Tips for playing.

[chuckdyke]

16 hours ago, quakerparrot67 said:

great tactic, but the inspiration is 'the untouchables',  s. connery to be exact.

 

Not far off, Chicago was not a Sunday-School.

[Erwin]

The probability of exploding a mine is reduced the slower a unit moves thru it.  But, IIRC, it is still possible to trigger a mine even when moving SLOW.   And just to clarify: As in the example above, only engineers can mark minefields making them less effective.

[Erwin]

RECON TACTIC:

I find that recon at the start of scenario is one of the most important phases of a mission.  Usually, the terrain is such that a recon vehicle can move from cover to cover.  However, a good recon vehicle tactic when moving along a road that usually works: 

FAST move a vehicle (make sure it is NOT "opened") along a road close to where a possible ambush site is located, and then immediately have it reverse back to close to its starting position.  This tactic usually gives the enemy insufficient time to get a shot off, but can expose an enemy ambush position.

If there is an enemy, one can go into "assault mode" or... avoid the area.

If no enemy, the rest of the units move to where the recon vehicle ended its FAST move and the recon vehicle now moves FAST and then REVERSE down the next stretch of road.  The length of the FAST move varies defending on the situation.

[chuckdyke]

With vehicles use the shoot and scoot method. Shoot to make sure you are spotted and reverse back into cover. The TacAI also has decent survival animations for recon vehicles.

[chuckdyke]

5 hours ago, Erwin said:

The probability of exploding a mine is reduced the slower a unit moves thru it. 

I restarted Trouble with Siegfried numerous times and this method works with Trouble with Siegfried. RT Red Dawn same method but the Sappers didn't spot any, even though I know the location. I bet once regular infantry moves, they will go off. Still slow one square at a time seems to be the best method. 

[Blackhorse15A]

On 2/18/2023 at 11:56 AM, MOS:96B2P said:

Also the author of the video, Gordon Cooke, has a few videos about CM Professional.  I am now subscribed to his channel. 

Yes. Great channel. Everyone should subscribe.

But seriously, any topics there not covered you wish were?

[chuckdyke]

1 minute ago, Blackhorse15A said:

But seriously, any topics there not covered you wish were?

Signals which are not completely covered in the game. Imo at least on par with engineers. We could have a scenario whose mission is to establish a field-telephone network for an upcoming battle. But this is more for WW2 and I have Red Thunder in mind.

[chuckdyke]

 

 

[Blackhorse15A]

19 minutes ago, chuckdyke said:

Signals which are not completely covered in the game.

Unfortunately how the game treats communications is different enough from real life to not match if you look just at comms. I mean, it's a model, so it does represent some realities, but not closely enough where real world understanding is super helpful in the game.

One problem is the various games being different time periods so tech capabilities change.

But mainly - as best I understand- in game everything follows the chain of command rather strictly. Which is why scenario designers have to include higher headquarters "off map" as reserves that never arrive. If two platoons in different companies want to share information it HAS to go through the Battalion HQ.

I'm not positive, but seems adjacent units (organizationally adjacent)don't talk to each other without going through higher. Which is unrealistic. Also I'm fairly certain there is no ability to "change channels" on a radio. 

In the real world, if you attached a tank platoon to an infantry company, the tank platoon leader would be reporting to the infantry company commander on the radio. If the scenario designers sets the ORBAT up properly like that, it can happen in game. But it's also possible to set it up "wrong" and have all comms going through BN HQ. Or worse, consider a scenario where you have three infantry companies and a tank company. The player decides to team up one tank platoon to each infantry company. Real world those tank PLs are talking to the supported infantry CO and the infantry PLs in the company. But in CM every tank PL is still talking to their tank company CO, with all comms routed through BN HQ to talk to their supported infantry PLs.

Also seems that line of sight for VHF comms is not accounted for, nor is range (I could be wrong there).

Definitely not accounting for a PL who is monitoring three nets (eg Engineer PL can be on a platoon net to his subordinates, a company net to the supported infantry/armor unit, and the engineer company net to his own boss, which also serves as an engineer net spreading info across a much larger battle space since there is probably a staff engineer at BN HQ on there too, plus the engineer PLs in all the other units, all in one net.) It seems CM *could* model such a comms system, but understanding all those intricies aren't there. More importantly, no ability to designated attached units and change the comms network. It's just the most basic up and down the chain of command.

[chuckdyke]

18 minutes ago, Blackhorse15A said:

The player decides to team up one tank platoon to each infantry company. Real world those tank PLs are talking to the supported infantry CO and the infantry PLs in the company. But in CM every tank PL is still talking to their tank company CO, with all comms routed through BN HQ to talk to their supported infantry PLs.

It is up to the player to play by some more realistic house-rules. One of them is horizontal communications. There are some techniques you can use but it is far from ideal. One of the reasons we stick to Hotseat, most players don't have this option. Playing Iron you can see with the blink of an eye who is within visual contact. On the other modes you can see only the type of C2 a unit has. With horizontal communication we have a simple rule. All the left radio buttons on the control panel must be on Green or the units must be having visual contact. A tank can support infantry if the infantry is fighting then the tank can support him.

[Blackhorse15A]

34 minutes ago, chuckdyke said:

A tank can support infantry if the infantry is fighting then the tank can support him.

True that a player, using their godmode view of the battlefield and knowing what all units can see, can give orders that don't care about communication. But the player cannot do anything about the fact that the underlying pixeltrupen do or do not know about certain enemy information and spots until it has been transmitted through the comms channels in game. Sure, if both an infantry unit and tank unit have both spotted an enemy in their own, it doesn't matter.

But if the tanker spots an enemy the infantry hasn't spotted yet, best the player can do is order area fire and wait for either spotting or the communication flow to happen. Real world, the two PLs are talking to each other and it's 1-3 transmissions for the tank to tell the squad what to look for and share the Intel. In CM it has to go up to BN (or higher depending) and it's 4-6 transmissions. Basically doubling the time for the Intel to be shared.

[chuckdyke]

3 minutes ago, Blackhorse15A said:

But if the tanker spots an enemy the infantry hasn't spotted yet, best the player can do is order area fire and wait for either spotting or the communication flow to happen.

That is why it is important to keep the relevant units close to each other. Like my illustration on page3. Soviet WW2 armor need infantry close by. Armor is the C2 infantry doesn't have any outside their own platoon level. I let a tank support infantry if it can spot the infantry fighting. Also assign a tank platoon to an infantry platoon. Sorting out the C2s at the start of a large scenario can take some time. 

[PEB14]

16 hours ago, Erwin said:

RECON TACTIC:

FAST move a vehicle (make sure it is NOT "opened") along a road close to where a possible ambush site is located, and then immediately have it reverse back to close to its starting position.  This tactic usually gives the enemy insufficient time to get a shot off, but can expose an enemy ambush position.

Interesting, but I'm not sure to fully catch the idea.

- You button up the vehicle, meaning you greatly reduce is spotting ability. Why so?

- You go fast to reduce the enemy chances to fire a shot, then you reverse back towards your starting point along the same road: up to where? starting point? covered area?.

- During the (slow) reverse motion you are very exposed to enemy fire, aren't you?

- If you're not fired upon, your chances to spot any enemy are slim (buttoned up + fast movement)?

Thanks your sharing the idea!

[chuckdyke]

39 minutes ago, PEB14 said:

You button up the vehicle, meaning you greatly reduce is spotting ability. Why so?

When I do things like that, I make sure I have OPs out there to observe enemy activity. You button up so that it is harder to get hurt. Most things in CM depends on volume, the more eyes are open the better the odds you spot something.

[Erwin]

7 hours ago, PEB14 said:

- You button up the vehicle, meaning you greatly reduce is spotting ability. Why so?

- You go fast to reduce the enemy chances to fire a shot, then you reverse back towards your starting point along the same road: up to where? starting point? covered area?.

- During the (slow) reverse motion you are very exposed to enemy fire, aren't you?

- If you're not fired upon, your chances to spot any enemy are slim (buttoned up + fast movement)?

The important concept is that the scout vehicle is not supposed to be the spotter.  It's purpose is to draw fire... and survive.

Also:  When on a road, we may be talking 75-150 meter FAST scouting moves followed by an immediate REVERSE to a safe location.

The purpose is to be able to scout quickly long expanses of road.  Normally I would send multiple 2-man inf scouts.  But, on some of the large/huge maps, that is just way too slow and take way too much time.  (Only a few designers allow sufficient time for "careful" scouting.)

1)  If one sends an unbuttoned vehicle to scout into possibly hostile territory the chances are xnt that a crew member will be shot.  The spotter(s) are the inf and crews in the vehicle(s) who are sitting back watching what happens to the scout vehicle.  

2)  Am assuming that one starts in a safe location.  So when the scout reverses back to that location, the unit should be safe.  Once one has scouted ahead to a new location without any enemy contact, that next location becomes the new "safe" location and everyone can move to that location.  Then the scout vehicle moves FAST ahead to the next possible danger location and reverses back to the new safe location. 

3)  It's harder to hit a moving vehicle even in reverse.  If the scout was unbuttoned inf small arms fire could probably kill a crew-member.  That's why the scout should be buttoned.  However, it takes time for the enemy Tactical AI to aim and fire a large weapon capable of hurting the vehicle.  

I have spend over a decade trying to figure out how to scout distance quickly with vehicles (in CM2) while giving the scouting unit the best chance to survive.  The above tactic has worked best for scouting down a long road.  If off-road, one usually can move a scout vehicle FAST from one covered location to another. 

However, as mentioned, if time allows I always prefer to send many 2-man scouts ahead to quickly locate enemy assets and positions.  However, I still find it very hard to keep them alive.  Once an inf unit has gotten close enuff to be fired on by an enemy, the inf scout cannot move away to safety quickly enough.

Hope the above helps...

BTW:  It's great to have threads on CM2 tactics again.  We used to have many of these "hint" threads in the early CM1 and CM2 days.  But in recent years discussions seem to have become dominated by discussions on the various weapons systems simulated.

Edited February 22, 2023 by Erwin

[Flibby]

I do not remember which poster used to espouse these ideas, some years ago now, but what really helped me was to think of firepower and how best to implement that firepower. Rather than just moving men around, what you are actually doing is moving men in order to position somewhere else to deploy more firepower.

In practice that took me away from forlorn infantry attacks to rather congregating firepower effects on a single area, overwhelming the enemy, and then moving in thereafter. Infantry attacks without significant fire superiority, even through covered areas, seldom work out for me.

[Erwin]

1 hour ago, Flibby said:

Infantry attacks without significant fire superiority, even through covered areas, seldom work out for me.

Agreed.  But, first one has to locate the enemy positions (esp major assets) while losing the minimum of men.

[CarlXII]

3 hours ago, Flibby said:

I do not remember which poster used to espouse these ideas, some years ago now, but what really helped me was to think of firepower and how best to implement that firepower. Rather than just moving men around, what you are actually doing is moving men in order to position somewhere else to deploy more firepower.

In practice that took me away from forlorn infantry attacks to rather congregating firepower effects on a single area, overwhelming the enemy, and then moving in thereafter. Infantry attacks without significant fire superiority, even through covered areas, seldom work out for me.

JasonC made a whole bunch of postings on CM tactics back in the CM1 days...It might have been him.

I belive he got thrown out the CM forum a few years ago...For what reason i don't know.

His posts are still intresting readings though for anyone intrested. 

I remember he had lenthy discussions about fire and movement...among other things.

 

Edited February 22, 2023 by CarlXII

[chuckdyke]

The scout car can travel anywhere on the map fast. Suggested tactic standing patrol to observe the effect of supporting artillery. The artillery FO can plot a mission but can't observe the effect. In these arid conditions infantry is restricted to get this post quickly. Dismounting the vehicle is required. This team didn't call the FO is in a more secure location.

Edited February 22, 2023 by chuckdyke

[chuckdyke]

To be 'Tired' is perfectly fine for an FO. Crawling is a lot safer than walking upright. Tired in the game won't affect his spotting abilities.

[callada]

On 2/20/2023 at 7:49 PM, chuckdyke said:

Using on map assets without going through the off-map fire direction centre. Playing Soviets, the player just loses too much time. 

First place a waypoint at the area you plan your fire mission.

From there you plot an LOF to find a position for your mortar.

At the bottom of your screen, you click your waypoint on your LOF and there you will deploy your mortar.

Drag your first waypoint away from your objective and it will end up near your deploy waypoint.

Check or you are able to carry out your fire mission. For realism have the C2 generates the tentative contacts. 

 

This technique works for all area fire, and can save a lot of time finding firing positions compared to working from the other direction.   Actually I might have learned about it from one of your previous posts.

[callada]

.

Edited February 23, 2023 by callada
oops, double post

[chuckdyke]

Don't send scouts where you have not been with area fire. The survivors still got rid of the squad leader can you imagine if the German squad had been fresh. Develop a drill how to occupy an area. They put one of us on a stretcher and we made a squad of their's KIA. Thank you, Malone (Sean Connery), for the inspiration. Study the scenario, this one doesn't put a parameter on casualties just make sure the other guy will attrite more.

 

[chuckdyke]

1 hour ago, callada said:

can save a lot of time finding firing positions

Also where to plan your routes for avenues of approach. What is better? Ivan, I want you to be sacrificed for Mother Russia. Or Ivan: "I studied the map, and this area should be safe just make double sure by checking and reporting back". Ivan would certainly consider going AWOL in the first scenario.

[chuckdyke]

The previous post is actually a house rule based on mutual trust. Dropping a ton of HE on a location which by pure coincidence has a hidden enemy key enemy unit looks a little suspect. Sending a probing attack afterwards looks a lot more realistic.