Skaffen-Amtiskaw posted:

What if XCOM, but against Nazis and via baguette country?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2085370/Classified_France_44/

ModernMajorGeneral posted:

I have now bought this and played a few hours. It's not terrible and I have enjoyed myself but it is also not a great game. The biggest problem is that I'm not sure who the target audience is.
The tactical gameplay is ok, and I like the suppression system (where every shot impacts enemy morale even if missed), but there are too many parts missing to make it a challenging game for strategy nerds, many of which are standard now (no unit permadeath, no cover destruction, no weapon customisation). However it is still too complex to be a casual game with low barriers to entry (the skill trees are huge and there are a lot of different potential team setups)

It has a lot of WW2 detail for nerds who like guns and uniforms (there are a billion different types of shirt and pants) but none of the equipment is moored in reality - everything has seemingly randomly assigned stats like +8% to dodge or +1 accuracy, so you have stuff like the standard metal helmet providing no bonus but a cool beret gives you +1 armour. This would not be a problem in a fantasy game but is obviously more of an issue in something with realistic grounding.

There are also attempts to strike a serious tone (with commentary about Nazi atrocities and deportations of Jews) but the Nazis have been made into arcade game enemies (where they have decided that the Feld gendarmerie are some elite force with +1 stats over regular army soldiers, and the "Gestapo soldiers" with +1 stats over them, and the "elite SS super soldiers" +1 over them, etc.)

also some of the politics is kind of funny

Tekopo posted:

The best ACW movie is Cold Mountain, because most if not everything else is some Lost Cause trash. I still enjoy Gettysburg but christ if it doesn't paint the confederates as saints

FrancisFukyomama posted:

wasn’t a big concern with bolt actions with internal magazines even in ww1 was that ammo consumption would outstrip production capabilities? when did that become a small enough of a factor that giving everyone auto weapons seemed like a worthwhile choice

DJJIB-DJDCT posted:

When cartridges started being made by machine and not rolled by hand, was a big part of it.

Actually producing metal cartridges was incredibly difficult for a long time. Particularly ones that would extract reliably and not break apart.

Iirc one of the civil war carbines used a rubber case for that reason,

Pomeroy posted:

Not Free State of Jones? No love for the hero strangling a R. E. Lee looking aristo bastard with a belt after he tries to crawl away on his knees?

Danann posted:

Virtual Russian posted:

What is this game?

It reminds me of Aurora 4X, so I'm intrigued.

Raskolnikov38 posted:

oh yeah i never got around to seeing that. was it any good

BearsBearsBears posted:

It's NEBULOUS: Fleet Command. The screenshots are from the dev build for the strategic layer that's currently not available to players (right?). It's currently 'only' a tactical spaceships game. In terms of realism it's below Children of a Dead Earth but above almost any other spaceship combat game.

DJJIB-DJDCT posted:

No, that happened, in 1967.

Frosted Flake posted:

This is where everything comes together.

The Golan Heights are close terrain. That does make them hard to attack, because you have to overcome a determined infantry defence at close quarters. This is in contrast to open terrain where you can (hopefully, and this was Israel's preferred tactic) shoot the enemy off their position at extreme range. Think of it like Gaza, defensible terrain typically means defensible at close quarters, because the attacker has the leisure of assembling forces ahead of time and will just use their numerical superiority unless they have to close in restricted terrain. Then it becomes an even contest of company vs company, battalion vs battalion.

In 1967 and 73 a lot of the fighting was at point blank range, bayonets and all. Israel paid an incredible cost to hold them.

Okay, think of what the Israeli army is like today.

They have high ground, and fortifications, but they have to hold those from a determined attacker.



Hills are not actually defended at the top of the hill, I realize this is what most people think.

The reason is that, because the attacker decides how many forces to bring to the battle, if you have one tank at the top of the hill, it can see everything - and be seen by everything - the enemy simply brings five and shoots you off the position. A tank can only ever shoot one other tank at a time, so being on the top of a hill is a losing proposition and has been since the start of the gunpowder age.

Instead, there's the military crest, where the enemy still has an uphill fight, but they can't see, and shoot you with all of their forces from kilometres around. They have to close with bayonets and grenades to displace you, if you're committed to holding there.

For forces that are outnumbered and/or outgunned, the reverse slope, the area behind the crest of the hill, is actually the best. The enemy must expose themselves to attack you, and cannot fire at you from the other side of the hill. That means, rather than being massively outnumbered, you're only practically outnumbered by however many enemy soldiers crest the hill at a time. It also means they can't just shoot you off your position with tank guns.

Before UAVs (I would argue even now because UAVs are overrated) they also couldn't see if they were having an effect on your trenches with mortars. Artillery is not very good at hitting some parts of the reverse slope, so you might avoid bombardment altogether if you site your positions correctly. The enemy has to really know their business to even know the extent of your positions, because, remember, they can't see them from their own lines.

Great. But as I said, this means that you have to defend your trenches at point blank range, which is your advantage, yes, but also means you take casualties to stop them.

e: this ties into the discussion in the Ukraine thread about how the basic IDF infantry weapon in 1967 and 1973 was the Uzi. At the ranges Israel preferred to hold positions against their numerically superior Arab opponents, the Uzi was all that was required. The IDF now is not going to have their soldiers fight in a way where the enemy stumbles into their trenches by accident and the battle takes place at point blank range.

gradenko_2000 posted:

I know it's science fiction and all but Helldivers 2 conveys this feeling of firepower really well where a lot of your kills comes from "crew-served weapons" and supporting/indirect fires. The assault rifle isn't actually all that great because you need to keep reloading all the time and its main advantage is retaining mobility.

At the minimun you want an MG to really lay down a base of fire, and ideally you'd be killing bugs with artillery or air support.

skooma512 posted:

Shogun is giving me a hankering for some Total War Shogun 2.

DJJIB-DJDCT posted:

Is it as good as the original miniseries or novel?

skooma512 posted:

Shogun is giving me a hankering for some Total War Shogun 2.

gradenko_2000 posted:

I know it's science fiction and all but Helldivers 2 conveys this feeling of firepower really well where a lot of your kills comes from "crew-served weapons" and supporting/indirect fires. The assault rifle isn't actually all that great because you need to keep reloading all the time and its main advantage is retaining mobility.

At the minimun you want an MG to really lay down a base of fire, and ideally you'd be killing bugs with artillery or air support.

Danann posted:

Helldiver is the Battallion Tactical Group experience with American Characteristics?

gradenko_2000 posted:

I know it's science fiction and all but Helldivers 2 conveys this feeling of firepower really well where a lot of your kills comes from "crew-served weapons" and supporting/indirect fires.

atelier morgan posted:

absolutely, super earth's designs are so bad they give even the american MIC a run for it's money

the (in game vtol) pelican gives the osprey a solid competitor for worst aircraft

DJJIB-DJDCT posted:

The Free League Aliens RPG, like all of their licensed stuff, is amazing, though it just makes me wonder how the Union of Progressive Peoples hasn’t decisively won since the Three World Empire and United Americas are dysfunctional in the extreme.

There’s no reason for the UPP to gently caress around with xenomorphs, really just need to run out the clock.

DJJIB-DJDCT posted:

My character in every game is someone who read the rules and set out to be as competent a professional as the setting allows.