When Worlds Collide - Help!! (Spoiler)

[Zaffod007]

Hey everyone, I just got cmbb about a week ago and have been in combat mission dormancy for about 2 years. I played cmbo into the ground back in the day and just now decided to do the right thing and continue the saga. I conidered myself pretty good. multiplayer id win 50 50 in the few games i played but i at least seemed to be able to whomp the computer most of the time. Man, in this battle it was waaaaaay different. The only reason It even came to a draw was after reloading it several times in crucial spots where I lost a lot of things. And no that doesnt prove to be much fun when the battle is over. I was really just trying to practice my tank tactics which seem to be very lacking. I know the t34 advantage during this era (summer 1942). But when all was said and done i had 28 vehilces lost - about 16 of them tanks. They had 21 vehicles lost, i think 14 or 12 of them tanks. ( im playing as axis here) I didnt just throw all my tanks in at once either. I tried to keep the pnz IIIs in the back and wait for the stugs and the pnz IVF2 reinforcemnts to take the lead. I sent a group of about 4 pnz 3s round the right flank to try and take the rear flag following them w/ 2 platoons of the motorizes inf. At this point i started doing the shoot and scoot with the gulley behind the tanks. Id pop them up, try n squeeze off some rounds and go back. Sure was fun watching them get picked off one by one by the t34s in the rear. After a few of the pnzIV reinforced them at this position by turn 23 they were all dead (about 7 in this rear flag spot). Any kill I got in this scenerio seemed to be tank for tank. It was pretty sad. :mad: I held the center flag for about the whole game and really whomped on their troops coming down the hill forward of this pos. My troop losses were 116 and theres were 240. Is this expected for this battle? Im hoping this is considered one of the more 'challenging' battles but im thinking that i have a lot to learn. I am very interested in how anyone else approached it and what the outcome was. Thanks everyone, and its good to be back in the tank saddle again.

Zaf

[Zaffod007]

Bumpity bump

[Joachim]

Some formatting would ease reading. The more people actualy read all of your message the more people might respond.

Can't remember when worlds collide, just that it is in the SP pack, so anything is just general help.

a) A hull down PzIII with 70mm frontal is almost invulnerable to T34s from 600m.

Any PzIV is easily penetrated by T34s.

c) PzIII can hardly kill T34s at range. Even up close they lack effect after penetration.

d) PzIV can kill T34s at range.

e) StuGs with 80mm front are frontally invulnerable and can kill at range

f) The AI tends to bunch up his armor. This usually results in local odds.

So what do we get from this?

If you don't manage to get local odds yourself as keyholing will still have several T34s in your limited sights, you either need something that is invulnerable to the return fire or get even bigger odds.

So

1) Spread your armor - but make sure it can mutually support each other (ie you have 2 or more keyhole positions which all have LOS to your intended beaten zone where the enemy is.

2) a)-e) means that you gotta present StuG 80mm or PzIII 70mm fronts to the enemy. Avoid positions where you get flanking fire.

The AI tends to fire on the first tank that appears during a turn. It'll stick to targets he can barely kill but has a better chance to hit. If several targets are available when a target is seleted, it'll choose the most expensive one (picking out HQs and such). PzIVs are more expensive than PzIIIs (at the same experience level). But you want to keep your killers.

So an ideal firing position is to lead with the PzIIIs. The PzIVs are the overwatch. Once the T34s concentrate their fire on the PzIII (but fail to kill them), the PzIV appear and kill the T34s. Of course this happens at range. the StuGs are for static overwatch - they can remain "up" to protect the PzIIIS on the march while the PzIVs have to remain hidden and only appear once the T34s are committed and target the PzIIIs.

You goal is not to occupy some flags, but to destroy the enemy first. Most points are for killing. And once you killed the enemy, you'll get the flags anyway.

Shoot&Scoot: Never really works for me. If you don't place the firing position perfectly, your tanks is exposed several seconds to multiple shooters but only fires once. Hunt and reverse in the next turn usually works better for me.

Gruß

Joachim

[Askovdk]

My first try with 'When Worlds Collide' was a disaster, but the map and force mix was so nice, that I had to try it again.

The way I solved it was to have most tanks without tungsten sneak up in the hills to the north of the farm. It can be done unseen from Russian roads. A few tanks with tungsten went hunting in the vally south of the farm, where they can ambush with flanking shots.

Finally I waited till the end of the battle before sending infantry into the farm.

The idea was to 'Shoot & Scoot' with the tanks on the northern hill, taking out the light tanks and slowly some of the T34 before finally letting them overwatch the whole vally during the final assault on the farm.

This was against the AI, - a human opponent would make this battle very hard for the axis. The AI seemed to love sending infantry down the hill the the east of the farm, just south of the main road, so the farm can be reinforced if you can have one or two tanks watching this hill unseen from the Russian tanks (the houses in the western farm suits the purpose).

It was still a tough and interesting battle, even with this 2nd run 'cheat', but I learned alot about close tank assault with tungsten.

If you are playing through the 'Stalingrad Pack' you have a lot of great battles in front of you.

Follow up question to the forum. I lost all the 'tungsten ambush tanks', but only after they had taken out around 1 T34 each. It was fun to play these sneaking tanks, but _is_ it a good tactic for the Germans in 42, or were I just lucky, that it worked for me?

I have played CMBB for 1½ year, and are enjoying this forum alot. Still I didn't feel I had anything to add before today, so yes, this is my very first post.

[Joachim]

The Germans wouldn't want to waste their tanks like this. OTOH if they hold the ground afterwards they could repair their tanks adn most abandoned tanks would be back in service a few days later.

The real tactics relied on radio and solid tactics allowing them to gain an advantage. The T34s are faster - but the Germans knew where to go. And they probably would not attack the T34s directly but try to maneuver so they were in a position where the T34s had to attack them. If the Soviets split their forces, the local odds would shift in favor of the Germans.

You can achieve something like this when you take a flag and the AI starts his counterattack. The AI leaves the favorable positions. You can often get flank shots this way.

a) if you catch a tank in the flank it often rotates. Rotating tanks don't fire.

reverse slope works great vs moving tanks.

c) Keyholing works best when the keyhole is at 90° to the enemy's advance path.

Gruß

Joachim