agusto

Yeah 5 tanks seems about right IIIRC. Seems to be a bug.

Yeah, it sounds like a bug. I played Kampfgruppe Engel (which is german and translates to "Combat Team Angel", btw) a year ago and remember that there was a significant tank force present in each mission. What is mission 2 again? Could you describe it to me, ZombieJesus? Maybe i can tell you then if your forces are different from the ones i had when i played KG Engel.

Yeah, they are BMP-2Ms, but the Ukrainian AT gun is also effective against BMP-3Ms with ERA & APS. In my experience it even reliaby penetrates the T-90s lower hull side armor at ranges up to about 800 meters. Its main advantage though is IMO that it' s so cheap. I cant remember the hard numbers right now, but IIRC you get a 6 gun battery for about the price of a single BM Oplot APS. Of course if you are playing a small scenario you should take the Oplot, but if you are going for a company sized mix of tanks and infantry, it might be a good idea to buy one Oplot less and go for a battery of AT guns instead. As i said, they defeat ERA and APS, which makes them a useful tool against the more modern Russian vehicles.

Almost! At least Kabul is on the same planet.

Has anyone of you ever bought a Ukrainian towed anti-tank gun battery in a QB? It' s not that bad! It defeats ERA and APS and it' s cheap compared to an MBT, the only other unit in CMBS equipped with an AT gun.

I was kidding, just poking a little fun at some hardcore linux users i know.

True believers use Linux and interact with their computer via the command line only. Even ASCII art is already apostasy! There is no OS but Linux and Tux is it' s prophet!

Yeah artillery is extremely deadly in CMBN, particularily the on map mortars in direct fire mode. You should really try out the on-map mortars, wagtunes.

I have a small 1 man business where i offer diverse IT services for my customers, and occasionally i build custom machines to the specifications of my customers. Like 4 months ago, i built a PC for a customer with a very large wallet: the budget was 3500€ (~4000$) and i built him a true 1337 machine, using only the best components available on the market. He was so happy with his new PC that he gave me his "old one" as a gift. When he brought me his "old" PC, i only took a quick look inside and i saw some dust, 4 physically small RAM chips, a tiny CPU fan and a graphics card of which i couldnt determine the model because it had its panel ripped off. I thought what i got was the usual used PC: 7 years old, Win XP, 4 x 1GB DDR RAM, Intel Pentium 2, and a GeForce 7000 series graphics card or something like that. Today i was looking through my stockpile of used PCs because i needed some spare parts, and i took a closer look at the PC i got as a gift 4 months ago. It turned out it' s much better than i thought: 4 x 4 = 16 GB DDR3 1333MHz RAM chips, a 3,5 GHz I-7 2700K with 4 physical cores and 4 virtual cores (8 cores in total), a 750 watt PSU and a GeForce GTX 580. That' s some really good stuff actually. Togather with the mainboard and the tower that' s gaming grade hardware probably worth about 1300€ (1500$) . I would have never bought such expensive components for myself, but i think i will probably add an SSD + a new CPU cooler to the package and use it as my new gaming PC . I am really happy right now, my business isnt going particularily well and i hadnt planned on getting a new PC anytime soon .

i have the general impression you wouldnt abuse your moderator powers if you got them, that' s what i wanted to say. You know, like doing the Gestapo thing and letting people with different opinions dissappear. "I dont know where he went, i didnt ban him! He must have been the victim of ...errr....a most unfortunate software bug that accidentially removed his account and banned his IP forever. I will miss him deeply, really."

Actually battlefronts pricing policy is compareable with almost all other game development studios that make games for a niche market. I dont only own wargames from BFC, i have a large collection of games from different developers, and most of them cost about as much as the CM games. Some were even much more expensive, IIRC i payed about 100 USD for CMANO.

Oh man it' s really good to hear you are alive. I hope you get better soon. I kinda knew you were going to say that when you come back . I dont know if you intended to send me a message, but the email i used for registering here was a one-way email adress...i dont have access to it anymore.

I played this scenario in a H2H game against Schmoly War. I was BLUE and i lost. I was able to capture all the objectives IIRC, but i took too many casualties. The rebels werent able to ward off my attack, but i constantly took losses. Schmoly War deployed his forced deep in the city and hit me with one ambush after another, he was really good at this. In the end i think i had about 20-30 KIA/WIA and 2-3 vehicles lost. I dont think you should add more forces to RED. In my experience as BLUE player, the scenario is very difficult because your forces are not suited for that kind of terrain and the casualty modifiers are extremely strict. IMO this scenario is perfectly balanced. It' feels absolutely authentic and it' s really cool. EDIT: Now that someone mentioned this scenario, i would kinda like to play it again .... this time as rebels, though. I would love to see what playing the other side feels like. On average i think i can do at least 1-2 turns a day.

Ukrainian Mi-24 shot down during combat operation, onboard footage, no survivors: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=159_1433424437

Thanks. It' s good to see you care about the issues of your users. That seems like a feasable option. Out of 37.000 registered members, some must be trustworthy enough to make the moderators. For example sburke, IanL and panzersaurkrauftwerfer have shown to be mature and reasonable, at least as far as i can remember. There are certainly a couple other people who would make good moderators as well.

@ sburke: My "gut feeling" is that the T-72B3 and the BM Bulat are pretty much equal in terms of spotting. The base model of the T-72B3, the T-72 which was introduced in 1972, and the base model of the BM Bulat, the T-64 which was introduced in 1967, are only 5 years apart in terms of technological development. The original T-72 was actually just a derivate of the T-64. In fact the T-72 was initially just planned as a cheap replacement for aging T-55s and T-62s while the T-64s were supposed to take on NATOs modern MBTs of the time. Of course the Bulat and the T-72B3 carry much more modern equipment than their cold war predecessors, but they are still closely related. Maybe they arent brothers, but they could be cousins.

@all who have problems with Windows 8, try this: http://www.classicshell.net/ Classicshell makes Win 8 look like Win 7. I am not on a Windows 8 machine right now, but IIRC you can change that. Try rightclick->view->details and then, at the top of the window, click on "name" to sort your data by ABC.

The Bulat looks really cool though. I often buy them in QBs

I am sure you will love it. Although CMBS is really really cool, CMSF is still my personal favorite of the series. I just like the desert i guess . Okay...i had made the new version easier than the last and after i tested it myself 2 times, i thought it had become too easy, but if you two found the version you played as difficult as you say, i think the new one is going to be fine. Thanks for your feedback.

General tips: If your tanks are inferior, try to maneuver them as close to the enemy as possible. Avoid 1 vs 1 situations but instead seek to attack with numerical superiority: Many of your guys vs. few of the enemys - that' s the way you win a gunfight, and it works the same way with tanks. Avoid attacks from the front, where the enemys armor is strongest, but instead try to maneuver around the enemys flanks. If a frontal 1vs 1 engagement isnt avoidable, always respect at least the most basic tactics of armoured warfare: Hull down: http://wiki.gcdn.co/images/f/f3/Tactics_hullDown.png Soft belly: http://wiki.gcdn.co/images/3/33/Tactics_crestRidge.png Impact angle (i am not sure how effective this is with modern armor - this was a WW2 tactic) http://wiki.gcdn.co/images/9/9e/Tactics_angle_of_impact.png Soft top: http://wiki.gcdn.co/images/c/c3/Tactics_highGround.png Tips for defending: When on the defense, it works well to place your inferior armor in a reversed slope position with ATGMs on the counterslope. This will help you to gain and maintain fire superiority vs. the enemy tanks that come over the crest. Many of your weapons will be shooting at each tank that comes over the crest seperately - a many vs few firefight you are going to win. http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/call/call_1-88_fig1.gif Tips for attacking: If your tanks are inferior to the enemys and you have a significant numerical superiority and troops of good morale , a mechanized wave attack might an option. It works very similar to a human wave "According to U.S. Army analyst Edward C. O'Dowd, the technical definition of a human wave attack tactic is a frontal assault by densely concentrated infantry formations against an enemy line, without any attempts to shield or to mask the attacker's movement.[2] The goal of a human wave attack is to maneuver as many men as possible into close range, hoping that the shock from a large mass of attackers engaged in melee combat would force the enemy to disintegrate or fall back.[2] The human wave attack's reliance on melee combat usually makes the organization and the training of the attacking force irrelevant, but it requires either great physical courage, coercion, or esprit de corps for the attackers to advance into enemy fire.[3] However, when matched against modern weaponry such as automatic firearms, artillery and aircraft, a human wave attack is an extremely dangerous and costly tactic in the face of devastating firepower.[2] Thus, for a human wave attack to succeed on the modern battlefield, it is imperative for the attackers to charge into the enemy line in the shortest time and in the greatest numbers possible, so that a sufficient mass can be preserved when the attackers reach melee range.[2] However, this solution usually means that the attackers must sacrifice concealment and cover for numbers and speed.[2] Because of this trade-off, human wave attacks are normally used by an attacker with a lack of tactical training, or one who lacks firepower and the ability to maneuver, but whose main advantage is motivating and controlling their men.[4]" from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_wave_attack

Interesting, thanks.

It wouldnt be the first time the Russians try to build a flying tank:

It' s way too tiny for Hitlers megalomania. Had Hitler designed it himself, it would be 100 meters long, 20 meters high, weigh 300 tons and be equipped with a submarine engine.

I counted the crosses, there are 16 of them. Absolutely . Thanks for sharing this GaJ, your men died for a good cause...our entertainment.

http://community.battlefront.com/topic/119396-the-peng-challenge-thread-some-one-get-me-a-drink-and-tell-me-whats-going-on-eh/page-7 The Peng Challenge is an old battleront.com forum tradition. You poke fun at other forum members until one of them gets enraged and challenges you to a Combat Mission PBEM multiplayer game. You must accept the challenge then, otherwise you will dishonour yourself, lose your face forever and be thrown in a real shark tank. Yes, Battlefront has a real shark tank for people who decline PBEM challenges in the Peng Challenge Thread.