The cost of infantry

[John Kelly]

Gentlemen: I appreciate the dialogue my question has generated. From what I've read, Germany had lost over a million men at the point our beloved game begins with most of those occurring on the Russian front. If that is true, then it stands to reason men and machines were precious, and should; therefore, cost more than similar Allied formations. Yes, No? Cheers, John

[jasoncawley@ameritech.net]

To wwb_99

I play the allies at least as much as I play the Germans, so I am well aware of how they work. And that they will work, when used right, against someone who makes mistakes, etc. That does not change the fact that the German infantry gets nicer infantry toys without paying more for them.

On the subject of the 60mm mortar, and its dueling properties against a German HMG, I partially agree. The exact proper use of the things is to pair up, and shell an HMG from 200-400 yards away, out of LOS. But there are definite provisos -

1. It won't work at all if the HMG is in a building.

2. If won't work well if the HMG is in a foxhole. Especially not a single mortar.

3. With just 1 firing and the target in woods, you will on average put down 1 man in a turn of firing.

4. You have ammo for three such missions. Your maximum potential casualties are pretty well capped - at around 3 per mortar.

5. You will get "alerted" and "cautious" results only, shooting at regulars who are in command control, if you use only one mortar. Most of the time.

6. If you fire two mortars at once, you can expect to put down 2 men and pin regulars, with a good chance to panic or break them, especially if they are out of command control.

7. Against veterans, 1 mortar is not going to do diddly. It will partially suppress for the 3 minutes the fire can be kept up, and hurt a few men, without that reducing the HMG's firepower afterward, at all.

8. Working as a group (2-3), you can expect to suppress or break 2-3 point targets, and to fire 2 small smoke missions.

Now, a little comparison. An HMG team can expect to fire off 30 ammo in 10 minutes. It can keep this up for 20-30 minutes or until killed. It can roughly expect to hit a man a minute over that period, unless stopped. More in open ground, less against good cover. The casualty cap is around the size of a platoon, 30 men not 3.

Most HMGs will not do that much. Most will fire only 1/3 to 2/3rds of their ammo, much of it at long range, and against a wide mix of cover types. It can still expect to put down ~3 times as many men as the 60mm, unless the MG team breaks (moral wise), or is killed rapidly by tank HE.

Light mortars are useful for their role, which is on-call suppression of point targets. But they do not approach the overall firepower of regular infantry or MGs.

[jasoncawley@ameritech.net]

To wwb_99

I play the allies at least as much as I play the Germans, so I am well aware of how they work. And that they will work, when used right, against someone who makes mistakes, etc. That does not change the fact that the German infantry gets nicer infantry toys without paying more for them.

On the subject of the 60mm mortar, and its dueling properties against a German HMG, I partially agree. The exact proper use of the things is to pair up, and shell an HMG from 200-400 yards away, out of LOS. But there are definite provisos -

1. It won't work at all if the HMG is in a building.

2. If won't work well if the HMG is in a foxhole. Especially not a single mortar.

3. With just 1 firing and the target in woods, you will on average put down 1 man in a turn of firing.

4. You have ammo for three such missions. Your maximum potential casualties are pretty well capped - at around 3 per mortar.

5. You will get "alerted" and "cautious" results only, shooting at regulars who are in command control, if you use only one mortar. Most of the time.

6. If you fire two mortars at once, you can expect to put down 2 men and pin regulars, with a good chance to panic or break them, especially if they are out of command control.

7. Against veterans, 1 mortar is not going to do diddly. It will partially suppress for the 3 minutes the fire can be kept up, and hurt a few men, without that reducing the HMG's firepower afterward, at all.

8. Working as a group (2-3), you can expect to suppress or break 2-3 point targets, and to fire 2 small smoke missions.

Now, a little comparison. An HMG team can expect to fire off 30 ammo in 10 minutes. It can keep this up for 20-30 minutes or until killed. It can roughly expect to hit a man a minute over that period, unless stopped. More in open ground, less against good cover. The casualty cap is around the size of a platoon, 30 men not 3.

Most HMGs will not do that much. Most will fire only 1/3 to 2/3rds of their ammo, much of it at long range, and against a wide mix of cover types. It can still expect to put down ~3 times as many men as the 60mm, unless the MG team breaks (moral wise), or is killed rapidly by tank HE.

Light mortars are useful for their role, which is on-call suppression of point targets. But they do not approach the overall firepower of regular infantry or MGs.

[Ben Galanti]

I'm getting into this a little late, but this is a response to one of Jason's points:

#2 Currently, only the VG Hvy SMG squads sacrifice some per-weapon firepower to reflect the fact that the MG-42 is really a 2-man weapon. Adjust the other German squads, to reflect the lowest FP weapon present. E.g. with 2 LMGs present and at least 2 rifles in the squad, the FP of the MG-42s would be 87-80-54-34.

Right now, the firepower from the second member of the team is effectively being counted twice, in the other German squad types. This slightly overstates the firepower of squads with 2 LMG.

I don't think this is the case. I believe that that the organic LMG42's are 'penalized' the firepower of the weakest weapon in the squad (or 2 times the weakest weapon if there are 2 LMGs) for every squad. In every case other then the SMG squads though, this is just a k98 rifle.

The easiest way to look at this is just to compare the numbers. First, looking at a SMG squad, where the LMG42 is penalized by removing the firepower of a SMG.

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

2xLMG42: 40 78 64 38 0

2xMP40: 72 22 1 0 0

</pre>

The MP40 firepower number is from a german platoon HQ, because it carries two MP40's. One thing to note, is that some of the firepowers do seem to have values of .5, which are not shown. CM seems to round down these firepowers. The firepower of one MP40 at range 250m is shown as 0, but I believe it is actually 0.5 rounded down. When you get two, it goes up to 1. This is borne out looking at a Gerbirgsjaeger squad with 7 MP40s. It has a firepower of 3, (ie 7*.5=3.5, but then rounded down to 3)

So, the true firepower of 2 LMG42's in the SMG squad is found by adding the numbers, you get:

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

2xLMG42:112 100 65 38 0

</pre>

Now, looking at a squad penalized by removing the k98's firepower (virtually any other squad will do), you do the same thing:

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

2xLMG42:100 90 60 36 0

2xk98: 13 11 6 2 0

</pre>

adding these together for the true firepower of the LMG42 in a squad with k98's you get:

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

2xLMG42:113 101 66 38 0

</pre>

Those numbers are within 1 of the firepower given for the 2xLMG42 in the SMG squad. I believe that the difference of 1 might be do to various unseen .5's floating around, but it might be a data typo too. In any case, it's rather small. So, this being the case, the true firepower of a single LMG42 is half of what is seen above:

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

LMG42: 56 50 32 19 0

</pre>

Now, these are not the numbers shown for a LMG42 unit. I think the error here is that the firepowers for the LMG42 unit are lower then they should be, not that the organic LMG42 in a squad is being penalized.

I'm not sure whether the low LMG42 squad firepower is just a mistake, or jsut a shortcut in that it uses the same firepower numbers as those of an organic LMG42. I suspect it might be a shortcut, since the stand alone LMG42 only shows up in a few, obscure TO&Es.

Sorry about getting so long winded on this, and let me know if I've screwed up on my math somewhere, but I remembered looking into this before and coming to this conclusion, so I figured I might as well post it for posterity.

Ben

(edited to try and get my firepower numbers to line up, anyone know how to do this?)

[This message has been edited by Ben Galanti (edited 03-13-2001).]

[Ben Galanti]

I'm getting into this a little late, but this is a response to one of Jason's points:

#2 Currently, only the VG Hvy SMG squads sacrifice some per-weapon firepower to reflect the fact that the MG-42 is really a 2-man weapon. Adjust the other German squads, to reflect the lowest FP weapon present. E.g. with 2 LMGs present and at least 2 rifles in the squad, the FP of the MG-42s would be 87-80-54-34.

Right now, the firepower from the second member of the team is effectively being counted twice, in the other German squad types. This slightly overstates the firepower of squads with 2 LMG.

I don't think this is the case. I believe that that the organic LMG42's are 'penalized' the firepower of the weakest weapon in the squad (or 2 times the weakest weapon if there are 2 LMGs) for every squad. In every case other then the SMG squads though, this is just a k98 rifle.

The easiest way to look at this is just to compare the numbers. First, looking at a SMG squad, where the LMG42 is penalized by removing the firepower of a SMG.

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

2xLMG42: 40 78 64 38 0

2xMP40: 72 22 1 0 0

</pre>

The MP40 firepower number is from a german platoon HQ, because it carries two MP40's. One thing to note, is that some of the firepowers do seem to have values of .5, which are not shown. CM seems to round down these firepowers. The firepower of one MP40 at range 250m is shown as 0, but I believe it is actually 0.5 rounded down. When you get two, it goes up to 1. This is borne out looking at a Gerbirgsjaeger squad with 7 MP40s. It has a firepower of 3, (ie 7*.5=3.5, but then rounded down to 3)

So, the true firepower of 2 LMG42's in the SMG squad is found by adding the numbers, you get:

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

2xLMG42:112 100 65 38 0

</pre>

Now, looking at a squad penalized by removing the k98's firepower (virtually any other squad will do), you do the same thing:

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

2xLMG42:100 90 60 36 0

2xk98: 13 11 6 2 0

</pre>

adding these together for the true firepower of the LMG42 in a squad with k98's you get:

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

2xLMG42:113 101 66 38 0

</pre>

Those numbers are within 1 of the firepower given for the 2xLMG42 in the SMG squad. I believe that the difference of 1 might be do to various unseen .5's floating around, but it might be a data typo too. In any case, it's rather small. So, this being the case, the true firepower of a single LMG42 is half of what is seen above:

<pre>

Range: 40 100 250 500 1000

LMG42: 56 50 32 19 0

</pre>

Now, these are not the numbers shown for a LMG42 unit. I think the error here is that the firepowers for the LMG42 unit are lower then they should be, not that the organic LMG42 in a squad is being penalized.

I'm not sure whether the low LMG42 squad firepower is just a mistake, or jsut a shortcut in that it uses the same firepower numbers as those of an organic LMG42. I suspect it might be a shortcut, since the stand alone LMG42 only shows up in a few, obscure TO&Es.

Sorry about getting so long winded on this, and let me know if I've screwed up on my math somewhere, but I remembered looking into this before and coming to this conclusion, so I figured I might as well post it for posterity.

Ben

(edited to try and get my firepower numbers to line up, anyone know how to do this?)

[This message has been edited by Ben Galanti (edited 03-13-2001).]

[Jarmo]

I believe we'll have some real data before long. There is an infantry only turn going on at RD tournament. (about 30 games all in all) I wen't in with an impression the german player would have an advantage with the SMG squads and so-on, but it is beginning to look like the advantage is not there after all.

[Jarmo]

I believe we'll have some real data before long. There is an infantry only turn going on at RD tournament. (about 30 games all in all) I wen't in with an impression the german player would have an advantage with the SMG squads and so-on, but it is beginning to look like the advantage is not there after all.