Chibot Mk IX

Don't get me wrong, I have no sympathy for an invasion army. I just feel bad for those staff officers.
I had a very busy week on work, so I can totally understand how frustration it is: Your CO. yelling at you , he needs a new offensive begin tomorrow. BTG 001-005 reports they are low on ammo, BTG 008 requests fire support from Arty Bde. BTG 011-013 says the need fuel. BTG 015 reports they lost three tanks due to enemy fire, but they are not burning, needs recovery bn's ARV support. BTG 006 cmdr reports no one protect his flank. OK, good news, you still have BTG 007 on your hand. Now you got to do calculation (and lots of calculation), check out the latest location of those who needs supplies  , send out couple convoys from Army's depot (probably 50km away from the border) travel 150km distance . Then communicate with those BTG commanders , ask them to meet with convoy x at certain location at certain time.
Good luck with that, a tiny error could causing a disaster to the supply convoys and the BTGs at the frontline.
 
If I have been assigned to this kind of job, I'd rather 躺平 (lying flat)    

No. Russians BTG's attacked our sector D, which was weaken by three-week artillery/MLRS shellings on the border when about 60-70 % of vehicles were destroeyed or damaged and many of conscripts had a low motivation. On the moment of invasion, most of trops of Sector D already breakthrough from the pocket. So, Russians attacked remains of Sector D group with alsmost disrupted C&C and some volunteer units almost w/o armor near Ilovaisk. Russians have overhelming superiorirty (add DNR units also) in personnel, equipment and they were fresh. 
In sector A, when UKR troops mostly saved C&C capabilities, sucess of Russian BTG's was minimal. Rugged defense of Luhansk airport and heavy battle for Georgiivka are examples of UKR could successfully fight with Russian army  

Don't get me wrong, I have no sympathy for an invasion army. I just feel bad for those staff officers.
I had a very busy week on work, so I can totally understand how frustration it is: Your CO. yelling at you , he needs a new offensive begin tomorrow. BTG 001-005 reports they are low on ammo, BTG 008 requests fire support from Arty Bde. BTG 011-013 says the need fuel. BTG 015 reports they lost three tanks due to enemy fire, but they are not burning, needs recovery bn's ARV support. BTG 006 cmdr reports no one protect his flank. OK, good news, you still have BTG 007 on your hand. Now you got to do calculation (and lots of calculation), check out the latest location of those who needs supplies  , send out couple convoys from Army's depot (probably 50km away from the border) travel 150km distance . Then communicate with those BTG commanders , ask them to meet with convoy x at certain location at certain time.
Good luck with that, a tiny error could causing a disaster to the supply convoys and the BTGs at the frontline.
 
If I have been assigned to this kind of job, I'd rather 躺平 (lying flat)    

Guess the BTG--Army organization structure has a huge problem for any operation deeper than 50km.  in old Bn-Regt-Div-Army structure, Bn draw supply from Regt/Div, who in turn get their supply from Army. The Army HQ only has to take care of a couple request. Now you have 15-20 BTG commander request re-supply at different location simultaneously. That is a nightmare from Administration point of view. To make the situation worse is who is RESPONSIBLE to protect the 15-20 supply conveys?  Traffic jam could easily happen with so many conveys moving on road. Should the supply has the higher priority or move the troops forward has the higher priority?
 
I feel bad for those Russian staff officers in Army HQ .  

Guess the BTG--Army organization structure has a huge problem for any operation deeper than 50km.  in old Bn-Regt-Div-Army structure, Bn draw supply from Regt/Div, who in turn get their supply from Army. The Army HQ only has to take care of a couple request. Now you have 15-20 BTG commander request re-supply at different location simultaneously. That is a nightmare from Administration point of view. To make the situation worse is who is RESPONSIBLE to protect the 15-20 supply conveys?  Traffic jam could easily happen with so many conveys moving on road. Should the supply has the higher priority or move the troops forward has the higher priority?
 
I feel bad for those Russian staff officers in Army HQ .  

I'm ok. I just too tired about all these news monitoring, so I havn't enough energy to write here. Today I tried to depart my wife from the city to her parents in more calm Cherkasy oblast, but we can't reach to railway station. Municipal transport stopped on the left bank of Kyiv, though on the right it works like and subway. 
All day from my balcony, wich exits to Obolon' and Vyshhorod periodically heard a sounds of shellings. Now I heard outcoming shots of our 2S7 Pion guns, located in 5 km from my house close to city limit. They fire somewhere to the west, where Russian troops concentrates to attack on the city. All day there were periodycal clashes on the line Irpin'-Bucha-Vorzel-Hostomel. There was attempt of Russian tank attack from Chernobyl zone through Ivankiv on Kyiv, but because of we had a time to demolish the bridges through the Teterev river, they halted. 

I found this map useful. Reading lots of rumours about Russian forces in the NE running low on supply and are foraging fuel and food.
Difficult to make a guess, but it seems to me the Russian Armed Forces plan was counting on the UKR army to fall apart very quickly. Especially the NE seems to be they are much slower than planned. Looks like a double envelopment on Kiev became a single armed thrust.
There are also reports that the 76th Airborne Division was earmarked to fly into Hostomel but landed instead in Gomel (right at the intersection of the borders between RUS, UKR and BEL).
The UKR govt is doing the right thing by having a third party - Israel, country well known for its long held sympathy for all things Nazi - to broker a cease fire. But the rhethoric from the RUS govt doesn't make very optimistic tbh. Also, threatening Finland and Sweden... well, I guess we can all make our own minds about it.

The only angle I can think of right now is that he has somehow managed to penetrate the Ukrainian military and government and has cut a drug deal behind the scenes.  However, beyond being insulting to those Ukrainians who are currently dying for their country, this also raise the obvious question of "why do a full scale invasion act?"  I mean if he had sway inside the Ukrainian government why not pull that lever and stage a coup from the inside a la Crimea?  Cruise missiles and massive rocket bombardments do not demonstrate a sophisticated political warfare approach. 
So unless Putin has been dozing through the last 30 years of western misadventures or simply has been smoking his own supply and thinks "I will be different" because I ride bears on the weekend, this dance makes no sense.  This is the chapter Clausewitz never got to; "war is sometimes just plain dumb".

You better believe that China is closely watching the response from the West for this.

As you can see in the video here, what we see in game is not representative of reality: 
 

@ncc1701e
The game use these vehicles very simplified.
The core of COP is 1V14 - vehicle of battery comamnder. 1V14 crew can establish single main observation post or two or three observation posts - main, forward and side. Usually there are main and forward. Main located near battalion HQ. Forward - close to forward positions. Forward obserwation post usually leads control platoon commander and he is a spotter (this is FO team in unit editor). Main observation post usually deployed out of 1V14 - equipmnet allows to use it outside. 1V14 has obsolete equipment, so by experience of Donbas war used mostly as transport, than for FO missions. In real life positin of 1V14 is "zero point" for artillery battery. Relatively it current coordinates, the  firing data are calculated. So, in real life you can't move 1V14 from previous position more than on several dozen meters and open fire immediately - you have to re-calculate own coordinates and this will take as miniumum 6 minutes for very rough result (and probably your firing will have big under/over shots) and about 20 minutes for more precise data. In the game you can change position and open fire simultainously.
PRP-4M - this is the almost the same thing that Forward observation post, but which have own armor and this is vehicle of artillery battalion level. PRP can move on battlefield, determine coordinates of targets, transmit its to 1V14 or on higher levels etc. So, it almost similar by purpose to BRM-1K. PRP-4M has radar and even one of the first Soviet thermal sight 1PN59 (but in the game it probably has radar only). PRP-4M can conduct artillery recon in more improtant sector of artillery battalion or can be attached to one of battalion's battaries as additional recon means
1V152 is new Russian FO vehicle wich should substitute 1V14 and 1V18 (not present in the game - the same as 1V14, but on the base of BTR-60PB for towed artillery) vehicles. But it also can be used with the same purposes like PRP-4.
 

I won this as Russian in a PBEM.
Talking from my memory, some details could be wrong.
My original plan is to take the left route. I sneak the ATGM teams, RPG teams into a building on the left flank, also put two BTR-82A as a reverse. Everyone hold fire or hiding behind the buildings. Trying to use a Zergling rush to deal with UKR’s BMP-2,  unhide and fire or move into a clear LOF simultaneously. But I accidentally found a different route, next to the left flank main road there is slope leads to the apartment buildings and the tower, infantry can climb it. I send out sappers to breach the wall first, then breach the building, move one room to another. I occupied all three apartment buildings. That cut the distance to the BMP-2 into half. Then a RPG-7 shot from the apartment kills the BMP-2 (or maybe it is the ATGM fired from a two store building in left flank, I can’t remember). Anyway kill the BMP-2 makes a clear breakthrough. I advance from building to building under careful over-watch. Then I occupied all the VP in the center, hit ceasefire , won the battle as Tactical victory.

About 7 degrees is the best you can hope for ...

It did however seem to raise their helmets off their heads just before they were vapourised? 

A scenario covering this is already avaliable - carious at malinava - 
Made by George Mc i belive...Its a very good scenario.

In FCRS (Flashpoint Campaigns: Red Storm) a wargame that feature Brigade/Division level operations in 1989, Soviets player can still triumph NATO player with carefully planned artillery bombardment, keep well spaced, rested echelons in high combat readiness, determined to send out 2nd echelons to explore any breakthrough. But that’s an operational wargame. The game itself is balanced with devastating artillery effects and exaggerate numbers of Sov Tanks that can fire tube launch ATGM.
I agree in Combat Mission scope, a 1989 timeline will bring a tremendous challenge to Sov player.
Soviet’s land force looks formidable in 1982
On the other hand, Soviets air power and sea power in 1982 have the largest technology gap with NATO.  

When playing solo QMB I tend to turn up the EW all the way up for both sides.  I just assume that the air would be filled with tons of electronic noise making communication difficult.

das ist gut!

That's quite a layered question, with some curveballs thrown in, so bear with me:

Firstly, sourcing:
https://www.armyupress.army.mil/Portals/7/Hot Spots/Documents/Russia/2017-07-The-Russian-Way-of-War-Grau-Bartles.pdf
In some respects this is apparently (and unsurprisingly, since it's five years later) out of date by now, but it's absolutely relevant for CMBS.

In there, you can see that the majority of the fundamentals of Soviet doctrine have survived intact into the modern day - attacking on-line for maximum mass, the focus on meeting engagements, on counter-attack in the defence, etc. In this sense, CMCW lets you see those fundamentals very clearly, in their intended context, before you translate them to a new one.

First curveball - there's a large difference between Russia vs Ukraine and Russia vs the US here. The latter is significantly more asymmetric, so ends up breaking a lot of the rules or otherwise forcing you out of where you want to be. That's essentially why things like Javelin exist, of course - they're supposed to be disruptive technology, aimed at plausible opposition. Will focus on Russia vs Ukraine then, with some notes on the US at the end.

Second curveball - I'm not convinced that all Black Sea scenarios capture or represent the main tropes of hyper-modern warfare as well as they could. Arguably that's true for all CM titles, but I suspect it's inevitably a little worse for Black Sea, due to the speculative nature of everything. As an example of that, Between Two Fahrbahns in Cold War. That's scenario that's great fun to play from either side, plays well H2H, and it's perfectly competent... but isn't terribly representative of "Cold War", and doesn't really make an argument, express a concept or investigate a tactical problem of the period. The same scenario might as well have Shermans vs Panzer IVs and it would work equally well.

So, what defines Black Sea? Philip Karber has a definition of the real combat in the region as "high intensity combat on a low density battlefield", and I think that core idea should also define CMBS. As a basic rule of thumb then - it's pretty common to use a Quick Battle map that's one size larger than your force. In Black Sea I think that should really be two sizes larger by default. That same thinking can/should apply to scenarios, but it's intended as a quick representation of the idea.

The other difference in theme is that in Cold War the operational tempo is paramount. Typically the tactical battlefield is not something that needs to be taken, it's something that needs to be move through, as fast as possible. This is part of the reason why the Soviets could be (had to be) comparatively free with casualties - gaining operational freedom is the goal here, and the tactical-level losses are acceptable.

This is not true for Black Sea. The Russian army is smaller, more casualty-adverse, and isn't screaming towards the Rhine at maximum velocity. This means you'll be more interested in capturing objectives, and can't afford to take the losses. In addition, the Russian army has significantly improved equipment. Much better spotting and C2, faster call-in times for artillery, ERA and APS, drones to call in massed fires, etc. They also have pushed assets down to lower levels - not as much as the US do, but significantly more than the Soviets, meaning that small units are significantly more capable and independent. The Russian air defence is significantly better than the US, so they should have drone superiority (and the US have nothing that can shoot down Zala at all). 

So how do you marry these two ideas? Soviet fundamentals, whilst being casualty-adverse? This is perhaps the major problem to solve as the Russians, but a lot of it comes down to controlling your engagements. You still want to be attacking on-line, with maximum firepower against a subset of the enemy, but you want to be careful as and when you engage, and to control that engagement with overwhelming firepower. An actual engagement might only last a minute or two, and a battle might be a lot of sneaking and manoeuvre, followed by a brief period of devastating fires. High intensity, Low density.

The first mission of the Russian campaign in the core game is indicative, I think. This is fundamentally a Soviet doctrinal meeting engagement. This is identical in concept to Miller's training scenario from CMCW, or the first mission of the Soviet campaign in Cold War, but the differences start to become apparent.

In the Russian campaign scenario, you have all the elements of that meeting engagement - you have a recon platoon, followed by a Forward Security Element of a BMP-3 company and a tank platoon, and they should be doing the same fundamental job.

The differences really start when the follow-up to that FSE is a single tank company, and not an entire battalion. That means that you're inherently more limited in how you can approach this.

The approach I took with this was to advance with the recon platoon and get spots along the route of contact, then advance at the speed of the fireplan. The FSE wants to march into a valley, so, suppressing the high town objective on the valley's far side is what allowed the follow-on tank company to take up a base of fire on the right side hill, on-line, and dominate the valley with fires.

The FSE can then approach into the valley floor, preceded with drone-summoned fires on the central objective, and with covering fires on likely enemy positions to the flanks. This FSE can then bypass, surround and reduce the central objective, before moving on to take on the others to the conclusion.

At each stage the fundamentals are the same - your fire plan is paramount, and in each bound you're attempting to go fires-first, maximising firepower at every engagement. 

So, how about the US? Well, Abrams, Bradley and Javelin represent disruptive technology, that will do terrible things to you. The fundamentals remain identical, but you can do everything right and still lose sometimes, and anything you do wrong will be punished severely. Fighting javelins is about firepower and the terrain read - they're systems used on foot, and the modern US infantryman doesn't like mortars anymore than anyone else does, so denying potential javelin positions is as important as anything. Abrams need to be engaged from the flank where possible (ideally from two angles at once), and Bradleys are near-psychic in their spotting, so you need to engage them quickly and decisively with excellent recon - you never want to get into an engagement where you don't already have spotting contacts.

So the fragmentation bug has been logged but I was wondering if information about this had also been logged as a bug or linked to the fragmentation ticket? It seems related to the fragmentation bug as the impact on armor (track only damage) is also occurring here. However in this case it is triggered by a direct impact on the vehicles ERA.

Issue
When artillery shells impact an ERA block it shows the same effect as an air burst or near miss. Damage will only be done to the tracks and no other tank systems are effected. In the attached images/file you can see an Oplot take a hit to the ERA directly adjacent to the main gun and suffer only track damage.

Test
Game: Black Sea
Artillery: 203mm 2S7M
Target: Oplot

images and saved game

https://we.tl/t-J0iGUhNcgn

https://imgur.com/a/ynY0LkL

I have not tested this in a long while.  However the below use to be true.  If anybody has updated info please let us know. 
Some vehicles do not get benefit from their primary thermal sensor if buttoned:
M1151 Recon Humvee
M1167 ATGM Humvee
M1127 Stryker RV
M1131 Stryker FSV
M1200 Armored Knight

I have frozen fingers while playing!
C'est beau 🥰

Do you mean 三个臭皮匠，合个诸葛亮?
Like 3 idiots are better than 1 clever person?🙂

Lower front is definitely a week spot. In CMRT, 100mm and 122mm can easily penetrate this part <1000m. 
 
A little OT. I know there were some discussion before. People says TacAI is aiming at the center part of the AFV.  I have noticed that in dozen cases a fully exposed KT or Panther received first hit through a penetration on lower front hull.  This cannot be explained by lucky shots. My feeling is TacAI intentionally aiming at the weak point.  
Of course this is just my impression from dozen cases, it needs some more testing to confirm this is true.
 

Thank you all.
Sorry, I should press 1 , go down to a ground view level. I will do an unprofessional terrain analysis later in this post.
I played five more turns. Things changed. First, my inf plt ambushed by German inf, I brought up a plt of T-34 to support the inf but that drag me into an unwanted tank gun duel with part of German right wing and the forward defense Panzers. In the end I was lucky to pull this off. Trade one T-34 with one Pz IV, I was really really lucky. Then,  another reinforcement show up , that’s unexpected , I blame the vague mission briefing. German has their reinforcement too but overall, I have better reinforcement.
Now I have 2 IS-2 (late) + 2 IS-2 (mid) + 34 T-34/85 + 5 SU-85 + 5 SU-122 + 98 smoke rounds + 96 152mm artillery rounds. vs 23 Pz IV + 5 Nashorn + 3 (possible 4)   Jagdpanzer IV 75mm/L48 version.
The increased tank number makes me favor option 2 more. Because option 1 gives a very narrow funnel route to get into fire position. I have 48 AFV here. It’s over crowded. Any small mistake could cause a terrible traffic jam which leads to my tank forces be sent into firefight in piecemeal.  
Anyway, domfluff thanks for your thought, the map is flat like a frying pan. There is a crest on the map. I marked in orange. Pass this crest and you will have visual contact with German. With CM’s black magic that makes MK1 eyeballs to see targets behind trees , 30+ German AFV firepower can be a remarkable welcome party.

Here is the view from position 1,   forward Pz IVs are in a prefect reverse slope defense position. You will have to deal with both forward elements and main defense line here.

Position 2 , it appears to be concealed by trees , but you know this game can generate some unpleasant surprise 😊 . Anyway , part of German force have a clear LOF on this position.

 
2.1,  turn left from position 2. Here you have good flank shots on German forward elements. If you can accept a hail of fire from the main defense line.

2.2, this is the planned river crossing point.  Behind that the flood plain/mud terrain is the narrowest part on the map. That's good because I can’t afford a whole tank co. bogged in mud.

3, an excellent place to flank shot forward elements. But the avenue of approach is to narrow, I will assign only one tank plt here.

(I will upload the ground view from 4 and 5 later, can’t find the screenshot. They must be on another laptop.)
So, here is the updated plan, I will delay the final attack for 20 more min. The 152mm and 76mm needs FO team, and there is only one FO team on the map. It takes 19min for 152mm to target Nashorns.  As soon as the fire mission confirmed I will let FO team start the 76mm smoke mission. Hopefully 152mm barrage will kill some if not all the Nashorns.  IS-2 will lead the attack. Hopefully they will absorb enough 75mm APC rounds before some lucky shots find IS-2's weak points on the armor plate. With gentle wind, 76mm and 82mm smoke should last 5-6 min. It is highly unlikely that I can make  two T-34/85 tank co. cross the river in less than 5 min. I have to accept a long-range duel. Must win the first fire fight fast, then wait for the smoke disperse, win the round 2 fire fight.