Dismounting MILAN from Marder

[Mad Mike]

Hello,

I was wondering if it is possible to dismount the MILAN from the Marder IFV?

I tried to do this with my Panzergrenadier-Sections, but it didn't work.

Maybe I'm doing something wrong or is this not implemented at all?

Cheers.

[Alex]

It can not be done. 'Milan' like 'forgot' on BMP non dismounting.

[Mad Mike]

It can not be done.

Thanks, that's the answer I was expecting, to be honest (after trying for some time in different ways).

Shame, it would have offered much more possibilities for the Panzergrenadier-Sections.

As far as I was able to research, the MILAN is used dismounted by the Panzergrenadier squads in reality.

Maybe this could be changed?

[Battlefront.com]

We tried to figure a way to support dismounting a weapon from a vehicle by someone other than the vehicle's own crew (support added for that in v1.20), but it was not easy. Since this is the only instance in simulating 7 major forces we decided we wouldn't likely need this functionality again. So we decided not to invest the time into making it possible to dismount the MILAN from the Marder.

On the attack, which is what the Germans are supposed to be doing in the CM:SF setting, it is highly unlikely that the MILAN would be dismounted and fired by the infantry. More likely the Marder would take care of things. Especially since there is a 400m minimum range (IIRC). If enemy armor is getting closer than 400m the infantry should think about leaving

Steve

[Mad Mike]

We tried to figure a way to support dismounting a weapon from a vehicle by someone other than the vehicle's own crew (support added for that in v1.20), but it was not easy. Since this is the only instance in simulating 7 major forces we decided we wouldn't likely need this functionality again. So we decided not to invest the time into making it possible to dismount the MILAN from the Marder.

Thanks for the reply, I understand the reason, no big deal IMHO.

Would have been nice to have though, especially in one german campaign scenario (without spoiling anything, when I did my setup for the "Fields of Fire" scenario, I really saw the need for this dismount functionality .. and unfortunately I was proved correct by the way the battle unfolded :mad:).

Btw, the campaign is great and I'm really enjoying it .. thanks for putting the German army into CMSF .

[Allan Wotherspoon]

We tried to figure a way to support dismounting a weapon from a vehicle by someone other than the vehicle's own crew (support added for that in v1.20), but it was not easy. Since this is the only instance in simulating 7 major forces we decided we wouldn't likely need this functionality again. So we decided not to invest the time into making it possible to dismount the MILAN from the Marder.

On the attack, which is what the Germans are supposed to be doing in the CM:SF setting, it is highly unlikely that the MILAN would be dismounted and fired by the infantry. More likely the Marder would take care of things. Especially since there is a 400m minimum range (IIRC). If enemy armor is getting closer than 400m the infantry should think about leaving

Steve

A workaround, that would admittedly be a bit of a kludge, would be to add a MILAN launcher to the Marder that could be acquired by the troops. That would give the player the option of using the MILAN ammo for the dismounted launcher or the mounted one.

I seem to recall somewhere that only the platoon CO's vehicle was supposed to have the MILAN mount, but I could be wrong on that.

[Waaarg]

That would give the Germans 2x the AT power(as implemented). They would have to remove all the ammo at once in order to balance that out. I think the standard load out is 6, and I believe that would have to all go on one guy?

The other option is to give Germans two functioning launchers, but this has so many issues (balance would be my main one, but thats probably far down on the list with this crowd hehe) its not viable imho.

[Battlefront.com]

Team weapons can not be acquired. The MILAN is considered a team weapon. Plus, even if we could do this the problem Waaarg pointed out would cancel the idea anyway.

Initially we had a dismounted MILAN and none on the Marder the squad rode in. This sucked because the Panzergrenadiers are already desperately short of infantry, which mean lugging around a (usually) useless MILAN added insult to injury.

Believe me... we all tried to think of a workable solution. Several code fudges were proposed and usually rejected, not because they wouldn't have worked, but because they had negative side effects. Which in turn would require code to work around and so on.

Steve

[Noltyboy]

dismounting Marder crew brought the milan with them?

[Webwing]

Believe me... we all tried to think of a workable solution.

We sure did.

-

[Battlefront.com]

Starting with v1.20 we added code support for a vehicle crew to dismount a vehicle and take the primary weapon with it. This was done for light vehicles which served as weapons carriers for things such as TOW, GMG, GPMG, and HMG. In real life the weapons crews drive around with the weapon mounted to the vehicle, then when they dismount they take the weapon with them. The Marines and Brits had tons of this going on, as did US IBCT.

This only works if the *crew* dismounts, not if passengers dismount. And this happens 100% of the time, never optionally. For the Marder/MILAN problem we needed a passenger (not crew) to optionally (not always) dismount with the weapon and ammo. From a code standpoint this was not easily done and so we passed on it.

As I said, in the CM:SF setting it would be unlikely that the passengers would dismount the MILAN except as a last resort. While it certainly is desirable to offer this option to players, it simply wasn't practical when all things were considered.

Steve

[c3k]

Steve,

Thanks for the explanation. To prove that no good deed goes unpunished, do you mind discussing the Canadian SRAAW(m) (the Carl Gustav)?

It seems whenever I have someone grab it, if there's ammo for it, that's what they carry. Yet, if there's no ammo, the Carl Gustav icon shows up on the unit interface (near the binoculars), but the soldier carrying it is shown with his small arm. That tells me the soldier CAN carry the Gustav and use his small arm, but if there's ammo for the Gustav, he will not use his small arm, regardless of the target. E.g. he will NOT sling the Carl Gustav in exchange for his C7, even if all he sees is an enemy uncon in the street.

Additionally, it seems (to my game experience with Canadians) that there are only HE rounds for the Carl Gustav. Sure, I've only scratched the surface of NATO so far, but please tell me that there's other ammo for this anti-tank weapon?

It just seems that the Gustav is kind of like the Javelin; it sticks to the unit no matter what, but with the added proviso that the Gustav, unlike the Javelin, is always at the ready if it has ammo. This reduces an already lightly manned section's small arms firepower.

Thanks,

Ken

[akd]

The game seems to treat the Javelin and Carl Gustaf as "acquirable" crew-served weapons. For example, break off the anti-tank team of a Canadian section and have them acquire one of the CGs (SRAAW(M)) from the section vehicle. Dismount them and you will find they are now a crew-served weapon team "missing" two crew.

I suspect this is what is driving the behavior, but if a full squad acquires the CG, you won't see the crew-served weapon UI, just the normal squad UI, so it looks more like an individual weapon (like LAW or M136).

Also, as it stands, there is no additional ammo. Just one HE round per CG. Too many CGs and too little ammo.