Friendly questions/suggestions

Close Combat: Panthers in the Fog is the first new release (not a re-make of a previous games) in years in the critically acclaimed Close Combat series. It details the desperate German counter-attack at Mortain, the last chance of the Wehrmacht to stave off defeat in Normandy. Can you match the tenacity of the American defenders of Hill 314? Or can you succeed where the Panzers failed, driving through to the sea and changing history? Improved 32-bit graphics and the ability to control more squads than ever bring the Close Combat engine to a new level.
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Panjack
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Friendly questions/suggestions

Post by Panjack »

1. I find it frustrating to determine elevations of the landscape. Is there something I've not figured out yet? That is, something other than using (tedious) line of sight techniques? Can some overlay to maps be provided that indicates high and low points in the landscape?

2. In the first full day of the historical campaign the Germans (AI) is not aggressive enough. The Germans are the ones who are supposed to be advancing, but Panthers often just sit far back and puff their chests out (while my tanks cower behind any available protection). Yes I understand Germans might not want to risk aggressive moves (with their likely too-few Panthers) because they might lack enough infantry support. But they need to take more risks as often my units can't put up much of a fight against them. Perhaps this changes in later days of the campaign, but if not this is something that might be addressed in patches.

3. At least once a German mortar scored a direct hit (a lucky first shot I think) on an open-topped M-10 (or whatever it is). Vehicle destroyed. But the mortar(s) continued to fire shell after shell at the same location until, I think, it ran out of shells. This pitted the landscape impressively and provided a nice display of explosions. But this seems to have been a mistake. Perhaps something is amiss with the AI firing logic: the target was destroyed after perhaps the first shell.
xe5
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RE: Friendly questions/suggestions

Post by xe5 »

1. There is the even more tedious right click and drag technique to determine elevations. The best attempt at an elevation 'overlay' Ive seen for CC is Thomm's quasi-3D .OVMs (zoomed out view) for CC4 & 5. The reduced size sample of St Pierre below barely does the concept justice.

Image

2. IRL, Hitler had the same complaint. The German advance stalled by noon on August 7th. I'd like to see AI aggressiveness tied to relative starting force strength then adjust based on relative Force Morale (top bars}.

3. Mortars are supposed to fire 6 shot fire missions. When the AI has more than one mortar unit it will fire missions from both at the same target. I find AI mortars to be fairly fearsome in PITF. Often its useful to expose an armored vehicle early in battle and jockey it around to 'soak off' as much mortar ammo as possible.
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Panjack
Posts: 501
Joined: Sun Jul 12, 2009 2:08 am
Location: Southern California

RE: Friendly questions/suggestions

Post by Panjack »

ORIGINAL: xe5
3. Mortars are supposed to fire 6 shot fire missions. When the AI has more than one mortar unit it will fire missions from both at the same target. I find AI mortars to be fairly fearsome in PITF. Often its useful to expose an armored vehicle early in battle and jockey it around to 'soak off' as much mortar ammo as possible.
In this case, it appears all mortars fired at the same spot until they ran out of shells. After this one target was plastered, no further German mortar shells were fired in the engagement.
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Redmarkus5
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RE: Friendly questions/suggestions

Post by Redmarkus5 »

I think that's a fairly realistic use of mortars, bearing in mind that the enemy can't see what you can see and may not be certain of the kill. If I was your opponent, I would also be hoping that there were infantry in position to protect the tank - if it's my only target I'd plaster it too.
WitE2 tester, WitW, WitP, CMMO, CM2, GTOS, GTMF, WP & WPP, TOAW4, BA2
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