Tactics
We conduct war as a Team
One of the first things you learn in the Forces is that everything is done as a team.
There's a specific safety in this principle. If you ever find yourself alone and separated from your element, the prospects of survival diminish significantly. As such it is imperative that one remain an active member of their combat element. For if one were to be wounded or find themselves in enemy contact, the formation allows for a concentration of martial power - thus the bundle of twigs becomes the fasces.
Types of enemy contact
There are two main forms of enemy contact; "soft", and "hard". Soft contact is when a your element observes or encounters an enemy force - who is oblivious to your existence. Alternatively, hard contact is defined as your element's reaction to receiving enemy small arms fire.
Lesser forms of contact include "sporadic contact" and "audio contact". At some points the enemy may engage you from a considerable distance, hurling volleys that may be essentially inaccurate. If struck by these rounds they will wound and in rare occurrences kill if they strike a lucky blow. This is commonly referred to as "sporadic contact"
Audio contact is more disconcerting for light infantry elements than anything else, and refers to actively hearing a vehicle, though generally uncertain as to what the source actually is. This could be a civilian vehicle driving by, or a suicide bomber, or an enemy IFV/APC. With this being said, one should not dismiss the audio contact as the civilian potential and expect imminent contact with enemy mechanised and/or armoured elements.
Reacting to contact
In day to day life it is easy to become complacent in our movement. How we saunter from room to room or from street to street requires limited awareness on our part. But in combative environments one's survival hinges on their ability to find cover and concealment. Cover can be any obstacle that would effectively stop an enemy's bullet. Concealment, however, may not stop incoming rounds but will obscure the enemy's view of you and thus their ability to accurately shoot you. At this time, our AI mod will instruct AI to still fire at you if they sense you're within a particular piece of concealment, however the fire is generally sporadic wild.
With all that being said, move with purpose, always with a keen eye for your next piece of cover. Ultimately this principle carries over to formations and reacting to contact as a formation.
So in the event of hard contact, seek cover behind the nearest thick tree; hard wall, hesco, or boulder, and use your senses to locate the source of enemy fire. Generally we use sound. The sound of the bullets ripping through the air around us or the sound of their weapons firing. At night one can also look for their muzzle flash to find their targets. Finally, once determined, call out their location on the radio or through local speech referencing any landmarks and their azimuth.
Example: "Enemy contact, on the hill, 267, by those trees."
Here we're noting to our group that the enemy, is on the hill at azimuth 267, by the treeline. This information should be transferred up the chain of command by fireteam leaders so that command can better understand the situation on the ground. But for the infantry element, its greatest strength is in concentrating the group's fire on the enemy.