Tips from the Frontline

[RNL Tiger]

Force Selection

I have mainly played scenarios for two simple reasons
1) Location, date, terrain and weather are all pre-set
2) Forces are pre-set including whether there are any reinforcements
Easy! Just get on and play it.

Of course, it is then tempting to not seriously think about what forces you want or need in the situation or to fully appreciate their strengths and weaknesses – you simply use what is there. POS noted “QB's can't be examined in the editor, that’s one of the reasons they're so popular, neither of you knows what the other person has bought and you can surprise each other..:)”, that sounded good.

So we would play a QB and immediately I was confused, because of all those options that you jointly agree on:

[If you wish to use this picture or edit it please go right ahead]

Seeing the QB parameters for only the second time in my Combat Mission experience I truly realised how little I understood these options and how they might affect force selection. In short, there is no real substitute for playing with the parameters just to test the result and to see what the available forces are for a given year and especially what the terrain looks like.

However, setting the options is easy compared to force selection and buying – infantry, armour, support… After all what do most of these things actually do and how do they compare? If those selected forces are put into battle how are they likely to perform? Looking at the armour I recognised a number of the tanks but not much else. Equally “The armour readout as you run your cursor over tanks at the buy screen gives only a ROUGH guide to armour thickness. The cost is no guide at all, because higher prices don't necessarily mean better tanks. So the ONLY way to fully check out each subtype is to line them up on parade in the editor and examine them that way..:)
And remember when you select a year and month, only the models in service at that time will appear on the buy screen. So buy those, then re-set the date to a later period (say 6 months on), and buy the newer model, then set the date another 6 months forward until you've bought all the models there are.”

So, what is really needed is a way to see the unit details and perhaps even test their performance in a staged scenario. Enter the Scenario Editor, which I had never used. The instructions from POS: “Just go in the editor and place units on a blank map so you can look up all sorts of data. To set up a test -
Click Scen editor> Parameters> Set Date> OK> OK> Unit Editor>
Axis> Armour> Quality> Click 10 times on unit in list to 'buy' it>
Allied> Armour> Qual> Click 10> OK>
Map Editor> Preview> key 5 overall view> click on unit> key P> click to place unit, then place rest> GO>
Done>Save> type a name and save it>Exit
Start Game> choose any side> Hotseat> OK> don't bother with passwords> GO, and hit GO several more times until the shooting starts”

“Never start a game without knowing the capabilities of your and your enemies’ weapons. So when in doubt, set up a test (like we all do) in the editor, by lining up say 10 tanks (or guns etc) against 10 enemy tanks then leaving them alone (don't issue orders) to shoot it out and see which side comes off best.
I've just done that in a scenario called High Tide, I examined it and saw that it was Russian T-34's and KV-1's versus German PzIII longs and IV longs. I had a rough idea of their capabilities but to be sure I ran several tests pitting type against type, and discovered they rank like this (best at top)
IVG
KV1
PzIII
T-34
So I began the battle knowing exactly what each type can do, it's priceless intelligence…:)”

The key point that POS was making was that - “games are often won or lost at the purchase screen”, so reviewing unit details and perhaps setting up small tests to understand performance is important. “Don't forget to buy by the platoon (tanks) and by the company (infantry), they cost much less that way, but by all means buy individual tanks and infantry platoons if you've got cash left… And don't forget to set your quality… Incidentally players often agree not to buy Tigers or Panthers or Stalins or whatever during the parameter discussion stage, that's another option.”

So, making progress but how about unit quality? “Quality-wise, ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS buy VETERAN Armour and VETERAN AT-guns, as anything worse (Regular/Green/Conscript) is a waste of cash. Don't bother with expensive Cracks and Elites, as Vets can do the job well enough. However you CAN buy Regular infantry if you want, as they're fairly reliable.”


I was starting to get the idea but I wanted to get an understanding of force selection in the overall context of the type of battle: “ALL the tanks and ATG's are VETERAN. (the infantry can be only regular to save cash)

2000 points QB MEETING,
10x tanks
5 x inf platoons
1x sniper
3 x HMG's
3x shreks/baz/piats

2000 pts ATTACK
2x cheap armd cars
15x tanks
9 x inf plats
2x engineer plats

2000 pts DEFEND
2 x tanks
6x ATG's
9x inf plats
1x sniper
9 x HMG's
2x light mortars
4xshreks/baz/piats
4x ATmines/ 4x anti-pers mines/6x wire/3x roadblocks (discuss with opponent first the max number of mines/wire/blocks to be allowed)

Here are two typical force ratios for 2000-point Meetings -
https://www.theblitz.club/message_boards...?tid=42413
See, about 8 tanks and 5 infantry platoons plus a few support vehicles, MG's, shrecks etc.”

Seeing that force selection gave me a number of questions:
a) Why no scouts for the ME but you do have them [2 cheap armoured cars] for attack? How do you use them?
b) For larger numbers of platoons why not choose a company?
c) Would you select all of the same tanks or mix it up a little? If mixing, why?
d) Similar to above would you choose a selection of infantry i.e. SMG and rifle?
e) You have selected light mortar for the defence - why?

“1 - In ME's we know the enemy is starting on the far side of the map so we don't need scouts to tell us that, I just race hell for leather at top speed for the flags and therefore have no need for recce vehicles. Also there are no mines in ME's so I don't need cars to sniff them out..:)

2 - Yes the word 'company' also usually means '3 x infantry platoons'

3 - I don't mix tank types, I prefer the bulk of my force to be the same type so that they all have the same speed, same gun, same armour etc. Likewise a formation aerobatic team wouldn't dream of having a mix of F-16's, Boeing 747's and Sopwith camels.. My standard force of 10 tanks would consist of something like 8xPanzer IVH's and a couple of Tigers, or 8x T-34/85 and a couple of Stalins

4 - Choice of infantry is far less critical than choice of tanks, and you can therefore mix SMG's/ Infantry etc

5 - Mortars are good on the defense because you can plaster clusters of enemy infantry, the blast effect can pin a whole bunch and make them crawl for cover. By contrast a burst of HMG fire doesn't pin more than about a couple on squads per burst. However, mortars quickly run out of shells so my main choice in defense would be lots of HMG's”

So, I looked at the unit details and ran a few simple tests and then I happily made my force selection for this QB using 1992 of 2000 points:
• 1xPlatoon Tiger PzVIE Late [what self respecting Axis player doesn’t love the big cats?]
• 1xPlatoon STuG IIIG Middle [cheap!]
• 1xCompany Jager 44
• 2xPlatoon Jager 44
• 1xSharpshooter

I was feeling quite confident at this stage that I was making progress but I was about to get a rude awakening.