Logic behind vehicle mounted TOWs

[MikeDude]

Maybe they should make it like the HAT, deviation circle. You can, fire earlier. But it would be inaccurate. If you fire after 11 seconds, you have almost no deviation (For long range accurate fire). And if you fire shortrange, 5/7 seconds should be enough.

[Mikemonster]

It's a good point about missile flight time. You'd obviously have to adjust the manouverablilty to match the decreased speed, that would make it far less arcadey and also easier to control.

[Hunt3r]

I think what I'm actually saying this:

1. Add acceleration to TOWs so close range and long range still take longer than before. Not 20 seconds long, but maybe 10-15 seconds to reach max range in game. Yes, it looks arcadey, but I'd rather have it look funky than the game actually be unrealistically hard on armor crews. I think it's pretty reasonable to give this to HATs with a heavily reduced time to full speed (75-150m tops) and possibly tone down the deviation from shifting the crosshairs around with mouseaim in return.

2. TOWs should be downright deadly if it penetrates, but against very specific targets (the front turret of an MBT...) it should just flat out do no damage. All or nothing damage system needs to be implemented for armor penetration. This really should be all projectiles.


ATGMs are very dangerous things to beat, and I think that it's more realistic and much more intense to have the ATGM team have to really fight for their kill once the ATGM is launched off if the enemy vehicles notice and try to suppress the ATGM team.

I'm also pretty sure that in PRSP the AI Bradleys have ATGMs that are massively slowed down. It makes for a much more tense experience when you're guiding a missile into a target and keeping steady hands waiting for the missile to splash and hoping a stray sabot doesn't find it's mark.

Maybe they should make it like the HAT, deviation circle. You can, fire earlier. But it would be inaccurate. If you fire after 11 seconds, you have almost no deviation (For long range accurate fire). And if you fire shortrange, 5/7 seconds should be enough.

My issues with that is it's excruciating to wait that long for the ATGM gunner and it makes it less realistic, and less "fun" overall for both sides.

I will tell you now that the most exhilarating experiences I've ever had in PR is when I can see a TOW flying straight at my gunner sight, and then we manage to fire off a shot in the nick of time to kill the gunner and the TOW emplacement and have it streak down and smack the earth in front of me. I know as an ATGM team what really gets the adrenaline pumping is when your ATGM is being guided down to the target and you start getting suppressed.

[ComradeHX]

My issues with that is it's excruciating to wait that long for the ATGM gunner and it makes it less realistic, and less "fun" overall for both sides.

I will tell you now that the most exhilarating experiences I've ever had in PR is when I can see a TOW flying straight at my gunner sight, and then we manage to fire off a shot in the nick of time to kill the gunner and the TOW emplacement and have it streak down and smack the earth in front of me. I know as an ATGM team what really gets the adrenaline pumping is when your ATGM is being guided down to the target and you start getting suppressed.

It is quite realistic.

Think of the days when tanks were manually loaded(and a lot of them are still manually loaded to this day)... Two tanks on opposite side encounters eachother when going over a hill; both missed first shot.

What does the drivers in their own tanks do? They scream at their reloader to get another round in and hit the other tank.

With this, you will be doing the same screaming at your gunner over mumble(and probably pressed local chat on accident so your teammates nearby hears it and laugh).

Having APC move-shoot the TOW just means lots of thing considered to be dumb IRL happens in game(apc actively hunting for tanks).

[lucky.BOY]

How can you even supress that Bradley IRL?

Imagine that if that thing is 4000m away and you have less than 20 secs to react. I dont think that the tank can put more than 1 round down the range before it gets hit, and that is not supression. That is either kill or get killed. Its like if a sniper duel would be a duel in supression...

Only thing the tank could do, if its T90 with those IR reflectors (shtora, is it?), it can blind the TOW computer, which then cant track the missile onto target. But thats only T90.

Funny thing is how this thread started saying how bad it is now for bradley ingame, and yet Hunt3er turned it into a complaint about poor tankers' life.

-lucky

[jerkzilla]

I think what I'm actually saying this:


2. TOWs should be downright deadly if it penetrates, but against very specific targets (the front turret of an MBT...) it should just flat out do no damage. All or nothing damage system needs to be implemented for armor penetration. This really should be all projectiles.

Now hold on there. That may be true for the actual armor of the vehicle, but while there's no arbitrary "health" bar in real life, there are a ton of subsystems that can get damaged and compromise the effectiveness of the tank. Things like the engine, tracks, weapons, ballistics computers, sights and even the crew themselves can be knocked out in real life, but this can't realistically be represented in game. So we get the health bar...

[tankninja1]

I think the problem is not the TOW so much as it is the "thermal sights" on the Bradley, and most other Western vehicles for that matter, the thing is they dont actually use thermals sights they use infared (FLIR) which looks for infared heat signature (body heat, warm engines, ect). The diffrence is a bit unclear but it seems that thermal sight are less effective in desert evirments where body heat and engine heats are closer to ambient air temperature, thus harder to make out on an aiming screen, especially without computer filtering, where as FLIRs looks at actual infared values, not comparing a value to a background abient temperature, so after a computer refines the image a little it and the image becomes more clear. Thermals also can see through light snow, dust, haze, and smoke, whereas FLIRs can see through considerable heavier snow, dust, have, and smoke, certaily proved in Golf War I. My suggestion allow Western armored vehicles (atlest TOW mounted on) to see just little bit futher (100m-300m) than thier Russian/Chinese clone counterpart.
P.S. In Gulf War I it was common for Bradley's, and Abrams to work side to side because the Bradleys had more powerful optics and could see further than the Abrams
Sources:
Thermal Weapon Sight - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Forward looking infrared - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
AN/AAQ-26 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Robert-The-Bruce]

Wow....

The ammount of complete bullshit and other misinformation in this thread is staggering, freightening, enraging and not the least bit funny.

I am speechless...

[lucky.BOY]

Feel free to clear it up, then. Please take no offense, but so far your post isn't the most informative in here.

[Hunt3r]

It is quite realistic.

Think of the days when tanks were manually loaded(and a lot of them are still manually loaded to this day)... Two tanks on opposite side encounters eachother when going over a hill; both missed first shot.

What does the drivers in their own tanks do? They scream at their reloader to get another round in and hit the other tank.

With this, you will be doing the same screaming at your gunner over mumble(and probably pressed local chat on accident so your teammates nearby hears it and laugh).

Having APC move-shoot the TOW just means lots of thing considered to be dumb IRL happens in game(apc actively hunting for tanks).

If the gunner gets overexcited and misses, that should be from his own fault, not from not waiting long enough before firing. IFVs/CFVs/ATGM carriers should be able to move very slowly (PR soldier sprinting) without having to wait another 10-15 seconds before using TOW. This at least makes it possible to make the APC not have to sit there and wait for the enemy to come to them, IRL these vehicles with TOWs can actually function as tank destroyers.

Having to get another round reloaded as someone else stares you down is scary but actually that you know you have a shot at living after a seriously close brush to death in a visceral way helps with the tension of AFV warfare a lot.

Now hold on there. That may be true for the actual armor of the vehicle, but while there's no arbitrary "health" bar in real life, there are a ton of subsystems that can get damaged and compromise the effectiveness of the tank. Things like the engine, tracks, weapons, ballistics computers, sights and even the crew themselves can be knocked out in real life, but this can't realistically be represented in game. So we get the health bar...

True, in IRL subsystems can be damaged, but for just conventional HEAT/ KE warheads it should be all or nothing damage. HE should have a logarithmic curve because once we get to about 120mm-150mm HE is usually big enough to just put an enormous hole into the vehicle through sheer blast force, 155mm HE from artillery to anywhere on the vehicle is generally a mission kill.

That should fix most of the problems.

I think the problem is not the TOW so much as it is the "thermal sights" on the Bradley, and most other Western vehicles for that matter, the thing is they dont actually use thermals sights they use infared (FLIR) which looks for infared heat signature (body heat, warm engines, ect). The diffrence is a bit unclear but it seems that thermal sight are less effective in desert evirments where body heat and engine heats are closer to ambient air temperature, thus harder to make out on an aiming screen, especially without computer filtering, where as FLIRs looks at actual infared values, not comparing a value to a background abient temperature, so after a computer refines the image a little it and the image becomes more clear. Thermals also can see through light snow, dust, haze, and smoke, whereas FLIRs can see through considerable heavier snow, dust, have, and smoke, certaily proved in Golf War I. My suggestion allow Western armored vehicles (atlest TOW mounted on) to see just little bit futher (100m-300m) than thier Russian/Chinese clone counterpart.
P.S. In Gulf War I it was common for Bradley's, and Abrams to work side to side because the Bradleys had more powerful optics and could see further than the Abrams
Sources:
Thermal Weapon Sight - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Forward looking infrared - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
AN/AAQ-26 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The problem is that it's going to make for frustrating games for those who don't absolutely love Russian armor.

The M1 original 105mm tank had an immensely better FCS than the T72M1. Russian FCS is incredibly hard to work with and they originally didn't even have passive IR (you can see a big lamp on the turret that's used to see in the dark). These days AFAIK Russia's armor has actually caught up and is no longer subpar. Their FLIR (yes, they all use FLIR now if it's modern) should be on par with US sensors.

How can you even supress that Bradley IRL?

Imagine that if that thing is 4000m away and you have less than 20 secs to react. I dont think that the tank can put more than 1 round down the range before it gets hit, and that is not supression. That is either kill or get killed. Its like if a sniper duel would be a duel in supression...

Only thing the tank could do, if its T90 with those IR reflectors (shtora, is it?), it can blind the TOW computer, which then cant track the missile onto target. But thats only T90.

Funny thing is how this thread started saying how bad it is now for bradley ingame, and yet Hunt3er turned it into a complaint about poor tankers' life.

-lucky

IRL I can tell you that Bradley commanders can and will see the gun rotate to face them and if they're out in the open the first thing you do is stop engaging and pop smoke and try to move to not get hit. A tank IRL can fire off a 120mm shell within 4 seconds, if laploading, reloading within 3, and fire again within the next 3 seconds if they can see the target and still have proper range/lead. Without laploading reloads might take 5 seconds. 20 seconds at max range is positively excruciating. Firing within 3 km to keep some space to maneuver the missile and not lose rocket power too soon wouldn't be unreasonable.

IRL ATGM crews on foot can be suppressed by autocannon and MG fire. If they stay too long, they also risk artillery shells crashing down on them or CAS strafing them.

IFVs in general need some rebalancing. The BMP-3 is okay IMO because it's made of paper so there's really no way to deal with that besides minimizing exposure and using it as a mobile field gun, but fixing the "filled with helium" handling would help immensely, the Bradley should be a bit more armored and stop 30mm front and side turret, and the front of the hull, it should be fine in the armor department. Properly modeling the gun and the ATGM system is also nice.


Basically, it would be nice to see munition flight time properly scaled for distance. Small arms don't need it because they don't shoot at far enough ranges to run into these issues, but anything as big as autocannon or greater should have "scaled" flight time.

Another idea I have to make ATGMs more "real" is to set their flight time so that it self-destructs if you fire it as a rocket at 1000m, so that way if you force the ATGM to have to turn too much it'll simply run out of rocket and self destruct. (IRL it just falls short of the target like a rock.)

[DankE_SPB]

This explains why the Ka-50 cannot jink after firing it's Vikhrs and it has to align the entire helicopter at the target it's shooting?

Obviously you need to align entire helicopter since the targeting pod is located in the nose and has limited elevation and traverse angles.

Yes, beam-riding is a lot better than wire guided for land/air applications. No, it isn't as good as SALH trackers in terms of shooting on the move.

1. What SALH has to do with our discussion
2. Why its harder to keep reticle on target with beam-rider missiles than SALH?

Spandrels take years to set up IRL.

Care to source that and specify how much time is "years" for you in this case?

[Hunt3r]

Obviously you need to align entire helicopter since the targeting pod is located in the nose and has limited elevation and traverse angles.

It's not the targeting pod, it's the fact that the missile won't be able to acquire a proper track of the lasers and thus it'll just fly like a rocket off into the distance, or just self-destruct. Please do some research into beam-riding and the Vikhrs. You'll see that there were a set of limitations that were imposed in return for cheaper missiles and more of them.

1. What SALH has to do with our discussion
2. Why its harder to keep reticle on target with beam-rider missiles than SALH?

1. SALH is the guidance system used by Hellfires. As long as the missile's camera can see the laser beam for terminal or beginning guidance, the targeting platform can do whatever it wants, as long as the laser spot is still seen by the Hellfire. This ties into your 2nd question.
2. It's not harder to keep the reticle on target, it's harder to keep the missile guide. With SALH or fire and forget systems there is much less dependence upon your launching platform to stay still and actually guide the missile to impact. Beam-riding uses a grid of some lasers that the missile looks back at to detect and it stays within the grid. If the missile leaves that grid, the missile goes dumb. So if there's enough movement, the missile can easily lose sight of the lasers, and you wasted a missile. TOWs also have this issue. Basically, both beam-riders and wire-guided missiles need to be fired when still. SALH/SARH and IR/radar tracking missiles should be able to be fired on the move.

Care to source that and specify how much time is "years" for you in this case?

Years is pretty much the time it is now in PR. It feels like years.

[manligheten]

With all due respect manligheten, there are a few errors in your post. For starters, there are just as many regulations governing combat as there are in peacetime, if not more. Rules of Engagement exist real world, just as they do in PR. Secondly, as mentioned in more than one place, moving a Bradley with the TOW launcher in the raised position can badly damage the mount and motor rendering it completely inoperational. Thirdly, while the Bradley does indeed fire high explosive (in addition to Armor Piercing Discarding Sabot Tracer, and Fin Stabilized Depleted Uranium) ammunition from the M242 Bushmaster chain gun, it does not fire grenades. The only actual grenades fired from a Bradley are fired from the two cluster smoke grenade launchers located on the front left and front right sections of the turret.

This discussion is not about whether or not regulations allow the Bradley to move with the TOW launcher in the raised position, but about whether the platform is physically capable of doing so. As I, and several others have stated, based on real world experience and verifiable research, the Bradley absolutely should not be moved for any major distance, over any type of rough terrain, or at anything beyond a crawl due to the very high risk of damage to the TOW launcher.

I understand that you can't go with full speed into a ditch with the TOW armed, but you should still be able to slowly move into fire position from cover. Especially with BRDM-TOWs who are always mounted. Remember, they wasn't supposed to use the 88 FlaK for AT service either...

Concerning overheating, it's still too way easy to overheat.

[Hunt3r]

I understand that you can't go with full speed into a ditch with the TOW armed, but you should still be able to slowly move into fire position from cover. Especially with BRDM-TOWs who are always mounted. Remember, they wasn't supposed to use the 88 FlaK for AT service either...

Concerning overheating, it's still too way easy to overheat.

Just a correction, BRDM-AT vehicles actually retract their launcher to protect it. The BRDM-AT's use was basically to dig a ditch for the main body of the vehicle and then cover it with some grass and such to disguise the vehicle.

Basically, it was just a TOW emplacement that could be moved up.

The TOW on the Bradley definitely needs to be able to be launched at a target with only the launcher and the gunner sight visible if possible, it's one of the primary ways that a gigantic Bradley can get away with trying to be a TD.

[Mikemonster]

Gennelmen.

See 1.52.

[jerkzilla]

I CAN SEE CRACKS IN THE WALL OF LIES!!!

[Xavo|xXx]

I see a rather small & slow amount of movement on relatively flat ground with no TOW's (and therefore less weight) straining the motor. I also see the TOW launcher being raised as they came to a halt inside the little firing zone.

Coincides with what others have been saying in this thread...

[Psyko]

Gennelmen.

See 1.52.

that was really cool. there should be a whole game called "Bradley:Mines bigger than yours, always!"

[Stealthgato]

TOW launcher goes up much faster than it takes to set up in PR then.

[fredo456]

Here's a video where we can clearly see the speed of the missile, pretty interesting (although I hate the guy who uploads these vid's)

TOW MISSILE DESTROYS A TALIBAN HILLSIDE CAMP - 'NO SLACK' - YouTube