Re: DSII for the 2020s

David Brewer wrote:

> > Yep. Particularly when one of them is physically... well, maybe not
> > *impossible*, but extremely unpractical.
> 
> Impractical hardly seems the issue. Jon copied out the fluff text
> from a David Drake book.

Makes me feel a lot better to know that Jon isn't guilty of that kind
of PSB - ie, with the emphasis on the B :-)

> > > Old Dirtside only had one, the mass driver cannon (as well as a
> > > HEAT ammo rocket-assisted gun and the familiar DFFG and HEL).
> > 
> > Modern HVCs are able to fire HEAT, KE of various types (APDS,
> > APFSDS, etc), HESH (poor vs vehicles, very good against buildings >
> etc),
> 
> Doesn't 120mm HESH ammo hold the current long-range tank-kill
> record at around 6km? It was, of course, designed for destroying
> concrete fortifications in WWII.

The shot was fired from a Challenger II so it could've been HESH if the
target was an old Iraqi tank (ie, older than T72), but I seem to recall
the people at RMCS telling me it was an APFSDS.

OTOH, the 120mm HESH round was definitely used in the blue-on-blue
incident where a Challenger II hit a British-crewed Warrior squarely in
the side... fortunately the Warrior had add-on armour, so it survived
with only minor damage :-/ If *that* had been a long-rod or HEAT, the
Warrior would have been completely wrecked.

> > HE (ie, anti-personnel frag charges) etc. Restricting them to
> > rocket-assisted HEAT only seems a bit too restrictive to me :-/
> 
> I didn't think of them as HVC-like guns (I no longer have a copy
> of DS1 for reference) but as low-pressure guns, like the Russian
> 73mm or 100mm guns used on the BMP-1 and -3 respectively... eg.
> not a weapon capable of throwing KE penetrators about. 

The 73mm low-pressure rockets we modified the fuses on for the Swedish
BMPs were unguided IIRC, but of course that'd work too. However, there
are several types of guided missiles that are fired from high-pressure
guns today

> I don't
> recall if the fluff text specifically said HEAT. It really isn't
> very relevant whether the shell was HEAT, HESH or some sort of
> explosively forged or propelled penetrator. In game terms the
> penetration did not vary on range, while the penetration for MDC's
> did.

> The general lack of anti-personnel ammo is just one of those DS
> things, I 'spose. Whether a tank-scale railgun is likely to be
> able to throw a large-calibre HE-frag-type bomb is something I,
> as yet, don't know.

Depends on the calibre of the gun. Railguns are unlikely to be very
large-calibre - they don't need to if their main job is to throw
long-rods. You can build reasonable HE rounds for 40mm and upwards
though - just make sure the fuse isn't affected in the wrong way by the
electromagnetic fields -  so they should probably be able to fire HE as
well.
 
> > > Playtest Dirtside II had a smart-munition-firing gun, but I
> > > 'spose that's too similar to a GMS.
> > 
> > ...which could be taken to represent the current Russian fashion of
> > launching missiles through the main gun of an MBT as well as the
> > more common approach of carrying a separate missile launcher > >
somewhere.
> 
> Sure, although, again, you don't need an HVC for that. The BMP-3's
> low-pressure 100mm gun also does this.

But the HVC can do so many more things than the low-pressure guns. If
all you want to do is launch GMS and HE the low-pressure gun works
fine, but it lacks flexibility.

> > > > * Allow infantry GMS/L teams in open-topped vehicles to fire
their
> > > > missiles "effectively" (ie, able to hit and inflict actual
damage), but
> > > > at a one die-shift penalty in missile guidance (ie, Basic rolls
1D4,
> > > > Enhanced 1D6, Superior 1D8).
> > > 
> > > Do you mean open-topped or open-hatched? Several different APCs
> > > seem to allow this, German Marders, UK Warriors.
> > 
> > Good point. Not sure if the weapons used in these cases correspond
to 
> > IAVR (GMS/P) or GMS/L, though - ie, were they LAW-80/AT4 types, or
> > Milan and similar?
> 
> Milan, in both cases.

OK. Then mounted GMS infantry should be able to fire their missiles
effectively, period.
 
> Are oprn-topped vehicles popular with anybody who plays DS2?

I doubt it, since they currently get severe penalties but no cost
reduction.

> > > >   - Flechette rounds:
> >
> > Flechettes are 1-2 inches long and up to some mm in diameter; solid
> > metal, no explosives, several hundred (in some cases - 152mm > >
rounds
> > IIRC - several thousand) in each shell. Think of them as
anti-infantry
> > long rod penetrators. Nothing like them in DSII at the moment.
> 
> Actually, this is what the fluff text for MAK describes... "a
> cloud of kinetic penetrators".

No, it isn't. A 2"-long flechette will not penetrate an armoured
vehicle. If it is
very, very, *very* lucky, it *might* get half-way through a steel
helmet. It will, however, easily go through flesh, earth and cloth
(including kevlar), and fairly well through timber.

Most infantry doesn't have hard body armour covering the whole
body, though - PA comes closest, but I assume they might get hurt by
hits in joints etc if they are unlucky (thus the MAK effect vs PA, but
they could equally well be treated as "vehicles" instead vs flechette
rounds)... and there are lots of PA models showing the troopers
bare-headed, too <g>

The current tactical use for flechette rounds is against enemy infantry
which has come in among your vehicles... or against enemy infantry
positions you want to suppress while your battle taxis drive right up
to the
enemy position before the barrage stops and your own assault infantry
dismounts.

EFP warheads (such as those used in the MAK-ish rounds under
development today) are virtually identical to long rod penetrators from
the viewpoint of the target - they inflict damage in exactly the same
way. The only thing which differs is how the long rod is delivered.
IOW, EFP subs fit the DSII PSB description of MAK very well.

> Wouldn't the KE of the penetrators depend very much on the tube 
> launching them?

For anti-tank long rods and some shotgun flechette rounds for close
defence, yes. For artillery-delivered flechettes and the ADM ammo the
US Rangers use for the CG RR, the means by which the flechettes are
expelled from the carrier shell is far more important.

> meaning a mortar has
> a lower muzzle velocity than a gun, therefore the flechettes will
> fall to earth much faster and with (as endless detailed of late)
> more KE.

If the mortar has a lower muzzle velocity, the flechettes it delivers
will fall to the ground *sooner* (or at a shorter range), but they most
likely won't go *faster*.

Regards,

Oerjan Ohlson
oerjan.ohlson@telia.com

"Life is like a sewer.
  What you get out of it, depends on what you put into it."
- Hen3ry