Anyone else here thinks that tanks vs. infantry in CMBO is not too realistic?

[[Wiking]]

I mean just the bit where e.g. a group of soldiers is running over open terrain with no cover, being targeted by like two Tigers and they suffer 0-1 casualty. That is not overly realistic now, is it?

[PVLLVS MAXIMVS]

Originally posted by SS_Obergruppenführer:

I mean just the bit where e.g. a group of soldiers is running over open terrain with no cover, being targeted by like two Tigers and they suffer 0-1 casualty. That is not overly realistic now, is it?

Im sure its not a perfect simulation of what would have happened in real life (after all, the infantry dont leave little puddles behind in the game, I bet they did IRL), but I bets its a pretty close approximation. It IS an abstraction. Open terrain tiles arent REALY open. There would be little dips and random stumps and fences and stuff Im sure, and the squads areing runnning in a big line holding hands either. Im sure they're quite spread out to minimize the danger of shrapnel and such.

[Redwolf]

In this case it's the MG problem.

Having said that, overall I think it's easier to overrun tanks with infantry in CMBO than in reality, but more important than the MG issues is that the infantry in CMBO is lead much better. Like if everyone has perfect radios and you can throw masses of coordinated infantry againt the tank.

Historically one of the things that made the tank so strong in early war was that it had radios, and usually at the ready. So the tanks were those who could be coordinated like CMBO forces, but not infantry.

Isn't it funny that somebody started a thread on tanks being too strong against infantry a few hours ago

[ March 17, 2002, 03:46 PM: Message edited by: redwolf ]

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by redwolf:

In this case it's the MG problem.

Definitely. Also, gunners in CM:BO seem never to have heard of, let alone mastered, the practice of leading a moving target.

Michael

[ March 17, 2002, 04:17 PM: Message edited by: Michael emrys ]

[Redwolf]

Originally posted by Michael emrys:

Also, gunners in CM:BO seem never to have heard of, let alone mastered, the practice of leading a moving target.

Yepp, no non-armored targets are get shot at with movement in mind. That is what part of the problem about the SdKfz 7/1 and 7/2 comes from.

[wodasini88]

this is similar to how the 20mm flak isn't very good against infantry, I watched my 20mm create a huge line of craters behind the squad it was firing at, it wasn't leading them

[Michael Emrys]

In fact, one of the best defenses against this type of weapon is to keep moving. Ironically, that doesn't work so well against a less accurate weapon (one that has a larger CEP). Since the exact arrival point for a given round is somewhat random, it just might by chance land right on your unit!

Michael

[Michael Dorosh]

I dunno, sounds exactly like what happened in Saving Private Ryan - two Tigers vs. US infantry in the open = no losses.

Hollywood always gets it right, doesn't it?

[JasonC]

There is the MG problem, the biggest here. It is especially noticable in open ground. There is the coordination and command issue - one commander with perfect own-side intel and borg sighting issuing orders reacted to rapidly to every squad. There is the tendency of CM players to use inflated morale infantry, with veterans very common and greens rare instead of the other way around. There is no morale effect of events beyond the unit hit, or its state of command if you take out its platoon HQ, until the very late auto-surrender, so the historical level of fear tanks generated is not depicted. There is the tendency of CM maps to be tiny and shallow, making ranges artificially short - appropriate for infantry fighting but much less so for vehicle and artillery fighting. Also, bazookas in particular are somewhat overmodeled against Tiger I side and rear armor, if part of the issue is what the infantry can later do to the Tigers. They could penetrate, but it was relatively rare, while in CM any side angle shot will generally kill.

All of that said, I do not recommend charging 2 Tiger Is with infantry over any appreciable expanse of open ground. The Tigers will generally shoot the heck out of them. What happens in one 10 second period of fire is not what happens in the whole affair. And CM as a whole is more bloody than real WW II combat, not less, with levels of loss typically seen in short CM engagements between companies or battalions, often higher than whole divisions lost in a full day of heavy combat. Because we CM players mash our forces together with a reckless abandon the actual participants shunned, for the obvious reason. They were "playing" for life stakes and we are not. We also tend not to care too much about the state of our force an hour later (simply because the game scale it tactical), while the historical commanders had to make theirs last for months or years.

[JasonC]

As an example, I just tried the following against the AI. I gave it one regular US infantry company, nothing else. I took 2 Tiger Is, one veteran and one regular quality, plus one regular quality motorized Panzergrenadier platoon (Heer). Both forces are around 530 points, same cost. Meeting engagement, 480x480 meter map, farmland with medium woods and small hills.

I put the tanks on the flanks and the grenadiers in a line across the middle, anchored on two buildings astride a north-south road. The infantry didn't go far, and soon hid, waiting for the Americans to get close and for the tanks to soften them up. The tanks fired at will (the regular one was rapidly buttoned by infantry fire, and the other I buttoned myself after a few minutes).

The approach march for the Americans was through a wheatfield, after which they reached a large body of scattered trees in the middle of the map. The trees were thin enough, and hills such, that the tanks on the flanks could see a good ways into them, though each tank could not see through. When the first squads came out beyond those woods I unhid the infantry. They then proceeded to firefight the infantry in the scattered trees at around 100-125 yards.

At the 10 minute mark the American attack had clearly faltered. I had lost 2 men from one of the grenadier squads. I regrouped them to ready a rush into the scattered trees. Ammo was low by then. At minute 12 I rushed, the tanks supporting by overwatch. The grenadiers cleaned out the woods easily, as most of the Americans in front of them just ran. I lost no one else, took a few surrenders, and drove the remnants back into the wheatfield, routed.

US losses were 136 casualties plus 2 PWs. 4 ran off the map and 25 were left alive at the time of the autosurrender result. Realistically they would just have run, not surrendered. The loss ratio was still 69 to 1 against the infantry, and the US loss total from one company was three times the historical average daily losses of a US division for a day. Or, between all and half of the average losses for an infantry division in a period of heavy combat, like the push to St. Lo meatgrinder (150-300 per day).

The Tigers expended 64 rounds of HE and almost 200 MG bursts. Plus one close defense system round at a frisky company HQ late in the fight (which charged the regular Tiger, threw 1-2 grenades that did nothing, and was subsequently wiped out). As for the zooks, they got off half a dozen rounds. One hit the front of the regular Tiger and did "no appreciable damage". The rest missed.

This does not to me look like undermodeling of tank lethality, in overall effect. But how it came about was a bit different from the historical way. In reality, the Americans would not have pressed so close, would have been suppressed in the wheatfield more easily by the tank MGs, and would have run much sooner.

As a result, they would have taken fewer losses, not more. The losses per early shot would have been higher, but above all the overall morale would have been lower. As a result, the engagement would not have seen so much firing at such close ranges.

In CM, the units resist fire (MGs especially) and armor fear, in morale terms and in larger unit terms, far more than they did in the real deal. More of the onus is on the player commander to get his men out of dodge if he thinks the situation is bad. But then they wind up exposed to far more fire than their historical counterparts tolerated.

And the cumulative result of that extensive incoming fire is more deadly than the reality was, not less. Tanks dish that fire out with near impunity, if not facing enemy heavy armor. It does help if they have any infantry support of their own to keep infantry AT at a respectable distance or suppress them after their first shots.

For their cost, main battle tanks clobber infantry. The MGs are undermodeled but the HE is if anything overmodeled. The MGs are also often sufficient to render the target infantry stationary (pinned in cover, or panicked and then heads down once they reach cover), which lets the HE go to work more effectively. And the MGs have lots and lots of ammo - on main battle tanks (as opposed to assault guns and HE chucker support vehicles).