Have a question about M551 Sheridan ammo selection...
My experience using M551 Sheridan AR/AAV's in winSPMBT causes me to ask a coupla questions.
I was a Sheridan crewman from '75 until they were phased out of DivCav service in 'late 78, early '79, Replaced, in our case with M60 MBTs equipped with IR night sites and the old big IR/WL searchlight, AN/VSS-1 IIRC.
The modeled ammo supply seems close enough for gummint work. Basic load was 29 rounds, usually broken down as 11 Shillelagh missiles and 18 conventional rounds. HE and cannister, no missiles, (the CS variant in the game, I suppose) were reportedly used in vietnam and I actually got to shoot about 40 rds of HE at Ft Sill as part of a test once. During my time on them in CONUS and Europe the only conventional ammo in our basic load was HEAT-MP-T (the MP part (multi-purpose) being a cheap way to redefine an anti-tank round as a 'multi-purpose' ammunition). Kinda like what we did later when the 105mm HEP-T ammo was dropped from the inventory and HEAT magically developed anti-material usefulness.
Anyway, in service use we considered the effective range for the conventional ammo to be 800 meters. Conveniently, this was the minimum range at which the Shillelagh could be controlled onto a target. Now most of us gunners figured we could hit tank-sized targets out to 1200 meters with the conventional ammo, if we got an accurate range. But no way would we have ever fired a conventional round at an armored target and followed it up with a Shillelagh.
In general there'd be a HEAT round in the chamber pretty much all the time. Unless we found ourselves in a situation where we could put Shillelaghs to good use. IOW it was a defensive weapon, rather than an offensive weapon. It also dropped 2-4 feet after firing before the missile's motors kicked off so firing from defilade was NOT an option.
The normal loadout was 1 Shillelagh in the ready racks in the turret and 8 conventional rounds. Everything else was in the hull racks. IOW paired conventional/Shillelagh firings were so not going to happen.
So I guess my question is, is it a limitation of the software that I have to blow through the HEAT and Shillelaghs every time I have a target? I'd prefer a default of under 1000 meters use HEAT, beyond go for the missile unless I moved the previous turn. It's really annoying when I find the perfect firing position to engage at 2500+ meters and the stupid thing unloads a totally pointless conventional round, disclosing it's position and giving the AI the chance to shoot up the launch vehicle before the followup Shillelagh gets to where it's going.
I'd also be leery of giving the pre-Desert Storm I M551A1 any credit for laser fire control. The laser was used by the TC who then orally relayed the range info to the gunner. Trust me, no one used the damn thing. It was more of a pain in the butt then it was worth at the ranges we might have used it at.
The Sheridans that 82d AB took into Saudi Arabia in Dustup in the Desert I had thermal sights and I have no idea how much in the way of fire control upgrades might have happened. I was busy training Saudi tankers on the nuances of the M60A3 TTS as they'd recently upgraded from their AMX30s
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