Combat Mission Shock Force 2: Marines

My spreadsheet for this module has one column that matters more than any other: squad size. Where the base game's US Army formations run nine-man squads, the Marines bring thirteen-man rifle squads, each loaded with grenade launchers and a machine gun. That extra headcount cascades upward through the orbat - an extra squad per platoon, an extra platoon per company - and it changes how you think about assaults entirely. You are not rationing firepower anymore; you are managing a sledgehammer, and the campaign is designed to let you feel that weight. The module's central scenario arc follows a Marine Expeditionary Unit conducting an amphibious landing on Syria's Mediterranean coast, then pushing inland. That opening beach assault, staged via AAV-7 amphibious transports, is the kind of mission the base game simply cannot reproduce. It is not just a cosmetic retexture of existing content - the AAV-7 removes the river-crossing bottlenecks that punish armored pushes elsewhere in CMSF2, and the campaign leans hard into close infantry combat rather than the long-range armor slugging that dominates Task Force Thunder. On the opposing side, Syrian Airborne battalions equipped with Russian-supplied hardware give the red force actual teeth, including a modern main battle tank that evens out what could otherwise feel like a lopsided stomp. In terms of raw content count, Marines is the leanest of the three CMSF2 modules. You get one campaign, sixteen standalone scenarios, and additional Quick Battle maps. The British Forces module ships with roughly thirty standalone scenarios, and NATO Forces gives you three full campaigns. If you are strictly counting missions per dollar, Marines loses that comparison. What it wins is tonal focus: the scenarios are tighter, the infantry emphasis is consistent, and the elite-unit modeling means your troops respond more reliably under fire than their Army counterparts - a detail that matters enormously in the WEGO system, where a panicked squad that ignores your sixty-second order packet can unravel an entire flank before you can intervene. The same criticisms that apply to the base game follow this module loyally. The tutorial is a PDF you read alongside the game, not an in-game system that walks you through morale states, movement types, or the difference between Slow and Quick movement orders. Newcomers will spend their first several scenarios learning by losing, which is fine if you accept it upfront - Combat Mission has always been a series where the manual is not optional reading. The UI carries its age visibly, with limited resolution options and no volume slider, though the engine runs on hardware that most modern wargamers already own. For an existing CMSF2 owner who has finished Task Force Thunder and wants a different tactical texture before moving to NATO Forces, Marines is a focused, well-executed addition. The amphibious opening mission alone justifies the purchase for anyone who has ever wanted to coordinate a coastal assault in a game that models it with actual doctrinal accuracy rather than abstraction. Just go in knowing this is more of the same engine, more of the same UI friction, and a smaller content package - the reward is a genuinely distinct fighting style that the other modules do not replicate.

Diego · Scout Team

Strategy & simulation

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