Grille in CM2?

[Capt. Toleran]

I did a search on this, and though I saw it mentioned, I didn't see any definitive answer on this from BTS (though maybe I should have read more extensively).

Will it be included in CM2? With around a 1,000 made (if I remember correctly), it seems like it would be a good candidate, as according to Chamberlain, it was used fairly extensively.

[Panzer Leader]

What is it?

[Sirocco]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Panzer Leader:

What is it?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

SdKfz 138/1 15cm Infanteriegeschutz 33 (Sf) auf PzKpfw 38 (t) Grille (Cricket).

The data I have is that 90 were produced in 1943.

[Panzer Leader]

Oh the Cricket.

Hey, nothing has yet been mentioned about the 35t and the 38t (Czech?) I hope we get to see those in action!

In 1940, they were better than the German tanks.

[Mattias]

Just under 400 I think... (All three Pz.38 types where called Grille)

But yes, they would be a good addition. Quite a few would probably want to see the Brummbär first though.

Now, speaking of the Grille series and the other sIG 33 vehicles I have been reading time and time again how these vehicles were designed for the purpose of:

Reaching targets behind cover, and than because of this most of the firing was done in the higher levels of elevation.

This is further supported by the fact that the vehicles were all very lightly armoured and not, per the instruction manual, to under no circumstances be used as Sturmgeschütze.

I'm mentioning it as it has been discussed here on the forum which was the sIG's most common role, indirect or for direct fire?

As far as the Grille type goes the former would seem to be the case.

This question also ties with the possibilities of on board, mobile, indirect fire. Something that is not implemented in CM as it stands today.

M.

[ 04-25-2001: Message edited by: Mattias ]

[Panzer Leader]

They sure were cool in the Panzer General series. I always had two or three of them in my core force. The only problem was the low ammo.

I would very much like to see onboard artillery able to fire indirect. After all, the mortars can do it, so why not the big guns?

[PawBroon]

As it has been said before, they are in but modelled in the form of Forward Observers.

Anyone said abstracted?

[jgdpzr]

Mattias,

I think the fundamental problem with the vehicular weapons such as the Wespe, Hummel & Priest is that of minimum range. Yes, these units were designed to primarily operate in indirect fire modes from well behind the front lines. However, when they are onboard, most if not all CM maps are simply too small to allow this kind of fire. I don't think the guns could elevate sufficiently. You'd be talking darn near vertical elevation and even if the guns were cabable of doing this it is highly unlikely they would be permitted to do so. They would simply make haste to an area further behind the fighting so they could do their thing the way they were designed. When they are this close to the fighting, they pretty much would have to be restricted to direct fire mode. Seems realistic to me. I guess it would all depend on the minimum range for each individual weapon and the size of the map.

[Enoch]

According to this the M7 Priest had a maximum elavation of 35 degrees. It doesn't give the maximum or minimum range. But, I'd think that 35 degrees is insufficient to be able to use the M7 as onboard indirect fire given the size of the maps.

My 2 cents.

PS: according to this the cricket had a maximum elevation of 72 degrees. This would make it a more likely candidate to be used as on board indirect artillery. But, I'd think that even at maximum elevation it's mimumum range would be well over 2000 meters or so.

[ 04-25-2001: Message edited by: Enoch ]

[Mattias]

PawBroon ,

The sIG 33 is not abstracted in the game. The off board 150mm FO represent 15cm Howitzers (164 vs. 198 blast rating). Of course one could use the 150mm FO as a surrogate but it is not the same thing.

Jgdpzr,

In the case if the Wespe, Hummel and Priest, sure. But the Grille is not a self propelled artillery piece comparable to those. It has a maximum range of 4700 meters and was intended to operate just behind it giving indirect fire support to the Panzer Grenadier units.

As I said, the specified purpose seems to have been to “reach targets that could not be reached with direct suppressive fire”. This role was fulfilled by the sIG’s alongside the mortars.

Consider it an indirect firing, close supporting weapon system made mobile by mounting it on an armoured chassis.

[emphasis edited]

Do NOT confuse them with dedicated SP artillery systems.

M.

[ 04-25-2001: Message edited by: Mattias ]

[jgdpzr]

Mattias,

You raise a good point about the Grille, in terms of it being different than the vehicular arty we see in this iteration of CM. To be honest, I don't know that much about the Grille. It may very well have been used just as you said, I dunno. I am sure BTS will take this into consideration when (assuming not if) implementing the weapon in CM2.

[WWB]

We definitely need to see some sort of on board, indirect fire mode in CM2. Right now the most useless vehicles in the game are the mortar halftracks, because they cannot be spotted for like leg mortars.

WWB

[PawBroon]

For the avid fans of rare to never seen before vehicules, here is the Hetzer variant of the Grille sIG33 of which 24 were done.

[c3k]

Gentlemen, (and I use it loosely)

You are WAY off base comparing the Bison/Cricket/Grille to a Priest/M7/Wespe/Hummel.

The standard German infantry regiment included 6 75mm infantry guns and 2 150mm infantry guns. These were used for DIRECT support against point targets. Their ranges (I'd look them up but it isn't germane to this thread) were MUCH shorter than Self-Propelled Artillery.

The 150mm heavy infantry gun (_s_chwere _I_nfanterie _G_eschutz - sIG) was a bitch to move. They started strapping them down on top of obsolete tank chassis and slapping a light wrap around armor on the top. (Small arms protection since these guns operated very much on the front lines.)

Now, this was a DIRECT fire weapon. Sight the target, fire. It had a very short barrel length and slow muzzle velocity. Therefore, it used a HIGH ANGLE trajectory. Some people regard any high angle fire to be indirect. Not so.

If you'd like more information, post your questions. Time permitting, I'll do my best (as far as my limited knowledge/references allow).

Ken

[Mattias]

c3k,

You certainly hit this thread running...

I am merely curios what a knowledgeable writer like Wolfgang Fleischer means when he says that the SP sIG where used as a means, alongside the mortars, to reach targets "behind cover".

That the "manual" regarding the use of the weapon system states that it is to be used in support both as a direct and an indirect weapon. While pressing dangers of, to the point of prohibiting, the use of it as a Sturmgeschütz surrogate.

The armour is just as thin as that of the SP artillery that operated further back, whereas it is not nearly as thick as that of the Sturmgeschütze.

In fact I have not seen anyone show anything that could be described as conclusively arguing in favour of either direct or indirect fire being the primary fire mission.

Most probably it was both, but the matter is of some interest as it could lead to further insight into the matter of, I'll say it again, on-board (CM scale) - mobile - indirect firing - weapon systems.

M.

[lcm1947]

How come the German's had all this neat stuff and we just had the Sherman's and more Sherman's and more Sherman's? Oh, never mind I think I figured it out just now.

[Michael Emrys]

You gents advocating on-map indirect fire must have already forgotten Bullethead's excellent (and lengthy) post explaining the problems associated with that. In addition to the minimum range problem already mentioned in this thread, there is the problem that for indirect fire artillery to work, it has to occupy a site that has been surveyed, with aiming stakes, wire communications to the FDC, and all the other rigamarole so dear to the heart of the redlegs. All this setting up takes time. Think: Hours.

So in CM you have only one way to utilize that kind of indirect fire, and that is to have the firing piece remain in its starting location (the assumption being that all the surveying, etc. was done before the action represented in the game begins). If it moves, it loses the ability to indirect fire. Which sort of robs SPA of its whole raison d'etre, doesn't it?

If you really want a game that accurately depicts SPA and its advantages, you will need to shift the scale up a notch to the operational level where the turns are an hour or six long. Then you could begin to get the feel of it.

Michael

[Mattias]

Michael,

Oh, I think most who read Bulletheads posts remember it

And true it is, as far as "real" artillery goes, i.e. the type that will fire from far away using spotters, radios, phones etc.

No doubt the IG's could be deployed in a similar manner but they also had different mission.

Direct fire is a non issue really but, lets call it, "semi indirect" fire is not.

Picture yourself in your SP sIG, you have a shallow valley in front of you with a hill or village on the opposite side, a little over 1000 meters away.

Now, you know the enemy is right behind the hill or assembling in the far side of the village.

I say you could fire indirectly at those areas without a laborious set-up process.

You know the direction, you know the distance, you can make a good approximation of the relative elevation, do you need anything more to fire indirectly?

would this be unspotted fire then? Well, unless some kind of input could be transmitted to the gunners I guess it would.

At the very least a measure of flexibility that is available to on board mortars and guns is not present in the game.

Anyone who has experience in the deployment of mortars, perhaps especially Self Propelled ones, should be able to answer this I guess.

In any event...

One thing that has, I think, skewed the views of CM players with regards to indirect fire is the incredible accuracy if the mortars and howitzers in the game. Indirect fire has been taken the role of precision bombing and anything less is considered unusable.

M.

[Triumvir]

When I was in SP mortars, one of the things we constantly practiced was hipshots. This means pulling off the line of march, setting up the mortars, recording position and centre of arc with first round out of the barrel within two minutes. I can say with certainty that you can do all this within one minute of the APC stopping; laying a mortar takes less than thirty seconds. Even when I switched to towed 155s, we were held to the same two minute standard.

Does this mean that there should be on-map indirect fire in CM? Almost certainly not.

There are a lot of prerequisites for indirect fire. You need the firing tables that tell you what combination of elevation and charge will give you a given range. You need a good idea of the range and direction. All this information is compiled by the BCP/FDC and distributed to the guns.

In CM there's no equivalent of a battery command post or a fire direction centre, apart from forward observers. An individual gun/mortar crew typically will have neither maps of the area good enough to plot fire nor equipment to survey their position and gauge the range.

Most importantly, you need some way to spot where your rounds are going, else you are wasting your ammo. Without someone to adjust your fall of shot, or without really precise maps and surveys, indirect artillery is useless. If I guesstimate the distance to a village behind a ridge at 1000m, but it's really 1200m, all the rounds I'm firing will fall 200m short -- and may as well be fired directly into the ridge.

CM, like real life, models indirect fire as being a finger from heaven on insect-like crunchies. That's because artillery rounds are expensive and wasting them on terrain not populated by enemies is frowned on.

Semi-indirect fire for mortars exists where the mortar crew ranges by observing the fall of their shot. That's currently modeled in CM. It's really direct fire, except that mortar trajectory is so arcing that it has to be indirectly aimed.

All of the above applies to all artillery pieces, even 51mm and 60mm mortars. The only difference there is that as calibre diminishes, the command process grows simple enough that the crew can be the FDC, crew and spotter all rolled into one.

Proper onboard indirect fire is already modeled by letting infantry pieces fire at out-of-LOS targets when they're under command of a HQ that has those targets in LOS. The HQ acts as spotter and FDC. This doesn't happen for vehicle based pieces because they are unaffected by command.

Basically, onboard indirect fire is already well handled for infantry weapons. To make them work for all weapons, vehicles must be able to respond to command.

[Abteilung]

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

When I was in SP mortars, one of the things we constantly practiced was hipshots. This means pulling off the line of march, setting up the mortars, recording position and centre of arc with first round out of the barrel within two minutes. I can say with certainty that you can do all this within one minute of the APC stopping; laying a mortar takes less than thirty seconds. Even when I switched to towed 155s, we were held to the same two minute standard.

Does this mean that there should be on-map indirect fire in CM? Almost certainly not.

There are a lot of prerequisites for indirect fire. You need the firing tables that tell you what combination of elevation and charge will give you a given range. You need a good idea of the range and direction. All this information is compiled by the BCP/FDC and distributed to the guns.

In CM there's no equivalent of a battery command post or a fire direction centre, apart from forward observers. An individual gun/mortar crew typically will have neither maps of the area good enough to plot fire nor equipment to survey their position and gauge the range.

Most importantly, you need some way to spot where your rounds are going, else you are wasting your ammo. Without someone to adjust your fall of shot, or without really precise maps and surveys, indirect artillery is useless. If I guesstimate the distance to a village behind a ridge at 1000m, but it's really 1200m, all the rounds I'm firing will fall 200m short -- and may as well be fired directly into the ridge.

CM, like real life, models indirect fire as being a finger from heaven on insect-like crunchies. That's because artillery rounds are expensive and wasting them on terrain not populated by enemies is frowned on.

Semi-indirect fire for mortars exists where the mortar crew ranges by observing the fall of their shot. That's currently modeled in CM. It's really direct fire, except that mortar trajectory is so arcing that it has to be indirectly aimed.

All of the above applies to all artillery pieces, even 51mm and 60mm mortars. The only difference there is that as calibre diminishes, the command process grows simple enough that the crew can be the FDC, crew and spotter all rolled into one.

Proper onboard indirect fire is already modeled by letting infantry pieces fire at out-of-LOS targets when they're under command of a HQ that has those targets in LOS. The HQ acts as spotter and FDC. This doesn't happen for vehicle based pieces because they are unaffected by command.

Basically, onboard indirect fire is already well handled for infantry weapons. To make them work for all weapons, vehicles must be able to respond to command.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Thanks for sharing the experiences, very interesting stuff

I seem to recall that the German PanzerArtillerie batteries were directed by Panzerbeobachtungswagen. Often either a converted obsoletecent panzer chassis or an SPW. Photos of artillery armor kills can be found on the russian military zone and further documentation on the panzerbeobachtungswagen can be found readily at achtungpanzer.com.

[Mattias]

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

[QB]When I was in SP mortars, one of the things we constantly practiced was hipshots. This means pulling off the line of march, setting up the mortars, recording position and centre of arc with first round out of the barrel within two minutes. I can say with certainty that you can do all this within one minute of the APC stopping; laying a mortar takes less than thirty seconds. Even when I switched to towed 155s, we were held to the same two minute standard.[QB]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Triumvir

I'm not about to bang my head bloody against this issue as far as CM implementation goes, but out of curiosity:

This "hipshot" procedure. Does it absolutely require some kind of hitech gadgetry like GPS, or would WWII artillery units have the same capability (perhaps with a bit longer delay)?

Just wondering how a SP sIG would have operated back then.

On one hand it definitely did not have time to stand around for "hours" preparing for firing and on the other hand it was not supposed to expose itself with too aggressive direct firing.

M.

[Abbott]

I am merely curios what a knowledgeable writer like Wolfgang Fleischer means when he says that the SP sIG where used as a means, alongside the mortars, to reach targets "behind cover".

------------------

His meaning was the blast effect of the 150mm round could reach enemies behind cover that smaller HE rounds failed to dislodge.

[Triumvir]

Mattias,

A hipshot requires absolutely no hitech gadgetry apart from good maps and surveying equipment. WWII artillery units would have the exact same capability, though slightly slowed because surveying equipment etc would have been heavier.

Mortars are very very low tech and a hip shot is really the same thing as a normal deployment, except accelerated. Really accelerated -- no camouflage, no MG nests, etc.

An SP sIG, though, would probably have used some kind of direct fire method. As far as I understand, German IGs were low velocity flat trajectory weapons for direct fire in support of the infantry. They were used much like the French 75s -- fire over sights at infantry that's too far away to return fire with small arms. That's how I've used them in CM games; plunked on a hill 600m behind my main lines (and so 800-1000m behind of advancing infantry) and raining HE on defenders. The same tactics should hold for the Grille etc.

That shouldn't hold for Wespes/Hummels, though, since they were field howitzers (FHs), which are low to mid velocity and medium trajectory weapons.

[Mattias]

Abbot,

My question was entirely rhetorical, just wanted to present a different perspective.

Now…

The SP sIG was extensively used as an indirect firing weapon. This is a fact. When one refers to the function of a weapon system as being, among other things, to reach targets that are covered from direct fire, one implies the use of true indirect fire.

Whether this function can be implemented in CM is another matter.

Just one of these things that the CM scale, game engine or design priorities (take your pick) does not encompass at the moment.

M.

[c3k]

Mattias,

You are correct that the various infantry guns were used to hit targets "behind cover".

I direct your attention to the low velocity, high angle, plunging fire utilized by these weapons. Imagine a target behind an obstacle (be it a railway embankment, sunken road, breastworks, house, whatever). Now, crank the elevation up, and start dropping rounds down on top of them. The gunners still SEE the target area and the shell impacts. THEY correct their aim. No big network of commo or map coordinates needed.

If the gun crew can see the target, it's direct fire. If they cannot see the target, but rely on maps and/or other units for corrections, it's indirect fire. A mortar on a hill firing at a unit it can see is using direct fire. High angle, plunging fire, but still very much direct.

A big advantage of these weapons was that they were organic at the regimental level. No need to try to get divisional arty assets to assist the regiment. Not being a '39-'45 Wehrmacht veteran, I wasn't there. I can only rely upon what I've read. Having said that, I've never heard of them being used in an indirect fire role. (Not that it wasn't done, I'm just ignorant of any examples of it.)

Ken