Is Syrian Equipment Fixed? Same with C2?

[Taki]

I mentioned more the Spotting and Infodistributing on the C2 ways. As i read in Nasyria those whole thing was stuck. Battalion Radio was overhelmed because every unit wanted to talk something. Noone realy knew where the enemy was. The Company (or was it XO?) was driven into mud and couldnt sent signals becaue of some electricy cables overhead and some buildings that disturbed the radio signals etc.

i knew that this is an "all going wrong" scenario. But there arent any problems with Users using those Communications. As argumented on the "low training" for syrians using this and that equipment there arent any factors (wich i can see, but maybe you can explain me) that are implemented in the game on wich can disrupt c2 or command in general.

another part is those displays (PDA handheld and displays in strykers for example). you see a unit u put your pda stick on it, mark it with some words and every unit on the same satelite link got the estimated position on its grid. Sounds fine, but is it really that fast and accurate in terms of spotting. How often are those Units checking it? (i know you did tell something on the spotting cycles Steve, but cant remember it) Is there somebody in a squad or vehicel looking right onto it?

And another question that comes to my mind:

When do we start getting those "T-72?" spotting back. actually you spot an unit and you know exactly what it is. What about sound contacts?

[Apocal]

As i read in Nasyria those whole thing was stuck. Battalion Radio was overhelmed because every unit wanted to talk something. Noone realy knew where the enemy was. The Company (or was it XO?) was driven into mud and couldnt sent signals becaue of some electricy cables overhead and some buildings that disturbed the radio signals etc.

i knew that this is an "all going wrong" scenario. But there arent any problems with Users using those Communications. As argumented on the "low training" for syrians using this and that equipment there arent any factors (wich i can see, but maybe you can explain me) that are implemented in the game on wich can disrupt c2 or command in general.

Those were Marines in An Nasiyariah... they don't have RPDAs, FBCB2 and a few other nifty gadgets like that, which is precisely why comms broke down the way they did during the battle. Every unit was using coded voice to pass information that can be transmitted via a BFT/FBCB2, graphically.

another part is those displays (PDA handheld and displays in strykers for example). you see a unit u put your pda stick on it, mark it with some words and every unit on the same satelite link got the estimated position on its grid. Sounds fine, but is it really that fast and accurate in terms of spotting.

It's accurate, in real life, enough to say, the MG is on the roof of that jammed up cluster of three houses at 593011 and we're next door at 593109, don't call for fire from Mortarman Charles, Ray.

How often are those Units checking it? (i know you did tell something on the spotting cycles Steve, but cant remember it) Is there somebody in a squad or vehicel looking right onto it?

Not constantly, but as you're not immediately doing anything ("spotting" would be the CM equivalent I guess) and people are calling contacts, it's something you'd pay attention to.

[Battlefront.com]

Bolt,

Here's the situation: a FO observer (yes, of the few Syrians have, but it was a lucky day and it's a FO who is calling for a fire mission this time) actually sees the target. He (the Forward Observer, mind you, not just some grunt) decides to call in artillery support. About what net changes are you talking about if he (and only he in his Company) has the dedicated support of the guns?

From what I understand there are still hoops to jump through to get the artillery coming down on unplanned targets. Plus, the delay is not just the communications but the length of time it takes, in total, to get rounds on their way to the target. That's what artillery plotted during the game is designed to simulate. Artillery plotted during Setup represents preplotted artillery strikes.

The thing we are missing, though, are TRPs (Target Reference Points) to allow preplotted artillery strikes during a mission. This is something that we will be adding to the game. Unfortunately, it's being held up by the need for completely unique user interface coding. We have to do this for Normandy for a couple of other reasons, so it should be along soon.

It's centralized system. Only few lucky guys on the ground get to get the arty support. And those are Forward observers who have guns somewhere behind their backs sit and wait just for his call, they know that they will give support only to this guy and can say "F you" to everybody else.

True.

Syriand DO have computers in their artillery units.

I'm sure that they do. I didn't mean to imply that they didn't. Primitive "computers" for artillery have been around since the 1930s. Any Finn gorgnard here will tell you that they had them for WW2, for example. Believe me... they'll go on and on and on and on about it until some Brit grog gets into a fight with them about how theirs was better. Oh the wonderful memories of CMBB discussions come drifting back to me

What I meant was that the US based computers do this stuff automatically. There's no user input as far as I know. The digital targeting information (from an FO at least) come straight into the fire control computer, mixes in with all the sensor data it has already on tap, and tells the gunners exactly what to do. In some cases, like the Paladin 155, the guns are adjusted by the computers themselves. Or perhaps I'm getting that confused with what the military is working on now... brain is mushy today

In any case, it must be remembered that the total delay time is an amalgamation of every source of delay possible. The US system is optimized at each step of the way so that in total the delay times are very low and the accuracy very high. The Syrians are not. Therefore, each step is a little (or perhaps a lot) less efficient than the US, which in turn means the total will be higher. How much higher? I don't know because we don't have any Syrian Army artillery experts here to give us answers. They also don't publish things like the US does. So all we can do is take what appears to be the correct response time for the US and make it significantly worse for the Syrians.

I don't want to sound like an ass, if I do, then please excuse me.

No excusing necessary... you're doing nothing wrong

You said that if someone feels that something with this game is wrong, he should say what and provide evidence why does he thinks the thing is not OK. As was pointed out in my thread, we think time to call in artillery is too long. I wrote that 155mm guns were called in in 3 minutes in late 80s during some training. If I try to search and provide the norm time (I mean, the time that is mentioned in the military regulations) for modern Russian artillery, will this be enough?

That would be great, thanks! At least it's a hard data starting point that we can use to evaluate what is in the game now.

Also, I'd like to ask how you guys want us to make tests? Create scenario, save it, make tests and then send via email to you? Dima mentioned few times that he needs "replays" and can't judge anything from screenshots. How can I create such "replay" when palying in Real time mode? Did he mean just a save game? Before or after weird thing happened?

There are different needs for different types of issues. For delay times it's probably good enough to list the time delay you experienced, the quality of the FO, the quality of the artillery, the type of artillery, and note if the FO was being shot at or not. Such things are generally OK for a very specific circumstance that is generally not influenced by a great number of variables.

Something like tank gun accuracy, spotting times, etc. are extremely variable and therefore a save (if it repeats consistently) or a replay (the best method) are needed. WeGo is a superior way to demonstrate these things because there are more options for capturing the information. Especially because very often Charles needs access to low level information BEFORE anything happened, so with WeGo you get that provided you saved previous turns. With RT it's more difficult because you need to save at an earlier stage and then document the steps to reproduce.

I totally agree with you. We, Russians, are the most unfair and lying people on the planet. As long things fit our agenda, we are happy.

I certainly don't hold that opinion of Russians, but after years and years of working on simulations that involve Russian (Soviet) hardware I have got to say that we've had far more Russians blind to the documented weaknesses/limitations of their stuff than Americans blind to the weaknesses/limitations of their own. When we get into such discussions we more often than not have Russians sticking to their arguments even though they can't produce any evidence to support their position, while Americans tend to either admit that they haven't got any clue or just go away mad

It's very frustrating for us because we know the information about Russian (Soviet) stuff printed in English is rare and often created by Western sources. We don't like this fact and would rather get information straight from Russian sources. Since we don't speak or read Russian we have to rely upon people that do in order to get us information. Unfortunately, such people are either incapable (for any number of reasons) of doing good research (research is a skill, not something anybody can do well), unwilling to face certain uncomfortable facts, or are themselves frustrated by the lack of unbiased information. Dima has been very helpful to us because he's one of the rare guys that knows how to do research, has a very good "bullcrap" filter, and yet cares very much about making sure Russian (Soviet) stuff is not under modeled.

One more thing, not connected with Syrian/Russian vehicles. Is there any information how many Javelins does US Army have at the moment? How many Javelins (CLU and the rockets) does Stryker company have? DO CLU really come with every Stryker? I've tried to search but with no luck. Can anyone help?

Sure... this has been answered many times by veterans of the Iraq war. The simple answer is that the theoretically allocation of Javelins is 1x CLU and 3x Reloads per Stryker (well, certain variants). This is in fact the actual allocation in the field, as confirmed by soldiers who were deployed to Iraq.

There is a single designated "AT Expert" per Rifle Squad who is trained on the Javelin. However, cross training is extremely high so it is probable that most members of a Rifle Squad know the basics of the Javelin. The CLU is often used for night time security, so it's actually used in practical terms quite frequently. And of course the Javelin is very easy to use and hit targets with even without much familiarity. Both Charles and I have used a Javelin simulator and it really is easy. Especially for young soldiers who grew up with video games.

Somewhere I have a report on how many Javelins have been fired in Iraq up until 2006 IIRC. The number was HUGE. And at $75,000 a shot it raised my eyebrows as one of the guys paying for all of those shots

Steve

[Combatintman]

Here's the situation: a FO observer (yes, of the few Syrians have, but it was a lucky day and it's a FO who is calling for a fire mission this time) actually sees the target. He (the Forward Observer, mind you, not just some grunt) decides to call in artillery support. About what net changes are you talking about if he (and only he in his Company) has the dedicated support of the guns?

AFAIK, CMSF doesn't let usual Syrian grunts or even commanders to call in arty. Only Syrian FO can do it.

Bolt - Merry Xmas too. I'm not talking about the FOO having to switch nets to the arty net I'm talking about Joe Grunt which adds to the friction as I stated previously.

[dima]

Also, I'd like to ask how you guys want us to make tests? Create scenario, save it, make tests and then send via email to you? Dima mentioned few times that he needs "replays" and can't judge anything from screenshots. How can I create such "replay" when palying in Real time mode? Did he mean just a save game? Before or after weird thing happened?

Real Time mode is really not useful to reproduce the issues. WeGo is a lot better at it as you can save the replay and can save the game too at the begining of the turn. I actually playe WeGo exclusively.

[vincere]

Somewhere I have a report on how many Javelins have been fired in Iraq up until 2006 IIRC. The number was HUGE. And at $75,000 a shot it raised my eyebrows as one of the guys paying for all of those shots

Steve

If you come across that or can remember a ball park figure it'd be interesting?

[MikeyD]

I think I saw that Javelin fired number too, posted on this group as a matter of fact. It was a big number like 15,000 or something equally absurd. God knows how to track down tht statistic again.

[zmoney]

Possible Spoilers:

I know one of the problems brought up was the poor spotting by the red force; well I have had a very different experience in George MC’s new campaign. I am playing Blue and had just got done clearing the first few NAI’s when I had my fancy scout HMV on Hwy 3 along with its escort M2 HMV, my command Bradley and two M1’s. They not only didn’t get the first shot off, the fancy HMV, one of my M1’s and the escort HMV were all knocked out by some armor advancing in the area of route blue. Plus the M1 that was knocked out missed with his first return shot.

In addition to these vehicles I also lost a Bradley on the hill near the wooded NAI, he was knocked out by the same advancing armor.

So these are just a few examples I’ve seen that tell me that there isn’t a huge advantage built in, I think it might have something to do with the troop quality. All my units where regular and I don’t know what the red force experience is but I bet if I had vet, crk or elite I might have spotted the enemy first.

[MikeyD]

Just yesterday I was playing with settings for Red AT-3 teams. A 'Green' AT team saw 3/4 of its missiles impacting the ground halfway to the target. Changed to a 'Veteran' AT team, I saw half of my Bradleys & Abrams' either destroyed or disabled! So its hard to generalize, an obscure little setting for one minor unit on the map might make the difference between winning and losing.

[Sgt Joch]

How good is the Russian stuff?

As anyone who witnessed the forum wars regarding CMBB and IL-2 will know, even when you have a lot of documented info, you can still have heated arguments on its interpretation.

Dealing with modern stuff, the problem is compounded since there is less info and much of the interesting bits are classified.

Dealing with the Russian stuff in Syrian hands, you have the further problem that the export version is often less performing than what he Russians keep for their own forces.

Own advantage with modern weapons however is that they are almost all one shot/one kill which simplifies the problem to one of spotting, reaction time and accuracy. When you get into that sphere, things become even more fuzzy since the quality of the troops handling the weapons become more important than the weapons themselves.

So to a large extent the relative deadliness of weapons in a simulation like CMSF will always be a best guess based on published data and what little real world data there is.

In 1.11, I think we have achieved a pretty good balance. I think you will find that the changes to the spotting rules have made all Syrian forces more deadly. You can no longer just park a platoon of M1s on a hill and have them spot and engage every Syrian units in LOS.

[vincere]

I think I saw that Javelin fired number too, posted on this group as a matter of fact. It was a big number like 15,000 or something equally absurd.God knows how to track down tht statistic again.

Cheers for that MikeyD. Damn statistics again- agreed sounds like a lot but I'd at least like to balance that figure with how many firefights there were. Perhaps only God knows that one.

[panzermartin]

I have to admit that 1.11 feels different. I cant seem to recreate the spotting problems I had before. ATGMs seem harder to spot from the M1A2 and syrians usually spot a bit better than previously. Accuracy of US small arms has increased a lot though but that is understandable.

[Sgt Joch]

I have to admit that 1.11 feels different. I cant seem to recreate the spotting problems I had before. ATGMs seem harder to spot from the M1A2 and syrians usually spot a bit better than previously. Accuracy of US small arms has increased a lot though but that is understandable.

Yes, the fact that Syrian ATGM teams are harder to spot has a big impact. They can sometimes get off 2-3 shots before they are spotted which makes them a lot more deadlier.

As the US player, you can't just bull your way through with tanks, you now have to use much more combined arms tactics.For example, scout with your infantry and take out suspected or spotted ATGMs with suppressive fire/artillery.

[Battlefront.com]

One thing is that we do have a pretty good idea of what contemporary US military forces can do against 1960s/70s Soviet equipped forces. Gulf War 1 and the initial phase of OIF are documented very well and it's clear that even the older M1 Abrams didn't have much to fear. Then look at intense street fighting, like Fullujah, where the US forces lost quite a lot of armor, even though the insurgents there didn't have anything big and fancy like the RPG-29 or AT-14. Although not perfect, it does give a good example of the possibilities out there.

Steve

[Apocal]

One thing is that we do have a pretty good idea of what contemporary US military forces can do against 1960s/70s Soviet equipped forces. Gulf War 1 and the initial phase of OIF are documented very well and it's clear that even the older M1 Abrams didn't have much to fear. Then look at intense street fighting, like Fullujah, where the US forces lost quite a lot of armor, even though the insurgents there didn't have anything big and fancy like the RPG-29 or AT-14. Although not perfect, it does give a good example of the possibilities out there.

Steve

Not saying you're lying, but do you recall your source regarding armor losses in Fallujah? I can't honestly recall hearing or reading anything about it.

[Battlefront.com]

I have a full accounting of all Coalition losses up through something like 2006. I'm not on my computer at the moment, but a decent number of Abrams and Bradleys were lost, not to mention Humvees. IIRC it was something like 25 Bradleys lost during Fallujah ops. However, most of them were probably not total writeoffs.

Steve

[Secondbrooks]

I don't know is it patch 1.11 or am i getting worse in CMSF, but... I've lost company worth of M1 Abrams and another company of Bradleys today. And some small numbers of infantry... Earlier it was possible if i behaved reclessly, but i'm been trying to keep casualities low and behave cautiosly.

Well Syrians seems to be at veteran level while my imperialistic pigs are just regular, so maybe that is reason. I can't remember mission where i would be doomed to play Blue force with lesser experience than Syrians. When skillful Syrians handles modern ATGMs results seems to turn very ugly for me.

Btw. Just how accurate SPG-9 is in reality? It seems that good quality crew manages to hit targets past 800 meters quite accurately (i'd say 50%) in CMSF. I've understood that it's accurate range is closer to 500-600 meters in optimal setting when it comes to reality, not that i would have checked that from anywhere.

[purpheart23]

I have a full accounting of all Coalition losses up through something like 2006. I'm not on my computer at the moment, but a decent number of Abrams and Bradleys were lost, not to mention Humvees. IIRC it was something like 25 Bradleys lost during Fallujah ops. However, most of them were probably not total writeoffs.

Steve

I will guarantee you that the vast majority of those bradleys were put back on the line. Twenty five bradleys is better than half a battalions worth. That's quite a few. I'll look into this a little further. Secondbrooks. You are going to have to be more specific when you refer to someone as imperialistic pigs.

[MikeyD]

I recall seeing those same stats (I swear I've had this conversation before ). Off the top of my head, from around 2006 about 80-90 Abrams were listed as 'total write-offs'. Some bad sh*t has to happen to a tank to get that designation. Break an Abram in half and they'll call it repairable, then ship the pieces to Qatar to be welded back together (only a slight exaggeration). I believe more than 20 Strykers were written-off in that timeframe too, and that's out of an in-theatre fleet of only 300.

[Battlefront.com]

Still looking for that f'n PDF I know I have somewhere. I did find a very detailed list of losses of all sorts EXCEPT vehicles. It's a Brookings report called "Iraq Index Tracking Variables of Reconstruction & Security in Post-Saddam Iraq". Link is:

www.brookings.edu/iraqindex

I also found a report by Anthony Cordesman who stated that the initial phase of OIF cost the US a total of 10 Abrams (2 to friendly fire) and about half that number of Bradleys. Marines lost 7 AAVs, though several were likely due to friendly fire. The report is dated July 21, 2003 so there was still a lot of unconfirmed data at the time.

Damn... I don't know why I can't find the damned document. Wait!! I found it It was made by Center for American Progress (Lexington Institute) with the title of "Army Equipment After Iraq". It was mostly concerned with the chewing up of vehicles due to all types of losses.

There is a quote of "combat losses" by Army Times, but the time covered is uncertain. It is at least 2003-2005, but could be early 2006. Aircraft include all those lost in Afghanistan since 2001. Losses were reported as follows:

Abrams - 20

Bradley - 50

Stryker - 20

M113 - 20

Humvee - 250

Wheeled vehicles (other) - 500+

Apache - 27

Blackhawk - 21

Chinook - 14

Kiowa - 23

As for how many of the Abrams and Bradleys were lost in Fallujah itself, I can't say. I'm pretty sure Bing West's book has some details, but I'm not near my copy. I did a quick check on the web and didn't find anything definitive.

Steve

[Secondbrooks]

Secondbrooks. You are going to have to be more specific when you refer to someone as imperialistic pigs.

Hmm... Those would be my pixeltruppen, losing M1 Abrams and Bradleys like flies.

[stikkypixie]

I for some reason still feel that small arms accuracy for Syrians is a bit too low. I tried Al Huqf Engagement, modified with veteran special forces (because of their body armour), they just "seem" to miss too much. I ambushed a US squad that was running past them at about 50m(!), and it took the better part of a turn before even one got hit.

Maybe I was unlucky, maybe I would get the same results with a US squad. But 50m is pretty close. It was only at around 15m(!!) that targets would reliably be hit. Or maybe it's my selective memory and granted I still won, but that's because I knew the AI plan.

But I don't know, it just feels wrong, if it were a 100m or 150m, I could understand.

It'd be really nice if someone could take a closer look in those this, to confirm or deny it. Or tell me what the best way is to verify it.

[undead reindeer cavalry]

Not only that, but there isn't a lot of hard information to go on in terms of things like "how long would it take a Conscript BMP commander to see an Abrams at 301m, at 12:32 with the sun in back of him, after a reasonable night's sleep, with nobody else shooting at him, while... etc., etc. Combine this with physical properties of the vehicle itself... it's extremely complicated.

i hope you mean "hard information" in the sense of giving the player some numbers. not "hard information" in the sense of having a source that tells you the real world probability of detection, because such sources exist in numbers. 50 years of studies out there, with neat and tested straightforwad equations waiting for your input parameters.

[Secondbrooks]

stikkypixie: I've suffered horrible loses when experienced Airborne squad opens up at close distances. Opening fire can cause few casualities in first second (usually point, rest of guys staying behind crest of hill or something other cover). And if not forcing unit to hide but to return fire i can expect to lose men even more. When it comes to ranges around 50 meters.

Situation probably was different from stikkypixie's, i sent them to move with hunt-order (=slow moving targets) directly at ambushing enemy.

I'd still expect US perform better in same sitaution, if CMSF takes optics into consideration (don't remember hearing anything official abotu it). As the saying goes: aimpoint raises accuracy to moving target 1.5 times and to stationary about 1.25. If i remember right the procentages.

[Battlefront.com]

Stikkypixie,

I for some reason still feel that small arms accuracy for Syrians is a bit too low. I tried Al Huqf Engagement, modified with veteran special forces (because of their body armour), they just "seem" to miss too much. I ambushed a US squad that was running past them at about 50m(!), and it took the better part of a turn before even one got hit.

"Better part of a turn" means something like 40 seconds? That's not a very long time to wipe out a squad. Plus, what was the experience level of the US squad? Any Leadership or Morale bonuses? In other words, how much of the "extra" time it took to wipe out the US guys was due to a few seconds worth of better survival skills and some body armor? Try the same test against a Green Squad with bad bonuses and see if that makes any difference.

The other thing to keep in mind is that it's hard to compare one squad to one squad because the weaponry and (often) headcounts are different. Generally speaking, the US Army has an edge and the US Marines have overkill.

URC,

i hope you mean "hard information" in the sense of giving the player some numbers. not "hard information" in the sense of having a source that tells you the real world probability of detection, because such sources exist in numbers. 50 years of studies out there, with neat and tested straightforwad equations waiting for your input parameters.

Really? News to me. So, since you probably have the equations at your fingertips, what's the answer to my question?

"how long would it take a Conscript BMP commander to see an Abrams at 301m, at 12:32 with the sun in back of him, after a reasonable night's sleep, with nobody else shooting at him, while... etc., etc. "

I'm dying to know

Seriously, as far as I know there is no comprehensive study with equations for any of this stuff. There are rules of thumb and/or equations that are extremely "brittle" we can go by. There are questionable, though generally useful, mathematical attempts from people like Dupuy. Lots of stuff out there that isn't applicable due to scale as well. But ready-to-go equations that cover tactical warfare in detail compatible with CM's needs? Never heard of any so if it exists it would be interesting to check out.

Steve