Short poll: Who'd be willing to use DF90

[Grenny]

Greetings.

 

I'm working on a campaign for later this year, and chekcing on interesst on which vehciles to use.

For the recon missions I'm setting up a mixed squadron and thinking about adding 1 plt of DF90 as fire support element. OPFOR will be BRDMs, LMV and BMP3s.

 

I know the DF90 is a "special" vehicle, but I think well suited for that mission. So who'd be ready to ride it for a time?

 

[Apocalypse 31]

I voted yes, but my opinion is that the vehicle capabilities must be considered.

 

It has a wonky fire-control system and the in-game M690A1 ammunition isn't effective against tanks.

[Grenny]

1 hour ago, Apocalypse 31 said:

I voted yes, but my opinion is that the vehicle capabilities must be considered.

 

It has a wonky fire-control system and the in-game M690A1 ammunition isn't effective against tanks.

Exactly.

There will be mainly enemy "light skinned" vehicles in the OPFOR setup.

Yes, there will be tanks...but very few and BLUE will get the capabilities to spot them and to deal with them...

[Lumituisku]

That FCS is sooo... toxic...  I hate that.  But otherwise I do pretty much love the vehicle.   I would be happy to ride it and quite few guys from Saber would follow me on that..  act of masochism      (problem is my timings don't often line up well for participating Kanium missions.)

[Ssnake]

6 minutes ago, Lumituisku said:

That FCS is sooo... toxic...  I hate that.

That's why it needs a simulation for training.😁

[Grenny]

Thanks for the feedback gentlemen.

There seem to be enough "volunteers"...I'll include one DF90 platoon the recon squadron of the "KANIUM BG setup"

[Captain_Colossus]

i would like to see a mission where a mismatch occurs if say there was a random chance your scout unit is threatened  by enemy tanks or if say the disposition of enemy tanks was generally known and thus provided the player an idea of where or what to avoid ( single player missions are often designed in the reverse, that is, enemy patrols are fed to the player for target practice, so a clever mission design which turns the tables on the player could be justified in order to teach or punish the player for specific maneuvers). I figured one of the best missions in the original operation flashpoint campaign story was an early scenario conceit that a huge russian attack was underway and the outmatched player was forced to retreat, rather than provide some more or less balanced scenario that the player was intended to 'win', in other words, work in your scenario some condition where the mission goes south and the player is forced to make self preservation decisions other than to simply destroy all threats

 

[Captain_Colossus]

upon further thought to add: a scenario where there are no opposing tanks on the map might make it seem as though the DF90 is itself like a tank, albeit perhaps closer to a T-55; the presence of enemy tanks would give the player the sense that he is not an impromptu, ad hoc tank

[Bond_Villian]

I used the DF90 as a proxy for the SADF Ratel 90 (along with some Shot Kals) , going up against T55s and T62s in a TGIF (Multiplayer PVP) scenario last year, and the DF90s dominated...

[ben]

11 hours ago, Bond_Villian said:

used the DF90 as a proxy for the SADF Ratel 90

 

Good idea.  It definately can dominate T55 if used with care.

 

Also I have used it as a proxy for various French wheeled recon vehicles.

[Mirzayev]

The thing to keep in mind with the Ratel 90's performance: it worked well because the terrain around Cuito Cuanavale allowed for armor engagements to occur at approximately 50 meters due to the dramatically limited observation and fields of fire. 

 

Terrain was assessed as "neutral" by the SADF, which really gave an advantage to the Ratel 90 because wingman pairs could get so ridiculously close to the very poorly trained T-54/T-55 crews that their low-velocity guns could actually penetrate to the flanks.

 

The SADF was VERY worried about the Cubans employing T-62s. Thankfully this never happened, and Operation Prone ended up being nothing more than a planning exercise. 

[Grenny]

3 hours ago, Mirzayev said:

The thing to keep in mind with the Ratel 90's performance: it worked well because the terrain around Cuito Cuanavale allowed for armor engagements to occur at approximately 50 meters due to the dramatically limited observation and fields of fire. 

 

Terrain was assessed as "neutral" by the SADF, which really gave an advantage to the Ratel 90 because wingman pairs could get so ridiculously close to the very poorly trained T-54/T-55 crews that their low-velocity guns could actually penetrate to the flanks.

 

The SADF was VERY worried about the Cubans employing T-62s. Thankfully this never happened, and Operation Prone ended up being nothing more than a planning exercise. 

WoW, that approach speaks for confidence in own training too...

[Mirzayev]

1 hour ago, Grenny said:

WoW, that approach speaks for confidence in own training too...

They were pretty good at the basics.

 

At the Lomba River, despite ending up attacking into the center of the enemy's main body after getting lost in the bush, the SADF could put a LOT of firepower quickly on target. 

 

Still had issues, like 2LT Hind getting killed after his Ratel 90 took a round from a T-54, and issues of vehicles being disabled due to fratricide.