[WIP] An Introduction to Task Force Thunder

Overview

A short Introduction to the Task Force Thunder Campaign showing newer players some tactics and giving a few tips.

Foreword

Be advised that this guide assumes you have masterd most of the basics of CM:SF2 and know about how to move, supression and similar, but are still a rather new player or inexperienced with the forces used in the campaign. Should this not be the case i can only highly recommend the video guides from Usually Hapless. I also highly recommend you play turnbased (otherwise the game is a bit wonky) and at least on veteran as on lower difficulties important mechanics of the game are just disabled to make it easier. I will try not to spoiler to much about the different mission and instead just give you a demonstration on how it might be accomplished, so i might not tell you about some nasty surprises that await you around some corners.

Should you have any suggestions, questions or find inaccuracies withhin this guide please let me know.

Mission 1: Breaktrough at the Berm OOB

In this mission you will have under your command:

• A Company: A Stryker Company with 3 M1128 attached
  • Company HQ
    • 2 man Company HQ in 1xM1126
    • 2 man XO team in 1xM1126
    • 2 man Fire Support team 1xM1131
    • 3 man Sniper team rides with Company HQ
    • 3×3 man Breach teams (Engineers) 1xM1132 (functionally a M1126)
  • 3xStryker Platoon
    • 3 man Platoon HQ in 1xM1126
    • 3×9 man Infantry Squads in 3xM1126 (1st Squads M1126 has a Mk19)
    • 4 man and 3 man mg teams ride with Platoon HQ
• 1st Tank platoon from B Company: 4 M1A2 SEP Abrams

First a general overview to the units and some tips.

Vehicles

M1126s are your Battle taxis for the Infantry their armor is thin and will not stop any relevant at weapon on the battlefield but they have a decent speed and good offroad capability so use them to get your Infantry into a postion and then back off and give Firesupport from behind nearby cover. Some walls and similar Obstacles allow you to only expose your turret while keeping the vehicle itself mostly safe. Keep in mind that the gunner has to stick his head out to reload the weapon so keep your distance to enemy small arms otherwise you will soon only have 1 man crews. Ammo wise they carry 2k shots for their M2s, 3360 5.56 for the Infantry Squads and 3200 7.62 for your mg teams, 40 40mms for gls. And finally 2xAT4s usefull for shooting enemys in buildings and defending against vehicles not that those should be a problem because they also carry a Javelin with 2 reloads i highly recommend using those whenever possible for all squads that will provide overwatch (my mg teams and sniper teams always carry as many as possible while still being able to move somwhat fast). The Javelin has thermals and is a atgm system with no setup time able to engage all targets on the battlefield from Infantry to tanks. Use them to engage weapon teams, atgms and all other targets that present themselfs.

M1126 with Mk19 indentical with normal M1126 except for the main weapon that is great for supressing and killing enemys in buildings. Be carefull about friendly fire at long range the rounds can go all over the place. Use mg teams to support infantry while moving up they cant friendly fire (there is a chance but its generally small enough to ignore) keep in mind that impacts near friendly units will still supress them.

M1131s have an exposed gunner and better Optics as well as a Laser Designator and no ammo for dismounts Scouts and Fire Support teams use them. I personaly just use them as taxis because vehicles a way to easy to spot, I prefer to scout with dismounts (that should if possible have javelins).

M1128s are there for long range fire support against soft targets and of limited use against vehicles. Their ammo supply is limited keep that in mind or you might get caught with your pants down.

M1A2 Abrams great optics, hunter killer system, great armor, decent ammo supply, good offroad capability. There is no enemy vehicle that can really threaten an Abrams and enemy Infantry can at most track you. Keep the flanks coverd and dont get hit by to many atgms and you are golden. Also pretty darn usefull in urban combat as nothing decides a firefight as decisively as a 120mm round and atmgs wont be a threat here.

Infantry

Infantry Squad 9 man with 7xM4s (2xgls, 1xScoped) and 2xM249 and also carry 2AT4 as wells as some grenades (if you have use those you probably ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up somewhere). They have a decent amount of firepower and are most effective at medium ranges (150m+), below that you might not have time to pin an enemy before they inflict losses. Because they ascribe to the accuracy trough volume school of shooting things I highly recommend picking up at least 1k more rounds (personaly i just grab all of it) from their taxis, as well as 2at4s (use those instead of grenades trust me).

MG Team3 or 4 man with 1xM240Bs and 2 or 3 M4s and they carry 800 round for their mg(spoiler thats not enough). You can order them to deploy their weapon, they can also fire them undeployed but that is only effective at short range. Deploying takes around 20 secs in the open or on roofs and around 2 mins inside buildings. The mg team is there to supress the enemy and you most definetly have the ammo for that, a platoon carries 12800 rounds of 7.62 with no other users for that caliber that should be enough for 2 mgs. So use them often use them at long range and position them in cover snipers like to take them apart i would also have the 4 man team pick up a Javelin. To ferry ammo to them just park a Stryker close to them or their building and they will automaticaly take some ammo if they run low.

Platoon HQ 3 man with M4s dont get them shot and if you have no Fire Support team available you should use them to call in artillery or airstrikes. Also try to keep them somwhat close to their squads.

Breach Team 3 man with M4s, a healthy supply of grenades and demo charges they are also engineers and can be used to try to spot and mark a safe way trough minefields. (Not feasible in 99% of circumstances just drop a 155m to disarm it, thats safer anyway.) The democharges are usefull for blasting holes into things to let your infantry/vics trough. Sneaking up on a blindside of a building and blasting your way in is one of the safest ways to clear a building (besides removing it) as it will supress the enemy on the otherside of the wall (demo charges dont do dmg).

Fire Support Team 2 man with M4s there to ensure that explosive packages are deliver onto the enemy, they have a laser designator and are the best in directing most of your firepower so keep them safe no matter what and if you have to sacrifices an abrams for it, so be it. Find them a safe spot make sure to hit k and give them a small arc so they dont shoot (holding shift allows you to give a cicrular firing arc) plob them on a elevated position far away from the action and you are good. If you have a drone i would recommend assigning it to them to direct artillery outside their LOS.

Sniper Team 3 man with 2xM4s and 1xM110 (the only other weapon using 7.62 besides the M240) give them a Javelin and use them to spot and engage long range targets especially enemy snipers and mg teams (counter sniping with a Javelin is highly effectiv).

Company HQ keep out of harms way in their vehicle.

XO Team if you ♥♥♥♥ up and get your HQ shot they are there to replace him. I use them as a slightly worse Fire Support Team.

Mission 1: Breaktrough at the Berm Setup and inital Plan

Our mission is to occupy the Fort in the middle of the map and destroy the defending Syrian Forces.

The Border Berm provides cover and 5 ramps on our side make for great hulldown positions for overwatching vehicles but limits us to brining vehicles trough the border crossing. The border crossing is mined with at mines, those will have to be cleared by artillery or marked by engineers if we want to send vehicles in closer. On the Syrian side we have a trenches and bunkers extending to the left and right of the Fort with some dugouts for tanks behind. There are also some bunkers but those make easy targets for out vehicles and should not be anything but target practice. The Fort itself is sourrounded by walls with towers in the corners and 2 rows of big buildings as well as some smaller buildings in the interior. The fort has many buildings which make for great positions to attack us from should we advance and also cover the trenches to its sides. The general layout makes taking the fort most likely a rather bloody affair.

The only terrain inbetween besides the Berm are some rather flat ditches which could provide some cover to Infantry.

After taking another look at the Briefing (Read them carefully there is lots of usefull infomation in there!). We can conclude that the enemy forces arrayed against us will be from a Reserve Infantry Batallion without heavy weapons. So we can expect at most 3 Infantry Companys of 4 Platoons with 3 Squads each consisting out of 9 man with 1 rpg and 1 rpk, possibly supported by a Mortar Battery with 6 mortars. There might be a HQ or rpg team here and there but those are in smaller number. They are supported by a battery of dugin T55s.

We know about the enemy forces that they

• are badly trained have low moral and are badly led with a limited amount of radios and C2.
• have a good amount of medium to short range light at weapons.
• possibly heavily outnumber us.
• are stationary in defensive positions.
• do not have any nvgs.
• have stationary T55s that will only constitute a neglible threat to our Abrams, but can seriously threaten anything else should they spot it.

We can conclude with this and it being a night battle that we will win this engagment no matter what the only question is if we take casulties and if any, how many? Because of this being a campaign and our losses not being replaced we should aim for not taking any casualties at all. Looking at the for the most part wide open map and us having 3 Howitzer sections, 2 120mm mortar sections and a guaranteed ammo resupply before the next mission. It seems that the best course of action will involve our Infantry not taking part in this engagment and only using them to clear the buildings in the fort if throwing all the Firesupport we have including the Kitchensink at it, fails to do the job.

I personaly decide to for now to clear the border crossing with an artillery strike a soon as possible keep the Infantry besides the Sniper Team (with a Javelin) and the Fire Support Team in their vehicles to protect them against possible mortar fire.The Arbrams will first roll up the ramps to engage any targets they can see before moving westwards clearing out targets from the ramps as they go while the M128s will take up position on the orphaned ramps to keep the area under observation. I will withhold fire from the mortar for now to have them available to cover a possible Infantry assault later. 2xHoitzer Sections will be assigned to turning the Fort into rubble as soon as possible while the first one will be used for hitting the Trenches with Airburst rounds, after destroying the mines at the crossing.

Mission 1: Breaktrough at the Berm Bombardment

The Abrams roll up onto the ramps and start engaging targets and kill everything they can see before the syrian T55s can return fire.

The tank platoon continues to engage targets unortunately it seems like some T55s are not visible form the Berm that might become a problem later.

After 2 turns of firing the first Abrams leaves its first ramp and starts moving West while an M1128 takes its place.

Keep in mind that gundepression is not a hard thing in CM:SF2 it and to close targets just increase the aiming time to simulate an actually competent vic crew maneuvering their vehicle to get a shot.(no the ai is most definetly not competent)

To stay away from the reported mines at the crossing I drive a Abrams directly trough a low barrier, by placing a waypoint directly infront and behind. This has a good chance of slighty damaging a vehicles tracks or wheels. This increases the chances of getting bogged down or tracked by enemy fire and if done to often can track you by itself. After the tank is past the bombardment of the crossing starts. When the remaining Howitzers come online I start bombarding the Fort while the vehicles on the berm continue shooting up Infantry that sticks heads out of trenches. This continues for around 30 mins.

Mission 1: Breaktrough at the Berm Assault

With 30min remaining i realize that just throwing Artillery at the enemy might not be enough and just in case I start to prepare for an assault in the last 15 min of the battle. The right side of the crossing seems to have taken enough round to be considerd somewhat save. And i start to send the tanks trough but I make sure to leave the APCs behind the mines as there is still a enemy T55 in a dugout position up the road. The problem here is that APC drivers are skittish animals and are easily starteld by the news of a possible tank ahead of them which will prompt them to reverse as fast as possible. With there possibly being a minefield behind that would be slighty problematic (read: I lost 4 strykers the first time i played this mission). Any way i start pushing tanks trough up to the enemy trenches which are manned by as already established by low quality troops with only ligh antitank weapons that are already decimated heavily. This allows me to be aggressive and push the tanks up close.

The tanks right flank is covered by the sustained artillery bombardment on the fort throwing up clouds of dirt. Operation reduce fort also starts to show itself here as nearly the whole first building block is collapsed. This might look like nothing could have survived but be carefull until you walk infantry trough and area you cant be sure that its save and enemy infantry has a tendency to find ugly little corners to hide in under artillery and somehow survive to ambush your mopup units.