War is Boring website plays CMANO

[Temple]

Sorry if this is already posted, but I didn't see it mentioned.

Article on the War is Boring website, How I Lost the Battle of the South China Sea. They play a scenario from CMANO to test out the new Littoral Combat Ship (with some help) in a fight against the Chinese. Interesting reading.

[ExMachina]

Wow. Kyle Mizokami. I remember him from his TacOp days!

[davedwmullins]

I just finished up SCS. The LCS class is terrible. After a few tries I just left them south of the action. One shot down a Cub.

[jomni]

Good read. And the game crashed. Lol!

[thewood1]

Maybe its a good concept being misused. I thought it was built to keep small close-to-shore boats away from fleets and shipping lanes. They should never be used where surface engagements are expected against fleet or even large patrol vessels...especially in a SSM environment.

[hellfish6]

ORIGINAL: ExMachina

Wow. Kyle Mizokami. I remember him from his TacOp days!

Yeah, wow. I was an old TacOpser too. I even had a scenario named after me.

[Dimitris]

ORIGINAL: jomni
Good read. And the game crashed. Lol!

Yeah, thank God for autosave [:)]

[JRyan]

Very interesting but not surprising at all. I wondered how the LCS could handle a high threat environment with such light weaponry. I mean a Perry class frigate has more and it is a 30 year design. The one thing that is good about them is speed and modularized design. That was what made the Spruance class so good, it had room to grow. No SSM and a puny gun are inexcusable...

[jdkbph]

RE: the LCS.

I think of it more in the way of a Knox class FF. Designed to do one thing and very good at it. The thing that throws most people about the LCS is the fact that it was designed to do multiple missions... but unlike true multi-role ships, the LCS can only do one mission at a time. So I think for our purposes, in CMANO, it is a dedicated, single-purpose platform.

The 2nd question is what roles can it do? Well, I think it's obvious that Air Defense and Anti-surface are not on that list. So, unless the intention in this South China Sea scenario was to set up a situation where the force was caught in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong equipment, the LCS should not be there (and as discussed in another thread, the Burke should have a very different load out).

Anyway, the LCS might be a good idea, but it has to be seen for what it is: a brown-water (modern definition) gunboat/ASW/ELINT/MCM/SpecOps platform. The problem with that is price and size. The thing is way too big and costs way too much for such limited capability... IMHO of course.

JD

[mikmykWS]

I included the LCS's to act as scouts in the scenario and not necessarily combatants. You can use their speed to get out of weapons range and payloads to identify targets for your SSM shooters (helo's, aircraft). The Burke can give them an added layer of protection if you move them towards it. You can then deal with the SAG with the SSN.

Mike

[jdkbph]

Yeah that makes sense. I guess the safe play is to just get them out of the way once it's established that there are enemy combatants in the area.

Which brings us to the Halsey... [:)]

JD

[mikmykWS]

What about Halsey?

If you don't like the load outs you can change them in a few clicks.

Mike

[jdkbph]

I know... just bustin' a little bit.

That's what the [:)] was for.

[:)][:)][:)][:)][:)]

JD

[Der Zeitgeist]

I'm doing quite fine against the Chinese so far. Built a mini-SAG out of the DDG and the two LCS, and splashed all of the incoming bandits so far. My Hornets are currently refueling off the Vietnamese coast on their way to the Chinese SAG. They will try to attack it, if the Virginia SSN doesn't catch up with it first. [:)]

[Der Zeitgeist]

Whoa, good thing I had those LCS's close to my DDG. Turns out they can be pretty useful afterall. I just had a pretty large ASM strike on my SAG, and we had one leaker when all the SM-6 missiles were used up. It came pretty close before USS Fort Worth splashed it with a RAM.

I had a problem with the ESSM's on Halsey. When I tried to fire them manually at the incoming missile, the allocation window said "Target can not be illuminated at projected intercept point". What's the reason for this, are there any special constraints for ESSM to fire? I had all radars on, and the SM-6 was working fine.

[hellfish6]

The author brings up a good idea I hadn't though of - can the LCS carry NSMs as a module? Poland mounts four of them on trucks as coastal defense weapons... does the LCS have the capability to mount NSMs anywhere as part of a ASuW package?

[mikmykWS]

In theory sure. In practice probably not.

Looks like there will be a competition next year to see what exactly gets fielded.

As the scenario shows the Griffin is very small and in adequate for dealing with larger combatants without some considerable improvement.

[SSN754planker]

TacOps4? the land sim? gawd that brings back memories.

[ultradave]

I played TacOps for years. Loved that game. Lots of PBEM battles.

Of course I practiced the real thing just before it came out first too, so the original appeal was there.

[jomni]

Just like Command, TacOps is one of those games without the human element (skill and morale). Just pure test of equipment and tactics.