Fionn's latest AAR at MODs & MODers:

[PawBroon]

Most of us know that Fionn Kelly doesn't take prisonners.

Not that he is a Ruthless Bastard, but just because the tempo of his games doesn't allow for such niceties.

So what can we learn from a game pitting an Attritionist (The_Capt, he is Canadian and God knows those tend to wear you off) against the Oirish Juggernaut?

Can a defense in depth stall an attack staged to overwhelm most positions by sheer speed alone?

With the upcoming release of CMBB, here is your chance to ride shootgun with Fionn and The_Capt and learn something in an attack played Russian style.

I'd be interested in reading your comments about that ongoing battle.

[Andreas]

Marcel, for some reason your site does not work for me anymore. Work machine, Windogs 2k. The pictures for the links do not load, and the links don't work in the browser, although I can see them in the 'properties' window. The cartoon loads fine though. Any ideas?

[Fionn]

As, I'm sure, would Warren and I.

[PawBroon]

Working here Andreas.

Triple checked on different comps.

Is your access limited to certain Domain on your work machine?

Firewall or whatever?

I'm not too technical but I do know that Wanadoo is famed for its hiccups.

Maybe you tried during one of those.

Keep at it, it's online and responding.

Thanks for telling me.

[Arsenal]

Anyone else having problems downloading the file?

Everytime I try it never completes,it just gets to 99% done then hangs .

[PawBroon]

Dunno if it's a factor but I'm using Download Accelerator Plus and it's going smoothly till the end.

It works without DAP too mind you.

On the plus side, if you are seeing the provided link, the site is not down.

Andreas?

Can you access it?

[Andreas]

Nope, will try again from home in an hour or two.

[edgars]

My download worked just fine, and movies played perfecto.

Having read this, i'm shocked by amount of knowledge of real world military doctrines this guy (Fionn obviosly) has, and how he applies it to the CM tactics. Pitty that I'll never reach such a heights, simply because i do not have such knowledge (and really, i'm not very keen to learn them in depth). I simply play by intuition and from experience.

Note: in 5th movie from allied side, look at the notorious spotter T-13, he's left targeting a patch of woods which is occupied by friendly troops, and spotting round fell damn close to squad and HQ unit (everybody does his share of mistakes, i guess ).

[Thin Red Line]

Very interesting reading.

I have a question : what does SOP mean ?

Rgds

[Juju]

Originally posted by Thin Red Line:

Very interesting reading.

I have a question : what does SOP mean ?

Rgds

Standard Operating Procedure.

[Ex Bellator]

I've read the first part and the thing that shocked me is the amount of M8 HMCs bought for one battle 12 !!

Gamey gamey gamey etc

[Herr Oberst]

Originally posted by Thin Red Line:

Very interesting reading.

I have a question : what does SOP mean ?

Rgds

Generally "Standard Operating Procedure"

i.e., the "how to" of a given situation, or "by the book"

[Fionn]

ciks,

"I simply play by intuition and experience"

So do I. OTOH when writing something which I hope people will read with a view to improving their play I feel it is important to outline the doctrinal and tactical bases for my decisions. Think of it this way... my past PBEMs, my knowledge of German, Soviet and Nato doctrines and my general gaming experience form my "intuition and experience".

However if I simply said "I sent my troops there cause I figured it was the right thing to do" no-one could learn anything by reading the AAR. If, OTOH, I say "This school of thinking would do x in this situation but I'll do y because I subscribe to another school of thinking... cue explanation of that school of thinking's ethos and methods" people get a chance to be introduced to a lot of things they may never have thought/heard about.

Of course there's no obligation on anyone to learn from the AARs. I just like giving those who are interested the opportunity to pick up some information to add into their own decision-making cycles.

As re: the FO who targetted danger-close... If I remember correctly that was intentional. As the game goes on you will see several more instances of danger-close arty. I believe that the cost in friendly fire casualties is more than compensated for by the shock effect of my troops hitting the enemy while he is still under a large mortar barrage. Others differ but one must bear in mind that the name of the game in this PBEM was "shock effect". Hitting the enemy so hard that you are willing to race into your own arty barrages ( at negligible cost) to get at him sure shocks him .

Rex_Bellator:

Aye, I was waiting for someone to bring this up. The problem is that since the American Army wasn't formulated to fight according to Soviet doctrine they don't have the right weapons systems for the job. Therefore I had to mix and match. I was looking for a lightly-armoured vehicle with a turret and a medium-calibre HE round. The best vehicle which fit that description was the M8 HMC unfortunately.

If you read the Soviet Tank Development articles at CMHQ ( http://www.combatmission.com/articles/articles.asp ) you will get a good feel for the development of Soviet tank doctrine and the different design requirements for each of the types of tanks ( e.g the tanks in the NPP would be quite different to the tanks in the DPP in terms of firepower, protection and mobility). Since no such differentiation occured in the US Army I had to mix and match with the end result that my M8 HMCs were allocated the DPP role, my M4s were allocated the NPP role and my M18s were allocated the DD role ( that's a bit of an over-simplification but it is close enough for the purposes of understanding what happened later in the PBEM).

In any case they weren't exactly used in a massively gamey manner. I think that in sum total they saw about 2.5 minutes of combat in the whole game .

Well, hope that clears up a few bits and pieces.

[Priest]

Well I know for certain that I owe Fionn a lot. I had the "joy" of facing him in a battle that was part of a Beta Test of one of the more shall we say successfull campaign games that is still going on!

His ability to critique you as he is whooping you arse is amazing, truly unique

Of course I have rarely lost in that operational game since then, I took what I learned to heart.

Fun AAR Fionn, keep them up, I still re-read the ones at CMHQ from time to time.

[Ligur]

Hay., when is the rest coming?,

[PawBroon]

With the next update.

I'll be back at it starting Monday.

So next week is as good a guess as you could have.

Next 5 Turns are worth the wait anyway...

[Fionn]

Heya Priest . Good to see you again.

Despite the "context" of that game... woeful on the German side... that one has to go down as one of my favourite games. Something about stopping a reinforced Bn only to then by pounded by over 10,000 x 105 to 155mm shells that evening just makes me go "Excellent!" in my best Monty Burns voice .

P.s. Good to hear you found the commentary useful

P.p.s. Did they ever let you look at the battles from my POV or debrief the casualties suffered from that bombardment?

[Walker]

Originally posted by PawBroon:

With the next update.

I'll be back at it starting Monday.

So next week is as good a guess as you could have.

Next 5 Turns are worth the wait anyway...

Next week?! :eek: That is cruel and unusual punishment...

[CrapGame]

Next week? That's as much of a tease as the old Alpha AAR days, when I religously checked for updates on every hour.

Bastages! Guess I'll play another versus the AI...

I really like the depth of the map. I am hoping that is what the maps in CM:BB will be like.

[Priest]

No I never did get a chance, I had to run actually backwards and fought at Lorry (my only other loss ever in a "Operational" game) and had a smashing success on the Sillgeny road. If you go over to CMHQ there is an article about me even

Currently I am having a lot of fun, and possibly my greatest accomplishment ever in CMBO occurred a few months back, but FOW prevents me from talking about it.

Haha that was fun as hell! Man talk about intimidation, FIONN was my first PBEM opponent ever!!!!!!

I had done some hotseat but wow that was new experience. Good to see you back, have been enjoying your posts.

Well back to work!

Ken

[Fionn]

I was your first? LOL! Well then I guess one could say your introduction was NOT gentle and tender .

FWIW I lost 6 men to your initial attack ( the one where you moved up to the road and then ran into my mine fields etc.... funny story... my HQ wouldn't give me mines or barbed wire etc so I had to organise a raid on my own divisional supply dump to STEAL the mines etc under pain of expulsion from the game if I was caught... Being me I took the chance and stole a truckload of fortification equipment ... At the time of your initial attack my total AT defence comprised 1 Schreck and a JagdPanther another Bn commanded had lent me (against orders). )

I was hoping to God you wouldn't press your attack because I only had 2 companies of Pioneers, 1 schreck, 1 tank (loaned against orders) and they had forgotten to give my FOs any ammunition to fire. I was totally up **** creek without a paddle .

Thankfully my strategy of appearing "big and dangerous but hidden" seemed to work. I lost a total of 6 men ( killed and wounded) but took out about 70 or so plus about 10 captured IIRC. As well as the tank and the jeep but, to be fair, those losses were really inevitable since I'd built a pretty good defensive position by virtue of my robbing etc.

Immediately after that I went to work building masses of bunkers for my men since I expected to be pounded by arty. Unfortunately I couldn't build enough and could only shelter 2 of my companies ( my 3rd company was returned to me after I screamed and shouted about the size of your force and the complete lack of power in mine ) so the 3rd had to remain outside to guard the minefields and fords.

Being me I decided to attack with that company but you got a little lucky and managed to capture some men before the attack could kick off and then hit the rest with arty.

I believe ( and my memory may be faulty here) that I lost about 60 men to that arty. Still, all in all, I think that 60 men lost at the cost of roughly 10,000 artillery shells is a pretty fair exchange rate.

The next morning I finally got so pissed off at the complete lack of understanding of the situation shown by divisional HQ that I ( and the divisional intelligence officer) resigned...

A pity really since if I'd had more than 1 Pioneer Bn ( say a company of tanks and some ammunition for my arty) I would have been able to push right through your position and rip the centre of the Allied line apart. 500 metres from where I defended the terrain became perfect for a nice armoured thrust into the Allied vitals. If only...

When the Germans did attack they suffered massive losses ( at least that's how it looked from my POV on reading the battle reports). The intel officer and I said time and again that to attack in the South was to run into strong American forces and it seemed we were right.

Damn, really brings back how engrossing GM-moderated campaigns can be doesn't it?

P.s. Congrats on Sillegny. I thought that was you but wasn't sure. You did a good job there.

[Priest]

Hey thanks.

Yeah, your "Robin Hood" manuever is still talked about today, a legend in you own time eh?

I figured as much, I was outclassed and did not understand how to attack. Still the way your defenses were arranged even now the initial result would have been similiar.

The best part is that the reason I had 10,000 rounds is that I was the only one to issue artillery requests that turn! LOL!

And you are correct, behind me was nothing, it would have been a cake walk. But then again a certain General would probably not have been killed, a nice write up about that also. If only he would have listened to his Major Wittman.

[PawBroon]

Originally posted by Walker:

Next week?!

That is cruel and unusual punishment...

Nope.

It's called taking 4 days off with YK2.

Believe me, I'm not paid on a per visit basis.

And though I do feel proud in the fact that since this AAR Thread was started, over 700 people generated over 2500 pages read at M&M, I am not delaying on purpose...

[Fionn]

Priest,

My "Robin Hood" maneuvre eh? A good name for it

As re: my illustrious commander... Yes I noted his passing with... a certain amount of emotion .

[ParaBellum]

Very interesting, keep 'em coming.

Fionn, I really enjoy reading your AARs. Loads of info and very entertaining.

Can't wait to read more!

Thx

BTW I think one of the first things I ever read from you were some tactices on sub warfare for Aces of the Deep. Long ago...