AT Guns

[CanuckGamer]

AT guns are extremely vulnerable in all of the CM WW2 games.  They always get spotted by tanks and then get taken out in seconds.  Even 88 mm AT guns because the scale of the maps don't allow them to use their longer range.  If I can take out one tank at the cost of one AT gun I consider it a success.  I'm wondering how other players handle their AT guns?  Do you give them a hide command and hope they get off the first shot?  What suprises me is how easily they are spotted.

[Redwolf]

I don't mind how easy they are to kill in open ground.

What nags me is how useless foxholes and trenches are in CMx2 for protection, and even have a negative effect on being spotted.

[Vanir Ausf B]

Trenches actually reduce the distance at which AT guns can be spotted. It's not a huge amount, maybe 10-15%. 88s are too big to hide unless you have a really big map. You'll have to keyhole them instead.

AT guns can be surprisingly resilient at times, and the AI struggles to hit them on hill crests.

[Codreanu]

My experience has generally been the complete opposite. More often than not I see AT guns still fighting it out even with only 2 crewmen left alive and are more or less invisible until they fire. I've seen 88s take multiple direct hits from high caliber HE shells and not kill a single crewmember. My advice would be to use them in keyhole positions if possible, their maneuverability is practically zero so they should be used as area denial weapons, force the enemy to expend more resources to maneuver around you, opening him up to crossfire from more AT guns if possible, or force him to expend more resources to take you out. Much easier said than done of course, but proper positioning is 99% of proper AT gun usage, make yourself as difficult as possible for the enemy to take out while still being in a position to cover important ground.

[Redwolf]

25 minutes ago, Vanir Ausf B said:

Trenches actually reduce the distance at which AT guns can be spotted. It's not a huge amount, maybe 10-15%.

Yeah, but the trench itself can be spotted farther out than the gun without a trench. Bad when playing human opponents.

[Vanir Ausf B]

It's been some years since I tested this, but IIRC trenches can only be spotted at ranges at which the gun would be spotted regardless. I don't recall ever seeing a trench spotted but the gun not.

[Redwolf]

1 hour ago, Vanir Ausf B said:

It's been some years since I tested this, but IIRC trenches can only be spotted at ranges at which the gun would be spotted regardless. I don't recall ever seeing a trench spotted but the gun not.

No, I just tried. Approaching 3x Pak40 in open ground, foxhole and trench the trench gets spotted first.

[Vanir Ausf B]

What range?

[Vanir Ausf B]

Ok, you're right. The Pak 40s are spotted at 200 meters but the trenches are spotted at 300m.

But the Paks get spotted at 400m without trenches so they still come out ahead.

[Bulletpoint]

11 hours ago, CanuckGamer said:

If I can take out one tank at the cost of one AT gun I consider it a success.

Points-wise, it's a success. Even cheap tanks like the Sherman are around twice the points of a Pak-40.

[Bulletpoint]

10 hours ago, Codreanu said:

More often than not I see AT guns still fighting it out even with only 2 crewmen left alive and are more or less invisible until they fire.

I also find them too resilient against very close hits. In my last game, I saw an AT gun take a mortar hit right behind the gun shield, but it kept on fighting. In reality, if half your gun crew mates are killed by a shell, you'll probably abandon the gun unless you're an absolute fanatic. And even then, you'd be too concussed to really do much. But in CM, even regular troops too often keep fighting like robots despite massive losses, in my opinion.

[Glubokii Boy]

For a short period i worked with a guy that had a tendancy to exagerate somewhat...Me and a small group of guys were discussing memories from our basic military training that we had in our younger years and came upon the topic of cammoflage...

True to his ususal ways this guys told us an episode from his military experience...Offcourse he was some top secret supersoldier that had been around the world participating in various special forces courses...Some of these were held by ninjas ...When it came to camoflage he described that he had been requested by one of our artillery regiments to assist them in the art of cammoflage..

." I showed the guys how to cammoflage their howitzers. After working all morning we vent back to the barracks for lunch.  When we returned after our meal we could not find the howitzers  again !!!! 

I had cammoflaged them TO GOOD ! We had to leave without them...

This level of cammoflage might not be neccesary in CM  but i would not mind to have an option to 'buy' the AT-guns at an increased cost but with an added moddifier to the stealthyness. 

 

 

[chuckdyke]

25 minutes ago, Glubokii Boy said:

i would not mind to have an option to 'buy' the AT-guns at an increased cost but with an added moddifier to the stealthyness. 

I thought that AT-Guns are supposed to be camouflaged during the deploy phase of a scenario. If they get moved or fire they lose the camouflage bonus. The original point was "once they fire it is a matter of time before they are taken out!" Exactly the reason they became obsolete. The immediate future was the ' Recoilless Rifle' which was far more tactically flexible. 

Edited January 17, 2022 by chuckdyke

[Redwolf]

3 hours ago, Bulletpoint said:

Points-wise, it's a success. Even cheap tanks like the Sherman are around twice the points of a Pak-40.

Well, Pak40 is 120 points, cheap Sherman is 190. So a gun is 2/3rds of a cheap, full tank

More importantly, even if you get one tank out of every AT gun that engages your purchased AT guns do not all engage. Some are out of way of the chosen attack path, some are discovered by infantry before they can shoot at a tank.

As long as we can't boost the gun with better cover and concealment in fortifications I think pricing them more at a factor of 0.4 or maybe even 1/3rd would be in order. It is all about actually getting the historical benefit out of the guns.

[Redwolf]

1 hour ago, chuckdyke said:

I thought that AT-Guns are supposed to be camouflaged during the deploy phase of a scenario.

Yes, I believe that is the case.

However, that cover is blown when in a trench because now the trench is spotted earlier than the gun.

And trenches are expensive so you can't just buy enough of them to make the attacker waste ammo on empty ones.

[chuckdyke]

2 minutes ago, Redwolf said:

the trench is spotted earlier than the gun.

I always found it worth my while to wait and see what is actually inside them. I agree however that trenches and foxholes should be modeled differently.

[Glubokii Boy]

3 hours ago, chuckdyke said:

I thought that AT-Guns are supposed to be camouflaged during the deploy phase of a scenario. 

Yes  i belive they are but currently we only have ONE level of camoflage as far as i know. There ought to be some degree of difference between a hastely assembled possition and well prepared one that has seen some serious work...

Having a few levels of stealth (camoflaging) to chose from would be nice imo...

[chuckdyke]

7 hours ago, Glubokii Boy said:

ONE level of camoflage as far as i know

It is either camouflaged or it is not. Something like the HQ stands 100 meters from it and when he sees a giveaway tell his boys to do it again.

 

[Vanir Ausf B]

10 hours ago, Redwolf said:

Yes, I believe that is the case.

However, that cover is blown when in a trench because now the trench is spotted earlier than the gun.

And trenches are expensive so you can't just buy enough of them to make the attacker waste ammo on empty ones.

I re-ran my the test with longer spotting time and added in a camo/no camo comparision. My numbers are slightly different than what I posted last night but don't change the conclusions.

• Range at which trenches can be spotted: ~550m
• Camo Pak 40 in trench spotted at ~300m
• Non-como Pak 40 in trench spotted at ~350m
• Camo Pak 40 out of trench spotted at ~600m
• Non-camo Pak 40 out of trench spotted at ~700m

It looks to me that the guns are still better off in a trench than not in a trench.

Edited January 18, 2022 by Vanir Ausf B

[chuckdyke]

27 minutes ago, Vanir Ausf B said:

It looks to me that the guns are still better off in a trench than not in a trench.

What level do you play? Gog Magog RT on Iron the Soviet AT Guns are required to fire before I spot the sandbags. Hammers Flank same story the MG's fire before I spot their foxholes. Outline of trenches became visible at around 300 meters.

 

[CanuckGamer]

Thanks for all the replies and very interesting reading.  First, let me say that the Combat Mission series of games are the gold standard when it comes to the tactical level.  My friends and I have been playing for 20 years since CM1 using turn based PBEM.  We play at Warrior level.  I have never played the AI.  The point I was trying to make it is that an AT gun has a much lower profile than a tank and as a number of people of commented you should be able to camouflauge it say with leaves and branches so it should be even more difficult to spot.  My experience over the years is that AT guns are spotted as easily as tanks and because of that I am more than happy to trade one AT gun for a tank but that doesn't happen often.  The crew of the AT gun are obviously less protected than a tank crew so even a HE shot landing in the proximity of the AT will cause enough casualties to basically take out the gun.

The tactic I have resorted to with AT guns is hiding them behind buildings  hoping to catch a tank at close range coming around the corner.  In other words pretty well the same tactic used for bazookas and panzerfaust.  Of course players usually advance with infantry ahead of their tanks so it is not often this tactic works.

I am wondering if the probability of spotting an AT gun that is hiding in terrain like woods should be tweaked.  As a general comment I am surprised how often small groups of infantry are spotted in terrain like woods.

[chuckdyke]

40 minutes ago, CanuckGamer said:

I am surprised how often small groups of infantry are spotted in terrain like woods.

I got caught recently as well and it is hard to find the sweet spot. Just enough into the woods not to be spotted and still be able to spot outside. It is like bocage in Battle for Normandy directly behind you can spot but you will remain concealed. In a forest it is much harder. 

 

[domfluff]

AT Guns and their employment.

As with many things in CM, there's more to a weapon that just their basic stats or points value. The enemy gets a vote, and this should be taken into account.

An AT position which is set up to directly engage armour head-on is going to die pretty quickly. You might get the jump on them and kill the first tank to cross into your sights, but then you've given away your position, and the immediate response will be incoming HE from tank rounds or mortar fire. You are slow, static, and don't have any good defence against this - even digging in to protect against mortars doesn't really help you continue the fight, since if you're suppressed then the enemy has already won the engagement.

The important point, then is to combine a couple of principles, illustrated here in FM7-35 (ANTITANK COMPANY, INFANTRY REGIMENT, 1944).



In the above: 

1 is a covered position, safe from observation and fires. Your transport will stay here.
2 is the primary position for the 57mm weapon.
3 is an alternate position, still capable of performing the same function, but sufficiently far away from the primary position to avoid fires
6 is the observer

(The missing numbers are for a secondary mission, which isn't relevant here).

You'll note a couple of things - the guns are behind a ridgeline, giving them protection from the terrain. Ideally they would also be dug in. There's an emphasis on spotting and relaying information, as well as shifting into another pre-planned position if needed.

Most importantly, the engagement is at an oblique angle. At no point are the guns pointed directly down a long road, outside of their effective range - instead the point where the road clears the treeline is the point where the guns can engage.

By engaging obliquely like this, the guns will immediately minimise both opportunities to observe their position, as well as a position to assemble a base of fire. Clearly an oblique engagement will also improve the chances of flanking shots, but that's not necessarily the main reason to do it.

I *don't* think it's sufficient to think about AT guns in the context of "well, at least I killed more points of the enemy than I lost". That isn't an entirely useless measure, but it's pretty far down the list of importance. The role of the AT here is to give the enemy a dilemma, and to force a response.

Edited January 18, 2022 by domfluff

[chuckdyke]

Masking with an observer in the right position. To think in the terms of 'duels' is counter productive.

[Bud Backer]

16 hours ago, Vanir Ausf B said:

I re-ran my the test with longer spotting time and added in a camo/no camo comparision. My numbers are slightly different than what I posted last night but don't change the conclusions.

• Range at which trenches can be spotted: ~550m
• Camo Pak 40 in trench spotted at ~300m
• Non-como Pak 40 in trench spotted at ~350m
• Camo Pak 40 out of trench spotted at ~600m
• Non-camo Pak 40 out of trench spotted at ~700m

It looks to me that the guns are still better off in a trench than not in a trench.

These results are consistent with my findings during play. I have repeatedly used trenches to enhance the concealment of AT guns, and especially when coupled with the camo bonus, found them to be devastatingly effective when properly positioned. Not all terrain is well suited for ATGs, and it’s important to recognize that when purchasing a force to not end up with fodder for tanks. I’d change nothing about their points.