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A baker's dozen of NATO vehicles from the mid eighties...


Scrapper_511

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8 minutes ago, Gibsonm said:

Must be some Scandinavian acronym.

 

We here used Land Rovers for ages (Series 2A, Series 3, Defender, etc.) and we called them "rover" or "land rover", I've never heard of "LARO".

 

Certainly though the short wheel base Series 2 with either 106mm RCL or Milan would be nice.

 

You have now then ... We dont speak australian in scandinavia funnily enough. 

 

SO ... moving on: More interestingly and to the point, then these were a full generation before the humwee TOW´S.

 

And thus could be used realistically in all the early cold war scenarios. They have a different functionality and application than tanks in the AT role.

Edited by Nike-Ajax
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Here is a link for you:

 

http://www.armyvehicles.dk/lr88half.htm

 

They where used in pairs 1 had the launcher and 1 reload, the other had 5 or 6 reloads and the long range radio.

 

Normally 2 pairs and 2 M113TOW made a platoon with 2 vehicle for scouts

 

The landrover family which was used where these http://www.armyvehicles.dk/landroverfamily.htm

 

The reason we used LARO88 was the the bottom of the GD240 couldn't take the TOW launcher so we used the LARO in this role much longer then in any others, in 1998 the LARO88 where superseded by the first Hummers to be implemented in the Danish army, all others LAROs where superseded by GDs. 

 

http://www.armyvehicles.dk/hmmwvm1045a2.htm

 

MD

Edited by Major duck
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On 8/11/2017 at 0:50 AM, Marko said:

 

About 3k.  

For a none playable model if memory serves me correctly.

there was a post about how much it costs a while back

But i don't think money would be the issue with esim more.

About time and accurate data.

 

The chieftain playable should be accessible I think. 

 

How much for that ?.

 

Don't think it sounds bad that amount 

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The floated "3k" figure is plain wrong. Besides, it's a matter of development capacity - a factor that can neither be expanded infinitely, nor quickly.

 

Please leave the business side to me. You don't know everything that is relevant for my decision making, because I don't tell you everything about every influential factor. Because, these are business secrets. To be unmistakably clear: There is no way I'm going to discuss eSim's business strategy publicly, nor it is up for democratic decision processes.

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On 8/15/2017 at 0:13 AM, Ssnake said:

The floated "3k" figure is plain wrong. Besides, it's a matter of development capacity - a factor that can neither be expanded infinitely, nor quickly.

 

Please leave the business side to me. You don't know everything that is relevant for my decision making, because I don't tell you everything about every influential factor. Because, these are business secrets. To be unmistakably clear: There is no way I'm going to discuss eSim's business strategy publicly, nor it is up for democratic decision processes.

My apologies for making light of the unofficial dollar figure/statement. At the time, I wasn't thinking about how such statements could affect the business.

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Floating the number doesn't affect the business at all, it just creates the false impression that if all it took were such a relatively small sum, eSim Games' failing to produce these vehicles either suggests incompetence, or unwillingness to listen to their customers. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Even if the figure was correct, money is only one factor among many. Discussing all these additional factors and my opinion about them would however reveal our business strategy more than I'm willing to expose. I don't know how many of our competitors are following my posts here, but I don't want to find out the hard way.

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On 8/10/2017 at 8:22 PM, streakeagle said:

All of my board games and miniature games for simulating "modern" armored combat were focused on mid 80s orders of battle. GDW in particular had both board games and miniatures rules covering this order of battle very well.

I'm curious about what kind of scenarios and maps you used for the 80s games you played.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 16/08/2017 at 5:47 PM, Ssnake said:

. I don't know how many of our competitors are following my posts here, but I don't want to find out the hard way.

 

I completely understand your reasoning, but I don't see SB having any competitors (which probably makes me an SB "Fanboi").

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On ‎8‎/‎17‎/‎2017 at 0:08 AM, Scrapper_511 said:

I'm curious about what kind of scenarios and maps you used for the 80s games you played.

The board games came with many scenarios, mostly generic based on standard engagement types with standard orders of battle: i.e. US company vs USSR battalion in a meeting engagement, or hasty defense engagement, etc. US company might be two or three tank platoons with an attached mech infantry platoon. USSR battalion might be two tank companies with a mech infantry company. The maps were generic "geomorphic" German terrains meant to represent areas similar to the Fulda Gap that could be rearranged to provide some variety. The miniatures games gave you force structures, but little guidance on setting up your own terrain on a table top or specific scenarios. The WW2 Command Decision game had supplements that provided precise scenarios to recreate specific battles and/or campaigns such as the Battle of the Bulge, but the Combine Arms modern supplement mainly provided rules, charts, and orders of battle. As the board games and miniature games were both by the same author, it was easy to adapt board game scenarios to miniatures scenarios. I typically liked meeting engagement/hasty defense scenarios with either early M1s or M60A3s and M2/M3s or M113s facing T-80/T-72 battalions with a company of BMP-2s or BMP-1s. Against any form of M1s, it was very difficult for the USSR to win unless you were skilled at using artillery or could somehow flank the M1s to beat their armor. M60A3s needed to get in the first shots and not miss to have a chance to win or otherwise needed creative use of artillery and infantry support to avoid being decimated.

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On 8/12/2017 at 6:15 AM, Ssnake said:

Well, there is no M60A1. Arguably you could substitute it by an M60A3 with thermal imager and stabilization damage, but it's not actually an A1 version; similar options you'd have with the Leopard 1. Also, the available munitions would be a but dubious/anachronistic for a 1960s scenario; APFSDS really took off only from the early 1970s on.

 

So, let me just ask, since the Leopard AS1 is so frequently used as a Leopard 1A3/A4 substitute, can we please get a specific vehicle made just for that purpose?  I'm not asking for a faithful recreation of a 1A3 or 1A4, as much as I am asking for something functionally equivalent.  For example, add in a representation of the PZB 200 night-vision device to the AS1 to represent a 1A3/1A4 set up for night fighting.

 

I'd like to be able to get into the AS1, and when I push the "+" key to toggle thermals, get something like this...

pzb-200_strichbild.jpgpzb-200_strichbild_mit_entfernungen.jpg

http://www.kotsch88.de/f_pzb200.htm

 

I understand that there were some versions of the M60A3 TTS that did NOT feature thermal sighting equipment.  From what I've been able to find on Google this would be units produced over a period of only a few months.  The A3 without TTS would have the day sight fire control set up identical to what we have currently, but a passive IR night vision sight instead of the thermals, not hooked into the fire control system.  That's pretty close to an M60A1 RISE/Passive, which means you've got a VERY good option for Gulf War era scenarios...

 

Also, IIRC, we do have some APDS 105mm rounds already?

 

 

Edit to Add:

There were enough M60A3 Passive to get sent to Germany...
 

Quote

 

When I arrived at the 1/11th ACR in 1980, they had just received the M60A3 Passive. The regiment was gambling, that if they accepted the "Passives", instead of waiting for the M60A3 TTS, that they would be first in line for the M1. They lost. The "passives" had "starlight" technology for both the gunner and TC, just like on late issue M60A1 Passives.

 

http://www.militarymodelling.com/forums/postings.asp?th=128994&p=12

 

Steel Beasts Pro PE appears to have included special textures for the Austrian army M60A3s, this page claims they weren't TTS equipped:

http://tanknutdave.com/the-us-m60-patton-series/

 

 

 

Quote

Just so you know there are also two different types of M60A3.
M60A3/Passive retained the passive elbow night sight from the M60A1 RISE/Passive and usually had the small box search lights over their guns and the thermal wrap on the tube with lots of buckles.
M60A3TTS had the wonderous Tank Thermal Sight fitted so it had no search light mount over the gun and had the power socket on the turret top blanked off. They also had more oten then not the later type of thermal wrap with only three buckles...

 

...

Hope this helps. I was an M60 tanker for a few years.

http://www.network54.com/Forum/47209/thread/982341015/M60A3+questions

 

 

 

Right there would be another cold war vehicle, and by simply breaking the LRF (Or flipping it to semi-auto and having the TC do the lasing from his position...) it suddenly becomes a very close replica of the M60A1 RISE/Passive...

 

Bust the stabilizer too and you can suddenly use it for even older M60s...

Edited by Maj.Hans
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The board game from GDW was the "Assault" series by Frank Chadwick. I had every release in the series. But I much preferred the look and feel of miniatures. "Command Decision" was Frank's miniatures game for WW2. A little while later GDW released the modern miniatures adaptation, "Combined Arms. GDW went out of business as the wargame/miniatures gaming fell to the wayside with the advent of PC gaming. But Command Decision continues to evolve and is still available in its latest form "Test of Battle". Unfortunately, ToB only supports WW2, but unofficial rules combining the latest data for modern armor provides an equivalent to the "Combined Arms" supplement.

 

The board game I enjoyed the most was West End Games "Air Cav". It was much faster/easier to play and just as realistic. It only came with two full maps: a Fulda Gap type terrain on one side and an Israeli desert type map on the other. But I loved the Air Cav German terrain map. Whether I was the US or USSR, I knew every hill, valley, town, forest and could exploit the lines of sight to my advantage.

 

Another board game I enjoyed was Avalon Hill's Tac Air. But each counter represented a battalion, so it was less about specific hardware and more about supply lines, speed of advance, learning to penetrate a line/outflank enemy positions.

 

Playing Steel Beasts from the map view is very similar to my board gaming experience except that it moves in real time which doesn't provide the chess like experience of carefully considering your options. In fact, Steel Beasts from the map view feels like one of those real time strategy games where you need to be everywhere at the same time, but can only command/control one area at a time and have to correctly prioritize where to provide command/control to make up for AI limitations.

 

The best part about playing board game and miniatures games was face-to-face interaction. But finding others to play those games could be difficult. I had a friend that would play Air Cav with me, but never had a live opponent for Assault or Combined Arms. Computers providing AI for single player is the breakthrough that killed board games and miniatures... not to mention the flexibility of the screen to provide a huge battle space not possible on a table top. I understand why board games and miniature games have mostly died out, but I still miss them even if I don't have the time/space to play them now that I am married with a child and working full time.

Edited by streakeagle
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  • 2 weeks later...
On 11/4/2017 at 7:16 PM, streakeagle said:

Another board game I enjoyed was Avalon Hill's Tac Air. But each counter represented a battalion, so it was less about specific hardware and more about supply lines, speed of advance, learning to penetrate a line/outflank enemy positions.

 

Computers providing AI for single player is the breakthrough that killed board games and miniatures... not to mention the flexibility of the screen to provide a huge battle space not possible on a table top. I understand why board games and miniature games have mostly died out, but I still miss them even if I don't have the time/space to play them now that I am married with a child and working full time.

I didn't have anyone to play board games with but that didn't stop me from buying a few sets. I was mostly limited to admiring the box art, counters, and maps however. I've rarely looked back after I got my 486 and I'm sure I wasn't the only socially inept teen that welcomed AI. It is no surprise, however unfortunate, how the PC spelled the demise of the board/miniature game industry.

 

Thanks for sharing your experience with Cold War era games/scenarios, Streakeagle.

My fascination with the era lives on in SB.

 

Oh, I had to share these:

TacAirBox.jpg

TacAirContents.jpg

Edited by Scrapper_511
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On 11/4/2017 at 10:16 PM, streakeagle said:

The board game from GDW was the "Assault" series by Frank Chadwick. I had every release in the series. But I much preferred the look and feel of miniatures. "Command Decision" was Frank's miniatures game for WW2. A little while later GDW released the modern miniatures adaptation, "Combined Arms. GDW went out of business as the wargame/miniatures gaming fell to the wayside with the advent of PC gaming. But Command Decision continues to evolve and is still available in its latest form "Test of Battle". Unfortunately, ToB only supports WW2, but unofficial rules combining the latest data for modern armor provides an equivalent to the "Combined Arms" supplement.

 

The board game I enjoyed the most was West End Games "Air Cav". It was much faster/easier to play and just as realistic. It only came with two full maps: a Fulda Gap type terrain on one side and an Israeli desert type map on the other. But I loved the Air Cav German terrain map. Whether I was the US or USSR, I knew every hill, valley, town, forest and could exploit the lines of sight to my advantage.

 

Another board game I enjoyed was Avalon Hill's Tac Air. But each counter represented a battalion, so it was less about specific hardware and more about supply lines, speed of advance, learning to penetrate a line/outflank enemy positions.

 

Playing Steel Beasts from the map view is very similar to my board gaming experience except that it moves in real time which doesn't provide the chess like experience of carefully considering your options. In fact, Steel Beasts from the map view feels like one of those real time strategy games where you need to be everywhere at the same time, but can only command/control one area at a time and have to correctly prioritize where to provide command/control to make up for AI limitations.

 

The best part about playing board game and miniatures games was face-to-face interaction. But finding others to play those games could be difficult. I had a friend that would play Air Cav with me, but never had a live opponent for Assault or Combined Arms. Computers providing AI for single player is the breakthrough that killed board games and miniatures... not to mention the flexibility of the screen to provide a huge battle space not possible on a table top. I understand why board games and miniature games have mostly died out, but I still miss them even if I don't have the time/space to play them now that I am married with a child and working full time.

 

There is a very nice VASSAL module for the entire Assault series, if you want to play boardgames on your PC.  And you can probably find an opponent to play via Internet.

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  • 1 month later...

VASSAL is amazing and I used to collect and update all the modules for my games that I once owned. But I am just not motivated nor have the patience/energy to re-learn the rules for board games and get used to the VASSAL interface. My time and energy are much more easily committed to PC games. I am an online multiplayer advocate for the challenge, realism, and fun of interacting with real people. But in practice, I seldom play online because it is hard to find a group that plays the way I want to play within the limited windows of opportunity I have to play. Whereas I can find many games where the single player experience allows to get most of what I want out of combat simulations in terms of unit types, force ratios, crew quality, etc. AI never behaves quite the way it should or the way I would prefer, but at least it is consistent and allows me to maximize the enjoyment of my limited time and energy.

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