Gamey tactic? - your opinions please

[Juju]

Gentlemen, I'd like you to imagine the following: You're playing a 1000pts attack scenario, and you're defending. The map is rather small (800x800).

Now, imagine your opponent rushes 80% of his grunt-forces along your right flank, by 'human-wave assaulting' 4 platoons plus some support along the map-edge for some 5 turns, The single MG and schreck who happen to be in the way get mercylessly slaughtered along the way. The LOS to those enemy platoons is obscured from the rest of the map by a small hill, so you can't stop them or do anything about it.

Your opponent then proceeds to attack you from the side (we're not talking 'flanks' here anymore,, we're talking about an enemy that comes from a different compass-direction) rendering your complete defense useless (it's pointing in the wrong direction now). You're still holding out for over ten turns, getting overwhelmed piecemeal. but in essence you had already lost the game by turn 5. And you had only lost 8 men by then.

Question: Would you consider this using excellent tactics by your opponent, or would you consider this gamey, because your opponnent is exploiting the the fact that the map is only very small and the terrain sort of allows it? Does it defeat the purpose of a 'fair game' and 'the challenge?'

I'm asking this because I'm in the middle of such a game, and I'm obviously losing, bigtime. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind losing. Hell, I lose half my games. Problem with this game is that -unlike most other games I've lost- it's absolutely no fun.

Your opinions please, gentlemen?

[Gyrene]

I consider that very gamey for a friendly game. Taking advantage of the physical limits of the map is a pretty crappy tactic, even if it works, this also goes for parking your uber tank at a corner to give it perfect immunity from two sides.

It's right up there with suicide scout trucks.

Now, if he wasn't hugging the edges, but came up along a genuine flank (sounds like he didn't) then it's fair ball.

If you find a reason to play this opponent again insist on very large maps for the low points. This way you can at least set up a round defense and he'll have to spread out thinner.

Gyrene

[Tero]

Sounds much like a game I am currently playing. Pretty much the same set up. The LOS is crappy 20 meters due to night and heavy fog. I am attacking as Allied and I am using tactics that would appear to be similar to your opponents tactics. I checked your handle but it would appear I am not playing against you....

Anyways: if your defences have been rendered useless due to faulty deployment you have only yourself to blame. Basically.

You anticipated your opponent to use a route which he did not choose. Did you perceived that bit of terrain he used to push ahead to be dangerous ? If you did you should have deployed accordingly. If not then you are SOL.

Using terrain features to your advantage is not IMO gamey.

[Soddball]

The guy has used the terrain to strike at what has turned out to be a vulnerable point. If, as Gyrene said, he hugged the edge of the board, it might raise some questions in my eyes. However, what he's done is negated the value of your defence by forcing you to fight on his terms. I would consider that to be, whilst perhaps not a 'fair' tactic, the tactic of someone who doesn't want to lose his troops in a head-on assault.

If he's played by rules you both agreed upon, troop types etc, and he's broken your defensive line fair and square, I would have to say well done to him. Sorry.

Is there any chance we can have more details once the battle's over? I would be interested to see layouts and it would be useful to see how static your defence was.

[Herr Oberst]

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

Gentlemen, I'd like you to imagine the following: You're playing a 1000pts attack scenario, and you're defending. The map is rather small (800x800).

Now, imagine your opponent rushes 80% of his grunt-forces along your right flank, by 'human-wave assaulting' 4 platoons plus some support along the map-edge for some 5 turns,<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Was this really along the map edge, or did he maintain a reasonable dispersion, just in a very confined area? Sort of were there two platoons abreast, or 4 single file to hug as much as possible?

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>The single MG and schreck who happen to be in the way get mercylessly slaughtered along the way. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

C'est la vie... or not.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>The LOS to those enemy platoons is obscured from the rest of the map by a small hill, so you can't stop them or do anything about it.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Now that(!) seems like an excellent use of terrain tactics. By placing those two units out there, you effectively isolated them from any mutual support from your other units. Assault you from the far side of the hil, and place a quick reverse-slope defense there in case you try to counter-attack.

It sounds like you had a pretty static defense laid out, and when the axis of attack did not come from the direction you "expected", for one reason or another, it was unable to reorient to meet this new threat.

IMO, some of the hardest things to do consistently are to:

<UL TYPE=SQUARE><LI>Arrange a defense in depth, not a single line of resistance.<LI>Always, always keep a mobile reserve, whether it is a squad, platoon, or company.<LI>Plan as if the other defenders on your flanks might collapse, and be able to "bend back" your own flanks, ultimately to form a hedgehog defense around your critical terrain.<LI>Begin pulling back heavy and support weapons early enough to save them. I've lost count of the number of MG and mortar teams I've lost during displacement because they are so slow.

[Jarmo]

Just plain good tactics.

The defender should be able to readjust his positions to meet the attacker from the new angle. If done properly and quickly the attacker has won nothing but only lost time.

I know this is not necessarily easy.

Flanking attacks are of the big reasons to keep a mobile reserve. It can buy the time you need for adjustments.

[Jeff Heidman]

You only had a single MG and a Schreck holding your flank?????

Jeff Heidman

[Snake Eyes]

It looks like your opponent was the 'fustest with the mostest' and he hit you where you ain't. Seems like a valid and 'fair' attack plan to me. Never assume where your opponent will attack. Prepare for likely avenues of approach, but always keep in mind what the unexpected route may mean to your defense. This is one reason to have a reserve capable of dealing with such a contingency.

[Monty's Double]

It's true you know, war really is hell. When I play a defence I usually buy one or two TRPs just in case there's a blind approach like this. Even light screening forces light the ones you employed are usually enough to slow an assualt up enough to bunch nicely for an artillery stonk. A sharpshooter placed further back but with LOS to the offending valley works even better. In a QB, 10-20 points for speculative TRPs are rarely wasted.

[Gyrene]

Well, I think the topic all hinges on whether his opponent was hugging the edges or not (By hugging, I mean literally single filing up a map edge).

If he did, it's lame; if he made a Honest-to-Goodness flanking manuever and swept his defenders, then more power to him, and like others said, keep your defense mobile and able to react.

Gyrene

[Panzer Leader]

Most definitely not gamey. Gamey is a word that should be used as rarely as possible since it is a serious charge. When I see an opponent "hugging the edge" I might scowl a little, but to be honest, it is to be expected, and I set up my defenses so I have some firepower overlooking all flanks out to the map-edge. It is the only way.

Incidentally, the "edge-hugging" is a hard trait no to do as the atacker. Head-on assaults are painful, and the flanks often offer better cover. It is the defenders duty to account for this.

Verdict: Not gamey!

[Jarmo]

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

(By hugging, I mean literally single filing up a map edge). <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I've seen a platoon near the edge fall under light fire, get spooked and run offmap. They werent even panicked and were some 20-30 meters from the edge.

My opponent was pretty pissed to lose some 30 perfectly healthy men.

[Brian Rock]

It sounds like a legitimate tactic to me as well. Given it's a smallish map it seems the only alternative was a frontal assault into the teeth of your defense, which doesn't leave him much room for tactical manuever.

It is a tricky issue though. Hugging map edges is a perennial problem with wargames. The question is what is the alternative? At what point can you tell a player "sure, that point is on the map, but you can't go actually go there"?

Using larger maps is one solution, but it raises other problems. Make the map big enough and you have to consider supporting forces on the flank - forces which don't appear in a game like CM.

Every game list I've been on has had this debate, and no answer yet. The closest I've seen might games like Steel Beasts and Armored Task Force. These games can have friendly & enemy AI units on the flanks, creating a more dynamic battlefields while leaving you an zone to manuever in.

[Scooter]

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

I've seen a platoon near the edge fall under light fire, get spooked and run offmap. They werent even panicked and were some 20-30 meters from the edge.

My opponent was pretty pissed to lose some 30 perfectly healthy men. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Jarmo says it perfectly. Snakes Eyes sums it up well too. No, it isn't Gamey. The map is the map. Use it anyway you can to your best advantage.

Now that he has your attention well fixed onto one direction, what does he have coming from the other direction to attack your new rear?

[Paco QNS]

I thinkEpaminondas was GAMEY in that way, too!

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>The battle (Leuctra) is noteworthy for several key innovations that Epaminondas used against the Spartans. The Thebans for some time had experimented with deeper hoplite formations. They had used a 25 depth phalanx at the battle of Delium during the Peloponnesian war to defeat the Athenians, but the hallmark of hoplite warfare was each side traditionally would put its main effort against the enemy's left flank.

The key was to win on the right before losing on the left. Epaminondas saw the Spartan right flank as their center of gravity and shifted his main attack to his left flank to directly oppose the Spartan hoplites. His second major innovation was to deploy his main attack force into a 50 deep phalanx. It has been suggested that this force may even have used pikes ala the Macedonian phalanx due to the unusual shape of Theban shields, but there is no direct evidence that this was the case. Lastly, the remainder of the Theban hoplite line was deployed en echelon, so as to delay the Spartan allies from engaging them before the Theban left had won the battle.

Xenophon, who is the main chronicler of this battle, wrote in a treatise on cavalry tactics that horses could be used to screen infantry forces due to the height of the horse. Caesar used this tactic at the battle of Pharsalus. The deployment of the Theban cavalry suggests that this tactic may have prevented the Spartans from seeing the deep Theban phalanx before the dust of the cavalry engagement had settled.

The battle itself went according to plan. The Theban cavalry drove off the Spartan cavalry and then the Theban left smashed into the Spartan hoplites. The sacred band probably served the dual purpose of protecting the large open flank of the deep Theban phalanx and probably executed a flank attack into the Spartan right flank. The results were the destruction of the Spartan hoplites, including the king, and the Spartan allies quit the field without actually coming into direct contact with the Thebans. The fall of Sparta had begun.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

cited from The Great Battles of History

[Marlow]

A couple of points.

1) There seems to be considerable opinion that an attack up a game edge is gamey because it fails to account for units that would be tied in with the defender's flank. In some cases the defending unit would have other supporting units in close proximity in the line, but quite often a defensive line was created by a string of strategic defended crossroads, villages, or strongpoint. For example, in the Ardennes holding a stretch of forest was largely irrelevant, as it was the road junctions that were important. In such cases it is entirely possible that an attacking force could move to a position on the defender's flank with impunity, and a defender has to be prepared to repel the attacker from more than one direction.

2) Even where there is a defensive line, it is not uncommon for an attacker to look for gaps in that line (especially points between units from different higher organizations) as an point of attack. Consider the board edge to be such a point.

3) If a map has a significant avenue of attack that happens to be along a board edge, it is not inappropriate for the attacker to use this terrain. In two games that I am currently playing, one flank had a nice little valley that provided a covered avenue to bring up my armor, exposing it to only limited AT fire. In one of those games, the rest of the board was open, and would have been a killing field.

Verdict: non-gamey.

[aka_tom_w]

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

Jarmo says it perfectly. Snakes Eyes sums it up well too. No, it isn't Gamey. The map is the map. Use it anyway you can to your best advantage.

Now that he has your attention well fixed onto one direction, what does he have coming from the other direction to attack your new rear?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I agree with this

My verdict:

(sorry he attacked the weakest section of your weak flank, learn from your mistake)

Not Gamey

PS Who here has a sig line that reads somthing like: "a good stratedgy is the art of avoiding a fair fight" (or somthing?)

Here's the actual quote in Bill's sig line:

"Bill Wood billwood@triad.rr.com

Strategy is the art of avoiding a fair fight."

[ 06-26-2001: Message edited by: aka_tom_w ]

[ 06-26-2001: Message edited by: aka_tom_w ]

[Pak40]

I don't think this is gamey at all because:

1) He obviously used the terrain to his advantage. approaching behind that hill makes all the tactical sense in the world. Not only did he capture the hill but his men were relatively safe in doing so.

2) The attacker has the advantage of choosing where and when to attack and he used that advantage to the best of his ability.

3) In contrast to #2, the defender has the disadvantage of not knowing when and where the attack is coming from, therefore he must account for all possibilities.

4) <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>because your opponnent is exploiting the the fact that the map is only very small<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I'm not sure how you exploit a small map in this way. If anything, a small map makes it very hard to flank down the map edge. He did well to do it on such a small map.

To be honest, you should have recognized this obvious appoach and planned for it.

TO ALL CM PLAYERS: Flanking down the map edge is not gamey. Even BTS has a stance on this.

[Kingfish]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Would you consider this using excellent tactics by your opponent, or would you consider this gamey, because your opponnent is exploiting the the fact that the map is only very small and the terrain sort of allows it?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

What the...?!?

The attacker exploiting the map because it is small? :confused:

You have a 1000pt force defending an 800m wide front, with two secure flanks to boot.

[Lawyer]

Hey, Juju, are you playing Marlow too? Hehehe.... It's only gamey if he wins, of course.

Just turn your defensive weapons in a different direction. Sooner or later, he has to show himself.

[Enoch]

I'd have to say that in general this does not sound like a gamey tactic to me. As long as your opponents forces were reasnoably spread out I think it was fine.

He used the terrain to his advantage and was able to attack along a line perpendicular to your defense.

This is just constructive criticism and you can take it or leave it: you probably should have better accounted for the path your foe took. I don't know what the rest of the map looks like so maybe you had to decide between two alternatives and just gambled and lost.

Live to fight another day.

[Chupacabra]

In the context I think this is legit. On such a small map, unless the attacker wanted to go over the top Somme-style, he was going to have to head towards one side or the other, and it would have been best to guard against that. It also helps, whenever possible, to keep a mobile reserve (even if it's one tank or a few halftracks) that can quickly counterattack.

In general I do have some of the same reservations that Gyrene has. Situations such as the Ardennes in which attackers could easily sweep around defenders' flanks were the exception rather than the rule. I wonder how difficult it would be to model (probably for the rewrite of the engine) some sort of random chance of losing a few men if within a certain distance of the map edge (10, or 5, or something like that). Nothing major, but I'd imagine that would put paid to questions like this.

[Juju]

Hehe, not Marlow, Enoch.

Anyway, thanks for your input all. guess I'll have to figure this one out by myself.

Marlow said:

>Just turn your defensive weapons in a >different direction. Sooner or later, he >has to show himself.

That's just the point. He shows himself alright. It's just the terrain is so that I cannot simply turn my units to engage the enemy. I have to actually move them all to do any good, thereby giving up any defensive advantage they might have had, since the entire attack does not come from the west, as per the briefing, but it comes from the north. IMO this would turn any attack scenario into some sort of half baked meeting engagement where your opponent has a 3:2 advantage in everything.

Just my bad luck I guess...

[Freak]

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

Gentlemen, I'd like you to imagine the following: You're playing a 1000pts attack scenario, and you're defending. The map is rather small (800x800).

Now, imagine your opponent rushes 80% of his grunt-forces along your right flank, by 'human-wave assaulting' 4 platoons plus some support along the map-edge for some 5 turns, The single MG and schreck who happen to be in the way get mercylessly slaughtered along the way. The LOS to those enemy platoons is obscured from the rest of the map by a small hill, so you can't stop them or do anything about it.

Your opponent then proceeds to attack you from the side (we're not talking 'flanks' here anymore,, we're talking about an enemy that comes from a different compass-direction) rendering your complete defense useless (it's pointing in the wrong direction now). You're still holding out for over ten turns, getting overwhelmed piecemeal. but in essence you had already lost the game by turn 5. And you had only lost 8 men by then.

Question: Would you consider this using excellent tactics by your opponent, or would you consider this gamey, because your opponnent is exploiting the the fact that the map is only very small and the terrain sort of allows it? Does it defeat the purpose of a 'fair game' and 'the challenge?'

I'm asking this because I'm in the middle of such a game, and I'm obviously losing, bigtime. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind losing. Hell, I lose half my games. Problem with this game is that -unlike most other games I've lost- it's absolutely no fun.

Your opinions please, gentlemen?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Well, thats the idea. To be effective one must use the map to their advantage in battle. To do less would be shamefull to your troops.

Your opponent then proceeds to attack you from the side (we're not talking 'flanks' here anymore,, we're talking about an enemy that comes from a different compass-direction) rendering your complete defense useless (it's pointing in the wrong direction now)

Thats the idea.

Might I suggest using medium sized maps for all engagments epecially for attack defend. Usually I run into the opposite problem in small map engagments, not having enough room to manuever as the attacker.

[ 06-26-2001: Message edited by: Freak ]

[Juju]

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

It also helps, whenever possible, to keep a mobile reserve (even if it's one tank or a few halftracks) that can quickly counterattack.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

There was (a tank), and it did (counterattack). They just kept running toward it in force. Naturally I had to withdraw...