Profile of GI John 412

Considering we're using the Lieutenant and/or Captain model, it is perfectly realistic for a Lieutenant or Captain to be carrying a M1A1 Thompson submachine gun (or M1 Carbine).


M1A1 Thompson submachine guns were issued (as were M1 Carbines) to non-commissioned and commissioned officers.


M1 Garands? Eh, not so much. I think there's just a bit of miscommunication. I meant they'd be using what a Lieutenant/Captain would actually use, not the proper squad leaders, as we're using those models.

I’m not saying it didn’t happen, I’m just saying that in the official table of organization for a Rifle Company, the squad leaders were in fact issued M1 Garands. I also mentioned the six extra Thompsons maintained at the Company level that could be issued out as needed or wanted.

So yes, some NCOs acquired Carbines and Thompsons sometimes, but the correct TO weapon was an M1 Garand and the only person in the platoon with a Carbine as his TO weapon was the Platoon Leader (a Lieutenant) himself. Not a single person in the Rifle Company was issued a Thompson as their TO weapon, so your claim that Thompsons were more common than M1 Garands in the hands of squad leaders supposes that not only did the Company have more Thompsons than they did (6 in real life), but individuals were also able to disregard the official TO more often than not. In order to give every squad leader, platoon leader and the company commander a Thompson, the company would have needed to have 13 Thompsons total when they only had 6.

Additionally, while going against the TO did happen, it was not the norm. In my 9 years in the Marines I have seen the TO ignored exactly one time and that was when I requested that one of my Marines be issued an M4 carbine instead of his TO weapon because he was too short to handle an M16A4.

But most importantly, giving every in game Riflemen squad a 6th man and a Thompson or two plus a BAR from the weapon racks would be insanely OP and bad for gameplay.

So in closing, Thompsons on Riflemen squad leaders is bad for gameplay, bad for balance, and not historically accurate either.

Excuse the offtopic post but I just wanted to smuggle these in since trenches are being mentioned.





Both are brilliantly made by Widerstreit, first one he meant as a rework for normal trenches, second one you could make trench lines ala WW1 which we thought would be best used for the Eastern Front Armies since they had a fair amount of trenches there, especially around the Kurks area. They could double up as anti-tank ditches since they allow the movement of vehicles over them but slow them down significantly.

Also another note, these trenches provide the same Green cover as other objects but the trenches themselves provide a damage reduction debuff of sorts, I forgot what exactly he told me he put them, so think of it as Green cover on steroids where it's around 30 or so % better than regular Green cover.

Very cool, but it also highlights exactly why regular sandbags are the best way to implement buildable cover. Can’t dig a foxhole in a street, but you can stack sandbags there. Lol

At a bare minimum it should be consistent. Conscripts can keep their unique Barricade structure, but if Volks and Sections can build bags, Grenadiers and Riflemen should be able to too.

I'd personally favour removing bags from Sections and Volks, and adding them to Sturmpioneers, Rear Echelon Troops, Combat Engineers and Royal Engineers.

I totally agree. Consistency is the most important part.

But the consistency should be twofold;

Consistency in that all basic unit types have the same core abilities. Sandbags or no sandbags on all core infantry for example. Either everyone should have it or no one should have it.

But also consistency from faction to faction. All five factions should have access, non doctrinally, to the ability to place sandbags, wire and tank traps on the same type of unit.

So what I’m hearing is that most players want to see sandbags, wire and tank traps normalized across all factions, but also want sandbags remover from all basic infantry.

So remove sandbags, trenches, bunkers and all other entrenchments from basic infantry across all factions and give sandbags, barbed wire and tank traps to all core engineer units.

I'd only prefer the M1A1 Thompson just because it's more realistic, but the M1 Garand would be okay too.

Look up the actual TO&E of a US rifle squad. Thompsons are decidedly less realistic than an M1 Garand.

In fact, US infantry platoons had only four small arms organic to them. Each squad would have one BAR, the Platoon Commander (a Lieutenant) got an M1 Carbine and there was also one scoped M1903A4 Springfield “Sniper Rifle” in the platoon, but it was assigned when needed and was not always even used. The rest of the men got M1 Garands.

So in total a US infantry platoon would have:

41 Men
37 M1 Garands
3 BARs
1 M1 Carbine
1 M1903A4 Sniper Rifle

It should however be noted that each company had extra special weapons that were handed out as needed. This included 6 extra BARs, 6 Thompsons and 5 Bazookas. Most of the BARs were distributed evenly throughout the platoons so each platoon would usually have 2 BARs per squad in two squads and one in the third squad. The Bazookas tended to be kept on the rear or assigned to defensive points and the Thompsons tended to go unused except in specific assaults or by guys who just really wanted one.

Below are some of my sources. I highly recommend the book in the second link to anyone interested in what WWII was actually like for the grunts with the guns in respect to small arms.

https://web.archive.org/web/20100131043837/http://www.bayonetstrength.150m.com/toe/USInfantry/rifle_company.htm

https://www.amazon.com/Infantry-Weapons-Combat-Personal-Experiences/dp/1888722150

I like your realistic approach to infantry warfare but sadly as you have guessed it, it's not for this forums' liking.

And in reality, it wouldn't make sense for infantrymen pull sandbags out of their pants and start stacking, most were equipped with only a shovel so digging a foxhole or shallow trench of some sort for a lightly dug in position would make more sense.

I had an idea of giving all infantry units the ability to "dig" foxholes which were going to be represented by explosion crater splats but my idea kinda fell through when I didn't really know how exactly to implement it sadly, or how it would work for a 5 or 6 man squad.

It would make sense and give infantry light cover at the very least tho.

You’re right about pockets full of sandbags. Lol

But the limitations of the game and map environment make sandbags the next best thing.

I would never build a sandbag wall in real life. That’s just stupid. It’s a big obvious sign that says “hey, we are over here! Please shoot us when we poke our heads up!” But that being said, you can’t dig foxholes in the street and it’s much easier for you to have a game render a wall on top of flat ground instead of digging a hole. So sandbags are already a compromise in terms of realism.

Another but (I I do love a good but), if players thing sandbags on infantry is OP or unrealistic, then don’t let ANY infantry build ANY type of cover, but let every factions engineer units build all of it. Rear Echelon Troops, Combat Engineers, Pioneers, Sturm Pioneers, Royal Engineers and Assault Engineers should all be able to build sandbags, barbed wire and (no cover granting) tank traps. The specialized entrenchments like trenches, bunkers, fighting positions and conscript sandbag walls should still remain unique to each faction in their use, but also be locked to the engineer units, with the exception perhaps of conscript sandbag walls.