Horse transport

[Guest Germanboy]

Tommi, excellent post as usual. Thanks for the info. I would actually agree with you on trucks, except for that trucks don't tend to stampede during a barrage, making them easier to code and slightly more useful.

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Andreas

<a href="http://www.geocities.com/greg_mudry/sturm.html">Der Kessel</a >

Home of „Die Sturmgruppe“; Scenario Design Group for Combat Mission.

[This message has been edited by Germanboy (edited 11-21-2000).]

[ASL Veteran]

Okay everyone, no need to get your panties in a bunch! Actually, I guess I really did intend to get a bur under your saddles. The reason I can use ASL as a yardstick is because it simulates the exact same scale as CM. Since it simulates the exact same scale as CM then that would mean that there are literally thousands of scenarios and operations that have been researched by respectable individuals as to the participants of battle such and such and what those participants brought to that battle. There are scenarios in ASL that do include bicycles and horse transport. There aren't tons of them, but they do exist. We aren't talking about the GAME itself, but the ORDERS OF BATTLE of the situations that the forces in each GAME face. These situations are similar because the SCALE of CM and ASL is the same.

Alas, I suppose the ability to draw that comparison is beyond the mental capacities of the anti horse crowd. By the way, I do know a thing or two about history ... not that would really sway any of you guys. I'm also not going to get into a heated argument with the 'anti horse' crowd since it doesn't really mean very much to me anyway. Suffice it to say that horses, bicycles, etc could be simulated at the scale of CM. Whether you want to agree or not is really not my concern.

Oh, and yes, rail guns could be simulated as well. Just include them as Off Board Artillery. Whether you would want to include it or not is another matter. See how easy that is? Okay everyone, it's okay to exhale.

[ASL Veteran]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by PeterNZer:

Not sure about the rest of us, but some of us view HISTORY as the test.

for goodness sake man, are you telling me soldiers rode around on the battlefield? "come on fritz, get Donner und Blitzen to drag that gun to those trees over there, never mind the yankie tanks". For goodness sake! Do some reading! I am quite frustrated with some people here who think that EVERYTHING smallish and armyish should be included in CM.

Well I'll join in. I think we should have the cookery companies in here too! I want to buy SS cookery companies! I bet they do a much better apfelstrudel than anyone else, they could be CRACK COOKERY COMPANIES! yeah! I mean, I read that Guderian had a commander scrounge up every last man (including cooks) to hold a line. Of course, I want to see them modeled with their white hats.

And cyclists, yeah! I mean, you could 'move fast' and charge down the allies on your bicycles. This happened all the time in ww2!

And horses of course! All the time they had Assault Supply Lines! Elite battalions of wooden carts and horses storming terrified allied lines! I'm sure i read about it in 'Action Man'. They were Sturmpferdewaffe, lethal when given pointy nose guards to spike allied soldiers. And of course, Panzerpferdejager, Horses with big spike mines on their bellies taught to go and hump Shermans.

Really.

People, if you want horses in CM, what are you going to do with them? realistically they'd be sitting about 1km away in a padock with some pimply lad looking after them. You telling me you want to assault them? They DIDN'T wander around battlefields moving guns under fire. Same argument for bicycles, infantry DID NOT storm the enemy picket ridding a bike, they dumped them some way away. Unless you think BTS should take some time out to model a bike rack and bikes in the middle of town.

In CM2 there MAY be some call for cavalry since they were used some, but even then not really.

Everything you ask BTS to do costs them MONEY, there has to be a bloody good reason for it. Please, some people really need to think. I'm an optomist, perhaps beating your heads against the wall will improve things, go try it.

PeterNZ

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I'm really stunned at your unscholarly post. You will note that I never once advocated the addition of horses to CM. I merely stated that they could be added if desired, and that it would not be 'outside the scope' of CM. The statement that they are outside the scope because of CM's scale is shallow. How about doing a scenario about an American recon company happening upon a German supply column guarded by an infantry company? What if you want to have a scenario where American armored forces are cruising through central Germany at the end of the war and they catch an artillery battery unawares? Maybe you wouldn't want to play that scenario, but you have to agree that there is a remote possibility that something similar could have happened in World War 2. Do some reading man! Think outside of the box!

[ASL Veteran]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Kingfish:

You know, he's right. I see no reason why we can't have Battleships and Rail guns modeled in the game.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Battleships are already in CM 1. Well, Heavy Cruisers anyway. I've used 8 inch artillery in a few scenarios ... have you? Post when you have something relevant to add.

[ASL Veteran]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Chupacabra:

All sarcasm aside. ASLVet, if you're so cocksure about your position, I wonder if you can find a reference to any battles on the Western front where horses played a major role once a battle was joined.

Nutrition affected front line squads as well, should we model that? How about modelling how clean the infantry kept their weapons? Or the quality of their uniforms? Well, if ASL did, I guess CM should hop to it.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

The first part of your post was 100% correct. ASL is the divine god of war. I believe we should all bow down and say a prayer of gratitude since the birth of CM was inspired by the existance of ASL. Actually, maybe we should refer to ASL as 'Daddy'.

Of course, you are assuming that I am somehow ADVOCATING the usage of horses in CM which I am not. I simply point out that they could be modelled. In this case your position would be stronger if it was restated as ... 'Yes, horses could be modelled in CM but I sure as heck don't want to play with them.' and that's fine. Different strokes for different folks.

[ASL Veteran]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tss:

Germanboy wrote:

Ever seen a picture of horses handling guns in a frontline situation? I have not.

I haven't either, but I have read accounts where horses were, indeed, used in front line to tow guns.

However, as far as I can now remember, in all those accounts those who had horses in combat hadn't planned for it but an enemy attack surprised the artillery or AT gun units.

Few examples:

- During the Finnish counter attack at Kuuterselkä 14 June 1944 Lt. Olli Aulanko's Stug run over (literally) a Soviet 76 mm

battery that was in tow (by horses).

- I have vague recollections that precisely the same thing happened during attact to Karhumäki in November 1941 when the only Finnish T-34 run over a 76 mm battery that was being transported for direct fire to front.

- When Soviets broke through Finnish lines at Valkeasaari 10 June 1944 their tanks drove to a Finnish artillery battery that was just being evacuated. Few guns were already in tow but the drivers cut the horse harnesses and left them behind.

- On the same day on the same front a MG gunner of JR 1 was evacuating his platoon's MGs with a horse-drawn cart when he noticed that the road ahead was blocked by enemy tanks. He jumped out of the cart and let the horse continue alone while he escaped through forest. The tankers didn't shoot at the horse as they saw that there were no-one in the cart. Very surprisingly, the horse and cart got back to their usual quarters intact, with the MGs.

- The next one is pretty unbelievable and actually it doesn't include a combat, but it is pretty interesting and a veteran claimed in an interview that he saw it with his own eyes. During the Finnish retreat from Karelian Isthmus he witnessed that one Finnish horse-drawn cart was advancing next to a KV tank (though the tank was probably a JS-II, tank identification was not an exact science those days). The driver kept his cart so close to the tank that it couldn't shoot its gun. The observer wondered why no tanker inside popped up to shoot the driver. Apparently the tank had got separated from its infantry cover and the crew didn't want to raise their heads. Finally the tank stopped and blocked the route of the cart. At that point the driver cut the horse loose and led it to forest, passing the front of the tank and going under the gun. The observer never found out who that horse driver was and what happened to him afterwards.

In all above cases the horses got to battlefield by accident. Whether that kind of occurences were frequent (and interesting) enough to be warrant inclusion in CM is debatable. However, the same could be said of trucks.

- Tommi

[This message has been edited by tss (edited 11-21-2000).]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Ah, there is a scholar in the house! Yes indeed, these are the sort of situations I had in mind. Indeed, they COULD be modelled and the question is more of whether we want them to be included or not. Some people would find scenarios with horses or bicycles in them entertaining, while some would not. However, to say they are beyond the scope of the game is not an argument about facts. It is an argument about opinion.

[Los]

Not to burst anyone bubble but there are plenty of instances of cavalry being used on the Russian front. (**** the Portuguese were effectively operating a cavalry squadron in Angola as late as the early 1970s even fighting mounted in action at times.) Not that I feel like particularly giving a history lesson, but Cavalry ops on eastern front, predominantly by the Russians (but also at times in significant strength by the Germans) were ongoing and on a large scale. There are sufficient accounts of actual cavalry charges. Particularly during Uranus "German Infantry Divisions found themsleves in the open fighting off cavalry attacks 'as if it were 1870', as one officer put it". (Anthony Beevor, "Stalingrad".)

It's not even an issue that can be disputed. And certainly horses were used to tote around heavy weapons at times even in CM scale operations. Still, there was never any ability or resoruces available to code every last single facet of WW2 combat into the first release of CM. And I would remind ASL VETERAN that neither did ASL (historical or ahistorical as it is) include all umpteen million chapters that it has today in its first release. It grew overtime s CM does. Frankly I doubt you will ever see horses retrofitted into CM1, though I wouldn't doubt they'll probably make it into CM2.

Patience sweathoppers....

Los

[Sgt. Steiner]

ASL Veteran is right. Everything posted here is an opinion, and everyone is entitled to theirs. This IS supposed to be a forum, where folks can discuss the various aspects of CM in a reasonable (and hopefully intelligent) manner. The rabid reactions of some members of the forum whenever certain topics are brought up, i.e. horse transport, bicycles, motorcycles, etc amazes me. Constantly stating "that is beyond the scope of CM", and then flaming the poor guy who brings up the subject is uncalled for.

Just say, "IMO this or that wouldn't benefit the game", and leave it at that. And if BTS were to include something in the game you didn't like (like the horse transport), then don't use it! If a scenario has that stuff in it, then don't play it! There are obscure units in the current CM that IMO could have been left out, but I don't fly off the handle about it. I simply ignore them.

Anyway, enough about that, and here's to our favorite game..

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Ob's stürmt oder schneit, ob die Sonne uns lacht, der Tag glühend heiß oder eiskalt die Nacht, bestaubt sind die Gesichter, doch froh ist unser sinn, ja unser sinn, es braust unser Panzer im Sturmwind dahin

-- Panzerlied

[Guest Big Time Software]

OK, time to pop in here...

Horse are, for the most part, outside of CM's scope. Do not forget that "scope" implies more than just scale. As some have suggested, if scale were the only measurement of "scope" we would have to put in field kitchens, ammo dumps, field hospitals, whore houses , etc. But scale is not the only factor.

Combat Mission is designed to simulate a wide variety of combat situations, weapons, men, and equipment for a given time period on a given front at roughly the company/battalion level. The greater something was a factor for such a battle, the greater the need for CM to simulate it. This works in reverse as well.

We are not going to simulate horse-drawn anything in CM2. Not because such horses were never fired upon in a company sized battle, but because it was not a standard part of a battle at this scale. More importantly, once the bullets started flying and the shells started coming down, they were largely irrelevant.

Cavlary on the Eastern Front is a tough one for us. As Los pointed out, they were used fairly frequently in terms of number of times in battle. Overall, they weren't that common. Or more exactly, there are far more situations to simulate that did not involve cavalry forces than did. And for that reason mounted cavalry (as opposed to dismounted) is on the back burner. There is a LOT to do for the Eastern Front, and in the Big Picture™ mounted cavalry is down on the list of important things to do.

So we shall see...

Steve

[Guest Germanboy]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by ASL Veteran:

Ah, there is a scholar in the house! <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

And we all know it is not you since your idea of scholarship obviously consists of reading a game handbook. Different strokes for different folks I guess. Next time if you don't want to get people upset I suggest not questioning their intelligence time and again or calling them CC players. But you may now go back to play with Lego and read Moby Dick, something which I hope will not tax your intellect too much, while adults get to argue about CM based on reality. (see, I can do that as well as you can)

Now, I accept that there are (very very few) situations in which having horses can be realistic. From the quotes Tommi brought up it seems to me that this would amount to the first 30 secs of a 30 turn scenario, after which the horses would be as useful as the average truck in CM. That brings us to the second question of whether it is worth doing it. My answer would be a resounding 'no', unless BTS suddenly finds the crock of gold at the end of the rainbow and can afford to employ programmers to model everything and the kitchensink (Sdkfz. 123456 Ausf. B Schwer), which by the way was never modeled in ASL, proving how inferior that game was.

And all this was just said much better by Steve in a post I missed due to IE's caching particularities...

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Andreas

<a href="http://www.geocities.com/greg_mudry/sturm.html">Der Kessel</a >

Home of „Die Sturmgruppe“; Scenario Design Group for Combat Mission.

[This message has been edited by Germanboy (edited 11-22-2000).]

[PeterNZer]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>I guess I really did intend to get a bur under your saddles. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Well done, you succeeded. As for the poster a couple of messages up, you'll note people didn't really (well I didn't) flame the original guy since he asked a reasonable question, however someone who is looking for a fight will get one

As for TSS being somewhat of a Grog, he's Finnish so it doesn't count. You could ask for the inclusion of toothpicks in CM and he'll come up with three different examples of Finns armed with toothpicks taking out Soviet platoons

I think the horses thing has been covered. The effort for the return is just not worth it.

If it requires you to come up with specific scenarios to justify inclusion of horses then there's your case for not including them, once you've played 2 or 3 scenarios with these specials then you're not going to want to play more of them and BTS's time and money is wasted on an irrelevent detail. There's unlikely to be a great deal of utility in including horses, bicycles, cookery companies and so on.

It's just not that exciting to play 'ambush the horse-drawn artillery and cut them all down'. Nor is it anything but briefly amusing to mow down bicycle ridding troops as they go for a sunday ride along the roads.

Horses and cycles are more useful at an operational level where movement speeds and transport speeds really matter.

I've still not seen a convincing argument that horses did anything in battle other than die or run away, and therefore are just not worth modeling.

However, I am not adverse to people giving BTS money and paying for their inclusion. The line just has to be drawn somewhere otherwise they'll spend the next couple of years doing this things

PeterNZ

[nijis]

This is way out of the scope of CM, but it might interest folks. Never mind Angola, I'm pretty sure cavalry is still being used in the Sudanese civil war.

In late 1998, UN famine watchers were concerned about an armored train that was moving south to the town of Wau to resupply a government garrison. Because the tracks get washed out every rainy season and have to be rebuilt as the train moves along, the train was only moving along at a few kilometers per day. The government couldn't afford regular troops to protect the train from the rebels all this time. Instead, they enlisted "militias" from the Muslim tribes up north, who rode down on horses. Rather than pay them, the government allowed them to go on looting and slave-taking sprees in the Christian/animist villages along the way. I doubt they did much fighting from horseback, however, because I think they stayed away from wherever armed rebels were likely to be. In an added surreal twist, the whole mini-campaign was being observed by the UN from satellite. Probably not the horse bits, but at least the progress of the train.

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"I can't listen to music too often... It makes me want to say kind, stupid things, and pat the heads of people... But now you have to beat them on the head, beat them without mercy."

V. I. Lenin

[This message has been edited by nijis (edited 11-22-2000).]

[Guest tero]

>You could ask for the inclusion of toothpicks in CM and he'll come up with three different examples of Finns armed with toothpicks taking out Soviet platoons

Actually, During Winter War Finnish troops did take out tanks by jamming their treads with logs and then a Molotov down the engine air intake. Seriously.

>I think the horses thing has been covered. The effort for the return is just not worth it.

Consider this: for years there was a minor nuisance caused by the war veteran horses to the Finnish agriculture. After the war the horses were returned to farm work and they had become so accustomed to the sounds of war they would take cover whenever they heard a loud bang or there was the sound of an aeroplane flying nearby. Sounds funny (I'd hate to have my car dive to a ditch every time there was a plane overhead or a bang heard . It took some time to convince the horses all was clear and to get them back to work.

Needless to say I belong to the "bring out the horses" fraction.

In CM2 there needs to be horses for the Finnish army because there were VERY few trucks in the Finnish army service, if you count the ratio of trucks vs horses.

>Horses and cycles are more useful at an operational level where movement speeds and transport speeds really matter.

You are aware there were such troops as "cycle Jaegers" in the Finnish army and that they did occasionally ride their bikes into combat?

As for the horses: the Finnish (and the German) army relied heavily on horses and not to have them as an option for gun towing duty is a clear omission.

And veteran horses learned and knew how to shelter themselves in case of an air attack or an artillery fire mission so they CAN do more than just run away in panic or roll over and die.

[Hans]

How about two version of CM, one with Horses for realists and another (carefully labeled)"NO EVIL HORSES WITHIN", The anti horsers can then download the "anti-horse patch" which will turn all horses into Italian made trucks.

WWI gave a good indication of how horses can be used in "up front war", especially of the horse artillery units.

My father had the honor to be an American Cavalry Officer (1939-1940) and they had a method of teaching horses not to react to gunfire.....wannna guess how they did it?

Horses? Sure they'll have to be in the Russian version and certainly in the early war years so we can recreate Polish Lancer vs Pz I's! For CM a low priority patch (probably using coding from CM II)

Regards all

[PeterNZer]

The madness continues.

Again, there's NO CLEAR EXAMPLES of horses used in combat!

Bollocks to a 'realist' version with horses!

Yes! Horses were used! Noone is denying that! Were they used in the 30 minutes CM represents? NO!

If they were used, it was in generally -exceptional- circumstances, BTS does NOT need to model every exceptional circumstance in ww2, or I want my damn cookery companies!

Yes, horses dragged stuff around, yes Bicycles transported troops, no horses did not drag guns around in battle, no people didn't ride through forests and across fields into battle.

Yes, just -before- and -after- the battle cycles, cooks, whores, looters, horses etc etc etc were invovled, but not in the 30min.

Furthermore, if they -were- used, exactly how interesting was the situation?

No, attacking artillery being moved is not that interesting, no attacking bicycle columns is not that interesting.

If cycles and horses were in CM you would see them innevitably being used in ahistorical ways, see the cycle troops cycle from cover to cover as they advance on the enemy, watch the guns being used on assault as they are dragged from position to position by well trained horses, (NO, not all horses were trained to be ignore gunfire, many horses were just conscripted).

There is no point at all in adding this stuff unless it adds to CM. Again, noone has bothered to counter the point that it will cost BTS money to even think of doing that, and who's going to pay for it? Will it generate extra sales? Will you pay for it? In the end, you'd say maybe one, maybe two scenarios where horses would be at all interesting, and for all that time and effort? You've got to be kidding!

As Tero points out, horses were not exactly useful anywhere near loud bangs and noises. If we model horses, it's time to model them taking off with the gun in tow and running off the map in full speed, destroying the gun and possibly themselves in the process. End result, noone would bother to buy them, again another reason why it would be totally pointless for a game of CM's scope to model horses.

For some reason, despite the fact that Tero admits horses are just about a waste of time in CM, he comes out in favour! Odd.

As for crack finnish cycle assault forces, I look forward to seeing them in CM2 I hope. I'll put my KV in the middle of a field and find out whether AP, HE or MG fire works best at turning them into red mist.

I'm all in favour of two versions of CM if someone will pay for it. They can include automatic allied air supperiority, racial modifiers, bicycles, automatic cheap arty for allies, horses, cookery companies and mobile whorehouses. Please pay BTS to make it.

PeterNZ

[tss]

tero wrote:

Actually, During Winter War Finnish troops did take out tanks by jamming their treads with logs and then a Molotov down the engine air intake. Seriously.

Worked best against BT-series, useful against T-26 tanks. T-28s were generally too heavy to be stopped that way. The method was not foolproof though, I've read one account where a "bomber" (as the close-defence AT men were called) tried to immobilize a tank with a crowbar and the only result was that it (the crowbar, not the tank) flew five meters away.

You are aware there were such troops as "cycle Jaegers" in the Finnish army and that they did occasionally ride their bikes into combat?

Though usually not on purpose. At least I can't remember any occurence where the bicycle troops knowingly advanced closer than 200-300 meters to the own front line while mounted, and they would then act as regular infantry for the rest of the battle. Sometimes it could take several days before a bicycle unit could recover its bikes. (Or, as happened often in 1944, the Soviets would reach the bikes first).

BTW, ambushing a bicycle column effectively is not very easy, since it is quite long and sparse and it won't take many seconds for the men to dismount and get cover. Also, if you advance on a forested road you can drive several dozens of meters into the forest before dismounting, giving a nice los cover.

As for the horses: the Finnish (and the German) army relied heavily on horses and not to have them as an option for gun towing duty is a clear omission.

But horses were not knowingly brought near the front line as a horse cannot take shelter from small arms fire. For example, at Kirvesmäki section of Taipale during the Winter War, horses were taken only up to "Karmankolo" bunker that was about 750 meters behind the front line. From there all stuff was transported by manpower, including AT guns when they were available.

Speaking of Winter War, there was one case of Soviet cavalry use that gives a nice crossover to the "gamey recon" thread since if anyone tried to do something like that in CM, his opponent would cry out "gamey" real loud.

In the first days of March 1940 Soviets advanced to Äyräpää area. They couldn't spot the exact position of Finnish line (what itself is not very surprising, since the line was basically only a series of holes in the snow). They then sent a small troop of cavalry galloping in front of the lines trying to get Finnish MGs to fire so that they could destroy the positions with artillery fire. I can't remember did the MGs open up or not. Note that in just about any other army the cavalrymen would have politely or not-so-politely refused the suicide mission.

- Tommi

[Kingfish]

Guys,

Horses are already modelded in the game. If you have offboard arty availible, or if your troops are well fed and supplied, then it's assumed that horses are included.

[Guest wwb_99]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Bruno Weiss:

Ah, but horsees can pull guns through the woods and vehicles can't. Gimme some horsees and I can start buying more AT guns instead of tracked AT's, cause them horsees can get them into nice hidden woods positions faster, and with the ability to withdraw them deeper into the woods where tracks and vehicles can't go. And horsees don't bogg, they would be cheaper than vehicles to buy, and and AAAANNNNNDDDDD, once BTS went ahead and took the big plunge, modeled the nasty smelling critters, then they'd be in a position to produce this game engine in any combat scenario spanning hundreds or thousands of years. HISTORY VILL BE OURS!!!

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

A heavy wagon (such as an ATG) is just as, if not more, roadbound as a truck.

WWB

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Ave, Caesar! Morituri te salatamus.

[Guest Big Time Software]

OK, let's all take a deep breath here No need to get huffy about things.

Folks in the pro-horse camp need to think about the bigger picture. Simple line of logic here:

Just because something was involved in warfare does not mean it is relevant to CM's scope of combat.

Horses used for limbering artillery, supplies, etc. were definitely not supposed to be in a frontline battle. Period. It does not matter if 110% of all German guns, food, ammo, troops, planes, or whatever were towed by horses. In frontline combat they were not supposed to be anywhere near the shooting. As with everything in war, at some point in time in some place it did happen. But it was no more supposed to happen than having the Bakerei Kompanie defending their cook stoves from advancing T-34s.

So simply put, if it wasn't a normal and/or purposefully part of frontline combat, it has no place in Combat Mission. So obviously this stuff will not be included. That means no horses for towing stuff.

Mounted cavalry is something we need to take a closer look at. In most cases I have read they were either used in a harrassing or recon role. Since CM is not designed to simulate non-frontline combat situations, these roles are not relevant. The use of large, organized cavlary squadrons in regular frontline combat is less well known to us, but it did happen. There are many questions for us to answer before we decide to include them for this purpose, some of which are simply "bang for development buck" questions. Right now we feel that there are far too many other big things that need to be tackled first, so mounted cavalry horse units are not a sure bet for inclusion in CM2.

Steve

[Bruno Weiss]

But what about the cows?

Hehehe, couldn't resist.

Ahem, truely wisdom speaks. Not unlike the Florida Supreme Court, the wisdom of a centrist position emerges. Horsees are not the mainstay, ergo not represented, but may be in other aspects... "Maybe".

King Solomon would be proud.

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"Gentlemen, you may be sure that of the three courses

open to the enemy, he will always choose the fourth."

-Field Marshal Count Helmuth von Moltke, (1848-1916)

[nijis]

Actually,there's a truly excellent movie about Finnish bicycle troops in the Continuation War upon whose scenes I'd really like to base some scenarios. They're all peddling along through some woods, then all of a sudden the lieutenant sniffs some Russkies in the woodpile, raises his hand, and everybody comes to a halt and deploys. In English it's translated as "Ambush." I think the Finnish version translates as the "Road to Mustapekka" or something.

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"I can't listen to music too often... It makes me want to say kind, stupid things, and pat the heads of people... But now you have to beat them on the head, beat them without mercy."

V. I. Lenin

[Guest tero]

>Just because something was involved in warfare does not mean it is relevant to CM's scope of combat.

I agree in principle. But lets take a perfectly feasible scenario for CM: 1000pts, Dawn/Dusk, Large Map, June 1944, Meeting engagement, Heer Infantry vs Allied Paras (say, fight over possession of a road junction yet unsecured by either force some ways behind the main front lines). Given the fact that the OOB of any given Heer Infantry division was equine heavy when it came to transports and that the givens of the scenario call for both forces to advance quite a distance it is unsportsmanlike to have the German gunners push the on board IG's around for several kilometers when they could use their horses to do the job. Yes, their deployment would take a few minutes once they were in contact but hell, that is war for you. And they could haul them to a jump off point and push them from there without being overly exhausted.

>So simply put, if it wasn't a normal and/or purposefully part of frontline combat, it has no place in Combat Mission. So obviously this stuff will not be included. That means no horses for towing stuff.

By the same token, should'nt the trucks get the same treatment ? SdKfz-7's hauling 88's (HT's in general) is OK as it did happen in frontline conditions. Trucks hauling stuff around OK as it is conceivable it happened in frontline conditions. Horses hauling stuff around not OK because it is unconceivable and not supposed to happen in frontline conditions, even if the majority of German transports were NOT motorized ?

[Simon Fox]

SHUZHUK

5 kg of horsemeat

5 kg of suet

350 g of salt

10 g of black ground pepper

50 g of garlic

greens to taste.

The prepared meat is rubbed with salt and kept for 1-2 days in a cool place at the temperature of 3-4_C. Guts are washed and kept for some time in salt water. Meat and fat are cut in small pieces and mixed. Garlic, pepper and salt are added and all this is mixed again. Then the guts are stuffed, its both ends are tied up with a string and they are hung out for 3-4 hours in a cool place.

Shuzhuk is smoked during 12-18 hours over dense smoke at the temperature of 50-60_C, then dried up at 12_C for 2-3 days.

Dried or smoked shuzhuk is boiled on slow fire during 2-2,5 hours.

Before serving the table shuzhuk is cut in thin slices to 1 cm thick, layed out on a plate, decorated with rings of Onion and greens.

[Guest tero]

Mmmmmmmmmmm..... horse meat. :-D

[Bastables]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tero:

>Just because something was involved in warfare does not mean it is relevant to CM's scope of combat.

I agree in principle. But lets take a perfectly feasible scenario for CM: 1000pts, Dawn/Dusk, Large Map, June 1944, Meeting engagement, Heer Infantry vs Allied Paras (say, fight over possession of a road junction yet unsecured by either force some ways behind the main front lines). Given the fact that the OOB of any given Heer Infantry division was equine heavy when it came to transports and that the givens of the scenario call for both forces to advance quite a distance it is unsportsmanlike to have the German gunners push the on board IG's around for several kilometers when they could use their horses to do the job. Yes, their deployment would take a few minutes once they were in contact but hell, that is war for you. And they could haul them to a jump off point and push them from there without being overly exhausted.

>So simply put, if it wasn't a normal and/or purposefully part of frontline combat, it has no place in Combat Mission. So obviously this stuff will not be included. That means no horses for towing stuff.

By the same token, should'nt the trucks get the same treatment ? SdKfz-7's hauling 88's (HT's in general) is OK as it did happen in frontline conditions. Trucks hauling stuff around OK as it is conceivable it happened in frontline conditions. Horses hauling stuff around not OK because it is unconceivable and not supposed to happen in frontline conditions, even if the majority of German transports were NOT motorized ?

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On Arty 'But not nearly as quickly as, later in the war, self-propelled artillery could be positioned. Horses took a couple of hours, half-tracks at least half an hour, but SP guns could open fire within seconds of halting.'(1990 Deighton) Guess which one were deployed closer to the front? Also your 'perfectly feasible scenario' never occured, paras jumped in to secure postions that were static to break the dead lock not to catch fleeing german infantry div on the move. Maybe its a 'perfectly feasible scenario', but not to me or history for that matter. There were only 3 drop operations carried out by allied para forces, I have never read any of these 'perfectly feasible scenario' occuring.

The fact that 7,5cm IG were so light should indicate that pushing them around for several hundred metres was not usual and were desgined along with the 3,7cm PaK for this, the 15cm sIG were another matter and had the same problems as the bigger guns indicated above, although to a lesser extent, which is why the Germans were so intrested in placing them in chassies such as the Grille at least for the Panzer and Pz Grenadier Divs, or why most infantry Divshad moved to 81cm and 12cm mortars at this stage of the war for their indirect capabilty.

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From the jshandorf

"Why don't we compare reality to the game like Bastables likes to do all the time?"

Mr T's reply

"Don't touch me FOO!"

"Yes that's right Jerry, RUN, Run for your little lives because Tommy's gotten close enough to assault mhahahahah."

Nizam al-Mulk, (Order of the realm) In speaking of his superb disregard of maneuver warfare, in the destruction of OGSF hamsters who then carried on to flee the battle in their own notion of maneuver warfare. Tally HO!

[This message has been edited by Bastables (edited 11-23-2000).]

[This message has been edited by Bastables (edited 11-23-2000).]