3 things I'm tired of

[Askari19]

I now know how to exploit the rule, but it still strikes me as gamey and unrealistic and I'm embarassed to use it, kind of like overrunning HQs with empty halftracks

My experience since then has shown a lot more unreasonable outcomes - is that better than "silly"? - from the original assault rules than from EA. HSL, I get that your sample set and your view of what's reasonable differs. Don't mean nothin'. I don't need to be right, and you can't prove me "wrong" nor vice versa. Nothing to bicker about.

I hope we are not coming off as bickering. We just disagree based on our individual experiences.
Mine first was a lone German machine gun platoon that the game engine die rolls made into a superman machine gun platoon.
Yes, the Mg was in a town and in an IP. But, it was attacked over and over for about eight turns by an entire battalion of British infantry supported by artillery & engineers. Each turn it would be disrupted and disrupted and disrupted and disrupted and then assaulted multiple times from multiple hexes. Each turn the 15% die roll would save it and it would regain it's morale. By the ninth turn I had finally reduced it's strength enough for it to go away.
I honestly find that more unrealistic than a company of Panthers wiping out a company of T-34's.

And, although I do not know the exact situation (of your half track example) I do not see anything wrong with a platoon or two of armed half tracks overrunning a HQ. But, that is just me.
I think that HT's also are good to go overrunning AT guns too. Another of my experiences involved disrupted AT guns that could not succumb to being overrun by armor and bren carriers.



HSL

Yep, I know what you're talking about with the apparently invincible EA-on defenders... I (fortunately) haven't run into that too often, if I had, it might change my tune.

Halftracks! that probably wasn't the best example to use. As we discussed a while back, I'm mostly OK with armed halftracks doing whatever they want - although if they're personnel carriers, I tend to keep them tethered to their passenger units to some extent. That's so hard to define that I wouldn't try to write it into an ROE or ask it of anyone else, but it's the difference between, say, covering a flank, providing fire support, or assaulting enemy positions that the dismounts are engaged with - versus leaving their dismounts and raiding independently like cavalry into the rear areas for targets of opportunity. If someone wants to do the latter, I'll accept it and hope to make them regret it! Anyway, what I was trying to say is that there are things that we can do within the rules and even within a good set of house rules/ROE that pass the 'legal' test but that I'm uncomfortable with from a "realistic tactics and doctrine" standpoint, and original CS assaults are often in that category.... for me.

[Von Earlmann]

Actually the assault rule in the original game wasn't all that bad......if we could get a better morph between that and the EA rule it would be perfect imo.The EA rule closely resembles the original except for the wierd unit that will hold of more than the entire garrison of the Alamo did. Fix that and we got a good rule :-)

Halftracks are great for assaults.....even better if you load the infantry for more firepower.......:-)......

HALFTRACKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

VE

[PawelM]

talking of haftracks ........

[Herr Straße Laufer]

HSL,
It was not a haltrack. It Was anti aircraft mobile german sdkfz. I have not seen anyone mentioning any restrictions assaulting with these. And anyway, who said it was a PBEM game and not local game aginst AI?

Ghosts of haftrack seem to be haunting every thread. They bound to come up even if I do not mention them :)

It's not a half track? Oh boy!

http://www.wwiivehicles.com/germany/sdkfz-list.asp

Looks like one to me. If it is armed with 20mm or 37mm AA gun it is still a half track.
And yes, my personal ROE's cover half tracks that carry AA guns, AT guns, machine guns, mortars, and artillery guns.

And, you made reference to an assault with a half track in a post immediately following a description of a PBEM assault? Are you looking just for an argument and doing so by erecting the strawman that Askari19 referred to in an earlier post?

Here I thought we could have an apples to apples discussion. You brought a fruit stand?
If I used a half track to assault a heavy tank playing against the AI, because the game engine allows it, I would also feel like it would be reshuffling the cards when playing solitaire.
Who would know? Who would care?



HSL

[PawelM]

It's not a half track? Oh boy!

http://www.wwiivehicles.com/germany/sdkfz-list.asp

Looks like one to me. If it is armed with 20mm or 37mm AA gun it is still a half track.
And yes, my personal ROE's cover half tracks that carry AA guns, AT guns, machine guns, mortars, and artillery guns.

Well you are correct it is a halftrack after all. My mistake. The point was related to the fact that this AA HALFTRACK ( as it turns out) has an assault factor of 1. I can give examples of units with assault of 1 which are not halftracks. For instance Russian GAZ-4M-AA and GAZ-AAA-12.7 Anti aircraft trucks, Russian Sniper team......

I think they could achieve the same with EA off. I personally dislike the idea of my Tiger platoon being captured by Sniper team cooperating with GAZ AA truck... :) --- (or any other unit which has assault factor of 1 or 2). Again my personal opponion and I do not expect everyone to share it....

And unfortunately to cover for that you would propably need to extend your ROE in case you disliked it as much or more than me.

And, you made reference to an assault with a half track in a post immediately following a description of a PBEM assault? Are you looking just for an argument and doing so by erecting the strawman that Askari19 referred to in an earlier post?

Not sure what made you think I was trying to achieve that? Just to make it clear I was not looking for an argument nor bulding any strawmen. I was expressing my oppion ( as everyone else here ) and sharing my exeperience on playing with EA off and on...

[PawelM]

On the same note. The analysis of the assault factors of some units makes me wonder what the designer of the game had in mind when deciding that russian ATR infantry platton has an assault factor equal to 0. This is the same for russian AT 45mm guns (i.e. 0 assault factor).
When I put it to comparison with ZIS-5 AT TRUCK (as well russian) which in unit viewer is descibed as:

"ZIS-5 Anti-Tank trucks were a stop-gap measure in order to provide more mobile anti-tank capabilities. The ZIS-5 truck was given armoured body and mounted a 7.62mm machinegun in the cab and the 45mm anti-tank gun in the rear deck, chassis and all. "

And it has an assault factor of 1?

I would like to think that the designer applied the same logic for each when making the decision on the assault factor.

Maybe a way of tackling AT trucks or snipers with assault factors of 1 capturing heavy tanks could be splitting the assault factor in to 2 values, i.e. HARD and SOFT exactly as for direct fire?

Then if a sniper had soft assault factor of 1 and hard assault facotr of 0 nothing would let him capture the Tiger even with EA off?

Just a thought?

[Herr Straße Laufer]

Maybe a way of tackling AT trucks or snipers with assault factors of 1 capturing heavy tanks could be splitting the assault factor in to 2 values, i.e. HARD and SOFT exactly as for direct fire?

Then if a sniper had soft assault factor of 1 and hard assault facotr of 0 nothing would let him capture the Tiger even with EA off?

Just a thought?

You are joking?

You must be. Or, are you are being provocative?

Either way, I'll update my personal ROE's to include the snipers. They came out after most ROE were put in place.
Unless I read about a sniper team capturing a Tiger, of course.



HSL

[PawelM]

I am sure that if I looked through all units available in CS I would find a lot of them having with an assault factor of 1. Regardless of the unit specifics, I would consider them having the same low probability of being able to capture heavy tank platoon. I would imagine this could be only possible if tank crew had a very low morale and new the doom was coming a decided to surrender.

On the game side I would be equally upset if my heavy tank was scooped by aunit representing an AT mounted on a truck as by any other unit. And to be honest I would propably need to make my ROE list very long to list any possible unit which I felt had little chance of succesful assault.

This is why I prefer to play EA in place

[Herr Straße Laufer]

My armor won't be scooped up by snipers or armed HT's & armed trucks alone. At least once per opponent that is.

And, EA won't prevent that if the armor failed it's die roll? Even against snipers and/or armed Ht's and trucks.
I don't play many with EA on (rarely ones with snipers or truck mounted AA guns) to see if it would work.



HSL

[PawelM]

To me the most interesting conclusion from this thread is that majority of member expressing their oppinions seem to indicate a golden middle between the two assault options would be warmly welcome.

I am sure many valuable oppinions and experiences quoted here would provide an excellent ground for any design effort aimed to address some concerns players have.

In my ideal world situation an assault rules in conection with definitions of unit assault factor would make the need for detailed ROE obsolete.

A wish for Christmas ?