Please disarm all crews

[Guest Germanboy]

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

I even provide an extra M5 HT in my Operations to be used as the Sqn Ambulance for collecting crews and ferrying them to safety (this is realistic and yes Germanboy I have researched it) (wish I could set the ammo at 0 though).<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Why the brackets? I think that is great - I have put FOO and BN HQ tanks with no main gun ammo into a scenario I am currently testing. I am by no means denying that heroics did happen, not after you said in another threat that you had done research to prove it, if you remember. I have a problem with the attitude that dismounted crews are cannon fodder though or should be used as infantry as a matter of routine/SOP, and that prompted my initial posts here.

Let me know when the scenarios are finished and I ask Grego if it is alright to put them onto the website. I am sure they will be excellent - who wrote the book you use as research base for the 4th/8th Armoured Brigades?

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Andreas

Der Kessel

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

[Vanir]

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

It concerns me that in such illustrious company (this forum ) so many cases of gamey tactics are apparent.

I would not like to see realistic elements of CM crippled or dumbed down just to prevent their misuse by some gamey individuals. /RANT<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

As if anyone who doesn't play the game the way you do is a lower form of life.

Like it or not, the fact is that what is gamey and what is not is largely a matter of opinion and personal taste. That is why there is such widely differing definitions of what gamey is.

Do you recon forward of your advance? Using half squads perhaps? A very commonly used tactic. Well, guess what. Some people consider it gamey. In fact they consider any type of recon in CM as gamey. And from a certain point of view they are correct. Recon is really outside the scale of CM. In a real battle it would have taken place hours before the GO button is first hit. This has been discussed in detail in other threads, but the point is you should be careful with labeling people as gamey. You could find that label stuck on yourself someday.

***

I just thought of a possible solution for this problem of players being overwhelmed by the might of assaulting tank crews.

Operations.

In operations you don't dare risk your crews any more than you have to because you really need them for the next battle.

Unfortuantely, operations as they are currently are a pain to set up for multiplayer and they lack some of the nice functionality of QBs such as random weather and reasonable limits on purchases as you get with combined arms QBs. This could be an area of improvement to look at for CM2.

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You've never heard music until you've heard the bleating of a gut-shot cesspooler. -Mark IV

[DraGoon]

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

Why the brackets? I think that is great - I have put FOO and BN HQ tanks with no main gun ammo into a scenario I am currently testing. I am by no means denying that heroics did happen, not after you said in another threat that you had done research to prove it, if you remember. I have a problem with the attitude that dismounted crews are cannon fodder though or should be used as infantry as a matter of routine/SOP, and that prompted my initial posts here. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Sorry I meant to put a smiley in that comment as it was a bit tongue in cheek, I do understand your position from the previous thread.

Interested in your FOO idea I have mounted him in a White scout car, not totally realistic but better than on the back decks.

[DraGoon]

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

As if anyone who doesn't play the game the way you do is a lower form of life.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I said or implied that? I think not.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>

Do you recon forward of your advance? Using half squads perhaps? A very commonly used tactic. Well, guess what. Some people consider it gamey. In fact they consider any type of recon in CM as gamey.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes I recce, and it is not unrealistic at all (see below), I also use flanking manouvres and I am aware of the bleating of certain individuals, usually because they got beat.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>

And from a certain point of view they are correct. Recon is really outside the scale of CM. In a real battle it would have taken place hours before the GO button is first hit. This has been discussed in detail in other threads, but the point is you should be careful with labeling people as gamey. You could find that label stuck on yourself someday.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Before you look at the Junior Member status and start to come over all superior let me put you straight on a few matters.

Lots of people on this and most other boards spend a lot of time reading posts and getting the feel of the forum before posting so they may have been around a lot longer and read many more threads than you might assume.

Secondly Recce / Recon is carried out at a number of levels. You are correct corps/divisional level recon may have gone through hours ago, however it would be a very stupid operational commander of any level that did not post a screen forward to identify and provide detailed intel on enemy positions and depth. I don't say this because I read it somewhere, or some game manual suggests it. I used to lead a Troop of tanks and at one time instructed in tactics as part of the RAC Demonstration Sqn at the School of Infantry.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>

I just thought of a possible solution for this problem of players being overwhelmed by the might of assaulting tank crews.

Operations.

In operations you don't dare risk your crews any more than you have to because you really need them for the next battle.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Exactly. Well done.

[This message has been edited by DraGoon (edited 01-02-2001).]

[Bastables]

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

Yeah - 'Do a search' BastI (as we like to call him in the Peng thread) is just one of these guys who could not do research if you hit them over the head with a scholarly work. I know for a fact he has his posts typed for him by a Makak

He is also very slow on the attack, almost but not quite as slow as I am in returning my turns to him.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Ok I give, what in Allahs name is a Makak?

[StellarRat]

Matt,

You guys should just make the crews worth a lot of victory points to the enemy if anything happens to them after they bail out. That no one will be tempted to do anything with them other then get them to safety. I think a variable game ending time will solve the last minute rush problem.

[Guest Big Time Software]

OK folks, let's get rid of the heat in this thread. There is no need for it.

Vanir, I didn't mean to imply that people who fight on to the last man are not "honerable". I put in that word, with quotes, as a sort of reference to the real world battlefield where the losing side would withdraw rather than to continue with a futile struggle.

If two gamers want to fight it out to the last soldier capable of using a sharpened stick to poke the other guy's eyes out, I don't have a problem with that EXCEPT when someone (like Babra) has had the unfortunate experience of repeatedly encountering such players when, obviously, he would rather have the game end in a more realistic way. Right now only House Rules can ensure this. What we are proposing with CM2 is to make this much more a part of the game that, with the consent of both players, can be overridden and played out to the last man. This should allow everybody to be happy.

StellarRat wrote:

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>You guys should just make the crews worth a lot of victory points to the enemy if anything happens to them after they bail out.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

This is already in the game. As is the loss of a crew in an Operation will kill the chance of getting a replacement vehicle/gun the next battle. Crews have also been made to be very ineffective in terms of their battlefield performance. They can't spot for crap, they are now even more beat up when they bail/abandon, they have only pistols (the only likely thing they would bail out with), and possibly no ammo (if they bailed out in a big hurry). Crews always appear as "Crews" and never as "Infantry" so Fog of War can not be used to trick the enemy about real troop types. Crews are also less likely to be targeted by the TacAI.

The problem is that in some circumstances, crews can give juuuuust enough of an unrealistic edge (even if at a high price) to the player using them. More often there is just a perception problem since all of the above mentioned anit-crew aspects of the game mean that most of the time the player using crews ahistorically is really doing the other player a favor.

Steve

[Dr. Brian]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Big Time Software:

Think about it. If you knew that you would have to fight the enemy in another hour's time, would you send your mortar crews off to near certain death <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Umm, Steve, CMBO does not model this, specifically, the fact that there is no battle in another hour.

Unless, of course, you do a campaign game (operation).

This is a MAJOR problem is ASL. You have the same situations. A set turn scenario, where all you have to do is win. Funny though, ASLers have no problems using crews as "fodder." (I don't either in ASL, or CM). But, that's because I play to win the game. I expect my opponent to do the same to me.

But, to correct that problem of "that mad rush," ASL developed the hisotrical campaign games. 20-30 scenarios, where the at the end of each scenario, the troops would HAVE to be used the next day.

In scenarios however, that is not the case.

In CM scnearios, it's the same thing. A campaign game where past performace is accounted for the following day, and you'll get rid of the "mad rush."

Solution then is a compromise. Scenarios for people who like the mad rush. A campaign game were it's sheer madness to do a mad rush since you need everyone the next day.

Pretty simple, actually.

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Doc

God Bless Chesty Puller, Wherever He Is!

[This message has been edited by Dr. Brian (edited 01-02-2001).]

[Dr. Brian]

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

Here's a good question, Name just ONE other game or game designer that has gone to this length to balance real life realism and deal with "gamey" use of crews?

any games come to mind?

None that I know of.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Advanced Squad Leader by Avalon Hill. They developed Red Barricades where the "mad rush" was sheer maddness, as the units today, would be needed tommorrow.

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Doc

God Bless Chesty Puller, Wherever He Is!

[aka_tom_w]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Big Time Software:

OK folks, let's get rid of the heat in this thread. There is no need for it.

Steve

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Great Post Steve

I liked this part the best

"If two gamers want to fight it out to the last soldier capable of using a sharpened stick to poke the other guy's eyes out, I don't have a problem with that "

Great Sense of humour, I do think that some people REALLY enjoy this "gladiator" style of fighting to the last man. I think we can see that in the posts in this thread and EVERY other thread about "gamey" or ahistorical tactics.

Thanks for the chuckle.

-tom w

[aka_tom_w]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Dr. Brian:

Advanced Squad Leader by Avalon Hill. They developed Red Barricades where the "mad rush" was sheer maddness, as the units today, would be needed tommorrow.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I'm sorry I should have been more specific, I was refering to video games or computer games only.

ASL, the board game, is of course an exception.

-tom w

[Dr. Brian]

Gamey ...

I think using the map edge to cover your flank is gamey. Do I do it, you bet.

I think using Baz or Pzk teams for scouting, when no enemy AFVs are in your opponenets OB, is gamey. Do I do that, you bet.

Hell, I even made a halftrack go in front of an AFV so I could make the crew foot infantry. The crew has a casulity, and so it wouldn't shoot it's MGs. I figure the crew on foot would help me win more than a halftrack that couldn't shoot. Is it gamey? You bettcha!

But, I play to win. This is not a study in history for me. I read books and study for that, conventions, travel, etc. CM is a contest to outsmart, out think, and beat your oppoenent into submission... basically, win the game.

To me, THAT is the best commander. One that takes his assets, and uses them to win. And since these are NOT real men, I don't have to have a conscience about them either.

I guess the list goes on and on.

Sorry if I upset anyone, but, that's how I like to play, and the people I play like it that way too. Just find people with similar interests... and, if it's going to be a problem, ASK BEFORE you play.

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Doc

God Bless Chesty Puller, Wherever He Is!

[Dr. Brian]

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

I'm sorry I should have been more specific, I was refering to video games or computer games only.

ASL, the board game, is of course an exception.

-tom w<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Nope then... I know of no computer games. BTS is the exception, that is for sure!

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Doc

God Bless Chesty Puller, Wherever He Is!

[Guest Big Time Software]

Dr. Brian wrote:

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Umm, Steve, CMBO does not model this, specifically, the fact that there is no battle in another hour.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Uhmm... I know I said what I said to remind people that it is NOT realistic to round up crews and charge them at the enemy. Therefore, any "justification" for doing so in a CM battle, using arguments of realism (as seen in some posts above), is misplaced since it didn't happen in the real world.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Unless, of course, you do a campaign game.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

True. If you play a CM operation you would be a fool to toss away your crews. But fewer people, by far, play multi-player Ops than QBs or premade one battle scenarios.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>This is a MAJOR problem is ASL. You have the same situations. A set turn scenario, where all you have to do is win. Funny though, ASLers have no problems using crews as "fodder." <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Speak for yourself only here Many of the people pressing us to correct the suicide crew reality problem are in fact hardcore ASLers. They apparently have had the same problems with competitive play with that game as they do with CM. House rules were used by these same people about crew use long before CM was even thought up. I seem to remember some miniatures guys piping in on this issue to, along with many computer wargamers (especially Steel Panthers gamers).

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Solution then is a compromise. Scenarios for people who like the mad rush. A campaign game were it's sheer madness to do a mad rush since you need everyone the next day.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

This is not a compromise in our minds. It is simply tossing our hands up and failing to address a serious reality gap issue. So we are obviously going to work on fixing it, not walking away from it. Again, we are going to allow the "to the last man!" players to continue to play as they do now, so our improvements in CM2 can be ignored by those who do not wish to take advantage of them.

Steve

[Vanir]

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

I said or implied that? I think not.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

If I've misrepresented your views I apologize.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Before you look at the Junior Member status and start to come over all superior let me put you straight on a few matters.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Preempting me from putting on airs was not necessary as I had no intention of doing so.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Secondly Recce / Recon is carried out at a number of levels. You are correct corps/divisional level recon may have gone through hours ago, however it would be a very stupid operational commander of any level that did not post a screen forward to identify and provide detailed intel on enemy positions and depth.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

It is my understanding that the initial stages of the type of engagement you have in a typical game of CM, where the two forces begin separated by only a few hundered meters, is a movement to contact, not a recce.

You may find this thread very interesting. As a former lurker you may have already read it, but here it is just in case.

Pay special attention to the posts by ScoutPL. Like you he once did this stuff for a living. Seven years (IIRC) in the US Army, part of those as a scout platoon leader. His take on recon in CM:

"Reality Check:

Scouting the last few hundred meters of an engagement (which is the whole focal point of a tactical game like CM) is a waste of assets and very gamey."

He still posts here now and then, so maybe you can resurrect the thread and debate him if you like. My reason for bringing this up is not to try to convince you that recon in CM is gamey (since I myself don't believe this) but rather to illustrate the broad range of definitions of gamey you will run into.

***

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Steve:

Vanir, I didn't mean to imply that people who fight on to the last man are not "honerable".<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

No problem. Thanks for clearing that up.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>I don't have a problem with that EXCEPT when someone (like Babra) has had the unfortunate experience of repeatedly encountering such players when, obviously, he would rather have the game end in a more realistic way. Right now only House Rules can ensure this.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

When you say House Rules that implies to me a standardized and accepted code of acceptable and not acceptable tactics. The problem is that no such code exists. Who's house rules do we use. Mine? Yours? Tom's? Germanboy's? ScoutPL's? The problem is eveyone has their own set of pet peves and no two people's definition of gamey seems to exactly match. Which is why we see so many problems like Babs is having.

I still contend that making operations more multiplayer friendly would be a good step in the right direction. Even DraGoon agrees with me on that

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You've never heard music until you've heard the bleating of a gut-shot cesspooler. -Mark IV

[Dr. Brian]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Big Time Software:

Many of the people pressing us to correct the suicide crew reality problem are in fact hardcore ASLers. They apparently have had the same problems with competitive play with that game as they do with CM.e<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Hmm, I haven't surveyed ASLers that play CM, so you could be right. However, I play ASLers in CM (but they don't participate on the BBS here, so my pool of reference is outside this group). Nevertheless, my use of "gamey" tactics (crews as infantry, board edge cover, scouting AT teams, etc.) is probably due to the competitive play in ASL Tournaments that I grew up with.

I still go to tournament year after year.

When you sit face to face across a table at a convention, in a 125 man ASL winner take all tournament, you are going to try EVERYTHING that is legal (i.e., not specifically prohibited by the rules) to win.

"Just win baby."

Should the "rules" of CM change, I'll modify my tactics and game play. Really simple for me, and no big deal.

I think it's the connotation that "gamey" can be interpreted as bad. I look at it as another way to win (re: pound opponent into submission, out think him, out smart him, etc.).

Just some more though

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Doc

God Bless Chesty Puller, Wherever He Is!

[Quenaelin]

If BTS is going to control these kind of "gamey" tactics, TacAI moral should be classified somehow, here is example:

Moral gameplay (decent good old war)

Immoral gameplay (killing prisoners and so on..)

Mad/Insane gamepley (you can do suicide attack and everything you want)

Then players could select which kind of war they want moral, immoral or insane:

Player A: I want moral war.

Player B: No, I want insane!

This could be joke also or not

[von Lucke]

Ah, the Eternal Debate:

"I'm Only Here to Win vs I Play to Simulate Reality". Otherwise known as: "Audey Murphy vs S.L.A. Marshall".

Or to put it more personally, "Dr Brian vs Germanboy".

It always comes down to the people who want total control over every aspect of what their little puppet soldiers do (ie; charge blindly into the jaws of Hell and die to the last man because it's what I want, and I know it's only a game, with no repercussions beyond this single battle, so why should I care?), and the people who want as close to the real thing (ie; factor in the uncertainty of morale and battle-fatigue, and make my little cyber-soldiers the fragile little bags-o-meat they should be --- very disinclined to walk calmly toward a .50cal while armed only with a Luger) as a game can get them short of being shot at themselves.

(Hmmm, I hope I didn't loose my objectivity there at the end...).

[DraGoon]

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

If I've misrepresented your views I apologize.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Accepted, thank you.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> Preempting me from putting on airs was not necessary as I had no intention of doing so. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

In which case I apologise.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> You may find this thread very interesting. As a former lurker you may have already read it, but here it is just in case.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Thanks for the link, I had skimmed the thread before, agree with some, disagree with others.

Steve

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> OK folks, let's get rid of the heat in this thread. There is no need for it.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Heat, what heat?

[SuperSlug]

I read most of this thread and I didn't see this mentioned so here goes.

If crews were so valuable during the war why not represent this by giving them greater victory point values. More for saving them and more for killing them. If a player wants

to crew rush you he can go ahead but he will pay the price dearly.

And for god sakes rearm them!!

Cheers,

[Alexander]

Slug posted:

If crews were so valuable during the war why not represent this by giving them greater victory point values. More for saving them and more for killing them. If a player wants to crew rush you he can go ahead but he will pay the price dearly.

Absolutely. I like that 'you get what you pay for' philosophy towards gaming. And it's realistic in a real world sense. One assumes an elite Panzerfuehrer like Wittman, in training costs and experience, was worth several Tiger platoons. The trouble is, Victory determination is murky and I don't think 'crews' are segregated by types. But sticking a Green crew from a disabled tank on the front line seems more likely than employing highly experienced ones in this manner.

For the time being, I use them as symbols to confuse my opponents about troop strength.

[Hakko Ichiu]

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

For the time being, I use them as symbols to confuse my opponents about troop strength.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

This doesn't work, since the FOW rules always identify crews to prevent just such a deception.

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Ethan

-----------

"We forbid any course that says we restrict free speech." -- Dr. Kathleen Dixon, Director of Women's Studies, Bowling Green State University

[Alexander]

This doesn't work, since the FOW rules always identify crews to prevent just such a deception.

True, but not everyone checks.

[Bruno Weiss]

Steve, just read your last post. Gotta take ussue with that one. CM in it's present form, invites the use of crews in the manner in which some are doing, others are complaining about, and still others say they don't really care much about. The fact is, if CM had been envisioned to handle the problem in the first place, then the battle or a battle would be ended by the AI when a certain percentage of causalities had been reached by one side or the other. (The missing link to realism there, is that CM allows a battle to continue on until the last man is standing). The fact that there is no such AI routine, leaves "that" issue up to the players. And, any quick read of this forum reveals that the players have no uniform perception of just what "gamey" is, but each one of them has an opinion on the issue and is even more verbose about it when having lost a game to someone they perceive as having been "gamey".

Within this thread alone, there are a dozen or so different tactical descriptions of how crews might be used, and might be gamey, or might not be gamey etc., etc. What is my point? My point is, I would not be lambasting the players for not doing what you particularly think they should, in yet your opinion (as opposed to the ten thousand and five other opinions posted on the subject). You could instead, just build an AI routine that flashes "Game Over", when a certain percentage of battle losses are met.

Except...doing so would then limit a major component degree of flexibility within CM. One which I personally think should stay there. (Ergo, you made the right decision in the first place). Now, I don't know the details of what tinkering your talking about with regard to CM2, but the issue of crew usage, and what is or is not gamey to me is something of a "much-a-do" about nothing. And certainly not worth turning CM upside down over. Back to my original post. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it". I don't see where CM is broke. Are we declaring it so? Not me, I think it's just fine, yes crews and all. The shocker though, would be if you began to send instructions to someone on the exact specifications of an Ark...

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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)

[This message has been edited by Bruno Weiss (edited 01-03-2001).]

[Jackal]

While reading a book covering the Korean war it mentioned many occasions to where officers and NCO's would collect as many men as possible to take up weapons and fight. Drivers, medics, . . .etc. it didn't matter, the man still had the potential to aim and shoot!

IDEA. . .is it possible to co-locate these pitiful misfits for troops from abandoned and destroyed vehicles and weapons, as well as spent Arty spotters, and collect them into the equivalent of an Infantry platoon? or a split squad at best??

Give me thoughts??