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On the north side of Hill 347 the battle was equally grim for the men of Ukraine. The leftmost vehicle of the vee died almost instantly in a hail of 30mm APFSDS darts. In the center of the 3d PLT vee, the PL’s BMP pulled forward, trying to support the infantry who were still streaming back through the forest. The LT was on the ground with the, and the gunner winced as another infantryman right in front of his track staggered and fell as the trees all around were ripped by cannon fire and exploding shrapnel. He had seen his platoon mate to his left die, and wanted to gain some revenge. He pulled his vehicle forward, straining to see through the smoke and dust, but it was useless. As he pulled to a stop and began to scan, he saw nothing through the swirling air. Suddenly a tremendous clang announced that the BMP-3 to his front had no such issue. Its thermal sights could not completely pierce the hot haze, but they saw much further into it than the naked eye, and the Russian commander had no hesitation at all in blasting yet another Ukrainian vehicle. The 100mm round detonated on impact, spending its jet on the vehicles engine pack and sparing both crewmen serious injury. The gunner called to his friend to bail out, and they both jumped clear of the track. As they turned to run, a second BMP3 spotted the movement, and the gunner made a fractional adjustment on his controls, and loosed a single burst of 30mm fire. Neither of the two Ukrainian soldiers ever knew what hit them. As they died, their Lieutenant watched in horror from behind a tree scant 20 meters away. Carnage on the northern slopes of Hill 347 http://youtu.be/q_6d5IyDh24 PFC Purtle watched as the movement on the hillside, and then the firing intensified. The young scout could not see clearly, as he was partly screened by trees, but he knew that the situation was deteriorating. “Hellcat Tree Tree, this is Golf, are you coming back? I think we might need to be backing up like.” He called to SFC Bagby over the radio. He waited an interminable 15 seconds for a response. “Golf, this is tree tree…” a gasping voice came over the headset, “Go on and get back. No way I make it back now without being spotted. I’m moving slow, maybe they won’t see me. Pull back and I’ll link up with you later.” Purtle and the driver looked at one another in shock. “Roger that. We are pulling back to last covered and will wait for you there Sarn’t. Keep your head down.” “You heard him, lets go.” Purtles command to his friend was punctuated by a loud bang from the hillside. As the HMMWV backed up Purtle could only loose a short futile burst at the hillside in the hopes that it might cover the older man’s slog back through the field. The sole surviving BMP2 on the northern hillside got a paltry payback. Stationary and scanning on what had been the south side of his LT’s vee, the grizzled gunner took under fire the only target that came his way – an old Russian MTLB personnel carrier. He didn’t know if it was a special carrier of some kind, or just the Russian 1SG’s support vehicle, but the older man was under no illusions about his likelihood of getting off of this cursed hillside, and was determined to ensure that at least some of the Russian invaders never left it either. He fired two long bursts, and the vehicle burst into flames. On the south side of the hill, KPT Antonyuk was still ignorant of the Platoon’s plight, but watching his 1st and 2d Platoons burn around him, he had little hope that the 3d Platoon had done much better.

PdPK Borys Levchenko though had little to celebrate. He saw the BMP-3 to his front detonate, but any joy was shortlived. Behind him, one of the 3rd Company BMP-2s had spotted a BMP-3. The vehicle, and in fact its entire company, had unmasked from the trees near Provinska Dvor and moved forward on the low hill which dominated the highway, taking 3rd Company under fire from a third direction. The BMP was vicious looking, its long powerful 100mm cannon with its fast-firing high velocity 30mm counterpart strapped alongside, questing from side to side in search of prey. The Ukrainian track fired, sending another AT-5 Konkurs missile speeding towards its Russian target. As the missile approached, the sensors on the low slung Russian vehicle detected it, tracking it in three dimensions, evaluating its velocity and size, and feeding this data to a sophisticated fire control system. The Arena Active Protective System evaluated the threat selected one of the countermeasure cassettes spread around the turret, and launched it. As the radar tracked the incoming target, it also tracked the countermeasure cartridge, and when both had reached the proper points in space, the Arena sent the detonation command to the flying cassette. The cassette had popped up and out from the vehicle and was oriented directly over the incoming missiles flight path. When it detonated, it sprayed fragments almost straight downward, like a somewhat undersized claymore mine. The cloud of fragments struck the Konkurs, and smashed through both the warhead and the motor, detonating both in a flash of flame and dust. Though the warhead functioned and a piercing plasma jet of super heated high pressure metallic gas lanced from it, it was still too far from the fighting vehicle to do any harm. As the BMP commander was screaming at his gunner to reload the missile, the young man yelled back that he could fire his 30mm cannon. Both men in their fear fought for control of the turret, as precious seconds ticked away. No burst of high velocity cannon fire followed the missile to spike the Russian BMP, and it rolled forward, continuing its advance. As the two crewmembers argued, a scant 100m to their rear one of their surviving comrade vehicles experienced the other aspect of the BMP-3’s sinister nature. This Russian BMP popped up rolling around the southern crest of hill 347. It paused momentarily, the doors on the back popping open and disgorging heavily armed infantrymen, who immediately sprinted for cover, as the BMP blasted the Ukrainian track with its 100mm cannon at point blank range. The vehicle immediately belched smoke, the gunner and driver leaping off and sprinting away from the incinerating body of their commander. Scant moments later, their wingman vehicle was bracketed by automatic grenade launcher fire. The small rounds were of limited anti-armor utility, and the one hit in the burst did no harm. Three seconds later instead of more AGS fire, a 125mm sabot round slammed into the vehicle, passing cleanly through it and gouging a lengthy furrow in the hillside behind. This stricken vehicle also burned, and no one emerged from the conflagration that followed. Borys was horror stricken as the field around him sprouted smoke columns, each one marking the grave of another Ukrainian vehicle. “These damn olded BMP2s are simply overmatched!” he thought. “Come on. We should pull back to a safe location to call all of this in. Where did the American Sergeant go?” Borys asked his RTO. They began to crawl back towards the gully behind them as the battle shifted decisively in the Russians favor.

TG 21’s commander peered through his sight extension, and congratulated his gunner. “Yes, you have found another one. Line him up carefully, then let him have a good dose!” “Yes commander! Firing now!” A stream of 30mm took this unsuspecting BMP-3 in the rear doors just like his comrade. A huge weight of metal slammed into the rear of the vehicle, knocking the doors completely off through sheer impact, detonating first on, then in the vehicle and quickly touching off the ammunition stored within. Another thunderous explosion and a former sophisticated, technologically advanced armored vehicle along with three men, were reduced to smoldering wreckage. The flames hissed loudly, as wet-looking diesel and plastic smoke rose skyward, the occasional small arms round cooking off, with a metallic ‘pop!’ The violence and finality of modern warfare is difficult to envision until it is experienced. http://youtu.be/JIUx0A3Wfpg

I played Bil in a QB on an entirely different map (strangely, it turns out is was a heavily converted version of the one I did in CMRT for Beutezug - painful how long it took me to recognize it!). I took the Russians, he took the UKR. He had BMP2s and those funny UKR MTLB chassis w/ the 30mm RWS. I was also prescient enough to grab some dismounted ATGM teams. I ate his lunch. Like, game over at turn 20. Not his fault, as the BMP3 overmatched everything he had on the map and I had several of them. The spotting disparity of the BMP2 versus... well anything, is pretty stark. Fail to see how I was out general'ed here though. I have (had) a single UKR mech company, 3 UKR 120mm mortar tubes (no precision rounds, and apparently inaccurate as hell) and half a US scout platoon against 2 full MRC's plus of the latest vehicles our friend Putin possesses, with ~ 8 ish T-90s and (so far) 2 supporting Tunguskas, plus artillery. I had one available ATGM, a Jav which started the game in the back of a Brad with no people in it. Okay, I missed it during setup. I'll cop to that error. But even with it, I can think of no conceivable terrain or scenario in which my force mix gives Bil a challenging fight. In what universe does a US Scout platoon leader outrun his artillery support, when he is anticipating contact? If I had been given the full PLT, with 3 Brads, 4 Javs, and access to the FA BN and UAS from the gitgo, this would have been a different write up. Okay, whine complete. Its all academic when the Abrams finally roll on anyway. I suspect I can manage to lose half of them in the first 30 seconds. If half survive for 2 turns, Bil will have a hard time. If all of them make it that far, I think I will win decisively. Would be nice if a good portion of the INF make it too of course, since Bil is no slouch. Would love to have 16 JAV teams running around magically blasting his tracks. Guess we'll see what happens.

Stephen - I am cursing you for making me wait so long for my US guys. I am about 5 turns behind on post right now, as work for me accelerates heading into Christmas. We have our HQ Xmas party today, so I am off ~ 1500. Will PROMISE the masses a new post today - half way done already - that will include a high angle vertical update from Speed/Power as they approach the battlefield. At the turn I am at Bil has just completed destruction of the last 2 BMP-2s in UKR 3d Company. Some brave heroics on the part of the mech boys, but not much to show for it. Tunguska's continue to rock, but now Bil is shooting HIS TGs at ME! Garp! Still 5 minutes to go until US arrives, and I expect Bil will literally be sitting smack on their arrival points. I have no combat power left at all, outside of what is in Krichek. What were you guys thinking?

Sorry phoenix, guess my answer is a bit late. It took me ~ 5 hours I guess, counting OS and drivers, but not counting all the ancillary software I had to grab and upload, but you'll have to do all that w/ a new built from your custom guys too. I used newegg tv on Youtube (superb two part series on building rig and installing drivers - 2 hours long, all quality input) and chatting w/ C3K, along with the occasional google search (usually got decent answers at tomshardware) as my primary sources. Biggest issues for me were nervousness over installing the CPU (unwarranted), troubleshooting then realizing I had to tell the Bios/UEFI that I had installed more components (easy fix), cable management nervousness (warranted, as unpluggin multiple times could cost you a mobo pin), and conceptual understanding of cooling scheme (she hasn't overheated yet so I must have done it close to right!). Overall was much easier than I expected and was actually a lot of fun. I highly recommend taking the plunge on this - C3K was my convincer - told me I had to 'man up' etc... If anyone else decides to have a go at it, PM him (revenge!) or me or both and we'll pass along knowledge - extensive on his part, limited on mine.

If you followed my AAR thread, you would know the rig I just built. This descrip is ~ page 13 I think. - Intel i5-4690K 'Devils Canyon' 3.6ghz - 3.9ghz boost CPU - 16gb DDR3 2133 Gskills Ripjaw RAM - Asrock Z97 Fatal1ty Killer motherboard - Nvidia GTX-970 4gb GPU from Gigabyte - 256gb Corsair SSD - H75 Corsair liquid CPU cooler - 1TB WD Black data HD - Raidmax CobraZ case - Seasonic 620w Power supply - Old model LG Blueray R/W - Win 8.1 Seems to run CMBS beta just fine. ;-) Parts bought from Newegg and Amazon, using this tool. "Go to hardforum.com . They have a utility called “hoverhound”. It is a basic price finder and trender. (It works with Chrome, maybe firefox, but not IE.) Find a part at newegg, and it’ll add a button on the newegg price. Hover over the button and you get price history and comparison. It’s cool. Your woman will think you’re more manly if you use it. Really." C3K Price came in under $1200, assuming I collect all the mail-in rebates. Gotta love Black Friday deals!

Which is orders of magnitude more lethal than the old WWII ones as well. Only saving grace there is your body armor. Yeah, I didn't mean INF is toothless - wait until I have more than 2 Jav teams on map! But if those BMPs had been T34s assaulting through those woods against PzFaust/Schreck armed PzGrenadiers, they would have gotten eaten alive. Here it is the reverse, despite the UKR INF having both RPG-7VRs and RPG-22s, which are roughly analogous.

Yes, it is unfortunately a function of having a H2H match built to order for a committee, not the players involved. It was billed as a US/UKR attack, and I think the design team presumed Bil would happily squeeze Krichek and fight a security zone battle with limited elements in defensive forward outposts against the UKR company and scouts. Unfortunately, he decided (correctly) that Hill 347 represents truly key terrain, and that taking it would best be accomplished with two mutually supporting MRCs - which my current forces on map have/had no hope of stopping. I did think the infantry would have done a bit better up on the hill, but forgot to factor in the APS/ERA on the BMP3s that makes INF AT weapons an even tougher proposition against them. I also underestimated their close range anti-personnel lethality - stupid, since I've inflicted them on Bil in this role before. One thing we are seeing now is that they spot INF in woods much easier than say AFVs in WWII, and this is a factor of the thermal sight modeling you see in CMBS. Modern tanks don't use thermals only at night - they make INF in woods stand out like neon signs, unless they are truly behind strong cover/concealment. Camo is a non-factor, and movement stands out especially strongly. This aspect of modern warfare is something players will have to learn as they play this title. Some will feel it imbalances the game, but truly, modern AFVs are ridiculously lethal if they operate with no real consideration for civilian/collateral damage. The imbalance is actually pretty realistic and something commanders must account for.

All - well, as you probably see from Bil's more up to date posting, the wheels are coming off for our poor UKR boys and PdPK Levchenko. Next couple turns C3K will get his wish for more blood, but unfortunately little of it will be Bil's Russians. We will sting from time to time. I am genuinely concerned about having the US reinforcements arrive on map in a 50m duel with T-90s at this point. Noted that we have some who don't dig the story telling - sorry, I am having fun. It is admittedly what is keeping me a couple turns behind in posting, but I made the decision to go with it and so am driving on. I will, however, give a few more situational shots, as the Speed and Power boys get closer. Once they get on map and we systematically annihilate Bil, perhaps I can do a more clinical treatment in the next AAR, rematch for say the first module pack or something? He'll need some revenge after what our Abrams plan on doing to him. ;-)

On the other side of the hill, Antonyuk was oblivious to 3d Platoon’s plight, but was keenly aware that 2d Platoon was in dire circumstances. He sent his command track to try and reinforce them, but the position was poor, hemmed in at the base of the hill by the butt end of a ravine which restricted their access to the western slopes where they could contend with the Company of Russians which had popped up to the south. Antonyuk realized this Russian company’s existence when its first cannon round detonated over a 2nd Platoon squad working its way up the slope. The Ukrainians were now literally caught in a crossfire from three directions – nearly a perfect kill sack - as they faced the two BMPs they had unsuccessfully engaged to the east along the treeline, the company of tracks to the south and the elements of the Russian company on hill 347 itself which closed in, curling around the peak to the south and firing down on them from the north east. It was the lead BMP of this element that faced SGT Cox and his team. The Sergeant was still cursing himself for failing to bring an AT-4, as he silently slithered backwards away from the BMP while its turret quested left and right seeking targets. He backed away, and then turned, low crawling trying to be a part of the ground. He thought they had succeeded, that their camouflage had shielded them from the Russian's thermal sights and they would make it to a defilade, when unimaginable sound engulfed him. It was like enormous sledghammers were pounding anvils on all sides of him. His legs felt like they were on fire and he looked back dazed to see if they were even still there. As he turned to look at his bleeding shrapnel-torn legs, he saw behind him his two teammates, literally blown into pieces, struck by a full burst of the heavy 30mm high explosive fire at point blank range. Shattered ribs and a half an arm jutted from shredded multicam of what had instants before been his closest friend. He also saw the a smoking muzzle of the Russian cannon pointing directly at him. He jumped up and ran, sobbing, his mind shrieking in terror. He sprinted just a short way and dove behind a tree, gasping, staring crazily around in panic, but then steadying, his breath slowing… “Never shall I leave a fallen comrade!” he muttered from the Ranger creed, closing his eyes and biting his lip. He told himself he would probably die. Then he clenched his jaw, took a breath, and began crawling back the way he had come.

Outside of Krichek, the commander of TG21 gave terse command to his driver, and tensed as he boldly pulled back up to observe hill 347. He knew the T-90 he had hit could easily be focused on his previous firing position, but his new spot was only a few meters offset from it. But he had seen movement on the hillside as they backed down and he wanted to see if they could hurt the unsuspecting Russian invaders from behind. He scanned the hillside with his binoculars, but saw no sign of the Russian tank. A moment later he spotted a BMP-3 – looking straight at the vehicle through the trees near the top of the hill, he was staring right at the thin rear doors. He grinned an evil smile as he twitched his turret override controls to place his gunner onto the target. No more pounding his gunner this time, he calmly asked if he could see the target. “Yes Sir, I see it. Should I shoot?” “Kill the Russian dogs!” The whole vehicle shook as the twin automatic cannons cycled at their cyclic rate of nearly 650 rounds per minute. Two quick bursts, and the distant BMP literally leapt into the air, the heavy rounds tearing through it and detonating its on board ammunition, throwing the flaming hulk three meters high before it smashed to earth in the crater it had just created. “Nice. Now scan and let us find another one.” “Sir, how about this to the left. Is that an enemy or friendly vehicle?” PFC Keane followed the radio conversation between his section leader, SSG Svendson, and LT Upham as they coordinated their rendezvous to deliver the Javelin. He was sitting in a nylon web sling strapped under the hatch of his uparmored HMMWV peering over the sights of his M2HB .50 caliber machinegun, listening on his headset. Armored glass and steel formed a cupola around him, with a small gap around the gun to allow it to be trained on targets. The gun itself was actually invented by John Browning in 1918. It fired heavy two ounce slugs of copper jacketed lead which could tear through buildings, trees or even light armor. Despite its age, the ‘Ma-deuce’ remained a formidable weapon, and the private was confident he could shoot it with accuracy. He and the Private driving were well trained – they had arrived to the Platoon at FT Stewart, GA nearly six months prior and had been together on the same vehicle ever since. As the US involvement had ramped up, their Battalion had switched to six and then seven day weeks, with the hours stretching longer and longer every day. Short overnight exercises, bled into the full mission rehearsal exercise. Originally scheduled as a rotation to the Army’s National Training Center in the Mojave desert of California, the urgency had cut it to a mere ten days out in the swampy terrain around Fort Stewart. Despite this, their leaders had focused the training on tactical tasks – using and maintaining their equipment until it became routine. Doing the harder tasks over and over. Learning solutions to the problems that hard, heavy armored vehicles pose when broken or stuck. Spending hours on ranges, learning to fire their weapons beyond the basic qualification standards, with nearly unlimited quantities of the usually strictly controlled training ammunition. Now, PFC Keane put that training to the test – he saw the enemy first, catching the movement as a Russian BTR 8-wheeled APC pulled up onto the hill. “Jason, I see one. There’s lots of movement up there. They are gonna see us for sure. Get ready to back up after I fire…. <Outlaw 16, this is Outlaw 12 Golf, contact, BTR right front, engaging, out.>” He settled behind the spade grips, laying the enemy vehicle directly between the rails of the ladders sight and aligning it with the 600m mark, then braced for the recoil and pressed down steadily on the steel ‘butterfly’ triggers. The gun burst to life, hammering out a short burst. Keane watched the tracers whipping towads the target, and saw sparks fly as the rounds connected with the enemy vehicle, several tracers ricocheting crazily skyward from the BTR’s armor. He fired another burst, then a longer one, willing the heavy slugs to shatter the Russian PC. Each burst hit, showering more sparks and more tracers flying off in different directions. But the Russian vehicle didn’t burn or back up. Keane saw it shift, and then saw clearly the small bubble turret on top rotate in his direction as he fired again. This time the flash of his rounds impacting was accompanied by the muzzle flash of the Russian heavy machinegun returning fire. The rounds zipped past over their HMMWV as Keene fired again, shouting for the driver to back them up. Just as he had been trained, the private backed the HMMWV up, but after thirty meters or so he stopped. Without SSG Svendson to tell him, he did not know from his position if they were now masked by the terrain. “We good?” he yelled up at Keane. Another burst of Russian HMG fire came in, this time connecting with Keane’s cupola, shattering one of the heavy glass windows into a snowflake, and spraying powdered glass all over the front of his uniform. “Hell NO! Back up!” as the gunner fired yet again. As if to add punctuation to this, a BMP on the hill fired a single round of 30mm HE which detonated against a tree just a few meters in front of their HMMWV. Keane fired again as he felt the vehicle lurch backwards again, and prayed they would make it to cover, as he cursed the unknown decisions that had him shooting a 99 year old machinegun that apparently couldn’t do the job he needed it to after all. Though fixated on the Russian BTR, he vaguely noted the rest of the slope of Hill 347 exploding into fire and smoke as they backed down. KPT Antonyuk had no idea what happened to his 3rd Platoon. Deployed in a line on the north side of Hill 347, the LT leading the PLT dismounted and directed his BMPs to follow in a ‘vee’ formation, and support his two squads of infantry, as they had done in training. He had his eye on a slight ridge to his front, with moderate trees and brush for cover, which he anticipated would provide a good spot to contest control of the hillside with advancing infantry. He missed having his 1st Squad the KPT had directed him to dismount back at the ravine, but figured he had enough men with 2d and 3d squads. Unfortunately, the Russians beat them to the ridge. As they advanced, 2d squad had begun to bound by fire teams. They could all hear the engines of the advancing Russian mech teams, but the hillside made estimating the distance deceptive. The team leader suddenly spotted a heavy BMP-3 grinding over the ridge less than 75 meters upslope from him. He quickly unpacked the folding RPG-22 he carried. This older Russian copy of the US M-72 LAW still packed enough warhead to kill the Russian track, if it could find a way past the explosive reactive armor. Perhaps a true long shot, but it was all he had so he leveled it and fired, but as he did, an airburst round from another BMP-3 detonated to his front, dropping a squad mate and ruining his aim. The round slapped a tree branch and detonated short, as the heavy fighting vehicle swung its turret toward the team. It opened fire, mercilessly blasting him and his squad with combined heavy and medium cannon fire. The PLT’s northernmost BMP-2 spotted the Russian track and hammered it with a burst of 30mm, scoring a penetrating hit. But the gunner mistook his success for failure as the vehicle showed no outward sign of damage, and began switching to his missile system. Once again the trees played havoc, and the missile crashed and detonated short of the target. But the Russian track now alert to the threat, reoriented its weapons from gunning down Ukrainian infantry and blasted the BMP-2 with 30mm fire, not stopping until smoke rose from the burning vehicle. The other BMP at southern tip of the ‘vee’ spotted and killed a Russian dismount, as the shattered surviving Ukrainian infantry sprinted past his vehicle to the rear, seeking cover. Six of the fourteen infantrymen of the two squads lay dead or incapacitated, as the PL desperately tried to gain some semblance of control, and the Russian BMPs continued to hammer the trees around them with explosives.

As PdPK Borys watched, KPT Antonyuk’s 1st PLT BMPs to his rear moved back up into firing positions to reengage the enemy tracks in the treeline to their front. Their engine whining as they moved, up, Borys’ felt his heart skip a beat as the center BMP’s Konkurs missile launcher flashed smoke and flame, but his burst of excitement died as the missile dove into the ground 200m short of its intended target. As he watched in growing horror, the BMP-3 responded. Despite the previous penetrating hit, it appeared unharmed, and it sent an ATGM back at the Ukrainian vehicle in response, a smaller missile launched straight from its 100mm cannon tube. This missile tracked straight and true, actually flying just over the smoke and dust from the Konkurs, and smashing into the vehicle’s front hull. Its warhead detonated, the shaped-charge jet lancing through the BMP’s thin frontal armor, spewing white-hot gaseous metal into the inner compartment, killing the driver and commander, and leaving the vehicle a smoldering horror. A second later, as if to make doubly sure, a solid burst of 30mm fire smashed into the stricken vehicle, spalling chunks of armor and outer kit into the air as it tore through the wreck. Just a split instant later, another GLATGM fired from the BMP-3’s unmolested partner detonated on the 1st PLT BMP-2 who had earlier scored a hit on his fellow. This missile immediately set the Ukrainian track on fire. Borys watched as the two of the three crewmen leapt from their vehicle and sprinted for cover – the driver died where he sat. An airburst round detonated over the track seconds later, hastening them on their way. LT Lysenko watched the missiles and beads of fire streaking across the field from his vantage point in the power plant’s control building. He craned his head to see, trying to discern what was happening and who was winning the concussive fight. Suddenly his world turned black, and he was knocked to the floor. Dust filled the room, as the young Leytenant got shakily to his feet, his ears ringing from the blast. I hole had opened in the wall of the room, about a meter above his head. He had no idea where the explosion had come from and wondered whether he had been spotted by as yet unseen Russians’ below. He gave quick mental thanks that it had not been a bigger round that caused it. He raised the handmike he still clutched to his ear to ask his Squad leader in the power plant access control building whether he had seen what happened. Tension on the mike cord caused him to look back to his RTO – “Mish…” the private lay face down on the floor, blood spreading from under his downturned face. He dropped the mike and dug at his combat webbing for a bandage.

I don't care if you don't care who wins. I do, and I intend to win. All that aside, not doing so great with the Ukrainians, but am confidant once the US forces arrive in strength. The air defense tank with the highly original name of TG21fired yet another burst. The TC was literally pounding the gunner between the shoulder blades, urging him to bring his fire down. With a satisfied sigh, he watched as the third long burst – like a water hose of bright lights – smashed into the back of the exposed Russian tank. “Again, again like that!” he yelled, pounding the hapless gunner even more. Two more bursts struck home, the rounds visibly exploding around and on the vehicle. The commander kept his eyes on the Russian tank and directed the gunner to spray the hillside where he knew other Russian vehicles lurked. Nearly 200 rounds of 30mm High Explosive spattered across the east side of Hill 347. Individually, no round was particularly deadly unless it struck within a few meters of an exposed Soldier. But the swathes of shells slashed grooves up the hill, peppered with vicious, buzzing shrapnel. Even without actually hitting anyone, they were bound to make people think twice the TC thought, then he gasped as the tank’s 125mm airburst round detonated three meters in front of his vehicle – he had been watching for the turret to turn, but… “Quick, driver, back up! Kick it!” The vehicle lurched backwards, and in less than a second had rolled safely behind the cover of several meters of hillside. An instant later, another 125mm HE round shattered the air in front of their former firing position. “Okay, wait until they think we have run away, then we pull up and do it to them again. Be looking for the BMPs.” the commander told his gunner. “Sorry about your back.” In Krichek, PdPK Tymo flinched again, as yet another near miss from the Russian artillery hammered into the street outside his make shift command post in the town hall building. KPT Kovtun stuck his head in again. “Sir, the Skif team is pulling back. They killed a vehicle on the far side of the river, but were under fire and have only three missiles left.” “Yes, very good.” Said the air defense officer. “What about the team at the north bank of the river?” “We haven’t heard from them, Sir. Perhaps their radio is out, or perhaps… the artillery?” The Kapeytan shrugged. An instant later he was lying on the dusty floor cursing and spitting out dust as yet another ear-shattering explosion rocked the south end of the town. “Are you okay?” He didn’t respond except to nod, still trying to clear his mouth. The constant explosions lifted every particle of dust on the floor into the air, and made breathing a chore. The dust tasted… different than what is usually kicked up by vehicles or the wind blowing. It had a sweet, acrid taste. “Call the American Major and see if his people have seen anything.” The PkPK said. Outside of Starov, another Ukrainian Pidpulkovnyk watched in agony as the BMP-3 he had seen five minutes prior, but was impotent to get a missile on, suddenly burst into life and began shelling the Soldiers creeping along the southern edge of hill 347. Borys had sincerely hoped that KPT Antonyuk would have managed to destroy or suppress this Russian track before he moved his men forward, but the Americans had moved forward anyway, and Borys supposed the Ukrainian men had followed not to be outdone by their foreign allies. Now both would pay the price. The BMP was firing 100mm High Explosive Air Burst munitions, set by the laser range finder in the vehicle’s fire control system to detonate at a specified range – in this case, the exact distance to the target, only a couple of meters above the ground. The result was a deadly shower of fragments, laying waste to nearly anything inside a radius of almost 25 meters. Borys watched in mounting frustration as shell followed shell, each coming closer to the hapless American forward observer team. Borys pounded his fist against the soft earth as he saw one of the US Soldiers drop suddenly still while trying to crawl clear. His attention shifted behind him as he heard engine sounds from a 1st PLT BMP-2 pulling up in Starov. “Good,” he thought, “now maybe we get something back.” “Tchangk!!!” The BMP’s 30mm autocannon was shockingly loud when it fired right past and over you. Borys waited for more rounds, but there were none. He looked out just in time to see the single shot knock sparks into the sky as it slammed through the BMP by the tree farm’s armor. But no more deadly 30mm rounds followed. “Is he jammed?” Borys thought. Then he noticed the AT-5 missile launcher on the vehicle’s roof shifting and an instant later the missile sped from its canister in a rush of fire, smoke and sound. But it only flew a few dozen meters before slamming into the earth and detonating, doing more to unnerve the Ukrainian infantry nearby than it did to the Russians. Borys watched in even greater frustration as the crew – probably new to their vehicle, and unsure of their drills, fired their smoke launchers and backed away from the fight they were winning. The Ukrainian officer paled, as he heard more engine noises on hill 347, as the Russian motorized company continued to bound forward on the hillside towards the Ukrainian and American positions.

FWIW (likely just a beta issue) my biggest problem running CMBS so far centered on an older version of the 'hotkeys.txt' file. You might want to double check yours in CMRT/FI if you are getting crashes after loading a mission. I won't be posting framerates until we get past 'beta' to 'release candidate' where all the .brz files are reoptimized and packaged for ease of execution. Even then, I'll only do so with higher permission. However, what I WILL say is that my rig is running the Beta game at a smooth consistent rate that makes the action nearly indistinguishable from prior rig. Detail, motion, detail reduction over distance, and even color seem much improved. Camera is like silk over teflon. My expectation is that the RC will run BETTER than the beta, so if your rig approaches the one I described, anticipate a great result.

Gents, Pleased to report that CM:BS Beta is up and running on the new rig, and the performance is... astonishing. Smooth like butter, even with all the setting (minus anti-alias) hard to the right. I don't do FRAPS for screen capture, but rather Bandicam. Had a weird issue w/ FRAPS on my old rig, so switched and like Bcam so far and will load it up tonight. Sent Bil his latest turn late yesterday evening. Should be able to start getting caught up on posts tonight. Never considered just how MUCH stuff I had to install to get it set up to do this! Drivers, CM:BS, BCam, PS, Office, zip utils, Adobe reader, etc... just takes time. Buzz - I had heard that the 4K stuff starts to get into the arena of 'human eye can't see the difference anymore.' Since you obviously disagree, I'll go on a quest to Bestbuy or someplace similar over the holiday to take a look. I was going to do another Dell just to have paired set, but will see if I think the difference is worth the expense.

Dan, 1. Yes, I deployed the UKR too aggressively, and failed to visualize the fight fully from Bil's perspective. However, I think had he let the UKR fight into a carefully constructed security zone, he would have chewed them up just as badly as he has thus far, and would be postured with more depth to fight what is coming. Now we will see a pretty close range fight for the slopes of Hill 374, and since my reinforcements come in from two directions, I may have the opportunity to oppose his forces from fairly close range with a full company against attrited elements of his MRC, some of which will have to posture north, and some south. The wildcards are the effectiveness of the MRC in the south, and whether he has other undiscovered long-range ATGM shots set up. While the Abrams has the advantage at longer range gun duels, he has effectively taken ATGM effectiveness off the plate here. His missiles will likely be APS intercepts on the first round, and I deem it unlikely he will get a lot of second shots, now that the AMP round is debugged. However, I understand from fellow betas that they have remodeled Abrams front aspect protection to be less than proof-positive against Russian KE at close range, so we'll see how it goes. Again, if I get them on the map first turn or two intact, time to offload my mech Jav teams with their Bradleys unmolested, I like my chances. 2. At the point I am now, the Tunguska has eliminated only two BMP-3s and damaged a T-90. This is meaningful, but still not significant. Losses to the UKR CO is approaching 70%. They are effectively done, so at this point it is trying to save the Scout PLT section, sneak in a few keyhole shots, go reverse slope in most spots and dare him to come over at close range, and hope that the reinforcements can do something effective. Really regretting not putting an ATGM team - like a Corsar which can fire from inside - at the Power Plant. There is no effective LOS anywhere near the ATGM teams set up in Krichek. Not sure that relief of encircled forces equates to Kursk - was thinking more along the lines of Hube's Pocket in March 44 in the south. 3. On APS, I am not sure which direction it will go. As APS evolves, countermeasures will evolve also. Jammers, stealth missiles, decoys, saturation, etc... all have promise to negate this capability in a (nearly) man-portable package. However, I do believe that medium cal autocannons will continue in development and fielding across the globe as their firepower and capability are hard to beat. While you may not kill an MBT outright (though I know of several who have w/ Bradley 25mm in Iraq) you would not want to be the MBT crew who gets dusted off by a sizable burst of, oh, say 40 or 50mm APFSDS. That coupled with the lethality and overall target capability of a medium cal solution against troops, aircraft, fortifications and urban terrain are hard to overstate. I suspect that all first-tier AFVs in the future will have APS, but it will not negate the need for smart, comprehensive protection packages, and vehicles will continue to trend heavier.

All - apologies for the delay, but I am in the midst of transitioning rigs. A fellow beta tester convinced me to take the plunge and try building my own system. I now have an operational new desktop: - Intel i5-4690K 'Devils Canyon' 3.6ghz - 3.9ghz boost CPU - 16gb DDR3 2133 Gskills Ripjaw RAM - Asrock Z97 Fatal1ty Killer motherboard - Nvidia GTX-970 4gb GPU from Gigabyte - 256gb Corsair SSD - H75 Corsair liquid CPU cooler - 1TB WD Black data HD - Raidmax CobraZ case - Seasonic 620w Power supply - Old model LG Blueray R/W - Win 8.1 Driving my Dell Ultrasharp 24" IPS monitor (now I need to get another one!) Bought most of the components from Newegg, and total cost w/ new keyboard/mouse (low cost snazzy TI gamer stuff) came in under $1200 after extensive mail-in-rebates (which I assume will all go through!) If anyone is thinking of doing this, I based the build mostly off of Newegg TV's 'How to build a PC' parts 1 & 2 video, with some great mentoring from my fellow beta. It was a blast, but caused some necessary delays. Rig is fully operational, and am cross loading stuff and reinstalling software at this point. If I get any benchmark numbers or anything I'll let you all know, but my friend assures me that this CPU/GPU combo will absolutely smoke CMBS. With the continued (from CMRT) large map sizes, shaders, extensive use of smoke, and good looking models, expect CMBS to stress less capable rigs. I am coming off of an Alienware MX-15 laptop with 6GB RAM, an older i7 processor and a GTX-260M GPU, which struggled, especially with load times. Hopefully my screenshots will reflect the new investment, and the time/to/turn will increase as I can get more done w/o waiting on 15 minute turn loads. Hopefully more from PdPK Levchenko tonight, but maybe not until tomorrow, as he watches the wheels come off... counting the turns until 'Speed and Power' arrive.

"Tree" is how we are trained to pronounce "Three" for radio comms to reduce miscommunication.

John, Apologies for my description. Many modern ATGMs execute an initial pitch-up maneuver at main engine ignition. In the Jav's case, this is extended into a full climb/dive flight profile, but in most other missiles it is used for simple obstacle avoidance during a phase of flight where the missile is being 'brought under control' by both its on board gyros and flight controls, and is acquiring and aligning itself with the directional guidance from the actual control unit. Helps it acquire the laser which guides it to its target. The Skif at any range beyond very short pops up ( a dozen meters? +/-?) then drops back down into a horizontal flight profile direct to target. Because the range here was so short, it popped up, and then the dive which would have brought it onto its normal flight path resulted in immediate diving impact. Hope this helps with the cranial brain housing unit spontaneous detonation issue you are suffering. I am not personally sure what the results of full-auto 'dusting' of an ERA equipped target would be with 30mm. Not sure what ammo the Tunguska would have on board in this instance. If it has dual feed, and packs APFSDS, I would not want to be in the T-90 that got hit by a 40 round burst from directly behind. However, APFSDS of this caliber would likely not detonate most ERA. HEDP on the other hand will eat a tile per hit, so spraying an ERA CV with, for example, an Mk-19, would do quite a job of stripping away protection, and possible thus gaining a penetration. But the HEDP round would still have to possess sufficient pen to hole the base armor package. Regular HE rounds would have a chance of eating a block, but the explosive in gen III/IV ERA is VERY stable (like, you can cut it with a blow torch). It requires extreme levels of heat and pressure to detonate, usually only found in an actual shaped charge jet. HE rounds might detonate one or two with luck, and might degrade the performance of blocks through deformation, but would not denude the whole side of the vehicle. Thanks to everyone for their support on this, and glad folks are enjoying. I am currently two turns behind (just got back from a trip to FT Benning), and I must warn you, things will get worse before they get better! Still 10 minutes or so before we get our US reinforcements. Until then, expect a rough time handling the Russian BMP-3s, especially where they can manage to hit us from two directions. I expect Bil to... not enjoy... the arrival of our US Tank/Mech Company Teams. The Abrams maneuver enabled by Jav covering fires will be hard for him to deal with, especially if we can get onto the map alive. Primary concern right now is I suspect he has some overwatch into the arrival zones, hence my invented commo issue between Power 6 and his forward company commanders! SGT Cox is going to have a pretty bad time too, sorry to say... as is LT Leysenko, though neither is KIA at the point I am at right now. More to follow.

PdPK Tymoshenko spoke rapidly into his cell phone – sometimes old school command and control just worked better, and as the long-time commander of the air defense forces in this sector, he knew his assets closely. Moments later, the Tunguska air defense vehicle of his nearby gun/missile section pulled up onto the crest of the river bank, the eastern slopes of hill 347 bare in front of it. Russian infantry were still slogging unconcerned, but quickly across the wheat field towards the hill. A quick series of orders from the track commander brought the twin 30mm cannons down and into ground mode, and a moment later a two long ropes of blazing tracer rounds erupted from the machine, carving a swathe of dust and fragmentation through the wheat. Then through the trees the commander spotted a tank, rear on to his gun. Eagerly he shifted the gunner, but in their excitement the rounds flew long. They knew they had only seconds before one of the many vehicles managed to swing its turret around, but certainly this had to give them pause, as exposed as they were. The commander told the gunner to reengage the tank, even as he directed the driver to prepare to back down to avoid the inevitable return fire. LT Upham huffed, as he dropped into the turret of his Bradley after climbing up the front and eschewing the rear crew door. He had unsnapped his combat vest and clipped it behind the turret hatch – accessible, but off of his body armor, which was now ‘slick’ to allow him rapid egress from the Bradley in the event of an emergency. He clipped in his headset – as a scout he wore an integrated headset rather than Combat Vehicle Crewmen (CVC) helmet – and told his driver to back up and then roll forward, and down the hill. “Sir,” his gunner said, “Gotta tell you something. We still got the Javelin in back.” “What? Oh crap. How the hell... never mind.” Keying his mike: “Outlaw Two-Tree, Outlaw One-Six, over.” “23” “See anything?” “This is 23, we know where one is, but haven’t got it pinned down yet. Placing icon now.” “Roger, I see it. Hey, I still have your Jav. Pull back and down a bit, and I’ll move to your fix with it. If he pops up I want you to nail him.” “Roger, it’ll take us a sec to back down.” This conversation occurred over the radio while Upham was simultaneously scanning as his driver pulled the track forward along the edge of the hill. “Okay, driver stop here a sec. Gunner, he has the icon in that copse right... there. Scan it and see what you can make out.” “CONTACT, BMP!!!” LT Upham was suddenly jarred by the strident voice in his headsest. It took a second to recognize that it wasn’t his own crew, but his heart was pounding nonetheless – one of his scouts was in contact. “This is Outlaw, One-Six, roger, who and where?” “This is Hellcat Tree-Tree-Golf, my direct front 800 meters. Engaging, out.” Hellcat 33 was the Battalion Bradley Master Gunner’s truck. A long-time Cav Scout, SFC Bagby had volunteered to fill out the understrength scout section for this mission, and MAJ Abrams (his boss) had agreed. Now he was apparently on the ground, and his gunner had spotted an enemy vehicle and was engaging with his Mk19 automatic grenade launcher. The Mk19 is an extraordinarily versatile weapon. At first blush, it seems like a souped up M-203 or M-320, the over/under grenade launchers fitted to the M-4 carbine. However, the Mk19’s 40mm grenades fly further, faster, and carry much more punch. For this mission, and most in the Ukraine theater, the Mk19 was loaded with HEDP rounds, which contain both a shaped-charge armor piercing HEAT warhead capable penetrating up to 51mm of armor, with a fragmentation sleeve wrapped around it to kill or wound personnel. The Mk19 can spit these rounds out at nearly 325 rounds per minute, slower than a regular machinegun, but still several rounds per second. However, it is a relatively low-recoil weapon, making it suitable for mounting on standard machinegun pintles rather than in a dedicated turret with recoil absorbing mass or hydraulics. The low recoil is due to the relatively low velocity of the weapon – the rounds leave the muzzle at about 240meters per second – meaning that it is truly a grenade launcher and not a cannon. One can easily watch the rounds in flight on their way to their targets, and time of flight to its max range of 2000m is nearly 17 seconds. It takes training, experience, and a unique eye to be able to fire the Mk19 effectively at ranges outside about 500m where the loft of the rounds really begins to be significant. Fortunately, PFC Purtle had the eye. His first burst plunged down like a series of long fly balls to right field, bracketing the BMP-3 with explosions and rattling the vehicle with shrapnel. The second burst of fire struck home – Purtle saw at least three hits, and one looked really solid. The vehicle backed up and the PFC saw its smoke grenade launchers pop as his third burst was in the air. He also noted with fearful satisfaction that the turret never swung towards his truck, so perhaps they never spotted him. He fired another longer burst to hopefully keep the lethal beast from pulling back up, then told his driver to back up to mask them in case it did. “Good shooting!” came SFC Bagby came over their internal radio net. “Next time though, announce it before you open up. I nearly ruined a good set of trousers!” Note: SFC Bagby is visible at right front, in wheat field. Leytenant Yuri Lysenko carefully raised his head again and peered over the parapet. He saw a puff of smoke from the treeline to his front, followed a second later by the report of a cannon shot, and he tracked the flight of the Russian BMP's shell, praying as it winged towards the base of hill 347. He exhaled loudly, as he saw the round splash just in front of the treeline, and caught a hint of movement as the Ukrainian BMP-2 backed down. After another moment, he paused, and then scanned off to the right, across hill 347 and the rolling fields beyond. Then he dropped back down and made another notation on his laminated mapsheet. He squeezed the handmike, stretched on its cord from the pack on the back of his radioman, and spoke again. “No, I don’t know what happened to Two-Four in the town. I haven’t heard him either, your radio is good, over.” A pause, as the other party responded. “Yes, the Rosiys’ka company is up on the hill, but I don’t see anyone dismounted. But there is a truck at grid November-Kilo 017233. Suspected ATGM position. Fire mission, over.” Another pause, and the LT nodded in satisfaction. “Roger, standing by to spot.” SGT Cox from Memphis, Tennessee could not believe what he was seeing. Not 60m away, just up the hill from the clump of brush that sheltered his three-man sniper team loomed a Russian BMP-3. The SGT had been just a young Private in the 1st Ranger Battalion during the last days of the US involvement in Afghanistan in 2015, and had seen scant combat. He had genuinely looked forward to this fight, and an opportunity to test his skills. Now he knew that if the enemy armored vehicle just lowered its sights a few degrees, his war was over. He was smart and a quick study, and it had seen him promoted to Sergeant after his time in the Rangers was up, and seen him through sniper school at Bragg. He knew the Russian track had a French thermal sight that literally could not miss spotting him and his team members if it was pointed in their direction. He sincerely hoped that someone would at least get out of the thing so he could get off a shot before he was blown to kingdom come. However, once it crested the rise it just sat there, as frozen as he and his two team members. SGT Cox slowly began lowering himself down to the prone, one slow inch at a time, and prayed for the opportunity to get to test his low crawl skills again.

In Krichek, artillery rounds continue to slam home. As KPT Kovtun directed, the young Ukrainian Forward Observer diligently copied down the fire mission information and plugged it into his vehicle’s network device. As he was doing so, he directed the driver of the PRP-4 – essentially a BMP with extra sensors and radios in place of the weapons - to pull the vehicle forward slightly for a better view. However, as he was tapping in numbers on the screen, his gloved hand mis-keyed a digit, and he had to back out of the menu and start over. Suddenly he realized the armored vehicle was still moving forwards – he looked up startled, and realized they had pulled out from behind the cover of the barn that was sheltering them. “No Maxsym! We must back up...” he never finished the sentence. A burst of heavy 30mm APFSDS rounds slammed into his vehicle at supersonic velocity, shredding the armor of the lower left hull and ripping through the fighting compartment. The first burst was followed seconds later by a second, and then a third. All in all, nearly 25 rounds penetrated. Inside, the young observer never knew what hit him. The gunner leapt from the turret, and the driver was a second behind him. As the gunner hit the ground, another artillery round slammed into the roof of the barn, the shrapnel taking off half of his head as at swatted his lifeless body to the ground. The driver fled for his life, pursued by an airbursting 100mm round from the same BMP-3 that had killed his chief. Peppered with shrapnel, but still moving, he dodged between buildings and dove into the cover of a nearby house, pasty white and shaking. Elsewhere in Krichek, other elements of the Ukraine Home Guards responded to KPT Kovtun’s orders, repositioning to better meet the threat. They were initially aligned as a perimeter defense, but with no immediate threat from the east, the KPT quickly responded, and despite the continual artillery fire, two BMP-2s rolled from positions looking towards the east, towards the west, seeking gaps between buildings that would let them scan the far bank. Soldat Koval was scared beyond measure. A veteran of skirmishes against the separatists in 2014, he never imagined combat could be like this. Russian riflemen on the far bank had spotted his team’s Skif ATGM position and were pouring AK fire onto them. Koval and his team crouched low in their hole, as the rounds zipped and sighed past them and through the trees over their heads. “Look!” cried Vasily the gunner. “I see,” said Koval, “Fire at him!” The Skif missile, popped out of its launcher towards the BMP-3 that had just rolled forward into view across the river. A split instant later it slammed harmlessly into a tree. “Dammit!” he cried, “Reload!” Training paid off as Vasily stayed rigidly locked on target, Koval and his assistant flung off the spent casing and grabbed for another missile. The team rocked as the BMP planted a 100mm round against a tree a few meters to their front. Koval bolted on another missile canister in less than ten seconds –“Go! Fire!” he shouted, and the second Skif flew. The range was short, less than 300m and it popped up then immediately dove directly into the BMP, detonating against the lower hull. An instant later, a tremendous series of explosions rocked the vehicle, as first its onboard ammunition, and then the infantrymen’s ammunition in the crew compartment, spontaneously detonated. Koval and his team picked themselves up, awed at the result, as the resultant wreckage smoked at the bottom of a meter-deep crater. Koval gazed over at his assistant – “Ihor, your hand.” The dazed private looked down and saw blood oozing from a hole in his glove. “Come on, that isn’t the last of them. Reload, and then we will bind that up.” Another AK round zipped through the trees over their heads, unheard in the shock of the explosive violence.

Oh, he is toast. I simply unselected his team for the photo opportunity. That team has more airbursts yet to endure too.

US Sniper team, following alongside US FO team, moving along southern slope of hill 347. These guys were committed to this move before I figured out how far forward the Russian MRC was going to come on the hill. Perhaps an ill fated move! Fairly good picture of their weapons, equipment, and uniform textures. Great work by the art team!