Did 1.03 do anything to make atgm vehicles better? and Why no BMP2M auto launching smoke?

[cool breeze]

Ok my title made it sound like there are just 2 parts but really its 3. 

 

I was just playing a quick battle vs the AI yesterday, on the super long skinny valley map (Edit to add :  Huge Novohurivka -Open).  US attacking AI heavy mech forces are generally able to beat me as the defending Russians on this map, but I try it sometimes when I feel like trying to handle the Ami sensor advantage head on.  This last play through brought up 3 things I wanted to post about.

 

Firstly, this is a really nice map but I rally wish it was slightly extended on the defenders side.  I don't like how the attacker gets loads of hulldown, high ground,  treeline positions to roll up into yet the defender has to start either hull up or in a lower and somewhat awkward places.  It seems like the map might have been snipped from a bigger map, if that's the case I would love for their to be released a version that just included a little more area in the back.  I understand if the desire was to make it so the attacker only has to attack through one reverse slope position, instead of one and then a little baby and kind of gameyly incomplete second one.  but it doesn't have to be a actual down again thing after the defenders peak, it could just be a little low area on the high area to be hull down in.   I imagine it being an often picked map since it has the really long dimension for some long range battling, and I think people would get a lot of enjoyment out of a better long range initial showdown. 

 

Secondly, BMP2M.  One of the coolest vehicles in the game... except it seems kind of messed up now.  Other people have pointed out the draw line stuff but that's a pretty big deal I wanted to bring it up again.  The BMP2 is ugly and not cool, I don't like my BMP2M looking like BMP2.   But that's not why I'm posting about them, I'm posting about them because they failed my plan.   lol  (like most complaints).    I bought a whole company of them, and their main job was to be hanging out slightly more exposed than my krysanthema to provide IR blocking smoke when they get lazed.  But apparently they don't have a laser warning receiver.  I managed to manually pop smoke with 2 of them.... so not a total waste but not quite a full company of mech infantry worth of utility (mostly my fault, I didn't even dismount hardly any of them... wasn't a serious game I just like playing with those kysanthema sometimes).

 

Thirdly ,  OMG did Krysanthma get changed over patch 1.03 to have its mast mounted missile system work exactly how you would expect?  My most successful one was simply hulldown in the grass at not very long range.  It destroyed 2 Abrams and 3 Bradleys and shot all its missiles, I'm not sure it was ever spotted.  Shortly after that I send him back to hide(since hes out of ammo) and his platoon mate near by engages some tanks and brads nearby from another hulldown open ground position.  After some shots he gets spotted and engaged by the brad, but the brad can only see the missile mast, and engages that.  This was at around minimum range for the Krysanthema maybe even less, so around 700 meters.  So although most of the 25mm missed some hit and it wasn't long until both launch tubes were knocked out sequentially, but the hull was never even hit.. Anyway this platoon managed to shoot over 20 missiles from short range and in the open, and the whole thing made feel like the game was handling the missile mast and radar mast thing better than before.  I imagine that if there was a little ridge to be hulldown behind at the back of the map,  the krysanthma would really dominate that initial long range confrontation.  As the map is now, the whole Krys battery I had hiding in the trees at the back did less than the platoon in the open at short range but hull down.  They shot some missiles but mostly just got blown up, didn't manage to pop any smoke back their.  And in case anyone is thinking the platoon that did so great did it because they were in the smoke, not because of the hulldown;  I don't think that's the case.  I did use smoke and it did help but I didn't notice em shooting thought it at all, I think it just kept me less outnumbered in the engagement.

Edited May 18, 2015 by cool breeze

[LukeFF]

Why no BMP2M auto launching smoke?

 

Because it's not fitted with that sort of capability, as you already found out.

Edited May 18, 2015 by LukeFF

[cool breeze]

Thank you for the very helpful reply   I thought that might be the case.... lol but seems an oversight on the Russians part in that case.... all that work to upgrade em and all, I don't imagine LWR weights or costs too much. So I guess as far as you know from your beta testing there wasn't anything done in particular about how the ATGM vehicles with the little mast work?

 

Edit to add:  woops didn't mean to upvote myself that was supposed to be for your helpful reply

Edited May 18, 2015 by cool breeze

[Neurasthenio]

Mast mount working properly would be great indeed to use those vehicles as they were supposed to be used! Should be possible with a game tracking individual bullet paths.

[Kieme(ITA)]

You can have a laser warning IFV with the BMP-3 Shtora. As you can see it's not much weight, but the system is complex as it needs several receivers to cover all sides of the turret. The BMP-2M lacks this kind of feature.