REOPENED- Looking for Players to Test a CMSF2 Multiplayer Battles

These battles are ticking along nicely, and I am getting some good data with which to refine this upcoming campaign. Thank you!

Anyone else out there that wants a 30 minutes CMF2 red on red battle, let me know!
 
Thanks for testing, @Bleskaceq and @Aurelius . As expected, the Loyalists won, but I am most interested in the attrition rate for both sides. In my current campaign design, each "unit" (ex: Republican Guards, Sons of the Prophet) has three company-level units with which to fight QBs, with some finite "add-ons" like what you bought using the command points system. I plan for a 4round/4 battle campaign, so the last battle is going to be fought with whatever is leftover. The tension in the campaign is that the Loyalists need to push to win 30 minute battles, but can't lose so many troops that they are combat-inffective by Round 4. The Rebels have a bit more cushion via the reinforcement system.

Questions for each of you:
Was it fun? Would you play 4 battles like that?
What add-ons might you have selected different from those you picked?
Was the map suitable for the battle duration? (I may get rid of the rearmost objective).
What would you change?
 
I enjoyed it! There were some wierd issues with LOS on this map, but otherwise it was great. I would definitely like to play more, but ideally as the Syrians, em, I mean, Dahranians.

For my selection of add-ons, I took two groups of fanatical combatants (tracksuit boys), two extra small fighter groups and some foxholes and wire obstacles. I was mostly hoping to get more rpgs with those and obviously more bodies to speedbump Aurelius with. In hindsight, it wasn't that great of a choice. They didn't come with any extra rpgs unfortunately, but mainly, the combatant groups were terrible experience-wise, all the other fighters were also fanatical and the popuation density was low, so there was no benefit to picking them, which is my bad.
So if I knew that, I would've taken the pair of T-55s and three BMPs. I originally didn't take them because I fully expected Aurelius to bring extra artillery and hinds for some reason. The extra heaavy firepower wouldve definitely helped.

I think the map size and objective density was ok. If only Aurelius knew how dire my AT situation was the entire time, he probably could've overrun me pretty easily.

I didn't like the final scoring (unless that was just completely ommited for this testing) were only the attacker scores for occupied objectives and the defender get's nothing, because then I can't even draw unless I still occupy/contest all the objectives, which I think is pretty much impossible.
 
I'm not sure what happened with the scoring. I double-checked the file and the Blue Objectives were marked as "Occupy - Known to Both," which usually means the Objective also applies to Red without having to assign a specific Red objective. Perhaps it's because that mechanism works for QuickBattles but not Scenarios? I'll have to run that down....

There's a number of things that I will be tweaking re: force composition and command point cost based on the outcome and your feedback.
 
I've said it before, and I'll say it again- the Loyalist side requires tanks to fulfill given objectives.

My force was too heavy and too light at the same time. I had a huge number of vehicles, and commanding them all was a chore. The firepower of the vehicles was minimal.

Casualties among the personnel were what you expect from such an attack (minus some obvious mistakes I made*)- for each tank I am missing, a squad of infantry will die. It's really simple, and that is why tanks are pervasive throughout every battlefield we see.

The map was OK, but I have some issues with it- my deployment zone is barely concealed and covered, upon leaving it I am immediately observed and under fire, and to leave it properly, I have to cross a ditch- which resulted in a first turn immobilization. Some of the objects don't have obvious entrances, others cannot be entered through doors. I've encountered numerous walls inside of buildings (both low and high ones). The placement of the objectives zones is sketchy- it allows players to camp in a corner (which is not in a building), and thus deny points to the opponent. Had I encountered something like that in an actual campaign battle, I would immediately resign from further battles.

*Another reason for the high casualty number is the fact that I felt pressured throughout the entire battle. There was very little time to set a proper base, plan the quickest route to the objective.

30 minutes are OK for combined warfare attacks. These crippled attacks (infantry in BMPs or BTRs) simply require more time and more ammo.

It's not 1945, its 2007, every team has a capability to burn a tank, and every team has automatic weapons.
 
Thanks for the feedback Aurelius.

I’ll be taking another rinse-through of the maps. They are all stock so didn’t pay attention to whether or not they had doors in the right places and such. And, I will watch for objective denial hiding spots when I set these up.

I hear you re: tanks and am considering a way to purchase these earlier in the campaign. At the same time, I don’t think that Bleskaceq would say the BMPs were ineffective.
 
Oh yeah, I forgot one thing- swap those BMPs for the ones with AT-3 ATGM. That way, in most situations, they wont be able to fire the ATGM (500 meters of blind zone). I lost an operator because he decided it's wise to fire the ATGM in a very hot and contented zone.
 
I did think about this, but got complaints about the dead zone on AT-3s from others. The Rebels can have vehicles such that the dead zone would be bad for the Loyalists. Most of the maps are <500x500 (yours was 1 of 3 current exceptions out of 21).
 
@Nathangun and @Spoogles - Apologies for not following up, but work and work travel has kept me very busy over the last 4 weeks.

As expected, the Loyalists won, but at a pretty high cost. Also as expected, the Rebels were pretty much wiped out. Were this battle played as part of the campaign, it would be the first battle, and NathanGun would be potentially forced to turn to the survivors for the 4th and final battle of the campaign. NathanGun's "special" airborne platoon would be considered combat-ineffective and unable to be used again in the campaign. The primary tension in the campaign is between the Loyalists winning battles while minimizing casualties over the first 3 battles so that they have enough left for the 4th and final battle. While winning battles is definitely good for the Rebels, inflicting casualties can be almost as welcome.

Questions for each of you:
Was it fun? Would you play 4 battles like that?
What add-ons might you have selected different from those you picked?
Was the map suitable for the battle duration?
What would you change?

Thanks-
 
I took @Aurelius ' advice and did some re-working of the Loyalist OOB. Whereas my previous design had each of the 4 Loyalist commanders leading a distinctly different unit - some with BTRs, some with BMP-1s, some just Infantry, I'm moving to one standard unit for all. Originally, I had wanted differences so that there would be meaningful decisions about which units to deploy in what terrain, and knowing that victorious units can add on armor later in the campaign. But, the discrepancies add complexity, don't reflect the ubiquitous presence of well-worn tanks in civil wars, limit combined-arms strategies, and probably will lead to some NPEs for players without armor early on in the campaign. Each Core Unit for quick battles starts with 1 T-62, 2 BMP-1s, and 3 BTRs, with the possibility to buy add-ons (and more possibilities for the Rebels to counter them).

With that in mind, I'm looking for 2 more PAIRS of players to run a test match using the new OOB and some of the other maps. PM me or respond here if you are interested.

Thanks all! This may be the last major test before this battle station is declared operational.
 
OnePingOnly said:
@Nathangun and @Spoogles - Apologies for not following up, but work and work travel has kept me very busy over the last 4 weeks.

As expected, the Loyalists won, but at a pretty high cost. Also as expected, the Rebels were pretty much wiped out. Were this battle played as part of the campaign, it would be the first battle, and NathanGun would be potentially forced to turn to the survivors for the 4th and final battle of the campaign. NathanGun's "special" airborne platoon would be considered combat-ineffective and unable to be used again in the campaign. The primary tension in the campaign is between the Loyalists winning battles while minimizing casualties over the first 3 battles so that they have enough left for the 4th and final battle. While winning battles is definitely good for the Rebels, inflicting casualties can be almost as welcome.

Questions for each of you:
Was it fun? Would you play 4 battles like that?
What add-ons might you have selected different from those you picked?
Was the map suitable for the battle duration?
What would you change?

Thanks-
Click to expand...

The urban fighting was horrific.
My conscripts easily fled and ran, where as the S.P. platoon were the only ones to stay in a fire fight for all the battle.

I'll play in another.
 
OnePingOnly said:
@Nathangun and @Spoogles - Apologies for not following up, but work and work travel has kept me very busy over the last 4 weeks.

As expected, the Loyalists won, but at a pretty high cost. Also as expected, the Rebels were pretty much wiped out. Were this battle played as part of the campaign, it would be the first battle, and NathanGun would be potentially forced to turn to the survivors for the 4th and final battle of the campaign. NathanGun's "special" airborne platoon would be considered combat-ineffective and unable to be used again in the campaign. The primary tension in the campaign is between the Loyalists winning battles while minimizing casualties over the first 3 battles so that they have enough left for the 4th and final battle. While winning battles is definitely good for the Rebels, inflicting casualties can be almost as welcome.

Questions for each of you:
Was it fun? Would you play 4 battles like that?
What add-ons might you have selected different from those you picked?
Was the map suitable for the battle duration?
What would you change?

Thanks-
Click to expand...
It was a really fun challenge! The campaign abilities definitely need tweaking (I assume for both sides, not just the uncons); the meta-aspect of the campaign will definitely make it less frustrating to have quite literally the entire uncon force wiped in a battle -- I'd definitely play a full campaign; I think the map was ok for the duration, but it could have done to be a bit larger, I think, it would have allowed for a bit more maneuver on both our parts, rather than largely being a grinder as soon as we set up a contiguous line of contact.

It was a good, fun, and challenging battle (the three things you want out of a CM match), but the map definitely made it a bit less dynamic than would have been preferable, especially working with uncons who benefit from depth and frequent repositioning. The size of the map also made a lot of the abilities kind of useless -- or at least a terrible idea. I don't really know how you would use technicals and whatnot on a map that small and dense.

Would happily play another.
 
Thanks, guys!
@Aurelius will again take on @Bleskaceq , this time at the Train Station (urban).
@Nathangun will fight @Spoogles again, in the Green Zone (rural).
Please see the maps and the briefings in the respective BLUE and RED dropboxes. Make your picks using the Command Points, pick 1 "Special ability," PM me and I'll set the battles up.
Let me know if you have any questions!
 
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