Can't Begin to Think about Modelling This

[Shep]

http://www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=wq.essay&essay_id=496613

Pretty good article, amazing how for robot warfare has come.

Scouts Out.

[hcrof]

Wow, interesting stuff. However, it seems to me that all russia/china/india need to do is create an effective jamming system and the robots will become useless.

They will be great for low intensity conflicts but not total war against a modern army.

I personally think that automation can only go so far and the Iraq war will show the limits of robotics. At the end of the day you always need "Boots on the Ground".

[Guest Guest]

deleted per user request

[hcrof]

To be honest I am not an expert with electronic warfare but isnt EM shielding only partially effective? Even if 80% (random number taken from the top of my head) of your robots survive it, you still have taken significant losses.

And physical control = wires?

[SgtMuhammed]

They aren't really meant for the actual WAR part of a war but more for the police action that follows. If something is suspicious during major operations you just call in something that goes boom.

[cabal23]

That kind of tech would most definably be shielded against emp or other types of bursts that would render them useless. A lot of money if you are just going to be able to jam it or shut it down. I do see this as the possible future. Already jets are going unmanned. How long until the whole force is robots with a few people far away in a brick buildings controlling them remotely? It is only going to go towards less humans on the field of battle.

[BlackMoria]

One could put UAVs into the game but it would be a challenge. How to handle them? Like Arty / CAS where one can indicate the area for the UAV to fly and units get revealed dependent upon the UAVs ability to 'spot' them?

Or as unit that the player can set waypoints and commands for and handle as another asset to control during the game?

Keeping in mind that command structure determines what assets are available. I have seen other players in another thread taking about wanting to see hellfire armed Predator drones in the game. The problem is that Predators are a Brigade/Division asset and at the level of play of Shock Force (Coy / Bn), the player would rightly not have any say or control over the UAV mission, since Bde/Div would determine the mission parameters and control the mission.

Whether it is a robotic 'warrior' with some small arms system or a remotely piloted fighter aircraft, what does it add to the game except for eye candy?

Given how CAS is handled in game now, it certainly doesn't matter if the 'pilot' is a robot or a human? What fundamentally from a game perspective does a robot warrior with a build in machine gun add to the game that a marine / army corporal armed from same doesn't provide. Certainly, the robot could take more hits to put it out of action and maybe be a more accurate weapons platform but does having one or two robots in a platoon add anything to the game? A better soldier but with a longer deployment time (I can't see a robot being able to bail out vehicle to deploy being any faster than human soldiers bailing out the same vehicle who are motived by the need to survive and bullet whizzing over head.

I think despite the number of robotics being deployed, the robots are still 'specialists' that are used for special purposes and circumstances.

We are still a long way from 'Terminator' units as portrayed in the movies....

[Dietrich]

...So will war eventually become a matter of one nation's robots fighting against another nation's robots?

Events throughout the world in the past few decades (and, by extension, throughout recorded history) have shown that not even killing aggressors ends conflict, so delegating the fighting to robots would be simply delaying the inevitable.

[GSX]

The fools, they cant make fighting Robots, havent they ever watched sci fi movies and read the books! Give a Robot a gun and he will attempt to take over the world, happens every time!!!!!

[dan/california]

There are a number of smaller UAVs that are used at the company and battalion level. The really hard part is

A) Figuring out what they would or would not be able to see.

Deciding whether to give the Syrians the the ability to target them or not, and if so how?

C) It would be a huge tweak in game balance. You just think artillery is deadly now. The all seeing eye in the sky calling down 155 is BAD thing. Red armor becomes totally unviable without some ability to hide and get the first shot.

D) Last but not least it is not required for Normandy, and thus is on the second tier list.

More generally

There is an enormous value to even basic UGVs if they work. You send it it into the house, if some one shoots it, make the house go boom. If it hits a trip wire and the house goes boom, it is no big deal, not compared to writing letters. The actual ideal would be to have truck loads of small, cheap ones and treat them almost like ammunition.

DARPA is working hard on them , down to the size of pigeons and rats, literally.

[dan/california]

It is not like most of the force is unfamiliar with X Box controllers after all.