Use of Wooden bunkers

[Thin Red Line]

More than often i get those in scenarii but they are immediately destroyed by tanks or guns.

Any suggestion for an effective use and placement ?

For example is there any way to hide them so they remain unspotted ?

[ September 06, 2003, 06:40 PM: Message edited by: Thin Red Line ]

[tabpub]

Personally, I try to sight them where I would only expect to encounter infantry alone. The best example is covering a large woods that the opfor might use as a covered route. Since the tanks/vehicles can't accompany the infantry, you should be safer.

Another choice is to put them reverse of a terrain feature that will shield them and have them interlocked covering open ground between the features. This deployment requires infantry to be on/in the feature though, in order to protect the blind side of the bunker.

And the final option is to have some sort of AT weapon covering the area(s) that enemy AFV's could use to bring your bunker under fire. Using the above example; a bunker behind a woods covering the open ground area next to the woods. Have an ATG set with a CA to that area, so that when an AFV enters that area to engage the bunker, it can be brought under fire from the concealed gun. Ideally, have the ATG at approximately a 90deg angle to the anticipated postition of the AFV, so that when it rotates either it chassis or turret to engage the bunker, that it will then expose its flank to the AT asset.

[Redwolf]

CM models them as vehicles and they are extremly easy to knock out with precise fire from weapons with high ROF - light tanks, AA autocannons and even AT rifles. They also don't get any realistic camouflage benefit.

If you want a halfway realistic experience of a defense with bunkers and pillboxes you would have to agree with your opponent that he doesn't choose anything with less than 75mm caliber and that he doesn't use AT rifles against your bunker.

Otherwise, since most of the threat comes from light tanks, an AA autocannon placed in the same spot as the bunker works wonder. Since the bunker is transparent and point-shaped you can place the gn directly behind or even on the bunker. It doesn't help against the AT rifles, though.

[ September 06, 2003, 09:58 PM: Message edited by: redwolf ]

[IntelWeenie]

Originally posted by Thin Red Line:

For example is there any way to hide them so they remain unspotted ?

Place them as deeply in Woods as you can while still having LOS to the desired area. Like Redwolf said, there's no camo in CM, so they get spotted like any other vehicle.

[Fredrock1957]

I have stuck a few of them in a test scenario within buldings of rubble... they dont seem to get spotted as quick but heck once they open up I dont think the get anything from the defense of the rubble terrain...I believe the 60-90 degree offset with a ATG will protect them. Also if you can get them on a hill in "hull down" (since they are considered a vehicle) that helps there defense a little... but then again they are only 46 points and I am positive with proper placement you can get 50 - 60 points out of them (wishfull thinkin) man I love this addiction

[Thin Red Line]

Thanks, i whish they will be more difficult to spot and to destroy in the next CM releases !

I've sen many MG spend all their 85 ammo, i still have to witness a bunker surviving after 50 or so ammo.

[xerxes]

The key to placing mg bunkers is to prevent long range ATR/gun/afv direct firing on them. Long open LOS to a wooden mg bunker will get them killed quickly every time.

Reverse slope or deep in cover are the best places. Behind heavy cover and firing laterally can be very nasty.

[Redwolf]

This is very unfortunate.

They should be just like a normal MG team, except much more robust against HE, especially indirect HE. Probably a little easier to spot, but by far not as much as an uncamouflaged vehicle. Such a log bunker is just like a foxhole, except with decent overhead cover, more robust against callapse from earth from the sides moving in and providing a decent shield against HE fragments and smallarms fire from all directs except the firing slit.

Instead we get bunkers that are (very) vulnerable to anti-tank rifle fire

[xerxes]

I have a new scenario under development that is missing the ATRs for exactly that reason.

[manchildstein (ii)]

one way to make up for their lack of quality in a designed scenario is to provide quantity instead... disregard point values and have as many as needed to be effective...

[JasonC]

For standard MG nests covering your direct, distant front you are better off using an HMG team in a trench. Not as robust under heavy arty, but still pretty tough. And much better against direct fire at range, because they will only get a sound contact and won't locate the trench until somebody gets to ~200m or so.

As for using the wooden bunkers because you've got 'em, what I do is position them immediately behind a building, looking out to one side. The building blocks direct LOS from the front. Using the LOS tool, I get the bunker rotation right so it sees everything the angle to the building allows.

Naturally this leaves the other side "blind", but I cover that with some other asset or with obstacles (wire, mines, etc). Somebody can also set up in the building to deal with direct approach (e.g. a hiding SMG squad with a short covered arc).

The limited LOS to one side forces enemy tanks to come forward to get angle on the bunker. Typically the enemy sends infantry first to scout, and the bunker can light those up as soon as they step into LOS. You want to deny an area of open ground to one side of the map this way. You don't want the LOS area to be too deep into enemy territory or it is too easy for enemy tanks to get angle to the bunker.

Instead you want a line of fire nearly parallel to your own front. That way an enemy tank must approach close to your other positions to get LOS to the bunker. And when facing it, typically must present a flank or at least a turret side.

You can often see likely positions for a tank to crawl to, trying to stay relatively far back and near cover, but still getting angle for LOS to the bunker. Set up an ATG with LOS to such spots from a flank and at a good range.

If the bunker acts as effective "bait" and lets a light ATG bag a tank, it pays for itself even if the tank gets it. If the tank doesn't get it, you get an anchored flank, too. Neither infantry nor arty can hurt them and infantry MGed in the open is easy to pin down.

[moik]

The game's portrayal of bunkers is not unrealistic.

Trying to set up a defense around protecting a single immobile unit (ie bunker) is a bit like the French building the Marginot Line. Bunkers are inflexible. It is very easy to set up an immobile bunker that your opponent can conentrate fire on (as you have seen).

bunkers are only good at protecting infantry/AT

guns against artillery and MG fire.

Use them where the terrain permits infantry but not tanks. Put AT gun bunkers where you expect the enemy to try and pin you AT gun with artillery and MG fire.

If you want bunkers hidden use terrain slopes and woods. These elements are almost synonomous with camoflage.

When in doubt use foxholes. They conceal very well and protect from MG/atrillery fire.

Moik

[JasonC]

Of course it is unrealistic, and you are being silly.

You can see a bunker just sitting there in full woods at a kilometer and a half.

You can't get more than a sound contact against a -firing- MG at a tenth that distance, in a foxhole or trench.

That does not reflect realistic camo.

Foxholes and trenches do not reflect overhead cover, and are quite vunerable to medium mortars etc as a result. Also to airbursts in woods.

Log bunkers are regularly abandoned with no men lost, permanently, after "penetrations" of the "firing slit" by the lightest caliber AP - 14.5mm and 20mm e.g. But MGs which are at least as likely to "hit" the "firing slit" can't suppress them.

These unrealistic effects are direct byproducts of trying to model bunkers as "vehicles". Which they simply aren't.

[moik]

wooden bunkers in woods don't get spotted unless they are firing. If you want your bunker to remain unspotted issue a hide command. I've had tanks (unbuttoned) drive to within 20m of a wooden bunker (in woods) and not spot it.

An MG team is considerably smaller than a bunker. It is also mobile and therefore much more difficult to detect even when firing. Although 200m-300m is about where they will be spotted when firing while in woods. However it really does depend on who's doing the spotting and from where.

Bunkers are large structures designed to deflect small arms fire and artillery splatter (splatter being a technical term). They can be hidden until they open fire.

I don't think it's reasonable to expect a wooden structure to deflect an anti-tank rifle round, much less a heavier, faster round.

Moik

[JasonC]

If you put a wooden bunker in brush at 1500m, not firing and on "hide", it will be picked up instantly and KOed within about 30 seconds.

If you fire from a wooden bunker set up in woods at any target in range, i.e. within 1 km, you will be picked up as a full ID within about a minute, and KOed again if there are tanks in view.

If you place a wooden bunker deep in scattered trees or in woods or pines and do not fire, whether on hide or not, enemy tanks unbuttoned can crawl to 150-200m and still not see you. Once they get to close range, 50-100m, they will see the bunker even on "hide" and not firing. (And as mentioned above, they of course spot you the instant you fire).

For comparison, an HMG in a trench will remain unspotted longer, and will give only a sound contact when firing at ranges from 250m to 1000m. The trench itself can be spotted at around 175m, whether you are shooting or not. A foxhole with HMG, not shooting, will not be spotted until you roll right over it.

Thus, having overhead cover and log and sandbag sides to one's MG nest forfeits the ability to fire while remaining unspotted, and restricts you to tree or wood terrain (trenches are stealthy even in the open).

HMGs in foxholes or trenches can dominate wide areas of open ground at range, remaining sound contacts while doing so. Wooden bunkers cannot. They can wait to fire when no tanks or guns appear in their forward arc, and stay concealed until they do if and only if set up in trees.

But effectively they can only dominate areas no enemy tanks or guns can reach. The loss on the stealth side makes them more vulnerable, and more than counters the benefit against small arms.

On my point about firing slit penetrations you seem to have missed the point. ATRs are not modeled as getting through the bunker wall, but as passing through the open firing slit. Since they are resolved by the ballistic fire procedure they can do this. MG bullets are resolved as infantry fire and so cannot.

In reality, an MG bullet is as likely to hit the open firing slit area as an ATR bullet, and there are more of them. The reality is neither is very likely and has to hit a man behind that open slit, not just pass through the plane of the firing slit, to do anything. But once the ATR bullet goes through the slit, it counts as a "penetration" and induces "crew bail out" as often as not. The MG bullet doesn't.

There is no real reason for the sharp discontinuity between even a 50 cal MG bullet (resolved as infantry fire and unable to KO bunkers) and an ATR bullet (resolved as anti-vehicle fire and so able to KO bunkers through the slit, even if they can't get through the wall).

Incidentally the sides of a typical wooden bunker would be 2-3 feet of logs and 1-2 layers of sandbags. We are not talking about fighting from a shipping crate and calling it protection.

(edited because I always leave out the first "l" in "vulnerable")

[ September 27, 2003, 03:09 PM: Message edited by: JasonC ]

[walpurgis nacht]

Originally posted by Thin Red Line:

Any suggestion for an effective use and placement ?

There is a general guideline to placing your wooden bunkers, which will make them very effective. Simply find a nice spot for them to cover your infantry. And then, be absolutely certain to keep them outside of the LOS of enemy AFVs. In other words, protect them, in depth, with AT assets. Be certain the opponent will have to get through multiple layers of your AT assets to "reach" the wooden pillbox. As someone already mentioned, use them as bait. You can design your whole defense around a pillbox if you place it well. You must ensure the opponent eventually HAS to deal with the box in order to push forward, and then you can place your AT assets in various positions to take out the enemy AFVs when they try to take the box out. Very effective.

The main advantage of the wooden boxes is the ammo load out=200. You can pretty much let them open up, and keep them firing indefinitely.