Vanir Ausf B

I found that pairing Khrizantema armed TDs with BMP-3s to provide IR blocking smoke screens is a viable tactic against US tanks.
 
I managed to easily destroy, with multiple frontal penetrations, ten M1A2 SEP tanks (some w/APS) losing only three TDs, and a couple IFVs (smoke cover doesn't last forever).
The radar system on the Russian TDs is capable to see through IR blocking smoke effectively while the sensors on an Abrams tank are blinded.

It's mounted on a traversable ring, along with the commander's sight and hatch.
 
The CM engine seems to not allow for traversable rings to traverse, so it has to be set in a some position permanently. Unfortunately, the chosen position is with the machine gun facing backwards, which is correct for when the commander is buttoned but not when he is unbuttoned.
 
I personally think this is a mistake; that it should be turned around and the commander's sight fudged. I will lobby for it internally but don't hold your breath.

Here's what came with all of those packages:
 
1. Egypt actually license produces the export model M1s, which rather makes them something easier to maintain
2. Saudi Arabia's fleet is almost 100% supported by western contractors due to lack of qualified local personnel.  It also falls into the whole Arab-standard "if I own this fancy piece of western equipment, then I am as good as the western military that uses it!" mentality than lends itself to purchasing equipment it cannot use, or support in the long run.  They also have a lot of money to throw at the tanks
3. Kuwait is mini-Saudi Arabia in this regard.
4. Iraqis believe in their heart of hearts they'd have killed every American and been able to fight all the way to liberate Jerusalem if only they had better equipment in 1991.  They bought the M1 because they believe it somehow made Iraqi tankers better vs was just something else for them not to maintain.  It also came with a full-on US Army established and for a long time, manned armor crewman school.  They also had money (abliet US aid money) to throw at the tanks.  
5. Australia is conveniently located at that Venn diagram point in which Australian desire for a new tank line up with the US strategic focus shift to Asia.   
 
Absolutely none of those were countries in the middle of a conflict with little to no practical US ground presence, no training mission, no industrial means to produce spaces, or not at all much money to buy its way out of problems.  
 
If there was going to be a western tank dropped into the Ukraine it'd be some manner of Leo 2 model, as there's a fair number of those on the market, and a decent number of sources for spares (and despite German disinterest in the conflict, the number of now mothballed Leo 2s outside the country, or in the hands of folks who don't seriously keep up tank fleets is fairly high).  On the other hand most of the US tanks in storage have the advanced armor arrays that 100% will not be exported until it's rendered obsolete by phased plasma cannons and proton shields or whatever.
 
And that's still going really far out on a limb.  The most likely situation is stimulating internal production as that's much less training mission/non-Ukrainian standard equipment reliant, some sort of former Soviet design from outside the country (again Polish refurbed T-72s seem like a good choice).  The best solution for a tank producing country isn't to drop a tank they don't produce on them, it's to help them make more of their own tanks (and the Oplot is nothing to sneeze at).
 
So yeah.  Can we talk about a more likely sort of aid vs the crazytown stuff?
 
ATGMs seem like a given.  Especially ATGMs of unverifiable origin (Israel is great for stuff like that).  Also a large push to get the Ukrainian Air Force back to strength wouldn't be a bad choice, what's killing it now is lack of functioning airframes.  This is exactly the sort of thing Uncle Sugar could handle with buying up every loose MIG spare part, and writing paychecks for either Ukrainian mechanics, or other former-Warsaw Pact maintainers to go in and overhaul the stuff grounded for serviceability issues.    

Vanir Ausf B,
 
How's this grab you? Taken from here. aw_mm's #11, dated 8/26/14. I have never seen the like of the kind of detail. During the Cold War, analysts got all excited because the someone managed to image the underside of a T-72 turret, for some reason upside down at the tank plant, allowing determination of the cavity size for special armor in the turret front. This makes that look like a nonevent by comparison.
 
 
"ERA is highly efficient per thickness - afaik it is the most space efficient armor. The reactive elements in the Soviet Kontakt-1 ERA consisted of a 7 mm thick layer of explosive sandwiched between two 2 mm thick steel plates (so the total thickness is 11 mm) which can reduce the penetration of a missile warhead by 400 mm. The optimal protection is achieved when the ERA is sloped, but at the roof this is not necessary, because pretty much all top-attack weapons strike from an angle (except artillery bomblets).

The only thing I was able to find about the actual Soviet/Russian ERA used on their MBTs is this picture from a Russian news website/blog:


It shows trials done during the development of the enhanced roof protection in 1983. The (1) marks the 50 mm thick anti-radiation layer installed inside the tank. (2) shows the 40 mm thick roof armor made of medium hardness steel. (3) is a 2 mm thick steel layer for holding all stuff together. (4) is a 80 mm thick polyurethane layer and (6) marks a 10 mm thick armor plate of high hardness steel under which a Kontakt-1 reactive element is located.

So the whole array would be: 50 mm anti-radiation liner - 40 mm thick roof armor - 80 mm polyurethane - 2 mm steel - 7 mm explosive - 2 mm steel - 10 mm high hardness steel or 191 mm of armor of which 90 mm are part of the turret roof and 101 mm applique armor.
According to said blog (if Chrome translated everything correctly) the armor was tested against an artillery bomblet with a penetration of 200 mm (dent in the armor marked with (8) ) and was able to resist it. 
Such a bomblet strikes perpendicular at the armor, against a missile like Javelin which will strike at an angle a protection of 400 to 500 mm could be expected in my opinion. Still this wouldn't be enough to deal with the Javelin missile, but then again it is a prototype armor from 1983. I'd expect at least the T-90 (1992) or T-90A (2005) to have upgraded roof armor."
 
Regards,
 
John Kettler

Gamey is whatever killed your guys. Fair game is whatever kills your opponent's guys

Come and check out the new modern ladder that started yesterday at theBlitz.org.  It is empty right now so you can still be there first.  You can find the announcement here: http://www.theblitz.org/message_boards/showthread.php?tid=67572which includes instructions on how to join.

We-Go & Iron. I consider CM a simulation and i always play sims with maxed out realism settings / on maximum difficulty. I dont know why I should play a simulation if i tone down difficulty to acarde game levels. I WANT to be tortured .

Also you can not assume that the enemy vehicle spotted your BA-64 from a distance and intentionally drove up to it to shoot it. The AI doesn't have the ability to 'stalk' its targets like that. Probably it made its move for its own rigid AI reasons, and spotted the BA-64 only when it got close. 
That said, I don't blame you for being surprised and frustrated at the situation.
For my part, I just accept these unfortunate incidents as gaps in the alertness, judgement, and reporting by my troops. After all, in the real world they'd have to see a contact well enough to make sure it wasn't friendly anyway, before engaging it, and we don't usually complain about the lack of that limitation in the game, or about the absence of ground to ground friendly fire incidents. 
The consolation is that the enemy suffers as much from fog of war as you do. 

+1
 
True it can be frustrating. We all feel it.

This is huge. This game is not a "you are responsible for making the perfect decision to get out of a puzzle" game. This is game of tactics - assess the situation and create the best plan possible and guide your soldiers to execute it. Then expect the unexpected and roll with it.

Present.  What do you want me to say?  You don't want your tanks to back up?  Don't get lased!  
 
US Army has no relevant doctrine for this yet, as we don't currently have LWRs on our vehicles.  Like the APS, the LWR is a postulated add-on that is commercially available and we can reasonably assume would be added to front line US units if we had say six months of warning to spool up prior to actual hostilities.  If it was 'come as you are, right *** now!' we would not (currently) have this kit.  At current defense budget levels we will likely field an APS sometime in mid 20s and a new tank long after I am dead <sad face!>  
 
Though our acquaintances in the IDF do have LWRs (I think I recall) on their systems, their threat is vastly different and so any doctrine they have hashed out against Hez/Ham threats would not apply to an adversary with MBTs and numerous different precision anti-armor threats.  In the absence of extensive use at our combat training centers (which would require a very substantial overhaul of our training equipment, as well as the LWRs applied) we must assume that we would be determining tactics/techniques/procedures through combat Darwinism/evolution.  If I was on a tank and the LWR so much as twitched, I would take immediate action.  While that might not include launching smoke, it would almost certainly include seeking cover.  Only difference is that I think running for cover forwards would be more frequent, as the crew is usually oriented that way on the offense, and it would be easier than trying to stop then reverse.  However, would be tougher on the TAC AI to get this behavior, so we've got what we've got.  My advice is...
 
Low ground is your friend.  Just because your Abrams is a rolling deathwagon does not mean you are invulnerable.  Move tactically.
If you cannot avoid it, consider using indirect-delivered smoke.  It doesn't stop thermals, but does a job on lasers.  Lack of direct-fire emplaced obscuration is a major gap in US capabilities.  One that I am literally hoping to rectify. 
Use overwatching vehicles.  Don't move if you don't have a friend covering you.  Keep bounds short enough for mutual support, but don't become overly robotic.  Flow like water over the terrain.
On the defense, look to array forces in depth, but focused into a defined killing zone (engagement area) with overlapping coverage.  Try to not allow the temporary withdrawal of a single platform unhinge your whole plan.  
 
Just my $0.02  Enjoy the game.  

I figured this would be a good place to hang impressions of some of the new for CMBS hardware for folks who are playing now (or like me, have stopped playing to eat/let fingers depart from mouse operating position).
 
 
1. Vehicle Air Burst is brutal.
 
Russia definitely has an advantage in the sheer proliferation of airbursting rounds.  It makes facing down BMP3s potentially messy with infantry, and tanks just as perilous.
 
On the other hand the US airburst capable platform is Odin level optics and sees all.  Seems well suited to killing ATGM teams and the like
 
2. ATGMs have been shaken up a bit.  
 
ERA is much more common, and APS makes what used to be a lot of sure-shot dead tank shots into total whiffs.  This seems to hurt RU/UKR more than the US.  Javelins are still something to hide under the bed from though.  
 
3. BMP3s are pretty much rolling JDAMs
 
Seriously.  They almost always wind up at the bottom of self generated craters if struck by large weapons.  It's rare to see one merely knocked out, the default hit is total vehicle, crew, and passenger loss.  From my experience so far the APS is the only protective package worth the effort.   On the other hand, the 100 MM is an awesome tool, and the ATGMs are as good as any of the other standard vehicle ATGMs in the game.  Might be better if you keep them back, feel forward with tanks and dismounted infantry, and then call them forward to deal with threats.
 
4. Precision fires is kind of cool
 
Haven't quite achieved the lethality I'd hoped for.  Mostly called for the US stuff, think part of it has just been a matter of how I employ fires.
 
5. Ukrainian tanks are a mixed bag.
 
They're both the bottom of the pecking order, and if you're playing as Russia, still capable of delivering very nasty surprises.  If I had to tier them against CMSF, they're comparable to the high end Syrian T-72s, with the Russian tank falling into the less capable NATO platform range.  The T-90 models especially are definitely superior, but it isn't the M1A2 SEP vs T-55 sort of superior.  
 
6. M1A2 SEP is still a monster.  
 
With the APS it certainly needs effort to KO.  On the other hand, I've had more than a few knocked out frontally from T-90s and the like, or badly damaged by 30 MM fire, or lesser tank rounds.  It's advantage is usually it gets the first shot in most engagements, hits in the 80-90% range (conservatively, I've certainly seen them miss at least!), and has almost universal lethality against what it hits.  Best I've seen a T-90 get off with was having surviving crewmen after it was knocked out.
 
7. ADA Is a pain.  Even MANPADs
 
Seriously.  If you're a CMSF NATO person used to having your way with airstrikes, prepare for sadface.  If you're expecting the Russian Air Force to nimbly pave your way to victory, again, expect some sadface.  
 
Best tool so far is if you know about where the enemy MANPADs are, dropping an artillery barrage to suppress them during your strike.  This requires some good optics, situation awareness, or really good guessing though.  

Loopy trajectory is modeled.
 
Fire rate tends to track closely with shell size. 105 will shoot less often than 75. But it hits harder.

Yes, over a year ago.

Gamey is whatever killed your guys. Fair game is whatever kills your opponent's guys

This is actually incorrect.
 
There's three kinds of Brigades currently in the US Army:
 
1. Infantry BCT.  Infantry squads have no assigned transport, but each battalion has sufficient light trucks to move around one company at a time.  Several of these brigades are also oriented on either airmobile or paratroop missions
2. Stryker BCT. Infantry rides in Strykers.  This is the only BCT that uses Strykers as transports
3. Armored BCT.  Infantry rides in Bradley Fighting Vehicles.
 
HMMWVs are not generally used as infantry transport, they saw use in Iraq/Afghanistan as patrol vehicles, but this should not be taken as the way the US plans to fight in a high intensity conflict.
 
The only real front line HMMWVs still in use are that the Infantry style brigades have weapons platoons in each infantry company, which is some number of HMMWVs allocated to carry heavy weapons (M2 HMGs, MK-19s, TOW-2Bs etc), and both Armored and Infantry recon units have some number of HMMWVs (Armored Recon platoon is currently a 5 scout truck, 3 Bradley mix, although it's likely going back to a "pure" six Bradley configuration, Infantry scout platoon has six scout trucks).  Next closest is the Stinger MANPADs teams usually have an uparmored cargo HMMWV to move around the battlefield.  
 
The remainder are all used for light cargo, transporting support or command type troops.
 
In terms of firepower in absolute terms the US infantry has significantly more in a squad for squad, platoon for platoon fight.  As I stated in my original post, the XM-25 and Javelin are both capabilities the Russian Army just lacks entirely in the dismounted role, and the allocation of designated marksmen systems and light machineguns (true belt fed ones vs magazine fed) is significantly higher.  Additionally US fire support systems are traditionally allocated one to two echelons below their Russian counterparts (especially so with heavy mortars and similar systems).
 
In terms of transports, BTR and Strykers are both fairly similar in terms of practical performance, the base model Strykers have superior fire control (turret really, and the MK-19 on a Stryker is pretty wicked), better protection, while the BTR-80A has superior firepower and all BTRs are much lighter and able to handle poor terrain better.  In terms of Bradley vs BMP-2, Bradley wins easily, Bradley vs BMP-3 really comes down to who's shooting first, BMP won't hold up to current generation AP rounds from the 25 MM, but the BMP-3 has overmatch against the Bradley's armor package.  Optics package, basic armor, and troop bay are all superior on the Bradley though.  100 MM with airburst is some nasty fire support, and the through the gun ATGM at least offers a better rate of fire (although the Bradley does have the ability to plop out two missiles in short order) however.
 
In terms of communication, there's a bit of an embarrassment of riches.  At the least each squad (9 man) and team (4 man) leader has encrypted short range communications, with longer ranged radio in the hands of the RTO at platoon level.  What is not at all uncommon is Squad leaders actually having their mitts on longer ranged radios, and encrypted HF type radios for Platoon and Squad leaders.  
 
In practice our infantry guys seemed to have more radios than they could practically use, so usually it was picking the right radio for the mission (larger manpack style ones for missions in fairly spread out environments, the smaller ones for urban operations or the like).   
 
Re: Ukrainian Quality
 
They've managed to bounce back pretty good.  I'm willing to credit at least the top quarter of Ukrainian units with comparing to the 60-40% percentile Russian forces.  The average Ukrainian unit isn't going to be up to snuff, but the better trained and equipped out to hold their own just fine.
 
 
Missed this on the first pass.  Maybe Russian optics, but US thermal optics are entirely able to maintain resolution for all engagements, on the move or not.  Daysights are the backup sights, or used when you've got some crazy-weird thermal crossover going on.

It'd be better as a weirdo ovoid three part venn diagram.  US infantry will likely trend towards better, between some really awesome capabilities (XM-25, Javelin, every squad is a spotter for fires as part of the boring old standard rifle squads) and likely a higher quality due to uniformly volunteer "lifer" type units in play.  However some of the better Russian units will likely touch into the realm of US squad for squad functionality.  And while not as sexy hardware decked out, they do have some good stuff (more night vision than Ukrainian forces at least, RPG-29s, functional dismounted coms).  Conversely some of their dudes are going to be the not as well trained "Russian modernization is still catching up" guys, which will likely be closer to on par with the Ukrainians.  Ukrainians will have some really good units that stack up well against peer level Russian forces, but almost none of the cool sexy gadgets, and more than a few Ukrainian units more or less magicked into existence in the last few months, so while doing a-okay against well armed separatists, might struggle against the full force of the Russian military.  
 
Don't think you can dispute the squad for squad aspect of the US on top, just for the technical capabilities alone, but I'm sure the other countries will have some force structures that are not SOF but still worth a damn.  

Re: M6 Linebacker
 
Actually before they even refurbed them back to M2A2 status they were already being used in Iraq as otherwise normal Bradleys (as it wasn't like ADA troops sat the war out, and if you're not shooting TOWs or Stingers the platforms are more or less the same).  
 
I'm of the mind retiring them was still a mistake.  The Avenger isn't armored at all, so it's not like it is going to follow just behind the armor or something and snipe helicopters.  It's just not survivable at all.  Of course the bigger mistake was opting out of BRADATS or similar platforms back in 1993.  
 
Re: A-10
 
Here's the thing.  Both it and the SU-25 have about equal odds of completing a strike in the sort of CMBS scenario (while both do things better than the other one, neither commands some amazing advantage that makes it more likely to slip past fighters or heavy SAM presence).  To that end if neither were in, I'd be okay as it's just excluding planes that would either be aborting because they've been locked up, or simply not deployed to the AO.  However if the SU-25 is in, and able to complete strikes in scenarios, then it's equally valid to stick the A-10 in, because if anything it is more likely the US would be able to achieve the sort of air control to employ strike fighters in the long run, while the SU-25 just wouldn't be long for the air war.
 
So again, neither of them?  Okay!  Makes sense.  One but not the other?  Que?
 
Re: USAF
 
The bigger issue I feel with the A-10 is it is one of the few assets the USAF employs that is actually customer friendly.  When it comes down to getting fixed wing support, the USAF is often very user unfriendly because their priorities are usually:
 
1. Shooting down enemy planes.
2.Proving air power can win a war by bombing things in the enemy capital city because that'll show em'
3. Shooting down enemy planes.
4. Killing ADA assets because they're super annoying and they keep triggering that damn alarm in the cockpit
5. Killing enemy aviation (planes)
6. Bombing things that might or might not be logistical assets for the enemy
7. Killing enemy aviation (drones and helicopters)
8. Crew rest
9. Routine Maintenance
10. Wishing the USAF would put out a movie that made them look as cool as Top Gun made Navy pilots look
11. Complaining about the food
12. Complaining about lack of enemy aviation to kill
13. Returning the Army's phone calls to find out what it wanted.
 
So to that end, the A-10 was something that wasn't going to be borrowed to go do CAP missions, bomb a palace, or conduct DEAD missions.  It was all the time, every day going to be doing either CAS, or battlefield interdiction, both of which get thumbs up from the Army and USMC.  And the A-10 was built from the ground up to liaison and fly CLOSE to the troops it was supporting.  
 
The F-35 in contrast flies tens of thousands of feet above the battlefield, isn't really designed to talk with, or coordinate with someone in the mud, and drops two bombs and returns to an air conditioned hanger some hundreds of miles away.  To make matters worse the USAF refers to the B-1 as a CAS capable plane, which is to say I have a brain surgery capable leaf blower.  
 
More than the airframes involved the A-10 was that commitment to support the dude fighting and winning the war.  The F-35 represents a reduction in that customer service, and removing it as an emphasis and instead shuffling it to the lowest priority.
 
Which is to make a really good argument for US Army fixed wing units, because by god the USAF doesn't want the job, might as well do it ourselves.

The UI during the orders phase is exactly the same in Iron and Elite. It only differs during playback and in real time.

The next patch should make HE a little more effective.

The next patch should make HE a little more effective.

Fixed that for you

Fixed that for you

I don't know about in reality, but in my experience it is a sure thing in-game.

I don't know about in reality, but in my experience it is a sure thing in-game.

When approaching infantry transport:
 
Anything that has four wheels is functionally the same as a jeep.  The exceptions to this are the american HMMWVs that fit MK-19s, TOW missiles, or what looks like a big box.
 
   Tangent: MK-19 has already been discussed.  Its murderous against infantry, unarmored vehicles, and some of the APC type targets can be knocked out by it with some luck
                  Treat the TOW version a lot like a 17 pound gun that's somehow merged with a speedy prime mover.  You don't want to place it somewhere it can be shot at at all, but it will reap a terrible toll on tanks if you give it a chance.
                  The Big box is the LRAS3, which is one of the most powerful sensor systems in the US Army.  The upside is it is a great tool for calling for support, or keeping sneaky things away from your flank.  The downside is it is not especially better at either of those than an Abrams, and is knocked out by anything more than small arms fire.  This sensor is also mounted on the Stryker scout vehicle.
 
 
Anything with 6-8 wheels/tracks and a machine gun: Treat like a halftrack.  They're really not that well armored, but are great for getting infantry forward fast.  Semi-exceptions to this:
 
    The BTR/MTLBs with 30 mm guns are great against not-tank type vehicles, and very good at suppressing or killing enemy infantry.  
    The Stryker with MK19 is just good enough to use forward, great at digging out infantry from buildings, or suppressing trenchlines.  
 
IFVs (tracked things with troops, some sort of autocannon, and ATGMs)
 
Imagine if your halftracks, light tanks, and AT vehicles all had a beautiful baby!
 
    Treat them like halftracks until they get to the point where they can deposit troops, once the troops are kicked out, then feel less nervous about using them as the mini-tanks they can be.  In a lot of ways, think of them like the M5 tanks from World War Two, they're great against other light vehicles, they're amazing against infantry, but you do not want it anywhere near something that can be called "anti-tank" or a real tank for that matter. 
 
Re: ATGMs
 
Here's the important caveats to remember when operating ATGMs from any platform (except the Javelin)
1. Bullets are faster than missile. The longer you fire the missile from, the longer it takes to impact, the more time the enemy has to react to missile.  It takes a TOW missile about 30 seconds to reach its max range around 3750 meters, that's enough time for the enemy to pop smoke, or return fire with a tank gun, which could very well kill the launching crew before the missile is even close to the target.  To this end it can be wise to ignore max range shots in favor of letting the enemy close in a bit (or it takes a tank shell 2ish seconds to go to 4 KM, it's flight time is fairly constant, while your missile fired at 2000 meters will only take 15ish seconds, which is a much harder thing to react to than 30 seconds)
 
2. ERA is built to ruin your ATGM.  APS also will wreck your day.  With that said, both systems degrade the more missiles they have to deal with.  To that end firing more missiles is often a good solution, so rather than spreading out your fires, massing 2-3 missiles on one tank will often overwhelm the APS (or deplete it's ammunition), and strip away a lot of the ERA protection.  
 
Also when playing against other players, it's much more likely they'll reverse out of an engagement if one of their tanks gets piled on by a few missiles, vs the fire being more spread out.
 
3. Reloading takes a bit.  This is especially true with vehicles like the Bradley or BMP series that have their launchers external to the vehicle.  When engaging with ATGMs, don't be afraid to mass like I said earlier, but hold a few launchers in reserve to continue to engage while your first salvo is being reloaded.
 
4. Mass your missiles.  If you've got two or even three different flavors of missiles, find their average optimal engagement area, and plan to hit the enemy in that range.  Using the Americans as an example the max effective range on the Javelin is 2500 meters or so.  To that end, holding off on firing off your TOWs until the enemy is 2000-2500 meters out ensures that target area is saturated with missiles, and rather than returning fire effectively, the enemy is evading and trying to leave the kill zone.
 
5. Trees give bad vibes.  Anything that is described as "wire guided" needs to be kept away from trees and similar obstructions to ensure the missile's guidance wire doesn't get snagged and cause the missile to rather dramatically miss the target.
 
Random errata:
 
1. Q. Which American units are spotters for artillery and aviation?
 
    A. All of them. Some are better at it than others, but if it's a team with a radio or digital communications it can call for a fire mission.  Plan accordingly from both ends for that one.
 
2. Borg spotting actually does kind of exist now.  Given the advances in battle tracking, all US, and many higher tech Russian units can share situational awareness to varying degrees.  They may still not be able to engage, but if the scouts up front spot your dudes sneaking along, odds are the rest of the force now has at least a very strong idea where your forces are at vs vaguely there's enemy somewhere up front.  
 
3. Fear the Abrams.  No.  Really.  Fear it.  It is the apex predator in this game.  If the enemy has them, you really need to have a plan on how and where to kill them vs simply having some AT assets on hand.  The APS and ERA ones appear especially dangerous at this point.