Are Engineers/Pioneers still useless against wire?

[Hakko Ichiu]

I was playing [CENSORED] which involves taking a VL surrounded by wire. I moved my troops up in text book fashion; suppressed the enemy in the area; then brought up my pioneers to remove the wire. I moved them right next to it and waited... and waited ... and waited. Nothing. Finally I sent my infantry through the wire, and they didn't seem to go any faster than normal. So, do engineers do anything against wire in CMBB? Mind you, they were handy against the mine fields.

[PiggDogg]

Hakko,

I think that engineers and pioneers are useless against wire. It seems that they have no wire cutters or Bangalore Torpedoes.

Cheers, Richard

[BuzzBomb]

I have yet to test it but In CMBB engineering units now have the area target sub menu command that allows you to attack with satchel charges.

I would suspect a charge to make nice work of wire if targeted apropriately. I have read that others have been using them to great effect to bring down buildings and bridges. Has anyone checked this with wire yet?

In CMBO your SOL using engineering units for the same task I am afraid.

[Eden Smallwood]

Originally posted by BuzzBomb:

Has anyone checked this with wire yet?

You bet your sweet patootie I checked- I spent a half hour trying to take out that d*mn wire.

First, just let pioneers hang out around the wire, and hope they figure it out. Nope. They're still standing there. And that was days ago.

Second let's *target* the "Wire". The pioneer squad is selected, and I move the cursor around, and if it's close enough to the "base" of the wire, the cursor gets grabbed in that usual way, and it says "Wire". Target that sucker.

They *shoot* at it.

Third, let's try to get an "Area Fire; use Big Bombs". Now, because the cursor gets *sucked* whenever it's close to the "wire", it's ALMOST impossible, but just BARELY is possible to find a couple microscopic pixels where the thing says:

barbed wire ; Area Fire ; Use Explosives

That sounds pretty dang good, right??? Nope. Does nothing. They toss all their satchels, but I think that the "barbed wire" in that message is just indicating a particular *location*, not a *thing*. It's equivalent to:

tall pines ; Area Fire ; Use Explosives

Fourth, bring in the KV. Yes, I'm completely serious. I could target it, when it says "Wire", but the bugger refused to fire at it. I swear! He just wouldn't spend the ammo.

I would suspect a charge to make nice work of wire if targeted apropriately.

Your suspicion fails to impress me, but if you ever find the secret, name your price.

Eden

[Sgt. Schultz]

Wire cannot be affected in any way that I am aware of in the scope of a CM battle. This isn't a fence around a cow pasture that can be cut in a few minutes. It represents large tangles of wire staked and secured by frames. Artillery and other explosives would just throw it up in the air and it falls back to earth in ... a tangle of wire. You have to either go around it, suppress all defenders and then work your way through it, put troops on tracked vehicles and ride across it, or play another scenario that doesn't have wire. Just be thankful that wire cannot incur casualties on crossing forces by itself. I bet that happened more than once in WWII. Someone gets hung up in the wire trying to dodge bullets or force their way through and cuts the livin' h*ll out of themselves. A nice facial laceration would degrade MY combat efficiency for sure.

On the postive yet gamey side it can be placed through woods end-to-end to make tank paths. Like putting hedges up cliffs to act as "ropes".

It's a bummer, but that is why they invented the stuff in the 1st place, to make it a bummer for the attacker.

[Mud]

Yup. Barbed wire cannot be taken out by any means that I know of. And while it doesn't kill people itself, it (a) slows them down significantly while they're passing through it, {It wouldn't surprise me if it caused extra fatigue as well...) and ( probably provides jack-squat cover.

So if the wire is covered by an HMG or a big HE hurler, maybe even w/ a TRP for the boresight bonus, whoever's trying to breach it may be a sitting duck.

Save the demo charges for minefields, strongpoints and tanks.

[demoss]

Barbed wire cannot be taken out by any means that I know of. And while it doesn't kill people itself, it (a) slows them down significantly while they're passing through it, {It wouldn't surprise me if it caused extra fatigue as well...) and ( probably provides jack-squat cover.

Yup. I can confirm that exposure goes way up when in wire, at least in CMBB.

[CPT T]

I have witnessed well trained engineers reduce extensive wire obtacles in a matter of a few minutes at the NTC. I believe it is within the time scope of CMBO/CMBB.

I am not sure why minefields can be reduced but not wire. I would like to see this ability added to CMBB.

[Nippy]

I just hit a single section of barbed wire with 10,000+ points worth of Soviet heavy Arty (300mm Rockets and 280mm Howtizers). It didn't do a darn thing...

Note: I sure looked cool though

[Bruceov]

You are probably playing against Crack or elite wire

[Tigrii]

I ran into wire with Pioneers in a QB, and when I tried both "area fire-wire" and targeting it directly, they just chucked grenades at it and wasted small-arms ammo.

[Silvio Manuel]

You can't remove wire in either CM, ever.

Exposure while in wire is very bad, at least 90%+ if not right around 100%, compared to open ground which can be 50-75%, or road which is probably 75%+.

[NewSocialistMan]

That's just plain silly. In RL, if I run over ANY wire obstacle a couple times with a JS2, it's going to look like Henderson Field.

[Guest Mike]

Y'reckon?

I used to put out wire & cut it & stuff when I was in the territorials (as an Assault Pioner).

WE dont' ahve heavy tanks here, but I do remember watching a M113 APC run across some wire a few times to show how a wire stands up to tracks - it knocked down the steel waratahs (posts) holding the wire up, but the wire itself just ballooned up all over the place behind it once it had passed.

the 113 had ripped some of the wire off teh posts so it (the wire) didnt' stay bent over like the posts were, it was still connected to posts remaining standing so there was plenty of spring after the 113 had passed over it to pull it it up and generally make into a random mess.

And where the posts had been knocked down by tthe body of the vehicle ratehr than the tracks they were often still a foot or 2 above the ground, and so was the wire on them - plus or minus a foot or 2 because of it's springiness.

What had been high wire like a fence was now low wire like a series of spiked tripwires - which is just as difficult for infantry to cross. Indeed low wire was/is still a valid form of wire defece - it makes it very difficult to crawl across the space, uses less wire and doesn't need high posts to secure it!!

What het passage of hte 113 did do was make the 5 foot double wire barrier into a 2 foot high barrier, which would've been easier to lay planks or some other devices across, but it certainly did't remove it altogether.

[NewSocialistMan]

I would think that a bocage cutter or buldozer would make extremely short work of even the most robust of wire obstacles.

I had a convo with someone about the game engine and was told that the probable reason why they made wire (and tall pines) immutable despite historical evidence to the contrary is because of mechanical difficulties in modeling. It is the same reason why, for instance, you can't just demolish a light building by driving a Tiger tank into it. It's not that it wasn't done with regularity, it is that it would require too much programming alchemy to make it happen.

[SurlyBen]

This is not really a fix as much as a difficult to use workaround, but for cover and movement, craters take precedence over barbed wire. If you have barbed wire on top of a crater, any units in or moving through that crater do so at the normal movement rate, and with all the cover that the crater normally provides.

Tanks with decent HE can blow a small path through barbed wire in a turn or two.

[Radar]

Originally posted by SurlyBen:

This is not really a fix as much as a difficult to use workaround, but for cover and movement, craters take precedence over barbed wire. If you have barbed wire on top of a crater, any units in or moving through that crater do so at the normal movement rate, and with all the cover that the crater normally provides.

Tanks with decent HE can blow a small path through barbed wire in a turn or two.

Thanks for the tip.

[Silvio Manuel]

Originally posted by SurlyBen:

This is not really a fix as much as a difficult to use workaround, but for cover and movement, craters take precedence over barbed wire. If you have barbed wire on top of a crater, any units in or moving through that crater do so at the normal movement rate, and with all the cover that the crater normally provides.

Tanks with decent HE can blow a small path through barbed wire in a turn or two.

I see how that can make sense- the troops can maybe crawl *under* the wire if the crater is plenty-deep, or else crawl around it somehow if it's been cut enough and the volume of the crater allows one to negotiate manevering past it w/o getting hung up. Neat.

So I guess we should all start planning on bringing SU-122/152, 105mm+ AFV, etc. on an assault, since they can blast craters under the wire and allow for an easier infiltration.

[ November 23, 2002, 03:27 PM: Message edited by: Silvio Manuel ]

[Silvio Manuel]

I just e-mailed Soddball to ask him to include this info in his CMBB FAQ.

[Chad Harrison]

The best tactic for wire if you have to cross it is to have your men ride on armored vehicles and have everyone else put out huge amounts of suppressing fire. Its amazing what one or two suicide half squads can show you.

Chad

[Guest Mike]

Originally posted by NewSocialistMan:

I would think that a bocage cutter or buldozer would make extremely short work of even the most robust of wire obstacles..

I imagine a dozer blade certainly would - ripping it out and pushing it to one side is something quiet different from running over it.

I don't know what a bocage cutter would do though - it might just bend or break the posts - essentially the same as running over it.

I had a convo with someone about the game engine and was told that the probable reason why they made wire (and tall pines) immutable despite historical evidence to the contrary is because of mechanical difficulties in modeling. It is the same reason why, for instance, you can't just demolish a light building by driving a Tiger tank into it. It's not that it wasn't done with regularity, it is that it would require too much programming alchemy to make it happen.

Sounds like supposition to me. It would be quite easy IMO to make wire clearable by demolition charges (as representing bangalore torpedoes) in the same way mines are.

[MrSpkr]

Originally posted by Sgt. Schultz:

On the postive yet gamey side it can be placed through woods end-to-end to make tank paths.

I'll have to try that tonight. I like it! Does the wire also engate the LOS blockage of the woods (so long as your LOS traces the wire itself)?

Like putting hedges up cliffs to act as "ropes".

I never heard of this. Does it allow infantry AND vehicle movement up the cliff (so long as you plot LOS carefully)?

Steve

[Dook]

The hedge-rope trick originated with Clubfoot's Blowfish CMBO scenario, I think. No vehicles in that scenario, so I don't know if it allows them to go up cliffs. Just out of curiosity, why would you want to drive a vehicle up a cliff anyway?

[Eden Smallwood]

Originally posted by Dook:

why would you want to drive a vehicle up a cliff anyway?

To get to the other side?

Eden