juan_gigante

I am a huge fan of mortars. If I'm attacking with, say, a battalion of infantry, I'll want 2 or 3 batteries of 81mm mortars on gun-killing duty. They pick a good spot, either in my deployment zone or not that far forward, and they usually don't move from there once established, until well into the battle and I have safe lanes for them to travel forwards. I believe that guns are the second most frightening tool a defender has, after uberarmor tanks, and killing guns as soon as they open up is one of my top priorities. Nothing can ruin an advance like a 150mm gun opening up on infantry. I also like to liberally sprinkle in 50/60mm mortars in the main body of troops, which move along with the main body and then stop when they get to a good spot to overwatch from. I use these guys to take out targets of opportunity - to get a key enemy MG to put its head down, to help establish fire superiority in the first turn or two of an infantry firefight, to get guns in remote key-holes that the 81s farther back can't see. I am more liberal with ammo use with the 50s than the 81s - for starters, the 50s usually have more of it, and being farther forward are more likely to die before they get the rounds off. The 81s I also like to save some ammo because if a battle stalls and turns into a slug fest, the guy with rounds left to fire with 5 turns to go has a distinct advantage over the guy who is dry, and it can be enough of an advantage to break the enemy in the few final frantic turns of a battle. I rarely buy FO modules anymore - on-map mortars are so much more reactive, so much more accurate, and are basically just as good at killing hammer/eggshell targets like guns. What do FOs do better than mortars? Hurting platoon sized positions? Sure, if it lands on target and they haven't moved back to a second line in the time between when I identify the position and when rounds land. And my T-34s and SP guns probably (hopefully) have plenty of HE to do the same thing, but as with mortars, quicker and more accurately.

Soldiers Want A Bigger Bang Considering some of the recent discussion in Congress on whether or not to have a competion between the M4 and other military carbines (basically the HK 416), this survey seems quite relevant. Has anyone's mind changed on this issue lately? Should we start replacing M4s with HK416s? Thoughts?

Adam - the key point that you're not getting is that with the absolute US air and artillery supremacy, EVERY US force is a heavy force. Two guys with a radio have the same combat power of an Abrams. The light Stryker elements are more capable than a heavy force at fixing and moving around and past enemy positions, and can move farther. At the operational level, air and arty do the vast majority of the killing.

Adam, a distinction I think you're missing between Stryker forces and heavier units that gives the Strykers an advantage is their C3I network. Depending on how many toys the Strykers get shipped with, the tactical commanders will have a far better image of the battlefield and be able to communicate much better. This tactical coordination will pay off at the operational level by allowing the forces to stay better organized and keep moving past and around enemy hardpoints. In addition, this superior C3I network should help get air and artillery support quicker and more accurately. Stryker units advance, find an enemy force, call in fire support, move past quickly. The point is, the unit is designed to move past the enemy at an operational level and leave the killing to air and arty, instead of having to hammer through everything like a Heavy force would.

Am I correct to assume that there will be some way to turn off all the added interface symbols, colors and such for the purpose of taking more pristine screenshots?

I'm really not sure why people are complaining quite this much about real-time. I mean, if you haven't noticed lately, real life is in real time. Soldiers, believe it or not, actually do real-time strategy without relying on silly run-and-gun tactics which have been stereotyped as the RTS norm. Now, I fully expect to do most of my playing in WeGo - I'm not sure I could keep up in real time. But to argue that real time is unrealistic, will require a vastly different style of play, or generally won't function well in a realistic environment like CM:SF is a little unfair.

I think that dynamic lighting could really improve the many night battles I expect to face. The advantage US guys get from NVGs might not be quite as big if there are flares, explosions, and fires everywhere, providing light for the Syrians and blinding or hampering the vision of the NVG-equipped US forces. Of course, this is probably a big enough thing that if they haven't done it already, they probably won't. And if I were developing CM:SF with a feature like dynamic lighting, I'd have been bragging about it already. So I bet they won't do it, or at least not to the extent where it would have much gameplay effect.

That the AI will pick one of several plans is so cool. I absolutely cannot wait to make scenarios. Honestly, I don't think I'll even play the game much with how long I'd like to spend in the editor!

Do the scenarios have to be balanced?

How is that for a visual? </font>

Last time I pull numbers out of ass without checking first. Thanks for the news, guys!

No AC-130? My heart is breaking! I suppose it might be tough to pick a variant to model, as they are changing so often, but I think that the AC-130 would be a really cool and useful tool to have available. Admittedly, the 155mm howitzer on the AC-130 is basically the same as getting Paladin support, but I think that the 25mm chain gun and the 40mm Bofors guns (or whatever their counterparts would be in the variant modeled) would be really cool to have available for support fires.

A serious matter in modern warfare, worthy of inclusion in-game.

YES

Grammar aside, I think it's a good question. A key issue with 1:1 representation is whether or not the Tac AI of the soldiers one cannot directly control will act in an intelligent and realistic way. That said, it probably fits better in the 1:1 representation thread.