Originally Posted by GreatZen

Actually, the McDonnell Douglas 500 OH-6 LoAcH (Light Observation Helicopter) suffered the highest percentage of casualties (by a ton) amongst the choppers used in Vietnam. Loach pilots were, in fact, the only category to exceed "2nd Lts - General Infantry" in mortality rate. OH-6s were used for general recon and were often paired with Cobras on search and destroy missions. Loach pilots needed to fly at treetop level to be able to see targets below and consequently, many OH-6s were shot down by small arms fire. For some bizarre reason, the Army elected not to spend the extra $200 required to make the cockpit glass bulletproof, bringing about one of the great all-time blunders of military design. Eventually, some one discovered that flying higher provides startling protection against small arms fire, and that the OH/AH/MH/EH-6s are so maneuverable that they are nearly impossible to hit with anti-aircraft missiles, the avoidance of which was the primary motivation for flying very low.

Incidently, we still fly the OH-6 and it's variants. In fact, the MH-6 is what the Deltas use to enter/exit combat and it has a capacity of 6 riders and 2 pilots, much like the "blackhawk" we deploy during the scenario games. On another note, actual Blackhawks can carry up to 20 fully armed infantry in addition to the two pilots and two side gunners, however, this is apparently absurdly cramped and BHs usually only carry about 14 infantry.

Meanwhile the CH-47 Chinook can carry over 25,000 lbs, and since the average army soldier weighs 170 lbs (and btw weighed only 135-140 lbs in WWII!!) and carries 80 lbs of gear, that comes out to 250 lbs per man, oooor.... an even 100 GIs. It should be noted that this is not the seating capacity of the chinook, merely it's maximum load bearing capacity for reference. Additionally, I agree that anything more than 25-30 would be imbalancing to the scenario even if we had over 400 players again.