W10 Searchlights - The Schwerpunkt Pledge

Evan Sherry

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After having read W10 Searchlights, I must go on record now. I solemnly promise (on the sacred memory of Gregory Peck) to all ASLers everywhere to never (ever) include a searchlight in any Schwerpunkt or Rally Point scenario.
 

klasmalmstrom

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After having read W10 Searchlights, I must go on record now. I solemnly promise (on the sacred memory of Gregory Peck) to all ASLers everywhere to never (ever) include a searchlight in any Schwerpunkt or Rally Point scenario.
You think they would be too powerful in Night scenarios?
 

benj

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Do they differ a lot from the ones in le franc tireur's Operation Chariot ?
 

Justiciar

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Do they differ a lot from the ones in le franc tireur's Operation Chariot ?
Correction: Yes and No. I answered thinking only as to the beam. The beam is different width/arc, but there are other similarities / imports lie Hide and Seek and TC and To Hit concepts.
 
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Brian W

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You think they would be too powerful in Night scenarios?
The US Navy quit using searchlights in battle in 1942. Because all it did was make the ship using them a bright target to everything else out in the dark.
 

klasmalmstrom

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The US Navy quit using searchlights in battle in 1942. Because all it did was make the ship using them a bright target to everything else out in the dark.
Not sure it relates as to why Even won't be using them... :) ... but the Chapter W rules does make it easier to see and hit a unit with a Searchlight that is switched on, unless one is looking "directly into the light beam".
 

Honza

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The reason is probably as simple as they are too much chrome to be bothered with.
 

Tuomo

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Not sure it relates as to why Even won't be using them... :) ... but the Chapter W rules does make it easier to see and hit a unit with a Searchlight that is switched on, unless one is looking "directly into the light beam".
Directly or DIRECTLY?

And what of the rumored North Korean Spiegelkrafthausen (SkH) countermeasure, wherein specially trained units were deployed with each man issued a 1-meter mirror which, when held up next to the others, formed a poor man's Segmented Deformable Mirror Array (SdMa), which could effectively return a focused beam back at the Searchlight itself?

AND! What happens when two such SkH units point their Covered Arcs at each other? It's the Tunguska Event all OVER again, I'm tellin' ya!
 

Michael Dorosh

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It's not unexpected that some designers may feel their level of comfort with the night rules doesn't permit them to fully utilize the new counter-mix, rules, etc. And night actions seem to have been far more common in the Korean War, probably based on the experience of the World War II vets that heavily populated both sides. Even from 1944 on, night combat was increasingly looked at as an opportunity for making real headway rather than a tactic of last resort. From late 1951 onward, the static phase of the war, actions tended to decrease in size, and night actions became more prevalent. There were exceptions, as the Chinese are a lot like the Russians in World War II - their operational skill improved steadily, in (I presume coincidental) proportion to the growing number of artillery pieces they were able to deploy. Some Chinese units were able to mount impressive daylight operations in 52 and 53. Reading up on the Canadian brigade, it's kind of astonishing to see how relatively poorly they rated themselves and how much they thought of their Chinese adversaries.
 

Evan Sherry

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Here's the deal. I got a big ol' 1978 Cadillac that I've been driving around the cardboard battlefield. I loved it. It had big tail fins and I added chrome to it in 79, 80 and 83. Then in 1985-6, I rebuilt the whole bloody thing, keeping the steering wheel and the old chrome. I did put bigger tail fins on it so I could ... you guessed it, add a little more chrome. So I added a bunch more chrome, in fact so much chrome that the whole daggone car is now 99% chrome. I still have the same steering wheel but, unfortunately, there's just no more room for any more chrome on my Cadillac despite my oversized tail fins. And now since I'm getting older, I avoid driving it at night whenever possible.
 

Eagle4ty

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The US Navy quit using searchlights in battle in 1942. Because all it did was make the ship using them a bright target to everything else out in the dark.
The U.S. Army kept them on our MBTs until the 80's (and even then some were still found in NG/USAR units and those used by other countries until the mid to late 80's). They had both white light and IR capabilities generated by a carbon arc with up to 500,000 candle power. You could easily read a paper by their light from 2,000m distance, though it got a little warm-well really warm, even at that distance if illuminated by them. Standard practice was to illum the tgt from a single tank for 5-10 seconds, then switch tanks illuminating the tgt area in sequence per SOP and displace with the tank after switching off your searchlight. The Soviets included a similar method for their MBTs of the time, though I believe they retained the searchlight on them for much longer.
 

Evan Sherry

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In the 1980's I was platoon leader in an H-series armored cavalry troop. In addition to my ITVs and M113s, I had four M48A5 tanks w/searchlights. I have been on these tanks with the searchlights on, firing the 105 gun and coax machine guns. Although we used the searchlights in our final gunnery before we turned in these tanks (for the artificial reef program) we knew that we would never actually use those silly searchlights in combat, because they would draw fire and certainly get us killed. We much preferred using coordinated illumination from our mortar platoon to engage in night fire.
 
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