APCs: Thoughts about their role

[Mikemonster]

Building and terrain penetration and lack of stand-off ability hamper the APCs enough not to seem realistic in my uneducated opinion.

I.e if an infanty unit was pinned down in dead ground behind some dunes and had a LAT, in real life I would presume the APC would just fire THROUGH the dune/berm/ditch and obliterate them. From 1500m away.

Same for a squad of infantry trapped in a building complex, just level the complex with them in it.

DieVoorJe, please stay around, you can give excellent insight into this issue.

[DieVoorJe91]

Originally Posted by Mikemonster

DieVoorJe, please stay around, you can give excellent insight into this issue.

I'm always around.

Originally Posted by PFunk

As for the way YOUR forces operate, are the IFVs operating like they're on their own mission, going off and conquering the entire map, or are you guys more like sitting back, waiting for Infantry to get into contact and then moving up if they need support?

Well what I can tell from our last excercise, is that in a defensive way of fighting, we fight combined. One continuous line of infantry with intergraded IFV's. But if we are talking about a attacking way of fighting, we most of time stayed in the rear in a holdig area or trying to seek out enemy IFV's and let the infantry fight each other.

But in my opinion on of the great things about a IFV's is there versatility in combat.
And as off a few months ago they are our armies main strike force cause of budget cuts, all our tanks have been taking out of service. So why are trying to let our IFV's maneuver a bit more like tanks.

[Xander[nl]]

DieVoorJe, one important aspect you left out is, which type of combat is it that you're talking about? Counter-insurgency ie. Afghanistan, or Open Warfare against capable armies?

Because I think in PR the way APCs work in Insurgency is rather nice and most of the time like you describe, staying in the background providing long range support and mostly minding their own business. That's not really where the problem lies IMO.

They however lack effectiveness (in teamwork) in AAS. I would like to know how you'd operate in a full scale war (that AAS represents).

[DieVoorJe91]

The way of fighting i talked about is that we call in holland, groen optreden, or in english conventinal warfare with 2 or more regular armies fighting each other in non urban battlefields.

But the methods we use in reallife cant be implemented in PR unless 4 squads or more are working thightly together as a platoon. Only then you can achieve the manner of fighting with 2 or more IFV's supported with inf.

For as the way IFV's are operating now on insurgency is the best way IMO.

[BulletPr0of]

Originally Posted by Mikemonster

Trouble is that the flanks in PR are never protected.. The APC is always an island even with infantry, meaning they have to worry about 4 sides instead of just the objective.

Hopefully in 128 servers there is enough support to allow for a 'front line' of sorts? That would at least allow fire to be directed on the assault objective.

Either that or 'Mech Inf' squads should have an APC and two full squads of inf, one for security and the other for assault. But I think this is far too complex and will/can never happen.

^ this

The maps are simply too big for 64 players.

Once everyone has claimed their assets, and sniper squads, you're left with around 18 people to fill the role of inf, usually split into more than 3 squads, 1 squad defending a flag, the others attacking, so generally speaking the attacking force on a 4km map pretty much comes down to 12 blokes and an APC going up against a force anticipating the attack, with an extreme chance of having some form of AT, and often with CAS on call, an example of this would be any of the flags outside of the Bunkers on Kashan, the armor can be heard, and spotted from such distances, that they're pretty much exposed any where they go.

[40mmrain]

Originally Posted by BulletPr0of

^ this

The maps are simply too big for 64 players.

Once everyone has claimed their assets, and sniper squads, you're left with around 18 people to fill the role of inf, usually split into more than 3 squads, 1 squad defending a flag, the others attacking, so generally speaking the attacking force on a 4km map pretty much comes down to 12 blokes and an APC going up against a force anticipating the attack, with an extreme chance of having some form of AT, and often with CAS on call, an example of this would be any of the flags outside of the Bunkers on Kashan, the armor can be heard, and spotted from such distances, that they're pretty much exposed any where they go.

Yes, I was playing on a server with about 120 capacity today, on AAS iron ridge. I had 3 apcs under my lead. We all advanced in a line with infantry on a flag and security from AT was not a problem.

With 20 infantry armed with rifles, 2 30mm cannons, and a 14.5, along with carious machine guns we were quite a secure attacking force, infantry was easy picking for the APCs, an spg or HAT was easy picking for infantry.

And then i crashed to desktop

ESsentially, APCs must always be together and not in front of infantry to be successful which doesnt fair to well with small servers

[Hunt3r]

If LATs are limited to a 400m range or so before they explode that would likely fix most of the issues. HATs IRL have around 2500m range so there's no getting around that.

[jerkzilla]

Originally Posted by Hunt3r

If LATs are limited to a 400m range or so before they explode that would likely fix most of the issues. HATs IRL have around 2500m range so there's no getting around that.

Unless their effective range in game is scaled for the view distance, but that's a pretty drastic measure.

[chrisweb89]

Originally Posted by PFunk

I was reading that Canadian infantry squads are being trained to never expect to fight without the support of their LAV3. So I have no idea what the actual on the ground result is, but the FMs seem to imply that Squad ops independent of LAV support is unlikely. I was also reading some retired officer's OpEd piece about how training has not focused on complex fire and maneuver tactics and instead relies on the assumption of APC support at all times to allow for simplistic frontal assault tactics.

The following information is just from readin aswell, and you may have alreayd known it just not mentioned it. I believe Canada's mechanized infantry(2 battalions in each regiment, 3 regiments total) are trained to always fight with the LAVs, but our light infantry(the remaining 1 battalion in each regiment) are trained to fight light, either motorized with G-wagons, boats, helicopters or only on foot.