Carter

About halfway down the page is your detailed explaination: http://www.hyperstealth.com/fracture/ I think you're being close minded on this considering the Marines, US Army, and now other countries are adopting digital camo.

Reading from another website, the Candians digital camo (CADPAT) had test results as follows: "The Canadian studies show there is a 40 percent less chance of being detected from 200 meters away with CADPAT Versus Olive Drab." http://www.hyperstealth.com/CADPAT-MARPAT.htm "Canadian CADPAT is 30% more effective than Olive Drab in field testing. The CADPAT soldiers could get 30% closer than the minimum ID range for a user wearing OD." ...This digital effect generates a dithering effect between colors (no solid lines) and works well within 100 yards of an adversary. However, this advance in camouflage is minimal as the colors tend to blend into each at farther distances... http://www.hyperstealth.com/fracture/ [ August 30, 2004, 12:21 PM: Message edited by: Carter ]

http://www.strategypage.com/fyeo/howtomakewar/default.asp?target=HTMURPH.HTM "THE WAY THINGS REALLY WORK: Why Digital Camouflage Patterns Matter August 26, 2004: Back in 2001, the U.S. Marines introduced a radical new camouflage pattern that used “pixels” (little square or round spots of color, like you will find on your computer monitor if you look very closely), instead of just splotches of different colors. Naturally, this was called “digital camouflage.” This new pattern proved considerably more effective at hiding troops than older methods. For example, in tests, it was found that soldiers wearing digital pattern uniforms were 50 percent more likely to escape detection by other troops, than if they were wearing standard green uniforms. What made the digital pattern work was the way the human brain processed information. The small "pixels" of color on the cloth makes the human brain see vegetation and terrain, not people. One could provide a more technical explanation, but the “brain processing” one pretty much says it all. However, the Canadian army quickly chimed in that they had been developing digital camouflage since 1996. Shortly thereafter, some old timers in the U.S. Army noted that they had seen digital camouflage in the 1970s. And they had. It turns out that Lieutenant Colonel Timothy R. O’Neill, a West Point professor of engineering psychology, had first noted the “digital camouflage effect.” It was never adopted for use in uniforms, but was used for a camouflage pattern on armored vehicles of the U.S. Army 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment in Europe from 1978 to the early 1980s. Why hadn’t the army adopted it for uniforms back in the 1970s? It seems that the key army people (uniformed and civilian) deciding such things in the 1970s could not grasp the concept of how digital camouflage worked on the human brain, and were not swayed by field tests. Strange, but true, and it’s happened before. In 2003, the U.S. Army decided to use digital camouflage patterns for their new field uniforms. China and Finland have also decided to use digital camouflage for new field uniforms. New ideas are often slow to catch on in the military, and digital camouflage was one of them."

I was recently reading over on strategeypage.com that the new Digital Camouflage reduced 'detection by 50%'... whatever that means. I hadn't read of any changes in TACOPS with regards to a digital Camouflage advantage. MajorH, will there be any updates to TACOPS detection range for digital camo troops? Just Curious... Thanks in Advance.

I would say that I only consider point value a rough estimate of strength. As you say game options/prefs can affect strength without altering point value. The thermal/smoke equation can be a dramatic alteration of strength. Think how many T-72s(no thermals) it would take to beat a single M1A1(with thermals) during a night attack? You might be able to fight that one M1A1 tank till it runs out of ammo. Other stuff like off-map artillery, air support, their delay time, and terrain can affect the strategic balance too. To me its more of a trial-and-error process to see if you've got a real balance of force... and even then game balance depends on the capability of the opposing player. If you're going for a 'fair' game, I'd give OPFOR thermals and improved ATGM's... and give the attacker at least 2 or 3 times as many points as the defender... depending on the relative skill level of the players.

Well I've won TF Peterjohn with "zero" casualties. I did lose a few individual personnel to artillery, but no unit losses. I've played the scenario a bunch. Generally I would lose 2 Tanks to artillery, but If I keep my tanks moving and get lucky I finish with no unit losses. I normally played the scenario with the default preferences. (Although I do turn off the 'see enemy OOB, and I make it so that firing units are NOT always spotted). Most of the time I throw in ALL the 'Red force' optional extras. Their artillery is the only thing that can touch me (unless I get sloppy). I don't use a time limit or replay bad turns. Saddam never stood a chance! I think Peterjohn was a tremendously cool scenario. Its easy but I felt like I learned a lot about the gulf war playing it. Thanks MajorH! I think I also had similar results on Team Sposito one time. (A few individual personnel losses only) The Army version is easy after you play a couple times. Generally my casualties run around 30% in TACOPS. If I use "real world settings" like NO OPFOR thermals, and regular OPFOR ATGMs, then I can get down to the 15-20% range. Sometimes better depending on the scenario. [ December 13, 2002, 11:19 AM: Message edited by: Carter ]

I like modern units because they give me a good understanding what state-of-the-art combat is like. Historical stuff is cool, but state-of-the-art equipment is 'current' and feels 'real' to me. With TACOPS you can set up a simulation for a modern day "what if?". One time I even set up a scenario trying to replicate a battle from a Sci-fi novel. The battle was from a STARGATE novel where a huge army of Cat-like creatures wearing power armor takes on an isolated Marine battalion. I used BTRs to simulate the Alien Power armor. (BTR's have similar armor, firepower, and speed to the power armor described in the novel) It was interesting. After I played the TACOPS scenario, I had a better idea of what the battle would look like than the author of the novel! The author would have really benefited from simulating his battle in TACOPS. (The author didn't even know about DPICM. He also didn't realize the effectiveness of several other weapon systems, but he did accurately describe a strategy of concentrating the large enemy force for destruction) I don't mind powerful units. Playing with them can be very challenging, because it seems to me that there is less margin for error. If you make a bad mistake you can get all your troops killed very quickly. Worrying about all my guys getting killed at any instant keeps me on-edge. Those WWII players probably just have to adjust to the realities of 21st century warfare. It's a big jump from the 1940's to present day.

I just pre-ordered my copy of Tacops 4 and noticed that the new user's guide already on-line. Very cool. The new mine vehicles should be fun. I'm really looking forward to them. And the new tanks too! I also couldn't help but notice the names in the credits... John Antal! Impressive. I saw a number of names from the forum too. But who is that Justin Carter guy? Seriously, I'm honored. Thank you again MajorH for producing a quality wargame. The internet-play feature is sure to keep me busy and drive my wife crazy.

That was my strategy. I had too much trouble retreating my armor, so I just put the necessary number on on the edge of the map. They get at least one salvo then retreat across the edge. I felt I needed more air defense to use a mobile defense.

I remember when I learned that lesson. It's hard to forget it. One of the first battles I played involved a the meeting of two battalions. My lead company burst out of the woods toward the objective. Unfortunately OPFOR's lead company also burst out of some woods 2km away. An intense fight broke out. I was winning. I called in artillery and thought everything was going my way. Now that I had a minute, I thought to myself... I really need to spread out my company. They're too bunched up. I gave the orders to spread out and right after that OPFOR rockets carpeted my position. My entire company was wiped out. Every vehicle was destroyed. The few infantry survivors were later killed by follow-on artillery. The good news was that that whole skirmish bought time for my other companies to secure the objective. I won the battle, but the casualties were steep. [ May 16, 2002, 04:26 PM: Message edited by: Carter ]

Nice battle. 100% OPFOR casualties are always my favorite! I do have one minor comment. You probably already figured out that you want to spread out your initial artillery TRPs more. I like to make a grid, so that the TRPs get good coverage and don't overlap. v4 looks nice! I like the new graphics. Is OPFOR pink?! I always thought that they were a bunch of commie pink-o's!!!!

Not sure what you mean by this? My experience is that fixed wing aircraft cannot target units in smoke.

Thanks for your insight MajorH! I didn't know about how that worked. But I'm not sure this is a factor in this case. My SAM's already shot down 1 MIG, then Hit and Aborted a second MIG. If I recall correctly, two more MIGS dropped cluster bombs. (one missed with the clusterbomb) Then the fifth one used its cannon against my Cobras. That aborted MIG might have come back, but I wouldn't expect the others to. Do jets attacking with cannon come back for another attack? BTW, will we be able to pre-order TacOps 4?

If they were just infantry, I might have left them. But there are enough T-80s and trucks there to give me a hard time if OPFOR played it smart. If nothing else, the troops give OPFOR eyeballs to watch my backside and call in air/artillery. They have thermals, so they can still see through regular smoke. General Question: What does everybody else do? Has anyone had experience with the troops in the small town counterattacking? I'm not sure the AI would counterattack, but a human could. I'm playing the mission again. I still feel like I'm getting the short end of the stick on airpower. I did 6 simultaneous airstrikes on the small town. 2 jets were shot down, 2 achieved only suppression of their targets, and 2 killed some infantry. US airpower in this scenario = worthless Meanwhile, one OPFOR jet managed to survive 5 stinger attacks and shot down 2 of my Cobra's. That was the 5th OPFOR jet attack in 45 minutes. They should have had only 2 or 3. My SAM's are already running dry. I'm going to change the OPFOR air settings next time.

Jingo, I have to say that I'm pretty impressed with the whole screen capture thing. I've never done anything like that with TACOPS. It's pretty cool.

Thanks for all the advice! The anti-SAM tactics should come in handy. My prefered method in the past has been to use precise ICM on the SAM teams that I can hit accurately. Their SAM teams don't last long against ICM. One round is often enough. Otherwise I use smoke to degrade the enemy SAM team's accuracy. Usually I can supress the enemy SAM's enough to use my air, but in this mission there were just too many enemy SAM teams.

I saw this one a while back. It's the BEST!!! I showed it to a coworker who flew almost 300 combat close air support missions in Vietnam. He was just amazed. He said the Zuni rockets they used would just bounce off of a T-55.

Jingo, I've been playing for over a year now. I'm sure you could beat my score with experience. Hell, one of the guys here once told me that he doesn't count a battle a victory if his casualities were over 15-20%. I rarely do that well.

I finally finished the mission. In the end, my infantry slugged it out with OPFOR's infantry. OPFOR never got close to retaking the objective. My casualties were high. Over 30% Then I decided to withdrawl my troops. I moved in helos and APCs to pick up my infantry. I came under almost constant air attack. I lost a lot more troops to those air attacks because my SAM teams were out of missiles. Final casualties were about 45%. I got everyone else out. I experienced a lot more air attacks than I expected. The mission said that OPFOR would only have 2 MIGs with slight possibility of additional MIG flights. I was attacked at least 20 times with MIGs during the game. Not exactly realistic considering the last time that US ground forces came under air attack was the Korean war, but it did make the game more challenging. I think I'll play the mission again.

Unfortunately for me my wife is a light sleeper and I haven't had much chance to play TACOPS in the last week. I did get some time in yesterday. Here's what happened: I finished setting up my defense of the objective with only a few minutes to spare. I attacked OPFOR first with artillery and gunships. OPFOR did a fake to the south, then deployed on a line attacking in the north and center. My forward skirmishers did great. I had also created a 4 to 5 ring perimeter of infantry around the objective. Most of my APCs were in the rear area hiding. My tanks didn't last long. I should have put them in reserve. My 8 gunships ran out of ammo quick. I resupplied them for critical attacks, but that didn't last long either. His vehicles only made it to my outer perimeter. I tricked his artillery into chasing one of my TOW APCs into the rear area. I had a "reverse slope" ambush waiting for them there. That was sweet. It's now 2 hours 5 min. into the game. All of OPFOR's vehicles appear to be destroyed. My artillery is just about all used up (I have some smoke and some resupply ammo). He has infantry attacking the objective, but I don't think they will make it far. I need to hold the objective for another 30 minutes. Pulling my troops out may be difficult. Also my air support has been just about useless. OPFOR has too many SAMs. I should have used my air in a simultaneous attack against the small western town in the beginning of the game. [ April 22, 2002, 10:25 AM: Message edited by: Carter ]

After discussing this scenario, I got interested in the mission and decided to play it this weekend. Setting up the mission I realized that I hadn't actually played it before. The mission I was thinking of earlier was a defense of an airfield. I took my time assaulting the objective. First I attacked the small town to the West with my ground forces and some Cobras. That took a little longer than expected, but I felt that I had to kill those guys rather than exposing myself to a possible counter-attack. What sucked was that my Cobras were attacked by MIGs. All my air defense was on the transport helos, and 4 Cobras were destroyed. Did I mention I like Apache's better than Cobras? At least Apache's have self defense missiles. This is gonna cost me later. After my artillery got zeroed in on the objective, I dropped smoke and moved in my infantry. I like softening up OPFOR with accurate artillery, then using a combo of artillery and infantry to take down defensive positions. A secondary attack to the south of the objective by my armored forces cleared out resistance there. That took me about 35-40 minutes of game time. I haven't finished the mission yet, I'm 50 minutes in, setting up my defense now.

All those flaming wrecks make it look like Dante's Inferno!

I'll second that.

I think I remember playing this scenario about a year ago. My memory is a little rusty, but as I recall I spread out my infantry and deployed them in a two-ring perimeter around the objective. Plus I had some skirmishers up front covering likely avenues-of-approach. You might want to do "pop-up" attacks from your choppers if you're not doing that already. There are some old posts on how to do that. I don't remember if OPFOR has thermals or not on this scenario. If they don't have thermals you can lay smoke on your units with thermals. He can't see you but you see him. Very deadly. Putting some observers way out front to provide observation for your artillery is always a good idea. When I played, I think that OPFOR penetrated all my defenses and got in and tangled with the inner perimeter of my infantry. It was a little messy and nerve-racking, but I pulled of the mission. Even plain infantry are great against AFV's if you set their attack range to 100-150 meters. The AFV's won't see you till they get in close. Then your grunts can hammer them.

The weapons I believe dhuffjr was talking about are: RPO-A Fuel Air Explosive rocket launcher which is described in the OPFOR equipment guide and TOS-1 Buratino (Pinocchio) "which is a 30-barrel 220mm rocket launcher on a T-72 chassis. With a range of 400-3500 meters, it can create a devastated zone of 200x400 meters." according to StrategyPage.com. The Buratino's warheads are thermobaric, and the vehicle is supposed to accompany tanks into combat. I don't know much more than this. Both look very nasty. I'd love to be an OPFOR commander with a few Buratinos under my command.