[SG2] Plague Boy vs. Standard Man: A SG2 Game Report - Long!!!

I played my ambush scenario last night. My head was stuffed up with Dristan
due to a nasty, NASTY cold I had. My opponent was Gary Bradley, a friend and
ex-coworker whom I have drafted into the ways of Stargrunt! Gary works
for the Canadian Standards Institute (the guys who run into walls with
motorcycle helmets to see if they work), hence the scenario was Plague Boy
versus Standard Man...

I will post the full scenario, including force list and a map of the playing
area, to a web site in the near future. I didn't take any photographs during
the game, but I've left it set up. I'll take some pictures tonight (minus the
SG2 counters and stuff).

The scenario takes place in the Traveller universe (Solomani Rim, for those
who care) on a Tech Level 12 planet. A rich, but small, faction on the planet
has come to dominate a poorer but more numerous faction. The rich faction
controls anti-grav system importation onto the planet, thus the poorer
faction
doesn't have anti-grav vehicles. A war broke out between the two
factions earlier in the year, with the rich faction taking heavy losses. To
bolster their side, they have imported Tech Level 14 mercenaries. The rich
faction has just launched an assault on a city recently captured by the poor
faction. As the forces converge on the city, a small mercenary task force has
been dropped on an advance route to the city in order to disrupt incoming
reinforcements. These reinforcments consist of a Mechanized Platoon in APCs.

The terrain consists of a mixture of light and dense woods with a road running
through it. The road does a gentle "S" bend about a third of the way from the
eastern edge. The Mercs have to destroy or disable half the APCs and escape
with at least half their force off the north edge of the map. Their secondary
objective is to destroy ALL the APCs. The Mech Platoon drives along the road
and must stop the Mercs from achieving their objectives. We decided that if
all APCs were destroyed but the Mercs did not escape with half their force,
the battle would be a draw.

The Mercs were all Power Armour troops. They had PGMP-14s (Plasma Guns
for
non-Traveller types) with Firepower of D6 and Impact of D12*. They
consisted of four squads of 4, and a command squad of three. In essence,
everybody carried a squad support weapon! This seems nasty, until you realize
that the firepower is only D6.

The Mech Platoon consisted of 6 APCs, 6 squads of 6 men, and one command squad
of 4. The APCs came in two types. One type carried only a multiple launcher
pack (similar to those on NAC Power Armour). The other had the multiple
launcher pack and a VRF Gauss Gun (a GAC/2 which I allowed to fire at
dispersed troops as though it were a SAW with D12 x 2 impact). There were
three of each vehicle, and either type could hold 12 men. The regular squads
consisted of 4 men with Advanced Combat Rifles (FP 2, Impact D10), a squad
leader with an ACR, and a support trooper with a 4cm RAM Grenade Launcher (FP
D10, Impact D8).

The Mercs were all regular units of leadership 1 and 2, but they were
considered Low Motivation. Basically, I felt that they would have excellent
NCOs, but Merc units would probalby have a high turn around and so the average
grunt wouldn't make it to be a veteran (he should be promoted by then). The
Low Motivation is simple: dead men don't pick up pay cheques. The commander of
the Mercs was a Veteran 1.

The Mech Platoon was medium motivation. They had 1 Reg 1, 2 Reg 2, 1 Reg
3,
and two Veteran 2 units. The commander was a Veteran 2.

I played the Mercs. I set up all the forces hidden and In Position. The APCs
would be coming along the road from the east. Near the west edge of the board,
the road runs into some woods. I placed one squad there. I placed a second on
a hill, overlooking most of the road. At the mid point of the ambush area, I
placed one squad on each side of the road in woods. My command squad I placed
further North, in woods, so it would be easier for it to bug out of the area.

Gary played the Mech Platoon. He placed his troops in the vehicles and then
placed the vehicles one right after the other, with no real spacing.

I used my Overwatch rules. Essentially, on a turn when a unit hasn't fired, it
may spend one activation to place an overwatch counter. The overwatch counter
may be spent any time an enemy unit moves or fires, allowing the overwatching
unit to fire but with the range band shifted upwards. Overwatch can interrupt
an enemy at any point in the enemy's movement, but can only fire at a firing
enemy after the enemy's shooting has been resolved.

As an adjunct to the Overwatch rule, I changed the Reaction Rule. The Reaction
Rule I used allowed any unit to interrup the movement or firing of an enemy
unit in EXACTLY the same way as an Overwatch counter, provided that it make a
Threat Level 0 reaction roll. This counts as the unit's entire activation,
though. As it turnst out, Overwatch was used but this Reaction Rule never came
into play.

My Mercs were all on overwatch. Gary moved his platoon along the road. On turn
1, nothing happened, except some dummy markers were spotted. On turn 2 Gary
wanted to do some Recon by Fire. I disallowed it until he pointed out that in
Vietnam troops often fired into areas that could be considered nice ambush
sites. Anticipating nastiness when the Mercs opened up, I allowed it. It
didn't do anything, anyway, as the fire only succeeded in removing a dummy
marker. Gary decided to leap frog the rear most vehicles over the others. I
hadn't specified that the road didn't allow vehicles to pass (except where it
actually cut through some woods) so I allowed it.

Turn 3 and the fun begins. Gary had to get at least 3 APCs off the board, so
he ran one right up and through the woods at the end of the "S" bend in the
road. Or, that was his INTENTION! I revealed my hidden marker and used the
Overwatch counter from last turn (Overwatch counters can be used anytime
before that unit is activated again). All four Plasma Guns blazed into the
side armour of the APC. The APC became disabled. There were two squads in it.
One man was wounded, and three others killed. I was unsure of what to do with
the troops inside the APC so I let them disgorge for free. A veteran unit took
the majority of the casualties, but remained Steady. A regular unit dropped
down to Shaken, even though only one man died in the hit.

Since I had most of my guys on Overwatch, I allowed Gary to continue to
activate his units. He put two of the APCs with VRF Gauss Guns on Overwatch
and then moved the third one up. I activated the squad on the hill using
Overwatch and hit the APC. It brewed up (with no one inside). The VRF Gauss
Gun and multi launcher fired from one of APCs on overwatch but it only
suppressed the group on the hill. A third squad of mine used Overwatch to fire
at THIS vehicle, but failed to do anything to it. Another APC used overwatch
on THIS squad, missing it. My fourth squad used Overwatch and fired on the
previous APC. It brewed up nicely!

So far I hadn't activated ANY units on turn 3 (they all fired due to
Overwatch) and I had succeeded in the first half of my primary mission
objectives. In retrospect, I should have started to activate units and get
them the hell out of there. But, I was overconfident. I figured I had a good
shot at taking out the other APCs. I stayed to fight. Since it was Gary's last
move that triggered all the overwatching, I activated one of the squads. It
fired into the one remaining APC with the VRF Gauss Gun and it exploded in a
ball of flames. It had one squad in it, that dropped to Shaken immediately. On
my next activation, they took fire and broke with multiple suppressions (and
one dead and two wounded).

Gary activated the other two APCs and ran them north and east, along the tree
line. His forces were chewed to pieces and he felt he was definitely losing
the battle. However, his movement was unimpeded and the APCs were now out of
harm's way. Worse (for me) they were between me and my exit point AND very
close to my still hidden command unit.

The momentum had shifted. My units were still in ambush positions and not in
an immediate state to escape off the board. I shifted a unit in the trees to
take out the Shaken but mostly intact group at the first ambush point. Two
activations later, the squad would drop to routed and eventually run off the
board. The unit at the first ambush point fired on the Veteran unit and
reduced it to one man alive, one wounded (but still steady).

The unit on the hill would turn out to be a problem. It removed the
suppression and tried to combat move through the woods on the hill, but only
got 4 inches. The APCs, now in the north, spewed men on either side of my
command unit! They fired on the guys on the hill, suppressing them. The
command unit ran out of the woods, and to a better position to the south,
before the enemy could see them.

One of the Mech Platoon squads moved south and east to harass the command
squad. They succeeded in suppressing it, before another squad of Mercs fired
on it. A deadly battle ensued, resulting in the mercs in the squad being mowed
down. The PGMP-14's firepower was less impressive against dispersed
targets, even those at close range. The command squad then came under fire
again, taking 3 suppressions! Another squad of mercs, the squad that routed
the enemy at the first ambush point, ran into the enemy for hand to hand
combat. One merc fell wounded, but the attack succeeded, with three Mech
Platoon guys wounded and the other two broken.

The battle on the hill became a slugfest. The very first unit to fire in the
battle ran up the hill to help its suppressed friend. It took two casualties
for its trouble, and kept receiving a suppression from the one remaining guy
in the first Veteran unit. Eventually, however, the Mercs did take out one
more APC (which swung around to help out) and suppressed another Veteran unit.

It was getting late at this point and we assessed the damage. The remaining
APC had been moved to the north west edge of the board, nicely out of the way.
The Mercs had lost more than half its force, but if they got the wounded off
the board to the north they could still win. The Mech Platoon had lost more
than half its force, but still had one APC, and two squads (not including the
command squad) in combat shape. One or two more dead Mercs and they could not
win.

The battle was pretty close to a draw, with the edge going to the Mech
Platoon. The Mercs could probably get most of the men off the board, but it
would take a fair bit of time to resolve it and another couple of casualties
could seal the Merc's fate. On the other hand the Mech Platoon is in no real
shape to help out in the fight in the city, with 4 APCs destroyed and one
disabled.

In retrospect, we both made mistakes. My biggest mistake was in not setting up
a squad for perimeter security, and not trying to escape when I had succeeded
with the first half of my primary mission goals (the game would have been
radically different if I had started to move my guys north the moment the
third APC was destroyed). Gary's biggest mistake was in not disgorging
infantry early enough, and in the way he set up his APCs in the convoy.

Changes to the scenario will be minor. The Mercs will be allowed to select
either the north or south board edge for escape instead of the Mech Platoon
knowing by default. I'm also thinking of placing some grav APCs on the board
for the Mercs and letting those ferry the mercs off the board. This would be
instead of them going off a particular board edge on foot.

The Overwatch rules worked very well. They made the ambush possible, really,
without having to have a scenario specific ambush rule. My own, homegrown
Reaction Fire rule wasn't used at all.

One thing I wasn't sure of, though. I wasn't sure if the Impact versus Armour
roll was an Open Shift or a Closed Shift? You see, the Mercs had D12 armour in
woods against ACRs with D10 impact. I was rolling D12 versus D10. However, the
light cover of the woods should have given them a die shift if it was an open
shift. This would have meant that the Mercs should have been D12 versus D8. I
think I goofed on this, and the Mercs shouldn't have been so badly damaged.

The low motivation of the Mercs didn't really apply. Because of the way units
make morale tests, the Mercs being whittled away meant that they didnt' take
any serious morale tests. I'm leaning more and more towards changing one of
the Confidence Test conditions. As well as a test when there are more
casualties than men remaining in the squad, I'm thinking of having a similar
test when the strength of the squad falls to 50% or less of the squad's full
strength. This would have meant a better chance of the mercs having lower
morale. The Mech Platoon had a lot of men dead and wounded, but only two
squads were left in fighting shape morale wise.

At any rate, it was a fun (if long) scenario. I wish there was a faster way of
resolving Impact versus Armour rolls. Those paired off die rolls can take
quite a long time to resolve. Still the scenario seems fairly well balanced,
with poor tactics being the main reason for our problems. The Mercs did hurt
the APCs badly, but once the infantry disgorged it was a real slugfest.

I'm looking forward to hearing your comments and suggestions.