CO2 BEDA FOMM Quick AAR

[john connor]

As to what is happening here, with all these massive Axis forces unable to push through? Mostly they are quite poor quality, and hence liable to lose morale quickly and then be paralysed and finally break up. But there's still an awful lot of them, compared to the Allies. I still feel a hankering for a better fight out of them than the AI provides. So, I check their tasks and see that they mostly have Move tasks to get them to the exit, with attacks and bypass ticked, but with the default route being 'avoidance'. That, combined with the fact that the Axis has only 2 objectives (kill the enemy and exit at bottom) accounts for why they don't mount many attacks, I feel. Because the AI is better, I think, at attacking objectives (terrain) than attacking to kill men, and it has no terrain objectives here (there are 2 low priority AI objectives corresponding to the Allied objectives either side of the road, which don't show up except in scenmaker, but they carry no points and hence really are low priority). I think to put a hold objective near the bottom plus hold objectives where the Allies have theirs would produce more use of the attacking assets available, though it may then unbalance it in favour of the Axis too much (certainly if playing as Axis or HtH). I'll try it.

 

[john connor]

Well, it's intriguing playing with the AI.
Putting a Hold objective near the Exit didn't work as the Axis AI just moved lots of forces round the Allies again and camped out there. So I took it off, re-positioned the two objectives flanking the road so they exactly matched the Allies objectives, put decent points on them, re-balanced the points all across the objectives (less on killing the enemy for the Axis) and then tinkered a little with the timings on the objectives. The result is a much more aggressive and planning Axis Ai. This will possibly be a struggle now for the Allies. I'm up to day 2 midday and my armoured cars have been wiped out by a concentrated and very effective (and sneaky) Axis armoured attack. Pic below with Axis AI plans highlighted. In the stock scenario the Axis basically tries to avoid all fights and go round the Allies to get to the exit objective, which I feel doesn't quite replicate the brutal, nasty hard fight this was historically. With the objectives altered like this we still have an Axis side with lots of relatively weak units, but you can see now that the AI really is planning attacks, as well as the Exit:

 

[john connor]

Well, got to the end and it's clearly still not balanced. The Axis wasn't good at clearing the exit point, so once I had camped out near it there was a log jam. I will have to add a Hold objective back there to make sure the AI clears the exit point. With me playing quick and sloppy like this, I need to get it down to nearer a draw, for it to be balanced. Will mess around some more.

 

[Ripppe]

I would assume that the capacity (Payload in this instance) tells you that the base selected is able to deliver 161 tonnes (the right side figure) from which 41 tonnes are currently in use. SO if I interpret this correctly those are basically the "cargo room" your base delivery vehicles has and how much of that is used due to supply columns.

 

[john connor]

Which means no room for fuel, in this case? Odd.

 

[Ripppe]

I would assume that 0/0 bulk fuel means that there just isn't any fuel tankers at disposal, so fuel needs to be delivered with other cargo (ammo, basics, etc.). So you still have fuel and it should be delivered albeit by trucks if I'm correct?

 

[Daz]

I would assume that 0/0 bulk fuel means that there just isn't any fuel tankers at disposal, so fuel needs to be delivered with other cargo (ammo, basics, etc.). So you still have fuel and it should be delivered albeit by trucks if I'm correct?

That's what I have always assumed. I would guess that there is some kind of time penalty for this kind of refueling compared to the bulk tanker method.
Wish I could help answer your questions on the depots Pete, but I am off to Spain tomorrow for a week, so am too busy sorting things out to give you a full illustrated answer I'm afraid.
Some quick advice though, when looking to see what your fuel supply line is looking like set the command lines to supply view, and the unit task indicators to fuel.
Remember that the units run out of fuel before the fuel reading in the E&S tab reads zero, at about 180 units of fuel if I remember right.

 

[john connor]

Well, that's already helpful, Daz. Didn't know that. When I look at it now I see that you get just as good a result with the stock version, more or less, and that what's going on - you're right - is they're all out of or low on fuel. They are poor quality, trashed troops with hardly any fuel. That would account no doubt for why they don't attack much. The fuel mainly, I think.

 

[Dave 'Arjuna' O'Connor]

Thanks Rippe, but I still don't get it. Stock is what is stockpiled at the base? So what is capacity? How much fuel/other supplies can be delivered, or is being delivered, or what?

Hey Peter, check out page 112 of the Game Manual. Go on, you know you want to. It's only a manual...it won't bite...much!

 

[john connor]

What a strange suggestion, Dave. Look at the manual!! You've been working too hard.

 

[Dave 'Arjuna' O'Connor]

Alas that's true.

 

[ivanmoe]

Alas that's true.

Hi Dave,

Great to see Beda Fomm getting a workout.

For our other readers, I built this map, OOB and scenario (as well as several others).

I'm not sure what sort of changes were made in porting the scenario over, although I'm hoping that the upper-echelon, Axis supply units were mechanized.

For a human Axis player, the key to winning was preserving AT-capability (as the Italians are so weak in this regard) and infiltration. Most of the Axis units have poor morale, and can be hard to coax forward. Finally, the clock could foil a lot of plans. On more than on occasion, I all but annihilated the Allied force in the south only to have the clock run out before I could exit the map in sufficient strength to win.

For the Allied player, it was absolutely essential to keep a cordon of infantry and anti-tank weapons across the roads and Eastern half of the map, particularly at night. At night, I'd withdraw the Allied armor behind that same screen so that they didn't get shot to pieces when the sun came up. The Allies took losses in the process, but nearly always hung on. And, of course, they had time on their side.

I have no knowledge as to how the changes in CO2 may have impacted gameplay. However, a lot of what I've read sounds awfully familiar.

ivanmoe

 

[Dave 'Arjuna' O'Connor]

Welcome back!

 

[john connor]

Hey Ivanmoe. Great scenario, as are the others in the Cauldron that you put together originally. Thanks!

I started messing with Beda Fomm because playing very casually (on realistic, historical, normal settings) I was able to get a Decisive Victory as allies very easily, so I suspect there will have been code changes that impacted, yes. I didn't manage to solve this with all my tinkering though.... To solve it I think I would have to give the Italians more fuel and morale, basically. And that would mean putting together two versions, one balanced for Axis play, the other for Allies.

I played Brevity recently and had the same problem with that, by the way - as Allies it was extremely easy to get a Decisive Victory playing the default settings. I suspect something has changed in the code (well, I guess many things have). I tried tampering with that and did some reading on Brevity. I couldn't find anywhere that there was a French force in the allied starting line up, but you have one there. You had a source for that? I also made it that there should have been an extra Italian infantry Bn in the Axis starting line up. That would even it up a bit. But I'm only looking at public sources. I don't have anything detailed on the period, and you probably did.

Peter

 

[ivanmoe]

Hi Peter,

Let's see if I can get a quote function working here:

I started messing with Beda Fomm because playing very casually (on realistic, historical, normal settings) I was able to get a Decisive Victory as allies very easily, so I suspect there will have been code changes that impacted, yes. I didn't manage to solve this with all my tinkering though.... To solve it I think I would have to give the Italians more fuel and morale, basically. And that would mean putting together two versions, one balanced for Axis play, the other for Allies.

There she goes!

On the AI Italians, they lost for a reason. 90% of the Italian units that are included in the game have no organic anti-tank capability. Even weapons companies and battalions have no anti-tank rifle. Rare, good Italian infantry like the Bersaglieri are in the same bind. So, the AI has a dozen or so Italian tank companies of varying strength to engage the Allies with, and perhaps eight anti-tank companies, all armed with 47mm ATG. Everything else, entire battlegroups, can be stopped cold by a single Allied armoured car unit. Conversely, almost all of the Allied Combat units have such a capability, The 25lb is a terror in this regard. Frank Chadwick's Beda Fomm game modeled the Italians' difficulties very well.

Human Italians ought to have a tough time in that same scenario. If the Allied AI isn't playing well, then I'd suspect that there's a problem with the objective settings. I checked now and the "secure" objective for Via Balbia was set out to 4km. That setting should have the Allies in the south defending four kilometers in every direction, and should stop the Axis from infiltrating left or right. Flanking the Allied positions at The Pimple and Mosque Hill and moving east should be difficult because it's slow going and the Allies receive reinforcements from that direction. If you win as the Italians, it's something to be chuffed about!

OOB came from all over the place and was influenced by:

Macksay - Operation Compass
Ospey - Beda Fomm
Frank Chadwick's Beda Fomm boardgame
The Australian War Diaries
A Italian-focused website: http://www.comandosupremo.com/forums/

The problem with OOB is that nearly all sources tend to overstate unit strength. For instance, a source will refer to the 4th Armoured Bde and fail to mention that the battalions cited are at or under squadron strength. Numbers of serviceable Allied AFV vary from hour to hour in the best, most reliable accounts.

As far as the French unit in Brevity, I have no clue. IIRC, the only French unit in any of the scenarios was a company of marines in the Mersa Brega scenario.

-Moe

 

[Metalogic]

Does this scenario come with The Cauldron module, or is it a custom one? If the latter, is it available to download somewhere?

 

[Daz]

Beda Fomm is part of the Cauldron pack, yes.

If you like this theater you may be interested in something I started here:

http://forums.lnlpublishing.com/threads/the-lead-up-to-battle-at-beda-fomm.1943/

I didn't get very far with it I'm afraid, but hope to return to it again one day.

 

[Metalogic]

Beda Fomm is part of the Cauldron pack, yes.

If you like this theater you may be interested in something I started here:

http://forums.lnlpublishing.com/threads/the-lead-up-to-battle-at-beda-fomm.1943/

I didn't get very far with it I'm afraid, but hope to return to it again one day.

Thanks, I have a particular interest in the early Desert War period