ozi_digger

I'm no expert on the USMC but I liked Evan Wright's Generation Kill - a portrayal by an embedded journalist who rode with Force Recon during the war in Iraq. A warts'n'all type of book. I especially liked how he wasn't politically correct - if a marine officer was a WOFTAM he didn't mind mind labelling him so. If that's not your cup of tea, then there is always Phil Caputo's A Rumor of War...

I'd recommend that BFC not bother with modelling concrete bombs for two reasons. a) They're not entirely effective as a less-than-lethal alternative; and They're not in widespread operational use. Thus, I'd be interested to see which sources the magazine article got its information from. Let me explain each point. a) They're not entirely effective as a less-than-lethal alternative. The measure of effectiveness for a concrete bomb is effective miss distance (EMD). This means it's impact point has to be within a certain radius in order to be effective. For this reason their optimum use is against medium sized point targets that just need a penetrative effect. Our typical concrete laser guided bomb (LGB) will probably be a Mk82, 500lb case filled with concrete and a Paveway II guidance kit (lets call it a concrete GBU-12, or CGBU-12). The circular error probable of a CGBU-12 is probably between 10 and 20 feet - say 15 feet. This means that 50% of strikes will fall within 15ft of the aimpoint and 90% will fall within 30ft. The CGBU does not represent a precision attack to take out a small point target such as a sniper. It is much more likely to temporarily neutralise the operations of the sniper -stun him and force him to move rather than killing him. This is not a permanent solution by any means - if my troops were being harassed by a sniper I'd rather see him killed so he didn't come back to fight another day. The other problem with the CGBU is ricochet. They have a nasty tendency to hit a target and then fly off into the distance - up to 1000's of metres in some cases. This, in reality does not represent a safe weapon to mitigate civilian casualties. CGBU weapon effects can be unpredictable at best - imagine it - the weapon strikes then ricochets and flies through half the neighbourhood before coming to rest. Conversely, the nearest low yield weapon is the GBU-12 itself - 500lb of frag and HE. On the positive side, its weapon effects are easier to predict - it hits and explodes in a predictable pattern. However, it still represents overkill in a situation requiring less-than-lethal effects. This is the reason the US is developing the small diameter bomb (SDB). It promises to be a low yield weapon that will not ricochet (and will self-destruct) and will mitigate collateral damage concerns. The weaponeering school of thought is divided on the use of concrete bombs. Some advocate their use and some urge caution because they may not be as effective, nor as safe, as you might think. The CGBU is not 'experimental' nor is it standard load-out either. HE and frag is a much more popular effect with those who call for CAS support. An aircarft on CAS standby is much more likely to have a couple of GBUs or JDAMs instead of concrete munitions. This is because the utility of concrete bombs is rather limited. For these reasons I'd recommend BFC concentrate on their core ideas - stuff that blows up. Concrete bombs are not standard loadout and they are not in widespread use. BFC seems much more interested in combat operations involving infantry and mechanised forces. Likewise, whatever CAS they model will probably have a lethal contribution to events on the ground ( I hope!).

Apologies to everyone for missing turns over the hols. If its any consolation I had a good time surfing and fishing :cool:

I found an article in the Dec2005/Jan2006 Training & Simulation Journal titled 'Artificial intelligence gets real'. It mentions 'Highway to the Reich' and CMAK as games with good AI qualities. The article says: </font> '..CMAK is a thinking man's wargame.'</font> </font>'...superb perspective of being able to examine the battlefield from any angle, backed by an excellent scenario editor that would make this game a useful tactical trainer.'</font> but, although a version has been licenced to the Australian DoD </font> '...Battlefront says a potential contract with the US Army's Training & Doctrine Command never got of the ground.'</font> Interesting to note the article points out that the military agencies are rather stupid when it comes to buying COTS games - if the hard programming work is already done, then it makes sense to buy a licence for a game engine that already exists. I s'pose its just hard to convince them to buy the licence. Oh well, better luck with selling CM:SF to the US Army.

Peter, you could try here: Online Berkeley Uni Maps of Syria They are 1:100k so you sould be abvle to pick out some detail.

Peter, you could try here: Online Berkeley Uni Maps of Syria They are 1:100k so you sould be abvle to pick out some detail.

Peter, you could try here: Online Berkeley Uni Maps of Syria They are 1:100k so you sould be abvle to pick out some detail.

In a similar vein, here is another account of a sniper rifle being used to good effect. It is a press release about an SASR soldier being awarded a bravery medal. Relevant part is bolded. Included full account because it is interesting. Reads like a game of BF2 doesn't it? Start on MG, go to Javelin, MG, Javelin, Sniper Rifle.... Guess sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.

There are a couple of issues with UAVs that point to them being good on paper but operational realities are often different. I think a big problem is that we see the footage of a Predator strike and think as a commander, we can get coverage of anything at any time. Let me just play devil's advocate here. 1. Abstract Recon. BFC (IIRC Steve in particular) mentioned that an abstract method of revealing opposing troops on set-up will be modelled. This will represent recon elements spotting troops. Probably includes aerial recon too. Although abstract, I think this may be the best system of simulating UAV spotting. 2. Bandwidth Issues. Already identified as a number one problem of a networked force of the future. BFC (Steve) also mentioned the problems that vehicles have in staying networked while they're on the move. To me this presents a problem for all tha high-bandwidth UAV data streaming to your mobile forces. 3. Connectivity and Timeliness. Timeliness is another major factor of a highly mobile networked force. If you are playing tip of the spear in CMSF, how old is that info by the time it gets to you? What format is it in? My guess is that the info will be anywhere from 1 minute to hours, depending on the tactical level of the resource. If its tactical and under the control of a COY commander then it would be minutes. Can still be old news in a highly mobile engagement. Tactical UAVs tend to have low res sensors compared to their strategic counterparts. So will that analyst at the end of the UAV have spotted the enemy at all? If he does, will that picture blob be correctly identified? Which brings me back to format. What end result do you (the COY commander) get the report in? An annotated graphic? A word picture? A radio message? 4. Recon and Surveillance. This is the bottom line of my devils advocate rant. UAVs at the tactical level are intended for recon and surveillance. Recon before an engagement and surveillance of deployments. This to me is not the tip of the spear and a UAV would only feed me information that was not instantaneous. This is not to distract from their utility on the battlefield, but I think we need to be realistic as to what we're actucally getting. Abstracted snippets during sutup suits me fine. Maybe I get a message when my opponent's reinforcements arrive, where they arrived, their basic nature and when. Super-accurate, real-time information? Its possible in limited circumstances, but a healthy dose of operational realities needs to be injected IMHO.

Following this logic, if I were to put some current, Australian-issue desert cams in a box and post it to you, we might see the Aussies in the first module? I'd imagine the LAV wouldn't be hard to model... and we are acquiring the M1 tank... so thats our force contribution covered. So whats yer postal address?

Small world, eh bloke? We might have to organise a CM LAN-up someday.

Ahh, you are a true Dutchman! You know your beer markets around the world. True, VB is the most popular beer. Mostly because it is cheap like the US Miller brand. Doesn't say much for the taste. Apologies I don't have a Dutch label to compare it to because all Dutch beer over here is expensive and everything from the Nederlands I've tasted so far has been pretty good. IIRC your wheat beers are superb. Tooheys is popular in NSW. XXXX Gold label is a mid strength beer and popular outside Queensland. I don't drink much commercial beer nowadays because I've got the home-brew going. My favourite is a lager, which is good in the ACT because it gets cold in winter and lager yeast works at low temps. Back on topic - I've sent my setups to the Major and Walker but I had e-mail server problems last night. Please let me know if you didn't receive them.

So who's projecting now? Or are you coming on to me? No thanks, I'm not here to see who can p1ss furthest up the wall. Excuse me? Did you say something? Sorry, must have been ignoring you. Must apologise if I was responding to your "You are a/an...[insert insult here]" posts at the time. That's right. Op Allied Force was a celebration of weapon accuracy. Target intelligence, on the other hand, was faulty. True, but more accurate than getting your information from Janes, or any number of websites these days that claim to have information that is simply not accurate... or attempting to create a model that is based an flawed logic. For example, Janes may tell you that the footprint for a given cluster munition is X by Y feet. They do not take into account delivery altitude, fuzing or whatver. In my opinion, I'd rather have a derived formula, rather than what I referred to earlier as guestimation or fuzzy logic. I can see how fuzzy logic worked for BFC with CMx1. However, when simulating modern technology, you may want a copy of the modern handbook that discusses some of these formulas. Take it or leave it. I don't entirely agree, especially given the nay-sayers - some 'army-ophiles' dismiss anything that is perceived to be written from an air power perspective. Driels has not written his book solely for the air force masters program. The models offered for AFV compartment damage, artillery, and small arms fire versus infantry may have some imperfections. BUT those imperfections are recognisable. That is, you don't read it, say to yourself 'oh this saved me from writing the code' and adopt it. Its a reference - how the Army weaponeers do it - ok, thats given me ideas - this is how I'm going to do it. I think I can see the humour in that. But I honestly don't understand the acronyms.

Here's what I currently have in my IL-2 music folder. I believe the same are applicable to CMSF: Queen: Another One Bites the Dust Prodigy: Firestarter ACDC: Hells Bells G'n'R: Live and Let Die Beastie Boys: Sabotage Edit - I forgot Metallica: One

:confused: Where do I join this old boys network? How come I haven't been invited?