I agree with you. If when you say ‘excuses’ you mean well reasoned arguments instead of speaking without having a clue as Tom did, i agree with you.
There are many small games companies that produce high quality products. BTS used to be one of them. Right now it looks like excuses count as features, and that all is well with CM:SF. Sorry, that doesn’t fly with me.
I was a frequent poster too - PeterNZer. I found the general forum has swung more and more to the right during my time there so even non-political threads (which are all that are allowed) are generally pretty far ‘right’ in tone. It gets a bit distasteful.
Excuse me? “Speaking without having a clue”?
I’ve steered clear of the discussion over on Battlefront because it’s not going to do a bit of good to wade into that sort of whinge-fest when no one’s going to care about what I have to say, which has already been badly mischaracterized.
But I stand by everything I wrote. If you mean the HEAT thing, it turns out I knew exactly what I was talking about. If you mean something else, do tell. Sparing me the cut n’ paste from the Battlefront forums, please.
-Tom
Actually, to shield you from the Grognard Flames, you should have said “limiting both the HEAT and SABOT/APFSDS rounds to artifically create balance in the scenario”. They’re not going to let up on you for that one. When I read that comment, I assumed you meant that they only gave you HEAT rounds and no APFSDS rounds to make the scenario more challenging. Which is what they’re picking up on.
This whole thing reminds me of Sword of the Stars.
Actually, flyinj, I didn’t put it that way because I was specifically referencing a scenario in which US forces are pitted against a small number of Syrian infantry with RPG-7V1s, which use HEAT rounds to destroy IFVs and tanks. I have no idea what kind of rounds an RPG can fire, but in the scenario I was playing, they were all HEAT rounds. They seemed carefully calculated so that once they were gone, the Syrians are pretty much helpless against US Bradleys. Here’s a screenshot, for example:
See the types of loadouts? See the ammo quantity?
I’m no grognard these days and I don’t pretend to be, but I know enough to be able to play a game like Shock Force. It appears my main problem in this situation was doubting myself when you tried to tell me HEAT rounds weren’t good against armored vehicles. :(
-Tom
I completely misunderstood what you were saying then. I thought you were referring to your armor only having HEAT rounds:
“But in order to present a challenge here, the limiting factor tends to be the number of available HEAT rounds balanced against enemy armor, an equation that will be contrived at best.”
Which is pretty much what the Battlefront grogs thought you were saying as well. The context didn’t really specify you were talking about RPG infantry.
EDIT: Also, don’t get me wrong here. I’m not trying to call you out as having no idea how to review the game. From yours and everyone else’s reports who have played the game here, it sounds like it’s going to be a dog. I’m just saying that I was confused by that statement, and others were as well.
Yeah that does kind of change things.
They probably designed the RPGs as a HEAT mechanism (the exact physics is somewhat close but not really the same) since they didn’t want to create a whole new damage model just for that (an explosive on the end of a rocket), which I think has some directed force/blast. They don’t make any other kinds of RPGs (that is to say, rocket propelled grenades) like AP rounds or anything.
Still I’m disappointed in Steve’s response, it contains all of the mannerisms and childish whimpering the wargaming industry has been desperately trying to get away from.
— Alan
Oh yeah. And I definitely don’t want to come off like I’m defending the rest of that rambling Derek Smart-esque rebuttal Steve put out. The guy comes off like a complete douchebag.
Well, I grant that I left the door open for it to be interpreted as if I didn’t know APFDSJSP-THX1198-variantB rounds (or whatever) were good against tanks. But I think the more relevant issue is that it’s in the nature of those Battlefront guys to look for something like that to discredit someone with whom they disagree – Ha ha, you got the number of rivets wrongs, go back to C&C3!! – rather than to address his overall point.
Which is this: The pace of modern warfare makes Shock Force a very different kind of game from the previous combat missions, and I’m not sure modern combat is well suited for CM’s scale. It’s almost a crapshoot whether my fifteen HEAT rounds will be sufficient against his eight Bradleys. Because it seems to me that’s pretty much what some of the scenarios come down to.
But that’s not my main complaint. In fact, I’m not even sure I’d consider that a complaint so much as a, I dunno, a passing rumination.
-Tom
Well Tom it’s not called High Explosive Anti-Tank if it wouldn’t be good against, you know, tanks.
— Alan
Well supposedly tomorrow during the day sometime they turn on the spigots and the preorders can be downloaded. I’ll be checking it out, certainly. With games like this I generally have to see it myself (they say there will also be a demo, probably tomorrow too). I have no doubt that the problems reviewers have noted were real, but I have no real idea what the version I’ll download tomorrow looks like vis a vis what was reviewed.
The overall design stuff, though, is probably more problematic, but I am hoping Battlefront will continue to evolve this thing in the right direction. I tend to agree that modern combat is a bear to do at this scale, particularly if you’re doing asymmetrical warfare–and unless you’re into historical hypotheticals or contemporary fantasy you’re not really going to have anything else it seems. It probably could be done but I suspect it would resemble a training aid or exercise more than a traditional grog game.
Grogs (and I’ve been there, done that, got the T-shirt) like nuts and bolts, arguing about details, and minutia. In a realistic simulation of 4th generation warfare much of that stuff ain’t too important–it’s a lot more "soft’ stuff and a lot less “how many milimeters you got there, big boy?”
What the hell is “asymmetrical warfare”? I keep reading this over & over!
It’s like how you always beat up Arnold in school and took his lunch money.
Two sides that have dramatically unequal capabilities. Us vs. the Iraqi insurgents, for instance, or Israel vs. Hamas. More specifically, it’s warfare where one side uses its comparative advantages against the other side’s weaknesses. The key is “comparative,” as most armies try to match their strength to their foe’s weakness. These comparative advantages may be things like NOT having a sophisticated infrastructure or heavy weapons, or in being free from constraints on the rules of engagement, etc.
The guerilla wars of the late 20th century were part of this trend, though many of those blended conventional warfare elements as well. Today’s conflicts tend to be more truly asymmetrical; it’s not likely we’ll see Iraqi insurgents forming “main force” battalions like the VC did, for instance.
It’s guerrilla warfare – how can someone confront a well-armed, well-financed conventional force. The way to take on the US is not to try to play to its strength by trying to fight a conventional war, instead it’s to do what’s going on in Iraq. It’s asymmetric because the two opponents are unequally matched both in equipment and in tactics.
[Edit: yeah, what Wombat said …]
That was an awesome movie. What was going on in this thread again? <shuts eyes and covers ears>
Steel Panthers II had some problems like this in some of the scenarios. I think one of the missions packs, especially, had these problems. There was one scenario with M1A2s vs Leclercs, and the massive front armor on the tanks meant that no shots would penetrate.
So the way to win was to fly a helicopter around the side where the AI tanks would track (but not fire), so you could hit the side or rear armor of the turret.
Even normal missions were pretty boring – oh look, my Bradleys ran out of TOW missiles, so now they’re useless against armor, but they still have 30mm ammo, so they can shoot infantry, while my M1s, with no good anti-infantry rounds in their 120mm guns, will take out tanks. Oh look, now I’m on the Russian side. I have T-72s. The US has M1s. I lose!
That movie sucked. I Netflixed it and was embarrassed for Robert Duvall.
My understanding of HEAT rounds is that it’s an older technology and is a “direct fire” technology, which is why RPGs and such use it at short range. So, in effect HEAT rounds used to be da shit before modern armor caught up. Then other rounds (like APFSDS) were invented to supercede the new armor. Thus, HEAT is good for short ranges (like a shoulder mounted AT weapon) and other rounds are better for long range tank v. tank distances. If you’re goingg to kill infantry it’s better to use regular HE rounds rather than HEAT. So when you are shooting armor it’s APFSDS > HEAT > HE and for infantry/soft targets its the opposite. A Bradley will easily be taken out by an RPG usinng HEAT rounds, an M1A2 Abrams, not as much but it can still happen. Kind of like a Tiger being taken out by a Sherman in CM:BO.
Anyway, all this is moot, as Tom says, if the engine is stuttery and the AI sucks.
Both HEAT and Sabot are direct fire weapons which means you fire with line-of-sight. Only artillery and mortars are indirect fire which means you fire blindly with an elevation and direction provided by a spotter.
The range difference between HEAT and Sabot is irrelevant. The important distinction is that HEAT rounds explode all by themselves since they carry an explosive charge, hence the speed at which they’re fired is not that important, hence a shoulder-carried weapon can fire them (or similar rounds) effectively.
Sabot rounds are purely kinetic ammunition, hence they must be fired at a very high speed to have any effect at all, hence you need a really big tank gun to fire them. I don’t think you can reach the required speed with a missile shot from a shoulder-carried launcher.
An M1A2 will never be taken out by HEAT unless you manage to hit the tracks. The reactive armor will always neutralize at least the first hit. That’s my understanding anyway.