Helos and scenario balance

[Panta_slith]

Yeah, Apaches, those jokers get all the best of it, and what about my frigging Vulcans? [:@]

[Mad Russian]

Did you have them in a Hold disposition?

To answer someone's earlier question, no, the Vulcan's do not have radar.

Good Hunting.

MR

[Panta_slith]

Yes, holding, grabbing what they can... [8D]
And no radar, so, how are they located if they don't shoot and are well hidden/dug-in?

[Mad Russian]

Here is a duel between an Apache unit and Soviet ADA sections.

The Apache is dealing Death and Destruction!!

Good Hunting.

MR

[Panta_slith]

Why are they "Retiring" or "Rearming"? Scared, maybe?

[2ndACR]

I always though NATO having air superiority was laughable, I always expected a neutral air battle space myself. Neither side having a good advantage. We trained to kill Russian AA weapon systems first with command control 2nd. Usually the M1's took out command tracks, us Brads took out AA weapons. Once they all gone and the Russians started deploying etc, we hauled butt for the next ridge line. As my name says, I was in 2/2 ACR, so we would fight from Border and if I remember right, the MLR was like 50+ miles to the west on a major river.

[Mad Russian]

Here is an Apache rampage! Everything you see in this screen shot that is destroyed was done by this Apache section.

Good Hunting.

MR

[Panta_slith]

What you say is very interesting, specially taking into account NATO doctrine in those times, the Air-Land Battle which, IIRC, was replaced in the 90's by maneuver warfare. The US lacked ADs, just a few Stingers here and there, correct me if I am wrong, for no to speak of the infamous Blowpipe Brits and Canadians had...

[2ndACR]

We had air defense assets but not to the same extent as the Warsaw pact. During my time, we actually planned to pop Hinds with the M1A1 when we could get a bead on them. That was not standard tactic but more of a troop level talk at Graf or Hoen and such. We figured a Silver Bullet would do them fine.

[Mad Russian]

Here is their score. They cleared a swath around them as they ruled the battlefield.




Did I mention they had to resupply once? [X(]

Good Hunting.

MR

[Panta_slith]

Hinds seem to be pretty tough beasts, but curiously, in a military simulator like Steel Beasts they don't seem so, you can down them rather easily.

[Panta_slith]

I told you, choppers are far too lethal! [8D]

[Mad Russian]

ORIGINAL: Panta

I told you, choppers are far too lethal! [8D]

NATO needed force multipliers. That's why such weapons systems as the A10, MRL's, etc. were all designed. In most cases you find that 90% of the damage dealt to the enemy is done by a small percentage of troops. (10%)

These Apache were in the right place at the right time. NATO was depending on one of the weapons systems always being in the right place at the right time. If they weren't the line was broken.

Good Hunting.

MR

[Mad Russian]

Here's what the battlefield looked like when we were done.

Good Hunting.

MR

[Gratch1111]

My feeling is that as Nato I have a hard time getting my AA to shoot down the WP helos, but they are much better at shooting down mine. Is this an accurate feeling as to what should happen? or am I doing something wrong with how I use my helos and AA?

[Mad Russian]

Except for the Gepard, in the WG army, the NATO ground based Air Defense units can best be described as abysmal.

The M163 Vulcan for instance didn't even have a radar directed gun. Standoff range for the Vulcan is 2-3 hexes. The Hinds can hit you from 6.

The WP were prepared to fight without air superiority if need be. Remember that for most of WWII the Germans had air superiority on the Russian Front. They fit their ground units out with equipment that would protect them as much as possible. They were much more realistic about how this would work than NATO. Of course NATO had that huge expensive air force and the AF Generals had to justify their existence. So, the story goes that NATO's airforces would save the day.

Some stories are fairy tales. Thankfully, we don't have to see how that one really played out. The circumstantial evidence doesn't look good for the home team.

As has been pointed out before, FPC doesn't cheat. We plug in the values for the equipment with as realistic data as we can get and let the game play out from there. From what I've had a chance to play with it, and I'm in the editor too much to get to play as much as I'd like, it seems we have gotten it pretty close to factual. We took all the equipment results we could get from actual events to create the equipment data base.

CD did an outstanding job in taking all that raw data and bringing it together in a form that plays out like it does. [&o]

Good Hunting.

MR

[Gratch1111]

yes please keep the game true to real life, if life is unfair u deal with it as best as you can. I dont want the game to be changed for game balance. as in if wp are better with aa and helos, then make scenarios that has more AA units as Nato, dont change the mechanics of the game or the specs on the units

[Mad Russian]

I think the differences in each nationalities armed forces is shown very well. When you go from playing one nation to another you have to learn an entirely different set of tactics to highlight their strengths and minimize their weaknesses. It's interesting to see what those strengths and weaknesses are and what you have to do to compensate for them.

Good Hunting.

MR

[Gratch1111]

exactly

[loki100]

agree, its one of the delights of this game that the 3 NATO forces and the Soviets all handle very differently.

As to AA, NATO relied too much on the assumption that overall air superiority would mean limited WP air activity and configured on that basis. May have been true in the 50s-60s but missed the impact of effective combat assault helicopters in operating in such a way as to make it pretty irrelevant who had air superiority.

The Soviets always assumed their ground formations would be operating in a hostile air environment. This actually predates even the Great Patriotic War era and goes back to the 1920s. As they developed their deep battle doctrine it was pretty clear that the bi-planes of the time would lag behind, but equally they would be operating in range of defensive aircraft. So they put a lot of thought, and equipment development, into AA at a time when most armies ignored the issue.

Never misunderestimate how conservative armed forces are, or how long past decisions influence current actions.