[Tue] 12 Feb 2013 (Snipers? Say What?)

How we died
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Bodge
Posts: 242
Joined: Wed May 04, 2011 6:36 pm

[Tue] 12 Feb 2013 (Snipers? Say What?)

Post by Bodge »

So after a very brief pre-session Cholo we got under way with a solid 40ish player count.

Missions:
  • Nutcracker
  • Fort EX
  • Cacheola
  • Finale
  • Colonels
  • Cholo mk 2! (afterparty)
Thanks for playing and bareing with me, I am going to go to sleep now, please post your thoughts below.

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Dogface
Posts: 163
Joined: Wed Jan 23, 2013 1:13 am

Re: [Tue] 12 Feb 2013 (Snipers? Say What?)

Post by Dogface »

Another great session, with 41 folks sighted at one point!

Nutcracker

An adverserial -- Us OPFORs had to get a broken T90 down a long stretch of road in 15 minutes while INDFOR tried to stop us. I took the Alpha FTL role, and we headed West and crested a hill to check out a nearby town just off the main route. At this point a hearty burst of automatic fire cut down the whole fireteam, killing me and wounding the others. Fortunately they were soon revived by Bravo, but by this point we were behind schedule. The tank powered down the road to try and make the deadline, but was shot out by about a bajillion rockets and finally blew up.
:zoidberg:

Fort EX

Commander. A bit of a debacle, to be honest! I survived right to the end though, so it wasn't so bad as all that, right? Right? :P This is mostly gonna be me describing what I could have done better.

We started at the south end of a wide valley. At the north was a heavily-fortified enemy area holding two forts that we needed to take control of, with a small village in the middle of the valley. We had three two-fireteam squads, a sniper team, a mortar, an IFV, and two BTR-40s with DShKMs.

Based on past experience I was keen to avoid going through the middle of the valley, as I figured any emplacements up on the hills would be able to cut us up easily. I was further put off when the sniper team reported heavy fortifications in the village in the middle of the valley. I therefore took the whole team up a gulley to the East, where a series of hills protected us from the valley itself. Once we rounded the first hill we came under fire from the north, as there were more enemy positions there and in the village further to the northeast.

The BTRs and IFVs came up and dealt with them while I sent Charlie to scout further east and see if we could move over yet another valley, but was advised this was essentially out of bounds. Once the path north was clear, I therefore started moving the whole team in that direction to a hill east of the target AO, bypassing much of the valley, popping up occasionally to hit positions inside it. By this time, both the sniper and mortar teams had been taken out of action. The IFV moved along the ridgeline itself, hitting targets in the valley as well. By the time we reached the northern hill, casualties were mounting. Alpha moved around to the north to flank, with charlie staying on top with bravo, who eventually hooked around to the south to hit the forts too. We were still taking heavy fire from the forts, and by the time we finished taking the first one, most of us had been wiped out.

:siiigh:

So.

There are a couple of ways I think this could have gone better. The first and most obvious one is to do what I think the mission maker intended, and move up north through the valley, taking and clearing the central village, digging in there to soften up the military presence to the north, and then storming the forts. The sniper team and mortar teams could have supported this admirably from long range, with the IFV either using the road or taking up a higher position to provide more fire support. There was quite a lot of tree cover in the valley which would have made a mass infantry approach relatively safe, especially given that there were few elevated fortifications -- they were mostly centred on the village. Up close, the infantry could have used their full strength. So by deciding to take us onto the hills, I was condemning us to the same problem we've had before of infantry being uncovered and unable to engage on open hillsides. It also meant the sniper team, who I foolishly ordered to start engaging targets in the valley, were the only targets for the enemy, and were thus killed quickly. What I should have done is coordinated mortar fire on the positions they had marked, using them as spotters.

The second option was to do the same plan I chose, but better. The BTR-40s, IFV, and possibly infantry ARs could have been used as a forward element to crest the initial ridge and take out the long-range targets, and then to skirt along the ridgeline horizon popping up to engage any enemies in range, covering the rest of the infantry troops in trucks directly to the northern hill -- making full use of the mortars with the sniper team and IFV as spotters. Once there, there was a reasonably safe gulley leading to the first fort that could have been used by an assaulting force, possibly with a base of fire set up on the north hill where there were some fortifications. If I'd scouted from the right position or got more information from people who could see, I would have been aware of this.

Here are some of the mistakes I made while carrying out the plan I chose, partly due to being under fire most of the time, partly due to just not thinking fast enough: :eng101:

* Told the whole team to move to the initial position (the hill NE of spawn) without thinking through the best way to arrange forces for the task at hand (i.e. long-range weaponry at the front, everyone else behind with SLs and ARs possibly skirting up to the crest).

* Once contact was made at the first position, didn't do much to arrange troops effectively to clear the threat; in particular didn't call up and position the IFV fast enough.

* When sniper team reported fortifications, told them to open fire instead of coordinating the mortars with them. Didn't go and spot/call mortar missions myself, or delegate it to anyone else.

* Although I got a lot of very clear, specific and accurate contact reports, I didn't assign particular elements to destroy them and confirm back to me.

* Didn't check for presence of enemy anti-armour equipment when moving the IFV.

* Gave confusing, unclear orders about what the plan was for moving north. Didn't plan or specify clear positions for bounding and popping up in a coordinated fashion.

* Kept everyone moving on foot when we could have used trucks.

* Told whole squads to crest and engage enemies in the valley even though it was ineffective. Should have used only the useful elements.

* When I heard the IFV was having trouble taking out bunker positions, didn't arrange for RPGs and mortars to hit them.

* When we got to the hill, kept most of the force up on the hill taking casualties, while alpha went out alone into the firing range of two forts AND a shilka(?) that I knew was still operational, without any real cover from the hill.

* At the end, just gave a vague order to charge instead of rallying the remaining forces closer together and keeping them coordinated.

So, I definitely learned a lot from this and I hope my continued experiments at CO'ing are at least informative by counterexample. :P Any thoughts/suggestions from the troops who were subjected to my buffoonish attempts at leadership, please do speak up! What did you want to be hearing from the CO? I'd also love to be able to practise this stuff in a workshop type environment some time. One thing I particularly need to learn is quickly reading the map, finding the location of positions I can see or that are described to be and quickly placing accurate, clear markers based on fast assessments of the situation. Too often I get tangled up while sorting out reports from the team, trying to make a plan, and trying to figure out relative positions at the same time. Assigning a DC to delegate tasks to -- e.g. handling the snipers, mortars, IFV and engineers -- would also have been useful in this situation.

lwlooz
Posts: 12
Joined: Sat Jun 30, 2012 5:33 pm

Re: [Tue] 12 Feb 2013 (Snipers? Say What?)

Post by lwlooz »

Nutcracker
REDFOR - CO

Our mission was to escort a shiny T-90 tank (without ammo for its main gun and speed restrictions) down a valley for 2 km in 15 min. In 15 minutes.
We were also to parade this lovely warmachine through a little village that was on our way. Enemy forces were to be expected the entire way.
I had 4 fireteams to do this. Charlie was to sweep the slopes and its many ambush places to the left of the road, Bravo was to do so on the right.
Alpha was supposed to stay with the tank as protection force. Delta had the glorious mission of racing ahead in a UAZ, scout the area and if possible settle in the little village to make sure the parade went well. The tank was to move at a steady pace and use its secondary MG-Gun as best as it could.

This still sounds nice in theory to me, but unfortunately Alpha and Bravo repeatedly ran into enemies, were outflanked while outflanking and sadly suffered horrible deaths.
Me annoying the enemies by madly spraying bullets at them from across the valley until I ran out of ammo sadly didn't have as a much effect as if I could have reinforced them both.
Sadly I had no reserve as Charlie was occupied with its missions and did scout,spot,observe and engage the enemy and Delta was very effective in its special mission.
Sending them in a UAZ up ahead to the little village not only got some enemy soldiers killed, it also provided us with intel, disrupted enemy communications and to my knowledge prevented them from installing a effective blocking force there in time. Sadly at the loss of much of Delta.

Considering that at the point where neither Alpha and Bravo did respond on the radio anymore I was still looking at a sizeable force overlooking the valley with their RPGs, I would have liked to abort the mission and sent my tank crew back to the starting point. My tank crew actually had the same instinct and sensibly fell back, but with 2 mins on the clock I had to tell them to make a run for it. This didn't prove to be the risky move that brought me victory, but it did prove that a T-90 can take about 6 RPGs before it explodes.

Fort EX
Alpha - One or Two FTL

This was Takistan. I had a rifle that was always out of range.
Apart from this it was a fun mission, in which my fireteam always showed up to places the ASR-AI decided to evacuate just seconds before to charge at us in mass. A common tactic of ASRs Art of War it seems. The only place where this was not true was in the very last fortified town, where AI sort of stuck to their fortified positions.
The ordered charge my squad leader Draakon made against them in some old WW2 russians armoured vehicle down a road with no cover was not very effective, but was fun to watch :)

Cacheola
INDFOR - Charlie FTL

We took up positions in the SE of town. As soon as contact was spotted, it was very disorganised from my side. I let my whole fireteam wander about on their own,finding and engaging elusive opponents. We managed to kill people and blow up their HMMWVs. So it didn't go too bad.

Rest of Missions
DEADFOR - Dead

The common theme with the rest of the missions of the night was that I died at the start. :D . I apologize for ordering a Heli Assault in Cholo Mk2 that got everyone but the pilot killed.

Labbes
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed Jan 16, 2013 4:05 pm

Re: [Tue] 12 Feb 2013 (Snipers? Say What?)

Post by Labbes »

Nutcracker
BLUFOR Alpha 2 FTL

I should have known things would go wrong as soon as we got into cover behind some rocks. Tasked with overseeing the valley, my fireteam spotted some enemies on the opposite ridge and we engaged them. Unfortunately, we drew fire not only from them but also from the tank (I believe). Tigershark heroically sprinted to some other rocks, so at least we weren't all bunched up. Just as one of my guys (names...oh I am bad with names) asked about our vision to our south east and I sent him round to scout, Alpha 1 was engaged from the southeast. Since my scout had not been taking fire, I gave the order to get back to Alpha 1's position, because if enemies had managed to get past them, we would have been sitting ducks. My reasoning was sound I think, the idea was still terrible. Turns out that going back up a hill is really much slower than I thought, and we were taking quite accurate fire from the opposite ridge. Tigershark died as soon as he had left his cover (or maybe he died still in his cover, I'm not sure), me and Geronimo (I think) died soon afterwards, both wounded and crawling up the hill. If I'm not mistaken, the fourth member of my fireteam actually made it, so go Alpha 2!

Fort EX
Bravo something FTL

This mission involved lots of shooting enemies that were terribly far away and following EBass around the battlefield. One of my guys took a random insta-killing bullet at some ridge. While following EBass around, we first aided some guys who had been more fortunate and were just wounded. At the little bunker with an MG in it, I did some spotting for EBass and some shooting (I doubt I hit anything though). When the order to charge was given, Nutty was lying wounded a bit away from the bunker. I told Geronimo to stick with the charge and went to heal Nutty. While dragging him to safety (which was not very far, I got him overy the ridge but unfortunately my head still popped out I guess) I took a bullet. Of course. Still, there was a whole fireteam right above us, and we were basically in cover. Unfortunately, even though I pleaded in sidechat and direct comms for someone to get us back up, three guys ran right past us. Nutty died, and the mission was over before I bled out so yay!

Cacheola
BLUFOR Bravo 2 FTL

Upon arriving at the village (thankfully I did not have to drive), we were tasked with splitting up and providing cover with both humvees. We took a bit of RPG fire while sitting on the road, which had the benefit of giving some clear targets to Bravo 1. Me and Crocuta left our humvee and provided some cover for B1, meanwhile the second humvee was receiving some more RPG fire. Deeming one humvee not seaworthy, SL tasked us to take one humvee with two guys and swing around the oil derrick, clearing it and proceeding into town, while the other two guys were to join B1. Nothing of note happened at the oil derrick, Geronimo thankfully is a far better driver than I am and did not crash the humvee into it, or the oil pipelines. I saw gunfire from one of the houses in town and fired into it with the humvee gun (which made me feel cool, but probably did not accomplish much). Then I thought it would be really clever to go around to the back entrance of the house and grenade the hell out of it. After I opened the back door and shooting, I realized my mistake of not having actually selected the damn grenades and I was shot down, leaving Geronimo to fend for himself which did not work out so well I think.
Sitting in a vehicle always makes me feel like I am half dead already. I might join a tank crew some day to get rid of that...

Finale

I took the tripod for the SPG and put it down at the correct place, which was good. I then did not hear a lot because the music was getting loud, so I didn't hear my FTL shouting for SPG ammo. Unfortunately, I did not have any. Suspecting I had dropped it when picking up the tripod, I went back to spawn, but did not find any either. Going back to the SPG, my whole fireteam was dead, so I picked up a rocket launcher and fired at a tank, who refused to explode. Then I ran around looking for some more ammo until I died.
I like this mission a lot. If the friendly AI had been less rubbish, maybe we could have mounted a counteroffensive (ha).
Also Ice gave me a link pointing to the music played during this mission. Awesome.

Colonels
Azoz (or was it Aziz?)

I wanted to make a pseudo-pincer attack, which did not work out all that well as some guys were lagging a bit behind, and then I shot my teammate Waffly because it would not give me a tag (it gave me one after I shot him, great). Sorry Waffly! I then proceeded to get shot myself, was healed back up and while I went around the bus station, the mission ended. Personal notes:
1. I should not order a charge half-heartedly.
2. If you think you're at the bus station but you don't see a bus station, you should probably check the map. I mean, it was late, but still. How could I not realize where I had to go?

Cholo: The Sequelization

I complained about the lack of music, then there was music. When the bad guys opened fire on our chopper I died, but it was okay because the music continues to play if you die. Damdadadadam.

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audiox
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Re: [Tue] 12 Feb 2013 (Snipers? Say What?)

Post by audiox »

Nutcracker
Redfor Delta Squad

Soooo, i landed a gig in Delta Squad. Which was not only a suicide squad, but consisted of me, SuperU and StrangLove. Things got scary right off the bat as Strang insisted on bringing a goat into our car for "safety purposes". What could go wrong?
Anyway, this mission had more civilian vehicles than i've seen in all other missions combined, posh area indeed.
We were tasked with gunning ahead down the road, with no backup, and vague, intel-related goals, but who doesn't like some suicidal stunts? Strang commandeered a tractor along the road, and me and SuperU kept driving. When we reached the first village i spotted an enemy fireteam who were moving into a compound to the side of the road. I hit reverse, and acted as a meatshield whilst SuperU ran into the compound next to theirs. The last thing i saw was StrangLove careening into the enemy compound in a tractor. :lol:
My job done, i laid down to die.

Fort EX
Charlie 1 FTL

In which i learned that if i'm in A/B/C 1 as FTL my main goal should be to keep my SL alive, since being promoted spazzes me out to no end. We maneuvered, fired a little, and ended up on top of a hill from which we took a lot of fire. Then people started dying, and nobody bothered to retreat, or tell us to. Then Bodge? died and my tactical genius got to unravel in all its glory. Which basically involved asking the other fireteam how many men they still had alive at irregular intervals. :oops:
I might be able to work SL, it seems fun, but i would need much tighter control of what the CO would want then, I'm still not particularly good at screening TS/Whisper/VON correctly, so a lot of information goes over my head. (Not that there is much inside, if the information were to get there.... :P

Cacheola
Alpha 1 FTL

Drive car, disband car, try to move across open field towards entrenched enemy, get shot to pieces, try to move back to vehicles, get blown to bits as cars explode around us.
:hist101:

Anvilfolk
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Joined: Thu Jan 17, 2013 3:56 pm
Location: Portugal
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Re: [Tue] 12 Feb 2013 (Snipers? Say What?)

Post by Anvilfolk »

The AAR count on this Tuesday is too damn low!

For that reason, I present to you.

Cacheola






Colonels





CHOLO 2 (afterparty)






Please please please provide some feedback, even if it's just "good enough" or "meh" (though the reason for the "meh" would be nice). I need to get rid of the original recordings, which are huge, but would like to make changes to this if you guys think they're pertinent. I am mostly just removing uninteresting parts, and adding a little bit of context. I considered dslyecxi's way of brief (voice-over the logo/mission name), but my voice is terrible. It would convey the ideas faster though, I think.

Anyways, suggestions, criticisms, etc, all welcome!

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Dogface
Posts: 163
Joined: Wed Jan 23, 2013 1:13 am

Re: [Tue] 12 Feb 2013 (Snipers? Say What?)

Post by Dogface »

Awesome stuff, looks great to me! I'd love to see these for some of the bigger missions too. :)

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