”Gameyness is in
the eye of the beholder.” – Me
Playing
CMBO in the Band of Brothers
is about having fun. Loosing a battle may be less fun than winning it, but it
will still be fun. However, there are some things that may take out the fun for
a player because he considers a tactic by his opponent as “gamey”. What do people consider gamey? Usually it’s
about “realism” of some sort. Ranger503 wrote a nice classification of
battles which you find here. The initial
version of this essay was focused on CMBO, and several things described here
still apply to CMBO only, mainly because the CM developers removed some issues
and added some features in CMBB and CMAK.
The following table lists a number of items that, if used in a CM battle, might disappoint or annoy your opponent because he feels “cheated” somehow – usually because of “lack of realism”. His reaction may range from not even telling you and just silently putting you on his “don’t play again” list to loudly accusing you of being a “gamey bastard” on the message board (not recommended). Since playing CM should be fun, annoying your opponent by doing something that he considers gamey is not helpful. Since many of us at one point or another did use something “cool” only to find out later that the other guy considered it “gamey”, this list is meant to help discussing the individual feelings towards gameyness before a battle starts. There is a (very human) tendency amongst the losers of battles to look for a reason why they lost which has not to do with their personal game skill; “gameyness by the opponent” is a nice candidate (others include “unfavorable map” and “unbalanced forces” :-). If you discussed the issue of gameyness before the battle, this excuse will no longer work.
Experience
from the Band of Brothers discussion forum shows that people have quite
different views on what is gamey and under which circumstances. Many members
have also indicated that their view on gameyness has changed several times over
their CM career. The list below includes all items that the author ever heard
to be considered gamey, and you probably find no person in all of wBoB that
considers ALL of them gamey. The author’s
personal assessment of gameyness of an item on this list (augmented by how many other
members seem to consider it gamey) is given in the soon-to-be famous DvC-DoG
value (“DrVonCool’s Degree of
Gameyness”). DvC-DoG comes in five levels: 1 = definitely a no-no, 2 = very
gamey, 3 = gamey, 4 = mildly gamey – some would even say not
gamey at all, 5 = only gamey if you loose to this, otherwise ok :-).
Potential uses of this list include
The list
is split into two categories. Category 1 (Force Picks) only applies to Quick
Battles with forces that are picked by the player (“human pick”).
Automatically picked forces in QBs and the forces assigned to a player in a
pre-made scenario can never be gamey and should be used to their full potential
(i.e. if in a scenario you get four British Wasps, five French HMCs, both
Canadian and US airborne big size artillery FOs and a platoon of US Super
Pershings, you should only worry about the crazy scenario designer, but not
about using all that stuff against your opponent, who likely has all sorts of
crazy stuff too). Category 2 deals with exploitations (real or perceived) of
limitations in the game engine that a game like CM has to have compared to
reality.
I’m open to (constructive) ideas for improvement of this list (better wording, additional items, …).
Force Picks
|
No. |
Gamey item |
Description |
versions |
DvC-DoG |
|
1) |
Flak trucks |
A bug in the CM engine causes AFVs to shoot at them with AP, which will do little or no damage. HE kills them all right. Forbidden in wBoB (unless part of a scenario). |
CMBO
only |
1 |
|
2) |
M8 HMC |
Gamey only if using lots (e.g. more than two in a 1500 point battle) of them in a group. HMCs are relatively cheap for their fighting ability, and the so called “HMC hordes” tend to overrun most defenses because of their sheer number and fire power. |
CMBO
only |
3 |
|
3) |
Wasps |
Gamey only if using lots (e.g. more than two in a 1500 point battle) of them. Wasps are relatively cheap for their fighting ability. |
CMBO
only |
3 |
|
4) |
Hetzer |
Gamey only if using lots (e.g. more than two in a 1500 point battle) of them. Hetzers are relatively cheap for their fighting ability. |
CMBO
only |
4 |
|
5) |
SMG platoons |
Gamey only if used as the main infantry force. SMG platoons are very cheap compared to their (short distance) fighting ability. SMG platoons have all automatic weapons, and the game model for ammunition of automatic weapons gives them as many shots as e.g. a rifle squad gets, so they have superior firepower without having a matching disadvantage. |
CMBO
(all SMG troops) CMAK
(Italian paratroopers only) |
4 |
|
6) |
“Super” tanks |
Very heavily armored tanks like Jumbos, Pershings, Churchill VIII, King Tiger, Jagdtiger, or in earlier periods Lee/Grant, Matilda, KV-1, KV-2, IS-1/2/3 etc. are very hard to kill – depending on the date the opponent may have no weapon in his repertoire that can kill them except at short distances from the rear. |
all |
4 |
|
7) |
Big artillery |
CM already limits your purchase of artillery; still you can buy quite a lot of really big shells compared to the overall force size. Having max. amount of artillery is considered gamey by some. |
mainly
CMBO due to high precision |
5 |
|
8) |
Assault boats |
If used on dry land. Supposedly enemy units focus their fire on the boats which allows other units of the boat owner to take free shots at the enemy. |
all |
2 |
|
9) |
Mixing forces or branches a)
across nations or more than two b) two branches within same nation |
This is about mixing units of different nations (e.g. US and British, or Italian and German) or different troop branches (e.g. Airborne with Army). Some people feel that any mixing is gamey; others think that mixing no more than two branches (but not across nations) is ok, e.g. the (in CMBO) favored mixing of British Airborne infantry with British armor. |
all |
a) 2 b) 5 |
Non-standard
use of equipment and other (real or perceived) exploitations of the game engine
|
No. |
Title |
Description |
versions |
DvC-DoG |
|
10) |
Wire for spotting or creating paths |
When wire is put on non-open tiles, you can spot much better across and along them. A long string of wires can enable you to spot through a thick wood patch that would otherwise certainly block your LOS. In addition, tracked vehicles will be able to drive across otherwise impassable terrain if driving over a "path of wire". |
all |
2 |
|
11) |
Flame wall around flag |
Denying certain ground to the enemy by putting it on fire is usually considered ok, but you could set up a complete wall of burning tiles around some or all flags, thus making it impossible for your opponent to reach them. |
all |
2 |
|
12) |
Crews used on attack |
Crews that are killed give big points to the enemy, so using them is punished by the game engine. Still some people frown upon the sight of your crews charging instead of hiding. |
all |
3 |
|
13) |
Crews used for scouting |
Crews have a low spotting ability. Yet you could use them to scout the enemy positions. |
all |
3 |
|
14) |
Edge hugging |
Advancing along the edge of the map, thus being sure that one flank is secure. In reality, there is no map edge, so you could never be sure that there is no enemy coming from the “other side of the edge”. While considered gamey by some, you better prepare for this as there is no clear difference between "edge hugging" and "flanking". |
all |
4 |
|
15) |
Jeep rushes |
Jeeps are pretty cheap and if you drive them close enough to the enemy defense, some defending gun etc. may unhide (triggered by the TacAI) and shoot at the Jeep, thus showing itself before becoming dangerous to your more pricey stuff. |
Mainly
CMBO due to lack of cover arc |
3 |
|
16) |
Endgame flag rushes |
This
is when close to the end (last one or two turns) one or both parties charge
some or all of their units close to one or more enemy controlled flags in
order to neutralize the flag or even control it without leaving the opponent
time to counter-attack. Real battles don't end by an outside counter, so the
opponent will always have the time to execute a counter-attack (assuming he
still has the forces). In its extreme form, you won't see your opponent for
the whole battle but in the last minute he jumps at you at full force. To prevent this, wBoB rules require to use variable endings in CMBB and CMAK, which greatly reduces the usefulness of this tactic. |
Mainly
CMBO due to no variable ending |
4 |
|
17) |
Retreating
units off-board |
Once
a unit leaves the map, it’s gone for good, i.e. can’t be used
anymore but also is safe from destruction (and thus deprives the opponent
from getting a chance to gain additional kill points). Each unit that leaves
the map also reduces the global morale, which in extreme cases can lead to an
auto-surrender by the CM engine. |
all |
5
(would be 6 if there was such a value ;-)) |
|
18) |
Mainly
using infantry in half squads |
CM
allows to split an infantry squad into two half squads (an overwatch element with the LMG, if any; and an assault
element with the SMG, if any). Splitting a squad supposedly has a negative
impact on the units morale (i.e. they take cover and panic earlier), but has
the advantage of being able to fight two targets and to require two enemy
units to suppress. Since a squad in RL won’t be all sitting in the same
foxhole anyway but may be well spread out (and spread out their fire across
several enemies), I add it only for the sake of completeness. |
All |
5 |
|
19) |
Long
strings of wire |
Barbed
wire was and still is a formidable tool to deny enemies fast access to a
defense zone. Yet in CM the attacker has no means to destroy a wire barrier,
whereas in RL there exist ways to do so. This has caused some people to
consider long strings of wire (particularly if it runs from one map side to
the other) as gamey. |
CMBO,
CMAK (in CMBB wire counts as loss!) |
4
(if from side to side) 5
(otherwise) |