Combat Mission Units: FIAT 3000

[@HardLineRival]

Maybe the Breda guns could have been fitted with the British innovation of turning the guns sideways

[@wheneggsdrop1701]

Or putting 5 car engines together

[@jussi8111]

or cutting a hole in the rear of the turret and adding a box

[@notcraig2239]

I think the real virtue of this vehicle being included is that we can somewhat simulate late WW1. In an environment dominated by bolt action rifles and unresponsive artillery, the machine gun variant could do fairly well. But the fact this thing can be penetrated by rifle fire to its sides tells you just how long its legs are. Excellent video as always

[@usuallyhapless9481]

Definitely. I need to work out some kind of WW1 or immediate post-WW1 set up

[@igoralekseyev3347]

easily the deadliest weapon in the entire game series. The only mistake you can make is not bringing more of these :^)

[@mrsniffles5417]

Definitely the deadliest for its crew

[@localmotivator3377]

Can't wait for the Bob Semple to take its place at the top of the food chain when it makes it into the game.

[@artemisfowl7191]

Given how much the CMFI Expansions covers the mainland, they should really include more modern Italian tanks, and Italian troops (Allied and Axis)

[@larsdejong7396]

To be fair, the Italian forces played almost no part in the campaign, due to the war already being unpopular. In fact, after the fall of Palermo, they deposed Mussolini, and started negotiations with the Allies. But at least for Sicily, I do agree.

[@alarminglyfastmovingskelet7289]

@@larsdejong7396 I think he means in Combat Mission in general, not necessarily just for Fortress Italy. If what he's getting at is that Combat Mission should cover the African Theatre than I whole-heartedly agree.

[@GarethThompson-u1w]

I was surprised to see a couple of these in a recent scenario. Somehow I had never encountered them before, and my first thought was "what on Earth are these little (obviously WW1) tanks doing here?". I took them both out with a 0.50 cal in the same turn from across the map.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

Ooof, .50 might have been a bit of overkill...

[@GarethThompson-u1w]

@@usuallyhapless9481 The range was a bit long for rifle caliber rounds (in any case, I didn't know at the time that rifle rounds were capable of doing the job), and their fronts were towards me. So 0.50 was probably the smallest thing I could send at them

[@usuallyhapless9481]

Fair point.

[@glenchen5723]

If you bring enough you can overwhelm the Sherman platoon you're fighting against by making them run dry on ammo

[@copter2000]

Or exhausting the loader to death.

[@d.c.6065]

Finally, a unit guide for something I use often!

[@nbr1rckr]

All those rivets make me shudder. I wanna like Italian armour in FI, but man, they dont make it easy.

[@zyavoosvawleilte1308]

They stick out of the turrets like Frankenstein´s monster, and much like it, thay will hurt you

[@Heinz0Fiction]

Those obsolete Designs always have a special place in my heart. I almost feel sorry for them if the encounter any unit with greater firepower than a pistol

[@ARescueToaster]

10:23 They have cute lil' sailor hats on

[@malarauko]

Interestingly the machine guns on these are probably not the Breda 30s but likely the SIA model 1918s which aren't side loaded from magazines (solving that issue at least) but are instead top loaded from box mags, presumably the very low in the turret position of the guns leaves enough room to get the mag in place but it was probably a bit awkward at the least

[@usuallyhapless9481]

Yeah, the SIA Model 1918s look like a good fit. Nice find! I suspect you could probably tilt the weapon mount up somewhat to change the mags- the gunner is already leaving the sight and losing the target anyway, so why not go all the way and take the weapon off target too.

[@malarauko]

@@usuallyhapless9481 yeah that's a really good point

[@squiggles5640]

didn't realise how badly i needed to see some italian gameplay until now

[@mrshar1000]

Love the unit guides! They are always my favorite, when its possible in the future I would love to see a unit guide to the M113 for CMCW! Keep up the great work!

[@usuallyhapless9481]

Thanks! The M113 is probably not a bad contender to be honest, there's a modern one guide up next and it's a common piece of kit.

[@iron_talon]

Now I want to see a full breakdown of stuff like Italian infantry and other weapons. Thanks for the video!

[@RisingChaosWriting]

honestly, if you could take these in a flexible force, I could see the machine gun variant being useful alongside infantry. It's a machine gun position with some armour, it can get some value in the right place and at the right time. Unofrtunately, getting to the right place and being there at the right time are notably difficult for good tanks, much less bad ones. Still, the little machine gun tanks are gonna be a scary sight to a rifle section meeting them head one.

[@asog88]

So excited for when you do a video about Italian infantry

[@usuallyhapless9481]

Sooner than you think ;)

[@Meyer-gp7nq]

Man you can really tell this thing has some tough armor by all the rivets on the outside, securely holding the armor onto the chassis

[@usuallyhapless9481]

No way that could end badly!

[@matthiuskoenig3378]

I believe the L5/21s were armed with 6.5mm SIA Mod. 1918. the most obvious difference that might affect the game is a 50 round detachable magazine, rather than the weird 20 round attached mag of the Breda 30. but the difference is probably still slight.

[@TurboLag92]

Great video, with good historical background and funny bits all rolled into one!

[@Brille_Zwo]

@usuallyhapless: Don´t know if it was mentioned already but you may have messed up the ammo load on the L5/30. You say, and I quote "16 rounds in total. 8 armored piercing and 8 high explosive." I checked ingame in the editor and in quick batte and this tank has 40 rounds (!) in total. 20 HE and 20 AP. That won´t make it win any wars by far but at least it is somewhat usable. Probably you have mixed it up with another unit or you played it within a scenario where it got less ammo... or it is just a hickup in the script. ^^ If you clip in the model of that tank you see 2 ammo racks, one on each side of the interior. Both have 18 holes to keep those rounds (36 in total). Probably the remaining 4 are mounted in the turret for easy access. Never the less a very good video. And I like that you also represent the forgotten/least favorable units of CM. :) Edit: Reading now that it could carry actually 68 rounds I don´t know where they put the rest of it. Clearly must been not that easy to reach. Probably in the belly of the tank.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

Yeah, I just rechecked and it has 20. Weird. The default state in the editor is 'Typical' rather than 'Full', so maybe the one I pulled out was on low ammo or something. Good catch!

[@PaulMcElligott]

We got this before the Sherman? The Panzer IV? Yes, I know that there are so many Sherman variants that a video would probably be two hours long, but a boy can dream.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

In all honesty, a Sherman guide is pretty daunting. Still on the list though.

[@Lazuli2-6]

Another great unit guide! Now when do we get the Bob Semple Tank in Combat Mission?

[@frostyrobot7689]

lol, dammit, you got there first...

[@AbrahamLincoln4]

The Italians are coming!

[@copter2000]

At infantry jogging speed. So it might take them a while...

[@PitterPatter20]

Frankly amazed that they found anyone who would crew these things instead of immediately deserting.

[@stephanelab3249]

Except the veteran who were figthing in the north african campaign. Not sure the average italian crewman were well informed about the caracteristic of the afv used by german or allied troop nor had a good wiew about the last developpement of the armored warfare in general during that time. The level of info was certainly scarce and relied mainly on courses done during their training or rumors. No books, no internet, no dedicated magazines or even combat mission.. :)

[@alarminglyfastmovingskelet7289]

Lack of knowledge definitely plays a part. Italy was one of the least mechanized/automated countries in Europe. To Italy's credit the tanks that they produced are actually quite impressive given how little resources/prior knowledge they had at the onset of the war.

[@capthawkeye8010]

These still might not have been as bad as the L3 tankette ultimately. The FT this tank was based on was at least a proven design.

[@ricardobelogeneralplastro1319]

@@capthawkeye8010 The L3s were more useful tho, they essentially worked as fire support and equipment carriers and had much more modern reliable engines. Think of them as the Italian Bren Carrier, except focusing more on offensive fire support.

[@capthawkeye8010]

@@ricardobelogeneralplastro1319 Engines that tended to poison the crew with noxious gasses due to an improperly designed exhaust system... The L3 was a classic example of everything wrong with Italian Fascism tbh. Looks great on march parades and impressive on film reels but in real life it will struggle against natives armed with rocks and spears. (Not an exaggeration, 12 of them were lost fighting the Ethopians that way.) Once the Armies of the Liberal Democracies began to appear it was always going to be a slaughter. Very few encounters with L3s are mentioned overall in Allied accounts of the war. It seems that on top of being easy to dispatch (and probably hard to see at all) they were usually found abandoned. It just goes to show that tanks were a serious commitment to support and even tankettes were demanding little vehicles needing the kind of support structure agrarian Italy with its citrus and wine production really couldn't provide.

[@Temeluchas]

Well, the ammo loadout for FIAT 3000 with 37-mm was 68 rounds. The 16-round limit in CM is either a mistake or an attempt to reflect supply issues (tbh, I didn't study the invasion of Sicily in any real depth (outside of a couple episodes) so I can't say whether lack of ammo was a problem for these mighty machines.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

I would honestly wonder exactly where you would keep 68 rounds inside that thing

[@nbr1rckr]

@@usuallyhapless9481 the crew has internal volumes they're not otherwise using...

[@Temeluchas]

@@usuallyhapless9481 In racks along both sidewalls of the fighting compartment. Don't forget - cannon-armed FT-17 carried either 233 or 237 rounds (237 in french sources, FTs captured by the Red Army in 1919-20 carried 237, FTs in Finnish service - 233). And while 37/40's round is larger than Puteaux, it is still not massive. FIATs with machine guns are also "undersupplied" in CM. Their loadout was 3,840 rounds (96 magazines) And another comparison: the soviet MS-1, which is also based on FT. It had both 37-mm and 2x6,5 machine guns at the same time. Loadout - 104 37-mm rounds, 2016 6,5-mm.

[@kamikaziu]

37mm rounds were very small compared to higher calibers like 75mm@@usuallyhapless9481

[@usuallyhapless9481]

Fair enough. I'm not sure it makes a lot of practical difference tbh, at least not by WW2

[@notcraig2239]

FT-17 Mentioned 🤤

[@OperatorMax1993]

Would be awesome for the devs to include the Sino-Japanese war, (so we could see the FT-17 for China and Type 95 Ha-Go for Japan)

[@obeastness]

the side mounted feed isn't really an issue for a machine gun in a tank, remove the stock, turn the gun 90 degrees to the left so the magazine now faces up, and then put a mechanism for the gunner to control and fire the gun, this shouldn't effect the gun negatively in any way.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

It's more the er, unique design of the Breda. Given that it had enough problems in normal operation, I can't see how flipping it sideways would endear it to anyone

[@larsdejong7396]

"Some were dug in as static defenses." God have mercy on those poor things, being subjected to 6 and 8 inch naval gunfire.

[@Mechanized85]

let alone to say large/huge/battle cruiser and old to modern battleship their guns can destroy them just with one round.

[@pcyoutube5127]

I'd be sweating if a cannon ball was fired at it!

[@zyavoosvawleilte1308]

My favourite tank genere: "I swear it tastes like FT"

[@cartergeorge1545]

Great video as usual, would love a Sherman video for FI!

[@gunsalot]

Well I for one think they are cute. Like kittens to the mighty Tiger. I feel a need to use them now.

[@AR-GuidesAndMore]

Would you mind to take a close look at the Wiesel from SF2? I know you think its cute (and you are right) it deserves your attention.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

It's on the list :)

[@AR-GuidesAndMore]

@@usuallyhapless9481 Yay

[@stephanelab3249]

Very interesting subject !

[@AR-GuidesAndMore]

Well,... this vehicle should return you points if chosen as far as i see it. 😅

[@Prederick]

Like, I know that many companies that make cars now made all sorts of vehicles, including tanks and planes during WWII. But speaking as someone who currently owns a Fiat, the words "FIAT tank" fill me with mostly humorous confusion and skepticism. I just have such a hard time looking at my little, reliable, unthreatening Fiat 500 and realizing that the same company that makes this made tanks. 🤣 EDIT: It's like if you found out Hamleys uesd to make Bren guns or something.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

To be fair, in WW2 a FIAT 500 would probably be more threatening

[@larsdejong7396]

​@@usuallyhapless9481now you are just being mean. 😂

[@wheneggsdrop1701]

It's something that belongs in the WW1 game isonzo not fortress italy 😅.

[@clusterstudio18]

Would make a nice UGV!

[@svjness]

Will you be doing anything on the French mod?

[@jamesduston9292]

Italian wounderwaffen

[@diasulhaqisya954]

neat.

[@jakeman52]

Man-made horrors beyond comprehension

[@archibaldbeansworth5th689]

Yippee

[@arng93]

Yoooooooooooo

[@higherground9888]

Fix it again Tony.

[@calumlittle9828]

About as frightening as a Fiat Punto.