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It's more complex than that, the Div HQ is basically ineffective when moving. But it's nothing insoluble. Div HQ communication problems is why all our brigades failed to move during the first part of the update.
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Mar 29, 2017 02:47
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So, my draft orders (non-official) Reform on point 1. Follow the roads back to Stethoscope. Stop Brig Cmd in the town, with the three machine guns and the trench mortar digging in on the sunken road to the south of town. Place one infantry company 8" south along the road and one 16" south. Any reinforcements start filling in just south of the mortar.  e: Actually, thinking about it, Trin can I cut off the two MGs in the trench to attach to another brigade? It would be great if they were completely overpowered with MGs. Added Space fucked around with this message at 03:44 on Mar 29, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 03:20
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Saros posted:Tank you're ordering brigades off on their own, in the dark into probably enemy reinforcements. This really is not a good plan. Even if they break through one they arrive they won't be able to receive any orders or get artllery support and will get torn apart by new BEF units. I understand that. To be completely honest, ordering an offensive like this is the complete opposite of what my instinctual response to playing games like this usually is, which is to turtle up, agonize over every little placement of artillery and support weapons, and wait for the enemy to blunder into my geometrically perfect defense. Usually, I would think that a good alternative to my current orders would be exactly what you suggest, consolidating forces under cover of darkness. Two things, though: 1) Our orders are to take Effadyers. This is the only explicit win condition given in our orders. Our other orders are a vague instruction to go as far west as possible and entrench. I don't know if we have a hard deadline in terms of a certain number of turns or not. If we do, then this win condition takes precedence and we have to approach this in a quite "gamey" fashion to overcome the insane C&C difficulties presented to us by the system (i'm sure they're quite historical, if not strictly enjoyable) - difficulties which will, I want to make clear, make your proposed alternative just as costly and error-prone. Our troops will fail to obey our orders, blunder into the enemy, fail easy order rolls, and see our divisions get blown up by enemy companies. I feel like we have no choice if we want to win by securing Effadyers except gambling on a footrace between our troops and theirs. If we wait any longer, the inherent difficulties of controlling our troops on the offensive and the ease with which they break down means the defender is outrageously favored in a scenario where we have to fight across an entire map. 2) I'm not so set on my vision that I want you guys to have less fun. I think we should take a straw poll to gauge the mood of the thread and see if we want to go for broke for our target or just dig in and wait for 1915. I also want Trin to answer this question: Do we have a turn limit on securing Effadyers? As in: will the game end on a certain turn, and is 'do we have troops in the town' the binary yes-or-no win condition? If not, then I'm fine developing a more conservative plan. If yes, then I'm happy to gamble on this. It's just a game, after all. e: Effadyers, Effyaders, whatever. We invade these barbarian lands to bring simple and much more pleasant German names to these desolate hovels. tatankatonk fucked around with this message at 04:28 on Mar 29, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 04:25
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LLSix posted:With this plan, there's no reason not to take the div HQ with them, which neatly solves the orders problem. Although that does mean the 54th and maybe one of the artillery groups should follow the rest of the 26th (Wurttemburg) Division. Without a telephone connection to corps HQ the division hq won't be able to update us with anything going on or receive orders making the issue even worse. Did nobody read my post? Trin was literally telling us it's a really bad idea. He also said in Roll20 before there is no hard time or casualty limit.
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Mar 29, 2017 04:36
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I read your post. If there's no turn limit then rushing makes no sense and i'll draft a much more conservative orders set along the lines of your suggestion.
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Mar 29, 2017 04:38
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I'm still in favor of a bold advance, as long as people write clear orders and consider all the contingencies. What if they run into the enemy, into barb wire, if any of the bridges are out, etc.
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Mar 29, 2017 04:38
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Here are the two endgames:Trin Tragula posted:3). Capture and hold Effyaders. So under number 4, we can essentially dictate when we end the battle by preparing a defence and sitting on it until the situation stabilizes. I think we're in a pretty good position re: enemy numbers at the moment and I think that we have an opportunity to take more ground before they can co-ordinate their brigades. I will ensure it is in a coordinated way and that we won't overextend.
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Mar 29, 2017 05:11
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The city objective is just a big walk in this general direction arrow. The actual win condition is being slightly farther west than that river, which is conspicuously located at the halfway point of the map. Digging in west of the river is a favorable position as per our orders - it saves us having to force a crossing in the beginning of our next offensive. The force setup has been absolutely symmetrical last game and from what we've seen is so this game as well, so we cannot reasonably expect to somehow secure the entire map. At best we can shove something in the objective that will immediately die afterwards, which is what we did last game and what would have gotten us party wiped if enemy command and control hadn't been considerate enough to kamikaze. Our goal at this time should be to secure and gradually, situation permitting, expand, a firm foothold west of that river. Even advancing to the western border of either of those woods west of the river should be viewed as an optional, now-what-do-we-do-with-all-these-brigades type move.
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Mar 29, 2017 05:52
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just like the insane disaster of the charge into fde ended in modest positive gains, so did the insane disaster of this turn end in something close to status quo. we seem to have maintained our foothold, and I think our night orders need to be focused on setting up an entrenched defense in case they try a night attack as for the rest of this scenario I think the sweeping movement phase has ended, and by tomorrow morning there will be too many infantry chits on the board to do the things both sides did in the first two days. I think we run great risks in trying to get WWI infantry chits with machine guns and trench mortars to make long range attacks that cavalry couldn't pull off - even if we could exercise command and control over them, which we can't! I think the tone of our orders, in fact, is a massive red herring, one that's in keeping with the way the Germans were thinking in 1914. we are meant to find out that taking the whole map is impracticable, and it's meant to still be around in future years so we can see how the different rules play out on this terrain - we're not meant to read them as implying that our perception of the game mechanics is wrong and we totally can wipe the map. I admit that I'm trying to read trin's mind a bit though also I'm away from my computer this week so it's a good time to get knocked out! and I can wait until future rounds of reinforcements/ players wandering off to get back in as more than a staff officer. in the meantime I'll just keep posting way too much! but hopefully a little less too much than before I'm really interested to see how our indirect fire looks from the other side after this scenario is over. I suspect they've been more effective but of course I think that, we can't see our fire land. plus they have had a lot of friendly fire it seems. I'll read the update more closely later oystertoadfish fucked around with this message at 06:17 on Mar 29, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 06:07
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Okay. Given your feedback, I'm going to cancel the orders I posted and make a more conservative plan establishing and entrenching along a defensive line that includes our gains west of the river. I'll have the new plan up either late tonight or sometime tomorrow morning.
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Mar 29, 2017 06:43
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Added Space posted:I'm still in favor of a bold advance, as long as people write clear orders and consider all the contingencies. What if they run into the enemy, into barb wire, if any of the bridges are out, etc. Mind you, there's a fine line between a bold advance, and a needlessly suicidal advance. Anything other than coordinating all available troops to attack at once, and to advance safely, without falling into disorganized mess, would be criminally negligent after the many, many lessons of the past, and I'm happy tank sees that. steinrokkan fucked around with this message at 07:22 on Mar 29, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 07:18
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Fathis Munk posted:*snip* In light of the above orders, why did the 53rd end up in stethoscope 
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Mar 29, 2017 08:23
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Please keep at least some of Fireplan BREXIT, I really like that idea, It's like having an extra brigade pop up to pull security for a while.Fathis Munk posted:In light of the above orders, why did the 53rd end up in stethoscope I guess it's a mix up with the designations, because the 52nd appears to be following your orders. While we're at a bit of a pause, does anyone want to take over the 51st since Cokerpilot is out for a while?
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Mar 29, 2017 08:31
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I can take it over for a while, if you want.
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Mar 29, 2017 08:50
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Sounds good. Hopefully I can sneak in some orders a few hours after Tatankatonk does his in the morning.
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Mar 29, 2017 09:05
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Okay so I think we should establish positions in the night that are capable of repeling an attack from BEF reinforcements. This means, pickets out ahead of the main body and getting 3 bde over the river ASAP then we bite and hold FdE. The BEF will no doubt hit the fords with artillery which is going to suck but there isn't much to be done about it. What I think would be ideal is the establish a strong position in FdE and have the BEF reinforcements walk right into it. I would expect that they receive another division as we are so that means more arty and three+ fat BEF brigades, probably entering from the Trios Feres area. I expect a similar move to what happened in the south with them sending the reinforcements together to the same place to clear us out of our cross-river positions. They also probably only think we have one brigade in FdE at the moment so its entirely possible they will gamble on pushing us out with a night attack counting on their superior sized Bde (and far better luck) to carry the day. I can also probably get some barbed wire up on the FdE road using my cav engineers before any reinforcements arrive which if we can settle on a position to hold means any night attack gets shot to poo poo tangled up on it. Finally for artillery we want to smash that infantry in SE FdE and attempt to clear out barbed wire wherever possible, it also needs to move after 4 turns or so as its positions are probably spotted. Saros fucked around with this message at 14:59 on Mar 29, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 14:55
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tatankatonk posted:Okay. Given your feedback, I'm going to cancel the orders I posted and make a more conservative plan establishing and entrenching along a defensive line that includes our gains west of the river. I'll have the new plan up either late tonight or sometime tomorrow morning. I really liked your bold advance plan. It at least attempted to achieve our objective. Settling in on the defensive feels wrong and won't ever let us accomplish our mission goals.
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Mar 29, 2017 15:15
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Tbh with our MG and mortar superiority (if they hit something) we might be better off defending and letting their meatblobs attack and hopefully let themselves open for a counter attack? It's funny because their brigades seem to be better suited for attacks and ours for defense (since we have more units that need to remain stationary and they have more chits for the chitgod)
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Mar 29, 2017 15:38
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Any advance on the BEF held town will end in disaster. It is too far ahead of our front lines to be supported and getting orders out to those troops would also prove difficult. On top of that we have no clue that the BEF don't have further reinforcements coming, or if they hold the town or even if the bridges are still standing. Worse just because we are in the town doesn't mean a bell goes off and we win we would need to hold it till we force the BEF to retreat and any force of ours that did make it would be hard pressed. So some recommendations I have: 1) Move the artillery we have at Ferme Inutille out immediately, it has been spotted almost certainly and it won't take the enemy long to start counter bombarding it. It isn't worth losing the artillery or some of it at least just to get some rounds out. 2) Forces not in the north and over or near to crossing the river should bunker down in positions where we can watch the fords and start entrenching so we have a strong defensive and spring off point. 3) Forces in FdE and near to it should move in and secure it post haste though caution should be used in case of contact with hostile forces. 4) Any and all artillery should be put into positions where we are going to want to attack come daylight. 5) Senior officers and any junior officers who have advice should after the final defensive plans have been made should start planning for where we want to attack in the morning.
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Mar 29, 2017 15:44
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IV CORPS ORDERS The night-time is our opportunity to establish a line that will either be our final defensive positions or jumping-off points for a few more gains before we reassess our strategic situation. All divisions are to do their best to establish the white line during the night. The pink line will be our objectives for the following day. 40th (Saxon) Division Aphid_licker, remove the remnants of your command to the orange circle marked in the south and begin entrenching along the Chemin. 26th (Wurttemburg) Division Jaguars!, your brigades will move to their designated positions and establish the white defensive line that should occupy the trenches already made in the FDE, provide sight on any attack coming west down the FDE road, and give you space to stage your morning attack on the rest of FDE while establishing the pink line. Work with the engineers to lay wire across the FDE road and make use of pickets to make sure you see the BEF coming before they stumble upon you. Your movements will be protected by FIREPLAN: BREXIT for a few turns to the Southeast. Further reinforcements - Brigade or Division level? Saros, you are in command of the next formation to arrive. In the meantime, direct our engineers to lay down wire across the FDE road to block an enemy advance from that direction, and work to entrench the permanent portions of the white line. Please make sure that lone Cavalry engineer unit is safely recalled to our lines. Artillery Sniper, for the first two turns you are to carry out FIREPLAN: BREXIT to suppress suspected enemy concentrations in the Southeast FDE while our brigades maneuver to the north. The marked area should be your only target during those turns. After that, you are free to relocate to avoid enemy counterbattery fire and to reposition yourself to support the clearing of the FDE beginning next morning. Engineers Whoever you're commanded by, work with the brigade commanders to set up defensive positions along the line. Wire across the FDE road is a priority job. Future Intent In the morning, our four brigades in the FDE will clear and hold the forest. The remaining units of the 40th division will secure the rest of our line for now, and any reinforcements will respond to needs as they develop, either reinforcing success along the FDE axis or reinforcing the southern line if we see a counterattack developing in that direction. Good luck!
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Mar 29, 2017 18:03
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tatankatonk posted:40th (Saxon) Division Whoa rude man Aye aye sir e: poo poo, missed a prime opportunity to use the old "is that to include our heroic dead" chestnut aphid_licker fucked around with this message at 19:01 on Mar 29, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 18:57
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Will put together a firing plan presently.
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Mar 29, 2017 19:10
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I'm sorry but I am still unclear which brigade is which in the north, especially because I am not sure why one of them stopped at the farm since they both had orders to follow the road and cross at the top ford ? Did the 52nd spot the brits from all the way over there and thus move towards them as per standing orders, thus making it the brigade near the farm?
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Mar 29, 2017 19:57
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Artillery Orders Red are missions for the northern battery, yellow for the south. I designated 4 missions to hit the center trenches at an attempt at slight misdirection, making them think we might be trying for a punch right up the center. At worst it helps interdict anyone trying to move north. Fire Mission for 2 turns, then move to the new red line, unlimber and entrench. Then commence following mission through end of update 
sniper4625 fucked around with this message at 18:29 on Mar 30, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 20:27
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The Brigade on the farm is the 51st. They made contact with the British Cavalry with standing orders to defend, so they stopped moving and fought until the enemy was gone. Steinrokkan in command. The one up top is the 52nd, they came in turn 36 and are moving where you intended, to consider it your one.
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Mar 29, 2017 20:53
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Double reading your orders, Tatank, let me know if you want my new line slightly further back to let the infantry entrench in my current destination.
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Mar 29, 2017 20:55
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With the four brigades in the FDE, we'll have to have the artillery hold the center for now until some reinforcements arrive, with Ikasuhito and the remnants of the 40th Division holding the line south of that. Your current entrenchment plan is fine, any handing-over to infantry will be far down the road.
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Mar 29, 2017 21:13
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Yeah, we're not getting reinforcements until tomorrow night. If you push them up that far there's nothing stopping infantry from coming down the center road and wiping you out.
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Mar 29, 2017 21:32
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26th Division: OK. I think we can get further without serious loss, so I'm going to outline a plan that that will push a bit further through the woods. If the guys doing the walking and the Corps commander don't all agree, then take up the positions ordered by Corps without further ado. This is to get to the far side of the Foret de Effyaders during the night. We won't go any further till morning, when the rear brigades will concentrate on clearing the southern half of the woods.  Top Diagram: Fathis' Brigade will end up in this position anyway because of orders delay. Steinrokkan's is to line up with the southern end of Fathis' Bde. Becuase of Night rules, we will allow 8 turns to do this instead of 4-5. I would incline to use ford A to avoid getting tangled with enemy to the south. Use a fatter formation as well for the same reason. Div HQ: Priority of Order changes: 51st 52nd 53rd 54th On Day 2, Turn 44, Div HQ is to proceed west along the road until it meets the Ford. Jaguars! fucked around with this message at 08:12 on Mar 30, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 21:34
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It might be fun to try out some sort of fire and maneuver scheme where the two brigades alternate attack and defense stances turn by turn. E: I mean staggered, A moves while B is halted, then B moves while A is halted.
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Mar 29, 2017 21:39
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Too complex for our lovely C&C. This way we have a 2 on one advantage if we bump someone in the night, which is a fair to middling possibility. Another conditional that will be needed is that we absolutely can't step off if both brigades aren't in contact with each other by turn 49.
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Mar 29, 2017 21:41
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  1. Finish your current orders and form up in the forest, switch to defense stance and wait for Turn 1, Day 3. quote:Conditional: 2. At Turn 1, Day 3, set off alongside Steinrokkan's brigade and, keeping the road to your south, move to the edge of the forest. Assume the defensive position and start digging in. quote:Conditional: Standing Orders When sighting an enemy in attack stance, Halt and switch to defend stance. When attacking the enemy,Use rifle fire When an enemy company Breaks Off or Retreats Suppressed, Do not pursue Break off automatically at 3/4 casualties Battle Formation Attempt to maintain Battle Formation :  Fathis Munk fucked around with this message at 15:38 on Mar 31, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 21:41
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Ed: post above has changed. Jaguars! fucked around with this message at 22:03 on Mar 29, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 21:44
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Yeah I saw your plan just after hitting post  I think the above thing should cover both opportunities since I'm not sure I'll have time to change it again before tomorrow evening. I set my conditional to only aiding steinrokkan if he gets attacked during the walk since I guess once entrenched it would be better for me to remain entrenched ?
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Mar 29, 2017 22:04
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umm, yeah that should be fine. when you go static, you'll gain firepower and cover anyway and it's probably better than getting caught in the open at daylight.
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Mar 29, 2017 22:14
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53rd Infantry orders Movement orders  53rd Infantry Brigade is to continue to march along the road to Stethoscope before taking the northern road out of the town and following it up and around to the west into FdE. Upon reaching point A the brigade is to switch into battle formation as shown below. After reaching battle formation the brigade is to advance to point B shown on the above map and hold position and dig in using the dig in formation as shown below. Battle formation  Dig in formation  Standing orders: When sighting an enemy 12" or less away on Attack stance: Turn to face the enemy, move into battle formation, halt and switch the defend orders. When sighting an enemy 12" or less away on Defend stance: Hold position When attacking the enemy: Use rifle fire When an enemy company Breaks Off or Retreats Suppressed: Do not pursue Break Off automatically when: 2/3 casualties are taken koolkevz666 fucked around with this message at 13:24 on Mar 30, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 22:17
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Huh they can, I always figured they could only shoot through one allied unit.
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Mar 29, 2017 22:24
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Hey sniper could we get some shot on the barbed wire once the guns are re-established. The turn is 12 long so lots of time.
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Mar 29, 2017 22:28
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Saros posted:Hey sniper could we get some shot on the barbed wire once the guns are re-established. The turn is 12 long so lots of time. Happy to put down fire on any desired point, if given....6-8 turns? Just specify which wire.
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Mar 29, 2017 22:43
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| # ? May 30, 2024 04:17 |
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 Proceed across the indicated bridge. I assume micromanaging the crossing is out of the scope of these orders. Position the brigade in a north-south direction. If somehow this is achieved before day 3 and the brigade to my north is stationary, wait for it to start moving, or for day 3 to begin next stage. In the meantime, fortify. On day 3 continue to the second destination, assuming a wedge like shape. End movement, go into defense, dig in. Throughout movement stages keep in touch with Fathis Munk (52nd, the guy immediately to my north), and if liaisons gain knowledge of enemy positions, do change direction to engage them.  Standing orders When sighting an enemy in attack stance, Switch to defend stance. When attacking the enemy,Rifle fire When an enemy company Breaks Off or Retreats Suppressed, Do not pursue Break off automatically at 3/4 casualties Battle formation Same as the starting formation for this turn before movement. I hope I got it right in the "guess what companies belong to whom" department. steinrokkan fucked around with this message at 11:51 on Mar 30, 2017 |
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Mar 29, 2017 22:58
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