Questions of logic regarding story and equipment

[instagoat 133]

Questions of logic.

As people know, I generally don´t care a lot about detail realism. Exact modelling of the looks of a particular gun, or the correct makeup of a force both in technology and equipment don´t matter in the end, because all guns shoot and all tanks do pretty much the same except with more bang.

What I have a problem with, though, especially as a singleplayer person, is questions of logic in the force makeup. The most glaring twist in logic, at least right now, appears to be the extensive use of evidently israeli gear by similarily clearly iranian soldiers. This raises multiple, and to me, worrying questions. Firstly, why are they using Merkavas and Tavors, when there are modern weapons in development both in Iran and in China that could be used instead. And, this is the knick-knack part, -how- did they aquire this gear.

The tom clancy (ie, cheap copout) explanation would be "China copied the gear and mass produced it for the alliance, because western gear is clearly superior and thus more desireable to be used."

Ditto for the merkava and the M-ATV. How and why are these being used by the eastern alliance? Did Israel get overrun and had her stocks looted by the eastern armies, who were desperately short on equipment? (This has terrible political implications in the real world, obviously). Or, as I mentioned before, are these mere copies? Or, are the tavor and merkava not Israeli gear to begin with (!) in the Armaverse?

It does not make sense to me. Moreover, the logic of BOTH nato and shanghai-cooperation org armies using Merkavas and (possibly) Namers escapes me too. Both of them using the same equipment at once, and especially these two vehicles which are -way- too heavy to be transported anywhere in any meaningful numbers (which is crucial in a high-speed modern global warfare scenario)... they -do- look cool though.

Am I counting rivets here? I´d like to think I am not: the choice of equipment has implications for the background story, unless the origins of the equipments are -completely disregarded-. Latter would sort of tear out the last bits of connection to the real world, and I propose that any name for the factions would then become completely meaningless and interchangeable too. The story needs to be anchored in some sort of background world: if this isn´t the real world, a substantial amount of completely original content would need to be provided to make it make sense again, I believe. Ie, a timeline that fills all the holes, as well as background content about the equipment, its origins and how and why it is being used by whom.

Maybe I am overthinking this, possibly I´m even being a rivetcounter at this point, however, I am genuinely concerned about this. What does the community think?

Cheerio

Instagoat

[dmarkwick 261]

I think this is the sort of detail that comes under "backstory" and thus isn't important to anything but the campaign. As I never play campaigns or even any default scenarios it's a detail that will be unimportant to me personally. Also I would guess that it's all WIP story, and no point worrying about a story until it's actually available to play :D IMO.

[purepassion 22]

I suppose we wait some more time, ok? ;)

[paecmaker 23]

Maybe bohemia doesnt want us to see all vehicles in the game this early so they just show us the vehicles they have already shown.

[Mr. Charles 22]

I think this is the sort of detail that comes under "backstory" and thus isn't important to anything but the campaign. As I never play campaigns or even any default scenarios it's a detail that will be unimportant to me personally. Also I would guess that it's all WIP story, and no point worrying about a story until it's actually available to play :D IMO.

I start playing them, but stop after i run into the first gamebreaking bugs, then wait for patch 2 or 3 :D

Standard procedure with every BIS release (especially the german version)

[*KEEPER* 0]

PLEASE get rid of those Iranian Flags from the OPFOR uniforms. I puke in my mouth every time I see Iranians armed with Isreali weapons. I beg you to please fix this or replace the Iranian flag with some kind of made up emblem that identifies it as whatever OPFOR alliance they belong too. I would also like it if the soldiers and equipment of NATO were represented without national flags or emblems as well instead of being automatically American. Since it is the ARMAverse, I would assume that any current or future NATO nation could adopt the gear and weapons that will be used in 2025.

Basicly just for the sake of the look and feel of the game my request is that you remove Identification of nationality from the physical soldiers and vehicles. If possible from Both sides but mostly from OPFOR.

Thank you.

[CarlGustaffa 4]

Best option would be to use object texture or hidden selection so mission makers could set their own texture. Flag as such doesn't worry me a bit, but sometimes we may want to use it as a team identifier color or something (like arm bands).

[Laqueesha 474]

In the story's synopsis, it is said that NATO is trying to hold back Eastern Armies from taking over Europe. Maybe Iran took over the entire Southwest Asian region, including Israel, and decided to use superior Israeli technology? There have been instances in warfare going back centuries where militaries used captured equipment and even personnel.

Maybe it isn't the Iranian flag? If you look closely at the flag patch, it appears that it is missing the Islamic Takbir spelled out in stylized Kufic script on the green and red bands of the flag.

Edited August 17, 2011 by Laqueesha

[dysta 10]

I believe at 2025 China is already busying the financial and social issues more than diplomacy and military. As well as this year China is able to develop their own technology with the Varyag and J-15 (they're equiped with Chinese internals assemblies, only the skins are copy-looking due to the airframe design is still need to be improved before they could make their own.) and I am pretty sure this thing is not for war until they're able to built their own "90,000 tonne diplomacy".

The copying are mostly in appearance, I believe Chinese is really lacking of potential designers for their own copyright to develop the shape with both uniqueness and superior performance. But again, in military, the actual performance of war is a lot more ironic than futuristic skinned battle.

[NoRailgunner 0]

Easy - some scientist have found a amazing formular/weapon and who got it will be the next Lord/ruler of the world/galaxy. All nations did send their best tacticool Ops to "secure" this precious treasure. Only BIS do know about the real secret of this discovery....

Perhaps its better if BIS makes fully fictional nations/factions/groups with their own flags, symbols and history?

[dysta 10]

Perhaps its better if BIS makes fully fictional nations/factions/groups with their own flags, symbols and history?

You mean this?

http://fedcom-online.webs.com/

(Well, except the history part, since it's way ahead to be exist...)

[bobocz 10]

In this Doupe.cz

journalist asked if vehicles are real and Ivan also answered:

Bad gays :) guys stole plan for the tanks and because design of the tanks are good, they now produce plenty of them.

Hard to tell if it is canonical.

Edited August 17, 2011 by BoboCZ

[instagoat 133]

In this Doupe.cz

journalist asked if vehicles are real and Ivan also answered:

Bad gays stole plan for the tanks and because design of the tanks are good, they now produce plenty of them.

Hard to tell if it is canonical.

To be honest, I´d be disappointed if this were true. That´s a pretty cheap explanation, and a bit of a copout.

[maddogx 13]

To be honest, I´d be disappointed if this were true. That´s a pretty cheap explanation, and a bit of a copout.

Stealing designs has happened before and it still happens all the time, no reason it couldn't happen again. Why should there be some more complicated explanation, when the simplest one is just as likely?

Anyway, the real explanation was probably more like "BIS liked the vehicles and decided to put them in". In the end, it still is the way it is.

[Maio 293]

I say OPFOR organized surgical strikes in Israels C&C, nuclear facilities and power grid at the beginning of the war, that crippled it's military and allowed it to move in and secure the country, it's more advanced military tech and it's nuclear arsenal. From there they shipped the Namer and Merkava via sea or maybe in the future they are made out of lighter materials so they were air shipped.

NATO is using captured Merkavas because they don't have the necessary logistics anymore to ship tanks half way across Europe. The Fennek and Patria are lighter and smaller and fit better within a NATO QRF.

[roberthammer 582]

IRL the China is copying design of original weapons/vehicles

atm they trying to make own "Stealth" helicopter with buyed/stolen pieces of Stealth Hawk

[dysta 10]

IRL the China is copying design of original weapons/vehicles

atm they trying to make own "Stealth" helicopter with buyed/stolen pieces of Stealth Hawk

Another victim of the BBC rumor... FPDR

I am talking about the design in appearance, not the mechanism nor software or stuff inside. Like the J-20 I've heard about 9 or more jets copying together into one (Mig-2000's Appearance, DSI from F-35, Full Canopy from F-16/F-22, F-117 of the stealth material, bellywings from Su-27, size is very close to T-50, 2 thrust vectoring engines from Su-37, I can even heard a tailhook from Su-33, you believe this?) even they have t combine then together into a new jet they still need at least 4 or 8 years for the research and diagram design.

For the current the China won't take such way to have some new armaments when designing is really time-consuming, if Varvag can able to discover all the functionality in 2 years later, China would be need 4 years to design a new aircraft carrier for 4 years, assembling it for another 4 years, and test-operate it for 5 or more years. So they need more than 10 years to get their new weapon development handy, but I believe they have no such time for modernize their army or so.

In that case, some risk to copying weapons is no doubt occurs, but at least they are not interested in, and would never, copying the internal part and will built up a whole different parts for the skin.

It's like 2 Pure-Chinese born people, one is live and studied in America, while the other is studying their own country's. Same breed, but different knowledge and understandings.

[roberthammer 582]

I was talking about design too - just look at their new assault rifle , It doesn't look familiar?

[dysta 10]

I was talking about design too - just look at their new assault rifle , It doesn't look familiar?

If you're referring the "new" as Type95-1 (or Type95B, but it's not Type95) then I must say the design of this is surely handy for normal operating, but even the newest design it's still not a modular weapon, which mean it cannot customize into different configurations like M16 or M4 series because it's lacking of rail mount and exchangeable part. It did heavily limited of the choice to make an multi-roles or personal rifle, but at least the bare Type95-1 is already adaptive enough for most of the Chinese user without customization.

[Laqueesha 474]

Bad gays stole plan for the tanks and because design of the tanks are good, they now produce plenty of them.

Bad gays [sic]?

Just kiddin' :p

[bobocz 10]

Bad gays [sic]?

Just kiddin' :p

:D Corrected. Maybe they are too. ;)

[wolfbite 8]

Maybe they're Kinda doing it like Ace Combat... Where everyone has whatever they want...

[bradp191 10]

Perhaps the Iranians still aren't that industrialized, so they set out with kind of the inverse of the German plan in the Battle of the Bulge. The Germans had plenty of tanks, but not enough fuel, so they planned to capture the Allies fuel supplies and use it to drive their attack. Maybe the Iranians don't have a whole lot of vehicles (especially as NATO exhausted their supplies of the anti-armor JSOW on them), but have plenty of fuel. So, they set out with a plan to capture vehicles as they go.

The political climate could mean that NATO wouldn't come to the aid of Israel in a "regional conflict". Even now, isolationism is becoming a pretty popular idea in America. The Iranians could whip up quite a bit of support in the region, I'm sure. The current president of Iran has been making moves to try and secularize much of their society in order to facilitate the emergence of Persia as a major player in the world once again. That would mean major gains in science and technology, as can be seen from what has been released about the game thus far. So, the Iranians et al. could very possibly overrun Israel with their numbers and similar technology.

I know the last part kind of contradicts the first part. Lets just call it complex rather than paradoxical.

[Rebel44 10]

Perhaps the Iranians still aren't that industrialized, so they set out with kind of the inverse of the German plan in the Battle of the Bulge. The Germans had plenty of tanks, but not enough fuel, so they planned to capture the Allies fuel supplies and use it to drive their attack. Maybe the Iranians don't have a whole lot of vehicles (especially as NATO exhausted their supplies of the anti-armor JSOW on them), but have plenty of fuel. So, they set out with a plan to capture vehicles as they go.

The political climate could mean that NATO wouldn't come to the aid of Israel in a "regional conflict". Even now, isolationism is becoming a pretty popular idea in America. The Iranians could whip up quite a bit of support in the region, I'm sure. The current president of Iran has been making moves to try and secularize much of their society in order to facilitate the emergence of Persia as a major player in the world once again. That would mean major gains in science and technology, as can be seen from what has been released about the game thus far. So, the Iranians et al. could very possibly overrun Israel with their numbers and similar technology.

I know the last part kind of contradicts the first part. Lets just call it complex rather than paradoxical.

Fully mobilized Israeli army has around 700 000 soldiers with much better weapons that anything currently owned by Iran + Israel has enough IRBMs and ICBMs with nuclear warheads to turm very large part of middle east into glass parking lots.

Also except of Syria, almost all other countries in region see Iran as enemy - so any cooperation is highly unlikely - there was even story last year that KSA might allow IAF to use its airspace to attack Iranian nuclear program.

[onlyrazor 11]

Fully mobilized Israeli army has around 700 000 soldiers with much better weapons that anything currently owned by Iran + Israel has enough IRBMs and ICBMs with nuclear warheads to turm very large part of middle east into glass parking lots.

Also except of Syria, almost all other countries in region see Iran as enemy - so any cooperation is highly unlikely - there was even story last year that KSA might allow IAF to use its airspace to attack Iranian nuclear program.

Then again, by 2030, Iran could have enough nukes to turn Israel into glass parking lots, the turn those glass parking lots into glassier parking lots etc.

No offense, but failing to account for the future can have grave consequences.

Just ask my computer