Pham911 Posted August 29, 2000 Share Posted August 29, 2000 Not sure what to make of this: Using excess carriers to perform scouting during an night operation, I order one to drive fast down a road to look for enemy positions. The driver goes flying down the road at top speed, then stops 46 seconds into the turn when he spots a Puma aprox 10m in front of him on the road. My Carrier sits there, and the Puma, which was moving towards him when he spotted it, doesn't notice him. Ok, fine, I figure. I've lost a Carrier, as the Puma must spot him pretty damn quick. The Puma proceeds forward, still not seeing my carrier(not target line, no turret swivel). 50 seconds into the turn, no shots fired. The Puma has been closing the distance between them for 4 seconds now. 51 seconds, nothing. They're almost touching, and the Carrier is directly in front of the Puma's path. 52 seconds... The friggin Puma hits my carrier and begins shoving it out of the way. It keeps pushing and knocks the carrier a few feet to the left, and still makes no indication that it's even spotted it. Turn ends, the Puma is now about 5m behind my carrier, no shots fired, no attempt to engage, no sign that anyone on the Puma was paying attention. By the end of the turn, 2 other Puma's that are aprox 60m away have not only noticed my carrier, but have turned to face it and are targeting it, and my carrier has decided to back up and is now poised to overtake the Puma that just hit it by going in reverse. My question is this: How do you run into a 4 ton vehicle on what looked to be a clear road 10 seconds earlier and *not notice*? "So I was saying to my wife... (THUMP CRASH GROAN SHUDDER ENGINE WHINING). Mien Gott! What was that? Hmmm, looks clear now. So, as I was saying, Ja, I told my wife..." [edited for a typo] [This message has been edited by Pham911 (edited 08-29-2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff Heidman Posted August 29, 2000 Share Posted August 29, 2000 <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Pham911: Not sure what to make of this: Using excess carriers to perform scouting during an night operation,... <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Well, duh. The super-high fidelity CM models EVERYTHING. Playing at night, you have to deal with the fact that your men might just fall asleep... Jeff Heidman Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Los Posted August 29, 2000 Share Posted August 29, 2000 I can only say that this has happened plenty of times in real life. A few examples of night driving confusion: I spent the early part of my military career as a scout and then section-platoon sgt in a gun jeep platoon. No sleep for a few days then drone along on some overland night recon mounted mission. We used to crash into the guy in front of us all the time, especially with no lights on and pitch black. ALso were mixed up in enemy formations at night as we tried to sneak on by. Remember in combat there are no lights at night not even black out drive. (that's for the rear) Now locked up in an armored vehicle is even worse. Three Bradley's drove off an embankment after a long night movement one after the other about four years ago, six men killed. Each was following closely behind teh otehr droning along through the night. At NTC we've extracted mounted teams by driving 40-50km along OPFOR roads even mixing in with OPFOR vehicles but at night even with NODs it's hard to make out who's who. Working with an Eritean interpreter a few years ago who happened to be a tanker in the late unpleasantries with Ethiopia. At night heir tank slid right into the back of an Ethiopian column unnoticed amidts the enemy for about fifteen minutes with infantry walking right beside them. They then proceeded to blast the last three or four vehicles in column which created enough confusion to get away. It's really easy to sit there on one's god like perch and scorn some of the stuff that goes on with these funny little AI guys but spend a day doing this for real and it becomes more of a knowing smirk. Los Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Von Fauster Posted August 29, 2000 Share Posted August 29, 2000 <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Los: I can only say that this has happened plenty of times in real life. A few examples of night driving confusion... ...At NTC we've extracted mounted teams by driving 40-50km along OPFOR roads even mixing in with OPFOR vehicles but at night even with NODs it's hard to make out who's who. Los<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I'll vouch for that. I was mech infantry and we did a stint at NTC. I remember one night I was serving essentially as a listening post (or cannon foder- can't remember the actual tactics my CO was trying to employ) and had my M113 tucked nice and tight down in a wadi. Around 2 in the morning a platoon of OPFOR walked darn near RIGHT OVER my track. We're talking no more than 20 -30 yards away- and they never saw me. Couldn't believe it. In hindsight, I should have opened up on them with the .50 (there would have been lots of people changing their shorts. The flame barking out of a .50 at night is something to see) but frankly, I was just too weirded out to fire! Strange things happen. That's a fact. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L.Tankersley Posted August 29, 2000 Share Posted August 29, 2000 If you're looking for a concrete rationalization to explain what you saw, how about this: at night, not only can friendly units be mis-identified as enemies, but sometimes enemies can be misidentified as friends. The Puma driver sees someone drive up, and reasons it must be somebody tooling around in a Kubelwagen. He's not running away; he MUST be friendly, right? Now if he would only get that jalopy out of the road so I can go kill some Tommies... ------------------ Leland J. Tankersley Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Abbott Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 Even in daylight…. My brother (USMC) is unloading 175mm guns from flatcars on the way to a stationary firing range in Georgia. He says “It is so hot and dusty that all the drivers have their t-shirts off and soaked with water and wrapped around there heads with only a slit to look through”. He is bringing up the rear gun in the column. He goes on to say “I am driving through what appears to be only a dust cloud when all of a sudden I come up to the gun in front of me stopped on the road. I am doing about 30mph (which is much faster then you may imagine) no time to stop! I make a sharp right off the road up a wooded hill crashing through the trees. Make a 180 turn knocking down trees with the barrel in a big circle. Drive back down onto the road and form up into the column. The column then proceeds on a few more miles to the range. This entire racket was never noticed even in broad daylight, as there was so much dust and noise just from the drivers who were able to keep their guns on the road! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madpad Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 It's all well and good saying X and Y can happen in real life but does Combat Mission actually model enemy units being mis-identified as allied or was this a glitch? By the way I believe that training manuevres are completely different from actual combat situations particulary the type of scenarios that CM models i.e. short, violent and close quarters with no driving along for hours without enemy contact. Speaking to friends who have been in actual combat or dangerous situations (Northern Ireland) leads me to believe this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Aitken Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 Madpad wrote: > but does Combat Mission actually model enemy units being mis-identified Yes. ------------------ There's a splinter in your eye, and it reads REACT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dalem Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 My personal "holy crap how could that happen" story is from Richard Bach's Stranger to the Ground. Paraphrased as... 2 guys in a T-33 jet trainer in Spain. Back seater reaches down to adjust seat, accidentally inflates his life raft. This had happened before, so crews had stuck a knife blade below the seat to pop the raft. Backseater gets blade, pops raft, which explodes with a loud bang and cloud of talcum powder. During the initial inflation, the microphone cable had been disconnected from the backseater's helmet, so no commo back and forth between pilots. Frontseater hears loud BANG and sees cockpit fill with smoke, so he shuts down the engine. Backseater hears engine 'flame out', so punches out. Front seater ditches in swamp. Weird things happen. -dale Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scorpion Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 Madpad - not only that, but you will notice from time to time that during night ops your men can misidentify each other and start blasting away. When your .50 cal targets your mortar support at night, it doesn't turn out well for the mortars. -Scorp Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Los Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 "By the way I believe that training manuevers are completely different from actual combat situations particulary the type of scenarios that CM models i.e. short, violent and close quarters with no driving along for hours without enemy contact." That's ridiculous. Even the most casual of study of military history (or a stint in the military) will put that notion to rest. What you do in CM is take up from the time your troops cross the LD. You missed the fact that they were up all night and the couple days before preparing for the op or finishing the last one. How the hell do you think those forces got to where they were? Overwhelming and pervasive fatigue is a factor of high tempo combat operations that soldiers have to deal with and commanders have to plan for. Don't confuse police actions like Northern Ireland where the platoons go out on short duration patrols (WHich I'm sure in and of themselves take many hours of prep time to get ready for and conduct and are by nature also high stress) for what goes on in a modern (WW2) armored or mechanized battle. And CM does model confusion and misidentification on the battlefield. Even cases of friendly fire. Los Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Henri Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 And how about the time in Africa when Rommel drove right into the middle of a British encampment; they drove right back out and were never noticed by the tired soldiers for whome it was just another column of dusty vehicles. Henri Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Simon Fox Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 Exactly, this is one of the good things about CM not something to complain about. The anecdotes related here are just the tip of the iceberg and nothing to do with "training". I can think of about 10 WWII instances right off the top of my head. Often even when the units realised their misidentification they were so mixed up that no-one wanted a fight anyway. My grandfather was in a British divisional intelligence unit and he had a few personal tales of driving his jeep along in German convoys at night. Los is right about friendly fire too, Ken Tout relates a story of two British SP guns blasting the hell out of each other in Normandy. IIRC there were only a couple of survivors from both crews. ------------------ "More German prisoners were now arriving. There were well over 150 of them, with a lot more yet to be brought in. I watched them sitting in the dust, knowing they must have been in a state of shock. This was something that had never happened before. They couldn't bring themselves to admit that this was their first defeat of the war. Not only that, but it was suffered at the hands of Australian infantrymen, who were vastly outnumbered and fighting their first battle of the war." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevilDog Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 By the way I believe that training manuevres are completely different from actual combat situations particulary the type of scenarios that CM models i.e. short, violent and close quarters with no driving along for hours without enemy contact. Madpad: All CM models is the actual engagement, usually fighting forces are in the field for months at a time. It can get very miserable and you would not believe the fatigue you can experience. The difference between elite and untrained units is that elite soldiers channel their missery into something productive like killing the enemy. At Camp Lejeune we had HMMWVs, AAVs, LAVs and tanks collide with each other during night maneuvers. The driver has a very limited view in the best of conditions. At night, with gobs of dust in the air (or if you're realy lucky you weren't buttoned up and got gassed - me), and so tired you can't keep your eyes open, you're lucky not to run into one of your guys in front of you, let alone someone else you aren't expecting. Playing CM YOU know there's about to be an engagement. In real life you usually don't know until someone opens up. I can't emphasize enough how limited vehicle drivers and commanders view is. When you actally climb into the driver's seat it's a shock. You can't see anything within 10 feet of the vehicle - no joke. I am continually impressed with the accuracy of CM. The designers must have prior service experience - they got so much right. No computer game will ever be the same as real combat, but CM models it very well. I have read a lot of posts, not just yours, that complain of 'glitches' not understanding how accurate in that instance CM portrays real life. I can only hope none of these 'glitches' get fixed in a patch and take away a little of what makes CM so awe inspiring. ------------------ Devil Dog Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GriffinCheng+ Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 Heri is right. Continuing with Rommel's adventures in the desert, IIRC, he once "paid a visit" to a New Zealand field hospital and inspected the solders there! Another was a British MP policing traffic at night and found that they were all German the next day. Wait to see more confusing in CM3. Griffin. ------------------ "+" is just the beginning. Expect to see "GriffinCheng76", "GriffinCheng(105)" or "GriffinChengA3E8" more should Forum problems occur again Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Michael emrys Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 Another illustrative Rommel story: In North Africa he was in the habit of getting into a Fiesler Storch and flying out to observe his troops when they were advancing and either redirect them onto the right track or hurry them along. One day he spotted a group of vehicles and flew over to investigate. They laid out the proper recognition panels and indicated a safe landing zone. The plane was in its final approach when Rommel noticed that the troops in the reception committee were wearing the wrong helmets and ordered the pilot to get the hell out of there. This was in broad daylight. In a way, it's a pity Rommel wasn't captured on one of his close calls. As a POW, he probably would have survived the war. Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lorak Posted August 30, 2000 Share Posted August 30, 2000 IIRC Didn't von Luck pass through an american intersection also? Can't remember if this was while he was in africa or in europe though.. Lorak ------------------ Proud commander of the CCT's Chinchilla Commando Teams Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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