raven80

Kieme CMBS USA Abrams
 
Let's be honest, whatever modern game you get your hands on, you can't avoid to feel this one as the battlefield's king. That's why I was so undecided upon so many things that, in the end, I had to base most of the weathering on the few recent photos showing M1A2 SEPs in europe during joint trainings. Thanks also to Saferight's force specific screens mod and its good pictures.
The trickiest part is the side ERA/spaced armor. BFC should really differentiate between the turret blocks and the skirt ones, otherwise you ca't get mud on the lower blocks without splashing unrealistically all the blocks in the same way and the upper turret sides.
 
Download:
https://app.box.com/s/24plheazjvgue3y883gmrqkblhum95ia
 
Changelog:
-darkened and desaturated colors
-enhanced details
-added light rain marks
-added 2 layers of dust and dirt
-added 2 layers of dry and fresh mud
-added subtle scratches
-added local effects
-new normal maps
-includes US vehicle gear and US vehicle MGs textures
 
Previews:

***   Spoilers ***   Didn't get to this during Beta, but just played it through as RUS and liked it a lot.  Restarted after misunderstanding a note in the briefing so I had a little intel, but played honest otherwise.  My only gripe is that I strongly dislike small maps that have usable/critical terrain right on the boundary.  The road on the left (from RUS perspective) is a critical avenue of approach, but the attacking Russian player has no concern for his security to the left side of it as that is all off map!  Introduces an artificiality that is just never there in real life, esp. in urban combat where 360 security is a constant issue.  Other than that, the AI plan was obviously very well thought out, the forces were fairly well balanced, and I got ground up pretty good before winning.  Key to victory was direct-fire 30mm support from the BTRs.  Their autocannon is so bloody destructive it hurts.  In one instance I meant to target/briefly, but screwed up and used target, when suppressing a small UKR element. Wound up dropping the whole top floor of the building, a vantage point I had actually wanted to use!  **spoiler**  I was also lucky in that I anticipated the sniper team in the church and guessed right on the floor they were on.  They got a face full of 30mm from my setup zone before ever firing a shot.  Never did get the mortar mission into play, which is silly as I could really have used the smoke, but was fixated on just the limited HE ammo and trying to conserve until needed.  I used a LOT of the BTR and INF laid smoke.  Critical factor.  Wound up killing the tank from behind with a BTR's 30mm, after running out of ATGMs and missing several times with RPGs.  It had counterattacked (painfully) to a point overwatching the bridge, but then lost morale and tried to run away, right past a BTR I had maneuvered around the whole back side of the map.  Overall a fun game, good small fairly fast scenario, that rewards good reconnaissance and  methodical urban combat techniques.  

I Played this one as the Russians first and got a Minor victory first time through. Ukrainian snipers and those pesky AGS grenade launchers set up on roof tops in ambush regularly picked off my engineers and M-R infantry as well as a couple of my BTR's. M-R squad would approach with BTR in overwatch so snipers would get off there one kill before being annihilated by the BTR's cannon fire often bringing down walls on one side of the building. One of my BTR's took out the Ukranian BMP positioned just over the bridge but The Ukrainian tank took out this same BTR as I was approaching the bridge so I brought some engineers up to blast some holes in the side of buildings and managed to take out with one of my RPG-7 teams. The one bridge crossing over the road was a severe choke point and lost a lot of my Russian forces attempting to cross the bridge to the other side despite having numerous M-R infantry and machine gun teams set up in over-watch in buildings  on the Russian side of the bridge. I made the mistake of trying to complete the mission without first bringing up the 2nd platoon which arrives as a reinforcement where I should of put first platoon which had suffered about 20% casualties on approach to the bridge into over-watch into buildings overlooking the bridge and use my 2nd platoon at full strength to make the assault over the bridge and into the town square. Used one of my BTR's to area fire from across the bridge on the top of the church steeple as this was the highest location on the battlefield and would have been an ideal location for an sniper or artillery observer. Final assault into the square was deadly and all of my remaining BTR's were picked off by RPG's or grenade launchers from various ambush positions iin/on buildings. I had one BTR left which was immobilized on the Russian side of the bridge which I left in overwatch across from the church/steeple which thankfully took out a lot of the Ukrainian forces snipping my infantry. I used my artillery 82mm mortar mission rather in-effectively in linear against the strong hold position of buildings located opposite side of the map from the town square victory objective. Last of my anti tank platoons was destroyed by the Ukrainian BMP which was located at the back of the town opposite side of map from the town square in a deadly ambush position. As I had captured the main objective being the town square and was nearly down to half strength I decided not to waste any more Russian lives on trying to destroy the last Ukrainian BMP and fast forward the remaining turns to the end scoring a Russian minor victory. This was a really enjoyable mission and highlighted just how deadly urban close quarters combat is and just how fragile vehicles are in such urban combat environments. Russian M-R squads also seem quite fragile when compared to there US counterparts as there was a number of times when only a few of the squad members were casualties then they would often throw there hands up in the air awaiting to be taken prisoner they seemed to be lacking in fire power but this could be just the way I had led them into ambush after ambush effectively diminishing there morale on several occasions. Great scenario looking forward to more like these:).

*******WARNING SPOILER **********
 
I played this scenario as the Russians, I dont want to brag but I got a Total victory. 750-100. The Ukrainians were down to 16 men holed up in the apartment complex. I lost 17 killed and 17 wounded along with 3 BTRs (2 on fire and another damaged and abandoned) . It's a challenging scenario for the Russians, no wonder people playing Ukraine against the AI are trashing the Russians. I used what little mortar rounds I had on the grenade launcher on the rooftop, using airbursts. I also killed an RPG team I detected on a rooftop on the other side of the bridge with my sniper team. BMP-2s are better than in Shock force BTW, they detected and killed some of my guys at long range.  The Oplot tank almost ruined my day but I detected it in time and managed to move two of my BTRs to a safe location. It ran into the other two at extreme close range (my BTRs were on a reverse slope) and it got raked pretty good by the two 30mm cannons (1 partial and I complete penetration). It nonetheless managed to kill one BTR and damage the other, with the surviving BTR's driver fleeing in panic. The Oplot then retreated because of too much damage and I finished it later with a dismounted RPG team from the infantry. 
 
Plenty of great nail biting moments in that battle. Best fun I've ever had in Combat mission. I was about to kill the tank when I first detected it (with an RPG team) but after staying still for two turns at a crossroad, the sucker decided to move out of sight as my RPG man was going to press the trigger hehe (costed me a BTR later)  The snipers that I sneaked in the little warehouse taking out the RPG team on the rooftop on the other side of the bridge was great too. I took out the last BMP at the corner of the map near the apartment complex using an antitank team I separated from the company HQ squad. I had loaded the squad with 4 RPG-26s acquired from the BTR and the team crawled its way to a nice flanking position on the BMP and nailed it on the second shot (they had two). Ammo expenditures for covering fire were extreme and for the first time in a game I had to bring forward the BTRs to resplenish my infantry. 

Nice. Poking the bear was a lot of fun testing. I think I probably went through it a dozen times in different iterations. Some unique challenges.  
That 2nd shot is poster worthy 

Night Stryker