OPFOR Thermal Sights Suggestion

[Larry Stephens]

Major,

I’ve been playing TacOps for a few months now and have been dutifully reading all of the Gazettes that you have compiled on the game. Based on my (very) limited playing experience, one point I’ve read concerning the AI seems to particularly ring true. The point has been made in the past that, without thermal sights, OPFOR tends to have a difficult time winning when the Blue side uses smoke. You have pointed out that this would seem to be a realistic result as supported by the experiences of the Gulf War. You have also made the point that countries fielding OPFOR equipment can’t afford the high cost of developing and fielding thermal sights. Both of these points make sense to me.

To increase the challenge when playing against the AI, TacOps allows the player to allocate thermal sites to OPFOR units in the Preferences menu. Although this certainly makes things more difficult for the Blue player, it also tends to make OPFOR too strong because of the large disparity in units that is common to most TacOps scenarios.

I was wondering if a ‘compromise’ could be made. Would it be possible to modify the TacOPs game engine to outfit either a fixed or a random percentage of eligible OPFOR units with thermal sights? Given that cost is a major consideration, it would certainly seem logical if OPFOR was only able to outfit some of their units with thermal sights. One implementation approach might be to expand the opening Preferences selection to permit OPFOR thermal sights to be allocated to a random percentage of OPFOR units at the beginning of a scenario. An alternative approach would be to allow the player to select a fixed percentage allocation from a selection menu.

I have no idea what degree of effort this kind of program change would require but would be interested in hearing your thoughts. Obviously, your database already indicates which units have a thermal sight capability but I have to think that, if it was really simple, you would have already done it. On the surface at least, it would certainly seem to provide a defensible means of balancing game play against the AI.

Larry Stephens

[Guest MajorH]

Kind of hard to get there from here but it could be done.

I guess the main reason it hasn't occurred to me to add this is that the total OPFOR force in a scenario is usually a battalion or a regiment. Within that limited framework it seems unlikely to me that there would be a mix of thermally and nonthermally equipped units.

Something to think about though.

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Best regards, Major H

majorh@mac.com

[James Sterrett]

Another point of view on this from a purely game-balance perspective.

Playing one of my long-term email opponents in a long series of games of TF Gallagher, we have eventually gotten to the point where Opfor cannot win - even with thermals and advanced warheads. Experiments into possible ways to beef up Opfor were terminated by a variety of troubles but may start up again after we have a fling with some Canadian units. 8)

I am **not** saying this balance will be found by everyone. It's possible John & I are simply better at defending, or know each other's attack patterns too well. But Opfor does not necessarily have far too much kit to beat, even with thermals, advanced warheads, and extra tank battlaion, and the slam-bang arrival schedule of Gallagher 8.

[Allan Wotherspoon]

Personally I would like to see different versions of vehicles with and without thermals rather than having a preference switch give all tanks thermals or not. That way you could mix and match your force, giving say one company from each battalion thermals if you wanted. It seems that would be a technically easier way to implement it.

The other thing I would like to see is some differentiation in thermal ranges. There is now some unclassified stuff out there on useful ranges for thermals and they generally are a lot less than 4000m for 1st gen thermals and not much more than 3200m for the latest generation.

Allan