I've been pondering this a bit before and what with the talk of the L7A3 minus
the GL kit, I got to wondering about the crew served weapons concept again.
Where does such a weapon like the Mk-19, M2 HB and other heavy crew
served weapons fit in the Stargrunt gaming 'verse? The future development is
the OCSW that is the heavy weapons counter part to the OICW (effectively the
L7A3 in primitive form)
http://fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/ocsw.htm
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/docs/ocsw_wea/slide01.htm
http://www.dote.osd.mil/reports/FY00/army/00ocsws.html
Its significantly more than a SAW in that it has some anti-light
armour utility that a SAW wouldn't have.
Does this fit into the range of a crew served RFAC? it is 20mm, so that seems
to fit. The firepower and point and area fire affects would be covered right?
That said, what to do about a model? I'm perhaps going to try to make one up.
I'll have to see what my bits box allows. The first thought
is to use the RFAC/1 from the GZG line of resin vehicles, but that
weapon is much too long/large to be broken down to man portable
sizes. Removing the barrel would seem an unneeded complication.
An interesting weapon.
Yes, I would agree that it would fall in the RFAC/1 category.
It looks like they intend a man-load of about 35lbs. The weapon and fire
control would be carried by one man. The tripod and a small amount of ammo (28
rounds) carried by another. The rounds weigh almost a pound apiece (37 in a
35lb case). So a team of 4 would provide 102 rounds and a squad of 8
would provide 250 rounds. The weapon fires semi- or full automatic. The
page did not state the rate of fire on full automatic. How long would the ammo
last before the team would have to withdraw for more ammo?
Now I am talking through my hat, but I will try to take a conservative
guess. Let's assume 3 rounds per fire on semi- and 20 rounds per fire on
full (still assuming controlled usage and not "emptying the canister"). In a
SG game (1-5 minutes), this would give a 4 man team 30 turns of fire and
an
8 man team 80 turns of fire using semi-automatic. In a DS2 game divide
these
numbers by 3 (3-15x as long a turn) to get 10 and 27. These numbers are
fairy large, and it is unlikely that a crew will burn through their ammo in a
single SG2 or DS2 game. At full automatic, it is a different story, 5 rounds
fire for a 4 man team and 10 rounds for a 8 man squad (DS: 2 rounds for a 4
man team and 4 rounds
for a 8 man squad). Usage would probably fall somewhere in-between. Yes,
the entire company could be carrying ammo, but I think that they would be more
concerned with carrying ammo for their own weapons, SAWs, GMS/Ps, etc.
For extended missions, situations where ammo is in short supply, or supply is
far away, it could present a factor. Also if the squad looses personnel, the
ammo supply drops quickly (almost 1/2 if an ammo carrying soldier is hit
in
a 4 man team and 1/6 in an 8 man squad). What would be a good way to
model this?
Also, how do you model having to set the weapon up and tear it down? In SG,
would this be a separate action? I think that setup falls below the
granularity of DS.
-----
Brian Bell
-----
> -----Original Message-----
> At 7:13 AM -0400 6/27/01, Bell, Brian K (Contractor) wrote:
From my understanding of the weapon and the specifics on the logistics trail,
the weapon is something of a hybrid between a direct
fire weapon like the M2 and the semi-indirect Mk19. The Grenade
launcher gives you nice area effect kills against troops but is hard
to range in and has a long/high arc. The M2 is quick to range in but
doesn't have any burst effect of appreciable nature.
The OCSW allows you to use a small amount of ammo, that has a
semi-burst effect, on a point or area target accurately and quickly.
ie, you lase the target's rage, fire as the fire control unit tells and you
put a few rounds over the soldiers that are behind cover. Grazing fire that
doesn't care about troops in defilade.
The amount of ammo needed seems to be low. Its not really a sustained fire
weapon, but something close. More of a lay a burst here kill the red force
grunts, lay a burst here kill the red force grunts.
Remember, its shooting the same sized rounds as the 20mm 'grenade' that OICW
uses. Which almost makes it a direct fire mortar, minus the burst effect since
60mm mortars have a much more HE in the projectile and thus a much larger
burst effect....
> Also, how do you model having to set the weapon up and tear it down? In
Well, since it is a Crew Served weapon, it should work out like the Size 1
Heavy weapons (or mortars for that matter). I'm still thinking
that 2-3 men should be more than enough given what the army is
looking at for a load.
I got to looking at how effective the RFAC/1 would be and compared it
to other weapons, its not really a multibarrel SAW (FP D10/Impact D10
like the NAC and NSL power armour uses, but its bigger and badder...
FP D10/Impact D12? Its supposed to take over the sustained fire
mission roles of the other weapons, but then I wonder if it really has the
area denial role that a sustained fire mission will have.
Still given how trench mortars supplanted machine guns[1]in the indirect fire
role, I wonder if this new weapon would supplant mortars in their role of
point fire suppression and kills.
1. WWI saw the penultimate use of crew served water cooled MGs in indirect
fire just like mortars are used now...During the battle of the Somme (I think
it was the Somme), 10 Vickers MGs were supplied with water and ammo by a
company of infantry. The 10 MGs fired a bit short of 1 million rounds over 10
hours, 100,000 rounds per gun. The
crews paused long enough (15-30 seconds) to change belts, refill
barrels with water and change worn barrels. The mission was entirely indirect
and was fired at the German assembly areas to prevent a local counter attack
while a British infantry unit consolidated a piece of ground they took.
> Date: Tue, 26 Jun 2001 14:41:49 -0400
<snip>
> Does this fit into the range of a crew served RFAC? it is 20mm, so
I'd think so. Seems to me that's equiv to a RFAC/1 in SG terms.
> That said, what to do about a model? I'm perhaps going to try to make
There are two crew-served weapons like this from the ESU figure line.
One
is an automatic grenade launcher, and the other is a multi-barrel
autocannon. Good figs - I have a "battery" of three (mixed types) for
my ESU.
I'm sure you could find suitable "crew" figures from other lines if you
want to use them with non-ESU forces.
********************************************
> At 2:55 PM -0400 6/28/01, adrian.johnson@sympatico.ca wrote:
The only issue I have with the RFAC is the D8 Impact vs Infantry....Seems it
should have a high firepower and high impact vs crunchies and high firepower
but lower impact vs vehicles.
> There are two crew-served weapons like this from the ESU figure line.
One
> is an automatic grenade launcher, and the other is a multi-barrel
Ack no! The NAC could never use such a weapon made by Eurie slave factories!
We must have a piece of hand crafted American and British mechanical and
electronic wizardry.
> I'm sure you could find suitable "crew" figures from other lines if you
Nahh, given how fancy and sleek the OSCW looks, I think I can
kit-bash a more futuristic version and then pour a few in lead to
make additional models.