resolved/improved.

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40 minutes ago, com-intern said:

JasonC would call you an idiot and then layout in detail why you were one which is valuable in a lot of ways. In the discussion on tank gun damage I would be interested to see his input for example.

But that kind of very 'micro' technical topic is actually where "His JasonC" was at his weakest, and often made enemies here when challenged by insisting his Word be taken on faith, usually without troubling to cite sources.

He has a extraordinary macroeconomic mind (Chicago school, works in very big brain OR), and so he was at his best in macro 'rack and stack' types of evaluations of men against fire over time, IMHO. Hence, tactics, operations and strategy.  And at no time did I ever get a sense of him regurgitating Osprey books.

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10 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:

But that kind of very 'micro' technical topic is actually where "His JasonC" was at his weakest, and often made enemies here when challenged by insisting his Word be taken on faith, usually without troubling to cite sources.

He has a extraordinary macroeconomic mind (Chicago school, works in very big brain OR), and so he was at his best in macro 'rack and stack' types of evaluations of men against fire over time, IMHO. Hence, tactics, operations and strategy.  And at no time did I ever get a sense of him regurgitating Osprey books.

Operations Research? That is big brain indeed. 

I thought his knowledge was a great database for a forum like this. Also, I like 'hard' discussion with direct to the point language. Although I think this is not a 'hard talk' forum ;-).

Iirc he also had a habit of making things personal/insulting, when he felt the need for it. Being quite a temperament myself I remember some incoming fire, too which I responded in kind. Guess a forum isn't really a good place for such outbursts. ;-).

Anyway, a decade orso later I've experienced my own adventures regarding stress, chances are the extraordinaire reactions came forth from such issues.

I remember him for his knowledge about USSR operational art first, his bullsh1t secondary. 

 

 

 

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Imo one thing we like to forget at times, is that doctrine is just doctrine. Armed forces always try to have forces conduct according to doctrine, which isn't always 100% successful (be it for the better or for the worse).

Around Bagration I'd expect quite some of the USSR soldiers having enough experience with success that they'd add their own sauce over doctrine. Probably some of the sauce which helped them survive until then. People are people, human ingenuity is everywhere. 

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20 hours ago, LongLeftFlank said:

But that kind of very 'micro' technical topic is actually where "His JasonC" was at his weakest, and often made enemies here when challenged by insisting his Word be taken on faith, usually without troubling to cite sources.

He has a extraordinary macroeconomic mind (Chicago school, works in very big brain OR), and so he was at his best in macro 'rack and stack' types of evaluations of men against fire over time, IMHO. Hence, tactics, operations and strategy.  And at no time did I ever get a sense of him regurgitating Osprey books.

Some of the Osprey books have been written by Zaloga or Robert Forczyk. The trouble with those books is that their overall quality sort of runs the gamut and your mileage will vary considerably with a lot of them. I suspect JasonC had a trove of sources "in the man cave" etc many of which are out of print. Crucial thing to me is that he generally went beyond rote spouting of knowledge and would come to understandings of subjects. Hence the "macroeconomic mind" or abstract thinking. His posts are quality overall, thorny side notwithstanding. 

For those curious though Beevor, Glantz, Forczyk, Zaloga, Tooze, Shigeru Mizuki, and Lizzie Collingham are usually the authors "behind" my understanding of the history.

To a slightly lesser extent Norman Friedman (naval subjects not directly applicable to CM) William L Shirer (journalist who wrote a comprehensive but weakly researched single volume account of Nazi Germany's history) and Erwin Rommel (Lucid as an author but problematic as he likes to embellish his experiences a lot. Guderian's accounts have the same problem.). 

Ya know Rise and Fall of the Third Reich is an interesting book nowadays. It was written by a journalist not an academic, and as a result it's more like a novel or a drama than a history. It is rather comprehensive and Shirer lived in the time and sort of captures the "spirit" of the years in his work in a way a technocrat certainly won't or will even deliberately try to avoid. It's colorful and emotive ya know? Which is probably why it still finds circulation in spite of its bad research and questionable assertions. Some of Shirer's views on race and homophobia though are hmmm more than a little problematic.

 His second book Collapse of the Third Republic was actually way better though and Forczyk pointed out that prior to his own book it was the only English-text in the west that made any effort to present a narrative of the Battle of France after the Dunkerque evacuation. I found it's opening third summarizing the history of the Third Republic very important for contextualizing pre-war France in a way that changed my understanding of the whole country. It didn't go enough into the First World War, but that would've considerably widened the scope of that book and probably ended up being a big distraction. It's still a bit of a melodrama but zeitgeist is a thing easily lost to purely technical analysis of things like Army doctrine and Krupp Face-Hardened Armor ya know. Just...mind the homophobia. 

Hell...what was this topic about again? 😬

Edited by SimpleSimon
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Really I would be interested in his macro view of the topic because something like gun hits is really only going to get resolved by pulling out vehicle loss (or hit) data. And I have a vague memory of JasonC having access to that sort information. Although at this point my memory of most of his posts is quite cloudy.


I've been reading quite a bit of Glantz and just got the second volume of the Stalingrad series in. Its a monster. I may be incorrect but I've gotten the generally feeling that Glantz has superceded Zologa as far as Eastern content goes?

I've also been trying to pick up some more books detailing specific units/battles as I feel that sort of info is more pertinent to the Company/Battalion scale of CM. Although unlike the operational stuff its harder to pin down quality books and authors. For example, if you are interested in the history of the Eastern Front at an operational scale you will be served well by just buying up anything Glantz has written on the topic. Its not all perfect but you are definitely in the ballpark. Whereas as you go to more granular detail authors tend to be far more specific. Stephan Hamilton, for example, wrote the excellent Bloody Streets which I just got in the mail a few weeks ago but has apparently only written one other book on the Oder Front.

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JasonC regularly posts on Boardgamegeek. He is into tabletop wargames these days, mostly the operational kind I think. Just register there and try contacting him, he'll probably reply. He has a rare quality : he is incredibly knowledgeable AND actually enjoys sharing what he knows.

Sure he was abrasive, didn't play nice with others, was blunt, didn't suffer fools gladly and would call you an imbecile at the drop of a hat. Yet he possessed incredible insights on military history and tactics and the forum was a lot more interesting when he was around.

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3 hours ago, com-intern said:

I've also been trying to pick up some more books detailing specific units/battles as I feel that sort of info is more pertinent to the Company/Battalion scale of CM. Although unlike the operational stuff its harder to pin down quality books and authors.

Norbert Számvéber's books are really good sources for a lot of what's happening in 1945. In Hungary, for the most part. Well researched, well formatted, and informative at the scale needed for this work.

There's another Hamilton book- out of print, but good for this level of information.

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13 hours ago, com-intern said:

I've been reading quite a bit of Glantz and just got the second volume of the Stalingrad series in. Its a monster. 

To have something to read during my holiday i just ordered the entire Stalingrad series last week...they should arrive any day now 😎...

Are they simular in style to his Barbarossa derailed series ?

 

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On 6/20/2020 at 6:11 AM, RepsolCBR said:

To have something to read during my holiday i just ordered the entire Stalingrad series last week...they should arrive any day now 😎...

Are they simular in style to his Barbarossa derailed series ?

 

Unfortunately I've not read Barbarossa Derailed but do have his Leningrad book and so far they are similar.

@benpark

I thought I recognized that name and it turns out I have his Waffen SS in Normandy book. I'm enjoying it but I will say that (and in my experience this is a common issue) you almost need to print out maps to have on hand or spend significant time internalizing the operation area. The attached map book in Bloody Streets is one of my favorite features.

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I find Soviet Doctrine endlessly fascinating. There have been many great posts here over the years, dating back to CMBB that I wish were condensed into a PDF. The various Osprey Elite books on tactics are good reads as well. I wish I could contribute more to this thread but I'm a little tied up right now. What I will say is that the Soviet military in 1944 was a formidable fighting machine and there is a great satisfaction to learning and implementing their doctrine and tactics. I'm eagerly awaiting Fire and Rubble so I can conduct mass pre-planned fires, attack limited objectives in echelon and skillfully (I hope) use the battalion support weapons to execute the mission. 

There are many posters here that I could swear are professional military historians or went to staff college and I'm glad that they keep contributing. 

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On 6/19/2020 at 1:01 AM, LongLeftFlank said:

He has a extraordinary macroeconomic mind (Chicago school, works in very big brain OR), and so he was at his best in macro 'rack and stack' types of evaluations of men against fire over time, IMHO. Hence, tactics, operations and strategy.  And at no time did I ever get a sense of him regurgitating Osprey books.

Ha, and here is JasonC in classic form over at BGG, "racking and stacking" a thesis on the Roman debacle at Cannae.

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On 6/19/2020 at 11:22 PM, com-intern said:

I've also been trying to pick up some more books detailing specific units/battles as I feel that sort of info is more pertinent to the Company/Battalion scale of CM. Although unlike the operational stuff its harder to pin down quality books and authors. For example, if you are interested in the history of the Eastern Front at an operational scale you will be served well by just buying up anything Glantz has written on the topic. Its not all perfect but you are definitely in the ballpark. Whereas as you go to more granular detail authors tend to be far more specific. Stephan Hamilton, for example, wrote the excellent Bloody Streets which I just got in the mail a few weeks ago but has apparently only written one other book on the Oder Front.

You could try Jason D Mark's, Island of Fire, it was recently re-released. Half way through it switches and provides more detail from the Soviet perspective at the level you are looking for. Bloody Streets looks good.

On 6/20/2020 at 3:13 AM, benpark said:

Norbert Számvéber's books are really good sources for a lot of what's happening in 1945. In Hungary, for the most part. Well researched, well formatted, and informative at the scale needed for this work.

Thanks, it available cheap on Kindle at the moment.

On 6/20/2020 at 1:11 PM, RepsolCBR said:

To have something to read during my holiday i just ordered the entire Stalingrad series last week...they should arrive any day now 😎...

Are they simular in style to his Barbarossa derailed series ?

Yes, similar format. You have a LOT of reading to do. 😃 The books are massive. Watch out for book 3 is split into two parts/books, I was caught out by this. Some good third party maps and/or a magnifying glass are useful. There was a website that I used that had all of the Wehrmacht maps day by day but they seem to have taken them all down.

Edited by Hardradi
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3 hours ago, Hardradi said:

Some good third party maps and/or a magnifying glass are useful. 

Yepp...the maps where a dissapointment in the 'derailed' books...very difficult to read...i guess i can expect the same here...

There is a 4th volume in the 'derailed' series with better, colour maps i belive...i might buy it some day...having good maps would be nice...

 

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