Thread: Why stuff never gets bombed.

Jets and choppers in PR face a major up hill battle. Anti aircraft has a very good view distance along with an extreme firing range. All they have to do is look for the black dot in the sky and fire. For air vehicles, targets on the group are nothing more then a tiny offset colored dot that maybe a rock or maybe something trying to shot them down.

Aside form anti aircraft, tanks or apcs that are engaging ground forces appear in the same manor to air vehicles, tiny specks. Jets have the shit end of the stick because it’s not only a tiny dot, it’s a tiny dot your going by at 1400 m/s.

This is why ground forces have a laser designator. Most people know about this, put the little green box on what you want dead and it is suppose to die, right? If you are lucky, a chopper is flying low enough, and it happens to be looking in the right area, you may just get a hellfire missel to kill the target.

People have to understand a few things when it comes to getting a target lazed and destroyed.

• First thing to understand is how difficult it is to see ground targets. So simply saying there is a tank on the bunkers is not going to get it taken down. Typing out the grid and keypad does nothing either. Pilots now have an idea of where on the map the problem is but still lack the ability to do much of anything other than put their aircraft in danger.

• Second, for accurate attacks you need an accurate laz. This means, placing the laz and watching it to make sure the green box sticks to the target. The target box tends to bounce a lot so you need to make sure it stays on target. No, click and forget.

• Third, you need to inform pilots as to where the target is. I don’t mean just typing E8 kp 3. While this helps, it is best not to rely on this. Helicopter pilots maybe able to work with this because a gunner can squad lead and place a marker on their map while the pilot makes sure the aircraft doesn’t dip out of the sky. However, jets do not have this ability. While it can be done, it is an EXTREME risk. Flying out of bounds takes 8 seconds to bleed and landing often takes more time then you will have before you bleed out.

What the third tip means is you need to get a big marker on the map for pilots to zero in on. Sending intel to the commander so he can place a marker for the CAS is a good step. But, that can take time and our server has an issues with people actually stepping up to the command position. The developers added a faster method of marking that all snipers and squad leaders have access too.

Any one who activates a laser designator has the ability to place a bomb marker on the map. This is not calling out over the radio that you have a target marked for CAS. That is step 4 in the process of marking a target of bombing. People who laz a target and call for it to be attacked are skipping 2 vital steps. The steps they are missing are the ones that will place the bomb marker.

The way the process should run it like this;

1. Enemy vehicle is spotted by ground forces, who then proceed to equip the laser designator, right click to zoom in, then left click to place a laser signal on the target.

2. Ground forces confirm that the target box remained on the enemy vehicle and then proceed to range the target. To range a target you must point the laser designator at the target to determine how far away the target is. This distance will be displayed in the lower right corner of your view in red. That is how far away that target is, you must remember that number.

3. Hold down on Q to bring up a command roster. The center icon will be the distance setting, use your mouse to highlight that circle and left click. A list of distances will now activate over the command roster. Ranges from 25/50 all they way up to 1200/1300 meters will be displayed. You must scroll to the number that matches the distance you found the target to be at. So if your target was at 178 meters you want to scroll over the 200/250 icon and right click to select the 200 meter marker. Right clicking sets the number on the right while left clicking sets the number on the left.

4. The designators operator will then need to return to the main command roster under Q and then scroll to select that he has a target for CAS bombing.
The following is a video of what happens when people laz a target and just issue a radio command that they have a target. Notice the there is no marker on the map. There is even a tip on the left side stating that you need to set a distance.

The following is a video of what happens when people laz a target and just issue a radio command that they have a target. Notice the there is no marker on the map. There is even a tip on the left side stating that you need to set a distance.

http://www.xfire.com/video/2e0445/