Problem With Infantry Panicking Too Early

[David Aitken]

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

it's amazing how a whole squad of 12 guys panics, and runs screaming all together in the same incoherent direction.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

This is a necessary abstraction, but it's more realistic than you may think.

A full squad does not 'panic' all at once, in the same way that a 'pinned' squad does not contain ten 'pinned' men. As experience is averaged, so is morale. A 'regular' squad may contain half green troops and half veteran, and a 'pinned' squad may comprise two cautious men, five pinned and three panicking. Once the majority are panicking, the status changes to reflect this.

Also, as I have said, panic is contagious. One man gets up and runs, and suddenly the resolve of everyone else is broken. Someone else who was just managing to hold himself together would then break and follow suit, and soon everyone has lost their nerve and headed for the rear. So it's not completely unrealistic for a whole squad to be running away together.

Finally, a 'casualty' is not necessarily a wounded man, but someone who is no longer functioning as part of the squad. This includes missing troops. So the next time you see a squad take a casualty under artillery barrage, maybe he was hit by shrapnel, or maybe he just lost his nerve and disappeared.

[CMplayer]

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

I think this is dealt with rather well through the '!' once they have recovered. To me that means that they are just no longer cohesive, and the high losses once they panick and run to me mean that some guys just scuttle off in the 'wrong' direction. The red cross mark does include panicked soldiers, it is not just dead or wounded. And once they have panicked and are gone, why would you want to have them clutter the battlefield?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Makes sense. I guess you can think of

the squad icon as 'where sarge went',

but the men can be panicked quite a ways

around that spot, or even be lagging

behind shaking turds out of their

pants legs or something.

Though there is definitely a contradiction

between such a level of abstraction of

infantry, and drawing exact LOS in

targetting.

--Rett

[Andreas]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by David Aitken:

Also, as I have said, panic is contagious. One man gets up and runs, and suddenly the resolve of everyone else is broken. Someone else who was just managing to hold himself together would then break and follow suit, and soon everyone has lost their nerve and headed for the rear. So it's not completely unrealistic for a whole squad to be running away together.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

This works the other way round too. There is a story in von Luck's memoirs, when he ordered two of his platoons (he commanded a company then) to undertake their first attack in Poland, and nobody moved, until he just said 'Follow me' and led them. Always easier to go with the group.

[CMplayer]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by David Aitken:

So it's not completely unrealistic for a whole squad to be running away together.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Interesting explanation, thanks.

What about when they panic on a bridge

and don't know which way to go? They

run back and forth, laterally, on the

bridge, instead of either running

back to the friendly side, or trying to

take cover where they're at.

Have you ever seen this kind of headless

chicken panic? Do you think it's possible

that the code is inadequate in that case?

It looks to me as though they are trying

to run towards cover that is _off the

bridge_ on adjacent, but inaccessible

ground, and their 'panicky' movement

vectors are getting set up wrong. But,

of course, that is only a guess.

--Rett

[CMplayer]

(double post deleted)

[ 07-01-2001: Message edited by: CMplayer ]

[David Aitken]

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

Have you ever seen this kind of headless chicken panic?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I would agree with you here. On one occasion I was defending a bridge, and was surprised to find a squad a couple of hundred metres from the bridge, but on the opposite side of the river from where I had last seen it. It must have decided the nearest cover was a certain patch of trees, but the river happened to be in the way, so it ran up to the bridge, across the river, and all the way back to the trees it had been heading for. It's not so much bridges but water that is the issue.

[Vanir Ausf B]

There is little doubt that CM units occasionaly have trouble deciding where to run for cover.

In a recent PBEM I had a platoon on top of a hill out in the open, but using a stone wall as cover from the enemy infantry firing up at them from the trees at the base of the hill. 2 of the squads paniced, but instead of simply ducking down behind the wall or runing back away from the hill crest they ran over the wall half way down the hill towards the enemy troops where they became pinned to slowly machinegunned to death over the next few turns.

[Col Deadmarsh]

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

There is little doubt that CM units occasionaly have trouble deciding where to run for cover.

In a recent PBEM I had a platoon on top of a hill out in the open, but using a stone wall as cover from the enemy infantry firing up at them from the trees at the base of the hill. 2 of the squads paniced, but instead of simply ducking down behind the wall or runing back away from the hill crest they ran over the wall half way down the hill towards the enemy troops where they became pinned to slowly machinegunned to death over the next few turns.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

LOL, that sucks. I'm playing against Sock Monkey right now and his troops did almost the same thing. They were hiding in some scattered trees on the slope of a large hill where I couldn't get to them. Well, something spooked them (possibly my halftrack firing at the building in front of them) so they got up to run away but instead of running back for cover behind the hill, they ran up the hill where ALL of my units nearby had LOS on them. They lasted about 5 more seconds running back and forth like a duck at a shooting gallery before they were killed.

[Horncastle]

I think Deadmarsh probably made a tactical mistake to get his team to crawl to the woods across open terrain. AT dont blend in to easily and coming under fire would cause them to have second thoughts.

He has got a good point though about the team then running back rather than into cover. There is certainly much room for improvement for deciding what panicked units do I feel.

A panicked unit is trying to save its bacon in what ever means possible, regardless of orders. I dont agree with the definition of panicking as meaning they are not thinking clearly. This is true to some extent, in that they will not stop and think for too long about their actions, but they will be definetly focused on the best way to survie. This would include running towards cover in Deadmarshes example, no man would decide to lug their heavy rockets all the way back across open ground while coming under fire.

Imminent death tends to focus the mind on survial above all things. Not being a psychologist or having faced the barrel(s) of a gun, I cannot back this up with evidence but I think its a fairly natrual conclusion to make.

[Sgt. Beavis]

How would 2 guys crawling around 500 m away be spotted in the first place?

[CMplayer]

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

I dont agree with the definition of panicking as meaning they are not thinking clearly. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Support for your position is that panicked

HMG units don't abandon their weapons to

be able to run faster. They must still

have it together enough to try to transport

their equipment.

--Rett

[CMplayer]

I once played a scenario where an American

company is completely surrounded at night.

There was no friendly map edge.

At the center of their position was

company HQ in the only stone building

in the area.

Panicked units, BOTH GERMAN AND AMERICAN

ran for that building. That means that

panicking German attackers went into

a kind of kamikaze suicide charge instead

of moving away from the fighting.

Also, prisoners assembled in that building,

both German and American. It was quite

funny to see captured Americans in the

same stone building as their unsuppressed

company commander.

I think a good possible way to deal with

this would be for HQ units to be able

to designate rallying points for their

platoons. Broken units would make for

a covered rallying point, and the 'withdraw'

command would work in the direction of

the rallying point, instead of towards

the friendly map edge as now. This wouldn't

solve all problems, but it would help

a lot, especially for making withdraw

work better, when the axis of advance of

a platoon has shifted to the side, as when

they are rolling up a flank.

--Rett

[Stacheldraht]

According to the manual, when troops are panicked, "The player loses control over the unit as self-preservation becomes first priority. Panicked units uusually try to run away from danger."

Interestingly, in numerous accounts and psychological studies of combat, you read of training taking over during stress or panic situations, with soldiers acting in a machine-like manner, carrying out things they've practiced hundreds or thousands of time. That's of course what the military intentionally tries to inculcate.

It seems in CM that this relates directly to unit experience level, where the more experienced troops have had more training and field experience and are more likely to have strongly ingrained "habits" that keep them acting in a militarily wise way while under fire. From that perspective, the foolish sorts of panic mentioned in this thread seem more probable when you're considering green or regular troops.

[CMplayer]

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

Interestingly, in numerous accounts and psychological studies of combat, you read of training taking over during stress or panic situations, with soldiers acting in a machine-like manner, carrying out things they've practiced hundreds or thousands of time.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

This could justify a possible improvement

to the game. On defence, a unit can be

assigned a 'withdraw path' leading to

a rally point. This way, if it has to

run for it, it will be more likely to

follow the natural cover, even if that

means not running in a straight line

for the nearest so called 'friendly'

edge of the map.

Since troops have _practiced_ moving

rear via, say, the wooded gully, even if

they panic, they might be more likely to

go that way.

I bring this up, because I have just, in

a game, seen 'panicked' troops run straight

up a hill, into LOS of an enemy REGIMENT,

when they could have jogged 50m to the left

first, in cover, to a wooded gully leading

straight back to the MLR. The presence of

that gully was the reason why their forward

position was located where it was.

To my mind, allowing HQ's to assign withdraw

paths and rally points is both realistic,

and would compensate for weaknesses in

the TacAI.

regards,

--Rett

[Sledge59]

I'm in agreement with the guy that says green troops are the secret to realism in CM. Watching both sides grind one another down to a pile of bodies over and over just feels unrealistic, and the more skilled units are most likely to do just that.

Of course there were skilled units in the war. Wouldn't they break off from a lost cause and live to fight another day if conditions allowed it?

[Mr. Hankey]

When moving across open ground from cover to cover, don't walk, don't crawl, run! Crawling in the open leaves guys exposed much longer than they care to be so, they tend panic. Crawling tends to work pretty well in woods or in a building to get out of the line of fire. IMO, the error was in Deadmarsh's tactic's not the game code. As if BTS is likely to change their code to accomodate this ramdom occurance.

I say it's random, because I had a regular bazooka team in the open taking MG fire from a panther G at 80m out and still have the nads to take a couple of shots before realizing I was trying to get them killed and headed for a nearby house. Next turn, they got it together and nailed the Panther in the side turret while it was distracted by a rifle squad.

No offense to Deadmarsh on the above statement as I'm sure he's a good player, but you know as well as I that BTS isn't going to change this, especially since they are waist deep in CM2, so why even bother?