Official SEOW

A noob question but how strong is a platoon. what is it made up of?

and

"Truncate Sea Mission Duration (carrier ops)" what does this do please
as well as "Truncate ground mission duration"

many thanks

DD_Frior

a Platoon is usually 4 armor (tanks) units or with artillery, 3 (AA,howitzers,AT-guns) pieces strong.

If you mean engineering/supply platoons they have several 2-6 trucks or half-tracked vehicles and a command car,2-3 AA-vehicles.
Some have also a couple of bmw-sidecar motorbikes.

Yes, Jager is right on. In SEOW each ground object type (tank, vehicle, artillery, column) in the template represents a single platoon. Each platoon has a "Normal Group Strength", as defined in Object_Specifications table, and which determines the maximum numerical strength of the platoon.

For example, by default a Katyusha platoon has a Normal Group Strength of 4, which means a full-strength Katyusha platoon will consist of 4 Katyusha rocket-launching trucks. Similarly, by default a HaGo tank has a Normal Group Strength of 4, while a BunkerD_gun has a Normal Group Strength of 1 (forming a full-strength BunkerD platoon consisting of a single BunkerD).
Mixing different objects in the one platoon is not permitted by SEOW, except where IL-2 directly supports combined units, e.g. vehicle columns.

There is a campaign setting in the DCS called "Load Units at Full Strength". If selected this will load a campaign template by expanding all ground objects into full strength platoons as determined by the respective Normal Group Strength values, e.g. a single HaGo in the template will appear as a platoon of 4xHaGo in the loaded campaign. Very useful option in certain circumstances. It is possible to edit the Normal Group Strength values in the Object_Specifications to however you like (values 1,2,3,4 only are recommended).

Truncation Options
Depending on how your SEOW is configured, it is perfectly acceptable to plot ground and sea movements that last for many hours. This can be crucial for carrier operations where aircraft are landing on carriers - much easier if the carriers are still moving. In the case that any ground or sea movements are still in progress at the end of the hosted mission, these truncation options will halt the units in place at the end of the mission and remove the remainder of their movement orders, so they don't appear as "In Progress" for the next mission. Very handy! For carrier ops that have mission durations of, say, 90 minutes, just plan your carrier to move for 2 hours each time and select Truncate Sea Missions. At the end of each mission the carrier will still be moving so landings are easier, but it will be ready for new tasking for the next mission.

Cheers,
4Shades

Ok understood.

many thanks.