c3k

Aye! A knife thrust in the side is always a good tactic! But, yes, the two units up on the bocage ("1" and the unit north of it) are about to die. Their job is to make the OTHER guy die. So, a few shots (15 seconds of TARGET) and then run away. Their role is complete: you know that you need to call in the artillery and where to do so. Have one fire for 15 seconds, then run for 30 and turn. Have the other delay for 45, then run. Get away from the line. OR Keep 'em both up there and fight it out. You've got bodies. Use them. Meat shields can be useful tools. Either way, a 15 second TARGET ("J") into the meat of Ian's troops will pin them and cause some morale issues.

Vertical stack some Javelins, like how the Navy packages their missiles on the foredeck and, err, poopdeck of their ships. Have a 6 pack (or 12 pack) of Jav's ready to launch out of some Strykers. Presto magicko: no more bad tanks.

I like the big gun move. The Russki's always go for muzzle diameter. 30mm autocannon stryker makes it equivalent to BTR80/82, with the benefit of better sensors and SA, for both the vehicle and the dismounts. I'd replace the MGS with their 105mm with some direct fire 120mm mortar turrets. See: http://www.army-technology.com/projects/piranha/piranha13.html and http://www.army-guide.com/eng/product1850.html and http://www.army-guide.com/eng/product1191.html I'd go with the single barrel, and have the PRIMARY use to be direct support. I'd stick a battery of 6 with every company. That way each platoon gets 2. If a maneuvering platoon needs firepower, the 2 which are with it can fire directly on the enemy. (Or pop the guys hiding in a gully, behind a ridge, etc. If the vehicle can see where to target, they can hit it.) If that doesn't work, then the other 4 120mm's can be used for indirect fire using all the gee-whiz digital comms and datalinks. The time from the "help" call to rounds on target should be just a few minutes. 120mm mortar shells bring a lot of oomph to a fight. That way, the 3 platoons can assist one another through maneuver AND on-call fires. Direct fire 120mm can also fire into embrasures and windows of bunkers/fortified buildings. They don't need the (over)penetration the 105mm L7 tank gun brings. Oh, and the Stryker won't roll over if the turret fires when it's sideways on a hill. That may or may not be a benefit. Ken

Definitely water jets for amphib propulsion. (The Russians, with all the rivers there, are leaders in swimming tanks. Ever since WWII..) Ramp: yeah, the wheeled BTR upgrade has some hinges which also make the rear seem to have dual modes of ingress/egress. I'd be surprised if, with all the other bells and whistles (and modernizing) they've done to this family of vehicles, if the rear did not have a primary ramp (door for when the hydraulics (electrics?) don't work). My .02. Ken

^^^ The game does a GREAT job of simulating what the remaining crewmembers will do, and how well/poorly the tank will fight because of it. (Unbutton the tank to see what happens. Look at the wrench tab for the status of various weapons. (I =think= it updates based on manning.)) Kieme covered the specifics of your case.

Your poor father! So, you need an engineer team just behind the advance, ready to breach to the right. How have you maneuvered your units to do so? I don't see a spare breacher ready to move. (Mine guys will be taken up with that task for several minutes. That can be a long time to be pinned down in a road.) Do you have any SMOKE capable teams up near the front? If you got shot at in the kill-sack which is road, my plan would be to drop, return fire, throw smoke, blow a hole, and pull out. (That's my drill, both in battle and on dates. Just sayin'... )

If you'd put your HMG up on the line protecting the large minefield on your north, it could now move down to cover the road. I think I suggested that upstream in the setup. ATG not seeing what the ammo team can: I can see why. You failed to move the branches of the bocage out of the way of the gunsight. Easy to forget. Give it a few minutes, that ATG should find the tank. Make sure you've got it set with an Armor Arc oriented that way. Tight arc on your ammo team so they don't give away the position. The team looking down the road? Tight cover arc. Where are Ian's men on the road going to go? That's right: either towards you, or back on the mines. Let 'em come closer, then when you hit them, some may panic and run back over the mines. That's always fun! On your left, again, tighten your arcs. Call in that fire using the TRP. Target zone 1. Make sure your guys near zone 1 HIDE with a tight cover arc before the shells start falling. If you don't, you're guaranteed to get a short round in their foxholes. If you do, nothing will come close. Murphy does it. The gist of what I'm suggesting is that you withhold small arms for as long as possible. MG 34/42 fire out to 200m can get guys in the open, inflict casualties, and pin. 100m would be the similar range for rifle fire. Does the team looking down the road have an MG? Using your IG will slow down the units near zone 1. Short, light, area target should do it. Get a few shells on 'em. Ian will then avoid that zone. If any of your guys open fire, that location will become a death-zone in about 3 turns. Be ready to relocate... Make him bleed for each meter, then displace and repeat. He's only got 30 minutes to get the farmhouse. That's not a lot of time.

These vehicles remind me of the tanks I'd make with Legos back when I was a kid. (When Legos were REAL building blocks, not the prefab kits kids get today. It was harder when I played with them. ) The clean lines, seemingly large internal volumes (relatively speaking wrt earlier Soviet/Russian AFV's), ERA, APS, etc., bode well for crew survivability. I'm very curious about the horizontal cylinders and how they perform the APS function. Most current EFP's use planar charges. These cylinders would either fire a projectile (in which case the horizontal orientation does not seem optimal and the coverage seems sparse) or they self destruct and fire outwards (radially) like a claymore? (I lean towards axial projectiles.) With nothing to go by but the old engineer's axiom of "form follows function", these look very functional, indeed.

Nice adjustment with that machinegun to protect the road. If your men in the road start taking hits, do you have an exit plan? You know, once they get past the minefield?

Hedges (passable) are knee high. If you see sticks in the artwork it is bocage.

Yeah. I avoided iron for a while. Once I started using it, I haven't looked back. It really does make the game feel/play better. IMHO. It's closer to the ideal of wysiwyg.

Nice. It'd be good to see your results.

Turret/hull down indicator will NEVER happen. Other games have hexsides which specifically give hulldown status from a certain direction (e.g., if the incoming LOF crosses the hulldown hexside). Then there's a to hit modifier and any hit means turret hit. Neat and tidy. Is hulldown for a Tiger the same as hull down for Stuart? Meaning, a wall 1m tall gives more cover to the Stuart than to a Tiger. Are they both "hull down"? What if the ground slopes down behind the cover. A tank 10m back has more cover than a tank 1m back. Are they equally hull down? As well, the game does not model each tank's specific viewing port. (I'd like THIS to be changed before ANYTHING else in the game.) Each tank has certain "generic" spotting heights. That's the ELOS system. We get some interesting effects in the game in certain outlier cases because of it. (I understand and agree with the reasoning for doing this. The LOS table needs SOME simplifications in order to process any game map before entropy cools our universe.) Because the game takes a very granular look at unit locations and exposure, a hull-down meter will never be useful. It requires a "hull-down from WHERE?" to be answered. Temp camo: I -think- there is a bonus to units which stay in their setup location, representing such a thing. Hmmm. If not, there should be...with an icon representing the status. Ken

Movement paths IanL shows going to the minefield: It looks like two teams have QUICK orders to enter the road, then SLOW to enter the minefield. That's gonna hurt. Your engineer team has MARK MINES command already usable (or so it looks in the screenshot). I'd stop anyone from entering the minefield. Get that engineer up there, pronto, and have them MARK MINES. Once that's done, then other units can HUNT (tight covered arc) or MOVE through the marked mines.

Your ATG is exposed to anything coming down the road. There are not too many positions to support it. Moving units as shown in 1 merely protects that ATG. It does not commit the troops. In fact, it puts a force in the center, easily able to pivot as needed. I'd do it... even with the fog of war which means you don't know what set off that mine. SInce you didn't SEE what triggered it, you don't know if it's a scout or a tank reinforcing a platoon. It's about force leverage and location. I'd do it. The road MUST be a kill zone. For that, you need bodies.

I'm with Womble: Option 1 makes sense. The road gets beefed up by them. If Ian comes through the north, they're ready to reinforce "3". If the road, Ian's hosed. South? Well, they're not committed and can make crossing the road very difficult. Team 4: great location, but does he have a cover arc??? You want devastating ambush, then run away, not long-range plinking. Cover arcs do that.

Different tracks. The heavy version seems to have 2 bow mounted machineguns, a la BMP-3. The turret seems to have boxy missile launchers as well as whatever autocannon it has. Nice. Of course, they all seem to have the extendable water deflector for amphibious use.

"Does Bill (sic) H (sic) still play?" What a wonderfully complex question! Rather, you should ask,"Has he ever "played""? Some would describe his style as being on a plateau far above mere "playing". Others are just ignorant. Although his abilities are immeasurable, rumor has it that his hands begin to tremor when he hears "stens".

^^^ Soft factors really matter. This thread prompted me to play through it. It's been so long, I'd forgotten it. My US infantry was a bit brittle, but then, they did find almost all the mines. Sigh. Green is not as good as Veteran. Etc. That matters for picking who gets what job. (If you have the luxury of being able to allocate missions that way. It comes down to forces available and time.)

....Arrested Development... Method One Clinic. (Tobias thought it was an acting clinic. Raved about the acting and emotive abilities of the other students enrolled in the clinic.)

Nice! The IFV is sooo much taller than the historical Russian APC/IFV design. Interesting that they seem to've gone for a larger internal volume. That's a big vehicle. Again, clean sides, lots of ERA. Thanks.

Avenger: c'mon, does ANYONE really think this is just a morale-boost jeep? Hell, they could put a loudspeaker on it pumping music, staff it with USO girls ( ), and give away free donuts and it'd probably have a better battlefield effect. I'd rather see a Duster http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M42_Duster . In real life AND in the game.

Minor point about your minefield. It looks like you took some mines from the northern half of the linear field. Yet, it's the southern half which has the two units covering it. I would suggest taking from the part which has units (the southern half) not from the northern. Very minor, but nits are meant to be picked. Oh, and what Womble said.

Err, no. Just wondering if any of the defensive pointers given in MG's thread would have a chance of being implemented. Another idea (free!), is to have MethodGamer use HIS setup against you, and, simultaneously, use the group-think defense setup. That way you guys get DOUBLE the gaming fun.

Defense is an excellent opportunity to kill the enemy. They just have to keep coming! It's awesome! No need to hunt them down, pry them out, and bayonet them. A bit of fast footwork (ALWAYS SHIFT POSITIONS), a few sharp jabs, one or two counterattacks, and Bob's your uncle. (Is he, really?) Nothing more fun than watching attackers fleeing... Well, maybe collecting the white flags from them or seeing all the red crosses sprout up. Defense should be aggressive. Sitting there and PLANNING to fold up into a nice little waxed takeaway chinese food box is NOT the way to win.