Re: [SG] Discussion about weekend questions

Hi folks,

>[Tomb] As an aside, Adrian well described 
>the battle but he forgot to compliment the 
>FSE/ESU side for being good sportsmen 
>and playing out a retreat action after it 
>became obvious they'd get slaughtered if 
>they tried to press the attack. 
>

My bad.

The FSE/ESU side did a great job of getting their forces out, after they
had walked into something much bigger than their intel briefing had
prepared them for.  And the very bloodthirsty NAC side who really wanted
to
play out the slaughter... er... defensive action... were thankful to the
FSE/ESU guys for being good sports and playing it out.

>[Tomb] As to the abstract turn sequence 
>and vehicles and embarking/debarking 
>infantry.... I don't really think that the 
>abstract turn sequence is anything but a 
>red herring here. The point is a vehicle that 
>double moves has spent all the actions it 
>could possibly spend in one round moving. 
>It couldn't go any further. So does it then 
>make sense that an infantry squad could 
>debark from the vehicle and move freely? 

Yes, it does.  If you are playing the vehicles and the squads as
separate
units, then they are separate...

>Ultimately,  you get three actions worth of 
>movement when any other unit could get 
>but two. 

Not at all.  One unit gets two actions of movement, then a separate
unit,
in a separate activation, gets two actions of movement (one is the
"disembark").  If the squad was NOT in the vehicle, then the vehicle
could
spend two actions in movement and the squad two actions in movement and
there would be no issue, right?  In this case the squad is moved by the
vehicle, but that's pretty much the WHOLE POINT of putting troops in
APCs... to get extra movement distance (well, and to protect them from
arty, but that isn't such a big deal in an average SG game).

I think you're getting caught up in the idea that there is somehow
something wrong with a squad taking its actions after it has been moved
by
an APC. It makes sense to me that in a five minute period an APC
carrying a
squad of troops could travel 300 meters, the squad could unload, and run
50
or 60 meters on their own.  That isn't in any way excessive.

More importantly, it's what the rules say you can do :)

>The way I usually run it: Embark/debark 
>costs 1 action for both vehicle and troops. 
>You can only embark on an unactivated 
>vehicle and only debark from an activated 
>one.

But that means to embark, you have to activate both the squad and the
vehicle at the same time, to spend their actions.  Either that breaks
the
turn sequence, or you can only embark or disembark by using command
actions
to activate both units.

 So, you have vehicle activates, moves 
>or fires, debarks troops. Troops, then 
>having automatically been activated, take 
>their one remaining action.

But then your side has just had four actions...  You could fire the
vehicle, disembark the troops, and fire the troops...  That's too many
actions all in one activation. The only other way you can have two units
fire at the same time like this is if your platoon commander transfers
actions to them.  

Keeping the troop actions and the vehicle actions separate eliminates
this
problem.

What happens if troops want to embark on a vehicle that has no actions
left?  Say the vehicle shoots and then moves 6" over next to an infantry
squad hiding in some bushes.  In a five minute period, the APC fired its
gun once, drove 60 meters, and because of that the troops standing
around
outside can't open the doors and get in?  That doesn't make sense.  

>2. When firing at infantry behind a brick 
>wall, for example, ignore the cover. 
>Rationale: You aren't firing at the infantry. 
>You're firing at the brick wall.

Then you should use the weapons vs. buildings rules...

What happens if the cover is forest?

>A DFFG/5 in DS2 has a 6km range and 
>anything in the closer range bands dies 
>when it points at them. At 400m, it ought 
>to be a VERY BAD THING to have this 
>pointed at you. 

Absolutely.

As you pointed out in your other post, pretty much all of the heavy
weapons
could have *some* kind of effective anti-infantry role that could be
reflected better than the current rules.

Having said that, the tank in the game we played on the weekend lasted
for
almost the entire game.  It was immobilized in the first turn, but took
maybe a dozen hits of various kinds before it was finally out of action.
If it had had a much more effective anti-infantry capability, it would
have
completely dominated that side of the board, which would have changed
the
battle.  Maybe that's more "realistic", but I've seen several SG games
in
which a tank has run around taking GMS/P after GMS/P hit and suffering
no
ill effects.  SG is supposed to be about infantry battles - if we make
vehicle HW's more effective, we have to keep that in mind, or a single
tank
will dominate...

Anyway, this is a good set of threads so far.  Lots of good suggestions!

-Adrian

***************************************

Adrian Johnson
adrian@stargrunt.ca
http://www.stargrunt.ca