Tips from the Frontline

[RNL Tiger]

Coup de grace

So, the tactical situation on my left is dire; on my right it is inconsequential, the centre has stalled and my once proud armour force has been reduced to a single Tiger, trapped by two T34s. So, as General Foch at Marne said: “[My centre is giving way, my right is in retreat;] situation excellent, I shall attack.”

The key question, is what should I attack now? The battle was sliding away and I needed to score a local victory to tip the scales back in my favour. There were two key options:
1) Send the tiger to knockout the last two T34s
2) Reconnect the tiger with the infantry to take the two flags in the centre

I decided to reconnect the tiger. However, POS suggested the more aggressive and risky option 1, leading me to say that if the tiger had gone after those last two tanks he would probably have got his turret blown off. “At that range 2 versus 1 - it seems highly unlikely my tiger would survive?”

“You're behind on points and are possibly going to lose, therefore logic dictates that you must try to pull some miracles out of the bag, you've got no choice, so send the Tig to try knocking out my last 2 T-34's, you've nothing to lose because this is a non-ladder game and you needn't worry about anything, just have fun..:)”

You can’t argue with the logic. Of course, for me there is only a limited amount of fun in watching my paper tigers fall in front of the might of the T34/85. It is much more fun to blast defenceless infantry with a Tiger! However, my tiger was about to meet its Waterloo as POS prepared to administer the coup de grace to my crack tiger.

Interestingly, I wondered how he knew the quality of my remaining tank crew was crack, especially as previously tanks had been misidentified and when I had clicked on them the crew quality section was blank. “That's 'extreme fog of war' for you, its quite normal for crews to misidentify tanks, its very realistic, you see what they think they see, for example if you're Russian in a game and you see Tigers coming towards you, they might not be Tigers, just ordinary panzer IV's or whatever. All nations mis-identify like that, but after a turn or two they realise their mistake and identify it properly. TIP - If they haven't ID'd a tank yet, you can still get an idea of what it is by the sound of its gun, a crack means small calibre, a bang means medium, and a thunderous roar means something big and nasty… Extreme fog of war is the one everybody uses because it’s the most realistic.”

“Just click on a tank to see its quality, like in the picture below:


can you see the word 'Crack' at bottom left? However I can't be absolutely sure it’s correct because of the fog of war thing, but from experience I know it’s probably correct. But early in games the quality readout won't show for most enemy tanks, it only shows after the tanks have been around and under observation for a while. It's realistic, I read somewhere that tank commanders can often tell the quality of an enemy tank crew by seeing how well or how bad they operate. The only reason its important in CM is because if you know an enemy tank crew is good or bad it'll help you make decisions better, I mean if you know a crew is low-quality you might decide to risk a shootout with it.”

So, let’s go back to the trapped tiger. The T34s moved away for some reason and I used the opportunity to reconnect the tiger with the infantry in the centre. However, it became clear why the T34s had moved away, I had left a STuG as a sitting duck by the left flag. In all of the excitement of the STuG shootout and lamenting their loss I had not actually noticed that one of them had only been gun-hit and had runaway. Of course, that was simply too tempting a target for POS, who quickly dispatched it. That was a REALLY BAD mistake on my part, not paying close attention to all of the battlefield and all of the units and consequently missing an opportunity to save the STuG.

However, my Tiger was not in the centre long before a T34 came up on the left and started to attack the infantry, whilst its partner was down in the valley [see it just behind the flag]. It looked like an opportunity to knockout the T34 before the other one arrived on the scene. Time to hunt the T34…



That first T34 has started to move, now where is it going? Hold on a moment, where is that second T34 going – it looks like it is trying to get behind my tiger? I can't believe it, IT IS trying to get behind my tiger. No! Surely it cannot make it in time…



Yes it can – and did. In the last 8 seconds both T34s engaged my tiger in a pincer movement and the first shot from the T34 knocks out the tiger before it can even get a single shot off…Coup de grace administered – game over.



My message to POS: They think its all over - it is now :-) That was a very nice manoeuvre on your part and especially well timed [how did you do that - gut instinct?] to have both tanks get into LOS from two different directions at pretty much the same time. In both scenarios [tiger turns to face either tank] you would have a rear shot and you would possibly only lose one tank for the tiger or even better as happened here you get a one shot knockout! :-) Anyway, very well done - it was really nice to watch but it would have been even better if it was someone else's tiger!!! :-)

I looked at your tank in the valley and I didn't think it would get to the tiger fast enough [you only used fast commands or did you throw a hunt in for that tank - looks like fast only] so I decided to go after your "bait" relying on the crack crew in a better tank. I also assume that you deliberately drove right up to where the tiger was originally as opposed to crest the hill in hunt mode to make a harder target and also to cover the case where I decided [as I did] to move the tiger?

“Yes I wanted the 2x T-34s to arrive in position at exactly the same time (what we holy men call a coordinated attack) to sandwich the Tig in their crossfire because it couldn't fire at both of them at once..:) The T-34 on your left had less distance to cover but all his waypoints delayed his move for 20 seconds just as I'd planned, thereby giving the T-34 miles away in the valley time to climb up the road and over the hill. I used 'Fast' for both tanks because I simply wanted to plonk them in position as fast as possible, although I did add a little Hunt 'hook' to one of the T-34s.
If I'd used a lot of 'Hunt' waypoints the tanks might have stopped too close to woods as soon as they saw the Tig, and I didn't want to risk eggs come flying out of the woods. So using 'Fast' carried my boys well clear of the woods before stopping.
Like I always say - "Fight with your brain first and your weapons second".

As for deliberately delaying your units movement, there are two ways to do it - Hitting the 'P' button, or adding waypoints.(the waypoints needn't trace a zigzag path, they can all be in a straight line if you like) To begin with, estimate how much delay you want to give the unit (lets say 15 seconds). But a P will only give you 10 seconds (not enough), and another P will give 20 seconds (too much). So the solution is to give it one P (10secs), then one or two extra waypoints of 2 or 3 secs each to fine-tune the delay to 15 seconds”

The loss of my final tank has really finished the game and whilst I took the flag on the right it is clearly an Allied Victory.