CMx2 tactical notes and observations

[PoorOldSpike]

YOURS OR HIS?
It's sometimes hard to tell who artillery belongs to, especially if you and your oppo have both got barrages dropping at the same time.
Orient the view so that you can see the angle the shells are dropping at, here they're angling down from the righthand (German) side of the map, so they're German (ignore the raindrops)..





This barrage is coming in from the left (US) side of the map so these must be American-


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STOP IT!
To halt a barrage, select your spotter and click the Arty button (circled)-





Then click the Available Arty window, then the 'Cease Fire' button


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THE 'EMERGENCY' ARTY CALL IS A WASTE OF SHELLS
Let's select the offmap 81mm mortar-





And give it a 'Point' target smack on that small barn.
(Note that although I clicked in the middle of the roof, the end of the target line jumped to the nearest tile, that's normal for Cmbn arty and area-fire placement)
I make it an 'Emergency' immediate mission and begin the turn-





And less than a minute into the turn the shells start coming in, but impact hopelessly off target at top left





Now let's restart the test and use any mission type except 'Emergency'. I select a 'Heavy' immediate mission-





And start the turn. Nothing comes in until almost the end of the turn when the spotting round on the right arrives, followed by two more the next turn.
(Note- sometimes only one or two spotting rounds arrive, whatever the spotter thinks are needed)





Finally the first shell of the barrage arrives about halfway through the turn

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Quickly followed by the rest of the barrage smack on target-





Scratch one barn-


Summary- Emergency missions arrive less than a minute into the turn, but because they don't use preliminary spotting rounds, they're likely to be off target.
So tactically they're only useful if the target is spread across a huge area of the map, for example a zillion men and tanks coming at you, as no matter where the shells fall, they're bound to hit something.

Non-Emergency missions won't arrive for about one and a half turns/minutes, but they'll arrive on target, and you'll have to hope the enemy is still there.

Note- times may vary slightly from game to game, and might also vary according to what calibre shells are being called in)

(Incidentally if you plot any arty in the Setup phase, it arrives with no delay and smack on target even if the spotter has no LOS, so beware getting a bombardment on you on turn 1 if your oppo guesses where your start line is.

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DIFFICULTY LEVEL
I play at Basic Training level because it's the nearest to CMx1's 'extreme fog of war'.
I tried playing CMBN at 'Veteran' level but didn't like it at all because the f.o.w. was far too severe and unrealistic, I had enemy units vanishing and being replaced with question mark icons all the time even though they were near to my own units with clear LOS.
For examp here's a shot from a Veteran level game, there are two German question marks at lower left in clear view of my US tanks but I haven't a clue whether they're vehicles or infantry.
That's what I mean about Vet level (and higher) being too severe and unrealistic. If this was Basic Training level, they'd show as proper 3D units, not as question marks.



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BEWARE: ARCS PREVENT FACING
You can't normally insert a 'Face' order while you've got an arc like this, that's why the Arc order is dulled out in the orders panel.
So that means at the end of the move the tank will be unable to pivot, and although his turret is pointing down the arc just fine towards the enemy at the far end of the map, his hull will sit there for the rest of the turn suicidally presenting its weaker side armour to the enemy like this.
(Not until the next Order phase will you be able to cancel the arc ('Delete' key) to get your 'Face' option back, and can then issue the face order)



Now the RIGHT way; the tank will move AND Face all in one action phase in this second test.
Slap on the arc, place your waypoints, right-click an empty area of screen, then left-click on the final waypoint to make it glow white. This will give you the 'Face' option back, so just point the blue Face line down the map then start the action phase




Voila!, and now the machine has moved and faced all in one turn..:)

Summary- remember arcs won't allow facing unless you either kill the arc first, or click the final waypoint to attach a face order to it.
In fact arcs can confuse our crews during highly-mobile gameplay, so I tend to only use them when things are pretty static.

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M8 HMC's no good at long range [/COLOR]
(Old hands will already know that but I like to make my posts as noob-friendly as possible)
A line of panzers on that distant ridge are making mincemeat of my Shers and HMC's. This HMC (circled) is bravely firing 75mm HEAT rounds at the arrowed PzIVH which is so far away it's almost invisible-





But its shot hits the ground (circled) in front of a panzer. The arrow indicates the firing HMC.
Other long range HMC shots during this game have been just as inaccurate, either sailing over the panzers or going wide and rarely hitting at this long range, especially in these dull rainy conditions. That's because The HMC's stubby low-velocity gun is only good for shorter range work in thick bocage or cities where it can't miss.
(The same applies to all other HE/HEAT-firing guns too, such as the Sherman 105mm or Stug 105mm, their accuracy drops off at longer ranges)


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POSITIONING[/COLOR]

I order my infantry to jog on "Quick" to behind that low bocage





They arrive and auto-line up along it. (the sighting line is just to check they have LOS through it).
Inf will always automatically line up like that after arriving behind hedges/bocage.walls/houses





But often when they arrive behind something they might still be facing in the direction of travel, so give them a Face order like this to make them look square through the bocage. (Units spot enemies quicker in the direction they're facing)





and next move phase they'll turn to face like this. (loose guys such as the crawler often occur in CMBN, sometimes it takes 2 or more turns for them to decide to get into formation)





Alternatively you can tag a Face order on to the end of the move order like this; first place the waypoint then rightclick an empty map area to free up the cursor, then leftclick on the white ball and issue the face order-

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Now lets run them behind a wall





And bingo, they neatly line up along it when they get there..





And you can issue a Face order





to make them face square across it..



1479587]Running them behind a house. I tried to place the waypoint centrally behind the house but it jumped to the left, it happens in CMBN and there's nothing we can do about it-





They arrive and auto-line up along the wall, although one guy went too far and is exposed-





Let's run them into that house, there are more windows upstairs than down, so we'll send them to Level 2 where they'll have good views. The waypoint jumps to the house centre, that's good enough..





They arrive and cluster in 3 groups around the 3 windows. LOS is good so I don't think there's any need to issue a Face order to fine-tune things..





What happens if we run them into empty ground?-

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they arrive and adopt a basically line abreast formation in the direction of travel-




Tip- click around to locate the available waypoints, I'm expecting the enemy to come down the red arrow so I think the circled waypoint is the one I want-




Cancel the waypoints and issue a move order to the one we want-





Hopeless! the squad prefers to huddle behind the wall, and their LOS can only see directly left, not able to see round the house at all-





So I pull them back to try another waypoint..





Okay,after re-facing that seems to looks alright, they can see down the side of the house-





But as we sweep the LOS line around, we see the squad has only got 'partial' LOS straight down the side, which means only part of the squad can see there.
Partial lines occur frequently in CMBN, it's realistic and we have to decide whether to accept it or try another waypoint. This will have to do-



Let's try ordering a schreck team to that position-





Hopeless! Like the infantry squad, they prefer to huddle safely behind the house, so I issue this order to pull them back to a new waypoint-

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and after re-facing them they can now see reasonably round the corner. Tactically speaking, the house shields them nicely from the full might of the enemy force, and hopefully they'll be able to pick off enemy tanks one by one as they come poking their noses around the house-


Summary- Trying to fine-position units in CMBN is like trying to play a guitar with gloves on, it just can't be done and feels clumsy and awkward, but also provides an interesting challenge to us as commander to put our boys into tactically-good positions where they can strut their stuff.
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MAIN GUN AND MG CAN ENGAGE DIFFERENT TARGETS
Here my PzIV kills an M8 with its main gun while at the same time machinegunning infantry with its bow MG



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ENDGAME TRIGGER
I'm finding in QB's v AI that if a side has taken a hell of a beating, the computer usually automatically stops the game around turn 10 and awards victory to the other side.
But in this one my Germans have inflicted terrible losses on the US armour and all shooting has ended, yet turn 10 has come and gone (clock lower right) but the computer is letting it go on
[img]http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub3/mp2.gif]/img]

So I reverse my Marder into the bright yellow Objective Zone, (in some games it's bright green) toggle it on/off with ALT-J



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NOTE:- remember Battlefront might bring out updates, patches and mods from time to time, so future graphics and gameplay might differ slightly from what you're seeing in these screenshots.
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