QB pricing oddities?

[Sublime]

I neglected to ask: using these guild lines do you and your opponents often use US forces, or is it pretty much all British all the time?

I play him very frequently (daily) and I use US forces mostly. I have used Brit forces, and I'm using Canadians in a battle now, but the previous 3-4 were US troops. I manage to hold my own generally against the Cats, though there are memorable... disasters..

[Redwolf]

These costs are a typical example of something the game development company cannot possibly come up with. Even if they wanted to goof off and play the game all day long, then it would never be written - makes sense, no?

There's no hope for good cost unless it's user-loadable.

Obviously, the users would have to come up with different cost tables, as the threat environment changes. At the least wrt date of scenario. What is worth a lot in June 1944 might be pretty vanilla in March 1945.

[Vanir Ausf B]

These costs are a typical example of something the game development company cannot possibly come up with. Even if they wanted to goof off and play the game all day long, then it would never be written - makes sense, no?

There's no hope for good cost unless it's user-loadable.

Except that they actually have come up with it, and for the most part it works well.

Obviously, the users would have to come up with different cost tables, as the threat environment changes. At the least wrt date of scenario. What is worth a lot in June 1944 might be pretty vanilla in March 1945.

That is true. In CMBB a KV-1 tank in 1941 was essentially a King Tiger.

It would love to see some means of community input. Unfortunately BFC have shot down the idea in the past, which makes them washing their hands of the issue all the more annoying.

The idea of making underpriced items cost a certain number of foxholes is a means of doing this in a way, although it does not work for overpriced items, so only BFC can do something about the Stugs (of course maybe others disagree with my analysis on that? But I can't see how a Stug can possibly be more valuable than a Sherman 76).

[Vanir Ausf B]

I play him very frequently (daily) and I use US forces mostly. I have used Brit forces, and I'm using Canadians in a battle now, but the previous 3-4 were US troops. I manage to hold my own generally against the Cats, though there are memorable... disasters..

Good to hear!

[Sublime]

I love playing Brits and US. But honestly I prefer US, probably because Im American. I used to always prefer playing Axis but now I prefer Allied. I just like the US infantry better, and I dont mind the US armor either. The Zooks I greatly prefer over Piats. And I do way better with 60mm mortars and US equipment. The only thing I really prefer is CW armor, and even then I miss the .50 AA mount.

Several games ago I used to ask Schultz for US troops and Brit armor. However I wanted to hone my skills with US armor, and I wanted more realistic games (as did he) plus I'm all to aware of how rare historically even 76mm Shermans were in June, let alone fireflies, so I wanted to get more experience killing German armor with 75mm Shermans. It can get dicey but I'd say I get pretty favorable kill ratios... And when its Shermans vs Panthers even 1:1 is a victory in my book. I've also learned a lot from schultz about how I played. I used to amass way more casualties and play like an angry Soviet commissar. I try to have a lot more finesse now, I never used smoke until Schultz all but forced me, now I used it a lot (its one of the great Allied tank strengths that I rarely see people really take advantage of)

He also showed me a lot about area denial as opposed to occupying it physically (important for VLs, especially in ME's. Often you can negate the defender advantage of your opponent racing to VLs, even without TRPs.) And the usefulness of quick engagements followed by disengagements. This really cuts down on casualties and helps win battles. Its very much an art though, but once you get it down its devastating. Instead of one ambush per unit per battle there can be several, and even in the attack you can hit them, back up, and hit them somewhere else, instead of just pushing into the meatgrinder, or as Schultz once told me - 'stand and deliver went outta style with the redcoats'

[Vanir Ausf B]

Does Schultz ever use Stugs?

I'm thinking:

vs. UK, random weather on: everything stock price

vs UK, good weather: Panther, Jadgpanther and KT + 20 pts

vs US random weather on: Panther and Jadgpanther +30 pts, KT + 15 pts

vs US good weather: Panther and Jadgpanther +50 pts, KT +35 pts

1 foxhole = 5 pts

[Sublime]

Stugs... Very occasionally. Assault howitzers more. He usually brings Pz IVs, Panthers. Next maybe Jagdpanzers. Or StuHs. I cured him of his KT fascination. He's brought them out in a couple of huge battles against me, and each time they were killed with little or no kills. However there were also about 2 huge battles where he brought a Jagdpanther. One I got a lucky kill, the other was awful. Using them in pairs he was a terror with them. That front armor bounces Firefly rounds like it's a stupid joke. He's a master at using his Hannomags, and is great with his scout teams. Anything with a high rate of fire is awful in his hands, especially MP40 scout teams.

I had to realllly learn the hard way a lot of stuff with him, especially about fighting armor on hills higher than you. I believe he had one Tiger I with 17 AFV kills, who knows how many infantry. (though I did get the bastard with a 105mm Priest HEAT round finally)

Another favorite of his is the 150mm IG - he's brilliant at placing them in keyholes or far away and using them without being spotted. I don't know if it was a bug (this was about 1-2 patches BEFORE 2.0) but he had one IG that killed literally about 50-70 troops in a direct fire mode, probably from around 1500m. I never spotted it. Best I got was a loose area sound contact. Strange too, because I recall in the same battle he had an 88mm ATG, which fired one round before I spotted it and plastered it with a storm of mortar fire.

BTW we always play me Allied vs his Axis. Elite setting. We used to do regular QBs, but now he opens maps, tweaks them, and gives us forces in reinforcement waves. It works great, it breaks the battle into phases - recon/scouting/fixing/battle- reinforcement 1 company 1-2 tank plt arty - then where do you attack, or defend.. another 15-30 minutes another company/platoon or two of tanks/arty, do you counterattack? reinforce an attack? reinforce success, or shore up danger. It makes controlling a couple battalions (or just one) very manageable, gives the battle legs... He always tells me his force composition because he knows mine, but I dont bother memorizing it or whatever. I dont care that much, in a perfect world it'd be double blind but hey.. We always try to do fairly big maps. For example the battle now, is his assault vs my entrenched canucks. the map is 2km x 2km. I honestly couldnt go back to a lot of smaller maps. You really cant do anything but forge ahead and it takes a lot of maneuver and other strategy considerations out. You get a nice big map and all sorts of possibilities and fun comes up...

[Vanir Ausf B]

I can't stand small maps, and when I say small I mean just about anything smaller than Huzzar, which is about 1400 x 1600.

I'm going to do a little testing on the Jadgpanther. It may be worth more points than the KT. The "Porsche" turret KT is good but not great, as you have discovered. The front turret can be penetrated by US 76mm -- regular rounds, no HVAP required -- same as the Panther front turret. When the production model KT makes it into the game that will be a different story.

I assume you guys always play in good weather. (?)

[Sublime]

No not always good weather but generally. This map with the Canucks he threw in air support for me later, which is a first for us. I've personally never used air support against a human.. yet. However we've played around with overcast, night, etc. Generally though yes, its daytime battles.

Now that you mentioned it and I thought about it he has brought Stugs several times. So many games -we've played one turn basically everyday since 2011. He's really brilliant with turretless vehicles, I cant emphasize that enough. He prolly couldnt get away with it against me now, but I remember our 2nd or 3rd game I rushed a sherman 75 close range against a Stug. I was hoping to blow past it, stop - turn turret and fire. With a combination of pop smoke, reverse, etc he managed to get that Stug the first shot - against a Sherman with surprise, etc. very impressive. the sherman died.

It's funny you mentioned Huzzar it's a great map. Speaking of great maps - Schultz is one of the best map makers I know and I could send you some versions of maps he modified. With his permission of course. Also Winkelried is a brilliant map maker, he made two GIGANTIC maps of Sauzet and Marsanne respectively that are... epic and huge. They're great, and feel very authentic.

When I started CMx2 I'd play the smaller maps and didn't mind as much. But really, picking one of three hedgerows on a 800 x 900 map or whatever isn't really maneuver warfare and it gives you no real wiggle room.

[Vanir Ausf B]

Speaking of great maps - Schultz is one of the best map makers I know and I could send you some versions of maps he modified. With his permission of course. Also Winkelried is a brilliant map maker, he made two GIGANTIC maps of Sauzet and Marsanne respectively that are... epic and huge.

That would be great. I remember Schultz said he was going to release those maps publicly when he was trying to arrange that tournament.

[bisu]

Sublime and VAB -- That's really interesting data on battle settings you use. I agree that you need a big map but what is the force size (in points) you take on a lets say 1.8x1.8 km map? Any rules for arty purchase? Any fixed infantry:armor ratio?

[Sublime]

No I mean we know eachother so we dont do ridiculous force mixes. I'll usually have 2-3 companies of infantry, with a platoon or two of armor. And maybe say, 2 on board 81s, an off map 81, and maybe 105s or something.