I feel like seven characters is a good place to start and I have a day off, so I feel like I ought to go ahead and start writing that first post. Unusually for me, I intend to keep it short and sweet if possible.

Awesome I'll be up for a while seeing as it's only 9:00Pm so I shall follow suit.

On Paper, I would say the squad is authorized the following:

Leadership
1. Squad Leader - Korporal
2. Assistant Squad Leader - Senior PFC or Junior Korporal
Machine gun Team #1
3. Gunner
4. Asst. Gunner
Machine gun team #2
5. Gunner
6. Asst. Gunner
Scout Team
7. Scout
8. Scout
Rifle Team
9. Rifleman
10. Rifleman
11. Rifleman
12. Rifleman

On paper, the squad is authorized 12 soldiers, but in reality, we show up with seven. We can go without the Asst. Gunners. Priority fill would be to the MG gunners and Scouts. Then the riflemen. The Asst SL would be a dual role for some "High Speed" PFC.

Yeah, it might mean the gunners having to carry more ammo or have less on hand due to a lack of assistants, the riflemen to double as scouts and probably hump LMG ammo and so forth. Theoretically, the various characters are capable to carry out these roles, I'd say.

I'd say it's perfectly reasonable for the LMG gunners to carry 1000 rounds, I did it just fine, if we end up with a HMG, they will probably need the help, as for filling the roles, I'll happily fill one of the scout slots, having his own eyes on a target would help my character prep his charges more effectively.

These are much heavier rounds. BAR gunners carried something like three hundred rounds tops and had an assistant gunner/riflemen humping the rest. For reference, the web gear for a BAR gunner was 12x20round magazines of .30-06, which is a significantly larger (heavier) round than the 5.56.

This is much of the reason why the 5.56x45mm round exists in the first place -- more shots, less weight.

As you can see, the first IC is up. Goldmarble, I created a situation where you can bring that anti-tank rifle to bear. ;)

Everyone else, the first post was long-ish to establish how the war started and how they got to the place they're at. You can just react to the situation at hand.

Edit: And I see no problem with Gunther's squad breakdown. But they are down to seven men(/women) for the moment. I can add other characters, have them straggle in from other squads or whatever. So I'm not cutting off the submissions for new characters.

People can still get in this RP.

Question:

What are we doing about support for LMG fire? AFAIK it's possible to fire the BAR without an assistant, just a bit more complicated and unwieldy. In this kind of situation would both LMG trained characters attempt to fire individually or group up to fire one more efficiently?

TeddyBearMafia said
Question are we doing about support for LMG fire? AFAIK it's possible to fire the BAR without an assistant, just a bit more complicated and unwieldy. In this kind of situation would both LMG trained characters attempt to fire individually or group up to fire one more efficiently?

It would be better to have two LMGs with one man, carrying each than to sacrifice the firepower in favor of having an asst. Gunner. When I was a rifle platoon leader, I had 23 men in a platoon that was authorized 39. filling the M60 Machine guns in my platoon was more important. We didn't have Asst. Gunners or Ammo bearers because of it. The firepower from two BARs is more effective than having one BAR and one bolt action rifle.

For the purposes of his post, Gunther is authorized to dispose the squad as he sees fit for defense against an enemy.

I think we can assume that they have a field telephone rigged up as well. Whatever improvisations get played out ICly, I'll figure out a rationale for them anyway, so use intuition -- there may be artillery support to be had, though god knows the quality of that fire support, since we're talking about green troops and green artillerymen and green everything.

HeySeuss said
As you can see, the first IC is up. Goldmarble, I created a situation where you can bring that anti-tank rifle to bear. ;)

Elephant guns shall thunder.

Posted. I took the liberty of assigning everyone to a foxhole, that your characters should dig. PFC Dupont and Heinrich Strauss are together. Gefreiter Amsel and PFC Franz are foxhole buddies and at the squad CP are Manfred Krebs, Halliger and Hasso Aldo in the center of the squad line. We have at least seven enemy halftracks, infantry mounted heading towards us. I also wrote in that our squad was the center squad for the platoon. The first is on our right and the third is on our left. The platoon CP is in the farmhouse to our rear.

This RP reminds me of "The Winter War" (The Russo-Finnish War). I can't help but conjure images from this movie.

If anyone would like to collaborate a conversation with Korporal Krebs, please send me a PM.

Right, spaced out on the larger rounds, will write up a post.

....I am so happy! Finally found how Solothurns were transported:




Couldn't find one for the S18-100 specifically unfortunately, but the S18-1000 is very closely related. Course...how the Swiss transported 20mm ammunition, I am still not sure. So I went wooden crate as best guess.

I'm pretty sure you are correct, Goldmarble. I left the military 11 years ago. Artillery and mortar rounds were still packed in wooden boxes then. Probably still are.

On another note, there may be other assets in our platoon sector to help out with Anti Armor, possibly even light armor or 37mm AT guns. But that's up to HS.

Probably not armor, but certainly some light artillery, mortars and anti-tank guns.

I'm deciding whether the Augstbergen would have figured out to mount the infantry so they can keep up with the tanks rather than keep the tracks sort of stuck to the infantry. Personally, I think it's probably the latter, as I do not figure the Augstbergen to be as sophisticated with armor as their opponents.

Also, SillyGoy, we're waiting on your post.

Tank Desant Is a technique the Soviets used before they found halftracks/armored personnel carriers. Maybe diesen Augstbergen employ the same technique? Another thing the Soviets were famous for on the Eastern Front was to push their armies as far as they could go until they got to the point that they had exhausted all their resources and simply could not go any further. They would then go into a hasty defense until their Logistics trains could catch up with them. It usually meant spending 3-7 days in this Defense waiting for fuel and ammo to come forward.

Gunther said
Is a technique the Soviets used before they found halftracks/armored personnel carriers. Maybe diesen Augstbergen employ the same technique? Another thing the Soviets were famous for on the Eastern Front was to push their armies as far as they could go until they got to the point that they had exhausted all their resources and simply could not go any further. They would then go into a hasty defense until their Logistics trains could catch up with them. It usually meant spending 3-7 days in this Defense waiting for fuel and ammo to come forward.

Can't say I can see our little fictional country of Augstberg employing such aggressive, offensive doctrine as the Russians, or the Germans deployed. Small country with a focus of Neutrality, seems more likely they would employ defensive tactics. Like much of Europe of the time, be thinking in terms of traditional trench warfare, rather than the modern, mobile style of fighting that WW2 introduced.

Currently, having probably seen how well "old" tactics fared for their neighboring countries, they could well be in a state of rearrangement, trying to adapt to this new form of war. The Swiss had very few tanks, mostly Czech 1935 and 1938 models, mostly because their real method for defending themselves from invading vehicles was: Landslides. They had explosives packed into areas above natural chokepoints on the mountain passes, and if an army started coming, blow the road closed. They could then safely shell the living crap out of the invaders, as they tried to clear the rubble.

If the Augstbergers do have tanks, I could see them being rather hopelessly out dated, but still effective in a defensive scenario: Good armor, mediocre guns, and more machineguns than what is really needed (Char B1, Mathilda, etc). Or tankettes. Or a couple of alright medium/light tanks, but no where near enough of them for a real battle.