AAR - CMRT Corsaire31 vs Strachwitz

[Corsaire31]

First incident happens I hadn't thought about : @Strachwitz gets curious and wants to know what's behind the smoke. He sends to their fate a scout team. Some shooting takes place with my squad which is getting to the woods. As my guys had short firing arcs to stay quiet during the crossing they loose the initiative and 3 men are injured before they return fire.

On the left flank, my recon squad is back to the eastern road houses. Studying the map more closely, I found a depression in front on the middle high ground where I can hide before assaulting. I have started to transfer the squads one by one. It takes some time as they need to hug the ground a while to make sure the Tiger doesn't see them. I also brought from the back in the wheatfield the AT rifle which is covering the road. I have the 20mm AA in sight, but you never know...

 

[Corsaire31]

That's true for sure. Just in very desperate situations I would take on a Tiger with a T-34/85 in a 1:1 situation. Preferably with 2 tanks from different positions. Or create somewhat creative situations forcing the Tiger to do something stupid. Like I did in our game with the King Tiger in Myth of Invincibility

Same here, did it often in CMBB, and generally involved the sacrifice of one of the tanks to focus the Tiger's attention while another tank was flanking from the other side on a concealed approach path.
This is also why when I was the man in charge of the Tiger I usually had when possible some foot soldiers spread out around as "early warning bodyguards", preferably with one or two Pzschrecks...

 

[Corsaire31]

Nothing really exciting until turn 19.

On the right my SMG company has taken hold of the woods. My problem is that I have a lot of people to pack up in a relatively small space while waiting for the bombardment of the village which will give the assault signal. May be I crossed too early, but if I didn't I'm sure my opponent would have seized the place and it would be more difficult later. One AT rifle has moved to the corner of the woods to try to see what the germans are up to in there and may be hunt the 20mm AA vehicle.
Also the Panther has backed out of its hull down position and I can't spot it anymore. At the same time I hear engine sounds in the back of the village. Another tank ?

On the left recon squads have crossed and are now hidden in the depression in front of the woods, waiting for the mortar shells to fall on the high ground in front of them (request on the way from FOs - 6 minutes)

This is when the Tiger suddenly opens fire on the group of houses at the eastern road objective, and I spot infantry movements in the central woods. Are the germans planning an assault on the objective ? They would be in for a surprise with all the SMGs hiding in the grass. Another good news is that the Tiger is shooting in an empty house. The guys hiding behind are a bit nervous though...

 

[Corsaire31]

Turn 20 :

The german troops are progressing in the village... too bad I didn't take a good old 152mm battery !

The engine sound in the back of the village turns out to be the 20mm AA repositioning.

On the left objective, I have taken my HQ out of the front house and all troops have moved back a few meters in case a house blows up. The flamethrower being in an unreachable back house has stayed in there.

 

[Corsaire31]

Turn 21 :

As the Panther has not come back overlooking the corridor right of the village, I seize the opportunity to rush one of my T34 across to support the SMG Company.

At this stage I still want to leave open the possibility of trying to take the western road objective, and I have already decided to use the Tank Riders reserve Plt on the right so they have been brought in the woods near the church. My Maxim HMG in the woods regularly takes pot shots at german infantry appearing from time to time at the edge of their woods and I give them once in a while an area shooting order in there so the bad guys keep their heads down. I try not to spend too much ammo yet.

On the Recon Co side, my first mortar spotting rounds fall near the central woods. At that moment, I'm quite happy with how the game goes according to the original plan.

 

[Nathangun]

Ok, sorry that I felt a bit insulted about that comment. I had a bad day and thus I am a bit unnerved. I misinterpreted your statement. We had a good game and nice chat besides and I hope to have another go sometime.

And you are right I am an experienced player and always willing to give input on battles and share some of my experience.

If you want I will comment your AAR from my perspective and hopefully give some tips and tricks.

What I find extraordinary helpfull for me and other players not wanting to recall every penetration data of every gun and armour thickness of every tanks and variants is this mod by Marco Bergmann:
http://cmmods.greenasjade.net/mods/5311/details

It gives valuable information direct in the UI of the game about armour thickness, penetration data of ammo (and special ammo) and tons of other extra information. Basically you get back very much infos that were all accessible in the old CM1 days.

I am not a grog and I simply won't/can't remember all that stuff so if I would be allowed to use just one single mod this is by far the number 1 mod for me.

Holy crap! I gotta get that mod!

 

[Corsaire31]

OK here we go again...

As we all know, it's usually when you start thinking you're not doing too bad that sh*t happens !

On turn 24, as my own mortar shells are falling on the central woods left of the village to prepare for my assault by the Recon troops, what I feared happens... Mortar shells start falling in the woods on the right where my whole SMG company is waiting. Although I had carefully kept the troops on my side of the woods, it's general panic amongst russian troops... Like in CMBB as soon as they are fired upon, they all get shaken or even panic, stick their nose in the grass and refuse to move.

This means you can't even get them out of there.. not many casualties, except for my AT Rifle guys who were hunting the 20AA vehicle and a grunt here and there. Curiously though, the shells seem attracted by platoon leaders inside HQs !

At the same time the reinforcement Tank Riders platoon is crossing the wheat field while my MG continues to shoot at german grunts showing up at the tip of their woods.

I spot the on-map mortar team and move a T34 in position to make an area fire.

The german mortars seem to have balls of steel as the guy keeps firing for a while with 85mm HE shells exploding a few meters around him, together with the MG rounds from the tank !

.../...

 

[Corsaire31]

I'm back...

In the next turns other bad things happen... My assault on the middle woods after a mortar preparation works as intented and the few germans there run away! This is when another well placed on map mortar ( forgot about those, I thought I would have the time to move ) starts pouring shells on my recon units as soon as they are in the woods. Same thing, they all call their mothers and refuse to move, loosing a few guys in the process and of course the platoon leader.

 

[Corsaire31]

On the right, Strachwitz has brought up the Hetzer to block my T34.
Happens something I would like to receive an explanation :

- My T34 is stopped, I know exactly from infantry spotting where the Hetzer is. If he wants to shoot my tank, he will have to move forward some 10 meters. Knowing this, I put a narrow Armor target arc including the place he will need to go to. To make sure I will see it, I open the hatch. Since I'm stopped and waiting for it to step into my target arc, I'm pretty sure I will get it.
What happens ? the Hetzer quietly moves into my firing arc ( 100 m away or so ) my guys don't even shoot (!) and the Hetzer puts two rounds in my tank...

Anyway after this the Hetzer wants to get rid of my MG in the woods harassing the german infantry, but I knew he would do it and have moved them before the area fire arrives..

.../...

 

[Richtig]

Sadly their is nothing surprising in your Hetzer/t34 story. It is the broken game we all still love and hope one day the apologists stop defending and actually fix.

 

[fabishd]

@Richtig I see what you mean . The home team always has the advantage.

 

[Corsaire31]

Sadly their is nothing surprising in your Hetzer/t34 story. It is the broken game we all still love and hope one day the apologists stop defending and actually fix.

Thks for the reply, but I don't understand how this can happen (based on my CMx1 experience) You mean there is a problem with the spotting of moving vehicles ?

 

[Strachwitz]

There are some problems with spotting generally but in my experience these occur quite seldom (quite long spotting cycles of 6 seconds for example).
But in this case at first glance I see nothing wrong with the outcome of the Hetzer against the T-34. At first glance as I of course don`t know all the involved variables. Maybe we can shed some light on this event and learn something from it. So a few questions:
1.Did your T-34 spot my vehicle and refused to shoot or didn`t they spot the Hetzer at all?
2.Has the T-34 proir knowledge of the Hetzer? What I mean is, had your T-34 a contact icon (the contsct was reported via the chain of command) for my Hetzer if you click on the T-34?

 

[Corsaire31]

Sorry I have no answers to these questions. All I can say is that the Hetzer entered an armour target arc at 100m and that my guys didn't shoot, although the hatch was open and they cannot have missed it. We will see later that the same thing happened with the Panther...
Not complaining at all, only trying to understand. I have done that before hundreds of times in CMx1 and I thought CMx2 was working the same, it looks like it doesn't, so I will not count on it next time...

 

[Strachwitz]

I know you are not complaining. It is very interesting to see the battle from the your perspective and analyzing what actually happenend.
First of all it is not unusual that one tank spots another first. And most of the time it is very logical and can be explained. Having said that there are sometimes strange behavior regarding spotting. But in this case I doubt it and it is interesting to see why it happenend the way it happenend.
To fully understand what happenend we need some more info as described above. If you want open the turn again and have a look. We don't have to speculate that much when we know what your tank spotted or not or if he knew through C2 that there is an armored target around.

Basically spotting is dependent on MUCH more variables than in CMx1 and also very much WYSIWYG and not so much abstracted. Factors are distance, terrain (and remember terrain is mostly not abstracted. If you are hiding behind some bushes then your tank really is hiding behind bushes.), size of the target, morale, experience, light conditions. Just to name a few! It even considers which directions the crew members are looking (in 6 second intervals) and also takes into account if the line of sight of every single crew member is obscured. For example the viewing slots if buttoned of the commander in a Stug III are on the one the left side. If there are for example branches of trees direct in front of the viewing slot the commander can't see through there.

I had a quick look at the turn you described and from my commanders view I can see parts of your T-34. As the Hetzer is not very high the commander can look through UNDER the branches of the trees. Whereas the T-34 line of sight goes right through the branches of the tress obscuring the Hetzer. My guess is the T-34 didn't even spot the Hetzer. But lacking more information it is best an educated guess

 

[Corsaire31]

It happened the same with the Panther later and there was no trees. It's impossible that the gunner can't spot a moving Hetzer 100 m away, specially if instructed to look for it, or the tank leader which was outside.

It just also happened again in another game with no obstacles and this time it was the ambushed T34 which won over the ambushing Panther.

Ambushing other tanks so far has been for me like playing belgian roulette. ( It's the same as russian roulette but there is a bullet in every hole... )

So from my few experimental games so far with CMFI and CMRT, and after reading many posts on the BF forum, my opinion is that the armor spotting system of the CMx2 engine is fubar ...

So the tactic is simple : as long as it's not fixed, I'm playing small and medium QBs only with the old "Recon" rules from CMx1, which is infantry and light vehicles only (and artillery of course). On the relatively small maps of CMx2 it will always make the games more interesting as you cannot block half of the map with one or two tanks and the game will not depend on one or two shots which noone knows how they are computed.

For larger games, you have more tanks involved so I guess the " roll a dice " factor is likely to be more balanced than if you have only two or three.

 

[Richtig]

@Corsaire31 Nice analysis and solution.

 

[Strachwitz]

I can't tell for the situation for the Panther. Haven't analysed it. But as explained above it is plausible your T-34 did not spot (although this is still just an assumption). The Line of Sight of your tank is blocked by the trees. Your crew has to look directly through the thickest part of the trees. No wonder he can't see my tank. Morose if he didn't knew about through C&C. Also your impression about the armoured target arc is a bit off. The target armour tells the tank to just engage armored targets within the arc. Plus the crew looks in the direction a bit more than in other directions. But that's it. The amoired target arc doesn't tell the crew that there actually is already a tank there. For that you need the information passed to the tank through C&C. Don't mix that up.

But it looks like you already made up your mind. I for myself can just say most spotting issues can be explained rather logically. But yes there are sometimes problems with spotting. But it really is just sometimes. The spotting system is far away from beeing broken. That's also the reason that this "issue" definitely will not be addressed by Battlefront as there is not really an issue.

 

[Richtig]

I wasn't going to ask - but now I will? How tall is an unspotted tank?
Correct answers on a postcard...

If the amount of traffic on BF forums isn't enough to let them know their is a problem - then that is the problem.

 

[Corsaire31]

No problemo Strachwitz, each one of us is entitled to have his own opinion. As said in my post I have several other instances where no trees or whatever are involved, so this cannot be an explanation. You could as well say that the game computes how much Schnaps or Vodka the crew has drunk in the last hour...

From what I read on the BF forums they have never given a clear explanation of how their system works. The fact that they say they won't bother to fix it doesn't mean the problem doesn't exist.