cmfan

The first one is not so much a bug as it is a result of the additional soldiers tasked to the HQ of the mout striker platoon. You can work around it by splitting off a Javelin team from one of your squads and rearranging the load out in the Strykers a little. It's annoying but you will be able to fit everyone in. The second issue is probably not considered a bug by BF but it should be. There are other vehicles, most notably the Bradley, where you pretty much have to go through the main armament ammo before the coaxial is used in a significant way because we can't do a "target x weapon" command.

It's not gamey in the sense that you can't select a squad or team with a Javelin and specifically tell them to use the missile on the enemy infantry. The AI is in charge of deciding what the appropriate engagement weapon is for the most part. In my experience the AI will only fire a Javelin if you have your team target some sort of vehicle or bunker, or in some cases enemy units inside a building. In the latter instance its hard to tell what motivates the AI to use or not use the Javelin with a "Target" command. As for real world employment... well in combat you use what you have to get the job done. However there are all sorts of tactical and practical considerations that go into a squad/platoon leader's decision to employ a weapon system. Using a Javelin to take out a Toyota pickup with a bunch of enemy fighters riding in the back 300 meters away is probably bad use of your available combat power, particularly if you think there might be armor in the area or a bunker that needs to be demolished. However, if you have a squad being mauled by a heavy machine gun on the back of that pickup then it might just be tactically justified to blast it with the fancy 100k missile. It just all depends on doctrine, the tactical situation and battlefield conditions. I've heard of instances of air strikes being called in on snipers!

Unfortunately I didn't save the turn when this happened, but this is what I recall happening. I had two scouts teams moving along opposite ends of a trench line in a pretty wooded area. A BMP-2 suddenly appeared out of nowhere right next to the trench line. It opened fire on a scout team at one of end of the trench while the other team started engaging it with hand grenades and an M203. Just as the BMP-2 started to turn and move towards them (it had quickly wiped out the other team) the scouts brought out two AT-4s and fired them in quick succession. Nothing happened to either the team or the BMP-2 when the rounds hit. My scouts routed, most where killed by cannon fire from the BMP and the lone survivor ended up running into an enemy squad as he exited the trenches. ps. This happened in the middle of a WEGO turn, so I never gave a direct engagement order to my scouts. It was all AI.

From what I've read, not gamey. Several Army field manuals suggest using it in this role.

The survivability of electronics against an EMP pulse also depends on how much energy it puts out and whether or not you were prepared for it. If you know its coming, you turn off all your electronics and maybe even sandbag really key components to protect them. However if you're out in the middle of an operation or really close to the air burst, well you better hope the built in hardening is enough.

The Javelin CLU is a must have for a dismounted reconnaissance. Never forget to take it along with your scouts when they get off their vehicles if they have one. Speaking on the subject... As others have pointed out, don't be hesitant to get your troops out of their vehicles to peek over ridges or around other terrain/urban features. Your troops have less of a chance of being spotted and will often identify potential threats at short range faster than your vehicles will. As with movement to contact situations (moving to engage the enemy) it's generally best to proceed with your smallest unit(s) while heavier ones remain in over watch positions. Oh, if the tactical situation permits you can also do what's called "scouting by fire". In simple terms it just means that you fire at suspected enemy locations to get them to reveal themselves by firing back or moving out of the area. You can scout by fire with direct fire or artillery. Using direct fire is tricky in that while it can get enemy troops to fire back and thereby reveal themselves to over watch units, your own scouting units will often be spotted themselves. Artillery doesn't have this disadvantage unless someone happens to spot your observer.

Okay that makes sense. I think the game models it, but still shows the round exploding on impact which made it seem like both the BMP and my troops standing next to it where invulnerable. The AI shouldn't really employ it in cases like this, but the BMP was moving around so my AT team might have started to employ the AT-4 while the vehicle was beyond the minimum range. Still slightly "iffy" in my opinion but I can live with it.

She looks like she already has a MARPAT pattern going on.

- An expanded role for engineers. Right now, they're just infantry who carry around extra demo charges. Start off by giving them the ability to detect and even clear paths through minefields. Expand this by adding other items they can breach or lay down: barbed wire, road barriers, etc. We had some of these in CM1. - User definable SOPs for platoons/individual units like TACOps. Have default settings that allow players to ignore using them if they so desire. - Medics. Very easy to model.

I can't remember but does the AT-4 have a minimum warhead arming range? Is it modeled? A game or two ago I had some grunts fire two AT-4s at a BMP-2 at point blank range to no effect. I was upset at first until I considered that had they done that in real life it would have been suicidal anyway.

Have you tried using target arcs to create an ambush zone. Just set the arcs to cover the area where you want the ambush to begin. The big limitations on this are that the lower the quality of your troops the more likely they are to ignore the arcs and open fire as opposing forces get closer. To be fair though this seems like a fair representation of what can happen in real life during a ambush.

I swear that wasn't us SgtMuhammed We were in Texas and Active Army!

Are you sure? I may be I thinking of the BMP-1 then. I remember reading an article where this was found to be a pretty bad design flaw that was exploited in Afghanistan. Nonetheless, I still think both exceed real life limits in CMSF. I am fairly certain though that both versions of the vehicles do have definite issues with gun depression angles because of their hulls. Supposedly it makes it harder for crews to find good hull down positions; which is partly compensated for by the fact that they have relatively low profiles, but this in turn causes a problem when trying to shoot over the heads of advancing troops... though this makes me wonder why you would want to do that if you can at all avoid it. Puts a new twist on all the training films we use to watch from the 80s where hordes of mechanized Soviet troops where advancing across the Fulda Gap, grunts in the lead with AKs blazing away and BMPs behind them doing the same.

Wait, you are talking about the vehicle TC and not squad or team leaders right? In the M2 the squad and team leaders ride in the troop compartment and dismount with the squad while vehicle TCs never do. If I remember correctly, the platoon leader takes a TC position in one of the M2s and dismounts or not depending on METT-T (do I have an extra T in there?). The platoon sergeant usually stays mounted and in control of the M2s.

Can we get it before the 70th anniversary of the landings?

Ouch. Reminds me of a time when during a live fire training exercise our FDC didn't calculate the correct angle T (difference in the observation angle between FO and the LOF of guns) and ended up sending a few rounds into the wrong range. Luckily everyone, including some guys working on the range receiving our spotting rounds, realized something was wrong before anyone was hurt.

Can't comment on the men, but I've also noticed the lack of elevation restrictions on APC and tank cannons. I've noticed the M1 do what you described several times. I've also seen a BMP-1 fire at an impossible angle - it's doubly annoying because BMPs (1 and 2) have relatively restricted elevation and depression arcs for their cannons.

I want shoulder mounted plasma cannons for my soldiers then. Oh, and invisibility cloaks. Yeah.

Heh, I remember naval artillery in CMBO. I use to blast who chunks out of my maps with it. Fun to watch but, yes, not very useful in practical terms.

I just wanted to say that I've downloaded your manager theFightingSeabee and I think its great! An essential for anyone who uses mods. Thank you for putting it together.

You can located the source of fire if you have surround sound speakers (or good headphones) and sound is localized to the position your viewing from Now that I think about it I've obtained a good sense of where fire is coming from by sound alone more than a few times. I do cheat however as I will hit replay a couple of times and change my orientation to triangulate the sound. Probably the equivalent of a squad sitting under cover asking each other "did you hear that? what direction didn't it come from?"

I've trained with Heavy and light machine guns as well and agree with what Seabee states. The machine gun modeling is not perfect, but its pretty good all things considered. There is one point that Seabee brings up that I've wondered about but haven't thought to ask until now: why all the tracers in the game? Particularly, for small arms like the M4? Even artillery seems to have a tracer effect! Did BF just want to add more eye candy to the game or did they feel it would help the player with identifying where troops (friendly and enemy) were firing?

Oh, a whole company. That's different. I have the scenario but haven't played it yet. Hehe, if you want your ego deflated play the "Forging Iron" campaign by George MC. He also has the red forces set to Crack and Elite on top of having excellently crafted scenarios and maps that make you earn your stripes. I started to grumble about the level of experience the Syrians had, but he pointed out the campaign is supposed to simulated Blue vs. OPFOR at NTC. It made sense then.

The thing with the shoulder fired SAMs is that their range is greater than that of the small arms used by infantry being transported in the helicopter and probably even any mini-guns the black hawk might have. From the reading I've done on the subject, which admittedly is not that much, the standard tactic for helicopter insertions is to fly in fast, nap of the earth and if possible via gaps in enemy observation or battle positions. Flying low and fast might draw some ground fire, but hopefully you'll go by so fast it won't be accurate and the enemy won't have time to deploy their SAMs against you. Speed being armor in this case. As for actions at the LZ... I don't know. I would prep the LZ with artillery, along with several other dummy landing zones right before the landing. I might also throw in some Apache/Cobra CAS. Hopefully, this would suppress or kill enough enemy forces in the area to allow my troops to land and make for cover. This all of course would take a lot of coordination and even a bit of luck.

Hmm, I don't know. I've had my Marines run away while playing a couple of scenarios since 1.11 and see nothing wrong with the behavior. Sorry, it may be my bias against Marines' self-image but my pixelated leather necks have only run when I do something insane/dumb with them like tasking a single fire team to charge a building full of Syrians or I keep a squad in a building being pounded by a T-90. To me that seems like sensible behavior on their part and I think it has actually saved some of them. As for experience and moral discrepancies between Marines and Syrians. I'm not sure what the "realistic" setting should be for each type of unit to tell you the truth. Whatever makes the scenario more enjoyable to play given the objectives?