A modest Proposal for CMBB: Recon Infantry Units

[Austrian Strategist]

2 men with bicycles, lightly armed, but stealthy (sort of FOs without artillery).

Realistic way to get rid of gamey 'sacrifice half-squads'.

[Michael Dorosh]

With increased spotting abilities, and a HUGE loss in victory points if they get killed - to avoid "gamey" use (or abuse, if you will).

Sort of like the old Scout counter in SL, come to think of it, though you never lost VP for them.

[skelley]

Why is a split squad scouting party gamey while a bicycle scouting party not?

[Caesar]

Why not just a scout command for normal infantry. If they get fired on they are likely to fall back in an orderly way rather than continuing on to their destination and duking it out. Maybe they could automatically move fast when crossing open terrain and sneak through bush etc. When this command is active give them slightly better spotting ability to reflect the fact that it is their whole mission. Might be a bit hard on the TacAI though.

Alternatively, if you have scouts that you buy, increase their spotting abilities, reduce their fire power to slightly above crews, increase their stealth to that of the sharpshooter. I wouldn't make them cost too many VPs as they are likely to take high casualties regardless of how they are used.

I still prefer the idea of a scout command as it means you don't have unrealistic elements in your forces and you can use your normal troops in a realistic manner.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by skelley:

Why is a split squad scouting party gamey while a bicycle scouting party not?

All of the battalion scale attacks I've read about neglect to mention any kind of reconaissance done in the ten minutes preceding the actual assault. By then, the company and platoon commanders had to base their plan of action on whatever intelligence had already been gathered - whether by divisional level reconaissance elements, or by locally run patrols.

Usually, the battalion CO or a selection of platoon/company commanders would do a recce on foot - as far in advance as possible (ie the night before a morning attack), and if that was not possible, would do a map recce.

The idea of breaking off half squads to go forth and "scout" during a battalion level deliberate attack seems kinda fictional to me - or at the very least does not fit well with what I've read about how CW battalions "did business." Once the troops went past the Start Line, there was no calling things off, and it was very difficult to rearrange artillery support.

In CM, we see NONE of this, since every unit on the mapboard is hidden from the player.

I think Germanboy has redressed this in one or two scenarios, by marking enemy positions with the landmark feature. This is a good idea, actually, and I would like to see more of that. I think JasonC did this in his campaign scenarios also - the one with the Germany battery, where the player started out with a general idea of where the enemy would be; based on his prior recce of the area.

Would be even better at some point in CM's development to allow partially revealed enemy positions at game start, even if not spotted by on map units - to represent prior reconaissance.

I'm far from an expert though and would like to read more.

[ June 02, 2002, 12:18 AM: Message edited by: Michael Dorosh ]

[Michael Emrys]

I agree with you 100%, Michael. One problem I have with CM is that the fog of war is a bit too much of an all-or-nothing proposition. Either you don't know where the enemy is at all or he is visible and you can shoot at him. At present, usually all I know about the enemy is that he is on that side of the map and likes to site his long-range AT assets in cover, usually back near a corner of the map where they have good fields of fire. And his infantry will be set up somewhere near the VLs. Duh.

While I don't think it would be realistic to reveal exactly what is on the map or where (that was rarely known in RL), as you say prior patrolling and other recon assets would give some idea as to the dispositions of the enemy. Certain defensive works would have some possibility of having been spotted. The location of battalion HQs might be known by monitoring radio traffic or observing activity in the vicinity of the HQ. And so on.

It would be nice for the designers of scenarios to be able to set how much prior intelligence a player receives aside from whatever is given in the scenario briefing. That is to say, this information would be graphically displayed on the map at the start of the Set Up Turn. Such a setting would be even more useful in QBs where there is no briefing at all.

Michael

[KNac]

I agree with both Michaels

also addtion of recon teams (4 guys very light armed) or recon patrols (2 men) like in SPWaW would be very ok.

[Andreas]

Well, there are landmarks in some of my scenarios, but in some (very few) of these, they are not correct They also only give you a general idea, no precise location. If I were not so lazy, I would do it in the briefing. I.e. name the position, and refer to it in the briefing for the attacker.

Also, locking a TRP onto an enemy position, and adding a conscript FOO (in a short battle) is a good way to simulate a pre-barrage, based on pre-battle recon.

There are things you can do to simulate that recce has happened. Don't even take much imagination.

[Austrian Strategist]

Originally posted by skelley:

Why is a split squad scouting party gamey while a bicycle scouting party not?

Well, some commanders feel some sort of responsibility for their men and would hesitate sending half a dozen into their probable death to confirm their suspicion of an ambush.

A specialized scouting party would be only two men, and their chance of survival would/should be higher.

[Austrian Strategist]

Originally posted by Caesar:

I still prefer the idea of a scout command as it means you don't have unrealistic elements in your forces and you can use your normal troops in a realistic manner.

I don´t think this is unrealistic. It would be analogous to the sharpshooter. Some are good at shooting, some are good at scouting.

[Austrian Strategist]

Originally posted by Andreas:

Well, there are landmarks in some of my scenarios, but in some (very few) of these, they are not correct They also only give you a general idea, no precise location.

If the Umpire AI could do something similar for QBs, this would also be great.

[YankeeDog]

It sounds to me like the lack of pre-battle recon problem discussed by Mrs. Dorosh and Emrys is more of a scenario design issue than a unit avaiability or a game engine issue.

Certainly, scenarios meant to depict extensively planned attacks on known positions should use CM's landmarks feature to show information from previous recon sorties and even possibly aerial recon of the area as this is what would have been done IRL. A crafty scenario designer might even occasially give false recon information this way - after all, recon is far from infallible, and a crafty defensive commander moves his assets around regularly to keep the enemy guessing.

As to two-man bicycle units, I'm kinda nonplussed. If they existed IRL and were used, then I guess they should eventually be included in a future CM. The thing is, bicycles are only going to be useful on roads - the photographs of the bikes I've seen WWII troops equiped with were far from a modern mountain bike. As such, they'd only be ridable on a road, and would actually slow down units on other types of terrain as the bikes would have to be pushed/carried. Seeing as I'm usually most interested in what's in the heavy cover terrain that I can't see into, and not so much the wide open terrain that one can bike on, this type of unit doesn't sound very useful to me.

Caesar - your "Scout" idea may well be in CMBB - if you check the CMBB FAQ threads, you'll see mention of a new "Move to Contact" command. There's very little detail on exactly how this command will work, but it might give unit behaviour similar to what you are talking about.

There is another aspect of recon that I think would be a great improvment to the CM engine. I was driving through rural farmland the other day on a business trip. I happened to pass a wheat field that a vehicle had driven through recently. As the road was a little bit higher in elevation than the field, I could see the track of broken wheat stalks from several hundred meters away. This got me thinking about spotting in CM - right now, you can only spot a unit itself, not any signs of it's activity or movement. (OK, one exception: foxholes)

Imagine that your forward units crest the top of a hill with a valley below them. The valley is mostly field, but there are a few patches of trees here and there. It's winter and there has been a recent snowfall.

Now, as it is in CM right now, you would have no idea if there were any enemy infantry units in the copses of trees in the valley - you'd have to actually search each one to be sure. IRL, if any enemy units had moved into those trees recently (for example, if this was a meeting engagement and your opponent had gotten units down into the valley ahead of your cresting the rise), your units would clearly be able to see sets of footprints in the snow leading into the stands of trees from their vantage point on the crest. Of course, footprints in the the snow aren't going to reveal much about the composition of the force that created them, just line of travel and a general idea of the number of men, but their existence would certainly make you suspicious of the tree stands they led to.

There are similar types of "track" that would be visible in other ground conditions on other types of terrain, such as broken stalks in high wheatfields, or vehicle tracks over just about any kind of ground except hard road - tanks really chew up the scenery!!.

For an A+, CM could even allow scenario editors to place track of various types of units on the battlefield to indicate recent movement and enemy positions.

Probably a bear to model, but it would definitely take the scouting/spotting implementation in CM to a new level.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Andreas:

Well, there are landmarks in some of my scenarios, but in some (very few) of these, they are not correct They also only give you a general idea, no precise location. If I were not so lazy, I would do it in the briefing. I.e. name the position, and refer to it in the briefing for the attacker.

Also, locking a TRP onto an enemy position, and adding a conscript FOO (in a short battle) is a good way to simulate a pre-barrage, based on pre-battle recon.

There are things you can do to simulate that recce has happened. Don't even take much imagination.

Why conscript?

I am playing Bure right now and trying to figure out why the FO was so low quality.

Or is this anything like the Cadbury secret?

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Why conscript?

I am playing Bure right now and trying to figure out why the FO was so low quality.

Or is this anything like the Cadbury secret?

[Austrian Strategist]

*Bump*!

Scout Teams would be really nice-to-have. (I´d sacrifice the bicycles, if people don´t like them. Or make them an option.)

[Michael Dorosh]

It didn't work out quite that way; with the TRP I found I was able to husband some shells til late in the game. I

was thinking of starting another thread in the scenarios forum to discuss this one, but may as well do it here.

Without giving away any spoilers (or being too smug, since my opponent has been known to post here and the

game isn't even over yet) I was wondering what the general consensus is about play balance in BURE? I don't

want to look at the reviews at the depot since I am still playing, but has your feedback been generally positive?

SPOILERS

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During my playthrough so far, I found I was able to make a lengthy approach march down both flanks of the board, shielded by the hills and trees; by about turn 15 I was able to launch a very fast attack down the right flank slope (looking towards Bure from the Brit setup area); I steamrollered over an entire platoon of panzergrenadiers with my short range firepower, and even got a lucky hit on a StuG with my PIATs which I left on the hill covering the advance. A sound contact did tip me off that he had armour, otherwise I may well not

have waited for the Piats to catch up.

The FO I used for a bombardment, but I saved about 1/3 my shells to be able to call down smoke; as it turned out my advance into Bure went so fast I didn't need it.

Another thing I like about the Bure map is the really neat LOS possibilities in between the buildings that you would not have expected by just looking at it.

So basically, neither side did anything for the first 15 turns with the exception of me slogging through the snow, and my advance into Bure was very easy. The tank support was unexpected, but welcome, it almost seems like overkill given my luck so far.

What was your original concept re: the British plan of attack in this one? The barrage seems more of a nuisance, really. Also, what is the recommended setup for the German forces? I won't check the thread until my match is over, hopefully the next day or so, but I am curious since there is often a big difference between a scenario designer's concept, and the way individuals implement their own plans given what they have to work with.

I am sure the play balance may have been affected by my opponent's set up choice; he set up two platoons behind the stone walls. I can see the merit in not setting up in the buildings, but I think I got lucky by flanking him and sweeping down from the forested hills - I had two platoons of SMG armed paras firing in enfilade across his positions and outright killed two squads completely off. I usually don't do this well against him, but of course, it ain't over yet either. His Jagdpanther picked off a Sherman that I raced forward into the town to finish

off his StuG and start shelling some buildings on the objective.