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Which units do you think you would dread encountering the most on the battlefeild

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: BattleGoat on 2002-06-05 10:03 ]</font>

Remotely Piloted Combat Vehicles. Its would be one thing to face someone in mortal combat, but quite another to face someone playing what in essence is a video game for them, and mortal combat for you.

How far away do you believe unmanned tanks to be? We generally assume that such equipment would be impossible in the timeline we use. We have however included UAVs and are researching the possibility of Unmanned naval units.

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Chris Latour
BattleGoat Studios


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: BattleGoat on 2002-06-06 07:36 ]</font>

I would personally find anything beyond UAV/UCAVs to be unlikely. Reason: Unmanned naval units present a big problem to the world's shipping lanes if, God help us, communications are lost. It would muck up trade for weeks, which would cost billions. Meanwhile, unmanned tanks are unlikely for a simple reason: NBC hardening. The US Army designs its combat gear with the assumption that they might get hit with a nuke/biological weapon/chemical weapon at some point, a possibility which is becoming increasingly likely. Were an "unmanned tank" to be hit with the EMP associated with a nuke, you would find massive problems such as not being able to use them. That would be bad, especially since your enemy is unlikely to have them. Thus, down goes your combat force, and in goes the enemy.

I think an EMP would reduce a tanks effectiveness to that of a WWII bunker whether in were manned or not. All the computer systems, radios, etc. would be down. Wouldn't they?

How far out does the timeline go? I think a remotely piloted tank would be as similar to an MBT as an RPV with hellfires is to a Recon Fighter, ie; similar capabilites, but cheaper, smaller, lighter, and more capable of taking risks.

It could be made with todays technology quite easily. The weak link would be the communications. I imagine the 'crew' may want to stay close by, with the possibility of operating the vehicle via Line-of-site IR.

This is all just speculation, but it is the way large, crew operated weapons will go. Whether this is in your timeline, i don't know. However, one has to assume that world conflict would rapidly increase military technology. Not having to risk trained crew would be a real advantage.

Just so you guys know from what I've heard the army is alreayd testing unmanned vehicles on a certian level. Recon wise they've been testing small remote controlled cars similar to the Predators. SOmeone at a base controls it via a camera. Similar no doubt to how we did it on Mars with that crawler thing.

So in short Unmanned tanks are pretty much here in a certian way. What one could do is have the unmanned tank be two parts. A command hub and then the tanks. if a person hits the hub- well then the tanks are considered gone to.

Heh thats a simplified version.

Unmanned vehicles are being developed and have been successfully tested just before 911.
The US flew a plane sized drone unmanned from wright patterson air force base to an Australian airbase all with remote control.
Its crazy.This was just before September 8th it was i think last year.
ALot of people were saying the 911 plane attackes were remotely controlled lol.

One of the classic stories of Science Fiction was about a space-faring advanced civilization fighting a war with a far less sophisticated one, and relying on their superior technology - developing advanced ideas and new concepts, each one that failed one way or the other in real heated battle. In the end the "less advanced" civilization overwhelmed and overpowered the other and won the war.

Clearly advanced technologies will cost lots of money to develop and deploy, and will they really work all that well in the end?

At the start of WWII it wasn't the superiority of German tanks that led to early victories, it was the strategies and tactics used. The early German equipment was actually a inferior to what they were facing, but they were successful.

I'm certainly not convinced that such error-prone new technologies as unmanned vehicles could prove to be all that successful in actual battle conditions (though as recon's they could do a very good job).

-- George.

How do military units engage each other in this game? I've played a game called Civilizations 2 by Activision and i hated it. Units don't really engage each other, they just shoot somewhere and the number of them just gets smaller. It's completely unreal, that's why I sent this game to my cousin for his birthday. :grin:
I hope it will be something like in Red Alert or something similar.

Well, this isn't a 'RTS' shoot-em type game, so it isn't really meant to be like Red Alert or Empire Earth in its gameplay.

However, that being said, we do simulate individual battalions, and they do all respond to very details initiative/orders/efficiency systems that affect how often they fire, how much damage they do, etc. When a heated battle takes place you will be able to see the individual battalions moving, firing, taking hits, retreating, etc. Sometimes it'll get very cluttered, but as long as you're not running the game at high speed you'll pretty much be able to see exactly what's going on.

We'll probably be posting some battle screenshots by early next month to make this all a little more clear.

-- George.

Actually the US Army does field a remote-control tank. It's called the panther. It's an M1 series tank minuse the turret. It's used primarily by engineers to proof minefields. It's fielded in a very small number and works pretty much in LOS.

SR2010 Engineers

All kidding aside, I think I would dread not a single unit but a smartly designed combine arms stack/brigade with its design based on the unit mission and terrain on which it is expected to fight.

Holy molly! I just realized how old this thread is It died 3 years before the release of 2010 !

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Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.
Isaac Asimov, Salvor Hardin in "Foundation"
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Si vis pacem, para bellum
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It is hard to free fools from the chains they revere.
Voltaire