unit experience is everything..

[hm_stanley]

Man..their is a very distinct and notable difference in unit performance from veteran to crack.. it like pvt. Pyle vs. Rambo. Wow.

[stikkypixie]

Man..their is a very distinct and notable difference in unit performance from veteran to crack.. it like pvt. Pyle vs. Rambo. Wow.

Try messing around with the motivation levels .

[Agua]

Try messing around with the motivation levels .

!! SHHhhhhhhhhhhh!!! hehee...

Yeah, a select few crack single team units with extreme motivation can make the rest of your grunts look decent.

[lookeylou]

Yes sir! That's why the buffs here always discuss the amounts and their quality of units in a given scenario. It can make or break a campaign if not accurate. And I thank them. I enjoy the tactics of the game.

[Stitch]

While everyone knows in QBs you pay in points for more quality troops, you may be interested to know that if there are rarity points associated with such unit, you will ALSO pay more rarity points as well as regular points.

And, it costs nothing to upgrade off-board mortar skill and motivation values...Wonder why.

[SlapHappy]

Yeah, the few extra points you pay to upgrade units from Green or Regular is probably definitely worth it. I just wonder historically however how many units could factually be described as being Crack or Elite. Probably not many.

At the squad level only it is probably more believable, however.

I could honestly see an SS unit having a fairly large number of Crack units mixed together with a lot of Greens and Conscripts.

[Bradley Dick]

I have had an entire battalion cut to pieces by one elite fanatic rifle platoon. Those men stood their ground until the end of the scenario. Thanks to the fog of war, I thought I had been facing a much larger force. When the rest of the men finally surrendered, there were only three of the enemy left. They were standing in what I would assume to be a trench full of blood and still had fight left in them.

On the other hand, green or conscript troops with low motivation will flush from their hidey holes at the first whiff of aimed fire.

I love the varying troop quality in this game. It's key to accuracy.

[BloodyBucket]

I was just reading an account of how badly "unblooded" US infantry divisions performed when committed to action for the first time.

It's hard to quantify. A battle tested, veteran unit could be badly used by a boneheaded commander, and a green as grass formation that was well led or had a sprinkling of old hands might perform better than expected. My father often told me he firmly believed that his fate was influenced more by the presence of a WWI veteran NCO in his squad willing to act as a mentor than all the training he got in the USA and Wales.

[Ryujin]

I think fanatical units also need more serious wounds to become incapacitated, as opposed to unmotivated troops who stub their toe and call it a day. It seemed to be that way in CMSF where fanatical insurgents would still be alive and fighting even when the building was collapsing around them and just have "yellow" wounds. I had some keeping fighting through enough small arms/.50 fire that the building fell apart just from the 20 minutes of sustained fire and the survivors just withdrew to another part of the modular building and kept putting up a fight.

I don't know if it's really realistic for ww2, but just cranking the motivation and not the skill, can make for some cheaper good defenders. Not particularly skilled, but they'll hold their ground through just about anything and are a serious pain to suppress/dislodge with anything other than ridiculous amounts of high explosives.

[Broken]

I think fanatical units also need more serious wounds to become incapacitated, as opposed to unmotivated troops who stub their toe and call it a day. It seemed to be that way in CMSF where fanatical insurgents would still be alive and fighting even when the building was collapsing around them and just have "yellow" wounds. I had some keeping fighting through enough small arms/.50 fire that the building fell apart just from the 20 minutes of sustained fire and the survivors just withdrew to another part of the modular building and kept putting up a fight.

I don't know if it's really realistic for ww2, but just cranking the motivation and not the skill, can make for some cheaper good defenders. Not particularly skilled, but they'll hold their ground through just about anything and are a serious pain to suppress/dislodge with anything other than ridiculous amounts of high explosives.

The fanatic level is a two edged sword. They may not break easily, but they don't always duck when they should.

[Narses]

Yeah, the few extra points you pay to upgrade units from Green or Regular is probably definitely worth it. I just wonder historically however how many units could factually be described as being Crack or Elite. Probably not many.

At the squad level only it is probably more believable, however.

I could honestly see an SS unit having a fairly large number of Crack units mixed together with a lot of Greens and Conscripts.

I hesitate to be too critical of this game as I've only played it for a month. Although relative to the experience/morale factors, etc. I am having some issues but it may be lack of skill and understanding of the game options. Ive been playing maybe 80% Ger, 20% US. I've been playing "QB" mostly and some scenarios and all too often my Germans are breaking rather quickly under fire. Usually I'm 'veteran.' I've not seen it quite so much in the few scenarios I've played so I'm thinking I'm not tweaking all the experience and morale factors correctly in "QB."

Frankly I'm feeling sometimes that I'm in charge of "Ost" units in Normandy not all German units. Of course its true the German static divisions had huge liabilites as they were stuck in place along the beaches and could not move. I recognize as someone said days ago that by 1944 Germans were having serious manpower difficulties and basic training and unit training was being accomplished by reducing the number of weeks but still the German forces were organized around veteran NCO's and officers all of which were combat tested (unlike some Allied units). In addition its documented that the Germans sent to best men to combat units ( see van Creveld in Fighting Power, Chp 11 'Leadership and the Officers Corps' and how the best in IQ in the US often went invaribly to the Finance Corps !!).

Anyway guess I'll crank up if I need to go to "crack." Still I love this game, just have to 'tweak' it properly."

[Narses]

I hesitate to be too critical of this game as I've only played it for a month. Although relative to the experience/morale factors, etc. I am having some issues but it may be lack of skill and understanding of the game options. Ive been playing maybe 80% Ger, 20% US. I've been playing "QB" mostly and some scenarios and all too often my Germans are breaking rather quickly under fire. Usually I'm 'veteran.' I've not seen it quite so much in the few scenarios I've played so I'm thinking I'm not tweaking all the experience and morale factors correctly in "QB."

Frankly I'm feeling sometimes that I'm in charge of "Ost" units in Normandy not all German units. Of course its true the German static divisions had huge liabilites as they were stuck in place along the beaches and could not move. I recognize as someone said days ago that by 1944 Germans were having serious manpower difficulties and basic training and unit training was being accomplished by reducing the number of weeks but still the German forces were organized around veteran NCO's and officers all of which were combat tested (unlike some Allied units). In addition its documented that the Germans sent to best men to combat units ( see van Creveld in Fighting Power, Chp 11 'Leadership and the Officers Corps' and how the best in IQ in the US often went invaribly to the Finance Corps !!).

Anyway guess I'll crank up if I need to go to "crack." Still I love this game, just have to 'tweak' it properly."

My reference to van Creveld referenced the wrong chapter. The chapter showing assignment of personnel by branch is in Chp 7, Army Personnel Administration, pg 71 has the chart.

Based upon the results of the Army induction test given everyone (AGCT) those in the 2 highest scores (Class 1 and 2) 89.4% went to the Finance Corps. Meaning the remainder in Finance 11% ( to make 100%) were from Class 3,4, and 5).

27.4% in those test high test score catagories went to the infantry and the other combat branches like Ar, Arty, Engr, Cav were about the same - mid 20%. Those combat branches then received approx 30% from Class 3 and 42% in the lowest test scores of Class 4 and 5.

[womble]

I hesitate to be too critical of this game as I've only played it for a month. Although relative to the experience/morale factors, etc. I am having some issues but it may be lack of skill and understanding of the game options. Ive been playing maybe 80% Ger, 20% US. I've been playing "QB" mostly and some scenarios and all too often my Germans are breaking rather quickly under fire.

The other factor that drastically affects breaking is the unit being in command range. It seems to me that if the HQ unit is not in effective command radius, pretty much any incoming will Rattle the troops, and casualties will very quickly drop them to Shaken or worse, even if only temporary. Of course, that status starts to snowball into Broken, because you lose control, and the AI can't always figure out that it needs to run, not cower. Hell, human players can find that tricky...