Red Rage

Forgetting the 1991 and 1994 referendums, followed by the 1995 Ukranian crackdown? In 2014, "barrel of the gun" was used simply to remove the Ukrainian power structures from the picture and prevent any radical elements from entering the same picture. The "invading" forces have been there longer than the state of Ukraine existed by several hundred years. Voting itself was fairly transparent and democratic with international bodies invited to observe. The fact that the same players who perpetrated Kosovo, Iraq, Libya and Syria decided that they are into following the international law to the "t" in the case of Crimea and refused is their own damn problem. Crimeans are overwhelmingly happy to be where they currently are, and that's the only thing that matters. A bit of a waste of time going in circles, don't you think? Russian posters consider sites like Bellingcat as con jobs and the social media based Ukrainian sources that you mostly rely on as bat**** crazy. You collectively dismiss all the Russian sources as propaganda. Nobody is going to change anyone's viewpoint here. All this crap was discussed and argued ad nauseum on mp.net's Ukrainian thread for thousands of pages (with hundreds of 2-week forced vacations and dozens of permabans), and not a single person changed their initial position.

A bit of a noob question - when in QB menu, is the side with the selected EW setting on the receiving or the sending end of things? I was under the assumption that if for example the Russian side had it set to "Light", then they were the ones sending light electronic interference, but after your post I think I mixed things. Does EW affect individual spotting at all? And if yes - at what level does it become relevant enough to notice? Also, does it mess with individual systems like APS and laser detectors?

It's still a game and real world tactics apply only in most general of ways. QB purchase decisions and actual unit stats/abilities have a bigger impact than all the manoeuvring in the world. I think that the issue that most people "who don't play the Russians the right way" (whatever that means) is with a very strange spotting system. US gear does the edge in long-range target acquisition irl, however most engagements in CM take place under the circumstances where modern Russian gear should be good enough to do the job. When you roll up on an unsuspecting M1 from the rear at point blank range (under 300m) with a T-90 equipped with a full hunter-killer suite from Thales and that said M1 somehow has time to spot you with his spidey sense, turn the turret 180 degrees, and get a 50/50 chance of firing the first shot ...well, that makes you scratch your head. Or when you have a recce platoon of supposedly Ratnik-equipped infantry sitting 30m away from T-90AM, with a full spot on several enemy vehicles, while T-90 just stands there like a monument for over a minute. Besides the point that the whole purpose of Ratnik is the the quick relaying of visualized information between units on all levels, even a WW2 infantryman would have time to run to the tank, bang his rifle butt on the hatch and start calling targets in that timeframe. Then there are other smaller issues. Like why cannot Russian infantry call in arty, while practically everything on the US side can call not only arty but CAS as well (and do so as fast as the dedicated FOOs on the Russian side) ? It's not the rigid Soviet model anymore - any infantry squad with access to the net can call in targets of opportunity for support assets. Why does it take so much longer for Russian artillery to start their fire missions? Why do Russian squads hunkered inside buildings seem to get insane casualties and suppression levels from simple 40mm US squads employ, when Ratnik gear utilizes aramid weave for actual armor pieces and shrapnel/burn resistant fabric for clothing items? Why do Russian sections have no radios and tablets (again - standard Ratnik equipment)?

You must be connected with the closed investigation somehow.

Yup, it's like there is an invisible wall that takes 5 to 10 seconds to see through and only applies to Russian IFVs (Ukrainians have an even longer wait time on that "wall", but I don't think anyone without masochistic tendencies actually plays them). I mean at point blank range, with a perfect view of that ass or side, even a WW2 IFV shouldn't take that long to spot and ID. Last mission of Red campaign I actually managed to sneak my T-90AM right into immobilized M1's tailpipe tucked in between buildings on the left, only to have M1 spin the turret and actually get a shot off killing my T-90; after the ragereload my T-90 got the first shot off, but M1 still had the time to spin that turret, and just didn't have that fraction of a second to finish aiming. T-90 took its time seeing the target (at less than 70m) that was spotted by a dozen other units over the course of 1 hour 30 mins, with several CAS runs over the location (don't even have to be all fancy pants with net-centric capability to see a pair of Mi-24 pounding the location and know that something nasty might still be there).

Some real life flavor to this thread (Yemen, a vintage AT-4 vs 2 different Saudi M1A2SA, side penetrations and catastrophic kills at what appears to be ~1.5km; not graphic unless you count imagination):

Sheer number for number RT has way higher casualty rates. Loosing a platoon in BS hurts, while in RT it's just an agressive recce for the armored main course. I think it was Cross of Iron campaign's opening mission where i lost 400 men and 9 Tigers , all in defensive posture, in a span of 15 minutes of a Soviet steamroll preceeded by a rolling rocket barrage. 400-600 is a typical casualty number for an entire BS campaign. More casulties = deadlier, no?

Who will upgrade and with what money? Without the Russian contracts whatever is left of Ukranian defense industry is going belly up. Polish industry doesn't work for free. So far we have KulibinWerks "volounteers" and their bizarro Mad Max creations: http://twower.livejournal.com/1763791.html http://twower.livejournal.com/1756214.html http://twower.livejournal.com/1734395.html http://twower.livejournal.com/1727388.html http://twower.livejournal.com/1721118.html Considering that Ukranian SSR industry was producing aircraft carriers and heavy cruisers, including completing a large chunk of a very ambitious Ulyankovsk class supercarrier, this is almost rock bottom.

Better question is why use CAS at all, even for Russian side, when you can get several batteries of high caliber arty + spotters for a price of the cheapest helo wing. It's fun to use and has a cool "whooosh" sound, but makes no sense if going for pure force efficiency. Sure, Russian CAS is alot cheaper but even with the reduced cost it's still too much for a sensible purchase.

All CM games are kind of the same-ish. Comes down to timeline and wargear preferences. Not sure why BS is considered as a far deadlier environment than RT. RT is WW2, so casualies will be massive and largely unavoidable (losing half of an entrenched battalion in an opening barrage is pretty normal in RT; while BS arty is more annoying than deadly to entrenched troops and is mostly used to KO vehicles). Armor combat is more fun in RT due to numerous bounces and partial penetrations; BS is more about spotting, since everything will most likely be killed in one shot. BS has more fun to use and capable infantry due to a wide range of avaliable toys. On a technical front, BS feels a little tigher and slightly smoother, but it could be placebo effect. BS mission/campaign content is slim pickings atm (if you want to play with Red toys, it's virtually non-existent beyond 5 campaign missions and a 3-4 scenarios). It appears that RT will get an expansion module alot sooner than BS.

Polpovnik? ... ... And the correct word is? a) polovnik b ) polovik c) podpolkovnik...

Way too much work with uncertain results. Especially when an extra BMP-3 w/APS can be had for the same amount of points, comes with two boomsticks, has smoke and can be deployed anywhere on the map within a minute And bunching up vs US (even in AI form)? I learned some hard lessons with that on at least 10 separate occasions. That arty comes fast and then keeps on dogging you. Literally everything and everyone can call in arty on you faster than your dedicated FOs and ATCs.

But isn't it still essentially one target that they engage, just with a way more detailed visual representation? I always thought of firepower values in CMx1 as a rough representation of how much "punch" an individual squad potentially possessed rather than an actual damage-per-second type of number. I believe CMx1 still had some sort of small-arms ballistics factored in, and the 3 ugly stickfigures still represented a full section under game's hood. Or am I completely wrong here? From my experiences, by the time AGS and RPO teams crawl to position, the fight is usually over. Due to US spotting edge and a long setup time, AGS units are extremely difficult to set up in direct LOS of a defender. RPO teams are pretty much bullet magnets as well (gunner usually gets smoked after the first shot). I wish AGS teams had the ability to be used like they are used 90% of the time irl - i.e., setup behind terrain elevations and fire in "overhang" pattern like artillery with no need for LOS. Atm, I stopped taking AGS platoons altogether for offensive battles. For preset scenarios I just use them to occupy ground worth points. Support assets wise, when facing US I found only 152mm and up to be effective with mortars being next to useless.

There is literally a thread right below this one on the subject, Yes, they do make a difference. Currently, a US section all Gucci-ed out with optics can easily suppress a Rus platoon of equal experience level. Rus infantry do seem to perform much better at night when they have their optics on. It's all abstracted though, same as FLIR and other vehicle modules. How exactly it's abstracted only the devs know. I wish we still had the detailed unit cards from CMx1 which displayed the nominal firepower value assigned to each unit (as well as range/pen values for vehicles), but those were scrapped for some reason. Now it's all about rumors, innuendos and individual tests to eyeball the effectiveness of any particular kit.

Incident details: http://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/2333614.html In 3 sentences or less: LNR elements f'ed a dog tactically. Sketchy advance in an open steppe with unknown tactical goals ending with an "oops" moment when a T-64 showed up. Ukrainians lost 2 T-64s, 1 BTR-80 and 1 BMP in the same sector, but it appears that the losses were from an earlier action.