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gradenko_2000
Oct 5, 2010

HELL SERPENT
Lipstick Apathy

gradenko_2000 posted:





2nd Squad Scouts

Rest / Stand Down / Hide

2nd Squad

QUICK movement to the point indicated

[HQ] 3rd Squad

MOVE movement to the point indicated

4th Squad

Rest / Stand Down / Hide

MMG1

MOVE movement to the point indicated

MMG2

No change in orders

5th Squad/60mm Mortar

MOVE movement to the point indicated

No change to these orders. 3rd Squad and 5th Squad have not yet arrived within Everglades.

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Comrade Koba
Jul 2, 2007

Orders updated, see new post

Comrade Koba fucked around with this message at 10:56 on Dec 7, 2018

Grey Hunter
Oct 17, 2007

Hero of the soviet union.
Accidental destroyer of planets
Game Options

So, we have only a little time left on the clock - sorry about that, but I was a bit stressed out at the time, and couldn't face redoing all the orders. so we have a few options.

1) I attempt to reset the game to its current state as closely as possible.
2) We say there has a been a short truce to collect wounded, and we restart with the same forces (barring a bit of rearrangement to consolidate units with losses. Deployment will be drawn from current unit locations.
- Option A, Artillery Ammo has not been replenished.
- Option B - Ammo has been replenished.
3 ) We say a longer truce has been called, all ammo is replenished. some reinforcements for both sides.

The other thing I've been wondering is if there are enough people to continue - these things tend to fail more to drop off, and I know some of you are fully committed, but I've noticed we're losing people quickly, and I'm wondering if its timer to wrap this up and move on to other things.

So, what do you lot think?

Acebuckeye13
Nov 2, 2010


If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, crisis counseling and referral services can be accessed by calling
1-800-GAMBLER


Ultra Carp
Personally I'd prefer just to call it, and we'd probably be close to calling for a ceasefire anyway.

Dance Officer
May 4, 2017

It would be awesome if we could dance!
I'd prefer if we called a truce for now, and pick this back up in the new year or just end it. It seems most people are tired, at least on our side, and there's some sore feelings about just how much the Germans were given for this battle.

Fray
Oct 22, 2010

I’ll not be playing after this so I’ll leave that decision to you all.

Hubis
May 18, 2003

Boy, I wish we had one of those doomsday machines...
If we are going to take a ceasefire, does it make sense for CAT company to finish their orders and advance to consolidate positions, or stay in this gully to preserve manpower?

Hubis
May 18, 2003

Boy, I wish we had one of those doomsday machines...

Grey Hunter posted:

Game Options

So, we have only a little time left on the clock - sorry about that, but I was a bit stressed out at the time, and couldn't face redoing all the orders. so we have a few options.

1) I attempt to reset the game to its current state as closely as possible.
2) We say there has a been a short truce to collect wounded, and we restart with the same forces (barring a bit of rearrangement to consolidate units with losses. Deployment will be drawn from current unit locations.
- Option A, Artillery Ammo has not been replenished.
- Option B - Ammo has been replenished.
3 ) We say a longer truce has been called, all ammo is replenished. some reinforcements for both sides.

Option 1 I think is impractical bordering on impossible, and is a recipe for sour grapes. I know the germans have got to have some 'wounded' tanks and unless you can restore their condition that's going to be a big boon to them. Meanwhile it's going to be hard to preserve the conditions of our various infantry commands.

Option 2 is a bit more doable, but runs into some of the same problems as before. Allowing force consolidation would at least help somewhat. I'd push for Option A, however.

Option 3 is the most practical to me. The Germans may not be amenable to it if they feel like they've got us on the ropes, which I understand.

Grey Hunter posted:

The other thing I've been wondering is if there are enough people to continue - these things tend to fail more to drop off, and I know some of you are fully committed, but I've noticed we're losing people quickly, and I'm wondering if its timer to wrap this up and move on to other things.

So, what do you lot think?

I view these things as experiments as much as anything else, and I'm here to stick around in whatever capacity as long as you want to run them (although time has gotten a bit tighter as of late). That being said, I know some other people are feeling a bit fatigued, and I think there's a feeling that at least some flaws in the overall format has been uncovered, and so it might feel disheartening to just slog on.

My personal vote would be to finish the next six minutes, then shelve this series until after the holidays and either pick it up as described above, or delay a bit longer and bring it back refactored based on some lessons learned.

I probably *don't* want to play Foy again, unless we do something different with it. I think the worst case scenario would be both sides bouncing back and forth between maps because neither can successfully complete an attack. If we fall back I'd rather just bounce to the next map, say the germans took/bypassed it in another action we didn't play out, and start fresh from there.

glynnenstein
Feb 18, 2014


I say end the LP series at the end of this battle. I'll personally stick around through whatever, but this is a good stopping place to wrap it up. I think the undertaking has been successful in many ways, but there are also a lot of issues that turned up making it best to close this effort up and move on at an opportune time.

Jaguars!
Jul 31, 2012


I think a lot of our players are fatigued from playing since the middle of the year. By the time we finish up the current timer, it'll be right on Christmas, so it's a natural time to wrap up.

Were we to continue, i'd be in agreement with Hubis. Artillery should only get a small replenishement, otherwise we're just going to get bogged down in shell fire again.

Jaguars!
Jul 31, 2012





HQ If there are any visible enemy, TARGET BRIEFLY for 30seconds, then move QUICK. Otherwise, just do the move.

3 Sq:TARGET any visible enemy. Report back if enemy can be seen.


1 Bn HMG


A,B and C are targets in order of priority. Area TARGET the highest one possible.

A is the most recent infantry contact of the three or so in the area.

B and C are the vehicle contacts.

Failing that, fire on the nearest target that the unit can see.

Report back on who they can target.


The Southern HMG is to move quick to where Baker 4 HQ is now and DEPLOY and facing directly west

Jaguars! fucked around with this message at 21:33 on Dec 7, 2018

brakeless
Apr 11, 2011

2nd plt, A coy, Armored Rifle Battalion

Northern MMG team cancel area fire.

FrangibleCover
Jan 23, 2018

Nothing going on in my quiet corner of the Pacific.

This is the life. I'm just lying here in my hammock in Townsville, sipping a G&T.
A reset isn't going to work at all, whether full or consolidated, because the damaged Panthers will come back fine and the damaged Shermans won't come back at all. An artillery replenishment will additionally result in the remainder of our fresh infantry being annihilated by German guns and an extended ceasefire with reinforcements for both sides will produce a rerun of the current battle. I think it's fair at this point to call off the attack entirely, we don't have the forces to do an urban assault in a blizzard against prepared enemy positions and superior armour.

Hubis
May 18, 2003

Boy, I wish we had one of those doomsday machines...
I will mail a bottle of bourbon to any Platoon leader who greases a turned out Nazi tank commander before this is over

FrangibleCover
Jan 23, 2018

Nothing going on in my quiet corner of the Pacific.

This is the life. I'm just lying here in my hammock in Townsville, sipping a G&T.

Hubis posted:

I will mail a bottle of bourbon to any Platoon leader who greases a turned out Nazi tank commander before this is over

Ah, well, that changes the calculus entirely. Over the top, men!

gradenko_2000
Oct 5, 2010

HELL SERPENT
Lipstick Apathy
I'm in favor of playing out the game, then calling it good. If we want to revive it next year, then we can try again under a different game.

I think the biggest point of feedback is that, if possible, we should have an "order inputter" from either side.

Grey Hunter
Oct 17, 2007

Hero of the soviet union.
Accidental destroyer of planets
I will run to the end of the clock, then end the LP.

As I woke up late today, and Stellaris Megacorps comes out tonight I've taken up time with another discussion. have 48hrs for orders.

Then I'l take some time off around Xmas, and start WITW in the new year!

Jaguars!
Jul 31, 2012


FrangibleCover posted:

Can anyone think of anything productive that 1/B can do? I'm totally out of ideas. I can probably get some lads forward into that treeline that's covered by indirect fire and tanks but I don't think that's going to achieve anything except their deaths.


Don't worry, we're getting whooped so hard we'll get all of our Shermans back for the next go around while also getting extra tanks.

So we've been kinda rudderless since we first got bombarded, and we're hardly going to win the game by ourselves, but I think we can KILL SOME NAZIS using a little flaw in Jerry's defense, like this:


The black line is about our limit of visibility from where we are now.

The red area is where you were talking about. Tanks cover it and the arty has been hitting it. In particular, the area near the farmhouse needs to be given a wide berth because artillery is dropping there. The land south of it is a forward slope that exposes us to the tanks. It's a no go zone. So instead of using the trees as cover, the best thing to do is to use it as screen. If we keep more than 20m off it, the lower ground on our side of it and the undergrowth will tend to prevent the enemy firing through it. Combined with good movement discipline, it makes a good end to our line.
The orange zone is also a no go zone, but because of the small arms fire that killed Comstar's team. The difference is that if we move into it a bit at a time, we can suppress the enemy as we gain positions that can fire on him. For example, my unit in the middle there just gained 20m by a short, fast movement with units either side suppressing and watching out for them.

Between the two areas is a bunch of German infantry that face the open ground. The tanks and the units in Noville can cover the German line, but aren't so good at seeing across the creek. This is where we can do some real damage. Especially, if we can get the mortars to places where we can direct lay on the contacts in the creekbed, I think we'll be rewarded by seeing some casualties and consternation. That's what I want to see when I go read their thread.

How do we do that?

1. Start by suppressing anyone we see. Who sees that guy in the building? No one knows at the moment, but lets find out and lay in a target order. Every time we spot an enemy, we should be halting the spotting unit and targetting. Even if the enemy comes and goes during the turn, we can still often target their position, we just need to request the information and use the videos. Request viewpoints of your commanders, it's every platoon leader's right to see what his goddamn eyes tell him what's in front of him, and his squad commanders as well, because you can be loving sure that the AI isn't going act on that info in any worthwhile way.

2. Gain some worthwhile positions. Worthwhile positions have other teams on their flanks watching out for them. They form a line so there's no exposed salients. I bet that MG south of the orange line can see enemy contact or is very close to a place that can, but how do we know if we don't take a look at it? Find me a screenshot of it and I'll show you how to improve it's position.

3. Get our heavy weapons on. Again, we don't have to see the enemy directly. Have a look at some of our units under fire. The more fire near them, the more soldiers cower on the ground. If we target the creekbed in front of them then they can't poke their heads up to fire, and they can't stand up to move. Suddenly the enemy defense loses sight of some more ground - and we can advance into that ground. And better yet, stick a mortar there and we can cause some real casualties.

Platoon wise, I'm going to keep going north to counter the threat up in Noville. I'm going to put the HMG in the position where my HQ is now, which will give good control of the north farmhouse and the approaches to the bridge. That makes a good base. I think between the two of you, you can have three or four units forming a line between Frangible's MG (Leave it there hiding until everyone else catches up is my suggestion) and the orange nogo. Start this turn by sprinting two units forward each. Look to gain about 30m. You both also want to bring your mortars up not too far behind, they are the ideal weapon to bombard the german creekbed line.

So yeah. That's what I think we can do, and while it won't produce miracles, I think we can get some results out of these final turns, or at least a learning experience.

Comrade Koba
Jul 2, 2007





SQUADS 1-3 move QUICK as indicated by the red arrow, form up along the dashed line next to the machinegun.

ALL OTHER ELEMENTS will MOVE towards and form up along the green line.

Hubis
May 18, 2003

Boy, I wish we had one of those doomsday machines...

Jaguars! posted:

So we've been kinda rudderless since we first got bombarded, and we're hardly going to win the game by ourselves, but I think we can KILL SOME NAZIS using a little flaw in Jerry's defense, like this:


The black line is about our limit of visibility from where we are now.

The red area is where you were talking about. Tanks cover it and the arty has been hitting it. In particular, the area near the farmhouse needs to be given a wide berth because artillery is dropping there. The land south of it is a forward slope that exposes us to the tanks. It's a no go zone. So instead of using the trees as cover, the best thing to do is to use it as screen. If we keep more than 20m off it, the lower ground on our side of it and the undergrowth will tend to prevent the enemy firing through it. Combined with good movement discipline, it makes a good end to our line.
The orange zone is also a no go zone, but because of the small arms fire that killed Comstar's team. The difference is that if we move into it a bit at a time, we can suppress the enemy as we gain positions that can fire on him. For example, my unit in the middle there just gained 20m by a short, fast movement with units either side suppressing and watching out for them.

Between the two areas is a bunch of German infantry that face the open ground. The tanks and the units in Noville can cover the German line, but aren't so good at seeing across the creek. This is where we can do some real damage. Especially, if we can get the mortars to places where we can direct lay on the contacts in the creekbed, I think we'll be rewarded by seeing some casualties and consternation. That's what I want to see when I go read their thread.

How do we do that?

1. Start by suppressing anyone we see. Who sees that guy in the building? No one knows at the moment, but lets find out and lay in a target order. Every time we spot an enemy, we should be halting the spotting unit and targetting. Even if the enemy comes and goes during the turn, we can still often target their position, we just need to request the information and use the videos. Request viewpoints of your commanders, it's every platoon leader's right to see what his goddamn eyes tell him what's in front of him, and his squad commanders as well, because you can be loving sure that the AI isn't going act on that info in any worthwhile way.

2. Gain some worthwhile positions. Worthwhile positions have other teams on their flanks watching out for them. They form a line so there's no exposed salients. I bet that MG south of the orange line can see enemy contact or is very close to a place that can, but how do we know if we don't take a look at it? Find me a screenshot of it and I'll show you how to improve it's position.

3. Get our heavy weapons on. Again, we don't have to see the enemy directly. Have a look at some of our units under fire. The more fire near them, the more soldiers cower on the ground. If we target the creekbed in front of them then they can't poke their heads up to fire, and they can't stand up to move. Suddenly the enemy defense loses sight of some more ground - and we can advance into that ground. And better yet, stick a mortar there and we can cause some real casualties.

Platoon wise, I'm going to keep going north to counter the threat up in Noville. I'm going to put the HMG in the position where my HQ is now, which will give good control of the north farmhouse and the approaches to the bridge. That makes a good base. I think between the two of you, you can have three or four units forming a line between Frangible's MG (Leave it there hiding until everyone else catches up is my suggestion) and the orange nogo. Start this turn by sprinting two units forward each. Look to gain about 30m. You both also want to bring your mortars up not too far behind, they are the ideal weapon to bombard the german creekbed line.

So yeah. That's what I think we can do, and while it won't produce miracles, I think we can get some results out of these final turns, or at least a learning experience.


CAT CO: move N with INCREASED pace and LIGHT security to reinforce 1/B as quickly as possible

FrangibleCover
Jan 23, 2018

Nothing going on in my quiet corner of the Pacific.

This is the life. I'm just lying here in my hammock in Townsville, sipping a G&T.
Alright, I'd like someone with the game to give me a full workup of the morale states, casualties, exact location and current head-level visibility of 1/B. I'd also like to see a shot from Jaguars!'s green line towards Noville so that I can get a lay of the land and another from Comstar's position so that I can see that the lay of the land isn't precisely the same. I'm not at all keen on a plan that involves advancing across a 100m frontage over open ground between two lines marked "will definitely get you shot to poo poo" in the hope that there's a zone of not being shot to poo poo between them, but there's no time left in the scenario, all of my men are dead or irrelevant and if I don't do something now then I've pushed pixeltruppen around the map for a month for literally no reason.

Jaguars!
Jul 31, 2012


Comrade Koba posted:





SQUADS 1-3 move QUICK as indicated by the red arrow, form up along the dashed line next to the machinegun.

ALL OTHER ELEMENTS will MOVE towards and form up along the green line.

Shorter moves. The red arrow is about 100m, which gives the enemy the whole turn kill you. If you go about half that distance, then you are down on the ground by the time they start shooting. Don't send all three squads at once, leave one as overwatch and send the other laterally to increase your spread.

FrangibleCover posted:

Alright, I'd like someone with the game to give me a full workup of the morale states, casualties, exact location and current head-level visibility of 1/B. I'd also like to see a shot from Jaguars!'s green line towards Noville so that I can get a lay of the land and another from Comstar's position so that I can see that the lay of the land isn't precisely the same. I'm not at all keen on a plan that involves advancing across a 100m frontage over open ground between two lines marked "will definitely get you shot to poo poo" in the hope that there's a zone of not being shot to poo poo between them, but there's no time left in the scenario, all of my men are dead or irrelevant and if I don't do something now then I've pushed pixeltruppen around the map for a month for literally no reason.

I can't exactly get all that on short notice, we can get you cas status next turn.
Here's the view from my flag unit:

Orange is the north farmhouse. There is or was a unit there, My HQ has been doing suppressing fire on it for quite a few turns. It's an easy building to suppress because a ton of units have LOS to it. Blue is the bridge. The ground gently rises to it. The trees in this area block LOS to Noville . Yellow is a building across the creek, in fact it's the same one that has the visible enemy in it. Suppressing this building is a top priority because it dominates the area.


This is from the MG team that's still in the island area. The orange arrow is the treeline, stay far enough away from it and distance and intervening undergrowth will tend to protect you against westward enemy. The yellow is the location of the farmhouse, which judging from the rounds landing there is abandoned but can be easily suppressed. The hedge also blocks LOS to a large part of the creek.

I want to make clear that we aren't going to assault the enemy. You can pretty clearly see that the foreground is too open. We just want to get troops arrayed so that we can take control of the area. If we can get mortars onto them I'm sure we can cause casualties and it seems a better use to me then going home with our tails down. In a human played game, there aren't going to be large glaring weaknesses, so we have to take the small ones and exploit them into larger ones.

Hubis posted:

CAT CO: move N with INCREASED pace and LIGHT security to reinforce 1/B as quickly as possible

I'd be careful about this, you're going to cross in front of their tanks and pack a lot of troops into an extremely small area. You'll also run out of time before you get there.

Jaguars! fucked around with this message at 21:29 on Dec 7, 2018

Comrade Koba
Jul 2, 2007

Jaguars! posted:

Shorter moves. The red arrow is about 100m, which gives the enemy the whole turn kill you. If you go about half that distance, then you are down on the ground by the time they start shooting. Don't send all three squads at once, leave one as overwatch and send the other laterally to increase your spread.

Won’t have time to make a new map, so I guess I’ll just have to wait and see how hosed I am. :smith:

Grey Hunter
Oct 17, 2007

Hero of the soviet union.
Accidental destroyer of planets


Game is over! Tanks for playing! all threads are unlocked!

Jaguars!
Jul 31, 2012


Well, that's that. A massive thank you to everyone on the team. We got dealt a lot of crap hands but we stuck to it without bickering with each other and that's all you can ask for really. Particular shout out to my platoon mates and the guys especially Pthighs who took the time to collect all the in game data I asked for.

FrangibleCover
Jan 23, 2018

Nothing going on in my quiet corner of the Pacific.

This is the life. I'm just lying here in my hammock in Townsville, sipping a G&T.

Jaguars! posted:

Well, that's that. A massive thank you to everyone on the team. We got dealt a lot of crap hands but we stuck to it without bickering with each other and that's all you can ask for really. Particular shout out to my platoon mates and the guys especially Pthighs who took the time to collect all the in game data I asked for.

Thanks for basically taking over Company there, you certainly kept me going. Bit of a shame we didn't get that last attack off, I was sceptical about it but it looks like the Germans intended to attack directly into us for some reason so we'd at least have gotten a good fight out of it.

gradenko_2000
Oct 5, 2010

HELL SERPENT
Lipstick Apathy
shoutout to Hubis, Baccaruda, glynnenstein, Fray, and Jaguars! and I'm sure there's a couple of you that I'm forgetting at the moment for really pulling the team together, coming up with detailed plans, and generally making this an exciting and enjoyable game

the repulse of the Germans in game 2 was an absolute blast and very evocative of our Bulge theme

Jaguars!
Jul 31, 2012


FrangibleCover posted:

Thanks for basically taking over Company there, you certainly kept me going. Bit of a shame we didn't get that last attack off, I was sceptical about it but it looks like the Germans intended to attack directly into us for some reason so we'd at least have gotten a good fight out of it.

Yeah, we did function reasonably well as a democracy, but I probably could have saved us some heartbreak by taking over at a much earlier point and at least thinking more seriously about what we could do with our company.

gradenko_2000 posted:

shoutout to Hubis, Baccaruda, glynnenstein, Fray, and Jaguars! and I'm sure there's a couple of you that I'm forgetting at the moment for really pulling the team together, coming up with detailed plans, and generally making this an exciting and enjoyable game

the repulse of the Germans in game 2 was an absolute blast and very evocative of our Bulge theme

Cheers man. It was a pleasure to command and I'm just sorry that we didn't get an opportunity to really achieve something in that sector without the time pressure.

glynnenstein
Feb 18, 2014


Thank you Grey Hunter! I deeply appreciate your work to run these things!

pthighs
Jun 21, 2013

Pillbug
Good job everyone for mostly sticking around and doing your best.

I'm sorry I joined on the third round, thus ensuring things would go poorly. :negative:

Hubis
May 18, 2003

Boy, I wish we had one of those doomsday machines...

gradenko_2000 posted:

shoutout to Hubis, Baccaruda, glynnenstein, Fray, and Jaguars! and I'm sure there's a couple of you that I'm forgetting at the moment for really pulling the team together, coming up with detailed plans, and generally making this an exciting and enjoyable game

the repulse of the Germans in game 2 was an absolute blast and very evocative of our Bulge theme

We came for the slaughter, but what we found were ~FrIeNdS~<3

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pthighs
Jun 21, 2013

Pillbug
I was explaining this game to a friend, and he asked what was going on, and I said that I had spent the last two weeks just running through a patch of woods on the corner of the map.

He just laughed.

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