MOUT without Clout?

[hcrof]

I don't play a lot of single player CMSF but I thought I would give Paper Tigers 'The road to Dinas' a go.

First of all I am very impressed - I love the concept, and so far, the maps have been excellent!

More importantly, I started in Petani and had to take the town in 45 minutes with a company of mechanised infantry and rocket arty + tank support.

After getting a little bit held up after establishing a foothold, I pushed ahead with a quick tempo and took the town without huge casualties. However, there was not much left of the town, or my ammo supplies at the end of the mission.

I had hit across a formula where a reinforced platoon would fire at every building in a compound before one squad assaults every building in turn to clear it. Any targets of opportunity would be engaged with tanks placed 500m outside the town and every tall building would be leveled in case they contained something that could engage my tanks.

This meant that after 45 minutes, I had used almost all of my 5.45, 7.62, RPG and HE ammunition, even after resupply!

Is there any way I could do this mission again without using so much ammo and yet not lose people as they walk into an ambush? Also, this is not a very subtle way of taking a town, and if I was playing PBEM I would have revealed every position I had to the enemy.

Surely, western forces don't:

a) fill every house in a densly populated town with bullets and HE

Level the town with an (attempted) rolling barrage by rocket artillery before going in - I know the georgians were accused of this but they are not 'western'

Maybe I am doing the right thing, but I would have not liked to face a counter attack after taking that town - I was spent!

Any advice would be very welcome!

[BlackMoria]

Can you revert to a game save?

I think that is the only way. Doing campaigns, I game save each scenario transition so that I can go back and try different things or different tactics (for example, in the Marine campaign, scenario - Decisions, Decisions where your exit point decides which way the campaign branches).

I think a earlier game save is your only hope but maybe someone else has an idea....

[bassplayer192837]

I think you need better tactics like a flanking manuever or attempt to take the higher ground. What does the map look like? Is it very mountainous and forested or is it flat and open?

[hcrof]

Unfortunately there is not a lot of room for maneuver, I have clear a road in order to facilitate the advance of the main force. The town is on the road.

Because of this you get sucked into the town which is defended piecemeal by a lot of low quality reservists.

I elected to approach the front because of the fact that I had tanks on a hill to the front and I was told that the enemy had AT assets (ATGM's and recoilless rifles) which could only be in the open on the flank.

Because there was no 'integrated' defence I could not come up with a unified strategy, I just was given a load of houses, of which some had enemy in them and only 45 minutes to clear them all.

The majority of my casualties came from a freindly fire incedent (my own ATGM nosedived into a full BMP :eek:) but I have no ammo for the rest of the campaign and a few moral issues about levelling the place as the population density was high.

@BlackMoria - Reverting to savegames is cheating!

[Apocal]

Surely, western forces don't:

a) fill every house in a densly populated town with bullets and HE

Level the town with an (attempted) rolling barrage by rocket artillery before going in - I know the georgians were accused of this but they are not 'western'

In Fallujah, after the first few days of relearning the truths of streetfighting, we went back to A). And there are three or four high level AARs that, wiht 20/20 hindsight (few civilians in town) basically say we should have done .

Maybe I am doing the right thing, but I would have not liked to face a counter attack after taking that town - I was spent!

Any advice would be very welcome!

You did it right. The way the book would like you to take a town is first surrounding and isolating it from support, probing inside to determine how the defense is orientated, then pounding the hell out of it, sending forces in to clear it methodically, while maintaining a force to keep it isolated and prevent the enemy from immediately counterattacking.

The only way I managed to do it with less was by replaying the scenario, to be honest.

[Paper Tiger]

Well, since I've actually played this particular mission many times and won it with single figure casualties without needing to resupply my troops once from an IFV, I can say that sounds like you were overdoing it a bit there, mate. The key is to start with a good artillery barrage. Yes, western forces don't do this but it's a good bet that in a civil war scenaro such as the campaign is set in, neither side would care too much about the civilain population.

After the barrage lifts, then take it slowly, get a good foothold in the village and expand it carefully. I usually task one platoon to the northern section of the village, one to the centre and one to the south and the engineers help out getting you into the courtyards. "But there's only 45 minutes to do this PT!!!" Doing it this way usually results in an AI surrender well before the mission time expired so you've got plenty time to do it too.

As it happens, I'm currently working on a new scenario where a US heavy Mech Infantry company (later to be substituted for a Brit Mech Infantry Company when I get the Brits) do something very similar to this mission and it's much tougher to do it in 45 minutes as you can't have that huge opening barrage on the town.

[hcrof]

Thanks guys - You have given me a bit of reassurance that I was doing the right thing - from what you said my big problem was that my second rocket barrage missed. (And I was careless at one point with a BMP)

I am now well into the third mission and having some great tank battles - a hull down enemy tank just took 6 hits before brewing up and one of my tanks limped away barely functioning. Thanks PT!

[dan/california]

The alternative that the U.S is vigorously pursuing is to do the first look with robots of some description. This already basically standard procedure when investigating IEDs. I am unclear how far along it is in terms of deployed capability for a straight up Fallujah type operation.

The general idea being to send in a cheap robot, if something bad happens to it make the building go away and send in the next robot to the next building. $100,000 missiles are routinely expendable, robots will be too, and soon.

[jenrick]

With current capability of guided munitions the US can be slightly more precise then A&B, and only put ordinance on specific targets. The new small diameter bomb and the usage of gunships provides a CAS ability that is almost pinpoint.

-Jenrick