A post about a pbem.opponent and Russian weapons

[Sublime]

First of all ive.mentioned a specific opponent several times about pbem experiences. he.s an excellent player and a top notch commander who has utterly wipeded me down multiple times. also id like to add in retrospect im not bragging, though i could see it being taken that way, about my skill at taking out US units. I mainly post such because theres a large contingent that insists Russian equipment is nerfed and i post such to contradict such claims. its not nerfed it just doesnt meet putin bot propaganda about russian military capabilities and/ot is used wrong. other culprits could be be bad lick, not enough practice on players part, using russ eqiipment like its US equipment, or just a poor commandee. anyway my sincerest apologies to relevant player/opponent who i have nothing butbthe utmost respect and amicable feelings for.

Edited September 1, 2015 by Sublime

[slysniper]

Well, since most of the players on this forum have no training at all in tactics. ( they have the money to buy the game) so they become company commanders or battalion commanders for the investment of $55 dollars. you should not expect many of them to have your great wisdom in the use of all the equipment at their fingertips.

 

So it sounds like to me, you better start giving training as to the great insights you have as playing the Russians vs a American force.

 

And it needs to be tactical training. (Not QB purchase decisions)

[hattori]

I'm extremely new to Combat Mission, so take whatever I have to say with a grain of salt.

 

I've been looking through these messages these past couple of  weeks -- I've personally had a lot of problems using Russian forces against the U.S., so Sublime, I would be very interested in what you have to say.  You've made endless references that most people are using the Russians incorrectly, but all I've managed to piece together from your posts is to buy lots of ATGMs, use a stripped down BTR-82A batallion with T-90AMs on defense, and use BMP2s with T-90AMs when attacking.  And play with no APS house rules

 

So please, I'd love to hear your opinion on tactics, what works for you, what you think people are doing wrong and how they should fix it.  I personally have severe difficulty dealing with how well the U.S. spots my forces (that and Javelins).  All I ask is you take your time when writing it.  In fact, write your thoughts first in a word doc of some sort, and correct all the red spelling mistakes -- I mean no offense, but sometimes with your spelling, punctuation, and lack of paragraphs it is a bit of a chore to parse what you're trying to say.

[sburke]

Well said Hattori (damned nice first post, welcome aboard!), a stream of consciousness wall of poorly written text becomes practically useless for a tactical primer. Look to Bil and combatinfman's posts as examples of what a tutorial needs to look like to be useful.

[Sublime]

yeah part of the problem is i work 60 hr work weeks and have a four year old son (yes in pic) that i value over any game so i often have to type on my phone and quickly. that being said im willing to do a qb where we discuss whats going on step by step from purchase to end and i can be a guide of sorts. if you want we could make it a dar but itd be on you to make most of the posts as most of my energy would be expended helping you and sending turns.

couple things. Khriz should be veteran or crack in ambush positions. keyholed if possible. you want as long range shots as possible and you only want to move on interior lines with absolute certainty of no enemy los to them moving.

you should use tanks in pairs or threes. not side by side but as a tactical unit as such. like one reverse slope. one behind a bldg nearby thatll either ambush a passing vehicle or move to emgage an opponent one ofbthe other tanks or a weapons system somewhere else is engaging. the trick is to try to have most of your units in position to either mutually support directly or dash out and get that flank shot or rear shot on an enemy attacking another vehicle atgm team or whatever. 155mms that come with the battalion tactical group. set at medium/max/airburst and adjusted accordingly will be a hellish long barrage and will really do a number on US inf and subsystems on tanks (set to airburst pref but not is fine) *as long as you learn to feel where the enemy is. also dont use small area targets use all the guns and let rip over a big area. you will cause suppression fear of movement and casualties. if you.re using air support i only use su25s if i know im gonna hit abrams with them i actually set them to light attack so they safe the abrams. it wont kill but itt

ll ruin the subsystems.

You have to accept casualties and higher ones than the US its just how it is. doesnt mean you ll lose though.

tunguskas (usually just one are a necessity) keep these back till later in the game and in a spot a tank or ifv will drive into its los. this is key for almost any russian vehicle. dont expect to drive forqard and spot enemies. you want them to drive into your vision. and expect the first several lases to cause pop smokes and reverses besides lucky shots from armor or khriz using radar.

As i said before the battalion tac grp is the way you wanna go. parse down most of the ifvs. leave some to plunder for rpg ammo and small arms ammo and enough for one platoon held back to rush to exploit a breakthrough or help a disaster. any russian moves in open country with ppssible enemy los should be as fast as possible. if aproaching the enemy and expecting combat or near the enemy move slow as to keep noise down and assist spotting.

Luck plays a big part.sometimes everything done right wont mean squat.

The Russian ags grenade launchers are good weapons. its essential to preview the map before a battle but even on offense a few atgm teams placed on high ground or held back until you seize high ground so they can rush up and crawl the last few meters over the slope can make a huge difference. again a mix of kornets and metis at13/14 is important. at13s can be shoulder fired and setup in buildings in 20 seconds. kornets are deadlier but take longer to setup and have to be to fired.

remember almost all US units have inherent advantages because most russian systems rely on lasers and the US has laser warning devices galore plus the US owns the night.

Theres a big debate whether arty launched smoke blocks thermals. even though its theoretically not supposed to it seems to in my games. if forced to advance against the us use arty smoke and rememver it takes at least two minutes to really start building up. then pretend your bmps and tanks are us infantry squads and use bounding movement except with small move orders that end with pop smoke. russian smoke launchers shoot it a lpt further out tham the us. you can literally smoke your way amidst an enemy formation. this could be bad though. the US AND RUSS have good close in infantry AT weapons. but its better than being picked off at range.

always remember US 30mm grenade launchers and bradleys can take down the mightiest russian tank. fear them accordingly.

make the most of your time, it allows you to play on inherent gamer impatience and perhaps the opponent will do something foolish. besides you may end up spotting something u wouldnt have a US player woulda seen right away. hope this helps for now. if anyone wants specific scenario ideas or a game dar pm me or sumthing

Edited September 2, 2015 by Sublime

[Sublime]

Well, since most of the players on this forum have no training at all in tactics. ( they have the money to buy the game) so they become company commanders or battalion commanders for the investment of $55 dollars. you should not expect many of them to have your great wisdom in the use of all the equipment at their fingertips.

So it sounds like to me, you better start giving training as to the great insights you have as playing the Russians vs a American force.

And it needs to be tactical training. (Not QB purchase decisions)

i never said i had great tactical wisdom nor training. btw i actually knew very little about modern weapons my knowledge.of such really endkng with cold war weapons and specialties being vietnam korea ww1/2. so i had to learm this equipment ESPECIALLY the russ just as much as anyone else. what helped and what will help everyone else is not letting thselves give up and insisting on redfor for every battle and playing human opponents as much as possible. and when in doubt weapons wikipedia or the manual is your friend. btw whats wuth the response anyways man? i didnt post here saying im the end all be all i posted to apologize to an unnamed friend and stating i believed russ forces werrent nerfed juat misused. and that my anecdotal evidence of us kills wasnt bragging though i could see it being construed as such. also i have and if asked will provide links openly offered tutelage to the community on what i know about using russian forces in BS. i dobt know what i did to offend to warrant your response but would like to know Edited September 2, 2015 by Sublime

[Sublime]

Also when you buy your tac group buy a tank group 41 for armor and parse that down to acceptable levels.

i almost always buy trps as

well.

i wouldnt buy the russ pchela drone as the US cannot shoot it down and i feel its gamey. to be honest i dont use drones for the russ regardless.

also see if your opponent as a house rule is ok with always setting map size one greater than battle size. this gives both sides moreaneuver room. maneuver room is key for the russians. less so for the us the us can literally just frontally attack amd blast a hole through often getting away with it the russ player has to be more effective with movement and deployment of troops. i also almost NEVER place armor in enemy FoV in the first turn or two unless its a keyhole and a khriz.

[slysniper]

I am not attacking you as to the previous comment.

Just pointing out that if you feel you have insights, you should go ahead and share them.

Holding on to insights does nothing as to helping educate the forum members, many of which really do lack much in depth knowledge on how to approach certain things within the game.

Personally, if I can do or say something that makes another player better, that is great, because I want to play against people that have skills, There is plenty of players that have helped me improve, I feel I should do the same.

Plus sometimes by posting how you do things will bring additional comments from others, sometimes bringing more insights as to ways to approach thing and can in return help you also.

No, the only complaint I have is also with your post. I am a terrible speller myself, so misspelling a word is no offence to me. But your post are so bad, it is sad that you cannot even understand what you are trying to communicate at times. you have given the reasons multiple times, but really, you just tried to shared some of the tactics you believe work, but it is so unclear, that I could not comment if I wanted to.

[John Kettler]

hattori,

 

Welcome aboard!

 

Sublime has made it clear that he intends to begin teaching people how to use the Russians, for they are his passion, and he's pretty unhappy about the wrongheaded common perception many here have regarding them. Speaking as someone who was the in-house specialist in all things Russian threat for 11+ years at two successive US major defense contractors (Hughes and Rockwell),  I'd start by saying that if you try to use the Russians to fight American style, you might as well stay home. The Russian way of war is not the US way of war, for the approach of each is driven by history, culture, world view and many other factors. For example, I used to work with a former DIA analyst working on his doctorate in Russian Area Studies at Georgetown University. His doctoral thesis was on the development of Soviet strategic air defense? Do you know what the impetus was for the development of the monster of today? Zeppelin attacks! The US never had to face such a threat. Indeed, if you look at things from the standpoint of the 48 contiguous states, the US has hardly seen any air attack at all. As in maybe one plane raiding CONUS. At that the 48 state level, the only real strategic threat was the Japanese fugo balloon bomb program, which was intended to cause vast conflagrations and damage the US war effort. As it happened, they fortunately did very little, but what if they had instead borne the fruits of Japanese biowarfare work, weapons used operationally in China and which killed tens of thousands of Chinese?  

 

At Pearl Harbor, the US lost ~160 planes. By contrast, when the Germans executed their strategic attack on Russia, first day Russian losses alone were 2000 aircraft. 2000! I cite this as but a tiny example of how the Russians think about war. The Russians would typically rather have two okay shorter range 82 mm smoothbore mortars than one great 82 mm longer range rifled mortar. Not only is this a philosophy of war issue, but it reflects their understanding of the incredible casualties to be expected in war, the need for lots of firepower, ease of production and the cost savings, resource expenditure minimization and resource preservation of skilled workers, precision machinery and strategic materials. Effective chamber pressures are lower in large tolerance smoothbore mortar than in a precision fitted rifled one. Lower chamber pressures = lower quality steel to build the mortar, which conserves the good stuff (workers, machine tools, high grade steel, forging capacity, etc.)  for more valuable uses such as field artillery. An excellent example is this approach is seen in the Russian GPW appraisal of the enormously powerful British 17 pdr ATG. Suggest you note well what the Russian ATGs are expected to be able to do, the technical and manufacturing complexity differences and the scathing observations about the economic efficiency of the weapon in terms of its consumption of strategic materials.

 

I warned and warned and warned some more about the dangers of mirror imaging the Russians based on US tech, but it took the defection of Viktor Belenko to Japan with his simply unbelievable in terms of design MiG-25 FOXBAT to drive home into very thick western skulls that the bird was almost totally unlike what they'd though it was. It was largely steel, not titanium and lightweight honeycomb. It even had rivets not flush with the skin in places. It had what was needed for the aeronautical task and nothing more. The engines weren't small and highly efficient, but instead were mind shattering monsters the likes of which we'd never seen. It had a "crude vacuum tube radar" which turned out to be EMP immune and so brute force powerful it could burn right through US jamming! Worse, it turned out our fancy jammers would've failed anyway, because the computers weren't capable of responding to emissions not in their electronic threat catalogs. The Russians had a bunch of what we called War Reserve Frequencies never detected by a zillion dollars worth of western ELINT gear and spying. Oops! There was also the small matter of finding an additional air-to-air radar which we not only didn't know was there but operated in an entirely different frequency range. I read the honking SECRET/NOFORN/WNINTEL technical exploitation report, and you could practically feel hysteria and smell the fear. The Intelligence Community was reeling. Though he didn't have air-to-air missiles fitted, the AA-6 ACRID was bizarre and for all the right reasons. The warhead was in the back and the rocket nozzles in the middle! Why? Because it was designed to go out and kill the never deployed B-70 high altitude supersonic bomber, with closing velocities so high the relatively crude fuzing technology needed all the help it could get in order to detonate the warhead in time. 

 

The US puts out, except when it royally screws up, as in the F-35, cutting edge, if not bleeding edge, weaponry, crewing it with expensive highly trained personnel. That's not how the Russians typically do things. Weapons are designed to be used by far less tech oriented soldiers, many of whom speak only rudimentary Russian. The man who built the once fairly mighty modern Russian Navy Sergei Gorshkov had a motto on his wall which read "Better is the enemy of good enough." That is an excellent summary of the basic Russian philosophy of weapon design and war alike. Pragmatism at its finest.

 

In recent times, at least, the US prefers the rapier stroke, but the historical Russian approach at the tactical level is more like a smashing blow from a mighty war hammer. With the reforms first pioneered by Ogarkov, downsizing the force in order to go high tech, today's Russian Army is getting more that way all the time, but broadly speaking, is not overall as high tech as the US Army. It has, though, whole categories of weapons the US doesn't, such as one of my favorite fulmination topics, a proper fully mobile tactical air defense, distributed over host of platforms, and it has many of the same goodies the US has, such as SFW.

 

Turning from weapon design, think about how the Red Army does things. Not at all like the US! Think mass employment. I've not run the numbers in CMBS in terms of what's doable, but in critical sectors, the US during the Cold War expected the Russians would be attacking at a 6:1 ratio. Think in terms of massing gun, mortar and rocket tubes rather than massing fires. I forget where I put it, but I recently presented a video in which there were so many BM-21s packed into a tiny area that they were practically on top of one another. Think ruthlessness. Think all manner of cleverness, such as bridges just below the top of the water, rendering them invisible to GPW era tacair, or sending tanks through terrain deemed impossible, such as the Pripyet Marsh. One of the things taught to US forces during the Cold War was that the Russians could and would use even the narrowest trail to move their armor through the NATO defenses. This meant sealing off high speed advance routes was no longer enough, greatly complicating defensive plans. Though not in the game, Russian tactical bridging was so terrifyingly effective in getting the Egyptians across the Suez Canal in the Yom Kippur War that the US Army copied the PMP pontoon bridge. Indeed, Russian bridging capability was so bad a threat that when western Europe conventional arms limits were being imposed, the US demanded and got a major reduction in Russian bridging units. During the Cold War, the Russians could easily destroy our HAS (Hardened Aircraft Shelters)(saw the pic myself of what a 240 mm rocket did--big through and through hole), but we couldn't destroy theirs. And long before the Durandal runway buster was available, the Russians had the BETAB rocket boosted runway penetrating bombs.  And I have written pages upon pages on the Forums about how dire was the armor/antiarmor gap during the cold War, with Russia dominating both ends for the longest time.

 

Think willingness to tolerate heavy casualties to the point of outright unit annihilation if it advances the overall objective in some way.  They were perfectly prepared to sacrifice entire Armies in order to ram a Tank Army through a breach in NATO lines. While I wouldn't expect Russian society to accept GPW level casualties (barring, say, a nuclear strike on Russia or something equally outrageous), given vastly greater access to information, I guarantee you the Russians are far less squeamish than we are to casualties in general. Mind, I'm not saying that families aren't destroyed and mothers driven mad by losing their sons, but that the very way life itself is viewed is profoundly not per the US model. Life is much harder there than here, starting with the climate, and the people are hardier in consequence. They still live much closer to nature than we do, so reverting, if you will, to the hardships of living in the field are more easily borne by comparison. 

 

Russia had 200 cities destroyed during the GPW. By contrast, the British burned Washington in 1812, and there wasn't a whole lot there when they did. Washington DC never had enemy tanks on the doorstep, but the Germans got close enough to Moscow there were claims the top of the Kremlin could be seen from Moscow's outskirts. Total US WW II fatalities didn't amount to even a tenth of Russia's. These sorts of experiences have shaped and inform Russia to this day. And it most definitely informs the Russian way of war. 

 

Consider tanks. In CMBS, the US player has a lot of KE killing potential in one tank; the Russians have theirs, with KE loads only slightly smaller than the Abrams per tank, in several tanks, making them more resilient in the face of casualties. While the Russian tanks are certainly capable of effectively fighting US tanks by using appropriate tactics, that's not their primary job. That job? Pouring in through a breach and disemboweling the foe from within. Tanks are weapons of exploitation, not battering rams to be thrown against the enemy's strength.

 

That's why there are so many ATGMs in the Russian force structure; why scads more are coming. They replace the previous designated tank killers--ATGs, both towed and SP. Just look at that tankbusting Tigr in the Victory Day Parade. It's  armed with dual quad Kornet EM launch pods, almost certainly independently targetable. Bumerang has Kornet EMs, as does the T-15 Armata Heavy IFV. Russian artillery can now precision target and destroy tanks, whether they are moving or not. Excalibut can only hit you if you sit still long enough in one place. Don't. Instead, be like an agile boxer. Stick and move. Russian tanks are fast and maneuverable. Use those advantages!

 

Russia has long had tankbusting helos and the Su-25, but now Russian tacair has Maverick class ATGMs broadly on par with their western counterparts and has things they don't, such as the 9K121 Vikhr on the Su-25T, though there have been noises made about putting Hellfire on the A-10. As I said, tank killers everywhere! This is one of the reasons every Abrams and Bradley in the game has ERA. And if the export model of the Kornet gave Israeli and US tankers the fits, understand it's not as capable as the homeland version. The US has very little experience fighting actual frontline Russian weaponry, you see.

 

Given the above, Sublime has given excellent advice--buy ATGMs and lots of them. Are they as "magical" as the Javelin? No they're not. Depending on guidance mode, either the gunner has to smoothly stay on target (SACLOS) throughout the flight or the target tracking task may be handled automatically via lockon (ACLOS), but either way the missile must ride the beam, which means the beam source can't be disrupted or knocked out while the missile's en route. F&F is a fantastic technology, but at what cost? A single Javelin missile runs $78K, whereas a TOW 2B is $50K and has nearly double the range. And if you read the ginormous Armata thread, you may recall that one of the weakest parts of the Russian armament industry is precisely the technology and worker combination needed to mass produce precision F&F missiles, whereas the LBR method is what's known as a mature technology and is drastically simpler, cheaper, far less resource stressing, etc.

 

And while the Javelin can  tear you to pieces with veritable impunity, given the chance, it's still on the shoulder of a very squishy grunt. A grunt who utterly detests being shot at, shelled, mortared, strafed, rocketed or bombed. Also, as I found to my horror while fighting the Russians recently, their standard artillery smoke, all the western defense hype to the contrary, wreaks havoc on systems using thermal sights. Havoc bad enough, for example, to screw up a Target Linear artillery mission because I couldn't see the far endpoint because of the smoke! The Javelin uses what for guidance? Exactly. Consequently, you'll want to suppress likely firing positions, immediately counterfire (Ainet is excellent for this) any launch location spotted and use your obscurant capability to the greatest extent possible, consistent with the suppressive fires. 

 

Widely proliferated and increasingly ever more potent Russian ATGMs are a lethal threat and should be deployed en masse, per the Russian approach to war. Besides, ATGMs are enormously cheaper than tanks! Again, I haven't run the numbers, but there's no reasonable way a smallish lightly armored vehicle with no 125 mm gun can cost as much as a modern MBT which also has ATGMs. I've fought against Shturm-S in a QB, and it was very tough to spot, to the point where I think, but am not sure, it wiped out my Tank Battalion CO's tank and everyone in it. It's only a slight exaggeration to say that while the Abrams sits on the ground, a Shturm-S or Kriz is more like partially in it.

 

The US has both the sensor edge and the superior weaponry in a tank fight to go 1 v 1 or even 1 v many, but you can't afford to do that. The US tank is far better armored for one and has a much more lethal KE round. The latter is the result of size limits imposed by the carousel loader. The T-14 Armata MBT's supposed to be much larger, allowing for longer propellant charges, therefore ~20% better penetration, but it's not in the game.  Therefore, your pragmatic tactical approach will be: hope for a single shot kill, but rationally expect to need several hits to at least disable the Abrams to the point where it can't hurt you. K-Kills are gravy. Kind of like an exploding plane is to ADA and SAM crews. Disabling an Abrams is to be treated the same as driving away an attacking aircraft. A victory!  To this end, as pnzrldr found out the hard way in his Beta battle, 30 mm autocannon fire can and will ruin the Americans' day, turning their high tech marvel into something which may well wind up incapable of effective combat (via hits to sensors, mobility, weapons, alone or in combination). This is why Sublime strongly recommended Su-25s--for scouring off the optics on the Abrams.

 

An Abrams without its CITV, gunner's day/night sight,  radios, data links and LWR, individually or in combo, is an Abrams in name but not so much otherwise. It's hard to find a Netcentric battle without being connected, to deploy countermeasures to a Kornet EM when you have no means to detect the beam it's coming in on, to race to cover to hide from a Krasnopol, to kill tanks with a missing wind sensor or muzzle reference device, to conduct effective, or maybe any, gunnery with dinged up gun barrel, to defend against infantry with the CROWS a ruin and the coax mount chewed up. IOW, don't try to eat the Abrams elephant all at once. Chew the great beast apart in chunks. Degrade. Degrade. Degrade. Grind that super capable AFV down to toothlessness and, per the earlier discussion about the Russian way of war, prepare to take some real lumps in the process. Remember, you are more loss tolerant than the Americans. Losing a tank for you is far far less hurtful to your overall combat capabilities than losing one of his is to him because Abrams tanks are so blasted expensive, particularly with great crews which maximize their killing potential.

 

If you put several LRF or LBR threats on an Abrams at the same time, you almost immediately exhaust its multispectral smoke capability, paving the way for improved kill opportunities for every such weapon. All of a sudden, the Abrams is like a squid that's threatened but out of ink! 

 

Since I have zero experience with either Russian infantry or artillery, I'm going to leave you in someone else's capable hands for those topics. I hope you now have some historical, military-technical and cultural context from which to fight, as well as at least the beginnings of a toolkit with which to do the grim job. Na Zapad!

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler

Edited September 2, 2015 by John Kettler

[Red Rage]

Well, since most of the players on this forum have no training at all in tactics. ( they have the money to buy the game) so they become company commanders or battalion commanders for the investment of $55 dollars. you should not expect many of them to have your great wisdom in the use of all the equipment at their fingertips.

 

So it sounds like to me, you better start giving training as to the great insights you have as playing the Russians vs a American force.

 

And it needs to be tactical training. (Not QB purchase decisions)

 

 

It's still a game and real world tactics apply only in  most general of ways. QB purchase decisions and actual unit stats/abilities have a bigger impact than all the manoeuvring in the world. 

 

I think that the issue that most people "who don't play the Russians the right way" (whatever that means) is with a very strange spotting system. US gear does the edge in long-range target acquisition irl, however most engagements in CM take place under the circumstances where modern Russian gear should be good enough to do the job. When you roll up on an unsuspecting M1 from the rear at point blank range (under 300m) with a T-90 equipped with a full hunter-killer suite from Thales and that said M1 somehow has time to spot you with his spidey sense, turn the turret 180 degrees, and get a 50/50 chance of firing the first shot ...well, that makes you scratch your head. Or when you have a recce platoon of supposedly Ratnik-equipped infantry sitting 30m away from  T-90AM, with a full spot on several enemy vehicles, while T-90 just stands there like a monument for over a minute. Besides the point that the whole purpose of Ratnik is the the quick relaying of visualized information between units on all levels, even a WW2 infantryman would have time to run to the tank, bang his rifle butt on the hatch and start calling targets in that timeframe. 

 

Then there are other smaller issues. Like why cannot Russian infantry  call in arty, while practically everything on the US side can call not only arty but CAS as well (and do so as fast as the dedicated FOOs on the Russian side) ? It's not the rigid Soviet model anymore - any infantry squad with access to the net can call in targets of opportunity for support assets. Why does it take so much longer for Russian artillery to start their fire missions? Why do Russian squads hunkered inside buildings seem to get insane casualties and suppression levels from simple 40mm US squads employ, when Ratnik gear utilizes aramid weave for actual armor pieces and shrapnel/burn resistant fabric for clothing items? Why do Russian sections have no radios and tablets (again - standard Ratnik equipment)? 

[Vanir Ausf B]

 

I'm extremely new to Combat Mission, so take whatever I have to say with a grain of salt.

 

I've been looking through these messages these past couple of  weeks -- I've personally had a lot of problems using Russian forces against the U.S., so Sublime, I would be very interested in what you have to say.  You've made endless references that most people are using the Russians incorrectly, but all I've managed to piece together from your posts is to buy lots of ATGMs, use a stripped down BTR-82A batallion with T-90AMs on defense, and use BMP2s with T-90AMs when attacking.  And play with no APS house rules

 

So please, I'd love to hear your opinion on tactics, what works for you, what you think people are doing wrong and how they should fix it.  I personally have severe difficulty dealing with how well the U.S. spots my forces (that and Javelins).  All I ask is you take your time when writing it.  In fact, write your thoughts first in a word doc of some sort, and correct all the red spelling mistakes -- I mean no offense, but sometimes with your spelling, punctuation, and lack of paragraphs it is a bit of a chore to parse what you're trying to say.

 

 

I am not Sublime but a few pointers.

 

Don't get into a staring contest with US units. Sublime's advice is sound. Any Russian vehicle in LOS of US units will be quickly spotted. You have to put solid cover between you and them. The key is try to catch the US unit while moving and preferably not facing your units, so you have to anticipate where they are going and cover that ground with multiple keyholed assets. This is easier said than done and can require a lot of terrain analysis and LOS checking with the target tool at waypoints as well as the camera at view level 1 (doing this with trees on trunks only can help quickly identify gaps in tree coverage, but checking LOS from waypoints can help locate gaps that may not be visually apparent. Abrams tanks can and will spot and kill your vehicles through small gaps between trees. You will be surprised at how much less concealment trees give than their visual representation suggests).

 

Infantry can remain undetected in LOS of US units if they are on Hide in good concealment such as buildings or forest but only until US units close to within a few hundred meters. Within about 100 meters your  guys hiding in the forest are going to be seen by anything looking their way intently which makes forests poor ambush positions unless they are thick. It is better to engage US forces from urban areas than forests. Put your guys on Hide with a 180° covered arc and they will unhide if anyone enters the arc.

 

If you find yourself fighting in low light conditions or especially low light combined with less-than-clear weather you will be at an even greater disadvantage since most US infantry units have helmet and weapon mounted IR sights while Russians have only weapon mounted day/night sights. In this situation dismounted AT-4c and AT-14 ATGM teams will be a godsend. They are the only man-portable thermal devices the Russians have and the difference in spotting range is huge. Also note that in such conditions your forward observers will need a UAV to call in strikes across long distances.

 

The only real spotting advantage the Russians have is the millimeter wave ground search radar on the Khrizantema-S. It can "see" through even multispectral smoke. Use other late-model Russian vehicles to generate smoke screens for them when in LOS of US units. BMP-3Ms shoot smoke about 100 meters, BTR-82As and BRDM-2Ms about 135m, BMP-2Ms about 125m, T-xx MBTs about 50 meters but in a wider arc. Russian vehicles can only shoot smoke twice.

[Vanir Ausf B]

When you roll up on an unsuspecting M1 from the rear at point blank range (under 300m) with a T-90 equipped with a full hunter-killer suite from Thales and that said M1 somehow has time to spot you with his spidey sense, turn the turret 180 degrees, and get a 50/50 chance of firing the first shot ...well, that makes you scratch your head.

 

Even Abrams tanks don't spot well to the rear in the game so the spidey sense is presumably the laser warning receiver. The problem is that tanks have instant reaction speeds. This has been effectively slowed down in the case of infantry close assault but remains an issue in other circumstance. Vehicles of all types, not just US, really do seem to have a spidey sense for incoming ATGMs. This is all going to have to be addressed at some point.

[John Kettler]

hattori,

 

I see I made a mistake in my last post. I should've said he recommended the Su-25 in the more lightly stored configuration. This way, it strafes rather than uses Kh-25s.

 

Vanir Ausf B,

 

Does the Abrams by any chance have a faster turret traversing rate than the Russian tanks? If so, that may be a factor in how fast the tank responds to being hit by any kind of laser illumination, though I don't know the spectral coverage. Anecdotal accounts here would appear to indicate LRFs, LTDs and LBRs all trigger it. Given reported reaction times, it seems reasonable to posit the Abrams LWR (angular resolution of what vs laser threat?) and attendant turret whipping around to deal with the threat is fully automated. But Shtora can be run either MIL or automatically, obviously with a significant delta between the two.

 

What happens if an Abrams is lased from several directions at once? Do we see that same oscillating paralysis behavior we saw back in CMBO with Tiger tank turrets, in which the tank sees a threat, starts spinning the turret that way, sees another while doing so, then swings back--during which the Tiger tank gets shot up? And while troop quality and leadership obviously will tell, so, too, will things like fatigue. In CMBS, clever scenario builders could depict the tremendous tonic effect of the introduction of  fresh crews and full strength reinforcements, even in small units, into a battle depicting hollow eyed tankers, hanging grimly on in their beat  up, ammo low tanks in chewed up units. 

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler

[Sublime]

First slysniper apologies then. in fact my problems with someone else on this board stemmed from his reluctance to share advice id given him to share with the community amongst another things. but thats dead and over. What did you not understand? for one i wrote that on a cellphone after twelve hours at work in a bad neighborhood waiting for a late bus. ive read it and do not see anything difficult to comprehend? ask me specifically and ill clarify? also if i mispell 'and' as 'amd' by accident its ridiculous to act as if the whole statement is unreadable.

Redrage i dont know what to tell you. not playing the russians the right way meams exactly that - you.re losing whereas others are winning playing them against competent humans. Obviously you.re doing something wrong.

First of all I wont comment on the Russ comms, perhaps it has less to do with a lowly infantrymans ability to call in fire ( and even still any hq unit basically still can) and more to do with how russ handles such requests and allocates fires which is drastically different than the US. And no its not Soviet times anymore but theres still 3/4 Soviet equipment and the tendency towards rigid Soviet command will take longer than 8 years of reforms to erase especially since most russ higher ups were Soviet Army at one time.

Indeed the 'spidey sense' is the abrams lwr which also automatically slews turret and tank twds target. And you will note about 95% (especially atgm) russ weapons rely on laser targetting. On top of that its purely anecdotal - Ive killed a lot of US armor from the rear and sides even the front. Id say your first mistake seems to be engaging an abrams with a lone T90, if you.d had more than one fr different angles the abrams would be dead. yes you.d lose one russ tank but as i said above as russ player you simply have to accept higher casualties.

Javelins are just the US super atgm. nothing to be done. endless real life references of units using the CLU unit not for firing.missiles but just for its excellent optics and thermals. You can park tanks either right adjacent to a building with building side towards enemy but then you wouldnt be spotted from that angle anyways. Trees act as 'ghetto' aps sometimes even for javelins.

As far as Us and Russ at night im not entirely sure for one all or even some Russian unots are equipped with ratnik even with ratnik US nvg still is a lot better, same with thermals, and the US owns the night. BFC will tweak what needs tweaking. meantime deal with what is a superb game that may have a few minor issues and win or stop playing. Also the US takes very heavy casualties with body armor versus my Russ arty, AGS, RPGs etc. and my Russians get killed a lot. but for example how many men were in the building you mentioned rage? Because your putting them in an enclosed space that also may cram alot of men in a small room could be a very bad idea.

again the ultimate cover against US is behind a building or where they simply cannot have LOS at all. Otherwise you need a plan and side plan and luck. Deal with it or fight Ukr forces or play another game. I like russ because its a challenge but not impossible and the feeling of killing a human players abrams is fantastic, akin to my US units in BN killing a KT with a hellcat (penetration that didnt kill KT but was killed) then a flethrower team got a partial penetration.

Finally though i reread the post last night and dont get how its incomprehensible instead of complaining could you please specify what you dont get?

my offer of private tutoring on russ forces stands.

ps i have big fingers and a small cellphone keyboard. when i have that small window to post from a pc theres a big difference. I did goto college but as a 9th grade dropout with a GED in the era when to pass the GED you only need a 40%. Maybe thats why my spelling sucks

Edited September 2, 2015 by Sublime

[Sublime]

Kettler an abrams lased several directions at once usually pops smoke.in fact most games i have they pop smoke three times per tanks every lase. the fun doesnt begin until they run out of smoke. in your situation the abrams would either reverse or if higher level motivation perhaps duke it out trying to attack each target in succession.

Edited September 2, 2015 by Sublime

[Sublime]

also if noone wants private tutoring then setup tactical examples in detail and ill respond best and detailed i can as to how I would approach it.

[John Kettler]

Sublime,

 

Good to know, but how many times can it pop smoke before it runs out altogether? Seems to me that's a critical item of info for the Russian player. 

 

hattori,

 

For your tactical knowledge, though sadly not depicted in the game, the Russians have simply tremendous smoke generation capabilities not on AFVs. For starters look up the TMS-65, a truck mounted jet engine based decontamination system capable of cleaning even tanks or putting out, depending on what's in the aerosol material tank, anything from artillery type smoke to vast blankets of broadband obscurant through which no current American high tech weaponry can see, range or designate. In terms of really screening the troops, both helos and fixed wing can lay down great curtains of smoke across the entire front of an advance. Would post some vids, but YT keeps giving me error messages.

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler

 

P.S.

 

It appears that after its hanging for many minutes, I did get one vid to post. MoD has authorized you and your fellow officers to watch this important orientation vid on the Armed Forces of the sacred Rodina! For Mother Russia!

 

Edited September 2, 2015 by John Kettler

[jep]

First of all ive.mentioned a specific opponent several times about pbem experiences. he.s an excellent player and a top notch commander who has utterly wipeded me down multiple times. [..] other culprits could be be bad lick, not enough practice on players part, using russ eqiipment like its US equipment, or just a poor commandee. anyway my sincerest apologies to relevant player/opponent who i have nothing butbthe utmost respect and amicable feelings for.

 

Create a YouTube video so people will learn how to play. Preferably QB without house rules because these battles seems to be most problematic ones. Good scenario designer or house rules can always ensure balanced battle but this would be kind of missing the point. I am still stating that weaker player should not choose Russian forces. Price difference is not enough to make balanced game.

Edited September 2, 2015 by jep

[Sublime]

no - weaker player should always choose US. I offered advice on specific tactical situations or private qb tutoring. Im not making a youtube video. i alrwady have two jobs and a four year old thank you very much. First i dont know how to record a CM battle second I dont have a youtube account or channel and third Id rather enjoy the time I have free from working two full time jobs with my son or playing

CM qbs. I have no problem typinh advice or shooting back n forth pms, emails, or even phone calls, but no Im not doing the youtube thing. Sorry.

Kettler most Russ units get two smoke discharges. There may be exceptions Im not certain thats across the board. However Russian prices do allow you to buy enough that if the advance/rolling smokescreen is used properly itll allow you to close into danger close to the US.

While doing this you want to be shelling the US rear or the onject of your advance (and call off barrage when your troops are about a minute away or better adjust it).

You also ideally would have any CAS elements being used now and or units in over watch firing on US units that expose themselves, like khriz' placed in two different locations that will see past your rolling smoke advance of infantry and tanks and cant see all of the US lines but PORTIONS of it likely to have US armor. Where is US armor most likely? this is tougher and dependent on opponents play style as well. Still obvious things, hills with huge lines of sight, near VPs, tree lines on hills etc. and also dont worry about then khriz if it cant see past your smoke screen. sometimes you may not want it to. sometimes you.ll want tje smoke to be popped then advance your khriz a litttle but keeping it far behind everything else immobile because its radar will see through the smoke. I just said see forward of your rolling smoke screen becayse that tactic, especially when its vehicle popped smoke, screams schwerepunk and you can expect your opponent to move armor up in anticipation of engagement/the smoke screen dying.

Finally be very careful with the smoke screen. look at distances you have to cover. it may be unfeasible. two dont focus it on two vehicles. rather you want one vehicle on left lead front lead right lead. I suggest empty BMPs with tanks about 25-40 m behind. the BMPs right behind the tanks and so on. infantry should be mounted ( platoon or two) rest dismounted and some of them ignoring smoke.screen using forests and natural cover to advancemto objective, but close enough that if in trouble units can be diverted from rear of smoke screen. plus the infantry should be heavily armed and have priority of fire for your on map 120mms. another portion of your inf will run amongst your tanks or preferably paralell to it in cover. because often smoke screens are blindly shelled. but if there isnt cover then amongst the armor. you want the merge of infantry and all your armor in that last dash. if timed right the smoke will dissipate and chaos will begin. your khriz' may or may not be alive but they keep forcing abrams and brads to pop smoke and reverse or get killed. usually theyll tske a few before they die if used right. the rolling smoke screen relies on chaos the smoke clears and your intermingled witb your opponent whose beeen shelled from jump by 155mm fire and now theres russian indantry ( split into half squads and going for any cover they can find) all over. BMPs and T90s are everywhere too. this isnt my favorite tactic because lady luck can really ruin your day. still - your forces are now literally intermingled with US. Itll be bloody probably but you can often pull it off without mission kill losses and cripple the US especially if the smoke clears and abrams start gettinh rpgs and 120mm in the flanks and rear with khriz and any atgms you have opening up whilst yout infantry is furiously firefighting the enemy infantry. in this case i advise overcommanding. you got em this far let the tac ai assess and attack targets it wants it usually chooses right.

Edited September 2, 2015 by Sublime

[Sublime]

And regardless of missing the point house rules exist for a reason. the US cannot shoot down the pchela. its unfair. Russian units rely heavily on laser weapons and atgms, the US currently doesnt have APS, and because its a game and cannot perfectly emulate real lifeany things that would remedy or get around these issues for the Russians dont exist.

If i did a qb with no house rules why not say buy all CAS and heavy arty a preplan strikes on enemy setup zone? problem solved. No the US has enough of am advantage and isnt fully been patched or completely reviewed and decided all is well. until then APS just makes a difficult job for the Russian 3x harder.

[John Kettler]

hattori,

 

This shows what I mean when I talk about what the TMS-65 can do when it comes to smoke generation.

 

 

So far, I've yet to find the combat exercise which took place in front of Putin which which helos and Su-25s came swooping laying great curtains of smoke, but I did find a most impressive Russian Armed Forces tribute video which has footage in it the likes of which I've never seen, gasp inducing stuff, together with other scenes which moved me practically to tears. Especially heavy on aviation developments, but has tons of other goodies, including incredible high res footage of the T-90MS inside and out. Beware, though of the info placards, claims and some of the missile pics. The Bulava SLBM still is flat out wrong and shows a Tomahawk type cruise missile!

Don't know whether you're aware of it, but the US Army now has two just graduated  fully Ranger qualified female officers. Unfortunately for them, they will never get to go operational. Meanwhile, I've discovered the Russians are training groundbreaking female future VDV officers, to the same standards as the men,  at what I believe to be the Ryazan Higher Airborne Academy. This is a very in-depth look at the academic and field work there, as well, of course, as the cadets themselves operating in a formerly all male environment. The comparisons the training officer makes between how the girls operate vs the boys (yes, uses those terms) in terms of seriousness, academic rigor and other factors is quite interesting. I've never seen anything like this on Russian squad tactics before. A huge shock is that they do their combat exercises with blanks only! No MILES gear, nor Simunition type rounds, either. If you do well, comrade, perhaps MoD will post you there! BTW, the unit isn't a battalion; that's hype from the person who posted it. The unit depicted is a platoon and has BMD-1s for IFVs. In toto, it looks as though the total series runs at lest 2.5 (glorious) hours! You can hear the Russian being spoken, but there's the English VO immediately after something is said.

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler

Edited September 2, 2015 by John Kettler

[John Kettler]

hattori,

 

IF CM is E-crack, as I've many times stated, the above doc series is vid crack. It is one of the most engrossing, "must see the next episode" things I've ever encountered.  I'm about to dive headlong into Episode 8 and may have to go into mourning when I run out of episodes. Also, I was wrong. The female VDV cadets are, in fact, part of an all-female battalion. This is a look at one platoon's journey during the members' fourth year of study.

 

It's one thing to see a fuzzy pic from a Russian military newspaper of cadets studying at Ryazan, but quite another to be taken into the classroom; to see and hear everything that happens. Where I saw tank sheds and tanks in front of them on various overhead images, here you get to go into the tank sheds while BMDs are being prepared for airdrop. Not to mention inside the driver's compartment of one while running around the countryside on exercises. Parachute jump training equipment takes on a whole new meaning when you get to watch the paratroopers using the gear and learn how the Russians organize jumps for everything from an ancient An-2 to an Il-76. Russian paratroopers don't execute a PLF (Parachute Landing Fall), but instead come down with legs tightly together, looking at the horizon, never their feet, and execute a couple of bunny hops like that following the intial impact. If you can find the time, I can't recommend this series highly enough. 

 

Sublime,

 

Appreciate the info on Russian AFV smoke capacity, but do you know how many salvoes the Abrams has? Also, I know you don't allow Pchela under your house rules, but since you already consider it (far?) more difficult for the Russians to win, because of the US technology and weapon performance edges, isn't it making the Russian player's burden all the heavier by excluding it? Or does the Pchela give the Russians the same sort of leverage that, say, APS gives the Abrams? IOW, does what the Pchela provides (and am pretty sure I posted a scathing Russian quote regarding it being so loud it roared like a BTR and whose imagery was so blurry as to be useless--unless I'm recalling the wrong drone), I guess I'm hard pressed to grok why the Russians, already hurting because of much longer times required to organize and receive support fires, should deprive themselves of such leverage as the Pchela affords? (Note to self: Study up on Russian drones). I get that you think it's unfair because the Americans can't shoot it down, but IMO, that's a tactical limitation the Americans imposed on themselves, just as surely as the Russian tanks in the game suffer because of a less potent KE capability because of the carousel size limit and because their designs don't focus on crew survivability the way the Abrams does, hence lack the heavy armor it sports.

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler

[Vanir Ausf B]

the US cannot shoot down the pchela.

Zala

 

A note of clarification to my earlier comments. It is not unrealistic for the Abrams or any other tank turret to automatically slew towards an enemy unit that is lasing them, but the hull should not go with it. I am hopeful that the tactic of "lasing off" target will be implemented in some way and also bore sighting for close range engagements.

[Vanir Ausf B]

Then there are other smaller issues. Like why cannot Russian infantry  call in arty, while practically everything on the US side can call not only arty but CAS as well (and do so as fast as the dedicated FOOs on the Russian side) ? It's not the rigid Soviet model anymore - any infantry squad with access to the net can call in targets of opportunity for support assets. Why does it take so much longer for Russian artillery to start their fire missions? Why do Russian squads hunkered inside buildings seem to get insane casualties and suppression levels from simple 40mm US squads employ, when Ratnik gear utilizes aramid weave for actual armor pieces and shrapnel/burn resistant fabric for clothing items? Why do Russian sections have no radios and tablets (again - standard Ratnik equipment)?

 

I don't have answers for all of these questions, but Ratnik is in the game to a limited extent. All Russian soldiers have body armor. Recon troops have helmet mounted night vision in addition to their weapon sights, and recon platoon HQs carry PDAs that allow them to network with UAVs.

 

Edited September 3, 2015 by Vanir Ausf B

[John Kettler]

Vanir Ausf B,

 

Appreciate the correction. Man, is that thing small, about the size of the control line combat planes from when I was a boy! The English translation is pretty rough in places, but I have to say it's pretty cool to learn about the ZALA 421-08 straight off the manufacturer's website. Though I can't say I quite follow much of the description of the control tech (lots of previously unseen by me acronyms), the overall design makes sense and the sensor packages appear well thought out.

http://zala.aero/zala-421-08/

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler

Edited September 3, 2015 by John Kettler