Trigger Happy Soldiers

[Falcon988]

This evening I was defending a small little desert town with a few British engineers against a battalion of Italian infantry & M14 platoon. Set a few men with demo charges in ambush positions at various areas, and put minimal sized cover arcs on them specifically to keep them from unloading on distant targets.

Repeatedly though, they disregarded the cover arcs, unhid, and opened fire on enemies they shouldn't have opened fire upon. Consequentially there were a lot of unnecessary losses when the Italians found my positions, forced the British to leave cover, and shot them in the open sand. It was very frustrating and my entire defense is in peril thanks to their incompetance.

Is this a deliberate design thing that models "human error"? Soldiers who literally can't hold fire to save their won lives?

[JonS]

CA + Hide seems to work quite well. IIRC, it also depends on the experience of your troopies - vets hold their fire better than greenies, etc.

[flamingknives]

They're more likely to open fire early if they're out of command too.

[Pzman]

I've also found that men, if they have a good shot at a soft target or even armor sometimes, after firing and then stopping, will often do so at targets outside of a CA.

[Joachim]

Best way to stop this is having your men in reverse slopes. Then they can't shoot early.

If this ain't possible, keep the following in mind:

Usually my men stay with their CAs. But once they fear they get discovered, they shoot first.

It is near impossible to keep your men from returning fire. Even indirect fire might result in breaking fire discipline (Recce by fire...).

If the enemy comes close and your units are not in good concealment, they will ignore covered arcs and fire in self-defence.

And they definitely hate getting cut off in bad positions. Anybody moving towards their (or the) rear is a massive threat and thus is likely targetted.

Any plan relying on some of your men being heroes and martyrs is doomed.

From your description, your men are doomed and fight massive odds. If you want your pioneers to keep their head down, make sure some MGs pin the Italian infatry well ahead of them to enforce an attack with tanks first.

Gruß

Joachim

[xerxes]

It's intentional in the TacAI that you get this behavior. Disobeying is more likely as threats increase and your troop quality decreases. Hiding will really reduce this but it also reduces your spotting hugely.

[Falcon988]

Well you all were right I definately was doomed. Despite some truly heroic and skillful action by the British resulting in a dozen Italian M14's destroyed by close assault, my unit was overrun by an entire battalion of infantry and several platoons of M14's. Wasn't a pretty thing to watch. Heavy losses inflicted on the enemy though and a few rearguard actions ensured that a few dozen Brits escaped unharmed. So it wasn't all that bad.

I'm still a little angry over my men's inability to hold fire, but I understand the reasoning. I was asking a lot of them I suppose and every one of the forward units were either destroyed or taken prisoner.

But the AI in Combat Mission never ceases to amaze me. It's best to think of your soldiers as human beings rather than mindless robots who will defend their position to the last man.