Suppressive fire!

[Arnoldio]

You don't either supress or don't. You supress when the situation calls for it. When the situation calls for a calculated shot in the forehead, then that's what you should do. Jesus.

Signed.

[=]H[=TangFiend]

An awesome VOIP quote from a few years back comes to mind and if I could remember exactly who put it into words it would be in my sig forever. I think (don't quote) whattheh3ll said this with infinite wisdom about PR:BF2

"The problem with the average PR player is they never know -when- to shoot. When they need to go weapons cold one of em always takes potshots at a target. When it's time to light em up, everybody just looks at each other. "

That really sums it up in a nutshell.

One of those Murphy's Laws of warfare; The side with the most flying objects usually wins.

[L4gi]

Id rather aim at them than aim next to them... No wonder you never kill anyone.

[Arnoldio]

Id rather aim at them than aim next to them... No wonder you never kill anyone.

It was fun at first, but your counter-everything egoboost posts are getting tiresome, fyi.

Though yes, I, and probably majority, aims at the guys, but without the waiting for deviation to settle.

[L4gi]

Its not an egoboost post. Just sayin', there is an easy way and then there is the dumbass way.

[Cassius]

You should use surpressive fire though. If you order surpressive fire only, it means you are waiting for something to happen, reinforcements, you need to hold a flag till your team takes it out of the game. Otherwise you should use surpressive fire for something, such as retreating, flanking, fixing the enemy for an airstrike, else its just a waste of ammo and you might as well just stay in hard cover.

[Wicca]

I dont know about you l4gi but i think everyone here aims at people when they shoot.

As per my statment why i shoot objects next to people, is because i see their muzzle flash/smoke. And i Cant see them. So i fire at objects next to them.

But I guess you were to busy looking at your score to care about your squad?

[SGT.MARCO]

Are you sure you're playing the same game? Suppression works if the guy thinks he will die if he pops his head out....which is rare since this is a video game and people give their virtual lives little value. Other then that chances are you are spraying at a position the opponent has since vacated and is now moving to flank your static firing position.

Let's not forget that while you may have 3 or so guys focusing on the enemy position he also has his squad that now knows where your guys are and will do their best to drop you.

Project Reality .97? because the truth is, you don't use suppressible fire just for fun. By shooting at the enemy they are deaf to whats going around them and also partially blind. If you don't care about your virtual life, have fun spawning back in. 2 scenarios

We landed on a beach on Beirut getting shot by enemy on a balcony. I told this group to suppress the enemy. we walked around and came right up on them. the fact that they were partially blind and deaf made them oblivious to the flanking maneuver. Supressive fire is not random shooting. Its controlled burst meant to handicap the opponent. you may be able to track who is shooting, but those shots also tell you that there is a good chance you will be popped if you stick your head up. It also gives you the chance to maneuver and come up with a strategy

[Rudd]

You should use surpressive fire though. If you order surpressive fire only, it means you are waiting for something to happen, reinforcements, you need to hold a flag till your team takes it out of the game. Otherwise you should use surpressive fire for something, such as retreating, flanking, fixing the enemy for an airstrike, else its just a waste of ammo and you might as well just stay in hard cover.

indeed this is correct, gotta have a plan to actually use your suppression, the only time I suppress for suppression's sake is when my squad is in a good defensive position, but facing superior forces - the idea being to prolong the firefight until reinforcement/idea/miracle...

[Brainlaag]

The biggest issue with suppressive fire when playing with public players is their lack of understanding what that means. Some empty their magazine full auto and are exposed for seconds until they have a fresh magazine reloaded, while others tend to shoot one bullet every 2 seconds, which obviously isn't enough.

Suppressive fire works, when applied correctly.

[Murphy]

It's highly situational at best. It's only really effective if you or your enemy has their back against the wall.


The negatives to suppression are twofold, first you are giving the enemy incentive to change position/flank and second you are announcing your position to anyone in hearing range as well as your intention to remain in your firing position.

The reason I brought up virtual life is that suppression is a state of mind, a defensive self defeating train of thought that can only really apply to the real life situation of bullets flying towards you. This could never be translated into a game as we all comfortably station our rears into out nice comfy leather chairs with our bag of Doritos to console us upon demise. You cannot break a mind that is actually at ease so suppression could never go beyond blurring my vision and telling me the enemy can't aim or conserve ammo, which are usually indicators of bad play.

And in the end I think ego has something to do with it as well. If my ego tells me I am better then this fool popping pot shots at me I am actually taking the first step to regaining the initiative in the firefight and as such it can be the keystone in turning defeat into victory. This is why bravado is so prevalent in any armed force around the world and why a lot of good clans are called elitist.

[Arnoldio]

Well yes, nobody gives a fuck about virtual life. (Well i do, but im not so afraid of loosing it, as you stated). Thats why you need to put down such supressive fire, that if the guy has balls to pop up, he will get nailed by atleast one bullet. If the enemy relocates, fair enough, you are still superior, since he will probably pull back a little -> ground is taken.

[A.Wickens]

Valid points Murphy. One point I think is being overlooked is that if you are able to apply truly effective, heavy suppression to an opponent in for example a building then they aren't able to just pop back up and shoot the suppressor because they will get their head taken off.

If you are going to suppress you need to look at the target building as a series of suppression points. "Where can the enemy shoot from, what are the weak points in the buildings defence, ie if he moves from one point of hard cover to another when and where is he exposed. Suppression needs to be well thought out, heavy and coordinated. You need your LMG in on the act, you need to stagger your volume of fire and ensure your reloads are coordinated. You need to identify firing points and ensure sustained rapid shots are placed so that people can't...well fire from them, and then you need to move.

Most importantly it you need to have a plan. There needs to be a purpose for revealing your position, be it withdrawal, flank or full on assault. Again the key is in the coordination. Suppresion is your jab, it needs to be rapid and accurate without swinging wildly, you just need to figure out what you are going to do next, footwork or right hook.

Suppression should be encouraged, sadly I have spent years trying to get squads to stop the gamey, unrealistic 'opposing shooting gallery counting game'. Mostly because after failing to follow an order to suppress properly I don't want to listen to someone who died basically whining the 'other guy counted faster than me'!

Like most semi realistic tactics it will actually work and conquer the 'gamey' stuff players do, but only if you have total buy in from your whole squad and believe in it yourself.

[Murphy]

Agreed on your post wick.

Suppression for the sake of suppression is dumb unless you are instantly taking the initiative with flankers. Ideally it will focus the enemy attention on the shooters and allow the guys flanking to get right up in their face. As you said it needs to be a snap to reaction and it won't last very long at all, but if you can shock your enemy for even a minute that is ample time for someone to close the distance and clear the sucker out.

It's just a lot less effective in game then a lot of us would like, and in theory it pans out nicely but in practice there is so much that can and will go wrong its often better to just close the distance and rip the guy apart without him knowing you have enough firepower to suppress. If you can combine weapon discipline with suppression it can be quite effective, but if even one cog in the machine of demise breaks down it all goes to hell and ends up being a liability. That's why unless you're in a good squad of players who know what to do suppression is a waste of ammo and time more often then not.

[Meza82]

some suppressive fire is better than others. u gotta have quantity and quality to do it right. good suppressive fire is alot of fire in the right spots. automatic rifles are way better than rifles for suppressive fire for this reason. 1 round a sec is better than nothing though. but of course, dont fire fire in the first place if your not under fire and you dont have a good shot.

[40mmrain]

The negatives to suppression are twofold, first you are giving the enemy incentive to change position/flank

yes, when youre shooting accurately, most assuredly the enemy has no incentive to flank

derp

[Murphy]

I probably have better tools in my bag of tricks to deal with him other then shooting a wall near him. He probably won't know I'm here if I don't shot at him then I can close in for a nade or wait until he is distracted (people have really short attention spans) and ensure I kill him.

You can only effectively pin anyone if they have no way of retreat (stuck in a house/alley perhaps?), which is what I mentioned in a previous post. Otherwise you are just saying "get out of that spot I can see you and know you're there".

[dtacs]

I never give the suppress order to my squad, its a realistic tactic that - like most - failed in its game implementation.

A dead enemy is better than one who knows of your position and hasn't been killed. And its not a situational tactic either, shoot to kill or don't bother.

[Truism]

The telling thing about suppression is that most people die with nearly full ammo. Rifle ammunition is some of the most abundant stuff in the game, you can rearm it faster than you can use it. If you're going to fire once, in a lot of cases it's worth putting a whole mag into likely enemy positions after your first target goes into cover, since you're normally going to need to relocate anyway to avoid the infamous "jack-in-a-box" maneuvre.

The default rifleman kits, btw, come with more than 500 rounds of ammunition (9 mags + ammo bag for another 8-9 mags). Think about that for a second.

While suppression is done better in PR than in any game other than CoH (which is a different genre), it could still use tweaks. Things to think about for future PRs, if they ever happen, are:

Adding a flinch effect (camerabone jumps when you take a near miss, which helps stop the wait and return accurate fire while pinned problem).

Adding a cumulative effect to suppression (as in CoH - each round of supression adds a certain value dependant on how close the round is and what calibre it is, while you naturally "heal" suppression at a rate dependant on other factors like your stance, how many allies are near you etc).

Finally, tying movement speed penalties to suppression values over a certain amount to stop the problem of suppression never really pinning - in real life, standing up and sprinting is pretty much suicide while pinned, but it's usually the best way out of suppression in PR (other factors are at play here, like dodgy hitboxes and deviation to some extent).

What people don't get is that being suppressed is the equivalent of being temporarily dead from a tactical standpoint. A suppressed soldier/unit cannot effectively do anything; the only direct tactical effects worse than suppression are neutralisation (cannot even attempt anything, some of the damage is likely to be permenant - at the individual level neutralisation is called pinning) and destruction (total and permenant attrition of the combat element - ie. death for a soldier).

[Arnoldio]

Also ofcourse, come as close as possible to the enemy before him noticing you. Closer you get, better it is, and they ahve less time to react. In those cases ofcourse you dont need supression fire. But if you are crossing some open area, like a road, and there is an enemy squad covering the road and engaging you while crossing, THEN you use supression to get your guys across while they hide. When your squad is safe, you have some other form of cover and you dont need to waste ammo.

If you use supression for contacts that didnt see you, then its pointless and gives your position away.