Bulgaroktonos

I'd like to see more specific targetting orders, or better yet, orders to not shoot anything at all. More than a couple times I've almost put my fist through the monitor because a squad observed an enemy BMP-3 and decided it was a good idea to take a shot at it while I was bringing up the javelin to take it down. A 'only fire on vehicles' or 'only fire on infantry' variant would be handy too.

In CM:SF I'm usually a company commander... I prefer caution, and care a lot about the lives of my men but realise that sometimes people die. That said, I usually try to respond to all threats with overwhelming firepower, which is why I love playing Marines.

You're absolutely right, but I wonder where I got the idea that they used M60A3s.

Not to mention the horrific trigger pull, the difficulties of mag changes, the difficulties of shooting prone with one, the crappy balance, and numerous model-specific problems.

I'm 100% certain it is a photo from 26 February 1991. And you pointed out a mistake I made. A lot of 2d Marine Division's other tanks were in fact M60A1 Rise/Passive tanks, rather than M60A3s. The one in the photo is an M60A1. Here's another Marine Abrams

The Marine Corps's 2d Tank Battalion, attached to 2d Marine Division was equipped with 60 M1A1s at the time, and was commanded by LtCol Cesare Cardi. The 4th and 8th tank battalions were also attached to 2 Mar Div, while 1st and 3d were attached to 1st Marine Division, and these manned M60A3s with reactive armor fitted. The Tiger Brigade was an Army unit attached to 2 Mar Div and included 1st and 3d Battalions of the 67th Armored Regiment. The Tiger Brigade was also equipped with M1A1s. The commanding officer of the Tiger Brigade was Colonel John B. Sylvester. From what I can tell, 2d Tank Battalion lost no M1A1s during Operation Desert Storm. Here's a couple of 2d Tank Battalion's M1A1s And here's an M60A3 with ERA And here's some Tiger Brigade vehicles

CM:SF fan fiction? I like it.

Can't talk about Challengers without including this Top Gear clip! I appreciate that they usually cover the sound of the Challenger engine with the Range Rover's or music, and they seem to have edited out the whine.

I agree. As far as I can see the advantages of a SCAR over any piston-driven AR15 design are to do with ergonomics and modularity, advantages which the majority of the Army don't really need. And besides, if you saw a guy with a rifle that looks like a fish would you take him seriously?

You called medieval armies 'slipshod', unprofessional, illiterate, and gave a silly comparison between the transportative capabilities of the two nations. Also, getting smug and dismissive about the Crusaders is dumb.

I don't get to talk about medieval warfare often on this site, so I'm making up for lost time!

I think you significantly underestimate medieval armies. To start with, knights (at the very least, and usually their men, too) were very professional, and the characterisation of the impetuous and incompetent knight slaughtering bands of threadbare peasants is a result of 18th, 19th and 20th century prejudices and a misguided fixation on battles (which took up a very tiny portion of medieval warfare) and those of the Hundred Years War in particular. To start with, knights performed cohesive charges that Napoleonic cavalry could not match, despite the latter having the advantage of bureaucracy and formal ranks. The generals were also often well-read and studied tactics and strategy, most commonly Vegetius, but others too. El Cid, Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, most famously read from military manuals to his men while he was in exile. Tournaments were, for their first two hundred years or so, training exercises rather than games, and very effective ones at that. Medieval warfare also took a different route from the Roman, instead dealing with a much greater density of fortresses and castles which shifted the focus of warfare from the battlefield to the siege, skirmishes and ravaging. While the Romans were skilled in siegecraft, ravaging and skirmish were big weaknesses of theirs, as shown by Germanicus' costly and largely ineffectual attempts in Germania, and the medievals improved greatly on siegecraft, as shown by the development of castles and keeps, better armor, round towers, the crossbow, trebuchets and gunpowder, and counter-castles. Medieval generals most often practiced the strategy advocated by Vegetius, one of battle avoidance, in which siege, supply, harrying, ambush, and all of those less glamorous aspects were the bread and butter (and meat and vegetables, too) of war within Europe. Battles were all-or-nothing gambles, and would remain that way until guns dominated the field. It's worth noting that Crusade is slightly different than European warfare, and has more complex cultural implications. Consider the effectiveness of Bertrand du Guesclin's work against the English. Very few pitched battles were fought, yet the Breton managed to win back nearly all that France had lost, and subjugate Brittany to the French crown. Another example of typical medieval warfare can be found in the 1099 campaign of William Rufus, King of England, against Helias, Count of Maine. There are two especially important events in this campaign that demonstrate normal conduct. First was the siege of the citadel at Le Mans, which was defended by a small number of Norman knights and their men for weeks until it was relieved by the king without a battle. The second is the ravaging of Maine. After the siege was lifted, Helias's men confined themselves to their castles, rather than face William's much larger and stronger army. However, William was unsuccessful in taking any of Helias' other fortresses notably Mayet, after the Manceaux burned the land during their withdrawal from Le Mans. So with Helias' men shut up in castles, and little prospect of supplying his sizable army in a sustained siege, William ravaged what those parts of his enemy's territory which had escaped the scorched earth policy, and disbanded his army, probably with intention to return the following year. Of course, he was killed (either by accident or intentionally) in the New Forest soon thereafter. The reasons medieval armies were usually smaller than the Roman were manifold. Perhaps most important was the actual lack of any empires anywhere near as big as Rome's, but there is much more to it than that. There was a strong dislike of centralisation among the Germanic peoples that entered Western Europe during the Migration period and lingered until the Early Modern period. Further, the dissolution of the Western Roman Empire and the inadequacy of the Roman Popes from the 7th c. until the late 10th c. (for example the so-called "Pornocracy") prevented any cohesion in the West. On top of that you get the comparatively even match between the various kingdoms and incursions from powerful invaders (Arabs, Magyars, Norse) made the dominance of any one culture or government extremely difficult. By the end of the 11th century, however, and perhaps earlier still, a lot of this was changing. I suppose, however, that if "Christendom" or at least "Western Christendom" could be considered a singular entity, its armies in the period (which spans as much as 1000 years, depending on what you consider "medieval") would be massive indeed. John Gillingham's article, "Richard I and the Science of War" is a superb work on the subject. Matthew Strickland's work "War and Chivalry: The Conduct and Perception of War in England and Normandy, 1066-1217" is a more complete overview. For a view less centred on Anglo-Normans, consider Aldo A. Settia's excellent article, "Infantry and Cavalry in Lombardy (11th-12th Centuries)" and for a non-Western, but nevertheless similar conduct in war, John Haldon's "Byzantium at War (600-1453)" is a handy introduction, while Eric McGeer's "Byzantine Siege Warfare in Theory and Practice" is reasonable and more thorough study. Sorry for the derail. The database is fascinating. I especially enjoy the ability to link men to retinues, and come to a rough assessment of how many men were independent stipendiaries, how many were part of a retinue, etc. There will be a few dissertations coming out of this database I'm sure.

I love LAVs. I love TOW Humvees. Can't wait to play this campaign.

I take it you meant WWII, but if not, I am very interested to find out where all these WWI games are coming from! Also hoping for a CM:Brusilov Offensive

So it's 7.62 x 39. Gotcha. An area where things can be improved I guess.

So wait a minute. Who can get resupplied by the 7.62 ammo in the Syrian BTRs? If it's not the venerable 7.62 x 54r, the only other Soviet round it could possibly be is 7.62 x 39, but does anyone in the Syrian Army use that? And moreover, why would a BTR have stores of two different rifle rounds?

Earning, yes. Receiving? No. I'm not a Marine after all, just a student. Just out of curiosity, is the version of the T-90 featured in-game pimped out with all the electronics and optics and missiles and such that would be found on the Russian models?

Thanks for the welcome. I'm interning with these fine fellows: http://www.tecom.usmc.mil/HD/ so they've indoctrinated me pretty thoroughly. That said, I can tell you all about the Marines in Desert Storm and Desert Shield, but not much else, though that isn't to say I don't like other periods. Back on topic, how many potential adversaries of the US have indigenous weapon and vehicle designs? I know the Iranians, for example, have their own tank, and the Chinese have their own assault rifles and the Type 99 tank, which seems to be a cross between the Leopard 2 and T-80, but beyond that, who has new kit to offer on the red side that would be readily encountered by the blues?

It seems like some people are looking for total war in this game, and the fact of the matter is that until the United States comes up against an opponent that is near-equal in size to the United States, is happy to fight a conventional war, has similar technological development (which often goes hand-in-hand with point 2), and gives the US sufficient motivation to go all-out then there will be no total war. The fact of the matter is that the puffed up expeditionary warfare that has been fought since the start of the Cold War is not amenable to that kind of situation. I can't think of an enemy which would simulate total war between two powerhouses without significant suspension of disbelief, which I'm pretty sure battlefront is not interested in. DaveDash put it more succinctly:

So when will we be allowed to call in a fire mission with whistle-tipped artillery shells?

Came here expecting bayonets, found something equally enjoyable

With the introduction of the M1A2 and TUSK, that distinction is pretty thoroughly blurred, especially without unclassified scientific data to compare.

That sea better f'ing run! Can't wait to play these.

Reeeeeally looking forward to this!

Is there any other good photography for the Russian side of the war?