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Valley of Death (spoilers)


Jammersix

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Are TOW missiles non-starters?

 

Go ahead, make a Russian's day. Take a Bradley, launch a TOW missile at a T-90 from three clicks away. Poof. No more Bradley. TOW misses because well, it's hard to control a TOW missile when you're nothing but an expanding explosion. Particularly when your Bradley is part of the same 'splosion. The time it takes a TOW to travel three clicks is plenty of time to focus the whole platoon on the firing Bradley.

 

Back In The Day, before any of the officers here were born, TOW was sold to us as the way we were going to win at the Fulda Gap.

 

That isn't what this game shows.

Edited by Jammersix
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You have Javelins, Abrams, and various things that really need to be kept out of the way, and lof.  Remember this, at all times, and in all scenarios.  Its worse when the APS swats it, and then it kills you. It really drives home that TOW is more or less obsolete. At least if BFCs modeling is even close.

 

I wouldn't say TOW is obsolete...that's a little overboard. I have had my Bradleys spot and kill with TOW's in defensive positions many times, if you are driving a Bradley into an attack you should be aware that its at a significant disadvantage compared to an Abrams.

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I had an interesting thing happen a few days ago. My Brad crested a hill to find a BMP on the other side. The BMP fired two missiles at me in fairly quick succession only to have my APS swat down both. Whew! Then my Brad opened up with his chain gun, which sent the BMP to the promised land. Funny thing, if the BMP had used his own cannon instead of missiles, he probably would have won the fight since he reacted faster.

 

Michael

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I found when the Bradleys are approximately out of Javelin range and hull down, they have enough time to back out off sight when lased by enemy tanks.

I didn't really like the Red AI in this scenario though, they were just doing a suicidal tank rush into the teeth of my defense. And the surviving tanks then did another suicidal tank rush out off the valley and drove straight through my advancing infantry screen.

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I just finished the scenario for the first time, and lost a minor victory to the AI.

 

So I can see how the Russians can win it.

 

They overran everything, went clear to the end of the map, killed my mortar carriers, then came back through the field, killing my company CP.

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I've seen plenty of Abrams killed frontally at 1000-2000 meters (even more so at less than 800). Lower front hull, weapon mount and at a side angle even those two frontal turret slabs are vulnerable if you hit them at 90 degrees. Better not get hit and get the drop on the Russian tanks. If your Abrams are moving and the russians are not, you lose a big part of that spotting advantage.  Also, 3 on 1 attacks and more results in a bad day for the Abrams. 

Edited by antaress73
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Two of my Abrams were killed. I play on iron, so there is no "rewind, rewind, how did that happen?" option.

 

One of them burst into flame, the other was immobilized by artillery, and then shot to pieces.

 

Iron doesn't have anything to do with a rewind option, WE-GO allows one minute turns that can be rewinded and watched over and over again, real time is just like Company of Heroes.

Edited by Raptorx7
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CoH is a different pure RTS game. Playing on Iron only means that friendly units have to spotted as well which to me is just nuisance.

Anyways, I would have thought that unless you gave your Abrams a Reverse order to the other side of the map. When I played this vs AI the Russians didn't fire any artillery at all. Also, I believe there is nothing in the game which can penetrate the Abrams turret front, not even the AT-14, so they are almost unkillable when hull down

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The front turret can be penetrated depending on the angle .. The gun mantlet is very vulnerable for example.. Also. The 960 mm of protection for the two turret slabs is from directly facing the tank. They are angled and in reality actual thickness is probably 700-750mm. Which means if you have lets say two tanks each facing the Abrams not totally from the front and on each side one will hit the armor and not penetrate (and die) but the other one stands a much better chance of hitting the other turret front slab at an angle of 90 degrees which offers much less protection. The Svinets-2 that the russians use in the game can penetrate 730mm-750mm at 2000 meters. Do the math. I've seen it more than once. Two nice holes at 800 meters on that right turret slab. At battlesight ranges 1000 meters and less with the Russian optics magnification (x16) its possible to hit the gun mantlet consistently if you keep your cool and remember your training. Point and shoot, the trajectory is very flat. How is this translated in the game probably depends on the experience level, motivation and current suppression state of the crew (nervous, shaken, okay).

As for missiles like Kornets, AT-10 Stabber the key is elevation . You must be higher than the Abrams so you can hit the top armor (I've killed an Abrams hitting the top of the turret with a stabber from a BMP-3M and another with a Kornet hitting the front upper hull from a top down angle )

It's not impossible but you must be careful and plan. Doesnt work all the time of course but it's better than nothing. But being at an higher elevation will maximize your chances.

The best is side shots of course. Then everything will penetrate IF you shoot first and hit (even the new 30mm APDS that the BMP-3M fires).

Edited by antaress73
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I've played this scenario as the Russians... russian Total victory on warrior... lost 11 tanks against the  abrams... 3 to javelins.. one to precision arty (yeah... the AI uses it) and 1 to a TOW-2B fired from a Bradley total: 16 tanks. None of the Bradleys and Abrams survived... three Abrams were killed frontally,  2 with side shots as I had moved forward two tank companies on each side of the map with one on overwatch in the line of wood overlooking that valley. So when the abrams faced one company... they presented part of their sides to the other... and it was long range too.. you dont have much a choice since to close you need to use that choke point in the middle which is suicidal. I lost only 3 BMPS since I kept them pretty much out of the fight and took the town in the middle with the infantry they were carrying.. so they were used as taxi. One got a M3A3 with his auto-cannon and that's all. Oh and yeah, Relikt saved some T-90AM against the M1 4-5 times (at long range). I made the mistake of not waiting for the third company to be on overwatch before engaging the americans with the two companies... it arrived on position halfway into the fight so I probably lost more tanks than necessary. I will read the briefing attentively the next time. 

 

88 americans killed 25 wounded... 53 russians killed (tanks) and 10 wounded.

 

You can win as the russians..Rinaldi did an AAR as the russians and he lost fewer tanks than me (11 I think)  with a total victory too, The difference was probably me not reading the briefing carefully and waiting for that third company to be on overwatch before advancing into the valley.

Edited by antaress73
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The stupid thing about CMBS is that the brads always LAZE the tanks. Ask any armor or cav guy and they will tell you that lazing is done ONLY when using the canon - as its unnecessary when firing TOWs. They train to judge distance by using the reticle (mil dots) - no laze required. If it's closer than 3600 meters, fire. If the tank doesn't track the brad in thermals, visually spot the missile in the air, and doesn't detect a laze, it should be toast.

Edited by tyrspawn
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I found when the Bradleys are approximately out of Javelin range and hull down, they have enough time to back out off sight when lased by enemy tanks.

I didn't really like the Red AI in this scenario though, they were just doing a suicidal tank rush into the teeth of my defense. And the surviving tanks then did another suicidal tank rush out off the valley and drove straight through my advancing infantry screen.

 

Hmm. I find scenario very difficult. I picked off 5 of the approaching T-90s before they could reach the valley with ATGMs and another 2 were killed by precision arty after they had reached the valley. Some were degraded by artillery too. No losses on my side. But now, i am 1:15 hours in the scneario, i have got approximately 2 enemy tank companies sitiing in a reversed slope position in front of me and i have absolutely no idea what to do. Any attack would be suicide IMO. I am hitting them with artillery but i dont have enough of it to kill them all. Any ideas? Maybe crawl some Javelins up? Tactically the situation is a worst case scenario for the Blue forces.

Edited by agusto
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The stupid thing about CMBS is that the brads always LAZE the tanks. Ask any armor or cav guy and they will tell you that lazing is done ONLY when using the canon - as its unnecessary when firing TOWs. They train to judge distance by using the reticle (mil dots) - no laze required. If it's closer than 3600 meters, fire. If the tank doesn't track the brad in thermals, visually spot the missile in the air, and doesn't detect a laze, it should be toast.

 

Youn are absolutely right. I hope BFC tweaks lazing at some point in the future.

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