Attacking Bunkers and Pillboxes

[malfuriouspete]

I have regular infantry attacking a bunker and managed to get behind the structure. Unfortunately, the only explosives I have are hand grenades and a molotov cocktail.. no pioneers at the moment with demo charges or anything.

My question, I have the infantry squads targeting the bunker from behind.. but they just refuse to throw in hand grenades. Or they do, but only maybe once every 2nd turn or so. Most of the time they just sit there targeting but not doing anything. What am I doing wrong?

[Philippe]

Think about real life for a minute. They're in the pillbox, we're out here covering the back door. How often is someone going to sneak up to the back door and temporarily expose themselves to instant death when the guys inside are sure to open up with everything they've got at anybody who gets near their door? Once every two or three minutes sounds pretty realistic to me. Would you want to expose yourself every sixty seconds to toss in a grenade just to please the puppet-master?

[JoMac]

However, as far as I am concered, a flanked pillbox at close-assault range for a few minutes is a dead one. Then again, this is CM we are talking about.

[Son of Hamchuck]

Think about real life for a minute. They're in the pillbox, we're out here covering the back door. How often is someone going to sneak up to the back door and temporarily expose themselves to instant death when the guys inside are sure to open up with everything they've got at anybody who gets near their door? Once every two or three minutes sounds pretty realistic to me. Would you want to expose yourself every sixty seconds to toss in a grenade just to please the puppet-master?

IIRC they didn't waste any time doing in the shore defense pillbox in "Saving Private Ryan".

[Guest Guest]

deleted per user request

[JasonC]

Adam - of course it is, way too powerful. Infantry generally uses dedicated AT weapons against tanks or it fails to hurt them. There are exceptions but they usually involved immobilized targets and large amounts of time, often at night or in other limited visibility conditions. Even then they involve use of ad hoc AT weapons, not "grenades", crowbars, or Finn supermen fish stories with logs. More like "go get 4 jerry-cans of gasoline" and ignite the thing - 20 minutes later.

[undead reindeer cavalry]

Finn supermen fish stories with logs.

which relate to dealing with early Soviet tanks with obvious design faults. there are no Finnish "fish stories" what comes to later Soviet tanks which required real AT weapons.

late war fish stories go more like "the defenders run out of Panzerschreck ammunition and thus were forced to just watch as the platoon of IS-2s stood at the battalion command post. as night fell the IS-2s withdrew."

[Joachim]

Try Soviet '45 guards (crack!) vs German tanks. Sad joke in CM.... but real.

Dedicated handheld AT works. Everything else does not.

Compare AT-gun ammo size in '41 to that in '45.

Compare handheld AT size to both.

Compare Hummer armor to BT series. Compare IEDs exploding nearby (not on target) vs explosives thrown at tanks. Guestimate effect of a IED vs a PzII, PZIV, Panther or BT, T34, IS2.

Grenades vs bunkers? It is a backdoor. As long as it is shut, the grenade won't do much. If you see whether it is open, you will be seen... and I wouldn't bet there ain't a small firing slit thru which you are seen (and hit) but won't be able to throw the grenade. Throw all of your hand grenades in a few seconds - or in intervals, hoping to persuade the crew to lose its nerves and try to get out or surrender.

[Tero]

late war fish stories go more like "the defenders run out of Panzerschreck ammunition and thus were forced to just watch as the platoon of IS-2s stood at the battalion command post. as night fell the IS-2s withdrew."

You are forgetting "multiple shots (up to 30+) of PAK38 and PAK40 rounds were expended by a single AT gun to kill (ie. make catch fire) a T-34/SU-ISU152/IS-2."

[malfuriouspete]

so... should I be attacking from the front where the firing slit is?? Infantry can throw grenades and whatever else they have that way?

In game terms, if I don't have armor or pioneers, whats the best way of knocking out pillboxes/bunkers?

I was playing an operation called Chichkovo, a soviet attack on a german held town, only infantry are being used. Have some pioneers but they are too far away from the bunkers and being pinned down by german infantry. I also have artillery spotters that were firing everything at the bunkers. I managed to knock out 2 this way (out of 4) but the others had to be taken out by infantry

[Bannon DC]

so... should I be attacking from the front where the firing slit is?? Infantry can throw grenades and whatever else they have that way?

No... don't do that. Reason why should be obvious.

You are doing the right thing, just be patient. I've experience the same thing and it could take 3-5 minutes. Better results if your units are under HQ command I suspect. And the more men you have in your unit should be helpful as well.

If the pillbox is isolated, you could just move on and continue the fight. But KO'ing the PB is probably worth sticking around to pick up the points for killing it.

[Dinodawg33]

We Shall not risk another frontal assault. That rabbit's dynamite!

When I attack the pillboxes with infantry I try to use smoke to cover the infantry's movement until they can get to a point (20-25M) to the side (but still just in front) of the pillbox just out of the PB gunner's field of fire. I had noticed the issue with units taking more time to eliminate a PB (from behind), but as was noted earlier, being right behind a PB isn't all that great. Now the enemy are in front of and behind you. Maintaining position just far enough off to the side still allows your unit to fire any of it's weapons at the opening, pin/panic the crew, and either destroy the PB or allow more squads to advance and help eliminate the position.