Project Artillery

[ArmySGT.]

Originally Posted by hyppoleonida

Very well done, and perfectly in line with my own way of thinking; I always thought that the equipment of a party, not just that of a MP Team, should be consistent with the place of origin / operations of the party, unless, that is, this same equipment is not particularly widespread or international.

Yes, I to think that the equipment the Morrow Project / Atlantis Project chooses to use should match that in use in the region or nation. The Project is there to help the people and you don’t want to be attacked or running away from you because of your strange vehicle and equipment. Therefore the equipment in use in Canada or Mexico differs from that within the Continental United States.

Originally Posted by hyppoleonida

Speaking of old aircraft, it seems only natural that, using as setting the UK, we are looking at the classic Spit - or the good ol' Hurricane, for that matter - because I believe there are still many around those parts, in museums or in private hands.
When I mentioned the classic warbirds made in the USA, it is because most of the campaigns MP I wrote / played are set in the States (by the way, I'm Italian) where it is not uncommon to find even today vintage equipment, vehicles and weapons and even where there are immense cemeteries where it would be possible to draw everything and more (for the series: here we don't throw anything away).
Same would apply if there was a Morrow Project beyond the Iron Curtain, because the Russians and their allies and satellites have never thrown anything away, they mostly recycled and resold / distributed their old equipment all around the world, so that would not surprise me at all to find an eastern equivalent of the MP loaded for bear with - just as an example - the Lavochkin-5 or the ubiquitous Il-2 Sturmovik, always to stay in the aircraft field.

I think a Morrow Air Force is vital to the Project and the success of the Project. So far the C-130 Hercules, the CH-47 Chinook, the OH-6 Cayuse, and the Autogyro. The stats for the first three are in Prime Base.

I look forward to a Morrow Air Force thread. I think a small number of F-20 Tigersharks ought to be included.

Originally Posted by hyppoleonida

However, the use of outdated vehicles and weapons as part of a MP's campaign, as far as I'm concerned, is limited to only two cases: the project teams who recur to salvage and refurbishing of relics in place of their own unusable/destroyed equipment or to replenish the reserves in case of success of the project and widening of the fleet / arsenal, or as standard equipment (more or less) of the various political entities that the team sees / faces ergo of the many agencies against which the Project fight for its own continued success.

The production of military vehicles and weapon systems is closely monitored and tightly controlled. The V-150 isn’t in US arsenals and production of parts can only be done because US allies like the Philippines and Saudi Arabia use them. However, that is not the case with items classed as obsolete. The M60 tank is classed as obsolete yet, the M68 105mm cannon is still know to be effective against modern MBTs. The 105mm Howitzer on the M7B1 is only a slightly older and less sophisticated cousin of the M102. The M2 cannon can fire the same 105mm as the M102. The use of older obsolete equipment works for the Morrow Project because they have the luxury of time to refit them, the resources to do so, and buying them for nearly nothing.

Originally Posted by hyppoleonida

It seems only logical to me that a job like the recovery, restoration and conservation is more useful to those who remained in the real world after the war, while the MP teams slept in their cryogenic sleep, unless you feel like assuming that a particular team was outfitted for precise will of the Project or for other reasons, with outdated equipment, although I can't see a purpose in a similar decision right now.

Cost and the necessity of keeping the Project a secret would be two factors. The Morrow Project could probably receive some ex-US Army M60A3 tanks to be decommissioned or melted down. The government might not even look after the first is melted down. Now opening up the production line and manufacturing brand new Cadillac Gage Stingray light tanks when the sole user (Thailand) hasn’t ordered any? Well someone is going to ask questions. Same goes for new M109A4 or A6 self-propelled artillery systems.

Originally Posted by hyppoleonida

All this talk brings us back to the question: unless you want to take as a point of view, the principle by which the equipment assigned to MP Teams is obsolete simply because the events of the original game took place around the the late 80s of last century, it goes without saying that looking around for the best that exists at the time to equip their teams' boltholes is only natural.
After all, the equipment already included in the manual TM 1-1 was the best available in the years when it was written; just as an example look at the missiles assigned to the MARS teams: in the '80s were the non-plus ultra of military technology.

I, myself play with the 1989 war date. This way it is easier for me to stat the weapons , computers, cars, and other equipment. Secondly, my materials and sources for the Soviet and Warsaw Pact equipment along with new and recently disclosed things helps me write realistic scenarios for Soviet bad guys.

Originally Posted by hyppoleonida

So, in my humble opinion, unless you want to maintain the principle that the teams, once hibernated, were no longer re-equipped, effectively sealing them in their tombs of concrete and steel (which among other things, I can't remember if it's written anywhere in the manual), I think it's only natural that, at the awakening of the teams you can find ... surprises in the form of weapons, vehicles and equipment that are state of the art today, but didn't exist when the team was put to sleep.

I don’t do that to the Teams, unless I write into the mission brief that the Team was awakened at a Morrow Facility, and retrained on new updated equipment. So in this way a Team has a LAV like the US Marine Corps except for a fusion power plant and knows how to properly operate it.

Originally Posted by hyppoleonida

After all, even the ubiquitous V-series armored cars so loved and used by the MP, today are ridiculous at best but in the '80s were perfect for the purpose and they were state-of-the-art light armor at the time.
So it's no surprise to me (and in fact I have done so more than once) to find that in the bolthole our heroes find instead of a V-150 a Renault VBL or a Lince or Puma armored cars, modern and premium vehicles compared to the old Cadillac-Gage's armored cars that have been discontinued for years now, while still in use in many countries, mainly in the Third World.

I look forward to some of the stats you have done on them. Have you done stats for the Centauro? That is very MARS Team to my thinking.