Achtung Panzer Operation Star - Volokonovka 1942 - The Breeze of Summer and the Smell of Burnt Tank Hulls

Graviteam is on fire, fellows. After the release of the second installment in the highly acclaimed Achtung Panzer series (Operation Star), it's DLC after DLC and there is no other choice but to enjoy.

Volokonovka 1942 is new DLC to be released on 15Jan12. It's a new area of operations, with campaigns and missions during the summer of 1942.

Here are some screenshots of a quick battle where I fed Soviet tanks into the teeth of a German tank company defending in a reverse slope. The body and burnt hulls count was not pretty.

France '14 (HPS Simulations) - 20th Century Firepower, 19th Century Tactical Mobility

If you are about to start playing France '14, I'd recommend getting a good stomach for high casualties and lots of patience for your operations timetable.

The German XII Corps (grey counters at the right) advances towards Dinant. It's 8 o'clock of 22 August 1914.

These armies can kill wholesale, you just have to give them time to deploy.

Tigers Unleashed (HPS Simulations) - Gameplay Notes - What Killed Sonderkraftfahrzeug 251? The Blog Goes Into Battlefield Forensics!

In my latest entry, one of my German halftracks (SdKfz 251) was dispatched by an enemy 7.62 mm SMG firing from a wooded hill.

Bug? Oddball?

7.62 mm PPD SMG vs. German halftrack. Plot of detection time vs. distance in the sandbox mode.

Tigers Unleashed has a so-called "sandbox" mode in which the user can choose a firing unit and a target. The sandbox mode then shows the data for shots being fired from the firing unit and taking into consideration the distance, terrain, illumination, shadowing, even the angle of both units.

Combat Mission Battle for Normandy - A Note on Combat Functions/Services and Weapon Systems

After an intense week at work, I decided to relax with a Combat Mission scenario. It was an unusually warm winter Saturday morning in the US east coast ...

Half and hour later, my son found me in the war room (AKA my home office), all twisted in my armchair, cursing at the monitor, the coffee and Argentine pastries untouched and put well out the way.

The scenario: Bloody Dawn, by one of the great scenario designers Field Marshal Blucher
The game: Combat Mission Battle for Normandy

Spoiler Alert! Do not read if you are still going to play this scenario against the computer.

Steel Armor Blaze of War Features Both Sim and Wargame Traits

This entry is about something I forgot to mention before: in Steel Armor there is a turn-based interface where you can maneuver your tanks and troops pretty much in the way that we have seen in the beloved Achtung Panzer war games.

If as the result of your (or your enemies') maneuvers there is a contact there will be a tactical combat which is automatically resolved by the computer (tactical combat not involving your own tanks) or is fought by you in the 3D-tank-sim mode.

Tigers Unleashed (HPS Simulations) - Gameplay Notes - Close Combat at Position 877

Moving men under fire and detached from their leaders is a battle in itself.

The status of my only platoon of PzGr. and their waypoints. Note how they are heavily suppressed (window on top, status tab, current levels group). 

This is a continuation of the previous entry where I edited a battle from scratch. Quick refresh: a company-sized team of German PzIVs and PzGr. against a computer controlled Soviet infantry battalion reinforced with a company of AT guns. I have my PzGr. ready to take a foothold in the first enemy position. Do I?

Red Orchestra 2 - Random Tactical Observations on the Lone Warriors

More Red Orchestra 2, fellows ... I've got the bug in me now ...

These entries are written with a tongue in cheek spirit. I am no expert in online first person shooters and I get killed a lot. I am not criticizing, just trying to entice a healthy discussion. All screenshots in this entry from a multiplayer server I joined, got killed enough to be sent into the bleachers of shame and spectating. All online nicknames have been covered to protect the innocent.

Steel Armor Blaze of War - Soviet Combined Arms in Afghanistan

The game: Steel Armor Blaze of War
The scenario: quick battle, T-62 platoon (player) supporting armored infantry platoon vs mujahideen infantry (computer). The Soviet-Afghan War.

Armor, the decisive maneuver formation to be used in mass against NATO's best. Here used in penny packets against these barely fed fanatics. I am in command of a T-62 tank platoon, supporting Soviet infantry forces in a sweep operation.

Steel Beasts ProPE V2.64 -Tank-borne Smoke Grenades, Soviet Style

There is this interesting thread at SteelBeasts.com about the T-72M1. The part about the relatively high distance that the smoke grenades are thrown from the tank caught my attention.

In that thread, a couple of fellow virtual tankers pointed out that in Soviet tanks the smoke grenades are thrown so forward (compared to their Western counterparts) in order to assist in the offensive. Just after the preparatory artillery barrage, the T-72s emerge from cover and dash towards the enemy, throwing smoke forward to gain a couple of hundred meters of closing ...

I had the opportunity to command a company of T-72M1s in a hasty attack against a town defended by a company of Bradley M2s IFVs. Smoke served us well  ...

DCS Black Shark 2 - Canon Shooting with Translational Drift

I haven't abandoned the virtual skies ... But most of the flying these last days has been practice.

The Ka-50 is a fantastic weapons platform once you get past a point where you fly without thinking of it. The demands of situational awareness, target acquisition and weapons delivery are high and I have become too dependent on doing everything from a hover. It is not rare for me to get sucked into my own downwash when I am engaging from a hover and instinctively floor the collective to duck into cover.