Jeremysbrain
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First Edition Vehicle Guides

Thu 03 Jun 2021, 17:09

I was looking through my First Edition Vehicle guides looking for ideas and realized there are a number of fictional vehicles in these books. Is there a good list somewhere of which vehicles are fictional in these books so I don't have to google all of them that I'm not sure about?
 
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omnipus
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Re: First Edition Vehicle Guides

Thu 03 Jun 2021, 22:00

There's Paul Mulcahy's reference pages: http://www.pmulcahy.com/best_stuff_that ... r_were.htm

(that includes a lot of stuff that's not in any of the GDW books, but some that was!)

A quick skim and my own personal brain (which is probably wrong in a few cases) says this:

HMMWV Fire Support Vehicle - don't believe this ever existed, even as a prototype, but it and things like it WOULD be an extremely likely battlefield modification
LAV-75 - only ever prototypes and not as presented here
M1A2 Giraffe - I doubt this ever even made it off the drawing board, at least in the 1980s. Certainly was never fielded.
M691 Diana - existed, but was never adopted
M990 ADA - T2K seemed obsessed with giving the US Army AAA capability that it never went forward with!
M917 ADATS - the ADATS system existed, but in US testing was always on a M113 chassis I believe, and never adopted.
M920 Hellfire - pretty sure this is a total fabrication
M757 Blazer - likewise.
M975 Roland - prototype only

The Soviet stuff gets even weirder, because the authors presumably had very little actual info to go on at the time:

T-74 - presumably this is just a T-80
T-86 - nah
T-90 - extra nah (a T-90 does of course exist now, but is in practice just a continuously upgraded T-72 and nothing revolutionary like a remote turret!)
M-81 - also nah
ZSU-30-6 - exists, but the details are wrong and ignore the missiles, etc. 2K22 Tunguska
BMP series -- Twilight is the only source I've ever seen that, for whatever reason, calls these "BMP-A" and "B" and "C" rather than BMP-1, BMP-2, etc.Their version of the BMP-3 significantly underestimates it
BRDM-3 - actually based of a BTR-80A, for some reason. And never adopted by Russia.
BT-76 - fictional, I think?

Further, all of these games miss the complexity of actual Soviet naming/upgrade conventions. There are multiple generations of pretty much all of their vehicles. A T-72B3 is a different beast entirely from a T-72A, for instance. T-80UM is significantly tougher and more advanced than a T-80, etc.
Author, Central Poland Sourcebook -- now available on DriveThruRPG
 
Jeremysbrain
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Re: First Edition Vehicle Guides

Thu 03 Jun 2021, 22:16

Thanks for the link and your insight.
 
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CherryC0p
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Re: First Edition Vehicle Guides

Fri 04 Jun 2021, 04:13


BT-76 - fictional, I think?
The PT-76 is the real tank. it exists in 4e as a polish tank. it's amphibious which is cool for crossing rivers and lakes
I do this in real life for fun on the weekends. #SurviveOmega #DoMoreWithLess
 
andresk
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Re: First Edition Vehicle Guides

Fri 04 Jun 2021, 07:06

Further, all of these games miss the complexity of actual Soviet naming/upgrade conventions. There are multiple generations of pretty much all of their vehicles. A T-72B3 is a different beast entirely from a T-72A, for instance. T-80UM is significantly tougher and more advanced than a T-80, etc.
This gets extra interesting when you try to figure out anything about the designations without a guide. Sure the main series usually follow the A,B... series, however then there's suddenly an M thrown in there. What could that be? 'Modernized' as for the AKM? Well for the T-72 it's slightly better than the first variant, but underarmored for export. What's going on with these guys - T-72BA, T-72B3, T-72B3M? Not to mention when you move to another tank they might be using a much different system of designations (in nuances, not big picture). Start adding in the designations for different countries as well and oh boy. For your average GI Joe it's a good day if they can tell which family the tank is from under all that ERA.
 
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omnipus
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Re: First Edition Vehicle Guides

Fri 04 Jun 2021, 10:21


BT-76 - fictional, I think?
The PT-76 is the real tank. it exists in 4e as a polish tank. it's amphibious which is cool for crossing rivers and lakes
Right, except the description for the BT-76 explicitly also mentioned the PT-76
Author, Central Poland Sourcebook -- now available on DriveThruRPG
 
Dijon
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Re: First Edition Vehicle Guides

Fri 04 Jun 2021, 16:16

I'm dating myself here, but if you go back to wargaming in the 70s and early 80s, many of the games use the A,B and C designation for BMPs (or just BMP). Sigh, time to go lie down, I guess
 
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CherryC0p
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Re: First Edition Vehicle Guides

Fri 04 Jun 2021, 18:41


Right, except the description for the BT-76 explicitly also mentioned the PT-76
Is this in the 1st Ed? in that case, then most likely a made up vehicle
I do this in real life for fun on the weekends. #SurviveOmega #DoMoreWithLess
 
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Ursus Maior
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Re: First Edition Vehicle Guides

Fri 04 Jun 2021, 22:49

Further, all of these games miss the complexity of actual Soviet naming/upgrade conventions. There are multiple generations of pretty much all of their vehicles. A T-72B3 is a different beast entirely from a T-72A, for instance. T-80UM is significantly tougher and more advanced than a T-80, etc.
This was simply not transparent to writers of fiction at the time or conceivable to a broader audience like players. Additionally, even a system like T2K in its earlier editions was probably not granular enough to take into account all these - sometimes minute - changes.

Also, everyone who does not get a headache when reading through these iterations and generations of tank upgrades, must be a communist sleeper agent. It's really just mind-boggling and I swear, some day I will need to draw a tree diagram for the mainline Soviet MBTs, IFVs and APCs.
liber & infractus
 
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omnipus
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Re: First Edition Vehicle Guides

Fri 04 Jun 2021, 23:37

Honestly, the naming conventions are not all that complex. Once you learn what a few of the letters mean, it becomes as clear as the "Mk." convention or the "Block convention" or, certainly, the "A2A1" convention.

The real headaches come essentially from Soviet politics and manufacturing concerns, which is why for instance the T-72 and the T-64 and eventually T-80 were all being actively fielded at the same time and sometimes in the same units! Most people in the West would sensibly enough conclude that "higher number better" but this wasn't the case especially once upgrades were introduced.

I understand why most games skip this level of detail. It's super not intuitive. But it is missing something potentially important, especially if you want to use accurate TOEs.
Author, Central Poland Sourcebook -- now available on DriveThruRPG

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