Suicidal behaviour?

[Overlord]

So, last night I prepared this small scenario, with a company of british paras landed in the night on a flat territory, on one side of a railway, which runs straight E-W and elevated 4 metres over the ground. On the other side of the railway, some germans wait. To cut it short, I order the paras, after having re-organised them in platoons, to climb the railway slope and crawl slowly to get info on what is on the other side. Well, the germans get aware of my men and start firing (though it was night and my paras were out of sight. But maybe someone sneezed!). And what happens now is quite weird: my men, though regular class, go to complete panic, but instead of running to the side they came, they START CLIMBING DOWN to the OTHER SIDE (the enemy side) !! And obviously, they are all slaughtered.

I noticed this fact of running to the enemy side, when in panic, a couple of other times. I have the 1.12 version of CM. Did other of you noticed the same thing?

Thank you and

regards

Overlord

[Olle Petersson]

This is a not too uncommon "feature" of CM.

Perhaps the Paras thought there was better cover on that side?

War is hell and troops don't act rational when panicked...

Cheers

Olle

[FriendlyFire]

Bear in mind that to run back would involve turning their backs on the enemy - which means they lose LOS, have no idea where the fire is coming from, lose morale, and die a lot more quickly.

Quick question - does CMBO model "move backwards while firing at the enemy in front of you"? If not, that would explain why the TacAI often chooses to move forwards to better cover instead, even though this may be almost as suicidal as turning around and running. And then a "tactical retreat" movement option would be an interesting addition to CM2. Say, half normal movement speed - and if they're suppressed, they go down to half normal crawl speed But it would keep the squad facing forwards, and hence able to engage the enemy. Then the TacAI (and players, at order phases) could choose between a withdrawal (turn and run, lose morale), tactical retreat (backpedal, maybe lose a little morale), stay in place (and probably die), or the current suicide rush

Of course, all of this is moot if the squad has lost its head - and the panic isn't that surprising. It's dark, they know they're exposed on top of a ridge, and suddenly an unknown enemy pops up at very close range and starts slaughtering them. Nasty.

[Overlord]

Yes, your explanations could be reasonable... So what I'm doing now is to change the level of paras to "crack" or "elite" and repeat the situation. I'm wondering what will happen.

Thanx

Overlord

[tailz]

Originally posted by FriendlyFire:

And then a "tactical retreat" movement option would be an interesting addition to CM2. Say, half normal movement speed - and if they're suppressed, they go down to half normal crawl speed But it would keep the squad facing forwards, and hence able to engage the enemy. Then the TacAI (and players, at order phases) could choose between a withdrawal (turn and run, lose morale), tactical retreat (backpedal, maybe lose a little morale), stay in place (and probably die), or the current suicide rush

B]

I'm liking the 'retrograde movement' command idea. I think a fighting withdrawl type of action would be very beneficial to CM2 (and maybe retropatched to CM!!) Especially for late war German actions, where fighing withdrawls were a significant part of the action.