Is assaulting Bunkers too hard ?

[wiggum]

Hi !

I currentl play the second tutorial (Utah) and have a hard time taking any of the VP's.
I think it is currently too difficult to assault bunker hexes.

Look at this example:


The Enemys inside the bunker consist of:
X Inf, Moral "D" (less then 10 men)
X Gun, Moral "E" (DISRUPTED and took gun losses)
X Gun, Moral "F" (DISRUPTED and took gun losses)

The Bunker is completely surrounded (but not isolated because there is a supply source on the bunker hex) by somewhat like 500 US troops and a dozen tanks and got assaulted 3 times already before my test assault.
I saved right before the assault, i assault with 180 combat engineers (Moral "D", Low Fatigue)
I reloaded the save and assaulted again, i did this 15 times and never was able to take the bunker hex, the result you see in the above screenshot is the best result out of those 15 tests.

What do you think, do i maybe misunderstand the abstraction of the engine ?
Is it maybe realistic ? I hardly believe a few low quality static german troops would fight to the last men in such a case...

[fastphil]

Let them go i.e. give them an escape route or they will fight to the finish (I think) . Same as in Panzer Campaigns.

[wiggum]

Hi !

What do you mean by escape route ? As you can see there is a empty hex next to them.
Is surrendering not simulated/abstracted ?

By the way, the defenders are Moral "D", "E" and "F".

[phoenix]

I wonder why that one is so hard. Playing the intro campaign I thought it was noticeably easier to take the beach bunkers than it was to take bunkers in Kursk, for example, which I found very challenging. I think the difference was the tanks.

One of the units in your bunker isn't disrupted, of course. And your attackers are 'D' quality. But you would think common sense would dictate that 10 men and a few guns wouldn't hold out so long against such numbers.

Are you using the tanks to shell the bunker before your assault? In the intro campaign I found that the tanks were powerful can openers. Doesn't address your question, of course - you think 180 D quality combat engineers ought to be able to take an already thrice-assaulted bunker containing guns and ten men who are in good order. History can provide examples of numbers like that not succeeding immediately, though. Not sure it's clear cut. How many losses did you take over your four unsuccessful tries?

Peter

[wiggum]

Are you using the tanks to shell the bunker before your assault? In the intro campaign I found that the tanks were powerful can openers. Doesn't address your question, of course - you think 180 D quality combat engineers ought to be able to take an already thrice-assaulted bunker containing guns and ten men who are in good order. History can provide examples of numbers like that not succeeding immediately, though. Not sure it's clear cut. How many losses did you take over your four unsuccessful tries?

Peter

Yes, i used the tanks right before the assault to shell the bunkers.
Of course, it could happen in reality but after 15 test assaults with no success it looks like its the most likely result that the assault fails and not some "bad luck" thing.
The four unsuccessful tries befor my 15 test assaults resulted mostly in very light causalities 1-3 men.

Another bunker to the south, containing only 5 men of "E" moral and 2 Guns of "D" moral fought off a assault by 9 tanks (Moral "B" and 65 Inf (Moral "C").

Yes, a assault can bog down easily in reality when confronted by a few well dug-in men and guns . But its also true that the 10 defenders would most likely surrender or route if already over 50% of their unit are WIA and KIA and assaulted again by 180 guys with nasty toys.
You have only so many turns and VP's on bunker hexes with a crew that fights to the last man even when confronted with overwhelming force and surrounded can be really annoying.

[Ricky B]

It can be frustrating when positions hold out against seemingly overwhelming odds. Dennis/Landser34 and I had some discussions of small units holding out for extended periods during the testing, too. But my thought has been that if the units are crushed too easily, then the attacks will move much too quickly. Some bunkers along the beaches held out for an entire day after the landing moved inland, one on the Commonwealth beaches held out for days, although I don't remember where exactly it was.

Remember, the only way the defender will be crushed more quickly in this situation would be if they all disrupt prior to or during the assault. And actually, to keep balance, I agree that BOTH attacker and defender should probably disrupt more easily. Then the attacks will bog down more realistically although that would still leave the defender a bit more vulnerable than currently.

Tough to balance, the PDT is the only way to adjust it and it is much better than 5 years ago, and that won't really adjust the disruption chances, that I can think of. I do believe that overall things work, and the attacks mostly move faster than what happened in 1944.

Anyway, the defender will be done next turn it appears.

Rick

[wiggum]

Attackers and defenders disrupting more easily sound like a plan it could give the game a more realistic feeling.

Also I rarely (like never) see any unit become broken no matter how hard the beating is they take.


also I don't know about giving these bunker hexes their own supply source which prevents them from becoming isolated. Them becoming isolated if surrounded would be realistic and give the assaults better chances to succeed.

[fastphil]

Attackers and defenders disrupting more easily sound like a plan it could give the game a more realistic feeling.

Also I rarely (like never) see any unit become broken no matter how hard the beating is they take.


also I don't know about giving these bunker hexes their own supply source which prevents them from becoming isolated. Them becoming isolated if surrounded would be realistic and give the assaults better chances to succeed.

I agree with the broken units-few if ever break.  In Kursk it may be attributable to the troop quality at Kursk, but not at Perekop.  Don't have Normandy so no comment.

[ComradeP]

The limited effectiveness of infantry assaults has been one of my pet peeves since Kursk, and the lower stacking limit in Normandy makes it more difficult to get a good infantry assault in. However, you do have more tanks that you can use to fire at the bunkers.

The reasons why taking bunkers, or any position, through assault can be difficult are often the same:

-All defenders need to be disrupted, so stacking several small units in a hex is more efficient than placing a single larger unit in a hex.

-Both sides use the same stacking limit, and there are no bonuses for attacking from multiple hexsides. PzC and PB are one of the few series where this is the case, as the majority of the wargames I play include bonuses for attacking from multiple hexsides. Both sides using the same stacking limit tends to favour the defender.

-Assault results are highly variable and less reliable than direct fire.

-Assault losses in general are low as a PDT setting.

I don't think the solution is to make units disrupt more quickly in all situations, as the game already has the issue of units having to pass a disruption check after taking any losses without taking the number of men lost compared to total size into account.

The 1 Man/D result is the bane of any Soviet line in PzC for example, where a unit loses 1/600 of its strength but still disrupts immediately. It's less out of proportion in Kursk and Normandy due to the smaller units, but attacking as the Allies can be challenging. At least their HQ's are decent to good.

It doesn't help that most of the Allied regular infantry units are C quality so they also disrupt fairly quickly.

Making strong assaults more costly for the defender would be an option. The mechanics tend to limit casualties per turn, which can be a good and a bad thing: it's nice that units don't die from direct fire in a single turn, but assaults could be more costly for the defender when facing strong assaults, to compensate for there being no multiple hexside assault bonus and both sides using the same stacking limit.

[wiggum]

Making strong assaults more costly for the defender would be an option. The mechanics tend to limit casualties per turn, which can be a good and a bad thing: it's nice that units don't die from direct fire in a single turn, but assaults could be more costly for the defender when facing strong assaults, to compensate for there being no multiple hexside assault bonus and both sides using the same stacking limit.

Good points ComeradeP, as always !

Making strong assaults more costly for the defender sounds like a possible solution, currently i think the balancing is not correct.
Maybe a higher chance to disrupt the defenders would be nice:
Lets say you assaut a bunker with 3 enemy units below 10 men each
One of them is already Disrupted
You assault with overwhelming forces (100 men +)

Now, currently you can easily fail to take the enemy hex even if you try it 15 or 20 times (reloading for testing).
If their would be a high chance that a strong assault on small units will even if it fails disrupt the defenders and make already disrupted defenders broken then another assault would have a high chance of success, that sounds reasonable.
And as ComeradeP pointed out, the thing with splitting units for defense that then each need to be Disrupted is also something which seems to need a bit more fine tuning to get a better balancing

Another thing that seems off is the Broken status. You can hammer defenders over 8 turns, they "might" get Disrupted with a bit of luck but then they recover again for the next turn so you have to disrupt them again. and even if they stay disrupted and you deal them more casualties in the following turns the chances they become Broken seem way too small currently.

Then there is the "Finishing off" rule that seems like a good idea to simulate units completely loosing cohesion after taking huge losses. But currently i think the chances that such "finishing off" occurs are too small. You constantly see units with under 10% strength wandering around and still fighting, even surviving multiple assaults.. Either make the chances higher or maybe make the "finishing off" possible after units are below 25% strength (or generally for units below 10 men to simulate how quick small units can lose cohesion if they suffer casualties), that sounds more realistic for me.

Point is:
If you assault a hex containing:
X Inf, Moral "D" (less then 10 men)
X Gun, Moral "E" (DISRUPTED and took gun losses)
X Gun, Moral "F" (DISRUPTED and took gun losses)

And deal them 3 more casualties and destroy 3 guns during the assault they should at least (if the assault still fails) become all disrupted/broken...broken at least if they already were disrupted !
We are talking about low quality static german troop, not die hard waffen-ss, elite paratroopers or Japanese fanatics.
I just looked up some actions involving Bunkers at Sedan. If assaulted with the right tools (combat engineers) they can be dealt with pretty quick once the line is penetrated and the bunker surrounded, PzB does not seem to simulate this correctly at the moment.

I mean, currently units inside a bunker go down from 25 men to 3 without getting broken at some point on a regular basis (and maybe not even disrupted status) and they still fight off assaults by 100 men units in good order, thats just a bit off and maybe needs re-balancing.

I hope the devs will look into this and improve the balancing in a future patch.