Lethaface

It was already confirmed that artillery effects on armor will be changed (to be more 'deadly').

As a (fellow) human I wonder if your breakfast is on the sour and salty side. I mean I agree that the stuff you mention could be improved upon. But this game was released about 10 years ago and implemented a (at the moment) fictional war in Ukraine. If you lose the hyperbole and just present the issues as possible improvements which could make the came much more close to the real 2022 conflict, I guess it's more pleasant to read and more chance of getting interaction or being listened too. Or if you like more critical posts: you use an unnecessary volume of words in un unpleasant tone to get your point across. It's really a shame because it was so close to being a good post, but ultimately it sounds like a broken record. We shouldn't have to put in the time to read those extra words, which bring nothing to the table and just clutter up our forum experience with negative vibes. FWIW BFC has said they don't plan to retroactively update CMBS to be like the 2022 war. But there might come a new game depicting the '22 war.

I'm glad they do. It can force the enemy TC to button up, cause suppression and degrade optics. Obviously it won't deliver the knock out punch, but it will facilitate it's proper delivery ;-).

I'd expect a 'mechanically stabilized' mount in a ROW setup on a vehicle to feature more tight groupings compared to a manually stabilized tripod mount. The weapon itself isn't more accurate mounted one way or the other, but I'd also guess a properly zero'ed weapon 'slaved' to the weapon controls will also be more accurate compared to the general soldier using the iron sights. That being said, for a suppression type weapon the 'drunken' aspect has some positives as well.

Plus he knows that 'security guarantees' aren't rock solid to say the least.

Perhaps he'd rather surrender to the West for good reasons ;-).

Don't forget the one that took the picture

When I woke up today to the news I first double checked if it wasn't 1 April, after which I had a good laugh. However this ends, it will be favorable to Ukraine at the frontline. 'Russian' or in some cases 'previously Russian' forces advancing to the rear might leave some of the in depth defenses and obstacle / mine fields in such a way Ukraine can breach through them relatively safe / leisurely and allowing them to create a sturdy bridgehead for exploitation behind the front. Interesting to see how Kadyrov will roll as well; how long will he standby Putin and what does that mean for his position at home. One can hope he makes a mistake and is himself ousted in another coup.

This (pri) seems significant cq interesting news

I think we agree but in accounting terms the cost can never be fictional, unfortunately there are only 'legal fictions' ;-). So while you are of course correct that the real/intrinsic value of such stuff is up in the air at any given moment, it is actually in the books somewhere. But indeed that doesn't mean one has to now actually find 6.2Bn somewhere. Just change the books and credit the 'Ukr aid' for 6.2Bn and debit it the amount to the general 'replacement costs provisioning' tab. Voila, more funds made available for aid to Ukraine. If pulling from (revalued) existing stock those 6.2Bn could be milked out for quite a bit I'd say.

If true and in place 'in production' could be significant for CB fires and more limitation of Russian ability to effectively use artillery.

Ideally one has discovered all the 'options' (as theCapt says) available to the defender and ran out of good / worthwhile targets for PGMs/fires before starting 'the big' push, if you even need to do a big push. Maybe it will be most wise to culminate with a lot of successful small pushes :D.

Sorry for regurgitating yesterday again, but thought this was an interesting post and my thread pace is lacking. Shooting up the defenses before trying to occupy objectives sounds a bit like the lessons I've learned from CM over the years. What is the time limit for this 'scenario'? :-). If they have a couple of months left before the muds put an end to this phase, while they still have a good number of fresh reserves/reinforcements available for insertion, why would they need to rush moving forward unless it is clear that a position is basically smashed? Of course sometimes one needs to do a bit of risky pushing to assert whether it is 'safe' to move forward, but other than that I don't see why they would go for a determined move into strong defenses (and or into counter attacking mobile reserves) / unfavorable terrain unless there is a need to take stuff at any cost before a certain cut off.

The interesting bit imo is whether the replacement cost (which do actually need to be paid in full one would assume) had come out a specific budget 'jar' labeled 'Ukraine mil support' and now needs to be refilled from another jar outside the defense budget (creating a deficit somewhere else), or are these just labeled costs which are all credited against the overall US Defense budget. In the latter case they can just 'change the label' retroactively, which will then also impact the fulfillment of the allowed balance sheet expenses for 'Ukraine mil support' for the difference (and thus open up the difference which seems to be 6.2 Bn). In other words, it might be just a simple balance sheet correction exercise. AFAIK the US Mil budget is a sort of current account backed by a large virtual $ printing machine where 6Bn is pocket change. But indeed not a good impression on the accounting side of things for the Pentagon, one would expect these things to be checked by teams of controllers and accountants; if you cook the books cook m good :D. PS I'm neither an accountant, although did learn a couple of things about it.

'Creative bookkeeping' for the political reasons you stated earlier I guess. Although I agree from an accounting pov that the value of things send should be calculated using the actual value those things where in the books; not for the value the 'replacements' (which might be not 'same') are being ordered. If you donate a car to charity and then deduct the replacement value off your yearly taxes, the tax service won't agree.

It requires intensive micro but yes I do enjoy MOUT. Sight/fire lines, suppression, smoke, flanking, breaching; proper application makes all the difference. .50 is king, at very close range the 7.62x39 AK cartridge does better in house2house fighting than the 5.56. Bringing AFVs inside also brings new dynamics; autocannon or 120/125mm HE does a good job of house clearing, but become extra vulnerable to handheld AT weapons. All in all, I like it but yes it can be 'tedious' or feel like 'work'.

Agreed, but someone/something else might have done the deed. I'd like to believe some of the vehicles from those piles can be recovered and I'm sure they'll do it if possible; I'm not assuming they are now recovered because there were no pictures of their demise. There are also no pictures of their recovery yet.

There was some footage of Ru soldiers close to one pile of Bradleys, I'd normally expect those to be destroyed by now but maybe the Russians couldn't be bothered about it? Let's see.

AFAIK USA already made clear what would be the consequences if Russia went nuclear/chemical/biological weapon. Apart from those being 'dire', there was no further information released to the public.

He did have some close encounters with the Soviet apparatchik and their influence in '39 in Spain though.

Russia can has lots of artillery and even have (local) artillery dominance in number of barrels/shells fired while still sucking 'at it' comparatively / relatively. That doesn't mean all their fires will be effective or ineffective. One observation one could make imo is that Russia could have made much more effective military use of their artillery /indirect capabilities since the start of the war, while Ukraine seems to have been achieving a lot with little (at first at least) and thus are showcasing a better bang for their buck.

I think it was the best scenario adapted for mirrored tournament so far :). Both scoring wise, no reinforcment inside LOS wise and both sides having several options as how to deal with the challenge wise.

What we, at least imo, also should expect to see (and or are seeing) is Ukraine 'learning' to do large scales mech offensives against well prepared positions. All the talking heads have been saying 'we' for a large part have lost that capability since the 90s. Ukraine are humans like all the rest of us, so it won't be 'easy' for them either. Ukraine's forces have much more experience with defense / counterstrokes compared to large offensive operations. And AFAIK they are now trying 'new things', as in large scale mech offensives the NATO way more or less. Apart from whether the doctrine is suboptimal/aged or not and the consequences resulting from the absence of dominating air support; it is normal if a couple of attacks fail because of 'mistakes', difficulties arising from coordination / whatever; the road from textbook to practice isn't smooth usually. Also In CM coordination between forces is key for battlefield success. The 'learning curve' to properly coordinate stuff using the CM system is steep but rewarding, especially in H2H play. I have probably lost a good number of brigades worth of AFVs, not to mention troops, while playing CMs since 2007. I have also played battles in which I suffered ugly casualties at first but came back with a major victory in the end. The one thing we could perhaps learn from Russia is 'loss resilience'; in war the things in play are human lives (unfortunately) and military hardware, so we better have a stomach for taking losses (or shouldn't play at the table). The worry would be if Ukraine doesn't learn, but so far they seem to be much better at that compared to the Russians so I'm feeling optimistic about limited successes for Ukraine. So far no sign of really collapsing Russian lines though, I still hope to see those but let's see

I guess only the driver will know why. Maybe he was trying to dodge arty fire or had consumed a bit too much of 'spirit enhancing' vodka to suppress nerves ;-).

I found it too and thought it was well analyzed / prepared.