jazjar Posted December 31, 2010 Posted December 31, 2010 I think the Mission ( Devil's Cross 01A )is a great concept, with having large, realistic force on force battles on the ground and air, but a couple of flaws stand in the way of this vision. First, the JTAC is not available, second, the mission is vey unfair, with my two hogs going up against hordes of MI-24Vs and MIg-29As. The CAP seems to be either unskilled or inaccurate, because they seem to takeoff, fly some circles away from the battle area, and then land without doing anything. The Migs then get me and if they don't, the surprisingly deadly Hinds will. The SEAD support is adequate, I have the luxury of not hearing whinings on my RWR from Buks and Osas because of the Germans. The friendly air defense is also adequate, once the Migs kill me and my wingy they are immediatley on the defensive from Patriots speeding towards them. Now, about air support, ( my job!) the A-10c is a wonderful aircraft, but it itself cannot stop eighty attaking vehicles ( two OPFOR reinforced battalions, right?) without at least some apache longbow help. The Russians on the other hand have Hordes upon Hordes of MI-24s that devestate my arty and C&C, where does this come from? Now, about order of battle. The Russians have two reinforced tank battalions, eighty vehicles in RL and it looks about right in the ME, but the U.S Calvary SQUADRON, not battalion is not properly represented. A squadron of Cavalry is supposed to have 3 troops ( companies ) consisting of two M2 platoons and two M1A2 Platoons, and a whole company of M1A2s as well, along with organic artillery and air defense. in Devil's Cross, two squadrons are represented by a Plt of M1A2s, and the other one is a group of six bradley sections. This is just the best review I can gie for the Devil's Cross 01A, thanks for reading! P.S. the composition of a troop and a squadron are very easy to find, ED :) 1 [sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]
skypirate Posted January 11, 2011 Posted January 11, 2011 That is a good review indeed and covers my points of comments with regards to the campaign. There were a few small glitches as well such as all wingman being stuck on the taxiway and not being able to take off. It would be interesting if possible to implement some sort of rearming restrictions. For example on one of the final missions I returned and rearmed each time with 6x Maveriks worth 150,000USD each to go back to the field and smack some more russian APCs. I did this 8 times (untill I actually was so sick of it that I just ended the mission) and calculated 7 million USD being thrown on the field just from my side. With this regards it would be more realistic to have a store count during the campaign and not be able to rearm with whatever we would like... Just a tought. [sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]Regards!
jazjar Posted January 11, 2011 Author Posted January 11, 2011 Usually, in real life, they don't arm you with six mavs. The a-10 has that capability, but it is rarely used. You would normally arm up with four of them ( in RL ). And by the way, my descriptions of ED incorrecltly moddeling the calvary troop were correct, but my guidelines for fixing them were a little off. I took the structure of a cavalry squadron from M1 Tank Platoon 2, from the section titled "Armored Cavalry Regiment" and then went on DCS A-10C and noticed that the unit in Georgia was a Brigade Combat Team! I went on to Wikipedia and found out the real structure for the "recon element" and found out that it was very different from that of an ACR. So, ED's representation is still a little off, but as I said, a lot of potential for that mission. ;) [sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]
MBot Posted January 12, 2011 Posted January 12, 2011 I am glad you enjoy the scenario. The order of battle is off in order to keep the vehicle count of the mission in check. Building the units according to specications is tempting, but will make the mission unplayable performance wise. The campaign is already very fps challenged as is :) Ultimately the goal is to give the mission this flair of authentiticy, the illusion of a bigger conflict, while keeping it playable. A tip I can give is that the player is not intended to play a leading role in the course of a mission (or the war). If you follow the task your are given in the briefing, kill a couple of vehicles and then safely return to base, you have done what you were asked to do. In mission 1 for example you are tasked to delay the Russian advance. If you kill 1 vehicle and cause the leading company to disperse, you have already done this (though only minimaly). If you delay the other companies or kill more vehicles of course that is even better, but those two Russian battalions do not need to be destroyed completely. Do what you can, but your primary goal will always be to return to base to fight another day.
Recommended Posts