General Combat Mission Tips

[Simcoe]

What's everyone's tips that are universal to Combat Mission (and maybe some that aren't)?

• It's better to use too much support fire on a smaller target than you think you need. Nothing feels worse than using too small of an artillery mission on an AT gun only to see it kill a tank later on. Same thing in urban combat. Better to level a single building than pepper a larger area.
• Play to your strengths. If you're playing a mechanized force with few infantry units stick to open terrain where you have the advantage and avoid forests like the plague
• Targeting arcs are your friend. It took me a long time to realize two guys in a good observation post can be the most powerful tools you have. Also, scouts that fire back are much easier to hit.

[Redwolf]

Just walk all over them with onboard mortars.

[Erwin]

A few items in my CM2 "how to fight to win" bible based on my 15K-20K hours of playing CM2 since 2007: 

In CM2 it's better in nearly all situations to lead with inf scouts to spot the main enemy assets.  Then destroy those assets with arty/mortars and/or ATGM's.  In modern titles, tanks are very vulnerable to ATGM's.  So you need to spot and kill the ATGM's first.  Only then commit tanks to mop up.  Of course this assumes that the designer has given the player the required units.  (Sometime designers deliberately give one inappropriate units to make the game challenging.)

Be aware that tanks have a supernatural ability to spot inf sneaking up on them - even in bad visibility.  A buttoned up tank can spot and kill 1 and 2-man teams 100 meters away in a blizzard(!).  Even when blanketed by smoke, a tank will still see and react to an inf unit creeping up to its rear.  A common tactic that works maybe half the time is to run at the tank and hope that one can get inside the tanks tactical AI decision loop.

In modern titles a team with a rifle-mounted thermal scope is as good as an expensive Javelin launcher at spotting enemy units at long (2,500m+) ranges, (and is better than FO's even with their expensive tech).

Trees are virtually indestructible.  Site your tanks immediately behind a tree (facing a suspect enemy) and any incoming rounds will impact on the tree and leave your tank/IFV unaffected.

Arty is surprisingly ineffective vs inf - unless perhaps you catch inf out in the open and have heavy arty.   If inf is in buildings even 105mm causes very few if any casualties.  One has to demolish a building to have a big effect.  (Arty does hinder inf moving between buildings.)

[chuckdyke]

5 minutes ago, Erwin said:

Trees are virtually indestructible.  Site your tanks immediately behind a tree

Check the tile it is on. This needs to be tested or the tree is the culprit or the tile. I find infantry scouts spot AFV's and the like but not other infantry. 

 

12 minutes ago, Erwin said:

One has to demolish a building to have a big effect. 

I think this sucks, an 81 mm mortar should go through rooftiles and explode inside a building.

[MikeyD]

Two things I've said often.

1) Play the game as though that's you down in the wheat field approaching that suspicious copse of trees.

2) If your strategy is reliant on the opponent being blind, slow and bad shots you're probably going to lose.

[chuckdyke]

Mission: Understand the 'Mission'.

Enemy:  the V key to get the enemy's point of view.

Troops: See which is + which is - they both have their uses. Support elements Artillery and Armour. Veteran and above I think spot better.

Terrain: Check eye level where the dead ground is. The less obvious the better. Walls, trees. bushes , buildings is what the enemy is using as references.

Time: Use it properly or you lose it.

Civilians: Find military targets.  It pays to use your ammunition where you have not only full icon contact but fresh tentative contacts too.  

[A Canadian Cat]

My two bits of best advice:

• Target arcs are your enemy. Using them inappropriately leads to your units getting killed without doing anything. Their purpose is to prevent firing so only use them for scouts and observers that you don't want spotted. Otherwise just don't do it.
• Use the terrain. Read this: https://battledrill.blogspot.com/2015/11/mett-t-analysis.html or any of @Bil Hardenberger's AARs. Even if you don't write things down or go as deep as Bil doing any part of METT will make you a better player and you will quickly realize you should be doing it all every damn time.

[Erwin]

35 minutes ago, IanL said:

Target arcs are your enemy. Using them inappropriately leads to your units getting killed without doing anything. Their purpose is to prevent firing so only use them for scouts and observers that you don't want spotted. Otherwise just don't do it.

Agreed for inf.  However, for turreted vehicles covered arcs are very important.  If the gun is already pointing towards an enemy, it will see and shoot quicker than if it has to rotate the turret.

[Bil Hardenberger]

1 hour ago, IanL said:

• Use the terrain. Read this: https://battledrill.blogspot.com/2015/11/mett-t-analysis.html or any of @Bil Hardenberger's AARs. Even if you don't write things down or go as deep as Bil doing any part of METT will make you a better player and you will quickly realize you should be doing it all every damn time.

Highly recommend that every player practice at least a rudimentary METT-T analysis at the start of any game.  Even a one liner on each component of METT-T will at least make you stop and think about your situation in the way a real commander does.

By the way, the post that Ian linked continues to be the most popular post on my blog of all time. 

[Redwolf]

13 minutes ago, Bil Hardenberger said:

Highly recommend that every player practice at least a rudimentary METT-T analysis at the start of any game.

 

But that is what the enemy expects you to do!

[The_Capt]

17 minutes ago, Bil Hardenberger said:

Highly recommend that every player practice at least a rudimentary METT-T analysis at the start of any game.  Even a one liner on each component of METT-T will at least make you stop and think about your situation in the way a real commander does.

By the way, the post that Ian linked continues to be the most popular post on my blog of all time. 

And I am posting a link to how it is really done.

 

[Ultradave]

I had to go back and re-read this. It's a classic of analysis

Dave

[OnWargaming]

15 hours ago, Bil Hardenberger said:

Highly recommend that every player practice at least a rudimentary METT-T analysis at the start of any game.  Even a one liner on each component of METT-T will at least make you stop and think about your situation in the way a real commander does.

By the way, the post that Ian linked continues to be the most popular post on my blog of all time. 

Your blog is amazing, thanks for running it!

Waiting new entries! 

 

 

[alogie]

I find Bill's gridded terrain essential for a decent terrain analysis. It may be just my eyes, but I find it very difficult to assess terrain without the grid.

[Heirloom_Tomato]

On 11/30/2021 at 11:57 AM, The_Capt said:

And I am posting a link to how it is really done.

 

I like to picture you out in the field, with your Company gathered all around, and you giving an official briefing with pictures like this. 

Edit to add: I have been reading some of the official WW2 diaries of Canadian army units and there are some hand drawn maps in them not too far off of what you drew.

Edited December 1, 2021 by Heirloom_Tomato
More details

[The_Capt]

1 hour ago, Heirloom_Tomato said:

I have been reading some of the official WW2 diaries of Canadian army units and there are some hand drawn maps in them not too far off of what you drew.

And haven't progress much beyond this in the field.  I have been told that 3d hologram battle boards are on the way but until then "the coffee cup is the objective.."

[Ultradave]

My luxury I took for fire planning was a homemade, hinged, plexiglass cover "clipboard" for lack of a better word. It was square, folded map goes inside, grease pencil plans drawn on the plexiglass cover, useful for briefings in the field - as  FIST Chief for the Co Cdr, but more useful in the Bde TOC for planning when I was a Brigade FSO. Depending on what we were doing, sometimes the Bde TOC was a tented site, other times it was a dozen of us huddled under some trees.

Lots of "sand tables" - clump of grass representing treelines, dirt hills.  Pretty rudimentary and quick and easy stuff. This was before the days of GPS, anything digital of any kind. 

Dave

[Sgt.Squarehead]

20 hours ago, Ultradave said:

Lots of "sand tables" - clump of grass representing treelines, dirt hills.  Pretty rudimentary and quick and easy stuff. This was before the days of GPS, anything digital of any kind.

I suspect it'll be back in the future, just as soon as both sides figure out who really owns their software and exactly what it's actually doing. 

PS - Just discovered something kind of fun while making this post, purely by accident.....CM:A appears to queue sound files at mission start and Alt+Tabbing out appears to pause the playlist.  I had made a screenshot of my TacMap for another thread and when I jumped back into my scenario I was greeted with a resounding cheer from my Mujahideen! 

PPS - At least I think they were cheering..... 

Edited December 2, 2021 by Sgt.Squarehead

[SimpleSimon]

Ask far less of your rifle infantry than you think you should and far more of your support assets in return. Send bullets first and men afterwards. 

Always conduct proper screening too. You don't have to deploy to fight pitched battles against every threat-but try to determine when a fight is really necessary. Plenty of enemies in plenty of locations on maps literally aren't worth your time or blood and should just be left for follow on troops. Divide and conquer. Enemies who flee into a forest or the back of a house not in your path might as well be on Venus. They're out of play. Keep them that way. 

[Codreanu]

If you've spotted an anti-tank gun or machinegun team, keep them under fire until you actually see that the gun has been abandoned. Nothing is worse than having an MG open up on your men out in the open after you stopped shooting at it because you thought you had knocked it out.

[chuckdyke]

4 minutes ago, Codreanu said:

you thought you had knocked it out.

You must have a visual which says knocked out or abandoned. Even on Iron it shows this when you have a full contact. On WeGo replay every time there is an exchange of fire. 

[KGBoy]

On 11/30/2021 at 11:57 AM, The_Capt said:

And I am posting a link to how it is really done.

 

Thanks for the IAR @The_Capt! Mucho appreciated.