Bocage in WWII

[Mord]

LongLeftFlank just reminded me to ask this when he posted in another thread...

Steve, have you guys come up with any plans on how you are going to simulate bocage in the Normandy title? LOL please tell me it'll be better than the tall hedge in CMBO!

Mord.

[Stuka]

You plant little pixellated bocage saplings and water regularly with occasional fertiliser and plenty of sunshine.

[MikeyD]

I could guess (based on nothing at all, I admit) that a super-thick "tall hedge" foliage choice could be added. Something impenetrable without a Rhino device. To get actual Bocage country I imagine a map designer would have to put in the sunken roads and steep banks in the elevations editor by hand. That's assuming the map editor's going to stay basically the same as it is currently.

[MikeyD]

I just had a thought. Since bushes/trees are represented individually now (as opposed to the CMx1 tree 'area') that might mean a rhino-equipped tank would take down specific trees leaving a permanent gap for other forces to follow through! That sounds a lot better than the CMx1 way of a tank being 'transported' through the hedge wall without leaving a gap.

[Flanker15]

But if they do that I won't be able to use my magic disappearing tank trick anymore. My friend has rather irate when my bulldozer tank repeatedly popped out right behind his tank, firing and then vanishing back behind the Bocage.

[mike_the_wino]

One thing that bugged me about CMx1 bocage was the fact that a line of Shermans could come banging through but German AFVs couldn't follow on through that gap. Seems to me that once the Shermans bust through the Krauts should be able to go over the trampled bocage or is that unrealistic?

[YankeeDog]

It probably depended a lot on the exact height and density of the bocage (it's not like they were all landscaped to some uniform standard), but my understanding is that non-hedgehog equipped tanks often *could* penetrate the bocage, but only at considerable risk.

The first risk is the obvious risk of throwing a track or otherwise bogging, perhaps sometimes even tipping over if the incline was severe enough. The other risk is that, while going up and over the steep embankment, the tank pitched up at such an angle that it exposed its' thinly armored underside just as it broke through the bocage. AIUI the Germans especially used this to create short-range AT ambushes where they could hit the underside of tanks with AT weapons. I have also read a least one account of American forces (101st Airborne, IIRC), using this tactic with a bazooka against Panzers.

A Cullin device doesn't just "trample" the hedgerow; it's sort of a half bulldozer, half plow -- the blades are designed to dig into the earth at the base of the embankment, and tear up the roots of the hedges that top the embankment and hold it together. So it quite literally punches a hole in the embankment, moving not only the bushes, but a fair amount of earth as well.

It will be interesting to see if CMx2:WWII is capable of this kind of terrain modification. I certainly hope so. If the engine is be able to do this, it will be able to do all sorts of fun combat engineering stuff. And if done right, other vehicles should certainly be able to use the gap created by a Cullin device. AIUI, the device was only ever attached to one tank per platoon (or company, I forget which exactly) -- one tank would make the breach, and then other tanks could follow through, as needed. Imporatant to keep in mind that some German Panzer designs were considerably wider than their Allies' analogs - you can't drive a Tiger through a hole just wide enough for a Sherman! Obviously, LOS conditions should change as well. You shouldn't be able to hide behind the section of bocage you just turned into backfill and mulch.

Cheers,

YD

[Battlefront.com]

We already have deformable terrain, so it's just a matter of programming in the ability for some vehicles to "cut" through a hedge type "wall" according to certain parameters. This will be a huge improvement over CMBO's generic pass through ability. Now the US forces will have to choose their breach points carefully, causing choke points and what not.

Steve

[Rocky Balboa]

Should work the same way as breaching a wall in CMSF

[mike_the_wino]

Steve Is The Man!!!!!

[Mord]

I was just thinking...seeing that we can place trees and bushes and the like, how about a button in the editor that would let us place bocage like you would trees, instead of placing 1, 2, or 3 trees it would place a block of snarly looking trees and overgrowth? It could be a certain depth and a tile wide coded appropriately. It would look much better than a symmetrical hedge with perfectly squared edges.

Mord.