Attacking

[rubisco]

I'm having a lot of difficulty making attacks.

I'm new to the CC series, but am a veteran of games like Combat Mission. I understand the principles of cover, concealment, flanking, smoke and suppression, but I'm finding it difficult to bring this all together in this game.

On the attack, I typically move teams forwards in bounds from cover to cover, with other teams offering suppressing fire. However, my suppressing fire doesn't seem to do anything. I still take heavy casualties moving forwards even using sneak and having 3 or 4 teams firing on a suspected enemy position.

I've played about 20 scenraios now and the best I've been able to achieve is to capture 2 objectives. By this time, my force is spent, out of ammo and with heavy casualties.

Is there a strategy guide available anywhere?

[Concord]

I've played CM and CC quite a bit. [:)]

In CM, machineguns are good for pinning troops - stopping an advance for instance.
In CC, the MG's are extremely lethal (well, in the "virtual" gaming sense).

The best covering fire for an attack in both games, is ARMOUR.

Where armour is not available, then I have some tips.
The best situation for assaulting a defensive position is where you can get at least 2 to 1 odds.
Once you get into a situation where you can rush a location, then I give move fast orders nearby.
Soldiers that complete these moves are generally aggressive, firing and throwing grenades.

Getting to the situation where you can rush a place is another challenge.
Sneaking units into locations that are close, but out of immediate line of sight is good.
Where you need to cross open ground, smoke (from tanks or mortars, or some squads)
can be used. But don't fire smoke while your men are crossing, because these shells can
injure them!

If the approach is covered by MG's and is open, "don't try it" is my general rule.
Unless you have to. Laying down smoke helps a little bit, but nothing beats tanks.
Very often, the MG that is firing at you is not even visible yet. But you can see their
gun flashes, and this is where you target your tanks. A few vollies, and you should
start to take them down.

I very rarely use infantry suppressing fire. I haven't found it works that well, and they
chew through their ammo. Plus, when they are given direct fire orders, they tend to
become visible to the enemy quickly, and then come under fire themselves (like yet
another MG post on the flank or further back).

If my infantry can move in covered areas, I use move fast - sometimes just move.
If I think the area can be seen by MG posts, I sneak. Quite often, sneaking will
allow them to get where they're going without even being spotted by the enemy.
Once there, if I don't want them to give away their position, I'll put them on ambush.

[Concord]

A couple more general tactics I use...

If I have armour, then I'll put them in places where they are relatively safe from anti-tank fire, but can see likely defensive positions. I'll then sneak a squad or two forward as recon. When they come under fire, I put them on ambush, and start blazing away at the enemy position (which has been identified by gun flashes) with tanks and MG's, or nearby squads.

When I come up with an attack plan and set up at the beginning, I will generally put squads in defensive positions, either in keyhole locations, or where there's cover from multiple positions. MG's I'm a bit bolder with, and tend to put them in places where they have a better field of fire.

I'll plan to probe in one or two places. I'll set up a fairly thin defensive line, and all the rest gathered near the attack point. I play with the game option "use initiative" turned off. That way, no one will move unless I order it. Then I start probing and scouting, trying to identify enemy positions. Sometimes I will try to outflank strong areas, or even move the whole probe to a different location and try there.

[rubisco]

Thanks for your replies. Lots of stuff for me to ponder on there!

[Southernland]

you can use supressing fire while attacking even if you can't see the enemy.  Draw your LOS to where you think the enemy are and dot it down and so long as you have a green LOS the troops you've ordered to fire will have some effect.  Using armour or guns you will likely be able to kill some of the enemy, rifle fire is less effective
 
Best way of course is to have some arty up your sleave ready to drop on anyone who dares shoot at you
 
I lost 1/3 of a BG to AI artillary yesterday when I left the game running to answer the door, a pzIV, two sdkfz251s and a couple of infantry squads chewed up by one barrage.
 
Smoke will also cover an attack

[CSO_Talorgan]

Remember that in Combat Mission there was a bug which prevented vehicles in general from providing infantry with cover. In Close Combat there is no such bug.

Meaow!

[:D]