Moving Mg's, HMG's & Mortars on foot

[Broompatrol]

I tried searching previous threads so forgive me if this has been covered.

I have realized I suck at moving my support units on foot. This is basically anybody who can't use the advance command: Mg's, AT-rifles. mortar's. ETC.

What's been happening is my little guys successfully advance and push the enemy back. The small mortars and mg's get left behind and useless because of terrain or range. Bazookas and PIATs need to stay near their platoons anyway, correct? When my guys scoot up "ping, pow" pinned in the open, very annoying.

Sometimes you just have to reposition them and the poor buggers often get the worst of it. I should be tried for war crimes considering how many PIAT teams have died under my command.

Any help is appreciated and please don't say "that's what tanks are for "

[MarkEzra]

You might wish to consider the "move to contact" to generally move forward all troops while keeping anti-tank, MG and mortar trailing behind the HQ unit. Once contact is made use "move", "sneak" or "run" to maneuver Mortars ect. to firing positions. I try to use "advance" to cover the last 20 to 40 meters and "assault" the last 20 meters or less, depending on cover and terrain. It doesn't help your cause when your troops arrive exhausted. Brewing up, by the way, "That's what tanks are for" LOL

[Guest Guest]

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[Bannon DC]

Givens:

Support weapons are more easily spotted when moving than squads. If they are moving fast, they will be even more easily spotted. The AI prefers to target them over squads. They move slow. They tire easily.

That all adds up to the obvious problem. To solve this, start with some of the CM basics. If they are easily spotted, put them under the command of an HQ with a good stealth bonus. Use terrain which offers the best cover, even if you have to go "the long way." Avoid open ground. If you are taking fire from very few sources, use your squads to suppress the enemy. If you have smoke, use smoke to cover your move. Move in short moves and hide. These are basic CM manuevers.

Now a little more advanced... coordinate your movement as a platoon instead of individual units. Combine all of the above basics with platoon movement tactics. What draws enemy fire? Movement draws fire. Fire draws fire. If you don't know where the enemy is... move a squad first and hope to draw enemy fire. Even if you don't need to "advance" across the map... just move to a different position and hope to get shot at. If nothing happens, move a squad on "fast" which is more easily spotted by the enemy. Order the squad to "hide" after his move so he does not take needless casualties. For "fire draws fire," you can order a squad or two to fire with "area fire." The enemy will return fire and give away their location (if they are in range, of course). In this way, you will know where the enemy is. Now, you can use suppression fire or smoke to cover your move.

For movement, consider that the AI would prefer to shoot your mortar or MG over your infantry squad. And generally, your infantry squad can withstand enemy fire better than a support unit. Also, the AI will go for the "best shot" which usually means targeting units that are closer or in less cover. You need to offer the AI targets other than your support units or "better" targets where it can use its firepower more effectively. This is where you move as a platoon.

For this example, you have to cross an open area of steppe about 60m across to get to the next "good cover" (like woods or pines). You have a platoon of infantry and 3 or 4 support units. To set it up, you have a good HQ with stealth bonus commanding your support units. Look for terrain height differences which may block the enemy's view... "dead ground". Your infantry squads are in position to the front or flank (the squads' cover or concealment is the same, but not better than, the support units). While doing your best to suppress enemy fire, time your moves so that infantry squads are exposed before support units. Your squads can either try to "advance" the whole 60m or go about 20 or 30m and "hide"... next round they will cover the rest of the distance. You can use the delay command to let the squad move 10 or 20 seconds before the support unit. Since 60m is too far for a support unit to run across, you can move it in 10 or 15m mini-moves and then hide. Don't move support units on "fast" because they will be spotted easier. Have them "move" and "hide." Stagger their moves by 10 seconds each so not all of them are moving at the same time. Keep them spread out by about 15 to 20m so they are not effected by fire on close-by units. It might take 3 or 4 turns to get across the open stretch.

What you hope to achieve is the squads take the inital fire. By the time the AI spots your support units they have hit the dirt and gone out of direct sight. Their staggered movement will cause the AI to redirect its fire often so hopefully they are not taking sustained fire. The AI sees a better target and switches fire to that one... which then hits the dirt... and another unit is moving which soon hits the dirt. And so on.

The above situation assumes the enemy is at 100 to 150m away. Any closer and the enemy fire will be deadlier and you will be more easily spotted. I'm not saying you will get through this with no casualties, but you should be able to advance to the next "good cover" and set up a new fire base.

Switching gears... keep in mind you can fire your mortars with an HQ as the spotter. This may help your mortars keep out of direct fire and not need to move as often.

Good luck.

[dieseltaylor]

Good answers.

Broompatrol. You do not say what size games you play but I tend to the larger games which I maintain allow a better mix of troops : )

Buying a battalion of British infantry generally brings the Universal carriers which were designed specifically for the problem you are talking about.

Bear in mind that to be historically accurate it is 90% certain that your units would not be at full strength so you can use the casualty button on set up to become more accurate. I mention this as battalion assets can be bought even in 2000 point game at 10 to 30% casualties.

This may sound unimportant but the Germans with their intrinsic company level HMG's do very well in CM against countries who have to buy in their HMG's at full price. Battalion level buying means the Allies are better value and have a rounded force mix to play with.

[Broompatrol]

tnks evryone for the advice. There were some gems in there which I will definitly use.

I guess I was looking for an easy answer....

Not in this game

[JasonC]

Short answers and procedures, practical details, exceptions and elaborations. In the end you have to integrate your handling of heavy weapons groups into your whole approach to fighting. But I'll start with the first, as directly as possible.

basic solution - move to contact and hide.

fall back when under fire - sneak and hide.

general procedure - packet movement, and only when necessary.

Routes should be inside cover where possible and should hop between bits of cover where that is not possible. Routes should be in full defilade to any known enemies. Routes should be scouted in advance by fast infantry able to use "advance" if fire can be expected.

Within cover, the effect of "move to contact and hide" is to halt movement if fired upon or when an enemy is seen. If within decent cover at the moment they halt, and if the range is sufficiently long, the enemy will rapidly lose the target ("becoming a flag"). Heavy fire can cause the same effect by pinning the moving team.

If instead caught in the open, the enemy often retains sight after dropping the team. The team should then continue to the next piece of cover using "sneak" - or break LOS entirely if that is shorter. Practical distances to sneak with a slow team run about 20m. If the distance is instead more like 40m, the unit will probably break, and going completely stationary may be preferable.

You can try to get fire off the team by suppressing seen shooters with your own overwatch fires. If the enemy is only sound, you can try to draw their fire and get spots by advancing toward the sound contact with fast infantry units closer to the shooters, while the weapon team remains stationary. A nearer and moving unit will tend to draw fire away from a distant and stationary one, especially once the latter is pinned enough to not seem threatening.

Packet movement simply means that only individual teams are risked along single routes simultaneously. The downside is a reduction in speed, and sometimes you must compromise this principle. But when you can afford it, it deals with fire dangers quite well. Timing of moves is staggered, and later units only "go" if the previous ones "made it".

If there are spotted enemies in LOS, they cover the route, but you can also remain stationary and fire, instead of moving. This is particularly true of the best heavy weapons items, which retain good firepower at long range (FOs, HMGs, on map mortars, ATRs, snipers).

Understand that the enemy cannot afford to fire at weapons teams at long range in adequate cover, indefinitely. They simply do not have the ammo to hurt them seriously at such ranges, unless they catch them in the open or HE catches too many of them bunched together. This is especially true of the HMG teams, which are very resilient. Yes they can be pinned or panicked, but they retain full fp even down a few men, once they rally.

Mortars and FOs are considerably more vulnerable and require the greatest care to move. Fortunately they also fire well without exposing themselves, and at range. They also have ammo for only a few minutes of fire, and if they have expended their loads you have gotten all you can expect to get out of them. So plan to get them to one good spot, fire off what they have, and then withdraw them.

Flankers are a class of expection. What I mean by these are weak teams, typically isolated from larger weapon groups, that typically need closer ranges or special lines of LOS, and thus tend to operate ahead of other units, with less scouting ahead, less command, etc. LMG teams, tank hunters or rocket based AT teams, in some roles foot flamethrowers, occasionally ATRs or snipers (which have longer effective ranges than the above), are examples.

Frequently all you care about from these is their spotting potential. The recipe is to move to contact and hide inside cover and sneak a lot otherwise, expecting them to reach reasonable locations only half way through the battle, get lost by sneaking around and hiding in cover for a bit. Then they hang around and return sighting reports, and occasionally get reasonable shots off. Some portion will run into more than they can handle and get whacked - can't be helped, but these are cheap and "risk assets".

Special moving considerations - frequently you can make one critical repositioning move, especially early, by mounting the teams on vehicles rather than moving on foot. There are also vehicle substitutes worth considering.

E.g. the SPW 251/2 has the ammo depth of 2 foot 81mms and repositions much more easily. Wasps and MMG carriers can be much more robust on the attack than foot FTs and Vickers MGs. A pair of HMG-42s can ride on one tank and drop off behind a critical hill or building. The Russians can do the same with 2 50mm mortars, to get suppression of a key gun from a forward position.

Problems can occur with some vehicle move attempts. E.g. German mortars and Russian HMGs cannot ride tanks, being transport class 3. Russian 82mms at full strength can't ride their typical transport - carriers, jeeps, scout cars - because the 7th man makes them full squad size. Work arounds are a single M5 halftrack for Russians, and an SPW 251/1 (carrying 2 foot 81s) or 251/2 for Germans.

Rocket AT teams and sometimes foot flamethrowers tend to be a special case, because they need closer ranges than most heavy weapons and they have high value targets. Basically they have to trail large formations of regular infantry and attach themselves to their leadership and scouting abilities. They should hang back well within cover until needed, and then reach forward firing positions by entirely covered routes or by sneaking the last 20-30m into LOS. (Even within cover).

Heavy weapons should be organized into fire groups with leadership, like mini-platoons, or attached to existing platoons. Separate groups are the right solution for slow speed teams with good firepower at long range. Attachments work for fast or medium speed teams and those that need short ranges. Slow separate teams should trail the standard infantry formations by 100-200 meters, and should only move forward to establish initial LOS.

The principle of group composition should be "flexible toolbox" - a little of everything to handle any kind of target with the right weapon. Do not put all your mortars in one spot and all your MGs in another, for example. Instead use 2 HMGs and 1 strong or 2 weak (50mm) mortars per group, with an FO or sniper or ATR perhaps attached. Then make several of these groups. Use only the appropriate weapons for the target engaged. Properly used, a heavy weapons group can fight from long range without ever giving more than sound contacts. Range is stealth.

If they have LOS to enemy positions they should get into cover and remain stationary - even if those targets are not yet spotted because no one else is close enough yet. The weapons themselves do not need to be within the 200m or so spotting range for a firing MG position. It is enough if the leg infantry or a vehicle gets that close.

At set up, major heavy weapons positions and staged moves should be planned out. Only plan on 1 or 2 moves per slow weapons group. Leapfrog their coverage, with some groups stationary, overwatching, when others reposition. Expect to spend 10 minutes shifting a slow group to a new position, counting scouting ahead, packet moves, travel time, and set up time - plus rally if shot along the way.

Pick locations with adequate cover, adequate size to contain the weapons group without presenting too juicy a target to enemy HE, and wide enough LOS to engage a number of enemy positions. It is not important to get most weapons into position rapidly, as their ammo will not last regardless, but high ammo HMG teams can be an exception to this. Get some of those into firing positions early to carry out the long range fight. Their superior stealth when firing will often let them do so with impunity.

I hope this helps.

[Broompatrol]

Thanks for the info.

The specifics in your post help me conceptualize how to use them better