9 replies to this topic

[Dan Lewis]

Since most of the games I run are in North Africa or Sinai, vehicle dust can certainly play a role. In the rules on 5.8 it says 

 

"Dust is created at a rate of 1” of dust behind the vehicle for every 2” of movement, when a vehicle is moving and the result obscures line of sight."

 

A vehicle moves 18" CC (activation + bonus move). So do I lay a trail of smoke 9" long?  

 

Anyone firing through the dust has a -5 to hit. 

 

 

Seems like a good tactic I could employ would be to use fast moving armored cars zig zagging, using evasive maneuver, in front of my tanks to give the tanks a modifier of -5 when being fired upon because of dust. 

[Begemot_]

Any historical examples of this sort of thing being done?

[Begemot_]

The dust tactic suggested above probably envisions something like  this:

 

 

 

A nice thick lasting cloud of dust generated by armored cars masking the following armored attack.

 

How realistic is this for the real world?

 

 

 

Further observations on dust in the desert.

 

The amount of dust a vehicle will generate will depend on the character of the ground.

 

If it is damp: no dust. It does rain in the desert sometimes.

 

If the ground is hard and rocky then little to no dust - certainly not enough to create sight line obscuring dust plumes.

 

 

If the ground is firm and not heavily trafficked not a lot of dust.

 

 

Dry surface but lots of vehicles moving together - more dust.

 

 

 

Hard packed dirt roads - not too much dust.

 

 

 

 

 

Soft dusty ground, lots of dust.

 

 

 

Then there is the consideration of how much dust is thrown up, how opaque and how long will it provide obscuration.

 

 

For a very effective cloak of dust to conceal an approach, how about one of these?

 

 

 

 

Of course, when this type of dust was in play, the war came to a halt while the wind blew.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Peter M. Skaar]

Your observations with the accompanying pictures are great, Begemot.  Except for a couple photos, most of the dust is not that great of an impediment to seeing the vehicles.  As you stated, the ground conditions are key as hard packed dirt, damp or wet dirt, don't throw up the clouds of dust that one might expect.

Dry farmers fields on the other hand with fine almost powdery dust can have more of the effect as indicated in the first picture.  I do remember my days at Ft. Hunter-Ligget in 1979 working to develop the joint air attack team of Cobra helicopters with A-10s working together.  It did not rain at "Hungry Lizard" all summer long and the tanks went over the same ground over and over again.  The dirt was churned up into almost a fine talcum powder and there were big, lingering clouds of dust where the tanks went in that case.

[Begemot_]

Another fact about dust in a combat setting: it reveals more than it conceals. The dust plumes show vehicle movement to the enemy from a distance. Approaching vehicles with dust clouds trailing behind them alert the enemy. Of course, this fact can also be used for deception, to falsely suggest movement of forces.

[Phil Callcott]

But, " use fast moving armored cars zig zagging, using evasive maneuver, in front of my tanks to give the tanks a modifier of -5 when being fired upon because of dust" is a double edged sword.

 

How do the screened tanks keep their heading correct in a dust cloud?

 

Thick dust in the Desert could be seen from the moon giving your position and movement away, unless a ruse.

 

And that fast armoured car is all too visible in front of his own dust...

 

Phil

[Dan Lewis]

Great Pictures Begemot_

 

Rommel would regularly create huge dust clouds in teh desert to give the false impression of marching troop columns (or vehicles). He wrote of this in his diary. He used it at Tobruk having the Italians attack from the west and they were tasked with generating a lot of dust. Meanwhile the Germans made a wide arc to the South and then attacked the British from the South East. Per Rommel;s diary the tactic was succesfull in tricking the British. 

 

This idea came to me due to one scenario I'm working on. My attacking force in this scenario is a mixtue of 12 British Vickers, Morris AC, Rolls Royce AC and couple Bren Carriers, trailed by infantry. All vehicles are armed with Machine Guns and Anti-Tank Rifles. They are approaching a dug in Italian position and the Italians have couple of 20mm AA Guns, with ROF of 3, which can take out some portion of the British vehicles before they get in range to fire back. A portion of the British vehicles are fast enough to use evasive movement and  thus generate the a -5 when being attacked. The vehicles that aren't fast enough are the ones who advance through the dust generated by the faster vehicles and thus have a -5 when being attacked. Since I have to approach while vulnerable to AA gun, at least this way I can reduce the casualties as all vehicles will all gain a -5 to hit. 

 

The italian have a dozen L3/35, also with machine guns and ATR. 

 

In practicing this Scenario (which I got from Panzer North Africa game), I was trying to find a way to balance the scenario as it seemed to favor the Italians too mch. British suffered too many casualties trying to get in range and then didn't have enough juice to engage the L3/35 in a ATR exchange. I looked up the dust rules and came up with a solution that gives the Brits a better chance of reducing casualties from the 20mm guns. 

 

This scenario is 1940 so ATR's still play a signficant role. In a discussion on TMP about ATR one of the guys pointed out that it takes multiple hits to take out a vehicle; the logic being that punching a hole in the armor with an  ATR shell doesn't mean that you hurt anybody or did any damage to equipment. So I was thinking I should use a home brew rule that you have to have 2 ATR hits on the vehicle to take it out of play. 

[Dan Lewis]

 Shermans NAfrica.PNG   328.68KB   0 downloadsHere's one more picture I pinched off a YouTube video

[Begemot_]

Dan - I didn't see any artillery in the scenario order of battle. Artillery is good at suppressing defenders and creating a bit of dust and smoke.

 

 

Begemot

[Dan Lewis]

You're right. i'm playing the scenario as laid out in Panzer North Africa board game, and no artillery was given to Brits or Italians. I'm using miniatures with Mein Panzer rules.