Compass Bearings?

[sonar]

Noticing the all new onscreen compass dial, can anyone imagine a scenario where actual compass bearings could be incorporated into the players briefing? Maybe in wooded or particularly featureless terrain? I think it's a nice little addition and would like to see it sometimes used to some effect if possible.

[Bruce70]

But then it would have to be in mils for realism. IMHO mils are stupid, I have never once heard a good argument for using them.

[ChrisND]

Originally posted by Bruce70:

But then it would have to be in mils for realism. IMHO mils are stupid, I have never once heard a good argument for using them.

Mils are for artillery and mortars, not navigation (At least for the infantry). They are used because they are more accurate, 17.8 mils equals one degree. Trust me you wouldn't want me computing a danger close fire mission next to you, using degrees. Especially if I am far away.

Former mortar maggot and FDC.

[TheVulture]

Originally posted by Normal Dude:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Bruce70:

But then it would have to be in mils for realism. IMHO mils are stupid, I have never once heard a good argument for using them.

Mils are for artillery and mortars, not navigation (At least for the infantry). They are used because they are more accurate, 17.8 mils equals one degree. Trust me you wouldn't want me computing a danger close fire mission next to you, using degrees. Especially if I am far away.

Former mortar maggot and FDC. </font>

[ChrisND]

Originally posted by TheVulture:

To be fair (and knowing nothing about mils), mils may well make sense to use in artillery applications, if it is a unit system that is relatively easy to work out a 'ball-park' figure for in your head, or adjustments are typically of order of 1 mil (for example) - working in degrees may be identical from a mathematical point of view, but mils may lend themselves better to an intuitive, rule-of-thumb approach which lets you see quickly whether your calculations make sense or not.

Vulture, exactly . I should have stated that more cleary, I meant just degrees with integers, as you would get on a simple compass. Mils go from 0 to 6400, so you have only to work with whole numbers, I wouldn't want to mess with extra degree units on a ballistic computer it just complicates things. Both can be just as accurate, but for indirect fire mils are easier and faster to work with.

[JonS]

The best thing about mils is that 1mil subtends 1m at 1000m (well, not quite, but it's near as dammit*), which makes adjusting rounds faster and more accurate - you can read how many mils left or right of the target the round landed out of your binos, multiply that by the range in 1000's of metres, and hey-presto, there is your adjustment.

The second best thing about mils is that with a 6400 circle it halves nicely for a long way: 6400 (full circle) - 3200 (half a circle) - 1600 (quarter circle) - 800 (45°) - 400 - 200 - 100 (roughly the field of view in the binos) - 50 - 25

Jon

* It's actually 0.981748m, so there is a built-in 1.8% error, which makes no practical difference.

[Apocalypse 31]

Compass Bearings?

PFF. We dont even use compasses anymore. We have stuff like Pluggers, and Daggr's as well as Force Battle Command to do the navigating.

Of course, we're still proficient with compasses, but you will rarely find one on the battlefield.

[Bruce70]

Originally posted by JonS:

The best thing about mils is that 1mil subtends 1m at 1000m (well, not quite, but it's near as dammit*), which makes adjusting rounds faster and more accurate - you can read how many mils left or right of the target the round landed out of your binos, multiply that by the range in 1000's of metres, and hey-presto, there is your adjustment.

So why not use radians or milli-radians (which I believe mils are supposed to approximate)? Then you get your adjustements exactly right. (BTW, I am being facetious)

[ChrisND]

Originally posted by LT Mike:

Compass Bearings?

PFF. We dont even use compasses anymore. We have stuff like Pluggers, and Daggr's as well as Force Battle Command to do the navigating.

Of course, we're still proficient with compasses, but you will rarely find one on the battlefield.

I hated those friggin PLGRs. I (and everyone I knew) bought our own civilian models and used those instead. Well, till we got Blue Force and FBC anyways.

[JonS]

Originally posted by Bruce70:

So why not use radians or milli-radians (which I believe mils are supposed to approximate)? Then you get your adjustements exactly right. (BTW, I am being facetious)

Facetitiousness noted, but it's a good question

To be honest, I don't know the official reason. The British - at least - did use ° " ' in WWI, but changed a few years later (possibly as part of a NATO standardisation thingy). My guess is that mils are used because they are very easy to teach and use. That last point is particularly important when you are sitting on the side of a hill with a brain badly fogged by fatigue and either frozen by the cold or melting in the heat

[gibsonm]

They are also great for range estimation.

In our bino's anyway the markings (and spaces between markings) are in Mils.

If a 5m telegraph pole is obscured by the 5mil mark then you know its 1Km away.

Similarly if the T-72 coming your way fills the 5mil gap between two markers then its just under 1Km (roughly 800m) away (since they are 3.6m wide).

Useful when doing a dismounted recce and you have left your laser rangefinder mounted in the vehicle.

Of course these days many binos have a range finder built in but the graticule is always useful for when the batteries go flat.

[JonS]

... and, using the same basic principle, you can also use them to roughly estimate speed.

[Bruce70]

Well it is based on the milliradian, and apparently the only reason for using it is that it is easily divided into parts. I still think it's lazy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angular_mil

[JonS]

Re: above link, note that the swedish version (1/6300) is strictly more accurate (0.25% built-in error), but I wouldn't want to use it.