kireta21

Actually it was Hague Convention.

OLD autoloaders derived from T-64/T-72 lines are obsolete. Sure. New autoloaders like those used in Leclerc, or planned for CATTB ("heavy" M1) are completely different story. Those not only allow long rod penetrators, but also allow to separate ammo from crew compartement, hell, with such design you can even try to separate ammo in blow-up compartement like in M1 series. Thing simply impossible with old Soviet design. Apparently after Ob.640 project was scrapped, and Ob.195 halted, Russian designers are working on new turret for both T-72/T-90 and T-80, with new autoloader. Still, it may take decade or more, as Russian army is oversized for its budget, and there's no much money left for developenent and modernization. Autoloader vs. loader argue is like smoothbore vs. rifled, Tunstein vs DU, laser lock vs. fire-and-forget. Both have their pros and cons if used properly.

That's my point exactly. You don't need high constant fire rate, you rather need high fire rate in short periods of time.

Human loader might get slower after a few minutes. The thing is, after those 2-3 minutes there's no AP rounds onboard anyway. With maximum fire rate most tanks will use up all rounds in less than 5 minutes.

Replayng Harvest Red now, and I ran into another possible bug. After using 81mm support option disappeared and never came back, forcing me to play Rambo aganist other camps and patrols. Were we alowed to use mortars only once during mission, or it's just a bug?

Well, yeah I should add "when they came out", cause I was misundertood, I think. M1 vs T-72A, M1A1 vs T-72B, M1A1HA vs T-72B w/K1 ERA, M1A1HC vs T-72 w/K5 ERA. Later 125mm gun reached development limit @Archbishop Lazarus pointed - unability to use long rod penetrators. While NATO countries created M829A3, L28, DM-53. 125mm is stuck in 80's and the newest round - BM-42M - offers similar penetration as BM46 from mid-80's. It's just cheaper as made of tungstein not DU. TUSK kit (those 7 more tons) have nothing to do with frontal armor. When it comes to tank vs tank M1A2 TUSK is as good as any M1A2 SEP or M1A1SA. I still wonder why BIS added army's M1A2 TUSK instead of real M1A1HC+ with TUSK kit, as designed for Marine Corps.

Inoperable cannon: yes. Mobility kill: Only in PvP. Unfortunaltely AI escapes from immobilized vehicles. While IRL you may just turn tank into heavy armored pillbox in ArmA2 mobillity kill is no different from "regular" kill.

Not really. Only handful of M1IP saw action in 1991. Most American tanks were M1A1 and M1A1HA. Basically newest variants of M1 and T-72/T-90 were equal to each other. But I don't think USA have any basic M1A1 in active service today. They were mostly upgraded to be roughly equal to M1A2, same like T-72B improved with K-5 ERA.

Bigger problem is AI can still "take a root" and ignore player-issued orders for a rest of mission. The funniest part is after using team switch and switching back to squad leader, AI often go back to place it got stuck earlier. I'm just replaying "Harvest Red" campaign, and after 18 months of patching I still have Razor members getting stuck in random places or leaving into random direction. Makes me remember why I went back to OFP for the last year.

I guess same reason why C-Beta mag haven't been adopted by US military. Reliability and ergonomics. Drum mags are usually less reliable, get damaged more easily, and normal mags are much easier to carry around than bulky box of ammunition. If you've ever carried spare ammo for squad MG you know what I mean. Russians in game use AK-107 as standard issue firearm and shoulder-fired, fire-and-forget Metis missiles, don't use scopes on their RPGs and put 7.62mm silencers on 5.45mm weapons. So somehow I can overlook incorrect RPK-74 magazine ;)

Back to tanks There's something I saw on youtube recently , it starts at 1:35. New turret for M1?

IDF expansion set? As long as it's not beating piss-poor militias versus tanks and attack helis, but regular war with somehow balanced sides, at least CWC size - I'm in. Hamas? No, no, no. It's not like there's no countries hostile to Israel in the Middle East. IDF have nice gear, lots of it. Arabian countries as Iran on the other hand often use quite old but still efective mix of Soviet and Western gear. What's more, IDF don't have as much overwhelming advantage over possible enemies as USA does, so balanced and unpredictible conflict wouldn't be so unrealistic. Not to mention, lost campaign resulting in "Samson Option" initiated would be hell of a Bad End IMHO. [possibly offensive opinion - If you're getting butthurt easily - don't read!] I see lots of possibilities for campaign, missions, gameplay overall. And butthurt wimps screaming "oh noez, they made us bad guys again, BAW!!!" will be butthurt anyway. It's like internet moral crusaders hunting for any sign of pedopfilia, who can degradate ANY child-related material to sexual level, just to fight it and satisfy their moralfagish ego. You're afraid of politics? Then how can you play Harvest Red, which is clearly about Russia first supporting Osetian separatists, and later invading Georgia themself? Dudes, chill out. It's just game. And don't forget you could always reverse roles and hunt American imperialistic pigs as Chedaki freedom-fighters :D. Sorry if I offended someone, but that's my opinion. Only moron would care about politics in computer game to the point when he gets butthurt because it differs from his personal opinion. [/possibly offensive opinion] Back to topic. IDF expantion set - yes, But only if you also add other local nation(s), able to fight them equally. Let's forget hunting insurgents, and play WAR, like in good old times. If it's AGAIN elite troops with tanks and helis vs "sand people/commie rebels of uncertain nationality" with AK's and BRDM's, then I'm out.

AKs in OFP had burst-mode because Flashpoint AI was not able to use automatic fire mode properly. Unless close to enemy and skill maxed it was firing in lowered fire rate, with constant rate (no pauses between bursts) so it was actually more like quick folow up shots than actual automatic fire. Burst mode "forced" AI to shot with full fire rate, and to wait some time before firing another short burst. Basically weapon realism was sacrificed for combat realism. AKs, machineguns and other non-burst weapons have burst fire mode (or modes) as well in ArmA and ArmA2, but engine, unlike OFP version, allows to hide those "unrealistic" modes from player.

I'm talking about ArmA2 splash damage, indirecthit=xxx; like in mentioned situation (common in ArmA), when hitting hard part of tank with relatively weak weapon (like PG-7) (turret or hull) disables soft parts (engine or tracks) because indirecthitrange=xxx ignores objects. If optics were made enough weak to be disabled by MG fire, splash damage would kill them almost every time turret or frontal hull is hit HE rounds in ArmA2 (arty, mortars, Grad) are super-effective against tanks anyway.

Well, we were trained to that as well, though this supposed to work against Shilkas and apc's, we were never told it can work against MBT's, so I'm not sure. Still it wouldn't work in ArmA2 without totally changed damage system. Two words: Splash Damage. Area damage ignore obstacles that IRL would block shrapnels or shockwave. Tank gets hit by RPG in side of turret - splash damage destroy optics. Like in ArmA where hitting frontal turret with RPG forced crew to leave tank. Why? Because splash damage disabled tracks.

Nope, it was already in Operation Flashpoint under numpad [del]. Just lauched it to confirm. OFP command menu didn't appear automaticaly after entering tactical view but after selecting unit or hitting any order issuing numpad button. And even than you could move it away by simply hitting backspace. If you have disabled 3rd person view in difficulty setting, you can't enter tactical view.

In the heat of battle there's no time to mess around with equipment, obviously. But ArmA2 is rather slow-paced game. It's quite common to have few spare minutes on you. Ability to tell, how much ammo left in mag (like ACE-style "magazine feels heavy") would be quite useful by itself, alowing player to drop nearly empty mags, and grab fresh ones from box (or backpack). And I think it SHOULD take some time, so it's up to player to decide if it's worth or not. Probably reduced when compared to real life (like mentioned patching up wounded troops), but instant refill would be as silly as point&click healing in many fps games.

With my AKMS I needed about 10 seconds (by opening magazine) or 20-30 seconds (removing bullets one by one) to empty full mag. Loading empty mag took me 30-60 seconds (actually you can't pass if you can't go under 60 seconds). You just need to prepare some space to dump bullets.

While I'd love such expansion, I do realize it would be truckload of work, as almost everything would have to be made from scratch. Something that big won't make it in DLC (I mean seriously, with all respect for ArmA:BAF, new faction is just small part of British Armed Forces, not even fully equipped side in game like USMC or Takis). We're talking about something as big as OA, and without shortcuts like reskining and remodeling stuff from ArmA2. That would be full size standalone Expansion Set, not like I mind paying 40-50$ for something that big and awesome.

Totally agree. Theorically we would need 2 armor and penetration values, separate for KE and CE. But unless we are trying to make something like Steel Beasts, one Armor value for hitzone and one Penetration value for ammunition is enough. And we even won't lose much of realism here, as most modern armor types provide similar KE to CE protection ratio, usually around 1:1.5. So actually recalculating armor/penetration values of all systems either to KE or to CE will be enough. Hitzones for tanks could be: Front Turret, Front Hull Side Turret, Side Front (crew compartement) Side Rear (engine compartement) Rear, Top And Ammunition storage where succesful penetration could lead (% chance) to catastrophic destruction of vehicle, with big blast and crew instantly KIA. Penetration of armor should be in % chance rather than "can penetrate/cannot penetrate", basically higher armor to penetration ratio - less chance for penetration. While still not overly complicated it would provide all realism actually needed. But this is rather wishlist :D. In fact, even simple armor/penetration system like in Blitzkrieg RTS game would be a huge step foward.

I am stumped as to why supposed currently-serving members of national armies are openly posting about their jobs on a video game forum... ;) Volunteer soldiers are fighting and killing because their propaganda/religion told them to do so. Drafted soldiers are fighting and killing because they are forced to do so. Professional soldiers are fighting and killing because this is their goverment pays them for. PMCs are fighting and killing because this is their employer pays them for.

No matter what they do, they'll never be as cool as those PMCs

I always had thing for Cold War gettin' hot scenarios. War set in late 60's. Map based on West Germany where combined British and West Germany forces are fighting Soviet Army in local conflict (with little, or without US support). Cold war era equipement used in way it supposed to be: AKM, G3, MG3, L1A1, RPK, Leopard, Centurion, T-62, T-64, Chieftain, Mi-4 etc. I would say it would be very CWC :D

The other way would be to add system simillar to "essential" tag in Bethesta rpg games, where character important to storyline couldn't be permanently killed untill untaged. Since we have pretty nice medic module in ArmA2, "essential" character instead of dying would be disabled and useless like any badly wounded troop, until dragged into safety and treated by medic or other squad member. Of course such function should be adjustable via difficulty menu, or placed in campaign way it will work only at lower difficulty level. It may be not realistic, but if there already "immortal" command in ArmA2 (allow damage false), so why not?

Challenger 2 damaged in Al-Amarah was hit in lower hull section, where armor is roughly 850mm (including ERA) vs.CE, so RPG-29 with its ~800mm penetration, dual warhead and some luck is enough to defeat it. Chally2 armor was critized after that incident, but it's worth to notice most modern tanks have only 700-900mm vs CE in that place, as it gets hit very rarely. T-80 and T-90 have even less (400-500mm) as this part is even less exposed. It's better to put more armor where it's more often needed. Merkavas do that to extreme. At it strongest point it has probably more armor than any other MBT, but there have been reports of crew compartment been penetrated by HMG fire! I don't say HEAT rounds don't work against MBT. They work, unless they hit front turret or glacis, as those are usually far beyond their penetration ability. HEAT can penetrate weaker spot of armor, and works much better against light armored vehicles. Just in head-on fight it's better to stick to KE rounds, as most hits will be in turret, some in glacis, and very few in mentioned weak spots. @maturin Sometimes M1 tanks carry few maingun rounds in hull to speed up loading (or simply to carry more). It's not very safe. but quite common. It's possible after been hit by jet one or some rounds went off inside. [edit] Something I found on tanknet one day: Those are pretty old tanks, but I think it shows clearly how much difference new armor system would make