The Commander Series Forum

I know this has cropped up several times but do we have a definitive set of house rules (assuming that's not an oxymoron) for Auto GLs?

I'm putting together a cheat sheet for my forces for the Landjut game and want to include them; am I best off just treating them as MG stands for now?

Not really, Pete who wrote the original rules always maintained they were factored into the infantry stats.
Cheers
Steve

30/40mm UGLs I can fully understand - AGLs on the other hand clearly fall into the SFMG/HMG category of tripod mounted/crew served support weapon. To abstract them away would seem extraordinarily arbitrary. I can't imagine that they'd be abstracted away where they form the primary armament of a vehicle.

Some vehicles did have 40mm AGLs as the primary weapon particularly AAAV7s. They were also use on HMMWVs in a lot of light units. I also heard some that US engineer companies had them mounted on some of thier M113s. Finally this may have happen after the cold war but in my artillery battalion the batteries were issued Mk19s for defense. There enough for each gun team. They were either mounted on the M109 or the ammo carrier.

One final note. I also remember hearing that the US army officaly classify Mk19s as a heavy machine gun.

Ok, don't have the rule book to hand but either treat as an HMG or maybe 3 hits at 40(H).

Sorry, I wasn't having a go, it just seems very odd - peculiar even.

No stats for British or American light mortars either, same reasoning.

Consensus of opinion during past discussions was to use HMG stats.I believe this is what Pete Jones suggested.

Cheers

Richard P

At the risk of going off on a tangent...British 51mm is completely understandable - as I understand it they were mostly used for illum or smoke and were of exceptionally limited range (a friend told me that when they did do a live fire exercise with HE a good headwind blew the bombs back towards them...).

The US 60mm though, as I understand it, is a different beast altogether and is set up with the infrastructure for use as a support weapon. I'd argue (in a friendly and constructive way) that they should be represented, especially for USMC and Airborne units - it's an important part of their firepower. If you're going to abstract them away you have to boost the combat capacity of the unit in some other way - otherwise they're no different to units that don't have them.

Lots of rules writers confuse the 60mm. I'd treat it as an 81 with a lower range, the WWII version is about 1600m. The ROF is higher than an 81, so makes up for the smaller bomb. The original weapon was the French Btn mortar in 1940 after all.

When we were fielding the AGL, there was a hot debate among the division staff over the weapon's exact role. The infantry wanted them for fire support, but the support units wanted them for rear area defense. The Aviation brigade commander wanted the the logistics units to give their .50 cals to the infantry in exchange for the AGLs and made an interesting comment: there were several hundred .50 cals in the division rear and their danger range was measured in miles, while the AGL range was just a few hundred yards. He predicted we would cause more friendly casualties than enemy with all those HMGs and was particularly concerned with his vulnerable choppers getting hit. The debate was not resolved during my tour because all our new AGLs were diverted to GW1.

The RMs I spoke to used them in Afghan as fire support. One described them as next to useless... against a compound, but once they're on the run and in the open... WOW! Grim business.

7lb and 2.5" RML mountain guns were considered next to useless vs Afghan compounds over a century ago. Apparently 3ft thick mud walls and lots of very small rooms males them exceptionally resilient.