Locking Zones of Control: Do you use them?

[JDR Dragoon]

No. Emphatically no. An infantry battalion equipped like a german WW2 one is supposed (at full or near full strenght) to be able to comfortably hold a sector of up to 3 kilometers (not frontage, but a sector, this is with a company in reserve behind the two frontline companies and with the heavy weapons company spread out in support). Holding a sector of 3 kilometers is of course dependent on free line of sight, in closed terrain like forests and cities it would of course be less. Battalions of other nationalities with more companies, and modern infantry battalions with armored carriers, utilizing autocannons and ATGMs are supposed to be able to hold even larger frontages (up to 5-7 kilometers, depending upon exact strenght and armaments). A company per kilometer is a luxurious position to be in and only achieveable in the most contested defensive sectors. In most other WW2 cases a company would have to hold longer frontages, possibly up to 2 kilometers (assisted by battalion and regimental heavy weapons of course). The main way of denying terrain to the enemy is through fire, not through presence.

[Liquid_Sky]

I think you guys are missing the element of time.

You have a 120 men in a hex (single counter). There is another one on each side of it, separated by an empty hex. In the opposite hex, you have 1200 men in a number of counters.

Should the attacker be allowed to walk freely through gap, suffering the light firepower of a company? Can the single defender not 'shift' slightly to match the movement of the units in front of him? The game is UgoIgo. Which means while the attacker is moving, the defender is static. The only thing the computer will do for him is shoot. In reality, the defender would have outposts. When those outposts get attacked, defenders would move up to block.

The game has a mechanism for the attacker to overwhelm the defender. Its called Assault. It has another mechanism to deal with defenders unable to show some semblance of defence..its called Broken.

The game will allow the attacker to 'chain' assault a position. If I have an entire division stacked in three hexes in front of a company, I will probably assault it three times at huge odds. It will probably disrupt. If the weather is nice, I can even advance a hex forward and assault it again.

If you have afv's, you can even 'push' the defender out of the way, making a hole...since the defender has units 'spread out' every second hex. All in a 2 hour turn.

Where the 'zoc' breaks down is when the attacker uses two units to isolate a defender. And one of those units is ridiculously small..like a 3 flak halftrack unit that whipped around. However, in practice this happens fairly rarely. The defender knows this can happen, and will defend in depth by putting a second unit behind the first.


If you allow 'leaky zocs' in the game, then you need to give the defender enough units to cover the front line. Which means more counters as the companies become split into half companies, or even platoons. Which still means the defender is not going to just walk through the front line, but will have to assault.

[goomohn]

JDR Dragoon:

Most WW2 battalions would expected to be able to man a 3 kilometer frontage fully and be able to hold it against all comers, holding at least a company or two in positions in depth behind the frontline companies (depending on whether the battalion has 3 or 4 rifle companies). And with that depth and reserve comes the ability to dominate terrain to the sides and rear by the shifting of fires and/or men to alternate targets and positions. This is how you dominate a position of 9 sq. km.

Handbook On German Military Forces [http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/Germany/HB/HB-4.html]:

The width and depth of a German defense area depend upon the terrain and the proportional strength of friendly and hostile forces. In general, however, the width of a defensive sector assigned to a unit is approximately twice the width of the sector when the same unit attacks. Normal sectors are: platoon, 220 to 550 yards; company, 440 to 1,100 yards; battalion, 880 to 2,200 yards; regiment, 2,200 to 3,300 yards; division, 6,600 to 11,000 yards.

I'm not gonna entertain an argument that a WW2 battalion could actually dominate a position of 9 sq km. Say if it was surrounded on all sides by enemy units which are in turn surrounded on all sides by units friendly to the isolated battalion. It's threat of fire is so great no enemy unit may march into its ZOC to snuff the lone battalion out?

[goomohn]

Should the attacker be allowed to walk freely through gap, suffering the light firepower of a company? Can the single defender not 'shift' slightly to match the movement of the units in front of him?

Yes, I think the player on his turn should be allowed to maneuver through gaps between enemy forces at 3 times cost in MPs. Which during good conditions would allow an infantry formation to move one hex under enemy opportunity fire without firing itself. If the attacking player has 1200 men facing 360 men strung out in defensive positions, he should probably attack/assault the 120 men he is facing. He should also try to send forces to flank that position in case the assault cannot push forward, and to threaten the other companies 2km away from the position he's up against. The defender is defending his 1km position, he can't shift men a km away.

[JDR Dragoon]

Nachts waren die Soldaten der 15. I.D. mit dem Ausbau der Stellungen, mit dem Abmähen von Schußbahnen in den Getreidefeldern, mit dem Verdrahten und Verminen von Mulden und mit dem Verschieben von Horchposten beschäftigt. Die Nester waren teilweise weit auseinander gezogen. Lücken von 100 bis 150 Meter waren nicht selten. Der Abschnitt des I. / 81 hatte z. B. eine Breite von 4, 4 km, die mit zwei Schützenkompanien und einer MG-Kompanie besetzt war, während eine weitere Schützenkompanie nicht in diesem Abschnitt eingesetzt werden konnte, da sie vom Regiment anderweitig verwendet wurde. Eine Ablösung war somit nicht möglich; alle Soldaten mussten in den vordersten Stellungen bleiben.

Die Geschichte der 15. Infanteriedivision 1935 - 1945

And the example above is not even the most extreme one I could find.

You will also note that the Handbook (which is a US, not a german source by the way) is pretty normative. Indeed, the company frontage is merely the frontage of 2 platoons doubled (and the frontage of a battalion is that of two companies doubled). By adding in heavy weapons (from battalion or regiment) between the units it becomes possible to extend the frontage by interlocking the fields of fire of two or more positions. Of course, some parts of the battalion front, such as forests or towns might require heavier manning as well, due to shorter fields of fire, contracting the frontage in the proces.

[goomohn]

So? The I./81 regiment is defending acrossed a river from the Red Army. In game terms they would be split into companies to cover this wide a sector. The 263 Jaeger division is on the immediate right. They are certainly not dominating a 9 sq km sector. If the Soviets had them surrounded this battalion couldn't be issued speeding tickets for escaping through Soviet zone's of control.

You said a battalion could control a front and depth of 3km. That is not true. I'm not your student on military theory and don't need a lesson in the size of infantry formation frontages. There is no logical reason for ZOCs beyond the slowing and care which a commander must maneuver acrossed an enemies flank. Logically if there is a kilometer of ground open between two enemy formations, armor should be able to move into and through this gap within 2 hours and still be able to fire into the enemies flank.

[JDR Dragoon]

In that case why don´t you try your hand at creating some scenarios featuring your ideas of how ZOCs should function and how great a frontage a unit of a given size should be able to control? In that case you will actually see whether or not your ideas can even be represented in the game and what their consequences will be with regard to the historical outcome (the last ony for the non-hypothetical games of course).

[goomohn]

Yeah I've already emailed ComradeP about it. Would you like to try one? I have M'41, S'42 installed. If you agree I'll send you my first turn. I think the base Panzer Campaigns system has be remodeled so much that the earlier games are way out of whack. Using Alternate fires (which I believe are more realistic as well) also greatly unbalances the game. Movement multiplier games would have those spread out front lines rolling back to defend the objectives. I believe it would be more realistic.

[raizer]

playability, imho will always trump realism

we are talking abstract 2 hour turns with robotic, random op fire with the players having total and immediate feedback on every unit that comes into contact with every and all enemy units. Not very realistic, but adds to the feel of the game. A very balanced scenario in PZ campaigns is a rare treat in the gaming world and pz campaigns has hundreds of balanced scenarios, many coming down to the the last turn-probably the reason its been around for almost 15yrs and this group is still going strong...

Locking zocs wrecks playability and game balance

[Liebchen]

playability, imho will always trump realism

we are talking abstract 2 hour turns with robotic, random op fire with the players having total and immediate feedback on every unit that comes into contact with every and all enemy units. Not very realistic, but adds to the feel of the game. A very balanced scenario in PZ campaigns is a rare treat in the gaming world and pz campaigns has hundreds of balanced scenarios, many coming down to the the last turn-probably the reason its been around for almost 15yrs and this group is still going strong...

Locking zocs wrecks playability and game balance

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