Black Sea Discussions

[A Canadian Cat]

550m is close so ATGM would be a poor choice. Do the T80s fire AP as well or do they only fire the missiles?

[PoorOldSpike]

In this latest test the Oplot crew preferred to fire a Kombat ATGM missile again instead of APFSDS.
I parked the Oplot stationary then ran a T-90AM out from behind the houses to confront it frontally, the range was 700 m.
The Oplot fired first (missile) and knocked it out (inset) before the T-90 could return fire. The hit text reads "Hit:superstructure front hull: partial penetration".
Obviously the crew knew their ATGM packed a helluva wallop so fired it in preference to APFSDS bless their little hearts..:)

[PoorOldSpike]

Groan.. one of Hind's tanks (muzzle flash, background) squeezes a shot between the treetrunks and clobbers my Abrams (no damage).
I thought I'd put enough depth of trees between us to conceal the Abrams, but whereas that works in CMx1, there's always the chance in CMBS that the enemy will glimpse you between the trunks..

[PoorOldSpike]

FORDS, tales from the riverbank
Unless there's a mod I don't know about, the default fords are hard to see and only reveal their presence by "ramps" in the riverbank as in this screenshot where I placed 4 fords..



They're easy to see on the map in the editor like this, so it might be a good idea to examine game maps in the editor to see if they've got fords before play begins..



An AFV climbing out of a ford..

[PoorOldSpike]

TESTS to find out what can cross Water with and without fords..

Ukrainian
I lined up every vehicle in the game and gave them "Move" orders straight across Shallow and Deep fords, and Water.
(Incidentally I'm using Lt. Smash's floating icons mod)




Shallow ford: ALL Ukrainians crossed-




Deep Ford: All crossed EXCEPT the 7 units in the yellow border, they went round the edge.
They were -Oplot(APS), Oplot, Bulat, T-64BV, Tunguska, UAZ469, Ural truck.




Water (no fords): All swam over except the same 7 units-


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Russian
Same setup and procedure as before, no need for as many screenshots.
Shallow ford: ALL crossed-




Deep Ford and Water: All crossed EXCEPT these 9 units- T-90AM(APS), T-90AM, T-90A, T-72B3(APS), T-72B3, Tunguska, Tigr, UAZ469, Ural truck.


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American
Shallow ford: ALL crossed




Deep ford and Water: NONE crossed, they all skirted round the ends


SUMMARY: Surprisingly the Americans are at a tactical disadvantage because they can only cross shallow fords, whereas most of the Ukrainian and Russian unts (but not tanks) are fully amphibious and can swim over rivers whether there's a ford there or not.
Note- in each test 1 or 2 vehicles sometimes bogged in shallow fords but freed themselves within a minute or two, but occasionally a vehicle became permanently immobilised.

[A Canadian Cat]

One way to find fords is to "run" the river with the camera. Here is what I do position the camera over the water got to camera position 1. If you are in the river your camera will go partly underwater. Start moving the camera along the river. You will soon see the fords. Or not.

[PoorOldSpike]

Yeah and luckily most map designers make it easier for us to find fords by simply adding some terrain tiles at the entry and exit points like this, (bottom to top is Sand, Mud, Dirt and Hard)

[GAZNZ]

All Russian vehicles were designed to attack aggressively bypassing bridges
that was the whole part of there doctrine
They learnt that during WW2 the importance of being able to cross rivers
So no surprise American vehicles cannot

[PoorOldSpike]

There are currently these 15 Ukrainian Light AFV's (inc a truck and car) in the game-




I compiled this "shopping guide"-



The purchase screen. The far right column is the increased cost when rarity is set to "Standard"-


Note- I've seen 14.5mm HMG's engage main battle tanks, usually while auto-reversing.
They also engage light armour and usually kill it with several bursts.

The BTR-4E has got ATGMs, 30mm cannon, Grenade launcher and MG and i've seen it fire all of them at different times at the whim of the crew.

The BRM-1K has got a low-velocity 73mm gun which misses by a mile at longish ranges, but is useful for lobbing HE shells at infantry.

We've all got our favourite toys, personally I use the BTR-70 for getting troops from A to B, it's more expensive than a truck but it gives the troops protection against small arms and shrapnel all the way, and packs a useful 14.5mm HMG to dish it out.

[Grober]

I miss btr 60 :(
How coool it would be if they would add older equipment to UKR and RU like T72 vanilla or T72M BTR 60 and BMP 1 ehhhhhh
BMD's.... ehhh

Also hope that soon they will be some european force addition i would love to see Poland, Germany, UK ? and China ! China would be awsome :)