Owen's Close Assault

Owen wrote:

Currently Close Assaults so strongly favour the defender that in only
vary
rare games nowadays do we see any close assaults actually occur except
with
PA units.

** You think this is unreal? Other than silly fake army sims, there
are few situations in which the attacker in modern warfare is in a
good position. Charges with bayonets fixed are a good way to die.
Heck, even with paintballs as your ammo and crappy accuracy low rate
paintguns, a short 20 yard charge against an opponent is brutally
dangerous. Add accurate weapons, support weapons, high rate of fire,
and defensive grenades.... OUCH.

 This tends to see games often bogging down in shooting
competitions with both sides hoping to pick off a couple of casualties
here
and there, cause a CL Check and hope the 'defender' eventually runs
away out
of lack of interest!?.

** Is broken from repeated hits you mean.

 The other ludicrous thing we see is one lone Elite or
Veteran trooper hurtling into the fray against a squad of 8 Regulars
and if
he rolls a half decent die the Regs CAN'T beat him!

** I'll take the contrary point. An elite can roll a low number VERY
easily also, and get creamed. I'd agree with you if the elite was
rolling 3d4 or something instead of 1d12. The elite has a slightly
higher average roll than a regular (6.5 vs. 4.5) and can actually
thump the crap out of his opposition if he rolls good (which may be
unreal) but it is fast.

** Two possible solutions without breaking everything are:

1. Count odds and modify dice. If the attacker has 2:1 advantage
(remember PA is double for such calcs), then upshift the attackers
dice (all of them) by one level. If 3:1, upshift two levels, etc. This
is an open shift. So, 8:1 regs vs. an elite would be d12 for all of
the attackers and d4 for the defender. He'd probably lose. He'd have a
reasonable chance at 2:1, a so-so chance at 3:1, and once odds got to
4:1 or better, he'd start to be hurtin'.

2. Make the elite roll a different die versus each opponent. So in
your 8-1 scenario, the attacker rolls 8d8, the defender rolls 8d12. He
is likely to win more than half, but he is unlikely (by averaging
effects) to roll all 8 wins.

 And lastly, if a
defender fails his CL Check and is forced to withdraw, he can then, if
he
hasn't activated this turn, turn around and give teh attacker who
occupied
his position a god awful burst of fire at close range.

** How about this: If you retreat from a close combat, you are
"disorganized" and must re-org before you can act to do anything but
flee.

What I propose here is a mod that I hope will encourage bold game play
for
attackers. Remebering that the Close Assault is not just representing
the
hand to hand aspect but also REALLY close small arms fire, throwing
helmets
and spitting etc.

** And defence represents a hail of short range full auto fire,
defensive grenades, recieving charges with fixed bayonets, etc. too.

4.    Defender ALWAYS has a chance at Defensive Fire: Defender must
pass a
Reaction Test as normal Rules with TL = to current Suppressions. If he
passes he may fire normal full squad fire as available counting range
as teh
mid point of the start position of Attacker. Range die is modified by
1
Range Band for each Suppression currently held.

** I ran into a situation at a con in a Mark Kochte scenario that was
nasty. Squad in woods. PA attacking - they race into the woods. I
don't test to receive charge as I don't know it is coming (No LoS).
Don't make it to my squad on the first move but I can't fire since I
don't have LoS. They then move in, appear about 10m away in the woods
(where'd they come from?) and they then kick the crap out of my squad.
Point: There are instances where the defender can't fire and might not
even know he was being assaulted till too late.

** Second point: If you used Jon T's proposed Snap/Reaction fire, when
his squad moved up close to take your squad under the guns, you'd try
to reaction fire and kill him before he can move up and gun you. Add
overwatch and advancing into CC is brutal. Which (IMHO) it should be.
Most CC I've read about or seen seems to be the product of enclosed
terrain such as mountains, hills, thick forest, urban, etc. where
forces can actually close in cover to a productive CC situation. Doing
this in the open is DEATH. Modern squads have so much FP that closing
with them in that sense SHOULD likely kill you. (Or offer a good
chance of same).

OK, what we see is firstly the players are encouraged to act boldly
and 'get
stuck in'.

** Side note: If I'd wanted a lot of Close Assault, I'd play 40K. ;)
** Seriously, close assault happen, but they have a lot to do with
using terrain to close, or good luck or big brass 'nads. Closing
across the open.... good way to die as the MILES gear and plenty of
wars have shown.

 However the attacker should first suppress his target, the more
suppressions the better.

** This is true in conventional close assault.

 The Defender still has an advantage in that he has
a chance to put some fire into the attacker as he's closing.

** If not supressed?

Any comments gratefully received......

** Just my 0.02. I'm far more burned by the lack of cumulative morale
modifiers for casualties than any CC weakness. (That is to say, if my
squad of ten is whittled down a guy at a time, I can have lost 40% of
my squad without any morale issues.

:)

Thomas Barclay
Software UberMensch
xwave solutions
(613) 831-2018 x 3008