Rifle squads and buildings?

[markshot]

What is the best position to place a rifle squad in a building?

Assuming that the squad is shooting it out and the building is not in danger of being entered imminently? Should the squad be placed on the first or second floor? Should it be placed in the front, middle, or back of the building relative to the enemy?

Assuming that the building is in danger of being entered imminently? Should the squad be placed on the first or second floor? Should it be placed in the front, middle, or back of the building relative to the enemy?

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Assuming that you must assault a building with a rifle squad being held by a rifle squad, what is the best method of assualt? Should you just give your squad an order to run into the building? Should they run to the outside of the building and then sneak into the building? Should you set their ultimate destination in the building to the first or second floor?

Thanks!

[Holien]

FWIIW

I have found the second floor to be the best place to defend a building from.

Seems that you get a bonus for the FP factor. I guess it is easier to drop grenades on people than it is to throw them up stairs and have them bounce back towards you.

In the case of position at the back when the enemy are in the building at the front (but not too far forward) when you have total control and want to stop the run in.

Once the enemy are in the building get to the back walls asap as this will help reduce suppression from the supporting enemy units outside the building and allows you to concentrate on interior defense.

As for attacking a building only do this if the defenders are suppressed and you have enough men to ge in there and engage in HTH combat.

Too often I have entered buildings and been wiped out because I did not suppress the enemy within. I have not tried the run and sneak in option and would be interested to hear others views on this. I tend to use the run and stop just inside. Or if I know where the enemy is a Run and then move towards the enemy.

A final tip is if the building comes under DF from a tank with a decnt gun. I.e. Stuh, Priest. Take the remaining men with a retreat command out of the building ASAP. You might have a few men to fight another day if you are lucky. Always choose buildings with a rear exit if you want your men to have a chance to survie.

So ensure that there are no padlocks on those fire escapes...

H

[xerxes]

I'd have to question 2nd floor placement unless you KNOW that the enemy has no available direct fire HE. That's just too good a target to collapse the building and trash your squad, mg, whatever. If the enemy has multiple HE deliver vehicles be very afraid of the second floor because you might never get a chance to issue a withdraw order.

Except: Unless you want the enemy to reveal their DF HE.

- xerxes

[Pak40]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by markshot:

What is the best position to place a rifle squad in a building?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Typically near the edge, so they have the best view out to defend at their highest firepower.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by markshot:

Assuming that the squad is shooting it out and the building is not in danger of being entered imminently? Should the squad be placed on the first or second floor? Should it be placed in the front, middle, or back of the building relative to the enemy?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

If there are no tanks or guns with HE(AA guns included) able to target the building, then either floor will do. The second floor only provides better views with regard to the terrain, it does NOT give your unit any bonus firepower. Place them in the front (see previous answer)

If there ARE tanks or guns with HE able to target the building(especially 105+) then place units on the bottom floor for easy escape. You DONT want your units taking HE in a building, this causes casualties and the enevitable collapsing building will cause more or kill your squad. It is most important that you get your units off of the second floor BEFORE the building collapses. When under HE fire in a light building, I get my units out of the building ASAP. I usually place them directly behind the building and wait for the collapse.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by markshot:

Assuming that the building is in danger of being entered imminently? Should the squad be placed on the first or second floor? Should it be placed in the front, middle, or back of the building relative to the enemy?

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I'd place them on the first floor, except maybe MGs. Place them where they have the best view to the enemy rushing the building. Always put the leader unit further back to keep him safe. I usually hide him except in emergencies.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by markshot:

Assuming that you must assault a building with a rifle squad being held by a rifle squad, what is the best method of assualt? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

In a 1:1 situation the rushing squad will surely take lots of casualties an ultimately be the loser. The only thing I can suggest is that you split your squad and rush both teams. The defending squad can only fire on one at a time.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by markshot:

Should you just give your squad an order to run into the building? Should they run to the outside of the building and then sneak into the building?

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Sneaking or walking into a building that MIGHT have enemies is probably a good idea, it will give you better sighing abilities.

However, I would run into a building with KNOWN enemies. The quicker they get into the building the better.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by markshot:

Should you set their ultimate destination in the building to the first or second floor?

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

This depends. If there are enemies on the first floor, then kill them first. If not then go upstairs and kill anyone there.

TIPS:

The best way to assualt a building is to reduce it to rubble with HE first. This is obvious enough.

But, if you have no HE available then make sure that you have a 3:1 ratio of attackers to defenders for a successful attack without taking outrageous casualties.

It will be possible to successfully assault a building with less than 3:1 odds but expect what most field commanders would call unacceptable losses.

WHENEVER POSSIBLE USE THESE TACTICS:

1) Heavy smoke in front of the bulding you're assaulting. Getting your men to the building is half the battle, this will help.

They will usually still take heavy casualties when the enter the building.

2) Attack from different sides of the building at the same time. This will split his firepower.

3) I usually split squads when assaulting. This doubles the number of targets he has to defeat, although it will lessen your firepower. I feel the trade is worth it.

4) Rush with a leader with morale and combat bonuses, have the leader trail the main assault by a few yards but keep all units in command.

5) rushes with flamers usually fail because the flame team dies quickly. The best way get a flame thrower near a building is to sneak him there with use of smoke or through other adjacent buildings or trees.

6) Engineers assaulting with satchel charges are a bonus.

7) Artillery can usually collapse a building. I've seen 3 60mm mortars collapse a light 2 story building in one round. AA guns also are powerful because of their high rate of fire. Two story heavy buildings are a tough nut to crack, I usually use 105 tanks or SP guns.

[YankeeDog]

I agree with the above. Never attempt to run a squad into a revealed enemy occupied building unless the unit in the building is suppressed. The few times I tried this before I learned my lesson, the squad broke and ran away before it even made it into the building, taking heavy losses. 'Human Wave' type assaults against a single rifle squad could probably work (i.e. rush one squad with a whole platoon), but you'd probably take considerable losses. Better to have two squads hang back and establish local fire superiority, and then rush in with the assault squad. It's best if the assault squad can rush the building along an approach vector approximately 90 degrees to the direction of the supressive fire - that way the supressing units will be able to continue firing until right before the assault squad enters the building.

In my experience, the 'run to the edge of the building and then sneak inside' technique is best is you think there might be an enemy unit inside, but you're not sure, and you're pretty sure that any enemy unit inside is waiting for you enter in order to ambush you. Sneaking units get better spotting, so they're more likely to spot the enemy unit before it opens fire on them.

Of course, one of the best ways to establish whether or not there's an enemy unit in a building is to hit it with a few rounds of DF HE. You may not always have the HE to spare, though (or you may not want to reveal where your tanks are. . .), so sometimes you just have to peek inside and see if anybody's home.

Here's another techinque for checking out possible occupied buildings with infantry I've been fooling around with. I got the idea reading about modern U.S. Marines urban assault techniques. This is my adaptation of the technique for the CM battlefield, not a literal description of the actual Marine doctrine. This is a work in progress. I've managed to use it a few times, but nobody's been home the few times, I've tried it, so I'm not sure how well it works yet. Any feedback would be great. It's really an extension of bounding overwatch, adapted to the combination of long LOS (ex: along a street), and very short LOS (ex: within a building) present in urban combat.

To do this you need at least two units. Three (or more) is better, though. Three squads works, but two squads and an MG (or tank!) is even better.

If you have three or more units available, one unit serves as overwatch for the entire process. This is where an MG or a tank is most useful. It should have clear lines of fire to the building to be investigated, as well as any other nearby likely hiding places for enemy. Obviously, the more overwatch firepower you have, the better. If you only have two squads available, though, the initial overwatch job is covered by one squad (From now on, "squad B").

Once overwatch is in place, one squad (from now on, "squad A") runs to the nearest corner of the building and stops there. Make sure their facing (using the Rotate command) is into the building to be assaulted. If the enemy opens up on this unit from inside the building (or another location nearby), your overwatch firepower should allow A squad to withdraw to nearby cover without too extreme casualties, and then you can open up on the revealed enemy with everything you have, establish local fire superiority, and then assault them as usual.

If A squad doesn't draw fire, and also doesn't see any evidence of enemy inside the building, then B squad runs forward and enters the building from a corner 90 degrees to the corner A squad is overwatching from. This way, if there is an ambush set inside the building, A squad can provide supressive fire through the windows for B squad's entry, but friendly fire problems will be minimized.

As noted before, B squad can perform overwatch as A squad advances, and then run forward to assault under A squad's overwatch, but a really good enemy sitting in, say, the building across the street might anticipate this and wait until both squads were just outside be building to open fire. I'm not sure how one would execute an ambush like this in CM, but I'm working on it (ideas, anyone?) Anyway, this possibility is why having a third, dedicated overwatch unit is better.

Like I said, this is my own adaptation, and while I've been able to get CM units to go through the motions, it hasn't really been tested under fire yet. It is based on real doctrine, though, and it makes sense to me. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers.

[tecumseh]

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

[YankeeDog]

Sorry I didn't respond to this earlier. I was out of town and away from my PC for a while.

Your point about larger buildings is well taken. Thus far I had only gotten as far as planning the technique for smaller buildings. I'll have to think about that. . .

I totally agree with you that the best way to deal with an enemy unit in a building is to blow it up. But I am also interested in the question of how to assault a building when HE is NOT an option - either because you lack it, or because of other restrictions. I have read that allied forces, for example, were extremely reluctant to blow up civilian buildings in Holland during operation Market Garden. "No deliberately blowing up buildings" would be an interesting restriction to have to work around for a specific setup. . .

Cheers.

[Commander]

I am still trying to figure out this game (I am playing the demo). At one point, I had some guys hidden in a heavy building and during the 60 second action sequence a single enemy commander ran into the building and killed my bazooka guy and two of my command units guys. My men didn't even shoot back! I had two squads in there too! It was a bummer because I was trying to keep that bazooka guy hidden so I could blow away some enemy armor without using a tank. Oh well....

[tecumseh]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by YankeeDog:

I am also interested in the question of how to assault a building when HE is NOT an option<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

OK, i guess i have never done this. i've never played an infantry-only game, so the only situation i would attempt this would be a desperate flag-rush on a building where the flag was big and the building was probably not defended by more than a single platoon, and i needed the points. In that case i'm not sure what i would do.

I think your technique sounds bloody good. It particulary avoids the issue of charging too many people into a already-populated building, which is suicide. i think it's main competition is the strategy of charging 2 (small or 3 (large full squads to the front wall, with a delayed charge of more squads to fill the rest of the building. The advantage of this is more firepower against enemies on the back wall.

Oh yeah, i do think you should always run. this idea of run to building, sneak inside sounds crazy to me. Sneak does not mean "shoot well". it means "try and stay unspotted and don't shoot until it is absolutely required". Running CM soldiers shoot very well, so use this advantage. (They don't spot so well, but with absolute spotting this isn't so important.)

someone should run some tests...

[YankeeDog]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tecumseh:

someone should run some tests... <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Good idea. . . I might have some time later this week. I'll post here what happened.

Cheers.

[conor13]

defense: stay near edge so you can chuck grenades at the enemy.1st floor if enemy has arty,2nd floor if he doesn't.

assault: assuming you need the building i say just storm the thing. if you don't, just have a tank or arty blast a round or two into it. if no tank/arty, simply charge at.*

* only works if no mgs are in the building.

-conor13