[Tue] 19th Feb 2013 (Combined harms)

[audiox]

Holy Stones
Opfor A1 AR
Blame it on the Stones. Toppo had us covered, and made sure we got a nice position to assess the situation from. Staying there for a while caused the enemy to believe it was a good idea to charge up the stairs to us. Which it wasn't. I have to wonder what would have happened if somebody had a grenade though.
After wiping out a fireteam we left the nice house. (Recommended for anybody planning a stay in the city, it even had a shisha!) Toppo was shot in the back and we apparently won the mission before any of us could retaliate.


Brony
Charlie 2 FTL
Charlie was to be in the rear and cover the middle of our approach through the green zone. Since everybody got into firefights immediately there wasn't much to do but move up and get mowed down.

Into the Sea
Bravo 1 FTL
This mission was fun in many ways. The scale was really nice, with all of the toys running about and doing their thing, and squad comms worked nicely. I really don't understand why we didn't get to listen in on Tiger's briefing to the different elements though... I mean, puny brains and all that, but part of what makes this fun is to get a peek into the commanders intent during briefing. (And my brain will melt down regardless, so i don't see it making a positive difference that we are left in the dark.) If there is a rationale for it then by all means, but select briefings seems a bit over the top. That said, command did a brilliant job guiding us to victory, no question about that.
Anyway, Bravo had fun. We walked up a hill, down from the hill, and shot at some dudes from the end of the forest. We managed to get ourselves some tactical barn action, and thereafter we started heading towards Berezino, got shot at from god knows where. Continued to the outskirts of Bere and then things went slightly awry.
B1 was supposed to run from our position to a wall right outside the city, which we did. Then we started taking fire, presumably from the city, though i am not sure. Meanwhile, B2 and BSL started getting shot at when coming up behind us. I wanted to get away from our position, so i moved B1 into Berezino and towards the nearest building, where we all huddled down. Then it seemed that Toppo went quiet for a while, then he was back, and then somebody said that he was down. This prompted me to enter into my very own Alexander Haig simulation mode whereupon i thought i was in charge of Bravo. Of course, having witnessed my horrible run in Shilkas Of Nur the AI decided that such a thing was an abomination, and shot me in the face.

Anyways, good comms throughout the mission, and that part was a lot of fun. I am apparently the worst enemy spotter ever to have graced the game, since i hardly ever find any enemies around even when taking fire. Oh well....
If we've been demolished by the AI in this mission before then command deserves kudos for that. Though it isn't that much fun to see an IFV charge ahead of one's squad and mow down everything that could be moving in the area. Nice to watch, and it would've killed me, but i guess i have a slight death wish like that.
The last bit was that i finally managed to use the mapplus addons in a useful manner, that was neat. And it was my first session with mk4-mapinfo, which is totally neat-o!

[Black Mamba]

Well, seeing the other AARs, I might have overdramatized a tad. Maybe it was just me.
Macaco has a point, maybe fixed Wings (Harrier?) are better suited for this type of mission, as they won't be able to engage infantry unless definitely marked on the ground (red smoke?).
Maybe one solution to this would be a fast mover with bombs (laser-designated) and cannon (to engage armor and smoke-marked targets only), without missiles.

In any way, I was not trying to be a dick or just whining about the host's choice. I'm all for experiments and trying to find out how we can make the most of those player counts. I was just not convinced with how it turned out in this mission, is all. Might be cause I loved it so much when we got annihilated everytime.

[Bodge]

Hey you got your wish with no man behind. I can edit it to have an av-8b lgb with a re-arm pad at the airfield.

[Macaco]

Hey you got your wish with no man behind. I can edit it to have an av-8b lgb with a re-arm pad at the airfield.

A-10 all the way! ~

Edit: To expand on this, a harrier with LGBs will basically only be able to engage targets with the LGB as for one the cannon is weak and won't take out a tank until you get a few passes in, and second, because the harrier moves and maneuvers faster than the A10 it's a bit harder to line up and stay on target. And last it's much more fragile, leading to a dead CAS crashing on friendlies much sooner.

[Black Mamba]

Well, that's kind of the point: the more fragile the CAS, the less it will just hog the battlefield. As for crashing on friendlies, that's a fallacy. If you stick to attack runs perpendicular to the ground advance, it's not much of a risk.
The 20mm cannon can take most IFVs, and the GBUs can take the tanks. Rockets can help too.
Problem with the Apache/A10 is they are designed to be able to shred anything with just the cannon. The more you let the CAS dudes use their cannon, the more you step on the ground dudes' enjoyment.

Edit: then again, this is all according to my POV. If the CAS dude's fun stamps on all the other dudes, it's the CAS dude that needs to make sacrifices, not the other way around. Reducing the fun factor in flying is okay, reducing the fun factor in being a simple grunt is not.

[Kefirz]

I think the Harrier is a nice change from an A-10. As Mamba said earlier, having more laser designated targets with GBU's wouldn't be a bad thing, and because it's more fragile it's better for the job in here

[Dogface]

I think the Harrier is a nice change from an A-10. As Mamba said earlier, having more laser designated targets with GBU's wouldn't be a bad thing, and because it's more fragile it's better for the job in here

I agree, a harrier sounds like it'd be a better fit. (Although Bodge, wasn't this for Into the Sea rather than No Man Behind? Although NMB does seem to need some way to protect the chopper...)

[Black Mamba]

There is an apache in No Man Behind. I'll check if I need to add engineers, though.