|
dtkozl posted:As this is a small battle there won't be a lot of arty flying around. Expect mortars from the americans as well. SPOILERS Well it's confirmed guys, the Americans do have weapons.
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 16:28
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 13, 2024 08:26 |
|
|
Gewehr 43 posted:Is there any kind of view into town from the northern farm? If so, it might be a good spot to station an HMG team to not only lay down suppressing fire, but also hold the objective. I'll try to give a more thorough report this evening. IIRC, the stand of trees in front of the buildings in the center-north are a good firing position only up to the center of the map where a hedge provides concealment for most terrain behind it and trees cover the higher-relief hills toward their start side.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 16:49
|
|
|
3/3 reporting for duty. I promise to follow all commands until I find an opportunity to be the big drat hero, at which point I will probably die. And with that, platoon 3 is filled.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 17:02
|
|
|
Popete posted:SPOILERS Whelp, there's all my planning out the window. Also wow, that spreadsheet filled up fast. Good job dtkozl
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 17:23
|
|
|
I figure it'd be useful to know what I can do with 2/3. Who are these guys? Edit: Ok, it LOOKS like the heavy squad is less mobile/armed aside from two squad weapons? I'm tankbait, aren't I? Captaindirtnap fucked around with this message at 17:30 on Jun 15, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 17:25
|
|
|
Popete posted:Klaus88 you are listed as the tank HQ, if you have a general plan or wanna lone hunt let me know. I'm all ears. I'm nervous about taking the big cats off road in a snowy map, honestly.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 17:52
|
|
|
Klaus88 posted:I'm nervous about taking the big cats off road in a snowy map, honestly. Eh, Panthers should be okay.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 17:55
|
|
|
Captaindirtnap posted:I figure it'd be useful to know what I can do with 2/3. Who are these guys? Fire support is the preferred term, the tank shell's/mortars that accompany the position are irrelevant.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 17:58
|
|
|
professor_curly posted:I traced out our deployment zones on the gridmap, in case it helps anyone. Thanks for this, was meaning to do that myself. Here's the same map but with the elevation map merged into it. 
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 18:09
|
|
|
Wow, we're totally full! Thanks everyone for joining and filling out the thread. I'll post a spreadsheet shortly, but for now I've created a roll20. Roll20 is a place where we can get together and chat in real time, and draw things on an editable map overlay. It can be better for spitballing ideas than forum posting. I'll try to hang out there most of the time, but if I don't respond immediately to questions ask anyway, and I'll get back either on roll20 or via forum post. You'll need to sign up for an account on the site, and then you can join our game. Please do so when you get a spare moment, and then bookmark a link to the game. It would be really nice if someone had time to make sprites for each of our units and import them into the roll20. We've used icons from advance wars before but NATO symbols or something else are acceptable as well. I still want most of our tactical discussion to happen in this thread, for the benefit of those who can't always check roll20, to make the game more entertaining for the neutral observers. Edit: Sorry, didn't set the spreadsheet to shared. Fixed now. abelian fucked around with this message at 20:30 on Jun 15, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 18:19
|
|
|
Ok, about a third of us have already signed up for the roll20, that's great. I've created a spreadsheet with the ORBAT and some useful links. Please bookmark this and the thread!. I put Klaus, Ninja, and Frozen in charge of the vehicle attachments. If you want to change this, let me know and I'll see what I can do. So my direct subordinate commanders are professor_curly, Klaus88, INinja132 and FrozenLiquidity. I've done some initial tactical assessment, but I'll have to do a full introduction and writeup after work. For now, here is some key terrain that I've identified:  These all have a good view of the central objective area, and could make anyone trying to approach it have a bad day.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 19:24
|
|
|
I'm tending towards sending the panthers towards A on that map, since it has a good line of sight of the town, and putting the hezter at B to watch the corridor on the right of the map.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 20:06
|
|
|
I would bet money they send a TB to D. edit: If allies were going to play the most efficient defense + attack combo strat possible, I'd say they're going to put a TB at D along with light infantry support, mass most of their infantry at C, try to pierce up into A with maybe 1 or 2 tanks/infantry, and send almost all their tanks, if not literally every one, up into B to try and take down what they expect to be our obvious infantry rush angle. Emmideer fucked around with this message at 20:22 on Jun 15, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 20:10
|
|
|
Klaus88 posted:I'm tending towards sending the panthers towards A on that map, since it has a good line of sight of the town, and putting the hezter at B to watch the corridor on the right of the map. I like this, my only concern is the Americans rushing across to A before the Panthers show up and then we are sitting ducks as we round the trees to the north near 24. Popete fucked around with this message at 20:33 on Jun 15, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 20:31
|
|
|
On the Orbat I'm listed as the Wirbelwind and Xenolalia as the Wespe but I believe that's the wrong way round.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 20:48
|
|
|
Popete posted:I like this, my only concern is the Americans rushing across to A before the Panthers show up and then we are sitting ducks as we round the trees to the north near 24. Good point, they could have half-tracks and dump a load of infantry at A, which would be no good for our kitties.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 20:50
|
|
|
INinja132 posted:On the Orbat I'm listed as the Wirbelwind and Xenolalia as the Wespe but I believe that's the wrong way round. Woops sorry, I probably wrote it backwards then copy+pasted. Go ahead and swap it back. You can fight amongst yourselves as to who's in charge, but with only two of you guys and with somewhat different roles, it will probably be pretty informal.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 20:52
|
|
|
I'm advocating that we blitz our tanks down the road into the central control point before the Americans can get there and force them to assault it. Our Panthers are going to be better than the Shermans they're likely to be bringing along, and I don't think they'll be sending their TD anywhere near the centre to begin with so we should be able to set up there and dictate the flow of the battle ourselves.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 20:56
|
|
|
cock hero flux posted:I'm advocating that we blitz our tanks down the road into the central control point before the Americans can get there and force them to assault it. Our Panthers are going to be better than the Shermans they're likely to be bringing along, and I don't think they'll be sending their TD anywhere near the centre to begin with so we should be able to set up there and dictate the flow of the battle ourselves.  I'm dead set against a blitz without knowing they're not driving Pershings. Or even if they are driving Shermans.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 21:00
|
|
|
Klaus88 posted:
I doubt they'll be driving Pershings. There's little to no cover on the approach to the central point. If they're driving Shermans or practically any other American tank and don't also immediately blitz for the centre we'll be able to get into position there with our Panthers and they'll have no way to push us out.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 21:09
|
|
|
Keep in mind that panthers are not invincible. Sherman 76s can knock out a panther from the front at these ranges. I've killed panthers at close range with 37mm greyhounds in this game. The side of those turrets is very vulnerable.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 21:14
|
|
|
I'm in favour of Klaus88 overwatch plan but we need to think about where exactly and how to get the Panthers in position and what infantry should also make the trek to A if thats where we deploy. With 3 main tanks and a TD we almost certainly have to be facing Shermans with at most 1 Pershing which means the biggest threat is the TD and we need to spot and contain it as soon as possible. With our 2 Panthers and the Hetzer in overwatch we can safely snipe Shermans from far enough away.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 21:17
|
|
|
The US doesn't have a tank destroyer, it has three 'Tanks' (Sherman 76's?) and an 'assault tank' which is probably a tank variant with a 105 howitzer for anti infantry work or a Sherman Jumbo which arent all that great at AT work (the Jumbo has a medium velocity 75mm gun if I remember right so isn't going to be amazing against Panthers). If it was a TD I would expect a M36 or something really scary. That said Panthers are vulnerable to the high-velocity 76mm at the ranges we are going to be using on this map and longer ranges are generally going to be more advantageous to us with tanks but we have an edge in close in infantry work with the way our guys are armed.
|
|
#
?
Jun 15, 2016 21:56
|
|
|
cock hero flux posted:I'm advocating that we blitz our tanks down the road into the central control point before the Americans can get there and force them to assault it. Our Panthers are going to be better than the Shermans they're likely to be bringing along, and I don't think they'll be sending their TD anywhere near the centre to begin with so we should be able to set up there and dictate the flow of the battle ourselves. Remember though, that at these ranges, the advantages that the panther has in frontal armor and its powerful gun are more or less neutered. The victor in this close quarters armored battle will be the one who can maneuver best and spot first. You start getting a Panther in a knife fight with one (or many Shermans) and you'll be dead quick. I tend to value the lives of my pixeltrüppen, so I tend to play cautiously. I say we split a couple of the squads into scout teams, and get eyes from A and B to determine the vector of attack the Americans are using. Meanwhile, place an HMG team somewhere in the woods just south of the north farm objective with good LOS to help blunt any infantry advances across open ground. I kinda dislike the idea of sending the Hetzer off by itself to our left as it just doesn't have enough armor to be safe. If it falls and the majority of our heavy armor is on our right, we've just opened a major hole in our left side for the Shermans (or ridiculously fast Hellcat if they have one) to exploit. Perhaps a Panther to our right (A), one just south of the farm near the HMG team, and one to our left (B). Maybe a Luchs at A and B as well with the SPG behind the farm as a local armored reserve. (?) Chuck_D fucked around with this message at 00:25 on Jun 16, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 00:17
|
|
|
So based on some initial scouting and looking at the terrain in Roll20, here are my initial thoughts from the infantry perspective. We'll call this "Plan: Right Hook" for now.  We move anHMG team to the west hill, to provide some overwatch. The area is too exposed to put in much more than that. One platoon will be Big drat Heroes and charge straight to the center. Hero Platoon should be able to reach this in the first round, theoretically. Expect to run straight into an allied platoon that's doing the exact same thing. Casualties are expected to be heavy, and fighting fierce. The other two platoons will swing west to what we've dubbed Lederhosen Wood. One platoon will become the central "Firebase Platoon" and set up to support the center and the assault. The Assault Platoon will move to sweep down the D woods. If we can smoke the line of sight with our mortars, I would suggest we do that. Then we engage in some brutal forest-fighting and clear out D from the flank. These are just preliminary thoughts, and I welcome suggestions from the other commanders and the panzer force.
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 00:25
|
|
|
I'm really happy with all the good discussion going on here and in the roll20 chat. It's hard for me to take part in the discussion much during the working day, but I'll be able to read through it after work. I'll try to post a bit about my expectations and how we can come up with a plan, but I won't get much of a chance until this evening (I'm on west coast North American time, GMT-7:00 for reference). My plan is to try to synthesize the various ideas going around into a few specific alternatives, in order to focus the discussion. Until then, some points to keep in mind while everyone is discussing options:
If you're new to combat mission or not very experienced with modern small unit combined arms tactics, I highly recommend doing the following 1. Download the demo(s) and play them. 2. Watch the first six videos of this playlist. They are worth every minute, even if the guy has a monotonous voice. 3. Read the game engine manual and the Final Blitzkrieg manual. If you do nothing else, watch the videos. abelian fucked around with this message at 01:43 on Jun 16, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 00:56
|
|
|
 Here's another suggested op plan I quickly drew up just to get some ideas out there. I apologize for my poo poo editing work. quote:Purple: Purple team consists of 1 Pzshreck team at the west-most forward position marked in purple, 1 HMG team at the edge of the farm, and Bat HQ in the house inside Objective 1 for spotting. The pzshreck team will be used as a forward observer in case of a flank and could also be replaced by splitting of a "scout" team from a squad if you would rather have the PzShreck elsewhere. HMG is to pin down any flank attempts if they are for some reason organic instead of armor, we could alternatively put the mg in the house with Bat HQ. So yeah this is just a real quick plan, feel free to cannibalize parts or remove others. I can also do a quick rundown of what our enemy may be fielding under one quick post if that would be advantageous. Xenolalia fucked around with this message at 01:50 on Jun 16, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 01:46
|
|
|
Recce 2 here, reporting in. I am not sure if it's possible, but maybe the infantry can detach a small team to ride on the Luch to get into position faster. I can rush them forward, drop them off at somewhere with decent sight line and concealment, say the woods at 17 Y perhaps.
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 05:22
|
|
|
Unfortunately, tank riding is not enabled in this game (only in Red Thunder, I believe). The infantry will have to hoof it.
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 06:24
|
|
|
Gewehr 43 posted:Is there any kind of view into town from the northern farm? If so, it might be a good spot to station an HMG team to not only lay down suppressing fire, but also hold the objective. dtkozl posted:Yeah the Bat HQ has a 80mm mortar call in. He can dole it out as he sees fit. Unless I'm missing something, doesn't the Wespe fit the bill here too?
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 06:28
|
|
|
FrozenLiquidity posted:Unless I'm missing something, doesn't the Wespe fit the bill here too? I haven't fired up to make sure, but I would guess that the Wespe can only be employed in the direct fire role when on map.
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 06:41
|
|
|
abelian posted:
This. The 2nd Objective is in a relatively open area and doesn't provide a lot of immediate benefit. It is roughly halfway between the staging areas for each of our forces and as we have no mechanized infantry units, we are unlikely to get there first - and if it is a race the best we can hope for is a tie. Of course, the Stgs and other close weapons will perform better here, but you're also making yourself an excellent target for mortars, tanks etc. as others have pointed out. Perhaps this can be used to our advantage, but it doesn't seem wise to place too many of our troops within this objective. As far as I am aware, it only counts towards the victory condition at a specified point, so there's little sense in throwing troops in to the meat grinder when they could be better served elsewhere. The tree lines on the north side of Obj. 2 may not have an elevation advantage (aside from the high ground to the East) but are generally closer to the objective than most of the treelines on the allied side of the map. It seems that if we were to initially deploy a significant portion of our infantry along these treelines with good visibility to the objective we should be able to deny it to the enemy and bleed him considerably if he attempts to take it. If he doesn't, the low ground just north of the objective could be used to get infantry within the cap zone and force a confrontation or perhaps coax the enemy to reveal a valuable asset in their attempt to dislodge us. Of course, if the enemy does not go for this objective, then these locations are still in a pretty good spot to redeploy to face threats from the flanks as necessary. In short, there are plenty of options, but does not seem wise to rush in to that area. I would expect an enemy team to set up in or just North of Obj. 3 in the buildings. These may not offer good visibility to Obj. 2 unless there are upper floors they can get to, as Obj. 2 is raised slightly from that position. In the event it does become an issue to taking Obj. 2, the elimination of other Allied valuable assets should give us enough of an advantage in the field to task an armored resource to deal with it, so I don't see it being an issue unless the rest of the plan goes to poo poo.
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 07:02
|
|
|
There is a very fine line when seizing an objective like this. If there were good solid cover in Obj. 2, then I would not hesitate risking rushing a sizable infantry force forward to seize it. If the objective were a village with some solid walls and buildings, we could get in there and be a massive pain in the rear end to anyone trying to get us out. See the first goon vs goon CMRT game for an example of this. But, I have to agree here that there just isn't enough cover in this map. If the infantry don't get mowed down approaching the central ridge, they will be exposed *from all sides* when they get there. FrozenLiquidity posted:I would expect an enemy team to set up in or just North of Obj. 3 in the buildings. These may not offer good visibility to Obj. 2 unless there are upper floors they can get to, as Obj. 2 is raised slightly from that position. In the event it does become an issue to taking Obj. 2, the elimination of other Allied valuable assets should give us enough of an advantage in the field to task an armored resource to deal with it, so I don't see it being an issue unless the rest of the plan goes to poo poo. The buildings are mostly barns, and all seem to be mostly useless in terms of visibility. I'll double check when do a flythrough in game next, but my guess right now is that those buildings will only be useful for defending against a direct assault of the secondary objectives.
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 07:18
|
|
|
abelian posted:I haven't fired up to make sure, but I would guess that the Wespe can only be employed in the direct fire role when on map. Yeah I mis-remembered, the Grille can be used for indirect fire, not the Wespe abelian posted:Unfortunately, tank riding is not enabled in this game (only in Red Thunder, I believe). Also are you sure it isn't just available for certain tanks? I saw troops on Panthers in the demo videos they showed for FB.
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 07:28
|
|
|
Xenolalia posted:Also are you sure it isn't just available for certain tanks? I saw troops on Panthers in the demo videos they showed for FB. No, I'm not sure! I'm busy working on an  post right now, but we definitely need to look into this. If nobody beats me to it, I'll fire up the game and try.
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 07:35
|
|
|
tank riding is in the game, it's also a bit fiddly and not practicable for a map this small.
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 07:35
|
|
|
If it weren't fiddly, it wouldn't be battlefront... You don't think we could use it to help get scouts forward if they could fit on the Luchs?
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 07:41
|
|
|
Deutsche Soldaten, Despite what the newsreels say, and as you are no doubt aware, the war is not going well. Nevertheless, we have amassed a potent force to strike the Americans. Just as we did in those glorious days in the Spring of 1940, we'll strike through the Ardennes and hit our enemy where and when they least expect it. While your loyalty and devotion to the fatherland is unquestioned, for many of you this will be your baptism of fire. While we haven't had time to give you the proper instruction and training that you fine gentlemen deserve, it's crucial that we spend all your spare time brushing up on the tactical concepts that will see you and your kamarden through the war. For many of you, this will be but a reminder, but the more familiar you are with these concepts, the better. The most important tactical concept for us will be fire superiority. Fire superiority means that your volume of fire is so great that the enemy keeps their heads down and cowers, rather than returning fire. Without fire superiority, you will quickly get pinned down as the enemy gains it in turn. When in contact with the enemy, you cannot maneuver without first achieving fire superiority. Attacking an enemy in good cover will require more firepower to achieve fire superiority than attacking the same enemy in the open. A corollary of this is that no movement near enemy positions can be undertaken without a fire plan. All assaults require a base of fire. For a weak enemy position, you can split up your squad into a fire element and a maneuver element. Once the fire element gains fire superiority, the maneuver element closes the gap, and kills or captures the enemy with grenades and assault weapons at close range. For a stronger enemy position, you do the same except with an entire platoon or company. Another important tactical concept, especially for the vehicles, is to spot the enemy before they spot you. Even with our superior German arms and armor, it's better to let the Americans walk into your guns. The best case is to lay ambush in keyhole positions where you can hit the enemy as they cross in front of you:  Now the terrain and frontage that we have will make it difficult to achieve anything like what's show above, but we should strive to apply the concept whenever we can. A third important tactical concept is that you should always reconnoiter the enemy. Do not send the bulk of your force forward until you've identified the enemy positions and kill zones. Always attempt to make contact with as small a force as possible. I cannot stress this enough. It may seem strange ("wouldn't I want to lead with a powerful force to hit back at whatever I come across?") But a small recon team is harder to hit, will take less casualties, and will be easier to extract from a killzone. Once you're out of the killzone, you can figure out how to deal with the newly revealed ambushers. But there's no point if your entire platoon is routed. Don't be like this guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7Cf80hd55w And definitely don't let this happen to you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lTVpGMfEwY We've had a lot of good discussion over the last day. We have a great group. I'm looking forward to seeing this through with you. If we are careful, smart, and have the least bit of luck, we'll seize our objective and make the Americans regret ever threatening the Fatherland. abelian fucked around with this message at 10:02 on Jun 16, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 08:10
|
|
|
We've been kicking around some ideas in the roll20. So far the best plan we've come up with for initial moves is thus:
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 09:41
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 13, 2024 08:26 |
|
|
yo dtkozl can our squads split into components or are they stuck as a squad?
|
|
#
?
Jun 16, 2016 10:02
|
|