CMx1 vs PCK

[Mraah]

ORIGINAL: Mobius

Now if we were to compare to CM:AK demo of what I experienced. I had a PaK38 in hide condition vs. the backs of 4 Sherman tanks at about 500m. The fire order was given. The PaK gun went from hide to fire and the Shermans immediately started turning and drew a target on my gun from both their main gun and their pintle mount AA machinegun. The gun crew was still getting up but hadn’t even fired a shot. By the time the gun‘s first shot the tanks had turned over 90 degrees toward them and the shell glanced off their side or front turret. The Sherman’s crews must have Spider senses that began tingling when a yellow target line was put on them. The PaK gun got only one shot off.

Yes sir! This is exactly what I don't want to happen in PCK .

If I might comment again, about Vehicle Morale. I hope vehicle morale is based on RADIO CONTACT and BUTTON status. Here's a quick story I read during the Battle of the Bulge :

On Decemeber 30th, two PanzerKompanies were advancing in the direction of Marvie. Lying in ambush was B company of the 35th Tank Battalion, 4th AD.
The lead PanzerKompanie had 6 Mark IV tanks from the 6. PanzerKompanie, and following them was 10 Mark IV tanks from the 7. PanzerKompanie.
Radio communication between the two PanzerKompanies had broken down.
The lead tank of the 7. PanzerKompanie watched the trail end of the 6. PanzerKompanie vanish behind a small hill. These 6 tanks of 6. PanzerKompanie turned to engaged 4 shermans and exposed their flanks to 6 shermans lying in ambush, subsequently losing all 6 panzers.
The 7. PanzerKompanie went into wedge formation across the frozen plain. Within 10 minutes the lead tank realized the trailing tanks had already been turned into burning wrecks and turned around and raced back, dodging fire.

So, what they didn't know didn't hurt their morale. For ten minutes they advanced not knowing they lost 8 Mark IV's !!!

Next time my platoon of Mark IV tanks crosses the battle field and gets wiped out I'll remember that this can really happen .
And, next time the A/I's Russian T-34 platoon sits dumb-founded while getting destroyed ... well, if this could happen to two PanzerKompanies belonging to the 1st SS Panzer Division, then the Russian's don't really have a chance ... do they?

My question to the designers of Karkov ... Is the A/I going to be dumb or are they going to appear to be dumb because of a very detailed communication/morale model?? I would say the latter.

Rob

[Krasny]

You're making some cogent points there Rob.

[Mraah]

ORIGINAL: Mobius
Now if we were to compare to CM:AK demo of what I experienced. I had a PaK38 in hide condition vs. the backs of 4 Sherman tanks at about 500m. The fire order was given. The PaK gun went from hide to fire and the Shermans immediately started turning and drew a target on my gun from both their main gun and their pintle mount AA machinegun. The gun crew was still getting up but hadn’t even fired a shot. By the time the gun‘s first shot the tanks had turned over 90 degrees toward them and the shell glanced off their side or front turret. The Sherman’s crews must have Spider senses that began tingling when a yellow target line was put on them. The PaK gun got only one shot off.

Mobius,

I forgot to ask you in my previous post. If you have a moment, could you setup a similiar situation using a Russian ZIS-3-ATG against 3 Mark IV's, buttoned and unbuttoned and please let me know what happens?

I was going to edit a scenario in PCOWS to compare but since PCOWS isn't in question I figured you could enlighten us on how Karkov would end the story.

Thanks again!
Rob

[Erik Rutins]

A ZIS-3 opening fire from concealment at the REAR of three Mark IVs at 500m? Pretty easy answer, at least based on my experience in Kharkov, the Mark IV's are in deep, deep trouble. Assuming it opens fire at the start of a phase, the player who owns the Mark IVs would then be able to react 40 second later (tanks don't see out their rear arc, so they would have no idea what was hitting them) and change the facing on them so that they could hopefully spot the gun and shoot back. I'd say odds are three destroyed Mark IVs, with a chance of two and a destroyed ZIS-3.

Regards,

- Erik

[freeboy]

that is why it is advisable to use combines arms, I asume infantry sees 360?

[Erik Rutins]

From the manual:

"Cone of Sight: A squad attempting to spot an enemy squad must have the enemy unit within a cone of sight. This cone varies in size and largely depends on the type of unit it is. An unbuttoned vehicle has a cone of sight 90 degrees to either side of its front (a 180 degree arc), while a buttoned vehicle can only see 45 degrees to either side of its front (a 90 degree arc). Infantry can spot 90 degrees to either side of their front (a 180 degree arc) while moving; if they are sitting still, they can spot in a full 360 degree circle. If an enemy unit is outside your unit’s cone of sight, no amount of positive factors will allow it to spot the enemy. Always keep your facing in mind and be aware of your blind spots."

[Mobius]

ORIGINAL: Mraah
I forgot to ask you in my previous post. If you have a moment, could you setup a similiar situation using a Russian ZIS-3-ATG against 3 Mark IV's, buttoned and unbuttoned and please let me know what happens?

Here is the result.
It took two phases to knock all three out. The last one survived the first 3 hits. One thing to note is that any hit on a AFV will automatically force it to button up. Good use for even an ATR even if they can't do much else to limit the visibility of tanks.

[Mraah]

ORIGINAL: Mobius
Here is the result.
It took two phases to knock all three out. The last one survived the first 3 hits. One thing to note is that any hit on a AFV will automatically force it to button up. Good use for even an ATR even if they can't do much else to limit the visibility of tanks.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
A ZIS-3 opening fire from concealment at the REAR of three Mark IVs at 500m? Pretty easy answer, at least based on my experience in Kharkov, the Mark IV's are in deep, deep trouble. Assuming it opens fire at the start of a phase, the player who owns the Mark IVs would then be able to react 40 second later (tanks don't see out their rear arc, so they would have no idea what was hitting them) and change the facing on them so that they could hopefully spot the gun and shoot back. I'd say odds are three destroyed Mark IVs, with a chance of two and a destroyed ZIS-3.
Regards,
- Erik

Erik and Mobius,

Thank you both for the result. That's the way it should be!!

Rob

[Mad Russian]

ORIGINAL: ravinhood

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

Ravinhood,

I'm sure long battles did happen, particularly for troops in extremely desparate situations. I don't think that contradicts Mad Russian's comment, which I agree with, that most battles were much shorter in terms of the length of the actual firefight. Now you might have a firefight for an hour, pause for an hour, resume fighting, etc. but there were usually pauses and often multiple hours between engagements.

But, I'm not talking about the "usual", I'm talking about situations where fighting went on much longer than a few minutes as he said earlier. If you're going to portray history you need to portray ALL of it, not just choice or usual moments. So, I don't agree with the philosophy of everything set in the "usual" sense in a RANDOM generated atmosphere. Everything should be POSSIBLE.

The usual engagement for a company would be about 40 minutes.

The entire Battle of the Bulge for fifty hours huh? You can't name a single battle in WWII that lasted fifty hours from beginning to end with no break. Not the same company. Never happened.

Sure I can I just did "The BATTLE of the Bulge". 50 hours non stop full scale attacking. How much plainer do I need to make it? Now if you're only definition of battle means attacking I might concede the point, but, a BATTLE entails a lot more than just attacking, you have to MOVE, PLAN, EXECUTE, SUPPLY, RESUPPLY, but, it doesn't mean the battle is over just because bullets aren't flying. Why you think they called it BATTLE of the Bulge? And every encounter didn't have a NAME as well. So, you can't sit there and say no battle lasted longer than a few minutes either bud. As I said some battles could last minutes, hours or days. It just depends on what one defines as a BATTLE.

[/quote]

I see. All that MOVE, PLAN, EXECUTE, SUPPLY, RESUPPLY is what the main point to you was. That no company could be in intense combat for fifty hours. I've never found a single instance of a company sized unit in COMBAT for 50 hours. Moving, planning, executing, supplying, resupplying and RESTING...yes. Fighting the whole time. No.

You proved nothing. A vague reference to your uncles combat experiences proves nothing. You want to discuss this with documented cases we can do that. Making vague references to actions you weren't even involved in I won't do with you.


The "BATTLE OF THE BULGE", as you call it, was actually a campaign that started on 16 December 1944 and ended on 28 January 1945, or there abouts, depending on who you want to believe. That would be 44 days. So, for your battle of 50 hours straight what happened to the other 41 days and 22 hours, The other 1,006 hours? They were the Battle of the Bulge too. Did the Germans just quit fighting then after the 50 hours?

No, of course not.

Because the Germans intended the breakthrough portion of the campaign to last for 50 hours, doesn't in anyway mean, they expected all of their combat units to be in sustained contact for 50 hours. Just like they knew their soldiers wouldn't be in constant contact for 44 days. All military operations are run somewhat like a basketball game. There are times when there is no action and other times when there is a flurry of things going on but time and physical exhaustion put limitations on what can happen and for how long.

In military operations there are breaks in the execution of battle plans in that same way. An attack is not all just pure combat.

Wargames tend to be that way. If you play my scenarios, you will find that intensity in them as well. I come to wargames to fight!! You will make contact in most of my CM scenarios within the first 5 turns. No matter how long it is and most of mine are short. My scenarios are not known for long periods of time where you are moving across the open steppes...but bone jarring, monitor cracking, screaming at the computer combat!

I take the slice of time where the balance hung in doubt and try to the best of my abilities to model that. Normally not the entire battle, although if the battle were short enough I have done it in it's entirety.


Good Hunting.

MR

[Mad Russian]

ORIGINAL: Mraah


MR,

Did you see my post in the features thread about having a larger core force? Maybe we can have a core force "pool" to pull units out of and perhaps not available again for the next battle in the same day, or days later.

tm.asp?m=1732181&mpage=2&key=#

Just wondering what your comment on that would be.

Rob

EDIT : Post #53 if the link didn't go directly to it.

****** Original Post

In my mind, a core force is larger than what we have during a battle, ie company size. A core force should be an entire division, brigade, regiment, battalion. The forces we select for a battle are pulled out of the core forces and those not selected are available in the next battle and still retain their experience, medals, etc. This way, you can have several small battles representing elements of your coreforce (company size). Perhaps having 5 battles in one day of campaign time.

******

CM is much more what you see is what you get. Once you open a scenario you get what they give you. Computer generated battles you get to buy from a core force.

I'm not the guy to go to for computer generated battles.

For those of you that don't know me I'm the founder of HSG. Our scenarios are accessible through The Scenario Depot II. We have a few. HSG stands for Historical Scenario Design Group. We design historically based battles. That's all we design.

We have at times spent months researching a single scenario with multiple members working on the same scenario providing what input we can get. Battle maps, orders of battle (OOB's), after action reports (AAR's)all of that is researched to the best of our ability. As I have stated in another thread I have spent two months working on a single map for a single scenario before. I've spent two years working on playtesting the balance of at least three of my scenarios. A scenario by another HSG member has been in research and playtesting for more than 5 months now. Thats what you get when you play an HSG scenario.

What you will get from me and HSG will more than likely not be core units in battle scenarios but very likely could be in campaigns/operations. Our main goal is to put you in the commanders boots. On the ground before the first shot is fired. To see how well you can do. We mostly do battles but some of our designers like the campaigns/operations or big battles.

Once PC has a map editor you will see HSG scenarios begin to show up. I have PC:OWS on order right now. I'm recommending it to th rest of my group as well.

The short answer to your question is probably no core units in HSG battles. Maybe in campaigns/operations. As for other designers that would be fine.

In the past I have run CM tournaments. I wouldn't mind doing PC tournaments in the future. All it will take is a fully functional map editor.

Good Hunting.

MR

[ravinhood]

ORIGINAL: Mad Russian

ORIGINAL: ravinhood

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

Ravinhood,

I'm sure long battles did happen, particularly for troops in extremely desparate situations. I don't think that contradicts Mad Russian's comment, which I agree with, that most battles were much shorter in terms of the length of the actual firefight. Now you might have a firefight for an hour, pause for an hour, resume fighting, etc. but there were usually pauses and often multiple hours between engagements.

But, I'm not talking about the "usual", I'm talking about situations where fighting went on much longer than a few minutes as he said earlier. If you're going to portray history you need to portray ALL of it, not just choice or usual moments. So, I don't agree with the philosophy of everything set in the "usual" sense in a RANDOM generated atmosphere. Everything should be POSSIBLE.

The usual engagement for a company would be about 40 minutes.

The entire Battle of the Bulge for fifty hours huh? You can't name a single battle in WWII that lasted fifty hours from beginning to end with no break. Not the same company. Never happened.

Sure I can I just did "The BATTLE of the Bulge". 50 hours non stop full scale attacking. How much plainer do I need to make it? Now if you're only definition of battle means attacking I might concede the point, but, a BATTLE entails a lot more than just attacking, you have to MOVE, PLAN, EXECUTE, SUPPLY, RESUPPLY, but, it doesn't mean the battle is over just because bullets aren't flying. Why you think they called it BATTLE of the Bulge? And every encounter didn't have a NAME as well. So, you can't sit there and say no battle lasted longer than a few minutes either bud. As I said some battles could last minutes, hours or days. It just depends on what one defines as a BATTLE.

I see. All that MOVE, PLAN, EXECUTE, SUPPLY, RESUPPLY is what the main point to you was. That no company could be in intense combat for fifty hours. I've never found a single instance of a company sized unit in COMBAT for 50 hours. Moving, planning, executing, supplying, resupplying and RESTING...yes. Fighting the whole time. No.

You proved nothing. A vague reference to your uncles combat experiences proves nothing. You want to discuss this with documented cases we can do that. Making vague references to actions you weren't even involved in I won't do with you.


The "BATTLE OF THE BULGE", as you call it, was actually a campaign that started on 16 December 1944 and ended on 28 January 1945, or there abouts, depending on who you want to believe. That would be 44 days. So, for your battle of 50 hours straight what happened to the other 41 days and 22 hours, The other 1,006 hours? They were the Battle of the Bulge too. Did the Germans just quit fighting then after the 50 hours?

No, of course not.

Because the Germans intended the breakthrough portion of the campaign to last for 50 hours, doesn't in anyway mean, they expected all of their combat units to be in sustained contact for 50 hours. Just like they knew their soldiers wouldn't be in constant contact for 44 days. All military operations are run somewhat like a basketball game. There are times when there is no action and other times when there is a flurry of things going on but time and physical exhaustion put limitations on what can happen and for how long.

In military operations there are breaks in the execution of battle plans in that same way. An attack is not all just pure combat.

Wargames tend to be that way. If you play my scenarios, you will find that intensity in them as well. I come to wargames to fight!! You will make contact in most of my CM scenarios within the first 5 turns. No matter how long it is and most of mine are short. My scenarios are not known for long periods of time where you are moving across the open steppes...but bone jarring, monitor cracking, screaming at the computer combat!

I take the slice of time where the balance hung in doubt and try to the best of my abilities to model that. Normally not the entire battle, although if the battle were short enough I have done it in it's entirety.


Good Hunting.

MR
[/quote]

Blah blah blah all you talk is blah blah blah and stuff you read in a book lol My uncles were there....were you? NO so you have no clue as to what happened in their COMPANIES in those first 50 hours boy. You really should stop thinking everything you read is the truth or what actually happened. Books on subject matter are closely related to things that happened, but, never the EXACT story minute by minute second by second. The real stories are from the people who were actually there, I can see in their eyes as they tell me the tales that what they say is more truthful than anything I would get out of a silly book.

This guys a joke I wouldn't play anything he designed or made he thinks everything in a book is the truth lol. I'd just as soon play a quick random battle or campaign they will be just as believeable as anything he could come up with. Some people just make me laugh, they open a book and think they know it all. lmao

[Mad Russian]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

A ZIS-3 opening fire from concealment at the REAR of three Mark IVs at 500m? Pretty easy answer, at least based on my experience in Kharkov, the Mark IV's are in deep, deep trouble. Assuming it opens fire at the start of a phase, the player who owns the Mark IVs would then be able to react 40 second later (tanks don't see out their rear arc, so they would have no idea what was hitting them) and change the facing on them so that they could hopefully spot the gun and shoot back. I'd say odds are three destroyed Mark IVs, with a chance of two and a destroyed ZIS-3.

Regards,

- Erik

Is there some reason an unbuttoned tank commander couldn't turn his head and see an ATG behind him? I can understand if the tank is buttoned to an extent but the commanders cupola on a PzIV allows for limited all round vision. Every German tank from the PzIII had them.

Most Russian tanks would be limited visibility to the rear but the KV-1 and JS-2 tanks in particular, actually had machineguns that were mounted in the back of the turret to fire to the rear. They had as much visibility to the rear as they did forward.

So, I'm surprised that a tank would have to turn to "see". Especially a German one.

Good Hunting.

MR

[Mad Russian]

One thing to note is that any hit on a AFV will automatically force it to button up. Good use for even an ATR even if they can't do much else to limit the visibility of tanks.

Soviet use of ATR's is legendary among German tank crews. They would shoot at the vision blocks on the German tanks and break them. Blinding the crews inside and forcing the tanks to withdraw from combat.

This was especially done to Tigers and Panthers.

Good Hunting.

MR

[Mad Russian]

ORIGINAL: ravinhood



Blah blah blah all you talk is blah blah blah and stuff you read in a book lol My uncles were there....were you? NO so you have no clue as to what happened in their COMPANIES in those first 50 hours boy. You really should stop thinking everything you read is the truth or what actually happened. Books on subject matter are closely related to things that happened, but, never the EXACT story minute by minute second by second. The real stories are from the people who were actually there, I can see in their eyes as they tell me the tales that what they say is more truthful than anything I would get out of a silly book.

Yes, I'm sure that more than 60 years later their memories are perfect. I'm just glad they lived through it.

This guys a joke I wouldn't play anything he designed or made he thinks everything in a book is the truth lol. I'd just as soon play a quick random battle or campaign they will be just as believeable as anything he could come up with. Some people just make me laugh, they open a book and think they know it all. lmao

Of course you play what you want. My scenarios are not for everyone. You can disdain all the historical research as just so much BS from a book if you like. The After Action Reports were written after the actions for a reason. While they were still fresh in their minds.

Since almost none of us were there we have to go by what was written or told by those that were.

I have experience with military operations though. I served in the 3rd Armored Division in Germany from 1974-1978. I know what I saw with my own eyes. I saw the kinds of operations and tactical situations that were meant to simulate combat.

I've been in a tank and I've been in Germany.

I know that's not the same. It's alot closer than just listening to stories and never having experienced any of it though.

I make scenarios I like and then share them with the rest of the wargame community. You can play them or not. That's your choice.

Good Hunting.

MR

[Mad Russian]

ORIGINAL: ravinhood

The real stories are from the people who were actually there, I can see in their eyes as they tell me the tales that what they say is more truthful than anything I would get out of a silly book.

Some people just make me laugh, they open a book and think they know it all. lmao

While I'm glad your uncles lived through the war and I'm sure their memories are good, BUT American forces were reknown for their inaccurate reporting of German forces.

According to American combat soldiers there were THOUSANDS of TIGER tanks in Normandy facing them. Every German tank was reported as a Tiger!

When in reality there were never more than a handful and they were usually facing the 21st Army Group. IMO, only when the after action reports of both sides are looked at, do you begin to get anything like an accurate picture of what happened in a particular action.

Good Hunting.

MR

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: ravinhood
Blah blah blah all you talk is blah blah blah and stuff you read in a book lol My uncles were there....were you? NO so you have no clue as to what happened in their COMPANIES in those first 50 hours boy. You really should stop thinking everything you read is the truth or what actually happened. Books on subject matter are closely related to things that happened, but, never the EXACT story minute by minute second by second. The real stories are from the people who were actually there, I can see in their eyes as they tell me the tales that what they say is more truthful than anything I would get out of a silly book.

Ravinhood,

Try listening to logic for a change. Oral histories are often unreliable as well and you will have a much tougher time convincing people that your one case can be extrapolated to the war better than hundreds and thousands of other battle accounts (which I've also read) that were all in the 1 hour or less range of combat time.

This guys a joke I wouldn't play anything he designed or made he thinks everything in a book is the truth lol. I'd just as soon play a quick random battle or campaign they will be just as believeable as anything he could come up with. Some people just make me laugh, they open a book and think they know it all. lmao

That constitutes a personal attack, which you know is off limits on our boards. Consider this a warning. If you don't agree with someone, it's time to agree to disagree, not to switch to personal attacks.

Regards,

- Erik

[ravinhood]

Wasn't a personal attack to me was stating MY truth of the matter. You can call it what you will. Sounds like a war story to me (your side of it) as you were stating above. I personally don't care what you or he says about what happened during the war and my uncles stories they are just as valid as any stories in any books as far as I'm concerned. They were there you two weren't and that's the real truth of the matter.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: ravinhood
Wasn't a personal attack to me was stating MY truth of the matter. You can call it what you will. Sounds like a war story to me (your side of it) as you were stating above. I personally don't care what you or he says about what happened during the war and my uncles stories they are just as valid as any stories in any books as far as I'm concerned. They were there you two weren't and that's the real truth of the matter.

Re-read your post - in your last reply you did cross the line. These comments count as personal attacks in my book:

"This guys a joke I wouldn't play anything he designed or made he thinks everything in a book is the truth lol. I'd just as soon play a quick random battle or campaign they will be just as believeable as anything he could come up with. Some people just make me laugh, they open a book and think they know it all. lmao"

I completely agree that your uncle's story is as valid as anything in any book. However that doesn't mean that it's more valid or should have more weight than the thousands of other wartime stories that differ from your uncle's. We all know war is full of unique situations, it sounds like your uncle lived through one.

When designing a scenario, you can set it to be completely open ended or with defender VP bonuses that bring it to a close more quickly. Even so, most scenarios would be over in less than an hour because when designing a game you have to give weight to the vast majority of firefights over the unique cases.

Regards,

- Erik

[Marc von Martial]

Knock it off Ravinhood. We do not discuss warnings. Period.

[Ron]

ORIGINAL: Mobius

Now if we were to compare to CM:AK demo of what I experienced. I had a PaK38 in hide condition vs. the backs of 4 Sherman tanks at about 500m. The fire order was given. The PaK gun went from hide to fire and the Shermans immediately started turning and drew a target on my gun from both their main gun and their pintle mount AA machinegun. The gun crew was still getting up but hadn’t even fired a shot. By the time the gun‘s first shot the tanks had turned over 90 degrees toward them and the shell glanced off their side or front turret. The Sherman’s crews must have Spider senses that began tingling when a yellow target line was put on them. The PaK gun got only one shot off.

Coming from many years of CM the above statement is simply not how CM works at all. I don't know the conditions of your 'experience' ie, other units involved to spot(the biggest downfall of CM), terrain, leaders, buttoned/unbuttoned etc. A simple test scenario would show that unbuttoned tank crews almost always wouldn't spot the AT gun until several seconds after the AT gun had opened fire and/or hit one of their platoon. If the tanks were buttoned, the AT gun almost always would KO the tanks within 2-3 minutes without ever being spotted at all.

Interesting discussion by the way. Thanks to all the participants for the detailed info. Cheers,


Ron