Your Tanksim Moderator...

[Oberon]

Very nice indeed. I'm mulling over this one, I keep rewatching the Brave Warriors series, I think this is as close to a Cold War Fulda Gap tank-sim that is available and will be available for the near future.

I've tooled around in M1 Tank Platoon II a bit, and usually wound up with my hull in one field and my turret in the other. Artillery is a swine, that much I have had ingrained into me.

How good are the tutorials? I would probably slot into the M1A1 as I'm used to Abrams (Hope they do a 3D interior of the Challie one day though).

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Oberon

Very nice indeed. I'm mulling over this one, I keep rewatching the Brave Warriors series, I think this is as close to a Cold War Fulda Gap tank-sim that is available and will be available for the near future.

I've tooled around in M1 Tank Platoon II a bit, and usually wound up with my hull in one field and my turret in the other. Artillery is a swine, that much I have had ingrained into me.

How good are the tutorials? I would probably slot into the M1A1 as I'm used to Abrams (Hope they do a 3D interior of the Challie one day though).

Ah, another one of the big old names of Subsim moving over!

Do not compare this to M1TP2. It does not compare, they are lightyears apart.

Good that you already learned that artillery is a swine. In SBP, if you do not respect it, it will brutalise you. What did Patton say? "Static defences are monuments to the stupidity of man." Good advise is to always get moving again after some shots fired. The enemy artillery's reaction time can be as low as I think 80 seconds. Lieste maybe has the precise value.

Most of the major vehicles - including the M1 - have tutorials that focus on several key aspects of each station. For the gunner, not only normal operations but also emergency operation are covered (using the secondary sights). The TC introduces sight override, TC fire, and unit command. Plus lessons on how to use artillery, move with overwatch tactics and so forth. Basically you get spoken through all things needed, since originally many vehicles had no written manuals (meanwhile, the major players in the car park have).

Handling and operating the tanks is not that difficult, at best gunnery needs practice, especially if EMES and the other hightech gizzmos went to bed early. Gunnery without auto-lead, laser range finders and thermal imagers can be a sweat-pumping, hair-raising affair. If you tend to curse, send out the wife before start playing.

The system-depth is not such a complex issue as with Falcon 4 or DCS A-10, for example. The avionics of fighters and tanks just do not compare. You get rolling sooner in a tank, than you get flying in a plane. The challenge of SBP comes from tactics, using the terrain, and timing.

If you have questions, ask. I'll be happy to be your obedient servant. SBP has seen some nice additions in recent two releases, playable forward observers (both vehicles with long range optics and crawling infantrymen) to use to sneak on the enemy and call artillery down on him. Playable infantry missile launchers. Playable infantry MGs. Playable UAVs and UGVs. It'S a good time to join.

Just for the record: no airplanes currently, and helicopters are a compromise. Infantry is a construction site currently, it sometimes is useful, sometimes not. Improved infantry AI is annoiucned for next upgrade end of this year. The focus of SBP is mechanised forces, tanks, IFVs, this is where its full competence lies.

[Oberon]

What I think I will do is take up the very kind offer of Seans to try a demo, I've got (at the moment) five days off coming up next week so that seems a good as time as any to give it a bash.

How streamlined is the GUI for commanding the rest of your platoon/company?

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Oberon

What I think I will do is take up the very kind offer of Seans to try a demo, I've got (at the moment) five days off coming up next week so that seems a good as time as any to give it a bash.

How streamlined is the GUI for commanding the rest of your platoon/company?

I could not imagine how to do it any better.

If oyu have a HOTAS form lfightsimmng, use it to map commands to the many buttons. But you can perfectly play with just keyboard and mouse as well. I use mouse and stick for gunnery, parallel to each other.

On your own platoon, you have commands for formation controls, movement and speed controls, finding battle positions, hold and open fire. Have them on your HOTAS, and you can control your unit blindly.

The map screen allows route-planning while being in mission. The itnerfce is very much the same like the mission editor, and the pre-mission planning screen. Embarkment on routes, moving to and from positions, typical reaciton to spotting enemies, is triggered via Boolean variables. The operator screen is always the same, and once you understood the principle behind
it you will see why I think this missions editor is one of the vewry best out there. It is simple, ergonomic, but allows very flexible, elegant, complex orchestration of forces.

I always recommend to take care for the editor from the first day on. It adds to your mission planning, you learn to pout your head into the terrain, and finally you can quickly chnage all scenarios that for example feature Leopards, into ones with Abrams, if that is what you prefer.

Also, like in reality, a good mission sees you spending good ammount of time in planning before you jump into the mission. A tip: if you preset any battleposition beforee mission play, don'T leave it to just these BPs alone, but already now attach withdraw routes to them, linked to a condition of "artillery fire" or "enemy unit fire" = true. That way your buddies will try to evade at high speed if they get caught by surprises.

You can also set advance orutes from these BPs (or withdraw routes), that get activated after a time limit you set. "If this unit sees enemy, embark on route 50 seconds later". That way, artillery will not catch you.

Start small, platoon only. When you get to the stage of company command, other platoons are copmmanded by either jumping into their vehicles and play them (if mission allows that), or directing them via the map.

It is possible to play the sim like a map-centgred wargame. Forces can be very huge, if you want. I tested it in 2006, with two forces of brigade+ - size firing at each other. That was a very extreme example, and no plan attached, I just wanted to see frames any playability. The sim handled it. On a Pentium-4.

But it is tough to handle forces bigger than company yourself. Consider platoon-level the major focus of interest, and company very well managable. But you will soon suffer from work overload, for example regarding ammo-management and rearming.

If you ever run big scenarios, consider some easing of realism actually helping to increase realism. On rare occaisons, the AI gets somewhat locked at firing at a well-dug-in enemy, and it empties its complete loadout of shells into the ground covering the enemy. That is unrealistic, and it also is unrealsiric that a company commander in the midst of battle asks every single vehicle every 90 seconds if he should pull them out so that they cold rearm. In rlaity, I assume vehicle commanders make themselves heared by themselves if they run low on ammo, and they certainloy do not fire their load of 40 SAVBOT and HEAT onto one single foxhole within just 3 minutes, and then stay emty where they are. Ease the realism: if playing big formations, use infinite ammo loadouts. Such events like described then can no longer ruin your battleplan. You can order the vehicles to reload positions nevertheless, if you want that.

In small-scale battles (small units, only 1 platoon) it is worthwhile to stay with finite ammo loadouts. The Leopards need to turn their gun to 5-o'clock position in order to reload the ready-rack from the hull-storage. Since that exposed the turret'S neck to the front, it needs some consideration when to reload, and where. You also need to stay aware of how many shots you have left in the ready rack. Some tanks and IFVs are very low on rounds ready to fire.

Check the many pdfs in the manuals folder once the sim is installed. Several vehicles have their own dedicated manuals, the CV-9040s for example.