GloriousRuse wrote: Fri Dec 23, 2022 8:19 pm
I think we're all missing a rather large part of the discussion, which is that the devs chose to model the Soviet Army as it was feared by western analysts at the time, not as it was. You aren't commanding or fighting against a "realistic" Soviet Army, but rather what NATO thought it would actually have to face in a coming war. At least that's my interpretation of why things like technical performance are over modeled and many factors like troop quality, employment context, and doctrine are minimized. It's all in the name of good fun, and its best to enjoy it as such.
A few examples:
Contextual Use: Ah, the hated Reflex missile. Now, we all know - now- you wouldn't battle carry this. The choice to employ it would be a deliberate one, clearing your tube, deliberately selecting the munition, uploading it, and then preparing to fire it. After firing it you know you are going to have a dozen seconds or more tracking the missile to target using SACLOS, making shooting on the move...difficult...and that's assuming your target doesn't back down or leave LOS. So that "offensive engagement" in FCSS is really a short halt, a deliberate upload, re-acquire a target, then track the missile on. The western side would get a few free shots before the unit "fired", including very potentially one while the missile was en route, with western gunnery doctrine meaning the halted missile tank was prioritized (stationary before moving, front before flanks, etc...). And you the player would be silently cursing your men as idiots for trying while the little explosions ticked off. Whoever survived would then forever more say "no, we aren't trying that."
It would be a very different scenario if the T80s were waiting in hide, knowing they were looking down a few KM of bowling alley. But NATO didn't know that, or didn't act like it. The missile really can work under the right conditions...NATO acted and trained like you could actually have it to hand in a jiffy and fire accurately on the move at extreme range. So that's what the devs put in game. The unknown terror that your range advantage was going to be erased by a wonder weapon, or the desperate hope that at least your best formations could fight back at range. Because it isn't about realism, its about "real-ish" fun.
Minimize the Differences: One of the unspoken truths about high technology is that it requires a commensurate investment in people to do what it says on the tin. You only need to look at one of Russia's famous tank biathlons to realize that even a notionally good fire control can miss a ton with a poor crew. We, just like the western analysts of the 1980s, routinely imagine the baseline as far higher than it is, and then apply it to our opponents - something the devs did very well in building the notional soviet army for the game.
I got a recent reminder of this via a war story or two about master gunners training Ukranian tankers pre-invasion. The Ukranians still in effect used the soviet model of gunnery training. They would roll up to their range position, fire at an assortment of targets, hit some, miss some and be generally pleased that they now knew how to shoot - at which point they'd be out of training ammo. In fairness, their T64s were by any mid cold war standard shooting quite lethally, a definite mark up from WWII gunnery, but just as definitely not the "75+% hit rate on the move!" the technology should have been able to do.
By western standards, their performance would be appalling. A western crew under range conditions does not miss; virtually ever. They race the clock to see if they can kill targets fast enough to reduce each threat before a very good enemy could acquire them and shoot back, in a wide array of situations. They fire more ammo, have more reps, and do loads of simulator work before that - and the chances are if they are too slow too often, let alone missing shorts, they get disqualified and have to try to qual again.
The difference that dedicated crew-tech fusion provides vs "good enough" and new tech is so gapingly astronomical that it boggles any of our conceptions of the classic wargaming parameters of "green, regular, veteran, elite" with some bonuses/maluses off a basic core of performance.
But again, NATO didn't know that. They assumed they were good, but that the Russians would be nipping at their heels. They treated them that way in modelling, giving them the benefit of the doubt for claimed capabilities, seemingly reinforced as other NATO crews played OPFOR. So the devs modeled that to reflect the feeling of the age - and they got it very right "man, stay up a second too long, they'll put one through your turret ring" or the Russian "fine, we'll lose the first volley then win the second" mentality. We all know that's not true - a company in road column at 2500m has about thirty seconds to live after a platoon top hats order - but damned if they didn't get that feeling right.
Doctrine An artillery example. We know that Soviet artillery doctrine, particularly for the RAGs that make up so much of the support in game, was fairly rigid. The RAG commander and a small staff rode near or with the Regimental commander and primarily designed his fire plan in support of that commander. He was chief of staff, fire control center, and unit commander all in one. He would stay in contact with the CRTA, but his guns really weren't a universal asset. Something like being instantly linkable to a higher-level recon fire complex to provide counterbattrey for the division or army at will, then transition back down into supporting his formation, then send a fire mission to help out a sister regiment to the south...it just wasn't in the cards. The C2 links weren't there.
Coming up from below, we know that calling for fire was strictly controlled by deliberate observation posts and commanders. A soviet sub-unit did not just "hop on fires net" and get support. And for good reason; not only wasn't that their job in soviet doctrine, but trying to call in accurate fire mission from a moving non-GPS'd tank against a target you might not even have a map open for, to guns that very well may not have had time to register and will need some kentucky windage for their own location...well, suffice to say you could miss by hexes in game.
But..one more time...NATO didn't treat it that way. They may have known down to the round what soviet doctrine said would happen, but invariably when they wargamed it they gave it a degree of flexibility and agility far above what it had. Breathless observers talked about the lethality of the "recon fires complex" without realizing it just meant some small part of the Soviet artillery might be able to do what was the standard for NATO artillery, and rather was an unstoppable killing machine sending back precise targetting data to waiting batteries in moments.
And the devs have worked hard to replicate that feeling, not that Soviet artillery is a very direct support centric item, but that to NATO's eyes they would be facing guns everywhere, with artillery pounding them from every direction at every step, from a fire control apparatus like their own only slightly worse. And man, did they nail it. Realistic? Of course not. But does it get the Cold War atmosphere they were aiming for? Absolutely.
So - yes, of course the soviets are over modeled. Because the game isn't about realism, it's about the NATO nightmare, and what they thought realism might be before everyone pulled back the curtain.