CWC2 questions

[ntdars]

Good day all! Excited to get some games in of 2nd ed in the near future.

Few questions; page 50 of v2 rule book it states "ATGW units are split into Dedicated ATGW units, marked with a D in the Army Lists"

I don't see any "D" marking in any of the units statlines, except that they are under the "Dedicated" section in the army list. Am I missing something there? As well, Infantry are not under that dedicated list, so can we assume INF:AT teams are "dedicated" and can fire multiple AT weapons a turn?

Second question, the V2 rulebook seems to be missing the army size modifier rules which can either add or subtract up to 25% of your base point availability before a game (page 52 of v1 rulebook). Am I missing it or was it removed? We really loved that element.

Quick edit; also surprised to see Russians now have a +1 to the air superiority roll same as UK/US whereas before they had -1 to the roll. Is this intentional or a typo?

Cheers

[Big Insect]

Hi there - thanks for raising these questions

On the dedicated ATGW question - there is a whole section of ATGW weapons where the heading states:
Anti-Tank (Dedicated)
All ATGW weapons in that section are the Dedicated ATGW.

Similarly - the dedicated Anti-Aircraft are all in the section headed:
Air Defence (Dedicated)

There may be occasions in certain lists where some of the Support units might need to be classified as Dedicated (so cannot be in the Dedicated section of the lists and then there would be a 'D' in the Notes column for that unit - but this is a rare occurrence.

The 25% variable element can still be applied - it is covered off in the Introduction to the on-line army lists - which is due to be uploaded shortly. But the mechanism is still the same as it was in CWC-II. But it is an optional choice now.

On the +1 modifier for the Soviet Union, yes, this is a deliberate change.
It reflects the fact that against any forces other than the NATO 'big 4' (e.g. West Germany, UK, France and the USA), the revision of how the Soviet air force was likely to have performed, needed adjusting.

I hope that helps?
Thanks

Mark

[Big Insect]

I don't see any "D" marking in any of the units statlines, except that they are under the "Dedicated" section in the army list. Am I missing something there? As well, Infantry are not under that dedicated list, so can we assume INF:AT teams are "dedicated" and can fire multiple AT weapons a turn?

Thanks for raising this BTW - and I will look at making things clearer in any reprint.

On the IATW question - sorry I missed that in my previous reply - the Dedicated bit really applies to the removal of the Command distance penalties primarily. It allow specialist ATGW (& AA) units to operate more remotely than in CWC-I and to be more effective as they generally carry more ammunition.
Hence why Milan teams in the Support section are not classified as Dedicated (for example) but Milan teams mounted on vehicles (in the Anti-Tank section) usually are. In some lists the same ATGW (AA) unit will appear in both the Support section and the specific Anti-tank (AA) section - it allow players flexibility as to how they are deployed.

On page 50 in the Antitank Effects/Restrictions table it states that IATW weapons can only be fired once, either as Response or Opportunity fire, or once as Commanded fire, per game turn. IATW are not Dedicated weapons.
NB: there is at least one exception in the army lists to this - where a specific army (the Dutch) multi-armed some regular infantry units with a couple of different types of IATWs. In that case (& it is specified in the Special Rules in that list) these Infantry units can fire both weapons in a single game turn.
But it is an exception and those infantry units are not classified as Dedicated.

I expect that there will be some movement of units in the lists between Support and Dedicated, as the errata unfolds, but that is the beauty of having on-line army lists 

The challenge with depicting IATW upgrades is that some are one-shot 'throw-away' weapons (e.g. some of the LAW variants) and others are multi-shot (such as Bazooka's or RPG-7s for example). But from a game-play perspective having IATW being able to shoot every turn in a game-turn proved to make them significantly overly effective during the play-tests!

Hope that helps?
Mark

[ntdars]

I don't see any Infantry options under the dedicated anti tank section, only under Support and they're labeled as "ATGW". So does that mean even an INF:AT squad can't fire multiple AT shots per turn? Feels a bit odd to me.

Apologies I'm not sure I understand the reasoning for the +1 to the Russian air superiority roll. Was the intent that they will be more effective against nations that AREN'T the big four? Because currently RAW they're just as effective as those now

Thanks for writing back Mark!

[Big Insect]

Hi there

No IATW are included in the Anti-Tank (Dedicated) section - that is deliberate.
AT guns and RR/RCLs are not restricted in the same way as ATGWs are - they can fire each turn on command or in Response or Opportunity fire.

All ATGW that are listed in the Support section of the lists will only fire once per game turn, and only as Commanded fire. This reflects ammunition supply primarily.
Hopefully I am understanding your question here?

With the Soviet +1 Air Superiority change - the view was that previously the Soviets were overly disadvantaged with the -1 modifier, against even standard NATO countries. Against the Big 4 the Soviets were previously effectively at a potential -4 potential disadvantage (at worst).

There is (of course) a lot of Western Cold War and post Cold War theories that NATO would have dominated the skies over the Western European battle grounds (& that is reflected in the books of both Hackett, Shirriff etc. as well). However, personally, I think that it probably would have been a lot more even than we think and that (as we are seeing in Ukraine) if both sides don't totally neutralise the enemy ground based AA it is going to be an extremely dangerous thing for anybody to be flying over the battlefield, for either combatant (& the AA and terrain rules changes reflect that).

I am also keen to try and create a play-balance in the rules/lists that works to give both sides enough of an opportunity to field their air assets (as all too often I've seen Soviet players just not bother to buy them as the chances of them being fielded  were so relatively low).
I'd be interested to hear how it plays out in your games.

BR
Mark

[sultanbev]

More recent USAAF research I've seen indicates NATO would have lost air superiority very quickly.
In practice NATO would have done "big wing" attacks a la the 1st Gulf War, and most of the Warpac stuff would be command driven pre-planned missions in effect, so in neither case would we have seen random tactical close air support directly over the battlefield much, and certainly not in penny-packet 1-3 flight attacks we see in wargames.
For example the German Bo-105 anti-tank helicopters were in regiments of 56 or similar. They were intended to be used en masse, so in CWC/MSH you'd either get 15 or so models of them all at once, or more likely, none at all.

A big wing attack would be 3 squadrons of bombers/attack planes, in CWC = 12 models, escorted by 1 EW flight for jamming = 1 model, 1 Wild Weasel Squadron for flak suppression = 3 models EF-111 or F-4G, 2 fighter squadrons@ 4-6 models (F-15 usually), plus tankers and rescue helos. Very little of which would be dedicated to blowing up random AFVs wandering round a battlefield 2000m from friendly units, covered by the lethal Soviet 3-tier air defence layered system.

It's not fun for wargaming, but the effects of airstrikes would be felt before the wargame started, eg you would have less ammo or so many moves of fuel, or parts of units just wouldn't turn up for 2-6 hours/turns; or, in an attack-defence game, the attacker would get pre-programmed attacks on terrain features where enemy were thought to be, bit like a preliminary artillery bombardment.

I'm not saying change anything  , but we should accept that aircraft representation in our games isn't realistic.

[Jim Ando]

Hi

In the old rules the  howitzer rule worked fine but I'm confused with the new edition.

The old set didn't have AP and AT stats so the H rule was need. However with the separate stats now how do you work out the distance for AT fire by a H marked gun.
I'll use a Carl gustav as an example
It's 5/25 for AT fire so it can only fire at afv targets 12.5cm away. Why not just put that in the stats as it can't hit armoured targets at 25cm. Or am I missing something as this will apply to all weapons marked H.

[toxicpixie]

Hi

In the old rules the  howitzer rule worked fine but I'm confused with the new edition.

The old set didn't have AP and AT stats so the H rule was need. However with the separate stats now how do you work out the distance for AT fire by a H marked gun.
I'll use a Carl gustav as an example
It's 5/25 for AT fire so it can only fire at afv targets 12.5cm away. Why not just put that in the stats as it can't hit armoured targets at 25cm. Or am I missing something as this will apply to all weapons marked H.

The "H" special will allow over half range fire at buildings and bunkers and similar, whilst restricting long range AT fire.

[Jim Ando]

I see but would that not be ap not at.

So you can see my confusion.

Thanks for clearing it up.

[Jim Ando]

So a piat can only engage armour at 2.5 cm now. Surely that's less than in bkc. Most of the infantry anti tank weapons are firing a heat projectile which if I'm correct isn't affected by range ?.

[Big Insect]

Hi Jim
There was an issue with the continuity across some of the IATW & RCLR stats - the 'official' Piat stats are AP:1/10 | AT: 1/10H - so a Piat can engage Soft targets at 10cm (with AP stats), Armour at 5cm (using AT stats) and Fortifications/Buildings at 10cm (using AT stats).
We are working our way through the lists to correct this issue.

However, as I've said elsewhere, one of the challenges of a time-period as long and as technologically innovative as this one, is that carrying over WW2 weaponry will mean that some of the stats will necessarily looks a bit odd (or appear very 'weak'). WW2 is a lot easier as the range & calibre of weapons are a lot more standard (& closer together) and you've only got 6 years (10 years at worst) of developments to accommodate (all be it that it was very rapid), as opposed to c.44 years in CWC   

Thanks for bearing with us.
Mark
 

[Jim Ando]

Thanks for the reply.

I'm still a little confused

So the piat should be 2/10 but the range stat has already been halved in the list unlike a Charlie G which at 5/25 has not.

[toxicpixie]

Thanks for the reply.

I'm still a little confused

So the piat should be 2/10 but the range stat has already been halved in the list unlike a Charlie G which at 5/25 has not.

Charlie G no longer has H does it? At least According to the Austrian list I was just looking at...

And as Mark says, you wouldn't use the AP stat for shooting up a bunker, you use the AT stat.

Hence the continued use of the H designator.

If you used the AP stat you'd need another rider anyway - to denote "this is AP but it can hit hard targets like bunkers" versus "this is normal AP that can only shoot up soft targets..."...

[Jim Ando]

In cwc2 Charlie g does have an H.

My post was just querying the point in having H guns as AP and AT are separate now. You could just have the AT range at the reduced number.

[Big Insect]

Just to be clear here:

All IATW and RR/RCLR should have an H stat (there is 1 that doesn't specifically and there will be a special note against that)

So as stated above - the correct Stats for a Piat (across all lists) are AP: 1/10 | AT: 1/10H
So the Piat gets 1 dice at 5cm against Armoured/Hard targets.

However, it gets 2 dice under 5cm against Soft targets (as you get a +1 under half-range) and only 1 dice between 5cm & 10cm. NB: AT H stats do not get the under half-range +1.

This is the way that IATW and RR/RCLs worked previously in CWC-I - the 'complexity' is the splitting out of the AP & At stats - it was thought that the H was not required, but as stated previously you can fire at Fortifications using the AT factors, but still do not get the under half range +1 for doing so.

Sadly the Charlie G stats in the Austrian is probably a typo Toxic 

As it is an M2 Carl Gustav its stats are - AP: 3/40 | AT: 5/25H
The PzF 3 below it in the list should also have an H against the AT stats - we'll get them corrected.

I hope that makes sense.

Thanks