New Commander Assets

[nicoX]

What exactly is a landing zone?

"providing easier communication between troops and drop off locations."

This doesn't say me much.

How do I request close air support? I guess using the SOFLAM but how. And do all air get the request, and how does it show up on their screen?

How does the SAT Guided Air Strike lock? Is it locked so the pilot don't need to target?

[Cp]

CP to the rescue!

The SOFLAM is the single binocular in the game capable of laser-desginating targets, or "lasing" for short. What this does is marks the target with an infra-red beam that allows aircraft (Jets and Attack Choppers) to drop laser-designated ordinance on a target. It is only available in two kits: the Officer kit and the Special Operations kit. The officer kit, when being used by a squad leader or commander, has the added feature of being able to announce when a target is being lased (optional) by using the T-Key CommoRose to say "Marking target!" On both kits, the SOFLAM is found by pressing your "7" key, with the exception of the BiMing map, which replaces all binoculars with night-vision goggles.

Up to now, lasing a target was thought to be a very complex proceedure, having to request close air support through the commander, have it approved, then use your commorose to laser designate the target. This is not true. You dont even have to use your T-Key CommoRose to do it.

Simply pull out your SOFLAM, zoom in on the desired target (which can be anything from enemy aircraft, tanks, APCs, vehicles, buildings, or even the ground) and click your fire key like you were shooting a gun (but DO NOT HOLD IT DOWN! Think of it like a gun on single-shot). You will then see a green square appear where you designated, but keep in mind that this is only visible with the SOFLAM or from Aircraft. Normal infantry, armor, transports, etc will not be able to see the laser.

Any target you lase will be active for approximately 13-15 seconds before you have to re-designate the target, so make sure you are coordinating your target designation with your air cover.

To lase a static (non-moving) target, it is simply point and click with the SOFLAM as I said earlier. To lase a moving target, you have to lead the target (aim in its path) and lase a spot on the ground that the target will drive through. If done correctly, when the target (i.e. a tank or APC) drives through the mark, the laser will lock on to the target and move with it. The same goes for aircraft. However, the life-span of the laser designation is still the same 13-15 second window, so you must make sure you have planes/helos inbound before you lase a target.

Once you understand how to laser designate a target, it is a simple matter of coordinating this with the air support. Timing and comms become tricky if you want to ensure your target gets bombed. So you essentially have 2 approaches:

[1] Designate a target when you think air support is going to be in the area (check map) and hope they drop a bomb or missile...maybe you get one, maybe you don't. The only sure-fire way to get a target bombed with this method is to be in communication with your pilots over TS or VOIP.

[2] Request Close Air Support (CAS for short) thru the CO (squad leader only, using T-Key commorose). If the CO approves, he will dispatch the air asset to your target, which is now shown on the map by a CAS marker (four yellow arrows). Keep your eye on the map and when the Aircraft is within 15 seconds range, laser designate the target. This gets your target killed, which is a thing of beauty if done correctly.

Ordinance Dropping:
For aircraft to drop ordinance on the laser designated target, planes must be between 500m and 700m altitude over the target (not 500m-700m over sea level! if a tank is on a hill thats 100m high, you must be between 600m and 800m by your altimeter, so make sure your teammates tell you how high the target is!) and helicopters can fire laser-designated ordinance from any altitude, but unlike planes who can fire-and-forget, the laser designation must remain LOCKED in the gunners crosshairs until the target is hit.

A note on helicopters: Helicopter gunners have TWO "laser" weapons. One is the laser-guided missiles (activated by pressing the "3" key), which is used the same way a TOW missile is (fire and hold down the fire button while moving your camera around to guide the missile) and the other is the laser-designated missiles (activated by pressing your "4" key), which require troops on the ground to lase a target and the gunner to lock on to the laser before it can be fired accurately. If you fire a laser designated missile at a target that has not been lased, it WILL NOT EXPLODE. However, you can fire the laser-guided missiles and steer them yourself if there is no infantry around to lase the target.

So go out and have fun with your new knowledge guys! Remember: communication is key! if your pilots dont know where to look for a target, they cant hit it. If the ground troops dont know the plane is coming, they dont know when to lase a target.

[BloodBane611]

What exactly is a landing zone?

Most of the time it is an arbitrarily placed location that has nothing to do with where a helicopter will ACTUALLY fit. But skilled commanders can use these to set up useful LZs, and then people can just jump in and say "take me to A please", instead of "I need to be south of processing" or whatever.

[RHYS4190]

I don't like having to rely on useless human pilots in this game for air support, they seem to just crash first few second and the no air support for 20 mins.

Or you get a tards in a attack chopper who fly to close and get shot down by a hat >: ( if I see them doing that one more time im going to chaw there ear off and flay them to death with mi tongue

And this is my favorite I get a pilot kit get in chopper then I always get the stupid little twat who can’t get a pilot kit trying to get in the chopper and then opps they die and it takes an hour to couch them into getting a pilot kit like im there bloody mother.

Front lines the new game on the way got the right idea and made it so un manned vehicles do the close air support role, save me a lot of trouble.

And then there this saying iv just made, ARMY issued bazookas to infantry for a reason… so they don’t need the bloody air force.