A question i've been thinking of for a while.....

[Jonny(FGM)]

Ok so whenever we start comparing CMSF to real life, the natural comparison point is the invasion of Iraq, similar environment, TOE and an enemy which is made up mainly of poor quality conscripts backed up with a core of well trained rebuplican guards.

So roughly how many engagements were there in Iraq that would be worthy of being a CM scenario (are we talking tens, hundreds, thousands?) and how many did the ground troops turn up at the scene to find the enemy already blown to smithereens and on fire from the air force and just keep rolling on, maybe firing a few shots to mop up the survivors.

This is all bringing me back to the casualty rates in some scenarios, I can't remember the figures off the top of my head (and some quick googleing doesn't shed any light) but even at 10 KIA per mission it wouldn't take many missions to get up to the invasion casualty figures (i'm not of course counting the occupation, just the invasion)

[Erwin]

Good question... The other question is how many friendly casualties were from simple accidents, friendly fire etc.

I read someplace that medals a re awarded only for disasters. When all goes according to plan, it's not considered medal-worthy. Most military situations that we as gamers would consider "interesting/challenging" result from a mistake or misjudgement of some kind.

CMSF is brilliant in that it creates a wonderful immersive illusion of reality (as did CM1). BFC games are arguably more realistic than any game by any other commercial game developer. But, I resist the proposition that any CM game is "realistic" if by that one means that a skilled CM player could go out to a battlefield and have a clue as to how to take command of RL units.

[Jonny(FGM)]

Yes I was meaning realistic in terms of outcomes than neccessarily techniques. Yes the Illusion of reality is amazing in CMSF but I find it becomes broken when I see blue troops dropping dead left right and centre, perhaps it's due to me being a product of a generation that has only had "clean" wars with very few casualties (for our side anyway)

[dan/california]

The Syrians did/do not suffer through the massive losses of 91, a decade of crippling sanctions or COMPLETE incompetence of the national command authority. Specifically the scale of CMSF they are equipped with some good ATGMs, some tanks with decent FLIR, and modeled as having had some meaningful training. All of these assumptions are reasonable but debatable. The Iraqis were desperately short of all three and it showed.

Also quite a bit more of the relevant parts of Iraq are open desert. Which among other things makes their supply lines extraordinarily vulnerable to air attack. And to a large extent the Iraqi army remembered how unpleasant 91 was and almost dissolved without fighting.

[Jonny(FGM)]

Ah yes, I did mean to put in the little caveat of AT-14s, T-90s and BMP-3s aside ; )

But I have had that thought before, that we over generalise by comparing Iraq and Syria just because they are side by side

[Jonny(FGM)]

So i guess this question has morphed into

Am I making an unfair comparison between Syria (at least as portrayed in CMSF) and 2003 Iraq?

[Boche]

well yes, but Im more interested in the first question!

[dan/california]

And remember, to be a decent game it has to at least resemble a fair fight. If its a fair fight someone, somewhere up the chain of command has done something to a pooch that is illegal in 49 states.

More specifically, I think the last time Iraq was as functional as Syria, both as a country and a military, was before the nearly decade long war with Iran. Say, 1978 or so. Twenty or thirty years of bad worse, and never-mind takes toll.

[akd]

Yes I was meaning realistic in terms of outcomes than neccessarily techniques. Yes the Illusion of reality is amazing in CMSF but I find it becomes broken when I see blue troops dropping dead left right and centre, perhaps it's due to me being a product of a generation that has only had "clean" wars with very few casualties (for our side anyway)

Time as a gameplay device for artificially increasing difficulty is one of the main contributors, if not the main one.

[Battlefront.com]

We see the CM:SF setting as having nothing to compare to in the real world. It's part Iraq, part Afghanistan, part WW3 conventional warfare.

Having said that, gamers tend to lose a LOT more men and equipment than real world examples. If any of you were in charge of Allied forces in Normandy I think The Führer of Groß Britanien would be in your debt

Steve

[c3k]

You keyboard jockeys need to learn a thing or two about REAL warfare. Yeah, I was part of the REAL invasion of Syria, so sit back and listen to me tell you about what it was actually like.

We were all vets of Iraq and Afghanistan. Some had been in more than that. The Euro's and Canucks? Hmmm, I don't know about them. Some peacekeeping I guess.

Anyway, I saw a lot more men get hit in Syria than I ever saw in Iraq or the Stan. I think I know why. See, during one engagement, we were getting hit pretty hard. All our guys were vets. We knew what we'd done before and it had worked. If we couldn't just light 'em up, we'd dig down. You know, stack up some cover, work back into concealment. Anything other than take a knee on the parade ground. But I saw some good men in Syria do just that. Just take a knee in the open. Go figure. A lot of them got hit.

Anyway, ordinarily, we'd do our job, but, brother, if we needed to we'd back off and let the Air Farce come in and pound them instead. Why die? Somehow, in the midst of this Sryian-fest, the Air Farce just isn't doing what it had done before.

Another thing, and this is going to sound weird, but I've been there, so listen up. Sometimes I've felt like I was racing against the clock every time I was in battle. It's like there was someone screaming at me, "Hurry! Hurry! For Christ's sake, you're running out of time!" Weird, huh? Anyway, that made me do things I would never have done before. I took a lot more risks that way. And this will really make you think I'm nuts. Before, if I had a good position, I'd stay there. Maybe scooch a little deeper, move some dirt up, you know? Not in Syria. I don't know why. And in Syria, every time I wanted to stop, I had like a cumpulsion to move forward. It was like I was being pulled along on a colored line. Going places I'd NEVER have gone. I KNEW my men and I were being pushed into death traps, fire sacks, but we had no choice. It was like we were mesmerized and just HAD to go there. Weird.

Toss me beer. I've got to get back to the war. I know I have a choice about going back, but it's like I don't belong anywhere else...

[MarkEzra]

Everything I know about war I learned from Sgt Rock

[umlaut]

But, I resist the proposition that any CM game is "realistic" if by that one means that a skilled CM player could go out to a battlefield and have a clue as to how to take command of RL units.

"4, 3, 2, 1 and 0!! OK, now. Let´s see. Now you´ll move west... ...Hey? What? Wait, guys!!! The minute is up. You´re supposed to freeze, while I issue your orders. Guys....?"

[Erwin]

"Boy, this battle seems awfully unbalanced. Er, can we stop and have a redo plz."

[Boche]

"hmmm dinner, Take 10 everyone!"

[Jonny(FGM)]

Ok so the main point I seem to be taking away is that CMSF is an accurate enough portayal if the allies decided not to use their air power so overwhelmingly : )

I'd still like my first question answered if anyone know though lol

[Erwin]

Except that the Allies probably wouldn't get out of bed if they didn't have air superiority, so...

[Sequoia]

Most of the coalition Airforce is out hunting for Scud missle launchers as the Syrians have threatened to launch a dirty bomb into Israel unless the Coalition forces withdraw and Israel has threatened to go Nuclear on Syria if Syria does launch the dirty bomb. This also explains why the Coalition forces are in such a hurry and willing to sustain casulties they otherwise wouldn't. They want to over run all missle sites as soon as possible. Yes I just made that all up.

[Waaarg]

Ok so the main point I seem to be taking away is that CMSF is an accurate enough portayal if the allies decided not to use their air power so overwhelmingly : )l

Wow I read this thread a couple times as it was a good OP and I didn't come away with that lol.

[Battlefront.com]

CMBO was used as a part of study at Ft. Benning many, many years ago. They had two groups, one commissioned officers (LTs mostly, I think) and ROTC officer candidates. They were asked to rate various parts of the game in terms of realism (or another criteria) with the two groups being separately noted for the results. Anything that had to do with FoW the serving officers all found the game highly realistic while the ROTC guys ranked it poorly because of things like imperfect information, units not doing what they were told to do, inability to micromanage various things, etc. According to the ROTC guys the game's "errors" were responsible for their plans not working! The Major who conducted the study found a lot of humor in this, I think

Steve

[MikeyD]

I'm reminded of an old PBS documentary about the Army conducting a desert OPFOR wargame perhaps 25 years ago or so. At one point the young Blue Team officer, finding himself hard-pressed, opted for a 'small' tactical nuclear strike to save the day. In the TacOps-style computer sim the officer watched the nuke strike take place, obliterate the enemy, then an expanding red circle quickly envelope his own forces as well - Ooops! A learning experience, I would suppose.

[pazuzusmiles]

haha Yes reckless bunch we are....