The Carillon Nose (137th Infantry) - Campaign In Progress

[LongLeftFlank]

Thanks! I'll sign off on the "maze" part anyway.

Even without most of the bocage fields filled in on the master, the settlements are starting to look suitably creepy and "closed in" -- the few exceptions like the church tower, the chateaus and the dairy really stand out.

As was true on my Ramadi map, gaining LOS (and overwatch) to a specific point on this map is not a simple matter. You kind of "stumble" upon locations nestled in the terrain, just as the veteran accounts of Normandy describe. And that plus the unrelenting AFV-unfriendliness of this map (consistent with historical accounts) is going to deliver a very different CMBN play experience than what you're (mainly) used to. Once I get around to actual scenario design, that is....

[LongLeftFlank]

Another fidelity check, for the 2.5 of you fellow deviants who care about such things....

"Le Vert Manoir" (Vermanoir) and L'église St Martin, La Meauffe -- my version

And a fin de siècle photo of the same spot.

Note that the pond in the foreground looks like it was filled in for pasturage by 1944 (but will remain boggy ground for anyone who thinks they can roll tanks in there to fire point blank into the Kraut positions).

[LongLeftFlank]

La Caillourie, one of those little Norman hamlets on the banks of the Vire whose rooftops are barely visible above the bocage.

[LongLeftFlank]

Low-res shot of La Germainerie la Meauffe, showing the primary American axes of advance: along the Vire, Route 3 and the rail line. Most of the building and farm complexes in town are now done and I'd shortly like to start building a "prelude" scenario (Baker Co. 1/119's fight to secure this area on June 18), using a submap.

[handihoc]

This is the map that just keeps giving! Really fine work, LLF!

[Erwin]

You are a true perfectionist LLF... I feel sorry for you. But, keep up the great work!

[LongLeftFlank]

Thanks, Erwin. I hope you'll be as productive a playtester for this map as you were for Joker 3.

And as to feeling "sorry" for me -- well, I'm able to earn a reasonable living using roughly the same personality disorder as I'm applying here for pleasure.

But enough chit-chat; here's another fidelity check. I decided to build out a stretch of the Vire river bank due west of the railway station. While using the 1947 Mosquito shot as authoritative, I also drew on a contemporary photo embedded in Google Maps:

After a couple hours of the aforementioned obsessive tweaking, here's my version (sorry about the low res patch in the background -- I had to dial my settings way back to get the map to preview):

A lot of the tweaking had to do with the angle of the river banks. This stretch of the Vire is 3 squares wide (~24m) and using 3 pure Water tiles gives a very steep "cliff" embankment which is an inhospitable surface for the vegetation that should be growing right down to (and sometimes into) the water.

Using one Water tile with a Deep Ford on each side gives me a pretty authentic angle (you can be the judge). For long "straight" stretches of river, I also occasionally mix it up by using a couple of Shallow Ford or Water tiles instead -- this makes the riverbank look more natural.

The next step was getting the right vegetation on the bank. Here's my secret sauce, for those interested:

1. Most adjacent tiles are Light Forest, with occasional patches of Heavy Forest, XT Grass, Marsh (plus Shallow Ford water adjacent) or other (weeds, etc.)

2. About half the riverbank tiles also contain a "gapped" Bocage, Low Bocage or Hedge object placed at a random angle so as to look like a naturally growing bush or thicket and authentically inhibit LOS.

3. The Vire was a "working river" (canal) until the early 20th century and had a towpath on both banks. Although these were disused and overgrown by 1944, most of the regrowing trees were (and are still) relatively small.

4. I haven't laid the hedgerows on the bordering fields yet, so except for the chapel at Bahais (center), the areas away from the Vire still look a little barren.

[Erwin]

"They" do say the insane are blessed by the Gods(?)

Not sure who "they" are or why it doesn't seem to work for me, but glad you are doing this wonderful work.

Between you and Aris, CMBN is starting to look quite decent...

[LongLeftFlank]

The church tower at St Martin was a linchpin for the German defense at La Meauffe. Its thick sandstone walls provided solid cover for artillery observers and a machine gun nest dominating hundreds of meters of surrounding fields. There's a smaller bell tower across the river in the chapel at Bahais that served a similar role for both sides.

It just won't do to have these critical positions simply leveled by a bunch of 81mm rounds early in a game (FOs and gunners can be replaced but good overwatch is scarce on this map). However, the shell-resistant 8 story cathedral tower provided with the game is too damn tall for a rural church -- it looks like there should be a giant flaming eye on the top.

Here's my solution; bury it 5m deep in the ground and steal Seabee's Pont du Hoc trick of having a small stone wall that helps troops climb in and out of the pit. The ground level also makes a solid bomb shelter (the godless Huns had heavily fortified this church and the adjacent chateau with poured cement pillboxes, etc.)

Notice I buried the church 1m as well, to give troops a "half basement" level to fight out of.

[Broadsword56]

Very instructive! But can you explain more about how/where a small stone wall was placed and how it helps troops enter/exit basements? Can't see from the pic.

[LongLeftFlank]

It simply needs to link to a low stone wall that's in the action square occupied by the tower. The "follow the wall" movement logic seems to override the "don't climb cliffs" logic which is how the units scale the Pont du Hoc cliffs (hedges, not walls in that case). I use a right angled tile to provide egress to both the church building and the churchyard although I havent checked the former configuration yet.

Units in the base tower level can exchange fire with adjacent units in the churchyard.

I also played around with laying a 16m footbridge through the middle of the tower to let units enter at the higher level. This works, but only one-way... Once the units "realize" they are in the church tower, they won't go back onto the bridge.

[Erwin]

"Once the units "realize" they are in the church tower, they won't go back onto the bridge."

This could be great for the CM:Zombies module!

[LongLeftFlank]

And one by one, the little Norman hamlets and farmsteads appear, enshrouded behind overgrown walls, bocage and orchards. All these have been carefully laid out in their authentic Google Earth footprints, with reference to the 1947 shots. Most of the buildings are unchanged today although the bocage has been largely removed.

La Caillourie -- innocent looking, but shields the entrance to a tactically critical sunken road....

The manor farm at Launay, first waypoint along the advance route of 2nd Battalion, 137th, toward the fortified heights at Le Carillon, June 10. INCOMING!!!!!!!!!

If you're curious, these villes take about an hour apiece to lay out, using two computers -- one with CMBN open and the other with (a) Google Maps / Streetview ( the 1947 image in GIMP © my gallery of buildings so I can match the textures and door/window placements as closely as possible.

And I'm not fishing for compliments here, just sharing ideas with my fellow map designers.

[Erwin]

When I see how much work you are putting in to make an xnt map it's a huge discouragement from trying to design any maps/scenarios myself in CM2. I am in awe of what you and the other map and mod folks are accomplishing.

[Broadsword56]

LLF is the ultimate map detailer. This is my favorite thread on the forum.

(In my maps, even though I use the same tools to get the farm and town footprints placed accurately, I've never even thought to go as far as trying to place doors and windows in their actual places, and I just use building types that "look right" from the aerial views or that seem to make sense for the specific location.)

[LongLeftFlank]

I have to work tonight (as in, the job that pays the bills -- just call me Bob Cratchit) but I did have one "a-ha" moment when viewing my CMBN handiwork at ground level.

The only parts of these settlements that are generally visible at any distance are the rooftops. Which make good aiming points for artillery, since you can see spotting rounds -- especially mortars -- impacting on them. Which may be a really good practical reason why buildings (at least highly visible ones) were NOT favoured as defensive positions in the bocage, regardless of how thick and protective their walls might have been.

And in that vein, those of you who have become accustomed to locating an enemy MLR and then plastering it with artillery or AFV direct fire before mopping up will be in for a bit of a shock on my map. Good luck getting LOS to an enemy position without walking right up to it. There's a reason FOOs had the shortest shelf lives of any personnel in the Allied forces.

[LongLeftFlank]

The northeast quadrant of the map (east of La Meauffe) is almost complete (except of course for the bocage fields, orchards and wooded windbreaks). Here's a low-rez pano shot from the east edge looking NW from the farms at la Guillotterie. The settlements I showed above are visible in the distance along the main road.

Once I've finished laying out the last settlements in this area (la Preterie and Concho), I'm going to carve out a 1.5km E-W x 1km N-S submap which I will use to test and perfect my own version of the bocage country down to the last muddy ditch!

Once detailed, I will release this to the community for use as a large QB map. This map fits within the 25,000 action square upper playability limit suggested by Broadsword56. As noted previously though, über armour and über artillery "queens" will hate this map.

I will then in turn carve out still smaller submaps for a couple of "warm up" scenarios -- a platoon-sized probe by 175th Infantry along the Moon-sur-Elle road east of La Meauffe (~June 15), then Baker Company, 1/119th's assault on La Meauffe itself on June 18.

About time I actually played this game some!

[LongLeftFlank]

Sole access via a sunken road crossing a creek (marsh)

[LongLeftFlank]

[sburke]

Jeez I am drooling already. I need a water proof keyboard.

[LongLeftFlank]

OK, I have now carved out the northeast quadrant into a large submap, of which I am detailing the 1500 x 1100m portion shown in this panorama shot. The bocage is starting to take shape.

[kipanderson]

LongLeftFlank,

I know it has been said many times before but this and your previous project are fantastic pieces of work... .

Greatly looking forward to it....

All the best,

Kip.

[LongLeftFlank]

Now dats what I'm talkin' about! Pixeldoggies down at frog level, slogging through muddy irrigation ditches to flank a Kraut sniper. Just watch for those tripwires....

[Sublime]

wow man. fantastic.

[LongLeftFlank]

Just discovered that the pixegrunts won't move along the ditches as expected; they keep exiting to go around, instead of through, the marsh tiles (placeholder for small streams since all water tiles default to height 5 which would create huge ravines). In combat that pathing could be fatal. Adding the "cordon line" of hedge doesn't help. Overlaying trenches does work but looks silly. Since I want these things uncrossable by vehicles I'll probably need to use heavy forest instead -- an imperfect solution since Slogging through marsh is about as slow and tiring as a water-filled ditch. I do wish they hadn't removed that CMSF trench tile, as it would have been perfect for these ditches, in spite of the performance hit. Oh well.