Tips from the Frontline

[RNL Tiger]

Result

The final result is:

[RNL Tiger]

Evaluation of performance

Purchase and setup stage:
• On balance the purchasing decisions could have been improved, in particular replacing the reserve platoon and perhaps one sniper with additional support weapons [HMGs/mortar]. In hindsight, I am inclined to have chosen more ATGs in preference to tanks but I was not impressed with the gunnery in this battle of either units
• Wire was completely ineffective and roadblocks would have been better. The trench on the right served its purpose even though it was unoccupied and whilst the anti-tank and anti-personnel mines played no part in the battle that was due to the effective tactical surprise of the attack
• Whilst the strong point setup had a fire-sack in the centre I am happy with that deployment. The attack came from the right, which achieved tactical surprise but the trench being saturated with HE showed what would happen to any thin line of defense on the right
• Infantry, spotter and sniper were well placed

Execution of the Defense:
• Infantry, spotter and sniper were manoeuvred as needed and in time
• ATGs were left in their original position and the expectations about their use against an attack from the right were proved true in that all three were engaged in the battle when the attackers moved towards he centre
• Tanks were used like semi-mobile ATG and once the tanks were in place they effectively lost all mobility because of poor location selection. For example I would have liked to move the surviving tank nearer to the surviving ATG so that at least they could try to stand up to six T34s together; using the principle of united we stand and divided we fall. However, with the tank backed up to the woods and the T34s to the front just out of LOS there was no manoeuvre that I could do that would help the tank to relocate. A tactical mistake if ever there was one for armour. [The downside is that if the tank and ATG were closer together the ATG might have been spotted…]

The purchasing decisions could have been improved but all in all, I was satisfied with the performance - not due to the minor victory but because I made good use of what I had.

[RNL Tiger]

Completion of the Trilogy

This is the third and final part of this set of Tips from the frontline AAR and I feel like I have completed a trilogy! It now contains a lot of accumulated knowledge and it will remain a valuable resource available to all for as long as the Blitz is here.

I said at the start that “As a newcomer…I wanted to learn by doing/playing and to ask questions…because what I wanted was a starting point. Beyond that, as a Combat Mission commander, we need to find our own way and our own truth!” Poor Old Spike has helped me tremendously to know and understand a little more [thanks very much] and I feel positive that I have achieved the starting point that I wanted. Therefore, I have reached the end of the beginning :-) I hope that some of you also find this AAR useful and have enjoyed the battles at the frontline.

[RNL Tiger]

Red lines are outgoing fire, yellow lines are incoming fire....is that what you're talking about? Doesn't have anything to do with LOS/Spotted/attack.

Thanks for that clarification; yes, that is one part of the question. The other part is how do you know if an enemy unit still has LOS to your friendly unit as opposed to the enemy seeing a "spotted marker" i.e. unit was seen there but is not in the enemy view currently.

[PoorOldSpike]

Here's a couple of screenshots of the above action viewed from the defending Germans end of the map.
Blue line is final German front line.
My 9x T-34/85's came up the red arrow from the far end of the map like bats out of hell and covered the full length of the map in 10 turns and then performed the Starfleet Academy hook manoeuvre to hit him in the rear (how kewl is that) but ran into a wall of 2 x PzIVH's and 3x 75ATG's and were stopped in their tracks.
Final tally - 5/9 x T-34's dead, 2/2 x IVH's and 2/3 x 75ATG's dead.
As can be seen, I never pulled my punches, so congrats to noob RNL..:)






White arrows show German fire..
PS - notice my Russian LMG in the far background at my map edge in the corner, I completely forgot to move him the whole game, ha ha ha..

[McIvan]

Red lines are outgoing fire, yellow lines are incoming fire....is that what you're talking about? Doesn't have anything to do with LOS/Spotted/attack.

Thanks for that clarification; yes, that is one part of the question. The other part is how do you know if an enemy unit still has LOS to your friendly unit as opposed to the enemy seeing a "spotted marker" i.e. unit was seen there but is not in the enemy view currently.

You can't be completely sure that you've gone to a "spotted" icon in the enemies eyes. POS has a thread in the tactics section about spotting ranges....outside those ranges if you aren't firing or moving you can be reasonably certain you will soon drop to an icon only. When moving, it becomes a matter of experience. It is better to break contact by getting out of line of sight completely and then sneaking back another way.

On the other hand, if your unit has a yellow incoming line then you know that they've been seen....the yellow line indicates you are being shot at or, if the enemy unit is still turning, about to be shot at.

One slight caveat....a red/yellow targetting line will last a few seconds after the enemy has gone out of sight....eg an enemy tanks going behind a hill or building......but no more than that. So it can be misleading for those few seconds.

Congratulations on your first win over POS!

Congrats also to POS for his admirable assistance to a new player. I would have loved being able to pick Spike's brains when I was new.

[RNL Tiger]

Playing a QB attack

At the start of the game POS had noted "Attack tactics are basic in the extreme - the attacker must simply roll forward until something shoots at him, they he must stop and blow it away. He then continues rolling forwards and repeats the process when something else shoots at him, and so on, in a series of rolls and stops down the map. An attack can therefore be summed up as - roll-stop-shoot/ roll-stop-shoot/ roll-stop-shoot

Remember, you want the defending enemy to shoot so he'll give away his position and you can annihilate him with your numerically-superior force. The fly in the ointment is that every time he fires he might knock out one or two of your tanks, so the whole thing boils down to who runs out of units first."

I favoured the find-fix-flank-or-destroy approach leading with infantry to screen the attacking armour and to identify the key defenses. That sounds good in theory but it also needs to consider the time element. This is a slow approach to the enemy and this became painfully apparent...

It is turn 8 of 20 and I have marched up the left side of the map and occupied a nice hill with a fire support element [2 x 82mm mortar spotters] and a platoon of infantry that can see the nearest two flags. The reconnaissance element was supposed to be the scout car that is zipping around in the front on the left and the two sharpshooters in the centre. Both have come across something but the defence is still pretty much unknown.



There are two key points:
1) Time is fast running out for the attack that has still not really engaged the enemy and it is approaching the half-way mark of the battle
2) The reconnaissance has not worked well because the defence has exercised fire discipline and consequently the attack still has neither identified the shape of the defence nor priority targets to find-fix-flank-or-destroy.

This leads to the following conclusions:
* Infantry led attacks are slower and consequently this needs to be considered during the planning stage
* Reconnaissance needs to identify the defenders, this can be hard when the opponent exercises good fire discipline

There is a place for both roll-stop-shoot and find-fix-flank-or-destroy in the attackers repetoire the key is to use them as needed for the circumstances [forces, time, map...].

[kineas]

Playing a QB attack

"Attack tactics are basic in the extreme - the attacker must simply roll forward until something shoots at him, they he must stop and blow it away. He then continues rolling forwards and repeats the process when something else shoots at him, and so on, in a series of rolls and stops down the map. An attack can therefore be summed up as - roll-stop-shoot/ roll-stop-shoot/ roll-stop-shoot

A more elaborated version can be found here

20 minutes is very,very short time for an attack on a map like that. More like 35+.
It will take 10-15 turns for you to get near the flags.

[McIvan]

Spike's advice on QB attack tactics is limited strictly to games with a time limit so short that you can't properly utilise any tactics at all except running forward. I don't know of anyone (except POS) who would accept a 20+ turn attack/defend.....35+ is the usual or maybe 40+. There are people who think that's too short as well and want 50-60.

You can only get away with 20+ if your force is essentially mechanised...nothing much on foot.

[Der Kuenstler]

I agree - 35+ turns would be the absolute minimum for an attack battle - you've got to have time to scout ahead and take care of your forces. A successful 20 turn attack would be dang near impossible...