The panicking and routing of squads.

[jshandorf]

Here is something I was just thinking about. I was reading some other topic where someone was comparing CC with CM and I got to thinking, mind you I think CM is a hundred times better than CC, but it would be nice to treat squads a little more individually.

What I mean is that I think it is bit unrealistic that a squad acts as a whole. For example... Panicking and routing. A whole squad usually doesn't panic and route. Usually just a few memmbers do. While I am aware of the "contagious" effect of seeing your buddies run. I don't think that 1 man panicking in a squad should have a major effect.

I am curious on how CM handles this. Does it keep track of the number of men panicking overall in the squad and say when it reaches 50%+ the entire squad may enter the "panic" status?

What of the other squads around it? Do they add a morale modifier if they are not panicking? I assume Comand Control plays a significant role but what other factors are involved?

One thing I liked about Close Combat was that you could have individual men route and panic and become detached form the squad. I am aware this is immpossible in CM right now but does CM keep track of the "status" of a squad by the idividual men that make it up? Or does it do it as a whole?

Thanks,

Jeff

[RudeLover]

I can't answer all of your questions, and I'm sure wiser folks than I have input, but here's my take. Remember that the number next to the little red cross symbol means guys in the squad who are killed, but also those who are incapacitated, wounded and evacuated, panicking, MIA, or otherwise no longer contributing to the fighting. Thus the phenomenon of a single guy bugging out as in the CC series is happening, but it not shown graphically. The accumulation of several casualties then starts to affect the squad's morale. These effects are abstracted, and you can't click on Pvt. Saunders and see that he's hurt and running for home, but it's happening 'under the hood.' It's the price you pay for being able to handle multiple battalions vs. a reinforced platoon...

[Jeff Heidman]

Just to expand on what Rude said quite well...

In any wargame, at some point you have to decide what your lowest level of granularity is when it comes to how small of a unit size you wish to represent. In CM, that is the squad/team. In CC, that is the individual for effects, but the squad for orders.

In other words, if this was an operational wargame representing Division sized units, you would not complain that your smallest unit acts as one, even though it might represent several hundred men. It is just the level of granularity chosen. The lower the level of granularity, the smaller the overall action you can manage.

The thing with something like the system CC uses (where the unit resolution detail goes lower than the command detail) is that it looks neat, but it has no effect on the game play. If the smallest unit I can command is a squad, it is not important to me what the individual members status is, since I cannot order them specifically anyway. All I care about is the overall status of the smallest unit under my command. Which soldier got waxed or wounded is unimportant to me, except as how it relates to the ability of the squad to accomplish what I want it to do.

Jeff Heidman

[Cueball]

But something that might be cool would be if sometimes the squad split, then half ran and half stayed.

[jshandorf]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Jeff Heidman:

Just to expand on what Rude said quite well...

In any wargame, at some point you have to decide what your lowest level of granularity is when it comes to how small of a unit size you wish to represent. In CM, that is the squad/team. In CC, that is the individual for effects, but the squad for orders.

In other words, if this was an operational wargame representing Division sized units, you would not complain that your smallest unit acts as one, even though it might represent several hundred men. It is just the level of granularity chosen. The lower the level of granularity, the smaller the overall action you can manage.

The thing with something like the system CC uses (where the unit resolution detail goes lower than the command detail) is that it looks neat, but it has no effect on the game play. If the smallest unit I can command is a squad, it is not important to me what the individual members status is, since I cannot order them specifically anyway. All I care about is the overall status of the smallest unit under my command. Which soldier got waxed or wounded is unimportant to me, except as how it relates to the ability of the squad to accomplish what I want it to do.

Jeff Heidman<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I understand completely, but what I am curious about is how is the squad's overall morale effected? For instance it could be that 1 or maybe 2 members of a squad are panicking but since they are not having an overall impact you don't notice it. It is only until 50%+ of the active memebers are panicking that the squad morale overall changes.

I geuss what I am trying to say is that i am curious as to how the squad is treated "under the hood" so to speak. While we can only interact with the squad as a whole the game may go deeper.

Jeff

[David Aitken]

jshandorf wrote:

> I understand completely, but what I am curious about is how is the squad's overall morale effected?

As far as I know, the squad is treated as one. If a man becomes incapacitated through panic, he will be recorded individually as a casualty - but recoverable panic is a squad-wide characteristic.

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There's a splinter in your eye, and it reads REACT

[Sparks]

Im no expert but, I would think that if the squad is being pounded, taking far to much damage, that the Squad LEADER makes the call to BUG OUT!!! every man for himself!!! il see you back at HQ! type thing

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Its not the end of the earth, but i can see it from here!

[Guest Big Time Software]

Hi Jeff,

Good question. Yes, a unit that is Panicked or Routed has had it as a whole, not just an individual member of that unit. This is one reason units appear to take more punishment than one would expect in some situations. The majority of the surviving members of a unit have to switch over to "run for the hills" mode before a unit will switch over. Panic isn't all that bad either. It is more or less a temporary state where the unit has lost its nerve for a short period of time (usually!). Routed and Broken are when things are REALLY bad, or the unit is just not up to the task of intense combat (i.e. Conscripts).

As the other Jeff explained so very well, it is a question of granularity. At some point the line has to be drawn even if there is some tradeoff in terms of introduced abstraction.

Thanks,

Steve

[Wilhammer]

I thought i read somewhere on this Forum that BTS might look into adding "forced" squad splitting from adverse combat conditions.

[robo]

On a somewhat related note. I had split a squad - one half-squad ended up panicking and getting the Red ! mark in the bottom right - the other half-squad saw no action. Later the two half-squads rejoined and the new full squad kept the Red ! mark. I wasn't expecting that.

[Bil Hardenberger]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>A whole squad usually doesn't panic and route. Usually just a few memmbers do. While I am aware of the "contagious" effect of seeing your buddies run. I don't think that 1 man panicking in a squad should have a major effect.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

In the book "Roll Me Over" the author describes just such a situation, where one man panicked and it effected his entire squad... and then his whole Platoon... they all ran for the rear, recovered after a time, and went back into action. This cannot have been a local phenomenon, it must have occured every day in WW2, just like it occurs in practically every battle in CM.

This was a true account that can be held up for comparison. Many times if you read a bit, you can find justification for almost everything that happens in CM.

Bil

[Jeff Heidman]

Bill has touched on an important point.

If you do any reading of psychology in battle, you will see that the psychology of what makes men break and run is really pretty interesting.

Turns out that one of the primary things keeping men from breaking is simply peer pressure. It seems trite and silly, but it is true. Most men do not want to be seen as weak in front of their peers. No-one wants to be the guy to break and run while their buddies stay and fight.

That first guy breaking then becomes the catalyst. Now, it is no longer a personal failure to run, because someone (and soon everyone) else is doing it too.

I, for one, and firmly convinced that most of what makes a Marine a Marine and a GI just a GI is not training, toughness, physical strength, etc., etc., but mostly just the espirit that goes along with being in an elite unit. They do not break easily because they have convinced themselves that they do not break easily. Obviously this is a bit of an oversimplification, because training, toughness, etc., does enter into it, but to a large degree they enter into it more as a tool to convince the soldier that they are different, not because it actually MAKES them different.

A great example of this is the German SS in Poland, and the Hitlerjugend division in France. Training and actual skills wise, they were reportedly considerably worse than their Wehrmacht counterparts. But they KNEW they were superior, and took relatively severe casulaties because they had tons of elan, and very little brains. But I would not have wanted to have to fight them.

Of course, later they (the Poland trrops that is) became exceptionally well trained and experienced. That, combined with their espirit de corps, made them the finest military formations in the world, until attrition and dilution turned them into shadows of their former selves.

Jeff Heidman

P.S. - Sorry for the long ramble.

[jshandorf]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Jeff Heidman:

Bill has touched on an important point.

If you do any reading of psychology in battle, you will see that the psychology of what makes men break and run is really pretty interesting.

Turns out that one of the primary things keeping men from breaking is simply peer pressure. It seems trite and silly, but it is true. Most men do not want to be seen as weak in front of their peers. No-one wants to be the guy to break and run while their buddies stay and fight.

That first guy breaking then becomes the catalyst. Now, it is no longer a personal failure to run, because someone (and soon everyone) else is doing it too.

I, for one, and firmly convinced that most of what makes a Marine a Marine and a GI just a GI is not training, toughness, physical strength, etc., etc., but mostly just the espirit that goes along with being in an elite unit. They do not break easily because they have convinced themselves that they do not break easily. Obviously this is a bit of an oversimplification, because training, toughness, etc., does enter into it, but to a large degree they enter into it more as a tool to convince the soldier that they are different, not because it actually MAKES them different.

A great example of this is the German SS in Poland, and the Hitlerjugend division in France. Training and actual skills wise, they were reportedly considerably worse than their Wehrmacht counterparts. But they KNEW they were superior, and took relatively severe casulaties because they had tons of elan, and very little brains. But I would not have wanted to have to fight them.

Of course, later they (the Poland trrops that is) became exceptionally well trained and experienced. That, combined with their espirit de corps, made them the finest military formations in the world, until attrition and dilution turned them into shadows of their former selves.

Jeff Heidman

P.S. - Sorry for the long ramble. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I totally agree with ya there about the one man being that catalyst for the rest to flee. But just on a side note, I would assume in battle there are many soldiers that want to run and not fight and these of coarse are the first few to run given the chance. After that the rest I would assume run because sticking around when men on both sides of you are fleeing isn't brave.. It's just stupid.

A quote now comes to mind...

"An experienced soldier is a scared soldier."

Jeff

[David Aitken]

That's what the chain of command is for. It's way too much to expect an infantryman to both fight, and assume that the other guys with him will also fight. You can't stick your neck out if you think you're going to get done over, and hence you'll be a poor fighter.

So squads have Sergeants, platoons have Lieutenants, companies have Captains, etcetera - and in combat, one of their most important responsibilities, is to make sure the men under their command will fight.

This is why a leaderless group of infantrymen is useless - no matter how committed they are, they just can't trust each other to the extent that they'd be willing to risk their lives. They need a superior who they know is going to keep everybody in line.

Sorry if I'm preaching to the converted, but like Jeff I find this subject fascinating - psychology is SO important in war.

David

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There's a splinter in your eye, and it reads REACT

[Bamse]

What you have to remember here is that CC have 15 units max and have a 2D engine.

CM Have many times that unitmax and a 3D engine.

You have too cut somewhere and CM have cut at the right place in my mind.

Björn E