What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Artillery- An on-map Bm-27 Uragan batallion is 250 points, half the price of a comparable MLRS unit. The cluster munitions are good against ANYTHING and if you buy an ammo dump you can keep pouring fire for almost the whole game. If you can't buy that, at least get some small cheap mortars for suppression and smoke fires. Mortars are excellent because they have a lot of firepower for their price.

Tank- Russian Chiormy Oriol. Slightly cheaper than an Abrams, and it's the only Russian tank with a fire control of 50 (enough to see through smoke). You have to buy it in the Export Tanks section under armor, to anyone having trouble finding it. It has less armor than an Abrams, but is still decent. The main reason I like it is not because of fighting ability, but just because I think it's cool that Russia has finally turned out a tank truly equal to Western models.

Infantry- FN MAG machine guns. Any machine gun works very well in open terrain, but the western ones tend to be more lethal. In close terrain, machine guns are usually less effective than assault rifle infantry, though, because numbers matter more in that situation. USMC infantry are the best because of high morale and experience and good weapons.

Air- Against an enemy witout air defences, helicopters are excellent. Any helicopter will do, as long as it has modern ATGMs. In pre-1980s scenarios, though, helicopters have poor anti-tank capability, and you should only buy a few cheap ones for scouting.

In terms of airplanes, the American B-2 is the best. It costs 999 points, but carries SIXTEEN standoff JDAMs. You could destroy the whole enemy army without them firing back, because it has a high enough EW rating to aviod most area SAMs.

Air Defence- Stinger SAMs or ZSU-23-4s. Stingers are cheap and the most accurate MANPAD avaible. I don't usually buy area SAMs because they're pretty inaccurate considering their cost and are vulnerable to anti-radar, but they're useful if the enemy has stand-off bombers.
If you don't like MANPADs for some reason or want a good anti-infantry weapon to double as air defence, buy a ZSU-23-4. They're not too accurate, but are cheap enough to pay for themselves if they kill a few enemy.

APC- BRDMs, or anything with just enough armor to repel bullets. I don't generally use APCs because they're too lighly armed and armored to survive on the battlefield anyway- that's a tanks job. It's best to buy something with just enough armor to survive small-arms fire, because anything else is a waste of money.

ATGM- Javelin. With a range of over 2,000 meters, top attack capability and very good accuracy, it's by far the best. All you have to do is make sure that you prevent them from being surpressed by artillery.

Recon- If you can't buy a recon drone, buy a helo. If you can't do that, buy something heavy enough to shrug off almost anything that the enemy will throw at it (if you recon survives he'll get a better picture of the enemy). If you can't find anything with that kind of armor, get a jeep or Humvee. Infantry have good spotting, so load them into your recon vehicle and dismount them when you contact the enemy. If the vehicle dies, at least you'll have a hard-to-spot infantry recon outpost.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Ooh, I don't agree APC's are a waste, they can get your infantry from point A to B, usaully faster and saver then if you walk them. Plus, when encountering other infantry, they multiply your combat power forward. Add to this the fact the AI tends to shoot at them first, means they die so your tanks can live long enough to take a few of those Commie Bastard's ...mmm, sorry, just got carried away for a moment.

Pre-'80's Scenrio. I like to think helocopters perform more functions then mere scouting, hell a jeep can do that soldier. Rapid re-deployment of infantry, scounting, yes that too but let's not forget enemy surpression!! Get yourself a couple of snakes loaded out with Zuni rockets and watch those VC bastards scatter and a minigun at close range, well I did offer them un-conditional surrender, didn't I?

Now I don't want to get anything stirred up here but I thought I chip in with a thought or two of my own. I hope I've not offended anyone, it's all good clean fun.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Defending against the blanket fire of an BM22 Batallion with ammo carriers is stern buisness indeed. I've tried it against some Russian PBEM gamers, and they "only" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif used about a battery..., but with an ammo carrier for every launcher they were able fire every other turn. The only really effective response I've been able to work out is attack helicopters..., wouldn't really want to think about what a Bn of BM22's could to to a ground force... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/Injured.gif

The price for a full Bn of (Russian) BM22s is considerably more than 250 pts though... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

The ideal counter to uragans, if on-map and tied to ammo units, is the MLRS units you held in reserve to smack him when he revealed himself.

Plot a couple of gold spots in the rear zone if you can spare them.

Personally - I declare uragans (or MLRS) an "Uncle Target", and will plot all available arty assets into the area of smoke left over and around, including pulling them off current tasks (maybe keeping a section or so of mortars on a critical CS mission if they are prosecuting a contact, but al auxiliary tasks get cancelled). And I will pound the ground around there till I see enough wrecks to convince me the task is complete. Primary target is the ammo trucks really.


Cheers
Andy

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

APCs usually are a waste, but "Personnel Carriers" aren't. Well, I usually play armor battles that take place after 1980, so this might be the reason why, because around 1960-1970 BMPs armed with Saggers are a good way to kill tanks. Other than that, though, modern APCs are pretty expensive. If you just want to move your infantry quickly,get something cheap like an M-113, but I rarely use infantry on the attack. If you want to multiply your combat power forward, that's what tanks are for- Bradleys, etc. are way too expensive considering their limited firepower and the fact that their ATGMs can be defeated by reactive armor. And as for the idea that the AI shoots at them first, if you want to draw fire, just buy trucks or humvees.
Well, like I said, I usually play post-80s armor games, but I agree that helos are VERY effective against infantry- only if he dosen't have any air defence, though. You have to get close to use them against infantry, and you're very exposed against air defences. Against TANKS, though, helos have good ATGMs by post-1980. Because of their mobility, they can move to the enemy rear and shoot at the tank's rear where reactive armor dosen't go.

As for infantry, it's usually a bad idea to do a heliborne assault unless your enemy dosen't have tanks or is fighting in close terrain.

edit: About the Bm-27s. Go to the Russian purchase screen and look at their cost- 250 points for a batallion. Bm-21s are 161 points and also very powerful.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

hmm... are you using a custom OOB?

A BM-22 Batallion (year 2003) costs 1386 build pts.
Glanced through the encyclopedia, can't find any BM-27 unit in the Russian OOB.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

When there is infantry involved,Snipers can be very useful. And I mean the "heavy" type.
And on the lighter side, my most favorite are... enemy units!... the destroyed ones :^)

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

I don't know, I'm using the version 2.5 OOB and I was playing a PBEM game with a guy. Maybe its a bug? Also, make sure you look at the on-map BM-27 because the off-map is more expensive.

Snipers are great for attack or defence. They're better than machine guns in some situations.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Mustang & Wilfur,
According to:
www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/russia/9p140.htm
BM-22 and BM-27 are the same thing. The designation BM-27 is the correct one for the 9P140 Uragan (Hurricane)
220-mm Multiple Rocket Launcher which I think is what we are talking about. The 161 building points correspond to a battery of BM-21s (not batallion). The cheapest Uragan I found is the on map battery at 462 points. Nothing close to Mustang's 250. Am I missing something?

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Well, maybe I'm just remembering wrong. Or maybe it was some kind of bug. Regardless, I bought 6 Uragan batallions and 3 paratroop infantry batallions with 5,000 points. Make of that what you want.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

I don't think you did, unless there was a serious bug. Three paratroop infantry battallions (nine companies) alone cost just under 5000 points, and that's in the cheapest possible configuration. And without their support companies.

You're sure you haven't got the formation sizes mixed up?Cause you can buy just about 3 airborne COMPANIES and 6 on-map Uragan BATTERIES for 5000 points. That's what I make of it at least.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

My favorite unit is a can of WHOOP ***! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

My favourite unit is the ACMA TAP. Really, it is. Whoever thought that one up is .... uhhh... special.... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Must be Swedish Strv-122 MBT, This steel beast has helped me to conquer Finland, Norway, Russia and now kicking some *** in China http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Also Swedish RBS-56 (Bill) missile teams rock, these have very long firing range and are very accurate, mostly seems kill enemy MBT's with one shot http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

From Infantry units i choose paras, small teams but very hard fighters as my enemy have found out after underestimating them.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

The RBS-56 Bill has a top attack capability, dosen't it? I haven't tried it, but if it does it wouldn't probably be as good as a Javelin. There isn't much to choose from between modern ATGMs as long as they have top attack.

You're right about the BM-27 thing, I opened up the game and checked it out. I bought 6 batteries and 3 companies. Still, I have an insane ammount of firepower.

Skill actually is a big deal when it comes to infantry combat, except for very close-in combat. Inexperienced troops have poor marksmanship and will loose in any battle greater than one hex away, even with superior numbers.

I don't like any of the Western tanks because most of them lack either VIRSS or Arena systems, which are a must against top-attack ATGMs.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

With the "short" L44 gun? Try the Leo 2A6.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Another good tank is the Merkava 4. The armor is excellent and the Merkava 4B has LAHAT top-attack missiles. An excellent tank.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

For tanks, I'm in love with the Israeli Merkava models 3 or if you can afford them the Merkava 4. They have great armor, fire-control and in real-life action can also transport infantry.

If you are looking for an M60-type tank, the Israeli Magach 6 Gal is the best. It has reactive armor [Israel was the first country to use them], a great fire control system [the Gal is actually state of the art and under-represented in the game], and best of all plenty of room inside to store food for the tank crew :-)

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

You can get even better with the Sabra, which is basically an ugraded Magach-7 with the Merkava's 120mm gun.
Should come in service any time in the Turkish forces if I'm not mistaken, but I couldn't find it in the game (the T-84 Yatagan is pretty funny though!).
Not yet in Israeli service, but I wouldn't bet it will never be... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif
BTW the ultimate Magach seems to be the -7 Alef, but that depends on which timeframe you're playing. Or is the Gal undertated?

Anyway the Merkava-4 still ranks among the very best tanks in the world IMHO, and that is pretty well pictured in the game.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

The Magach 6 Gal actually has a better fire control system than the Magach 7 of any type, but inferior armor. The Magach 6 Batash is a Gal version with added passive armor and the reactive armor removed. The game doesn't quite represent this correctly, but not everybody has driven one :-)

The Sabra is an upgrade to the M60 that Israel offers to countries and is probably not going to be available to the IDF. The Merkava appears to be Israel's choice in MBT and all of the Magach versions are actually being replaced in service in the IDF.

For APC, Israel is also King. The Achzarit takes the hull of a T55 MBT, removes the turret, and thereby gives the soldiers inside the armor protection of a tank. While a bit underarmed, compared with a Bradley, I'd still prefer to be inside one of these and not be a shooter than shoot it out with the enemy but have a lot less protection.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

The only problem with the Achzarit is that it is so slow that you can't keep up with the tanks. With the Merkava at hand I wouldn't bother with APCs anyway. Just buy more tanks and load them up with infantry.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

The problem with modern tanks is that you have to worry about them getting killed by all kinds of top attack missiles and helicopter ATGMs. The Merkava 4b is nice because it has both VIRSS and LAHAT top-attack munitions, and it's probably my favorite tank now. The top attack ATGMs are pretty innacurate for some reason (the game says they have a hit chance of 70% or more, but they only hit about 30% of the time), and it's hard to get a good hit with them, but they're 1/10th the cost of a tank. If nothing else, they'll slow your opponenet down and force him to deal with all these hard to kill ATGM teams. What's also great about the Merkava is its ability to carry infantry- heavy snipers work very well against missile teams.

The Achzarit is just an overpriced hunk of metal. Anything without Chobham-type protection in modern scenarios is for all practical purposes as heavily armored as a jeep. I still think that BTR and M-113 type APCs are the best. The Russian Valuk APC is also an interesting design- very fast (speed of 37!), amphibious, about 40 points and has a 30mm chaingun.

How about boats? Does anyone here ever use naval units? The Yugoslav OOB has a "Missile Boat" equipped with a naval gun and two 57mm rocket launchers which have enough punch to kill anything else that floats. Some of the American PBRs have flameguns and are good against infantry. A lot of people think that patrol craft are useless against tanks, but I can tell you that I've immobilized a lot of armor with ship-mounted grenade launchers and rockets with flank shots. This was all during the WBW Carribean Conquest campaign, against older tanks. Of course, against anything mounting a good, accurate gun, PBRs are going to get blown out of the water.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Then what about mounting such a gun on a PBR or something? If you want high-tech combat-capable coastal boats, just look towards Scandinavia. F.e. I think there should be Swedish boats around with AMOS automortar turrets any time soon, if there aren't already.
And regaring what you said about 57mm rockets on missile boats, it looks like several lower-tier forces with large Soviet stocks have the habit of welding BM-21 122mm rocket racks on old missile boats once the missile packs have become useless.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Where did you hear the thing about third world countries mounting Grads on boats? If you just noticed it in the game, it's probably just there to represent naval missiles because the game dosen't have any code to really represent naval SSMs.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

I have a strange and inexplicable affinity for the LAV III (in particular the 25mm variety).

Not sure why. They can't carry a full riflesquad. They can't kill a tank. And they're way too expensive to use as first-line recon.

Yet I keep buying them ... go figure.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

I like certain units also, but I don't buy them all the time. For some reason I like the Russian Chiormy Oriol (found under Export Tanks in the Russian armor purchase screen) a lot. It's actually a pretty good tank, vision 40 and two ARENA shots, but the T-90M has the same capability and is slightly cheaper.

For some reason I also think that the light chaingun APCs like the LAV, Lynx, Valuk, etc. are sexy. It dosen't make sense, but I think they're cool to have.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

No, I didn't get that from the game; from various US publications, it appears that some potential opponent countries (at least North Korea and Iran) have tried to replace the outdated and unserviceable missile launchers on some of their patrol crafts or larger ships with 122mm rocket racks salvaged from truckborne launchers. That would f.e. replace (C)SS-N-1/SS-N-2-type missile tubes or Western equipments for which no spare parts were available.

It would sound logical that other countries with more Soviet oldies than spare parts and a minimal technical basis would attempt that kind of DIY retrofit.
As a side note, the PLAN seems to be experimenting about a cruder, similar technique.

For more reference see the "North Korea Country Handbook" from the USMCIA, or f.e. I got this article from the CSIS on Iranian forces.

I'll post about further sources whenever I find some, if that's of any interest to anyone here! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Wow, an armed cargo ship. It's really a very simple idea that noone's tried before. I'm going to make a China-invades-the-world campaign later on, and I might use one.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

And how do you simulate tanks and howitzers tied on the deck? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

The question remains: are they really up to using that kind of thing in real combat conditions, are they experimenting for further dedicated shipborne systems (e.g. using the landlubbers' stabilization technology), or is that just a propaganda quirk to frighten the hell out of the Taiwanese?

Or as far as the game is concerned, just take any old LC unit and stuff it full with any old vehicle-based weapons if you like!
I tend to do the same with infantry weapons in some landing scenarios, to account for crewmen, grunts, MPs or just anyone giving some support (rifles, MGs, grenades, mines, rarely LAWs and MANPADS) during the beaching.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

If you're talking historically then you're wrong. You might want to google Q-Ships, a prime example of this. Also, the development of practical VTOL aircraft led to the proposals in the 1980s that perhaps container ships could be configured quickly and effectively as low cost aircraft carriers serving helicopters and Harriers.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

It looks to me like just another prototype. It'd be terribly unsurvivable in combat (no anti-missile defenses, and when anything substantial hits this big floating target all of the howitzers and the ship sink). But I'm going to include it anyway just because it's cool.

They have plently of generic "ship" icons in the game. Have you ever looked at a Support Ship or Ammo Ship? I'll take one of those, load all the weapons mounts with BM-21s, and put it offshore somewhere as an auxiliary unit for the campaign. The Ammo Ship class might be a good idea to pick, as something carrying that many rockets is bound to be very volatile and ready to explode.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Look at the NVA "Support ship" f.e., it uses the ammo ship icon in the LCG class, and I think that's the best to use. Ammo carrier class would give it an unrealistic ability to resupply other units, and you have other ways of making it unsurviveable.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

No, I just like the explosion it makes. And it would likely be carrying lots of small arms reserves anyway, as the crew would be firing howitzers, machine guns, and other army ammunition.

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

Buratino, SU-25 with FAE and Schmel infantry...hmmm, notice a pattern? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: What are your favorite units in the game?
 

My favourite units (no order of preference) are:

MLRS - time the arrival of MLRS cluster munitions right so that you have 'bounding artillery' strikes, and you can keep squashing the enemy as they advance. That's a great tactic to employ when playing a meeting engagement. By the time the enemy reach the victory hexes (or even get close) so little is left that the remainder of your advance is essentially a mopping-up op.

Great anti-armour weapon, also great for wiping out clusters of infantry. But what's best of all is that MLRS units automatically respond with counter-battery fire, with great effect. Unfortunately MLRS does not exist in the real Canadian Army T0&E, so when playing Canada v some other country, I have to attach US forces (equipped with MLRS) as a substitute. I will be working soon on an OOB for a fictional, in-the-future Canadian Army which actually has some decent kit including MLRS.

M777 155mm howitzer - it's capable of lobbing cluster munitions and is fairly cheap to buy. It's a half-decent alternative to MLRS if your buy points are limited. Just don't expect to blast away wide swaths of enemy forces.

Leopard 2A6EX/Strv122 - Far and away my favourite tanks - superb fire control, excellent armour (only the M1A2 is better in this area), great mobility.

CV9040 IFV - The 40mm main gun on this Swedish-built IFV just destroys infantry in the open, most wheeled/older tracked APC's with first-round hits, some older tanks if hit obliquely or from the rear.

Centauro tank destroyer - This thing is fast and potent. Half-decent armour. It's an ideal tool for conducting rapid advances and exploiting the enemy's weak spots.