distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

how far/close should the Company CO and the Battalion Co (ie, A0) be to the combat? especially important for the battalion CO since losing him means you lose the long campaign.

At first I tend to place the battalion CO in the rear with the artillery but he almost got killed by counter barrage.

Re: distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

A0 - in the rear and near nothing that will draw enemy indirect fires (do not sit him by arty, or AAA positions, or some SFMG that start blatting away etc). Put him on his own hill with a view of somewhere useful that he can use his observer skills on, maybe.

Do not get him into combat situations, nor convert him to a vehicle or whatever. Too valuable to lose.

Coy commanders probably should stay about 3-500m behind the fire-fight - and only join in if they have to (because its all going pear shaped, or it's a runaway success). If he is an AFV and an enemy starts shooting at him - don't duel with him, hide with pride (he has been seen). Put him near the reserve platoon of the coy, perhaps.

Cheers
Andy

Re: distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

Yes, never ever place the A0 near any kind of on map arty.

Don

Re: distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

I would actually recommend not placing anything else too near on-map arty either, since they tend to attract their fair share of counter-battery fire. Exception being ammo carriers, and possible transport vehicles (in case you use shoot-and-scoot approach and move your guns to a new position after couple of rounds of firing).

In case you are using AA-weapons to protect the artillery park, they should also be placed at a safe distance from the assets they are protecting. Around 10 hexes is suitable distance in my experience.

Re: distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

Unless I am playing soviets, I try to stick the company commander some 300 meters behind the one or two platoons in front, along with any machine guns that the company may have, or that I've given them extra. Reserve platoon goes behind him, or to the side (terrain depending).


Soviets, he goes a slight bit closer behind the advancing line.

Re: distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

If you PBEM you just told every opponent where to find your HQ :) ( right behind that cluster of MG's behind the main lines..........)

Don

Re: distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

hah yes :) The guy I do PBEM with doesn't read these forums.. I hope.

Re: distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

Just quoting myself really - but more on the overall commander (A0)

In the old Steel Panthers 1, players only had a small number in the campaign core (about 24 as far as I recall). Thus, it paid to "Rambo up" the A0 into a combat unit and get him stuck into combat, since he was about 5% of your core troops.

However, with the increased size of cores in the Camo games, this is absolutely not necessary any longer.

A0
--
- Is the overall commander, and his loss will terminate any campaign (bar 2 player PBEM campaigns). He is your on-table representative, after all. (You are not him, you are the all-seeing "Player God" in games)

- Losing him is a big morale blow for your entire force. It's a major element in the calculation for "force broken". When your force is broken, all rallying gets more difficult.

- He represents the rear communications link. If he is KO in any game (not just campaign games) then any comms with off-map units gets more problematic. Arty batteries will tend to be out of contact more often for example.

- If he is left as the default HQ type element, then he is an "FOO lite". He is far better at calling arty than any other non-arty HQ, if not quite at full FOO quality. In a campaign game, you should therefore use him as such - he will gain in the "arty command" statistic, and so get even better at calling in the guns quickly. If you change his element type to a tank or whatever, then he loses this FO ability. As an infantry type element, he is reasonably survivable to enemy arty strikes, and less noticeable than vehicles to enemy air strikes (for example).

So - A0 should either act the WW1 "general in the château" role, hidden somewhere safe in the rear, well away from any other elements which might draw fire (arty say). OR, as I tend to use him, in the rear of the advance on say a hilltop with a good view acting as my #2 arty FOO, but again away from any other troops which may draw enemy fires - esp indirect fires.

Treat him rather like a King in chess, therefore.

Cheers
Andy

Re: distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

You'll know one way or the other the next game you play...

........and if it's Andy look for the hilltop behind his lines with the best view of the map.....


Don

Re: distance for company CO and the battalion CO
 

I'm rather curious that no one has mentioned the A0's role in rallying. I almost always keep a fast vehicle near the AO in order to move him to the 'point of maximum effort' as an additional level of rallying. Now Andy and Don have me wondering if I've been making a mistake all these years!