Re: Numerous bits

At 11:13 AM 2002-10-31 -0500, you wrote:
>On 31-Oct-02 at 11:07, Allan Goodall (agoodall@hyperbear.com) wrote:
>> On Wed, 30 Oct 2002 17:05:07 -0500, kaladorn@magma.ca wrote:
>> 
>> >I think you meant UP1. 
>> 
>> Definitely. That was a typo.
>> 
>> >5. Smoke launching should be considered a firing action. Allan, if 
>> >you haven't seen this abused, you need to get out and game more...
it 
>> >is very easy to have two activations, FIRE then POP SMOKE.
>> 
>> I play mostly with those without a military background. Smoke hasn't
been a
>> big issue. I often don't "play", either, but referee. As such, yes, I
need
>> to get out and game more!!!!! (Of course, there doesn't seem to be
that
>> many gamers within 2 hours of me...). 
>> 
>> I will only use smoke as a fire action, then. However, the rules
don't let
>> you fire when suppressed. This means that suppressed units don't get
to
>> pop smoke. Is this realistic? Or do you make smoke count as a fire
action,
>> but the only fire action you can conduct while suppressed?
>
>So what about this situation:
>
>I have 6 soldiers: FP3.  I have four fire (d12) and, as my second
action
>have the remaining two drop smoke.  Any less abusive than the "not a
>firing action" scenario?
>
>Roger Books
>

It didn't happen in our games but this is a potential hole in the rule.
To
avoid abuse, I suggest that ALL the soldiers must fire smoke.

If you want something more realistic, you could vary the smoke radius in
function of the number of soldier that fire. So in your example, the
smoke
will be smaller and probably too small to protect the entire squad. This
might be too complicated to handle if all squads are using smoke!

In our game using smoke, we usually limit the number of squad that can
use
it and most of the time allow it only on one side.

Last game we played, only the attacker had access to smoke but with
artillery. He could not use explosive warhead, only smoke (to avoid
damaging the objective). This was great because it cost a communication
action and that was not easy. Lots of time, more than one action was
spent
attempting to call artillery.

I can attest that smoke screen are VERY efficient. That game last 15
turns.
The worst turns for the attacker were those turns when the smoke deviate
or
the artillery call was not made or failed. We finished the game this
week
(it was started more than a month ago before my wedding) so eventually,
I
should be able to do an AAR with digital picture and all... 

Yves