Packing Multiple Squads Into A Single Terrain "Square"

[Treeburst155]

This is something we probably all do that I think may be very unrealistic. Would an entire platoon pack into 20 square meters of cover? It seems to me in such a case they would either be shoulder to shoulder or most of them would be unable to fire for fear of hitting their own men in front of them. Since the game doesn't punish players for this I suggest we are all gamey. LOL!!

The game also allows two squads and possibly a platoon leader IIRC to fit into a small building if the units are carefully positioned diagonally at the corners. 20+ guys in a farm house? I live in a two bedroom, one bath house. I have enough window space for ten people to take up firing positions and only a fraction of the ten could fire in any one direction. The other ten and the platoon leader would have to be content raiding the refrigerator and watching TV. Again, since this is not the case in the game I suggest it is gamey to put two full squads in a small building.

I just thought I'd throw this out to see if I can stir up some more debate on gaminess. I enjoy being a troublemaker.

Treeburst155 out.

[L.Tankersley]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Treeburst155:

Would an entire platoon pack into 20 square meters of cover?

...

I just thought I'd throw this out to see if I can stir up some more debate on gaminess. I enjoy being a troublemaker.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Actually, that's 400 square meters of cover.

I enjoy being a nitpicker.

Is it possible to put 30+ men in a house? Of course. Could they all fire effectively in one direction? No, but they can't in CM either. Units in one corner of a house have pretty restricted LOS. I think the current system is a reasonable abstraction -- it's not perfect, but I can't think of a solution that wouldn't have equally troubling problems without dramatic changes to the game system.

[Treeburst155]

Good points, Leland. The small building packing doesn't bother me as much as the terrain packing although LOS from buildings is greater for the units than in reality. How many buildings have windows in the corners allowing close to 270 degrees visibility for an entire squad?

Granted, 400 square meters is plenty of room for 40 guys to take cover but what percentage of those should be able to fire in the same direction at a common unit or two.? I've run into this often (and done it too).

Edit: We're talking a three meter by three meter square per man throughout the entire terrain square. These guys are packed in tight.

Treeburst155 out.

[ 05-24-2001: Message edited by: Treeburst155 ]

[ 05-24-2001: Message edited by: Treeburst155 ]

[curih]

Treeburst has a point, but I think it's all part of the abstraction. Personally I rarely pack guys that close because they always end up getting hit by 150mm shell that knocks out most of the platoon. For the the buildings, consider that the small building represent one and two floor buildings.

curih

[Treeburst155]

I forgot that small buildings could have a second story. That goes a long way toward easing my building packing problem.

The terrain square situation is still a biggie though IMO. Surely the grogs and simulationists out there must have some comments on this. I really think it takes advantage of the game engine to pack a platoon (and often more) into a single terrain square and proceed to fire on a single unit (or two) in the same direction with every one of the packed squads. A "cirle the wagons" situation where the troops are firing at enemies in many different directions seems OK to me but concentrated fire in one direction by all those guys packed in seems unrealistic.

Treeburst155 out.

[Michael Emrys]

Let's put it this way: if you want to pack an entire platoon into a single square, that's fine with me!

Just hold that pose while I get out my artillery.

That's the reason why it was rarely done in real life. Dispersion was protection against area fire weapons like artillery and MGs. But soldiers could be massed for special circumstances, like a bayonette charge into hand-to-hand combat. Rare, but possible.

I think CM does a pretty fair job on this issue.

Michael

[Treeburst155]

But if you know there's no arty that can get you and have no intention of charging...

Treeburst155 out.

[Michael Emrys]

Well then, IMO any bugger that gets caught without any artillery or mortars or MGs bloody well deserves what he gets!

Michael

[Treeburst155]

I hope most others feel the same way about this. That would enable me to continue to pack squads without guilt when I'm fairly certain all threats to the tactic(mortars, arty, MGs) have been neutralized or have expended their ammo; a common situation towards the end of the game.

Treeburst155 out.

[Michael Emrys]

One thing I don't quite get, and that's the reason you want to pack your troops together in the first place. Unless that's the only useful bit of terrain in the vicinity, I can't see the point. Your troops fire won't be any more effective so far as I know unless you have a very narrow LOS to the target. In fact, although I don't know if the game models this or not, it should be somewhat the opposite. Incoming fire tends to be psychologically more effective if it comes from widely dispersed locales, giving the impression of being surrounded.

Michael

[Treeburst155]

The situation comes about when there is no other cover available that offers LOS to a unit or units you want to engage. It also occurs when defending VLs on relatively open maps. Its been my experience that the situation occurs quite frequently actually.

Treeburst155 out.

[Michael Emrys]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Treeburst155:

Its been my experience that the situation occurs quite frequently actually.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Ah well then. Different strokes and all that. In a year and a half of playing the game and the demo, I can't recall ever doing that.

Michael

[Treeburst155]

Suppose there are three possible positions of cover that have the desired LOS, but two of them are dangerous to get to or would expose your guys to some heavy firepower once there. The tendency is to pack the whole platoon into the one safe place which I contend is often too small to carry more than a squad.

Edit: Are you saying you don't bunch up tight on open maps with little cover? We'll have to play a game sometime. You spread out in the open and I'll be sitting in tiny patches of trees with the firepower of a full platoon coming out of every patch. Your inf will run for the nearest patch of trees as soon as they come under fire. They don't like to fight in the open.

Treeburst155 out.

[ 05-24-2001: Message edited by: Treeburst155 ]

[Olle Petersson]

Putting troops in a tight formation doesn't provide any gamey problems.

- As been putted out, arty makes mince of them.

- Small arms fire directed at any squad will spill over and suppress the other squads as well.

- If the enemy is close even friendly fire will affect all troops.

Cheers

Olle

[JasonC]

I don't think this is a problem in CM. Others have pointed out the danger from arty, and area fire from MGs can be added to that too. The buildings are a bit tougher to take, but 2 floors can explain that.

On the actual densities of tactical deployments, though, they can go way up there. Much higher than you might think. I can give an example from Nam, the fighting at LZ X-ray in the Ia Drang in 1965. It is certainly an extreme, but not anything out of the age of Napoleon. Here is a description of the feature, from the US colonel who lead the force there.

"The clearing was about 100 yards long, east to west, and kind of funnel-shaped, with the ninety-yard mouth of the funnel on the western end near that dry creek. The bottom of the funnel was on the forty-five yard span of the clearing's eastern edge. In the center of the clearing was a copse of scraggly trees, about half the size of a tennis court. All told, the space at X-ray amounted to no more clear ground than a football field."

Now, some terrain alternations occurred during the battle. A small area on one side of the clearing was cleared of trees with explosives to make room for 2 choppers to land - a tile, maybe two, in CM terms. And on one long side of the field, some of the men cleared fields of fire out about 50 yards later in the fight. Overall, then, 100 yards on a side is about as big as it ever got. The troops were deployed on it, and just beyond into the trees, 20-40 yards off.

The initial length of the perimeter, then, would have been around 17 CM tiles, and at the maximum later on, perhaps 28 CM tiles. How many men fought in that space?

Before it was over, 2 battalions US. Somewhat understrength, but around 120 men per company in the field, 900 or so overall. That is around 80 units in CM terms. In the early part of the fighting, perhaps 40 units. 3 units per tile, then, but with some spread front to back thinning them out (but not much; they weren't in any great depth).

And that is not the densest. Those were the defenders. They were attacked by 4 battalions, an entire NVA regiment plus a VC battalion. In the densest attacks, an entire battalion hit just one side of the perimeter. That is around 5 CM tiles long, maybe spread out a bit more farther out, and converging as they approached. This wasn't some (-) regiment in name only, either. Full strength at the start.

The attacks were in waves, certainly. But there is no question the NVA put 2 full companies at a time - 300-400 men - into attacks on a frontage of 100 yards. "But how, that is 1 foot per man?" Yes. Some crawled, some hunched behind them, some stood behind them in the elephant grass, some got up on the ant-hills (the size of cars), some climbed up in the trees. They were stretched out some front-to-back. They slid down behind men hit and used their bodies for cover.

They did this under the fire of 24 105mm howitzers, several 81mm mortars, helicopter gunships, and 50-100 fighter-bombers bombing, strafing, and dropping napalm. Into a score of M-60s and hundreds of M-16s. They made it to point-blank range and overran some of the US positions, destroying 2 platoons essentially to a man and mauling 2-4 others, before the firepower cut off reinforcement and the attack faltered. Sometimes half-a-dozen US soldiers were down in a single foxhole. When it was over the NVA fallen were literally stacked on top of each other. One machinegunner (who got a silver star) had 100 dead NVA within 40 yards of his foxhole.

The sense that battlefields are empty comes more from inability to see anything when everyone hits the dirt, than from actually being empty. Often, battlefields are anything but. That is one reason artillery does so much of the damage; at times it can be hard to miss.

[Matthew_Ridgeway]

“Small arms fire directed at any squad will spill over and suppress the other squads as well.”

No it doesn’t…who you kiddin. I have played numerous games in which an enemy infantry runs “right” through the middle of one of my squads. Squads I have hidden in the woods or in a building. The units running are hardly scratched from opportunity fire of my guys. Suppression…pah. In many case I have seen the ambushing unit take far more punishment then the goofs that ran right through the middle of my hidden unit. Sorry folks but if I’m hunkered down in an ambush position and an enemy unit runs right through my perimeter those bad guys are toast.

Now you can kid yourself by saying gee what was the visibility like…or were the ground conditions soft…or maybe your guys were green…nope sorry…I don’t buy it. There is something inherently wrong. It’s just a weak infantry simulation.

Hi Mom…whatever the hell that means.

[Skipper]

"Operational density" in Lvov-Sandomir operation was 6 km per division. NB: operational density here is the width of division's formation; actual density in the breakthrough corridor (counting second echelon and operational reserves) actually reached 1 km per division.

Division is roughly 10,000 people. During the assault, about a third of these people is deployed at the firing line. That's 3,000 people at a 60,000 sq.meters area. Or 1 per 20 sq m. And this is NOT in a single patch of trees 20x20 m, but along the whole frontline.

[Treeburst155]

Thanks for posting here, Jason.

Matthew,

I think you misunderstood what Jason is saying. He's saying closely packed defenders will all suffer from incoming fire directed at any one of the packed squads. This is true. You are talking about something very interesting but entirely different.

Skipper,

Forgive me for being dense but are you taking the position that a full platoon packed into a 20m x20m square is not realistic or are you agreeing with Jason?

I'm not sure what I think now. I guess my problem has to do with the entire packed platoon being able to unleash all it's firepower at one specific unit without worrying about hitting their buddies packed in front of them.

So far nobody seems to have any problem with this issue so I'm about ready to throw in the towel and accept that it isn't unrealistic to pack a platoon into one terrain square.

Treeburst155 out

[Skipper]

I am taking a position that one could see this sort of troop density throughout a sevral km x 100 m stripe at times (major infantry assault during the first stage of an operation.

Ie, if there is a small patch of wood in the middle of a field, there is nothing gamey with having 40 men sitting there, IMHO.

PS It is quite another story that most of the "open" terrain is not as flat as CM's. Normally (or, at least, often) there are plenty of ditches, craters, stones etc, that can provide 100% cover from small arms fire.

[Treeburst155]

Thanks Skipper! I understand now. I also agree that in CM open terrain may be too open in that there is virtually no cover in such terrain other than the occasional dip or bump.

Treeburst155 out.

[David Aitken]

I recently ran a test for other purposes, and saw an enemy squad firing at one of mine, and inflicting casualties on another of my squads about 15-20 metres away (perpendicular to the line of fire). As far as I am concerned, there is nothing wrong with cramming squads together, but they will be less effective. Further apart, they can fire on the enemy from a wider angle, and will not suffer collateral damage.

Jason's example it interesting, but somewhat irrelevant. The battle in question was a strong infantry force with very powerful support weapons at its disposal, defending by necessity a small area, against infantry attackers with apparently little in the way of supporting fire. If the Vietnamese had had artillery, the defenders would not have lasted long.

In CM, I keep my squads as far apart as command radius will allow.

[Michael Emrys]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Treeburst155:

I'm not sure what I think now. I guess my problem has to do with the entire packed platoon being able to unleash all it's firepower at one specific unit without worrying about hitting their buddies packed in front of them.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Ah! Why didn't you say so? I've been kvetching for months now about the ability to fire through friendly units without harming them. This applies not only with regard to units in the same terrain square, but to any unit in the line of fire at any range. In fact, I would expect it would be easier to avoid hitting your own guys when they were close at hand rather than 100-200 meters out.

I don't know whether this was simply too hard to code or was just something that BTS overlooked, but they have had it brought to their attention several times since the game came out and have not, so far as I am aware, commented on the subject. I regard it as one of the more serious and fundamental failings of the game as a simulation though.

Michael

[ 05-26-2001: Message edited by: Michael emrys ]

[ 05-26-2001: Message edited by: Michael emrys ]

[David Aitken]

Friendly fire is a huge problem at night. I was playing Leeo on a rainy night and my men basically massacred each other.

[FFE]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Michael emrys:

I regard it as one of the more serious and fundamental failings of the game as a simulation though.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Michael,

Retrospectively the game was designed around very low system requirements, several years ago. This is the norm. I'd wager to guess BTS had to juggle code intensiveness versus the fun factor while maintaining the system requirements printed in the manual. You probably already reasoned this out.

I do agree what this thread purports. I.e., friendly soft units ought to be considered as a small round of smoke to prevent, block, and dissuade same-side fire-through, which often occurs within the simulation.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>In fact, although I don't know if the game models this or not, it should be somewhat the opposite. Incoming fire tends to be psychologically more effective if it comes from widely dispersed locales, giving the impression of being surrounded.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

The game does indeed model this aspect. A unit will fail morale much faster when receiving fire from its flank and rear. If the firing units are nearby, the target will generally surrender.

[Stalin's Organ]

It always amuses me that people think that soldiers are automatons, willilng to do what their "players" order without thought.

Ever considered that the men you're simulating might like to be close enough to chat with hteir neighbour?

Open order is very nice in practice, but even in peacetime conditions it's quite lonely unless you're very well trained. The simple comfort of having people around in a dangerous situatoin makes soldiers clump up.

So IMO a whole platoon in 400 sq m is probably a damn sight more accurate than having it spread over 200m of frontage!

Note that this is a training issue, not an expereience one - well trained green troops will handle open order better than poorly trained veterans - the vet's may be vet's due to city fighting experience for example, which is f-all use in the open!