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General Mon Pere himself just charged a town full of machineguns AND WE DIDN"T SHOOT HIM? See, this is exactly the kind of situation where I wish the targeting order was a bit more flexible. Here's hoping I'm far enough away to disappear into the gloom and/or the BEF/Mon Pere don't have orders to pursue me. E: Also, is it significant at all that he's actually out on the field instead of in a Chateau a few km away? Crazycryodude fucked around with this message at 19:13 on Mar 2, 2017 |
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Mar 2, 2017 19:06
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Well, the removal of the loss limit changes things some. Time to dig in for the siege of Croissants and hope we can hold until dawn. It's kind of like a zombie movie, actually. Except the Frenchmen smell worse. EDIT: if the rest of the surviving commanders deem that it wouldn't breach opsec, would it be possible to send that last paragraph as a message to the Entente? The Sandman fucked around with this message at 20:09 on Mar 2, 2017 |
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Mar 2, 2017 19:47
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Crazycryodude posted:General Mon Pere himself just charged a town full of machineguns AND WE DIDN"T SHOOT HIM? See, this is exactly the kind of situation where I wish the targeting order was a bit more flexible. Here's hoping I'm far enough away to disappear into the gloom and/or the BEF/Mon Pere don't have orders to pursue me. Corps Command riding at the head of a cav bde and personally getting some sabering in is admittedly very sick
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Mar 2, 2017 19:58
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Current plan is that when he comes to finish me off, see if I can get my HQ into contact with his HQ so we can have a glorious climactic battle.
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Mar 2, 2017 20:00
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Crazycryodude posted:Current plan is that when he comes to finish me off, see if I can get my HQ into contact with his HQ so we can have a glorious climactic battle. Guess I now have a recipient for my bucket of Iron Crosses
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Mar 2, 2017 20:05
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Trin, a question: can we specifically request that the artillery ignore the 2" rule and fire at Frenchmen even if LOS issues mean there's a chance of dropping shells on our own men? Because if we can, I'm willing to march my brigade between Clemenceau and St. Croissants, then call in artillery on my own position when the French attack.
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Mar 2, 2017 20:19
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Crazycryodude posted:E: Also, is it significant at all that he's actually out on the field instead of in a Chateau a few km away? Should be a pretty severe penalty to receiving new orders. Although now he's moving onto a new town, so eventually he will reestablish telephone contact. In the mean time, since the ability of the French to actually post new orders is uncertain, I think it's likely most will stay in their trenches. [e] for a little while Edit: The BEF is probably an independent unit that can still manoeuvre (Thanks for updating your tutorial posts as well, Trin) Jaguars! fucked around with this message at 21:15 on Mar 2, 2017 |
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Mar 2, 2017 20:22
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Hey, Cryo. Assuming you aren't run down by cavalry next turn, and that you're right about this being a mirror match, the other thing you could do aside from HQ and howitzer hunting is try to reach the town in the northwest of the map and annoy the French if they go for it.
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Mar 2, 2017 20:31
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The comedy option is hoping they don't leave a garrison in Q and I can just walk back in when everybody goes to pound on Croissant.
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Mar 2, 2017 20:39
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With no Casualties and hardly any daylight turns to worry about, we should at least make an attempt to recapture Q. Send the two healthy brigades there, have the small ones come in to defend St C, we don't need to defend the Bouclecourt road anymore bacause the Gooneville road is still a functioning line of communication. There are two routes to Q we could use, we could go via la Oeuf, which will be opposed, or we could move to Haltebruit then immediatly due south, which will may be detected later and will have less people in the way. Night movement will take a lot of time, so we could set an attack time, say 0500 and have both brigades move toward Q in a coordinated fashion. A late successful attack will work better than an early uncoordinated one and will give the french little time to react. As I see it, it should be worthwhile, I think we should go big or go home.
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Mar 2, 2017 20:51
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Crazycryodude posted:The comedy option is hoping they don't leave a garrison in Q and I can just walk back in when everybody goes to pound on Croissant. That would be hilarious, but would also require the French to be really, really stupid. And that they not have a cavalry brigade they can swing back around to finish murdering you. Hell, it's your call. At this point you're pretty much under your own command anyway, given the number of enemy troops between you and the rest of us.
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Mar 2, 2017 20:56
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Jaguars! posted:With no Casualties and hardly any daylight turns to worry about, we should at least make an attempt to recapture Q. Send the two healthy brigades there, have the small ones come in to defend St C, we don't need to defend the Bouclecourt road anymore bacause the Gooneville road is still a functioning line of communication. I agree. But two brigades will not be enough. If we are indeed going to go big, we need to push with almost everything we've got. Let's make a plan for it. Go through the woods, jump out and peekaboo those motherfuckers.
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Mar 2, 2017 21:33
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If, by the time of dawn, we still have an army to speak of, then yes, I would consider that.
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Mar 2, 2017 21:43
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Guys we just saw what they can do to an isolated unit.
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Mar 2, 2017 22:02
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That's why it depends on what happens at night. If we do in fact turn the enemy away, survive with a couple brigades, and time to reach the objective en masse... It could make sense. That's a lot of ifs, though.
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Mar 2, 2017 22:15
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After hashing it out a bit on Roll20, thinking the best way to do this, if we decide to try it, is to have our two full-strength brigades leave their artillery and MGs to defend St. Croissants, then take alternate routes to Quatrepouts. Brigade 1 marches along the road west of St.C until it reaches the fork just east of Haltebruit. It then turns south and marches to the Bois de Bacon, and finally charges La Oeuf to kill whatever enemy units may remain there. Brigade 2 moves out of St.C to the south, marching along the road to Graisse. Once it reaches the town, it turns west and follows the road to Quatrepouts. In both cases, the brigades would move in battle order at all times and attempt to move the full 8" each turn, applying the bayonet to any Frenchmen or British that get in the way. For defending St.C, we put just enough infantry south and east of town to spot for our guns and MGs, assisted by some stretches of wire Jaguars intends to lay down across the most likely French paths of advance. The rest of the infantry waits north of town to counter-charge any Frenchmen that enter town, as attempting to directly defend the town just means they get butchered by a French charge instead.
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Mar 2, 2017 22:26
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DO NOT DIVIDE ONE'S OWN FORCE IN THE FACE OF OVERWHELMING ODDS DO NOT HOPE TO OUTMANEUVER AN ENEMY WITH A FREE REIGN OF THE MAP
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Mar 2, 2017 22:33
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To travel from St C via Haltebruit to a form up point about 8" away from Q would take 10 turns, plus a 20% getting lost factor and 1 turn for final manouvres for 13 turns. At the very latest, for a single attack on the last turn of the game, our units would have to depart at 0200. To travel via La Oeuf is 55", which will take 7 turns + lost factor + an unknown amount of time fighting in the dark. 0400 or earlier departure time.
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Mar 2, 2017 22:51
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Got to say splitting up your forces seems to be about ready to hand any small victory you might get to the enemy. The Entente know where our forces are and any attempt to move out is likely going to have the advancing forces discovered and cut to pieces by the vastly larger number of Entente forces. My advice would be to dig in and make them come to you, cut down their forward units as quickly as you can and just try and tough out their artillery. Make them bleed for their victory.
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Mar 2, 2017 22:56
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Jaguars! posted:With no Casualties and hardly any daylight turns to worry about, we should at least make an attempt to recapture Q. Send the two healthy brigades there, have the small ones come in to defend St C, we don't need to defend the Bouclecourt road anymore bacause the Gooneville road is still a functioning line of communication. i don't want to move at night and i don't want to divide our forces in the face of the enemy, but on the other hand i am sick to my teeth that we didn't get charged, i've been waiting for a fight all day
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Mar 2, 2017 22:59
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having seen the rest of what you guys were talking about, i really really do not want to move from a fortified position to an unsure position, on terrain i don't know, at night
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Mar 2, 2017 23:01
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steinrokkan posted:DO NOT DIVIDE ONE'S OWN FORCE IN THE FACE OF OVERWHELMING ODDS First, they won't expect this, and will have to alter their plans on the fly to compensate rather than being able to take advantage of following a more developed plan. Second, it's pretty clear that it's better to be on the attack at this point, given that Cryo's men could barely even slow the enemy down when charged. Third, for the defense of Croissants, our infantry are basically irrelevant except for what spotting they provide. Our artillery and MGs are what will actually do the work, and I've set up a defensive plan for them. Fourth, this plan pins down their freshest units, the cavalry and BEF, while preventing the enemy from surprising us from the west. Fifth, it gives us a chance at genuine victory in this battle, in spite of everything that's happened to date. Sixth, it gives us something to do that might keep our remaining players involved in the game. Seventh, it's the closest we've come to a coherent plan since everything went pear-shaped in the first orders pulse.
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Mar 2, 2017 23:03
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If I think of offensive actions I want us to take I'm envisioning at least two brutal takedowns of isolated enemy brigades with the weight of the entirety of our sad remaining forces before I'm willing to even think about sending someone off on some errand as step three. Like when General Kuno arrives do you think it looks better when we go "okay we secured StC and weakened the enemy, but I guess they still nominally have Quatreprouts" or "we have three companies besieged by two enemy brigades in StC and two companies besieged by one enemy brigade in Quatreprouts and everyone else is dead".
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Mar 2, 2017 23:07
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HEY GAIL posted:having seen the rest of what you guys were talking about, i really really do not want to move from a fortified position to an unsure position, on terrain i don't know, at night Yes, it's pretty much a self-evident position to hold. The Sandman posted:First, they won't expect this, and will have to alter their plans on the fly to compensate rather than being able to take advantage of following a more developed plan. First, they do not have to compensate for poo poo when we are sending our last troops away from the objective we hold towards half an enemy division. We would be doing all the work for them. All they have to do at that point is accidentally bumble into St. C. and call it a day. Second, Cryo's defense was very unfortunate, but hopefully it was bad luck rather than an inherent result of the game design. We have also seen our attacks crumbling into nothing when we should have done well. We have also seen a fairly effective defense by our troops when we were surprised in the initial encounter and at a massive disadvantage. Third, infantry is irrelevant except when it isn't? Artillery can't saturate its deployment zones enough to deal with enemy on its own. At the same time the French can't attack units in cover without getting into a shooting match with infantry. FOurth, it prevents the enemy from surprising us from the west by marching all our manpower, blind and with nighttime penalties, into the guns of the enemy force that would be surprising us from the west, with no concept of winning besides literal blind luck (you can't hope for a tactical triumph when you can't see the enemy before bullets start flying). You can't fire me, I quit. Fifth, wishful thinking. Sixth, just enjoy the fact you are still breathing. steinrokkan fucked around with this message at 23:17 on Mar 2, 2017 |
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Mar 2, 2017 23:13
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Given that he explicitly told us he didn't care about losses now, I'm willing to take him at his word. Also, this plan does involve taking down the isolated enemy brigades before they can rejoin their friends for the attack on Croissants. Which is important, because we can put up a much stiffer defense if the enemy has only one really viable approach vector to use and we can thus actually concentrated our remaining firepower on that route. EDIT: I'm not leaving St. Croissants undefended. The image below is the defense plan. 
The Sandman fucked around with this message at 23:27 on Mar 2, 2017 |
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Mar 2, 2017 23:16
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We don't care about losses AS LONG AS WE CAN HOLD ONTO SOMETHING. Also there are no isolated enemy brigades we know of, and if there are, we are not able to predict where or which they are, doubly so at night! I can't imagine in which scenario the French, who have been consistently acting with large forces, and who now have obvious superiority in both mobility and numbers, suddenly have a bunch of separated, uncoordinated units just randomly walking around without expecting to meet an enemy. steinrokkan fucked around with this message at 23:20 on Mar 2, 2017 |
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Mar 2, 2017 23:17
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The Sandman posted:First, they won't expect this, and will have to alter their plans on the fly to compensate rather than being able to take advantage of following a more developed plan. They won't expect it because it's fully insane and suicidal. Cryo was attacked by a 3:1 superior force because we sent him off all alone. Perestroika was massacred because he was bumbling across the map all alone with his guns limbered. If we send off our infantry they end up somewhere sans artillery and MGs. This plan does not "pin down" their units, it occupies them for about a turn with the massacring of our helpless dudes. It does not give us a chance at victory because the only conceivable outcome is us all dying, which is not in our mission objective list. Horribly dying will not be fun for players. It is not a coherent plan, it is utter lunacy based on wishful thinking.
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Mar 2, 2017 23:18
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OK, with the majority against, I have absolutely zero problems with just sitting and defending. A high risk plan like I proposed will have zero chance of working without 100% buy-in, so let's just take it easy and see if the french choose to smash themselves against our guns.
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Mar 2, 2017 23:22
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Jaguars, I do not have anything against your original proposal, but I think it is pretty obvious it would need to happen under certain circumstances. Among which knowing where the enemy is, being able to see and move without penalty, not being under a constant threat of turning the wrong way and walking into a cavalry brigade, etc. certainly are. And the best way we can ensure that we have knowledge of the enemy's disposition is to let him come to us and reveal himself through combat. If we survive that, we can consider moving on Q, though if the game just ends at the morning, that will probably not be possible.
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Mar 2, 2017 23:27
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we have seen again and again the overwhelming advantage defenders get, when they are properly prepared to receive an attack. not to mention that you are never supposed to divide your forces in front of the enemy, not to mention that we'd be trying to do all this in the dark. you'd be throwing away the advantages we do have, which is guns and a good position.
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Mar 2, 2017 23:32
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Let me ask a question, then: where do you propose to put those two brigades worth of infantry that they can spot for our guns without masking them? Without also diluting the guns such that we can't bring more than three or four to bear at a time on a given French attack? And when we've guaranteed that the French can bring the two-and-a-half brigades they currently have in the southwest quadrant of the map to bear wherever and whenever they want?
The Sandman fucked around with this message at 23:41 on Mar 2, 2017 |
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Mar 2, 2017 23:38
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Those are simple problems that can be solved by individual brigadiers. A Defense with all our brigades will be rock solid in most directions and able to respond if they try to come from unexpected ones.
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Mar 2, 2017 23:42
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Jaguars, may I propose that you should swing your guns to the western side of town? I think they would be more needed there.
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Mar 2, 2017 23:51
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If I were the French I'd be pulling all sorts of sneaky maneuvers to try and position myself for an attack on Croissant once the sun comes back up. We need to be prepared to hold Croissant against a large chunk of, if not all of, what they have left. Charging off to try and rescue me/retake Q in the middle of the night is just suicide, especially since according to how Trin described the "getting lost" rules the two outcomes are either we roll perfectly every single time every turn we're moving, or we blunder into an entrenched gunline/the BEF/both. If it was light out and we had a lot more intel, it might be doable. But it's the middle of the night, the enemy outnumbers us and has free run of his bit of the map, and we only need to hold our current positions to get at least a minor victory.
Crazycryodude fucked around with this message at 00:02 on Mar 3, 2017 |
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Mar 2, 2017 23:54
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We need to put our units in the outskirts of the towns. Being in the outskirts means our forces won't be seen until they get within 4 inches wile we would have full vision to them out in the open. This should mean we would see them and get to fire first even with the French having initiative. They won't spot us unless they are right on top of us and so won't have any targets to shoot whilst we will see them approaching and get to fire on them. Of course once our units fire they will be visible but as far as I can tell with us going second in the turn if we wipe out the enemy and they are more than 4 inches away from us come the new turn they won't see us.
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Mar 2, 2017 23:58
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Jaguars! posted:Those are simple problems that can be solved by individual brigadiers. A Defense with all our brigades will be rock solid in most directions and able to respond if they try to come from unexpected ones. So when the French push three brigades at one side of Saint Croissants, one after the other, and we only have one to defend with since we needed to cover the entire perimeter, how do we respond? Especially since by the time our other brigades do respond, the French are now the ones with the advantage of whatever trenches they just captured? And since we can expect the French to bring up sufficient artillery to overwhelm ours if we have to disperse it enough to have LOS past our troops on all sides of town? Also, for those commenting on the overwhelming advantage of the defender, at what point have we seen that this battle? The closest we came is when the French made their first attack on Croissants back in the morning, and that was with a single brigade that had been weakened by my and Ikasuhito's brigades before it hit the town. What we'd be facing now is multiple brigades that we wouldn't be able to see until they were already on top of our infantry, who no longer have to worry about us having troops anywhere else because they'll know we pulled everything back into Croissants.
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Mar 3, 2017 00:01
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If we really want, a decent compromise is that we find a couple infantry companies we can spare and send them down the road from Croissant to Brioche and on to Haltebruit, then have them turn due south and cross La Crepe. If we get lucky, the Entente won't have left anybody in the town and we can retake it in the morning just before the timer runs out. Maybe send Saros or something. In fact, the more I think, the more I like the idea. It's admittedly a bit cheesy, but if they didn't bother to garrison what's obviously our main objective they kinda deserve it, really. Crazycryodude fucked around with this message at 00:10 on Mar 3, 2017 |
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Mar 3, 2017 00:02
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koolkevz666 posted:We need to put our units in the outskirts of the towns. Being in the outskirts means our forces won't be seen until they get within 4 inches wile we would have full vision to them out in the open. This should mean we would see them and get to fire first even with the French having initiative. They won't spot us unless they are right on top of us and so won't have any targets to shoot whilst we will see them approaching and get to fire on them. Are you one of the guys reading only this thread? Do you want to have the unclaimed brigade?
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Mar 3, 2017 00:04
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The Sandman posted:So when the French push three brigades at one side of Saint Croissants, one after the other, and we only have one to defend with since we needed to cover the entire perimeter, how do we respond? Especially since by the time our other brigades do respond, the French are now the ones with the advantage of whatever trenches they just captured? And since we can expect the French to bring up sufficient artillery to overwhelm ours if we have to disperse it enough to have LOS past our troops on all sides of town? We are supposed to be building dynamic defenses as much as we can. Any one of our defending brigades should be able to quickly take up a failing brigade's place at the perimeter. With you retreating to the trenches in particular we are going to be arranged like spokes of a wheel, able to rotate between various angles facing different enemy approaches. Also something to consider: Would it be more beneficial to shorten the lines of our front brigades so they could focus more guns on shorter frontage, and also limit the amount of fire the enemy can lay on them at any particular moment? See my picture on last page or somewhere to see what I mean. Long, neat lines seem vulnerable to me. steinrokkan fucked around with this message at 00:09 on Mar 3, 2017 |
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Mar 3, 2017 00:06
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steinrokkan posted:Are you one of the guys reading only this thread? Do you want to have the unclaimed brigade? I've avoided doing so mostly because I am already in two other LP's and only have the joys of MS paint for making maps. At this point my lack of experience with deisnging orders is making me refrain from taking command though if one is available and it won't cause too much bother I guess I could claim a brigade.
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Mar 3, 2017 00:09
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