PBEM Player Guidelines

[Vacillator]

1 minute ago, Centurian52 said:

I want to face an enemy with human-like intelligence and flexibility.

And you've ended up playing me .  I am reasonably flexible.

On a serious note I think playing other humans is the best way to be challenged.  You may or may not find that with me, but you surely will with others.

[Centurian52]

Just now, Vacillator said:

I think playing other humans is the best way to be challenged

Until we get better AI at least.

[Bannon]

I definitely prefer playing against a human regardless of whether I win or lose. Part of the difference for me is the dialog that may accompany a battle.

[Vacillator]

16 minutes ago, Bannon said:

I definitely prefer playing against a human regardless of whether I win or lose. Part of the difference for me is the dialog that may accompany a battle.

I would have liked that more than once if I could. Totally agree.

That's confirmed then, a PBEM is on the cards in our future .

[Bannon]

15 minutes ago, Vacillator said:

I would have liked that more than once if I could. Totally agree.

That's confirmed then, a PBEM is on the cards in our future .

Another high ranking forum member wanting to open a can of whoop-*** on me! Bring it on! 

[Brille]

1 hour ago, Centurian52 said:

This is reminding me of why it took me so long to even give H2H a try. I want a challenge. I want to face an enemy with human-like intelligence and flexibility. I just wish there was a way to get that without having to interact with actual humans (I'm not complaining about any of my current opponents, you have all been great so far). The only really satisfactory solution would be a better AI.

Well usually I post my mentioned 2 houserules to my oponent and see if he agrees to them or not or if he wants to add anything.

When we do more games and rather frequently then we may add some more or not...depending on how serious we want to get. It´s just that simple for me. I don´t want to turn it into a religious contest or so. It is just to make clear that we are on the same page.

 

5 hours ago, PEB14 said:

Considering all these missing components, why put a house  rule forbidding to area fire on a position where the player knows there is an enemy? In RL, the firing tank or squad would get the information, because some runner from a nearby squad would relay it, especially to a tank! In CM I shall move an entire team to reliably convey the information to a nearby tank, while only ONE runner would do the job. I personally don't and just shoot. Is it THAT unrealistic? I don't think so

Well...it is unrealistic for a tank to instantly know and instantly shoot (by manual orders) at a place where a fireteam just encountered an enemy squad, especially when he is not seeing a thing. Artkin is right in that regard.

The command structure may be as good as it can be but it comes with a delay for sure. Just imagine you are sitting in a tank 500m away. Maybe you see the fireteam attacking and getting mowed down in the street, but no signs of the defending enemy. You could plaster the **** out of the area but you don´t know nothing at this moment. You don´t know where exactly the rest of the friendly platoon is, you don´t know where the enemy is. IF the platoon is in good radio contact with your tank you maybe get a clearance of the situation in the following minutes and start firing.

The thing is that CM don´t reflect the blindness of tanks and lack of situational awareness (when closed up) in this way...or let me say with players bypassing the spotting system it hardly feels that realistic.

And I don´t mean to offend somebody, I played and still play this way myself sometimes, just the way how serious I and my opponent want it to be. But calling it realistic is not right by any means.

I don´t want to ban area fire because there are realistic applications for it but reacting to troops the tank doesn´t know anything about is not it.

 

 

 

[Vacillator]

2 minutes ago, Bannon said:

Another high ranking forum member

I wouldn't be worried about that.  Different skills - blathering, helping, whatever versus playing the game proficiently.  The two might come together but they might not.  I always like to say I'm rubbish so as not to disappoint.

[Andrew Kulin]

On 3/28/2024 at 12:34 PM, Centurian52 said:

To give an example of how much worse it would be without the 'target' command, in one of my battles in which I'm defending hedgerow country I sprung a couple of nasty ambushes against my opponent. I had my pixeltruppen hiding with short target arcs until his scouts were nearly at my end of the field, and then opened fire. Afterwards I repositioned my teams (which I think must have looked like I was abandoning the hedgerow to him), had them resume hiding with short target arcs, and I was able to repeat the ambush on the next group of soldiers to cross. If there was no area target command I would be able to repeat this tactic again and again with complete impunity. There would be absolutely nothing my opponent could do about it. You can't possibly tell me that that would be more realistic than my opponent firing into my hedgerows with everything he's got, spots or no spots (which he has very wisely, and very realistically, started to do)?

Umm.  Whom are you referring to?

[Vacillator]

2 minutes ago, Andrew Kulin said:

Umm.  Whom are you referring to?

Please continue this conversation my good friends, I'm gaining some useful indirect intel .

[Centurian52]

22 minutes ago, Andrew Kulin said:

Umm.  Whom are you referring to?

Sorry. Did I say too much?

[PEB14]

On 3/29/2024 at 9:45 PM, Brille said:

The thing is that CM don´t reflect the blindness of tanks and lack of situational awareness (when closed up) in this way...or let me say with players bypassing the spotting system it hardly feels that realistic.

You're right, of course. But neitehr does the game offer the possibility to reproduce the way troops behaved to reduce this lack of situational awareness. By example, the one-man scout crewman I mentioned is not getting out of my imagination, it was a widespread tactic (according to the books dedicated to the French 2nd Armored Division I've recently read - and as I doubt the French invented the concept in 1944, it was probaly widespread at least among Western Allies).

There is another reason why I'm reluctant to add lots of restrictive house rules.

1) IMHO in CM the attacker is at a disadvantage. Lethality being unrealistically high, and TacAI being quite poor at using terrain features, as an attacker you really need some help… (Obviously this is not relevant for Meeting Engagements.) This is even more relevant for scenarios designed to be played against a defending AI, in which the defending side is buffed up to provide some challenge when playing against the AI.

2) Scenarios are designed with the rules as they are, not for house rules… All house rules aiming at more realism will fatally result in slower attacking paces. And because of the clock limit, it puts the attacker at yet another disadvantage.

 

But in fact I completelt understand @Artkin position. It is certainly not pleasant to play against players who use completely gamey tactics. But I feel that adding tons of houserules kill the game more than it adds pleasure to it (at least for me).

Hence the key is more to find players whose playing style fits yours. I'm glad I did and I sincerely thank the guys I'm presently playing against for that!

 

Just to add one cent in the machine: IMHO for added realism one should consider a houserule banning the use of offboard artillery for the attacking side in WW2 games, except for:

- mortars;

- preplanned (1st turn) bombardments.

As a matter of fact, considering the very limited time frame of most CM games (less than two hours), calling regimental or divisional artillery to fire accurately on targets 50 or 100 meters in front of moving infantrymen… I'm still looking for such references in the literature!

Edited March 30 by PEB14
typos

[Heirloom_Tomato]

On 3/29/2024 at 10:29 AM, Centurian52 said:

7. You do know that as a Combat Mission player you are in the shoes of every officer and NCO on the battlefield, not just the overall commander, right? The overall commander may not be able to see all of his units. But each of his units can see themselves. In real life if the overall commander forgets that one of his units exists (which seems rather unlikely (the commander may not have up to date info on where his subordinates are or what they are doing, but it seems doubtful that he'll forget that they exist), but that's the possibility you are modeling by turning icons off) and fails to give it any orders, that unit will still by capable of making its own decisions. If you forget that one of your units in Combat Mission exists, it will just sit there doing nothing. Again, I turn off icons sometimes when reviewing the action for the spectacle, but it makes no sense to insist on this as a rule. And again, how could you ever know if your opponent is abiding by this rule?

 

This mod only removes the icons for the OPFOR, it leaves all your icons active.  It makes the challenge of "spotting" the enemy up to the player as you have no enemy icons moving across the map. It kind of "forces" the player to look at the battle through the eyes of all their men to see what they can see. The pain with it comes when you are playing multiple battle at the same time and as both sides since you have exit the game, swap out the mods and reload the game every time you switch from Axis to Allies. It works best when you only play as one side all time. A request to have this be an option for the game to include, ie, Icons ON, OFF, SPOT and ENEMY OFF, has been asked for with the Engine 5 upgrade.

[Vacillator]

2 hours ago, PEB14 said:

calling regimental or divisional artillery to fire accurately on targets 50 or 100 meters in front of moving infantrymen

Pierre, I need you to tell me how to do this.  PM me urgently .

Edited March 31 by Vacillator

[Halmbarte]

2 hours ago, Vacillator said:

Pierre, I need you to tell me how to do this.  PM me urgently .

The best way I know of to do planned fires is using TRPs, assuming you have enough of them. 

H

[Blazing 88's]

On 3/29/2024 at 12:52 PM, Myles Keogh said:

What about the people who do really gamey stuff?

There is a video by a once-prominent CMx2 YouTuber in which his opponent used trucks to both scout and be "bait" for the TacAI.  He was placing trucks near his armor in the obvious hope that opposing tanks would choose to fire at the trucks and thus open themselves to a retaliatory fire by his armor.  (It also appears he dismounted the truck drivers in order to keep TacAI from retreating the trucks (i.e. keep them in place as bait.)  Of course, that's allowable by game engine and maybe even "smart" gameplay, but it's a total cheese/gamey tactic.  (Frankly, if an opponent did that in one of my matches, then I'd never play that person again.)

Do people make house rules about the "appropriate" use of trucks/jeeps/damaged vehicles?

Bingo! It's not smart, it's called BS!

[Erwin]

24 minutes ago, Blazing 88's said:

Bingo! It's not smart, it's called BS!

BS = "Bloody Smart"??   

(I'd be PO'd as well.)

[ALBY]

howdy friends

Lately, I have been experimenting with 2 things in the editor to help balance forces and address these issues.  Totally obvious things that I have recently reminded myself of.   
 

1.  Curating weapons, loadouts and upgrading or downgrading vehicles or infantry.  Scarce ammo and green gunners can detune vehicles and create difficult command choices.  
 

2.  Using weather to limit visibility and  drone/thermal sights.  
 

@Artkin has a point imo. Although I did not get it when he offered me a match as a rank noob. I understand the game dynamics a little better and I get ‘it’ a little more now.

However, I think you have to have design your games so that they require as few ‘non-enforceable’ game rules as possible. If it can built into the game within the constraints we have, then it should be. There are many iterations of force and weather combinations that can even up forces and provide good gameplay. 

where I am at now is that I do prefer CMBS and experimenting with ‘modern problems’.  I also value the creativity and ingenuity of my PBEM oppo and my attitude is that I can fight  or recover from any challenge, if it’s interesting, so I tend go with few rules other than to not bomb setup zones in ME.   I have been prejudiced lately against super strong or upgraded vehicles.  auto-cannons are vexing me lately. We all have our favorites. lol.   I think we all need to be as flexible as possible, especially in CMBS as we will be making our own fun until they revamp another modern title for us.   PS, I appreciate my PBEM oppo and playing the AI is not satisfying imo. 

[Probus]

What is y'alls opinion of pre-planned artillery not in setup zones but on routs of advance?  For instance a road through the woods that you are planning on going down or suspect the enemy is going to use to advance to your location?  Not exactly 'recon by fire' but could be a tactic to break up ambushes or nail possible convoy routs.  Would that be considered too 'gamey'?

The situation I'm considering is a ME in which a small town is the central battle zone.  So wouldn't it be wise to blast all the roads into the town with pre-planned artillery?

[PEB14]

8 hours ago, Probus said:

What is y'alls opinion of pre-planned artillery not in setup zones but on routs of advance?  For instance a road through the woods that you are planning on going down or suspect the enemy is going to use to advance to your location?  Not exactly 'recon by fire' but could be a tactic to break up ambushes or nail possible convoy routs.  Would that be considered too 'gamey'?

The situation I'm considering is a ME in which a small town is the central battle zone.  So wouldn't it be wise to blast all the roads into the town with pre-planned artillery?

It sounds 100% realistic to me as long as it it "preparatory fire", that is before starting to move your forces...

[Erwin]

1 hour ago, PEB14 said:

that is before starting to move your forces...

??  One has to assign all "prep fire" in the setup turn.  The only choice (for offmap arty) is whether it is "immediate" or starts 5, 10 or 15 minutes later.  Prep fire from an onmap gun is always "immediate" (onmap arty fire cannot be delayed).

I cannot see how firing on possible approaches is gamey.  The only house rule that makes sense is "No firing on known enemy set-up locations on turn 1."  (How would one know where the enemy set-up locations are without first loading the game as the enemy player?)

[Centurian52]

On 3/30/2024 at 4:41 PM, Heirloom_Tomato said:

This mod only removes the icons for the OPFOR, it leaves all your icons active.  It makes the challenge of "spotting" the enemy up to the player as you have no enemy icons moving across the map. It kind of "forces" the player to look at the battle through the eyes of all their men to see what they can see. The pain with it comes when you are playing multiple battle at the same time and as both sides since you have exit the game, swap out the mods and reload the game every time you switch from Axis to Allies. It works best when you only play as one side all time. A request to have this be an option for the game to include, ie, Icons ON, OFF, SPOT and ENEMY OFF, has been asked for with the Engine 5 upgrade.

Ok that's definitely on me for not reading carefully enough. I still don't see the point. The enemy icons are there to tell you what your troops know. If you disable enemy icons then you know less than the game intends for you to know. It still just feels like a handicap for the sake of a handicap, rather than something that makes any sense from a realism perspective.

Edited April 2 by Centurian52

[Centurian52]

I have to echo @PEB14's point that the fewer house rules you have, the better. One or two rules might be necessary from time to time (no turn 1 fire into known or obvious setup-zones in meeting engagements makes sense to me). But the more rules you add the more it feels like a sport and the less it feels like a battle. I can see it easily getting to the point where you'd be walking on eggshells the entire time and unable to have any fun.

[A Canadian Cat]

Just now, Centurian52 said:

I have to echo @PEB14's point that the fewer house rules you have, the better. One or two rules might be necessary from time to time (no turn 1 fire into known or obvious setup-zones in meeting engagements makes sense to me).

Yes, agreed 100%. Keep it tight and simple. Preferably so simple there are none. A way more interesting and fun thing to do is introduce a few rules on how you manage C2 - for example the Hard Cat rules  (https://community.battlefront.com/topic/135087-hard-cat-rules-v2i-simple-to-use-command-control-rules-updated-01-june-2022/ ) Those don't create expectations that opponents will not do things to hurt you it just limits some of the god view flexibility. 

 

 

Just now, Centurian52 said:

But the more rules you add the more it feels like a sport and the less it feels like a battle. I can see it easily getting to the point where you'd be walking on eggshells the entire time and unable to have any fun.

Yep, for me if someone reaches out with a bunch of rules it's a major red flag they are going to be no fun to play against. Not to mention I would hate to accidentally break a rule I agreed to because I simply forgot - I usually have a few games on the go after all. So hard pass if a new player starts saying "oh and do not this... and don't forget not to that...".

Now having said that, a long time playing partner who wants to experiment with something, that's a different kettle of fish I'm all in on trying something interesting. That's not what we are talking about though.

One of the great things about CM is rules lawyers are not successful because a truly impartial judge is keeping the game rules - the computer. One that you cannot wear down and befuddle. I suspect there are people here who have played war games with the people I call rules lawyers and don't want to repeat the experience. It used to be you were required to play with who showed up. Not any more

[Centurian52]

13 hours ago, Probus said:

What is y'alls opinion of pre-planned artillery not in setup zones but on routs of advance?  For instance a road through the woods that you are planning on going down or suspect the enemy is going to use to advance to your location?  Not exactly 'recon by fire' but could be a tactic to break up ambushes or nail possible convoy routs.  Would that be considered too 'gamey'?

The situation I'm considering is a ME in which a small town is the central battle zone.  So wouldn't it be wise to blast all the roads into the town with pre-planned artillery?

Not gamey at all. Using fire to deny an area to the enemy is a real tactic. Free Whisky actually did a video on how best to use artillery in Combat Mission. He describes four types of effects that artillery strives to achieve in real life, and which can be recreated in Combat Mission:

Suppress: Keep the enemy's heads down.

Obscure: Prevent the enemy from seeing your troops.

Secure: Prevent the enemy from occupying a piece of terrain by making it too dangerous.

Reduce: Inflict casualties on the enemy.

There's no doubt a similar formal list of effects that you can achieve with direct fire, whether it be from small arms or tanks/IFVs. But as I haven't come across it yet, here's my somewhat less formal (and not necessarily comprehensive) list of what you can do with direct fire:

Suppressive fire: Keep the enemy's heads down.

Recon-by-fire: Find the enemy by shooting at suspected positions, baiting them to shoot back.

Secure: Make a position dangerous for the enemy to occupy by shooting at it.

Destructive fire: Inflict casualties on the enemy.

Fire is a tool. Ultimately we want to use that tool to destroy the enemy. But it has many other uses that can make it easier to reach that ultimate goal, or make it harder for the enemy to destroy you. If you can think of any way to use fire to manipulate the enemy into doing what you want (or not doing what you don't want), then that's a legitimate use of fire, and one that has probably been used at some point in the real world.

 

Edited April 2 by Centurian52
If I'm going to reference the video, I really should post the video

[Centurian52]

Actually it occurs to me that most (though not necessarily all) 'gamey' tactics that are possible in Combat Mission are either real tactics that are formally taught, or really are pretty gamey but still have at least one example of real-world use. I recall someone commenting a while back that one reason Patton wasn't as popular with his own troops as he was with the general public was that he tended to fight like a Combat Mission player (that comment was gold, if only I could find it so I would know who to credit it to). He allegedly once sent a jeep speeding down the main road of a town for the express purpose of seeing if any Germans would shoot at it (IIRC it didn't work, there were Germans in the town, but they held their fire).