Urban Combat - Up Close and Personal

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Urban Combat - Up Close and Personal - 12/4/2001 10:57:00 AM

Capt. Pixel

Posts: 1219
Joined: 10/15/2001
From: Tucson, AZ
Status: offline

One of the types of combat that I abhor the most is the street-to-street fighting of urban combat. (this may well be due to my gawd-awwful record in winning these kinds of battles

) My question is: What tactics do you veteran players out there use to deal with the extreme deadliness of attacking an opponent in these close-in, highly defensable situations? (and altho' the response "don't - encircle and move on" is certainly valid and wise, it's hardly useful. Someone, eventually, has to go in there and clear out the enemy)

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- 12/4/2001 11:19:00 AM

Alexandra

Posts: 546
Joined: 12/7/2000
From: USA
Status: offline

Here's my tactics, when the enemy cooperates

1. Find enemy - typically with scouts or infantry. 2. Supress enemy with mortars, arty, riflemen, AFVs. 3. Eliminate with enginneer assault teams. 4. Repeat. Now, while doing this, AFVs and MG teams should be covering roads, etc, to interdict enemy reaction elements. Note, also, that this is an attacking, not a defending strategy. Hope it helps. Alex

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- 12/4/2001 11:27:00 AM

Tomanbeg

Posts: 4385
Joined: 7/14/2000
From: Memphis, Tn, CSA
Status: offline

It depends. Early war-before heavy armor, I buy lots of arty and blow a lane through to where I want to go. Late war, I load inf on the thickest armored tank I can get and work real slow down parallel streets, with infantry going thru the houses between the streets. When you get to a cross street, stop everything , build a fire base and send fresh toops across the street and into the next block. Casualty budget is 1 platoon and 1 tank section per block. If you get lucky and punch through, flood the hole with fast vehicles. When using the armor punch your arty is used to protect the flanks. Fire blind on each intersection as you approach it. I plan which blocks I'm going to bust and put my preposition arty requests on the intersections that will need interdiction. None of this works THAT well. My solution to city battles is not playing them. A real ball buster is having to fight to get to the city and then having to bust it. With C&C on you will lose several turns getting the troops in position and ready to go.
T. (engineers are NOT optional. I split up my engineers, using the reassign button to add a squad to each rifle platoon, saving the zero engineers for local reserves.)

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- 12/4/2001 11:30:00 AM

generalrichmond

Posts: 178
Joined: 10/15/2001
From: richmond, va
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Goooood topic. Whether on the defense or attack, firelanes are especially important. You want to get these setup ASAP with MMGs or HMGs. It's obvious on the defense; on attack you want to look for retreat lanes and hose those suckers after some arty gets pounding in there. Eliminate their morale and destroy their stand and fight ability by raking routed/retreating units. Oh, there's nothing like a warm MG barrel... here, wanna touch??

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- 12/4/2001 12:10:00 PM

Kuroshio Apocal

Posts: 49
Joined: 11/16/2001
From: Riverside, California, USA
Status: offline

My way is a bit less historically accurate, but it works well in SP:WAW

. Infiltrate a company of Rangers or other Special Forces infantry to one side of the town and split their defenses. Usually, this will throw any and all defensive plans they had into chaos. Para- and glider-assaults work to a more limited degree (due to the enemy being able to see it coming), but they can be just as effective. Speed, stealth, and surprise are the key to almost every battle, but street-fighting more than any other.
-ka

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- 12/4/2001 12:17:00 PM

Redleg

Posts: 1805
Joined: 5/23/2000
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My method is similar to Alex's.
Find 'em. Recon.
Fix 'em Using mortars, mainly.
Fight 'em. Hopefully with a numeric advantage.
Finish 'em bring up additional squads. Move slowly so squads don't get decimated by SMG or engineers. City fighting is very much like fighting in the jungle.

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- 12/4/2001 12:47:00 PM

degen

Posts: 166
Joined: 9/8/2000
From: California
Status: offline

Ahh, one of my favorite settings to do battle in. I too use tactics similar to Alexandra, with some modifications: Start pounding suspected strongholds with artillery as I advance. I prefer heavy artillery over mortars, as the mortars don't seem to do the trick in an urban setting.
Scout those strongholds and assault with engineers, while moving in AFVs for fire support. Suppress first from a distance with MGs, AFVs, or whatever is handy, then move in 1 - 2 squads for the kill.
Hammer a wedge into their defenses and hold for the counterattack. Anchor key positions with engineers and MGs or if none are available, just stack-up the squads. If need be, ram an AFV into a key building to hold it--a little unconventional, but desparate battles sometimes take desparate tactics.
Continue to pound positions with artillery, but adjust to keep the barrage just ahead of your advance so that the next layer of defense--as well as the counterattack force--starts taking a pounding.
Carefully move AFVs into support positions, but scout roads first for mines.
At some point you will break a gap in the defenses and can rush to encircle the remaining victory hexes. In any event, the casualties will be high, but that is the price paid for house to house fighting. One of my favorite scenarios for urban combat is Jess Housley's Schoolhouse, but the Carenten battle in UTR is a close second.

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- 12/4/2001 7:57:00 PM

panda124c

Posts: 1692
Joined: 5/23/2000
From: Houston, TX, USA
Status: offline

Surround the town, artillery the H*** out of the town, shoot then as they come out the back. If you have to go in after them you will lose units, use SMG, Special Forces, and Engineering units if you have to root them out. Mortars (50mm, 60mm, and 81mm not 120mm or 4.3in) can be used to support your units in the town, don't use guns (75, 105, 150, or larger). And one more very inportant thing, don't rush go slow, clear the town section by section. Set MG's up to cover roads.

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