Trench warfare 100 years later

[Aeraaa]

Originally Posted by Isto

Imagine, a squad waiting in ambush in forest and enemy squad comes within close range of 8 men with automatic weapons who open fire. I say dead squad game says 2 men killed.

Company of soldiers marching through field and two machine guns in the forest with elevated positions opens fire, i say at least half of the company if not the whole company - game says 2 men killed.

Also, irl every single soldier would be pinned down immediately, in the game couple squads has a change to be.

Of corse, there is also the game mechanics of turn based combat that could not be exploited in the real life.

In my opinion the game is fine as it is and would not be so interesting if it would be more realistic in that regard.

Here I need to tell that a squad moving around the battlefield is not 8 men nicely packed together for a camera shot like in a typical Hollywood movie. A squad occupies the ENTIRE hex in the game (which is 50*50 meters area, approximately anyway since we're talking about a hexagon and not a square). In addition, a squad also has specific formations IRL, designed to maximize the protection of the squad. So in an ambush maybe only the pointman was spotted and whacked, but the rest of the squad immediately took cover and returned fire (or fell back). It is a game's illusion that a spotted squad means every single person in the squad got detected. Entire squads wiped out is not a common thing but it can happen and I do remember instances of squads evaporating with the first shot of an enemy squad from 50 meters away.



As for the machinegun comment, I will advice you to look at more historical cases than the first day of the Somme. Again, machineguns do not mow down an infantry company that has most of its soldiers covered and concealed (and yes, there is plenty of both even in an apparently clear hex). In fact, that is why most fire range performances of weapon systems do not match actual combat performance. You rarely have many targets to shoot and for more than 1-2 seconds at best. High rate of fire though can be a very persuasive tool for the enemy to keep their heads down and do not try any silly ideas like advance or shoot back. That is why suppressive fire is so important and why firepower (either explosives or fast firing weapons) is the dominant factor in a firefight, even more that accuracy.

I do agree though that fire should have a bigger effect on the morale of the people on the receiving end. Something like ASL's system would be perfect (squads that are receiving heavy fire can be broken, which means they are pretty much useless and their only goal becomes retreating into cover unless a leader rallies them).


the short version: weapons do not massacre entire formations because said formations do not expose themselves to get shot at in the first place.