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Acebuckeye13 posted:Man, those casualties were a lot closer together than I thought they'd be. If we'd managed to keep our tank assets alive we would have had this in the bag. Hob and Apostate really did splat whole teams on several occasions. I don't know if Grumio saw it, but that 2-story house he 152'd killed a whole HMG section. "Find Germans with scouts, suppress them with mortars, vaporize them with armor" was working pretty well. It would have helped if "scouts" were more of a team and less "most of a platoon" on a couple occasions, but some of that's the order format. I wish we'd had a 152 in the south from the beginning.
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Nov 2, 2014 14:44
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Looking at these numbers, the real winner was the fog of war.
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Nov 2, 2014 14:46
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The casualties in the north were the tipping point, but the north was never the primary operation. The goal in the north was to keep any Germans at the farm occupied and unable to engage the main attack in the south. There weren't any Germans there, but some were enroute. That's a bit of a consolation, even if we couldn't take the farm. The thing that ended this game was morale. Losing half the Soviet commanders meant the remaining ones were getting overworked, and it was showing.
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Nov 2, 2014 17:34
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Well here I was thinking we are going to lose and get murdered any moment, and suddenly the Russians surrender. Even looking at the results I can see that was premature. You should have stayed and played to the end, not quit just as the battle was getting fun!  The main issue here is that the Russian leadership was too oriented on gaming instead of just playing. Their whole strategy revolved around points for killing people - they kept discussing it all over, and when they figured they are losing too many points, their morale sunk. I don't really understand why you would surrender. Well I know most of your people left, but it feels the reason they left was because they felt the were losing. But if you go into this LP with a mentality like this, focusing mostly just on the points, you will not have fun, you will get pissed off by the "fog of war" and you will quit once you figure the numbers are not in your favour. That's not fun! What's fun is fighting to the bitter end, even if you already know you will lose. People have spent two months maneuvering into position, they all wanted their minute of glory - and they would enjoy it very much, no matter if they "won" or "lost". Because, heh, losing is fun. The only thing that's not fun is not getting to play because your leadership decided you've lost too many points. I want to play again, and properly this time! === Here I should point out that I've enjoyed the game tremendously even though I didn't really have much to do - commanding only a single HQ unit of marginal importance. But the spirit in the German thread was friendly and enjoyable. It didn't feel we were playing for points or victory conditions - we just wanted to give the Russians a beating, although most of us probably expected to die. It was fun to be a part of that. EDIT: The next game should really be a German assault under similar conditions, just to show them what we can do! 
markus_cz fucked around with this message at 19:09 on Nov 2, 2014 |
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Nov 2, 2014 18:58
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It was what, forty minutes out of a hour when the game ended? They'd lost, there was no point in continuing a slow brawl that consisted of making broad orders every turn in and out for either side.
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Nov 2, 2014 19:11
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Gamerofthegame posted:It was what, forty minutes out of a hour when the game ended? They'd lost, there was no point in continuing a slow brawl that consisted of making broad orders every turn in and out for either side. Forty minutes out of an hour and a half. It wasn't even half over. Edit: Don't want this to come off as criticism of the Soviets. They quit because people were dropping and not having fun, and since fun is the true mission objective, I can't exactly fault them.
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Nov 2, 2014 19:19
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My point is, they haven't lost. They could have eventually eliminated our two companies because we were on par in casualties... and they had twice as many men. If the Russians endured, they would have conquered the East town. Which of course, in the game's terms would count as "a loss" or "a draw" at best because of the scoring system. But in "roleplaying terms", it would still mean the Russians have eliminated the Germans and therefore basically won. The real problem is the focus on the scoring system instead on what is actually happening on the map.
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Nov 2, 2014 19:20
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GenericServices posted:Forty minutes out of an hour and a half. It wasn't even half over. At the rate both sides were losing people, the fight would have been decided in the next 15 minutes. If the Soviet's final attack had worked, they'd have effectively won. If it hadn't, they'd have lost.
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Nov 2, 2014 19:22
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markus_cz posted:My point is, they haven't lost. They could have eventually eliminated our two companies because we were on par in casualties... and they had twice as many men. If the Russians endured, they would have conquered the East town. More men...but less armor. Without heavy support, I bet we would have given them a good drubbing. Still hoping to see the banzai charge.
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Nov 2, 2014 19:24
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sniper4625 posted:Still hoping to see the banzai charge. I'd like to see a Russians-charge-Germans attack, since it'd simulate the attacks the Russians were about to make. But an everyone-charges-everyone-else attack would be cool too.
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Nov 2, 2014 19:39
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Bacarruda posted:I'd like to see a Russians-charge-Germans attack, since it'd simulate the attacks the Russians were about to make. But an everyone-charges-everyone-else attack would be cool too. Oh yeah, I figured it'd be the former. Hard to use our superior positioning and MGs if we're running at the foe!
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Nov 2, 2014 19:44
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I wonder if the germans could have defended properly with all artillery and tanks on the west bank and just a company of scouts to call in artillery. And HMG sections to defend any crossings.
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Nov 2, 2014 21:44
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markus_cz posted:Well here I was thinking we are going to lose and get murdered any moment, and suddenly the Russians surrender. We lost too many players. That's literally the only reason we gave up. The game in this format is an exercise in teamwork and communication. Losing too many people kills off those elements. If I wanted to micromanage a ton of things I could just play the game by myself.
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Nov 2, 2014 21:53
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I'm not convinced the Soviets could have conquered the east town if they just kept playing. The casualties were pretty even up to that point, but it was swinging pretty far into our favor just in those last few minutes. The Soviets never made it past the outskirts of the town. The real bloody fighting for the dense interior of the town never even started, and the Germans still had all tanks but one. With most of the Soviet tanks in the north knocked out or disabled and their infantry turned into mincemeat by the Panther up there, we could even have the King Tiger cross over the Berezina and lead a counterattack against the rest of them at some point. I was really curious to see how our defenses deeper in the town would hold up. The Soviets were trying to call arty on that spot, but there was no way for their spotters to get LOS on it. I chose that spot specifically because it was on a reverse slope. Looking at the Soviet thread, they had no idea whether they could see there or not: The Merry Marauder posted:
The Soviets would not have been able to shell most of those positions back there without moving their tanks way up close, within panzerschreck range, and we had a couple of tanks waiting for them back there as well. I think our positions were well protected back there. If the game kept going, I think the Soviets would have been drawn into some really bloody house to house fighting and our schrecks finally might have seen some use. I wanted to finally call a halt to the retreat and make a last stand at that spot. I thought it was perfect for it. I had my company HQ on the line with everyone else and I was ready to die gloriously for the fatherland!  
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Nov 2, 2014 23:31
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One thing that I hope the Germans appreciate is how psyched out we were about mines. That fear of the bridge being mined in the south seriously affected our operational planning, as well as the actual turn-by-turn tactical decisions. I have no idea if they paid for themselves on a points-earned basis, but they certainly were a good investment psychologically.
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Nov 3, 2014 00:49
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markus_cz posted:What's fun is fighting to the bitter end, even if you already know you will lose. People have spent two months maneuvering into position, they all wanted their minute of glory - and they would enjoy it very much, no matter if they "won" or "lost". Because, heh, losing is fun. The only thing that's not fun is not getting to play because your leadership decided you've lost too many points. What's fun is enjoying the game. Nothing more, nothing less. Lots of people on the Russian team weren't having any fun. Once we eliminate the players just continuing to post low-effort posts out of duty to the rest, that left insufficient numbers to play. The dropoff of players reflected that, and exacerbated it because people were being put in roles far far greater than what they initially applied to do. People also had busy lives, and 48 hour turns were very intrusive in terms of commitment. Despite my attempts at trying to encourage players to send in orders, the rate at which deadlines were being met were continuing to sag, and sag both at high and low levels, requiring high command to fill them in themselves. There was no will to continue playing in the hope of a turnaround, or at best an honorable defeat, because if we can't take West Town we can't really win. And if insufficient numbers of people were inherently having fun continuing, then why keep going? EDIT: And honestly, if I had seen Kenzie's posting, I would definitely have wanted to quit sooner. Being dicked around with pixel-perfect pre-simulated LOS stuff is absolute bullshit to be on the receiving end of. I definitely think that needs to be forbidden in any future game. Acebuckeye13 posted:Man, those casualties were a lot closer together than I thought they'd be. If we'd managed to keep our tank assets alive we would have had this in the bag. That reflected my understanding, too. IMHO, the German strategy of ambush then fall back was not really all that effective. The sequence of them hitting us, then we hitting them back ultimately led to fairly minimal casualties and not really much of a swing to their side. I think we were mostly good for that part - we could have pursued more tightly, sure, but that would have been much more risky. The infantry losses were not so big a deal - it was the 6:1 loss ratio in AFVs that sunk us. I think we could have done a bit better by sending scout squads or split teams forward instead of entire squads, but we were scared that such orders were too micromanagy and would lead to Grey Hunter errors. I honestly don't think I did anything major wrong from an overall command viewpoint. If I had the game, and more experience, I could have done a bit more, I suppose. But oh well. Others might disagree. EDIT2: Also if Barracuda wants to say 'the real target is your enemy's morale, our tactics were designed to frustrate our opposing players', then I don't think it's kosher to then turn around and demand the Russians keep playing when they don't want to. Fangz fucked around with this message at 01:32 on Nov 3, 2014 |
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Nov 3, 2014 01:05
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Leif. posted:One thing that I hope the Germans appreciate is how psyched out we were about mines. That fear of the bridge being mined in the south seriously affected our operational planning, as well as the actual turn-by-turn tactical decisions. I have no idea if they paid for themselves on a points-earned basis, but they certainly were a good investment psychologically. Personally I was just happy that at least one of them went off. That alone made them worth the investment. 
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Nov 3, 2014 01:19
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TehKeen posted:Personally I was just happy that at least one of them went off. That alone made them worth the investment. A bunch went off. There was the AT mine that blew up Willie's truck. And at least two of the AP mines in the village went off (one on the Outpost Farm path and another in one of the booby-trapped houses).
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Nov 3, 2014 01:34
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Regarding LOS stuff, unless Grey had forbidden it at the beginning, I don't know why it's be unkosher to use it to get the detail Grey didn't provide. It's not like we were the only team with the game, and for all we knew you guys were doing the same thing. Kind of moot in the end, but considering our other disadvantages, accurate LOS and screens doesn't seem as big a deal. I do agree that no one should be forced to keep playing against their will.
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Nov 3, 2014 02:06
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Bacarruda posted:A bunch went off. There was the AT mine that blew up Willie's truck. And at least two of the AP mines in the village went off (one on the Outpost Farm path and another in one of the booby-trapped houses). Your mines on the road blew up my squad first. And then some other poor squad decided to path right over them. JERKS!
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Nov 3, 2014 02:11
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Fangz posted:EDIT: And honestly, if I had seen Kenzie's posting, I would definitely have wanted to quit sooner. Being dicked around with pixel-perfect pre-simulated LOS stuff is absolute bullshit to be on the receiving end of. I definitely think that needs to be forbidden in any future game. Haha, well I was assuming you guys were doing the exact same thing. A game like CM kinda requires you to be really anal about LOS and positioning, because if you aren't, bad things happen (like what happened to our scout snipers). Just a couple of meters makes the difference between protection and exposure, or LOS and no LOS. What exactly would you want to be forbidden? Testing things out in the game first? Nothing we did couldn't be done by the Soviet team as well.
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Nov 3, 2014 02:42
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Kenzie posted:Haha, well I was assuming you guys were doing the exact same thing. A game like CM kinda requires you to be really anal about LOS and positioning, because if you aren't, bad things happen (like what happened to our scout snipers). Just a couple of meters makes the difference between protection and exposure, or LOS and no LOS. Honestly, it makes sense for the defenders to have thoroughly surveyed the area where they're setting up defenses while waiting for the hammer (and sickle) to fall. If you want to get roleplaying spergy about it, you could do something like this: In attack/defend scenarios the defenders can do as much in-game LOS testing as they want to simulate days/weeks of on-site preparation ahead of the battle, the attacker none. In meeting engagements, neither can do so.
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Nov 3, 2014 02:56
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I think the major thing we learnt here is that high command on both sides should own the game and have some experience with it. What Fangz is bitching about was the recreation of the map and soviet unit positioning to check if they could hit the panther on it's glorious run, keep in mind that Kenzies map wouldn't have been totally accurate and would have been based on what they Germans could spot and hear. But I can kinda see where he's coming from so maybe allow LoS checks on the map but have an agreement to not place enemy units on it to get more info about them. Maybe something like the earlier "photos" one of the sides was using showing the viewpoint from possible enemy positions but not their exact LoS positioning.
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Nov 3, 2014 03:00
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Peanut3141 posted:Honestly, it makes sense for the defenders to have thoroughly surveyed the area where they're setting up defenses while waiting for the hammer (and sickle) to fall. Maybe in a different context, but as this is during Bagration, when the Germans were in full "randomly chuck things in front of the Soviets in the hope of stopping them before the Vistula" mode, there's not a whole lot of methodical prep going on on the micro scale.
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Nov 3, 2014 03:04
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sniper4625 posted:Regarding LOS stuff, unless Grey had forbidden it at the beginning, I don't know why it's be unkosher to use it to get the detail Grey didn't provide. It's not like we were the only team with the game, and for all we knew you guys were doing the same thing. Half way through the battle the Russians lost the update of who was where. One side had it at the end, the other side did not. I needed to spend 10-15 minutes at the end trying to work out which units were mine, and was using GH's map for movement, that walked me into a minefield that would have been marked otherwise. Everyone should be using the same map for movement and placement IMO. Even if I had the game to do it myself, I don't have 30 minutes every 2 days to spend plotting out my movement, little lone do it for other people OR hope someone else will spend an hour to give me perfect movement and LOS.
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Nov 3, 2014 03:10
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Abongination posted:What Fangz is bitching about was the recreation of the map and soviet unit positioning to check if they could hit the panther on it's glorious run, keep in mind that Kenzies map wouldn't have been totally accurate and would have been based on what they Germans could spot and hear. Yeah there was one tank in particular that we couldn't actually see. That was the one I was afraid of. The plan also depended on the Soviet tanks staying put throughout the next turn. If that tank in the outskirts of town, on the main road, moved up a little bit to the wooden bridge it might have been able to hit the Panther right on its rear end. The plan was still a gamble even after the testing that I did for it.
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Nov 3, 2014 03:14
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Fangz posted:EDIT: And honestly, if I had seen Kenzie's posting, I would definitely have wanted to quit sooner. Being dicked around with pixel-perfect pre-simulated LOS stuff is absolute bullshit to be on the receiving end of. I definitely think that needs to be forbidden in any future game. I don't want to forbid people from using the game if they own it. On our side I think we had me, duckfoot and uPen who owned the game. duckfoot disappeared before the first turn, uPen was never very involved, so I was the only one posting screenshots for us. More people posting screenshots, checking LOS and running tests definitely helped the Germans win this match. I think it'd be a good idea to try to balance that out in future games, but there's no predicting people dropping out.
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Nov 3, 2014 03:37
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Kenzie posted:Haha, well I was assuming you guys were doing the exact same thing. A game like CM kinda requires you to be really anal about LOS and positioning, because if you aren't, bad things happen (like what happened to our scout snipers). Just a couple of meters makes the difference between protection and exposure, or LOS and no LOS. Well, I'm NOT saying you are dirty rotten cheats or anything, because it was never specified before hand, but there has to be limits. If there aren't limits, then it seems to me that things would devolve to 'who has a player who owns the game, and has the time to simulate every little thing' and then everyone else on the team would just copy and paste that player's precise instructions. The limitations you complain about are exactly the limitations the Soviets had to play under for the majority of the game, and as you say, this was a big disadvantage for us. I think we generally (at least I did) assumed you were playing under similar broad strokes orders, vague intel to us. Ultimately you guys were playing Frozen Synapse, while we were rolling an autoresolve in a Total War game. There needs to be an agreement *what* we are playing. I would say that a rule of thumb for this should be: Nothing more than what a commander would have access to in practice. So I think running forward simulations to see how a turn would go should definitely be out. Playing turns out with specific units to see if defenses would hold up should also be out. Judge that sort of stuff by intuition, let the fuckups happen. Screenshots and LOS checks during pre-battle planning seem sensible. IMHO anyway. quote:In attack/defend scenarios the defenders can do as much in-game LOS testing as they want to simulate days/weeks of on-site preparation ahead of the battle, the attacker none. Only if you give the attacker the doctrinal 3:1 superiority in force. 
Fangz fucked around with this message at 04:06 on Nov 3, 2014 |
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Nov 3, 2014 03:56
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Fangz posted:Only if you give the attacker the doctrinal 3:1 superiority in force. Or let the attacker open with a bunch of pre-planned artillery anywhere they like, gratis.
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Nov 3, 2014 04:04
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Evenly splitting game ownership between the teams is reasonable. The battalion/kampfgruppe and/or his XO should own the game, as should one or two other active players. Not owning the game can be a major handicap during force selection and planning (in past goon games, it hurt bunnyofdoom and unwantedplatypus and it certainly made things a struggle for Fangz). Company officers should be familiar with Combat Mission (either through playing demos or the game itself). As for the whole screenshot/mapping spergery issue. It's not a problem as long as there's a balance of power. fwiw, I think we had this last game. The Germans had Kenzie and Dralun, the Russians had dublish. If there's another game, should make sure both teams have multiple people willing to take maps and screenshots and do LOS checks. That way, even if people drop off, that information is still flowing to both sides. Heck, we could even have screenshot takers in the observer thread who occasionally help out. One thing we should add next game is common mapping. During planning, both teams should cooperate to make a common gridmap, a topographical map, a hi-res map, maps of key locations, and a map with common location names (from what I read in the observer thread, it seemed like Grey and the goons were having a hard time remembering "The OK Corral" and the "1%" were the same place). That should level the playing field somewhat. It seems like not having good hi-res mapping was a liability for the Russians, especially as they tried to plan their attack into town. These games should be won and lost based off of tactical decisions, not because one team could actually see where they were fighting and the other side didn't. Bacarruda fucked around with this message at 04:14 on Nov 3, 2014 |
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Nov 3, 2014 04:09
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If there's another one, I'd be happy to make a set of maps for general use. Should have the new computer by then.
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Nov 3, 2014 04:20
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I still think simply splitting game ownership is an incomplete solution because it forces so much more responsibility and basic work on to some players over others. I felt hugely guilty asking dublish to do stuff because I was taking up a shitload of his time when he wanted just a small platoon position. It seems like it would just again turn into an endurance race between the game owners. There should be limits. Another option is to have the neutral observer thread be the screenshot taker/LOS checker. Then we can be sure that both sides are getting the same quality of stuff.
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Nov 3, 2014 04:26
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If we're doing another game, I'll offer some small constructive comments. I think a smaller game (no more than 350 or so troops per side) would work better. Even in single-player Combat Mission, controlling forces larger than a battalion gets very challenging. With 200+ units on the field, it was very easy for Grey to screw up and for goons to get frustrated. I'd try to keep the game moving quickly. Thirty minutes of in-game time took almost 2 months irl to play out, which sapped player morale and interest. Smaller maps and shorter time limits would get people moving and help keep players interested. Keep doing video turns. Being able see things play out in video was very helpful. A couple of things to add. If an enemy unit is spotted, click it so teams can see which friendlies spotted that hostile. Also, include a unit click-through in every video. This lets commanders track fatigue, casualties, ammo, and figure out exactly which units are theirs. Same goes for fire missions. If a mission gets called in, keep people updated on its status. Post the right maps every turn. This happened for both sides, the Soviets especially. All in all, this was a very fun game. I'm glad Grey Hunter takes the time to run these games and I really appreciated his effort. The man is a LP force of nature.
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Nov 3, 2014 04:29
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Bacarruda posted:As for the whole screenshot/mapping spergery issue. It's not a problem as long as there's a balance of power. It's not a problem in the sense that one team is at a disadvantage. It's a problem in the sense that one or two people within the team make the rest of the team superfluous. Might as well skip the whole "team" part and just play normal PBEM. When the battle was starting you laid out three plans and had thread comment it. If someone with game had said "I played all three and Plan A wins, B and C lose almost certainly" what would the people without access to CM do? Vote for plan B anyway? Same goes down to individual units. If I would like to drive my tank to X and someone says "I tried it out, drive to Y instead so you're in cover, here's a map" what do you need me for? I keep repeating myself, but I thought this was a team game. Plotting precise movements with the game and simulating stuff seems like it'd be actively harmful to the "team" part.
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Nov 3, 2014 07:33
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Like I mentioned earlier, a gridded terrain mod might help with that kind of thing. Sometimes it's almost impossible to accurately judge what the terrain you're dealing with is like from 2D maps and screenshots. Zooming around the 3D map in the game makes all the difference. Gridded terrain helps bridge that gap and it will let players tell exactly what they are dealing with from a few screenshots. The only problem is that one of these mods doesn't seem to exist yet for RT (at least I haven't found one yet). There are mods like this for all of the other games though. Maybe we can try a Normandy or Italy game or something. 
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Nov 3, 2014 08:25
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Right, looking at my free time allotment, I don't think I can do another round I'm afraid. Sorry for those who were interested - hopefully another
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Nov 3, 2014 09:42
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Grey Hunter posted:Right, looking at my free time allotment, I don't think I can do another round I'm afraid. That's absolutely fine. Thanks for two great battles! And if the CM series continues in the future, you won't be able to resist, will you? 
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Nov 3, 2014 09:45
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I hope someone will step up and give us more of this insanity. Thanks for all the hard work, Grey, it was fun while it lasted! It's too bad we never got to see the Soviet planes bomb
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Nov 3, 2014 09:51
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Grey Hunter posted:Right, looking at my free time allotment, I don't think I can do another round I'm afraid. That's cool, it was fun while it lasted, at any rate. As for WITP, I'd love to see you break that game over your knee. Multiple day Pearl Harbour, bombing from roof height, the whole shebang, really.
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Nov 3, 2014 09:56
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Kenzie posted:Maybe we can try a Normandy or Italy game or something. Was playing around in the editor to try to find a way to communicate terrain and features easily and have tested it on a map I had for Normandy, it's a American assault on the crossroads at Monthardrou. A cropped together large map (open in new tab for huge):  Overhead actual map:  Attempt at a cropped together overhead, not so smooth (open in new tab for huge):  View North:  View South:  View East:  View West:  And since combat mission is awesome this map is of course modeled on a real location which can be found on google maps: Here! How were people doing elevation maps? That's something I've been trying to figure out, the gridded terrain mod was causing issues with some of my other texture mods so I've left it off for now but would love other idea's, maybe something through http://www.geoportail.gouv.fr? My French is awful so no idea how to navigate to what we need. This is the best I've managed so far from google maps: 
Abongination fucked around with this message at 12:58 on Nov 3, 2014 |
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Nov 3, 2014 11:37
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