Section Leaders:
Fionn Kelly  & Madmatt

Fog of War & Anti-Tank Guns
Page 5 of 5

Well, I noticed some posts on the Combat Mission forum about anti-tank guns and fog of war issues and decided that the best way to try to explain them was to actually set up a simple scenario myself to illustrate how anti-tank guns are virtually invisible until they start firing (unless, of course, you site them in the open or something equally insane).

So, what I did was make a quick map which features woods on either side of a road. The map has a hill in the centre to act as a LOS obstructor but apart from that is very simple.. It took me approximately 40 minutes to make the 1km by 1km map, set the elevations, choose and place the units etc..

So that's 14 tanks versus 3 AT guns and 1 King Tiger. In this scenario I've placed the AT guns within 200 metres to 400 metres of the road to demonstrate that they can't be spotted. It should be noted that doing so ensures that once they are spotted they will be quickly knocked out by massed HE fire but this is a LOS, FOW example and not intended to explore optimal ambush dispositions.

I have played both sides of this scenario via hotseating so that I could ensure getting the exact shots I wanted of the various views to illustrate the nature of FOW in CM.

This shot is taken during an American Perspective Action Phase Replay. Once both the visible AT guns have been despatched by HE shells the 5 surviving American tanks begin the advance again. As they emerge from behind the smokescreens that used to be their fellow tankers the last German PaK88 opens up on them. As the tactical AI is wont to do when faced with far superior firepower it plots a withdrawal route for the endangered Sherman whilst laying down covering fire.. What was great for me on this occasion was that since the Sherman wasn't able to conduct its reverse before the turn ended I was able to see the Tac AI's waypoints.

Note: To everyone who has ever been annoyed by tanks which turn their backs to the enemy when they try to get out of trouble instead of reversing out of trouble note that the AI has chosen to REVERSE to safety in order to keep its frontal armour facing the enemy gun at all times.

Before the American tank can reverse fully this last German AT gun is knocked out of action. AT guns are terribly vulnerable if the enemy is able to put a nice bombardment or bring direct fire to bear on them as is shown nicely by this scenario. This last shot is an attempt to show the aftermath of battle.

Four Shermans (one of them immobilized) and one Stuart survived the battle. Very few crew escaped the knocked out Shermans as an 88mm shell at those short ranges penetrates with such excess kinetic energy that most were killed in their tanks where they sat.. Eight Shermans and one Stuart lie destroyed on the field of battle and over forty allied soldiers just died.

German losses amounted to three Pak88s and 4 men.. Not at all a bad trade. AT guns are deadly in Combat Mission and if I had set these up at a longer distance from the kill zone I would have been far more immune to return fire and would have probably destroyed the entire American force BUT the requirement to have firer and target relatively close for screenshot purposes forced this deployment on me..

I hope you enjoyed this little set piece battle and learnt about the modeling of Fog of War and AT guns in Combat Mission.

Yours,
Fionn Kelly,
Manager of Historical Research,
The Gamer's Net.