[Tue] 28 May 2013 (Trees with teeth)

[Bodge]

A rather healthy player count this week allowed us to die in vast quantities. We played

Missions:

• Bend
• Wideola
• Nutcracker
• Lifting the seige
• Uprising

The slaughter was rather unrelenting in bend, draakon did commendably well at scavenging RPGs and eliminating a few vehicles before we all snuffed it. The Western Chernarus Neighbourhood Watch were extra militant in wideola and claimed many blufor scalps. The Nut was well and truly cracked with mucho rpg fire from indfor and we even had time to squeeze in a new mission courtesy of Kale. Even enough time for a little uprising at the end.

Thoughts and reports below.

[Pr3sario]

Wanted to share this before my AAR tomorrow. Thanks for taking a bullet for me Toppo!

[Mojo]

A short session for me as I was only able to attend the flesheating wideola trees mission.

Wideola
CO - Washington
CO Medic - Mojo
JFAC - Lemon(ish)

Started with a lot of planning and some confusion as not all helicopters had pilots. On our way there a alpha lead decided enough was enough and bailed heroicly into the treeline beneath, or maybe he just fell trough the hole in the chinook. Once we landed I realised that I had been in the wrong helicopter, but to no matter as we landed close to eachother. Staying with the CO, I watched charlie watching the A10 airshow of fireworks a bit too close for comfort (Some of them lost a few legs) and as we moved in closer we got flanked by some trees with guns. After fighting the trees and running deeper into the fields, a friendly truck snook up and I accidently fired a bullet in its general direction. (Sorry guys, I thought my gun was lowered ) They picked us up and drove into the forest where we got shot at, after driving some more, we got shot some more and almost everyone onboard died. The CO somehow managed to survive and the scenery was set as the A10 delivered some nice firework into a local town.

After discussing the uselessness of MTS in wooded terrain I called it a day.

Thanks for a short but sweet session folks!

[awaitz]

My very first AAR. Thought it was about time.

Bend: try's trusted MATA.
We hid behind some rocks right before the bend, right in the center of the AO, and stayed in cover as the front of the convoy passed us.
The sound of the passing heavy vehicles, and the shaking ground scared the shit out of the both of us.
All we could do was to keep our heads down, until we heard the mine go off down the road.
Once the explosions started, we moved up towards the road, with the tank as our primary objective, only to meet the gunflash of some angry russians. I took a bullet to the face, and it all went dark.

Wideloa: A10 Pilot
Spawned at the Northern Airfield, and went to get more coffee while the teams boarded their choppers. Started up my beasty, fully armed A10, and began to circle the AO.
Recieved my first fire-mission, that went completely FUBAR. I was too eager to go in there, and too triggerhappy. I should of course have confirmed the orders from the CO, but failed to recieve both the direction of approach, and the desired weapon to use. I came in from the wrong side of the town, and according to CO i pretty much fucked up one of the Squads with my 10 Hydra rockets. Really sorry about that, and I am prepared to be court martialed.
The other three firemissions went pretty good though..

Nutcracker: Medic, OPFOR
After my friendly fire massacre on the previous mission, I decided to go medic on this one.
Followed EBass up the road for a while, before he magically dissappeared.
I decided to go rouge, and climbed up the hill on our left side.
I stayed ahead of the tank, and managed to get a couple shots on an enemy hiding behind some rocks just ahead of me. Unsure if I managed to kill him, I went around further to the left around the rocks and came up behind him. Killed him, and one more enemy.
Using the same rocks as cover, I scouted the city and the hill on the other side of the road. There I managed to take out atleast one more enemy, right before the rpg's started flying, and our tank was lost.

Lifting the siege: Alpha Squad Medic
After yet another mission filled with nothing but death, I once again signed up as medic.
I kept behind Alpha most of the time, and didn't fire a single shot until after the first Mortar posision was cleared. My medic skills however came to good use, as MAT gunner Guus seemed to be on some kind of a suicide run, constantly running in front of enemy fire.
Well atleast he kept me busy.
We rushed towards the second Mortar posision, and glorious victory.

[Nimrod]

Bend
Bravo 2 AAR

Saw some serious fireworks on this one.

[Aqarius]

Missed the first one as always, but I did get to be in teamspeak when all of Bravo jumped to Valhalla. They truely are glory squad.

Wideola
A2 FTL
Landed in the north, and advanced along the AO border in a left bend. Shortly after entering, advanced to the designated base of fire and got wholesale slaughtered along the way. I'm getting PTSD from the Ai in Chernarusian forests.

Nutcracker
Bravo AR
Spaced out the baricades, placed my mines, and joined Draakon in ambush while our AT held overwatch. Had a decent position for suppressing scouts, and held it untill a big fireball from the road brightened my day.

Lifting the seige
B2 sapper
(Was this a test?) This seems like a really fun mission, despite our FTL biting it fairly early on. Maybe it's the lower player count reducing the clutter, or less than ideally placed heavy defenses, but it did seem to have a fairly smooth rapid tempo. At least from my perspective.
EDIT: oh yeah, to the traitor of the people who blew me up at the end, you caused a CTD.

[Cuddlefish]

Bend - DC Medic
This mission... was not an auspicious start to my evening. Teamspeak decided I really wanted to be talking on CC at all times unless the mic was muted, and that took embarrassingly long to resolve (Silly me, I believed adjusting settings would actually work rather than just rebooting the thing), apologies to any annoyed by that. To top it off, my teleport action failed to appear, so I spent most of the mission being a long distance runner rather than a medic. Still, good exercise isn't a bad thing. Had to take a longer route than I would have liked to avoid being spotted and engaged - at first it was because I was worried I would tip off the enemy before the ambush could be sprung , and once the fire started... crossing back over the ridge to enter the valley wasn't looking like a high percentage strategy. I circumnavigated around to the back of an Alpha fire-team, and set to providing what medical assistance I could. I started taking fire from an AI machine-gunner, sought cover, and tried to return fire with an AK-74. On his third long burst the 'Commie Bastard' decided to actually aim, and popped me right in the noggin.

Wideola - Bravo 2, Rifleman-AT
We had a nice helicopter ride (with the obligatory Wagner), and a relaxing walk through the woods. Well. Most of the woods were relaxing. Then we reached... Well, there are so many overwrought labels that could be given to it (the copse of corpses, the grove of graves, etc) but that little stretch of trees, whatever one wants to call it, was an absolute killing field. Everyone was dropping around me, being revived and then shot again - and I couldn't even see where the fire was coming from. Eventually I took a hit, crawled up hill, and then I was killed instantly by I haven't a clue what.

Nutcracker - INDFOR Bravo, Rifleman-AT
As part of Draakon's fireteam, Labbes and I were dispatched to hide in a large rock outcrop overlooking the hill. We waited until the tank had rolled well into our ambush zone, taking only sporadic fire, then on cue let loose with our rockets - I scored a side hit as the tank was retreating from some other shots, not sure how the other shooters did. This seems to have gotten me some attention - shortly thereafter my position came under fire from a determined shooter god knows where - and it really was one of the most vivid examples of the enemy having fire superiority I can remember. I had enough cover that the odds of being hit were relatively small if I stayed low, but if I did -anything- but lie in that ditch and hope someone kills the shooter, I'd get nailed inside of two seconds. Which was pretty much my state for I believe a few solid minutes - prone behind a rock, JSRS rounds cracking over my head and impacting in the dirt just past me - one even grazed me fairly early, though how I had so little ill effect I'm not sure [I barely even had sight wobble - maybe it was small fragments from a round that shattered on the rocks or something?] and a bit later I took a much more significant hit - I think the attacker(s) must have repositioned, because it seemed like the angle they had was much better. I was able to crawl to Labbes and his much safer hideaway, at which point he patched me up. The tank then began to advance again, so I loaded up my remaining rocket (regretfully only HE) and prepared for the second ambush, which I was pretty certain would be fatal. Sure enough, as fire was called, I stood up, took aim, fired, and was riddled with lead by some machine gunner or another before I could hit crouch, killing me outright.

Lifting the Siege - Bravo 2, Automatic-Rifleman
Bravo's initial approach to the town was an impressive piece of coordinated bounding by the squad and fire-team leadership. "Tactical" as anything. The feel was somewhat broken when AntlerOwl Dogface (my FTL) and I rounded a corner into a group of OpFor doing the same. Everyone started shooting like mad, I was wounded (and went through something like 80 bullets against two or three men inside of 15 yards - not sure if I even scored hits), and AntlerOwl Dogface was killed in action, leaving me in command less than a minute after Bravo 2's first enemy contact. Wasn't really what I was planning on for the mission. The fact that we had even moderate survival after that point I'd say is attributable to both the BSL's (I want to say Washington but I'm not certain) good unit coordination, and the fact that both Nimrod and Aquarius were absolutely superb as 'my' fire-team. They really turned something that could have been unpleasant into a wonderful time.

EDIT: Wait, Dogface was my FTL in Lifting the Seige? Huh. I could have sworn it was AntlerOwl. Maybe that was a different round.

[tryteyker]

Bend - MAT Gunner

Yeah so the old quote "I'm not going against Tanks" still counts.

Mission briefing worked out rather well with the CO more giving suggestions rather than absolute orders. I had the glorious idea that awaitz and me could hide behind a small house (turned out to be a shack rather) and advance down slope if needed. The Snipers kept us updated pretty well and it got scary when reports of a T72 and BMP came in. I just laid down at a rock and was quiet as I heard the tank and BMP rattling above us. Our engineers hit the front of the convoy with a mine, and this was my signal, so let's go!
Well. Wait. ArmA was being funny and tried to force me to use my AK against them so I had to take my RPG twice before it worked out. Once I got my RPG, I rushed past a Russian infantryman towards the BTR laying on the road, active, with 6 Russians guarding it. Aim and fire it is.
Again Arma doesn't like me. I sorta shot my feet and not the BTR. Needless to say I died. Awaitz got a bullet to the head afterwards too.

Wideola - TH2 Pilot

Last time I flew a helicopter was 3 months ago guys, you'll be fine!

Starting words from Bodge: "If you crash your helicopter in this mission you'll take everybody with you. No pressure pilots.", very inspiring indeed. 3 guys in the air, Phoenix as TH3, awaitz as A10, and me as TH2. Dream team. Mission briefing went smooth but I didn't really listen to any of it besides "Alpha and Bravo land at LZ Paris". After that I was busy planning my rotation really, but I suppose it went smooth. As we jumped into the mission, regular banter was starting over vehicle chat, with Bravo being mounted in my helicopter. Didn't seem like Alpha had a pilot, so they jumped into my helicopter aswell. At this point I was more worried about having to fly a second rotation because Alpha wouldn't fit in. It actually worked out, and the CO and his JTAC would've fit into my helicopter too, but they decided to go with Phoenix' helo.
We eventually took off and good communication kicked in between me and Phoenix. We tried keeping a good distance from each other (~1km) and that worked out pretty good. As we were mid-flight Alpha lead decided it'd be a good idea to try switch seats, but apparently he fell through the hole of the Chinook or something. I had to ignore him for the time being as the main force was still on board. A few minutes later we closed into the LZ and sorta sucessfully touched down, although it took me quite some time to come to a full stop and it was really risky. Everybody managed to get out though, and I started my rotations. I quickly picked up Alpha Lead meanwhile, and again it was a really hairy landing both times. I went down smoothly at first, but he didn't see me at all. After giving him some directions, he saw me, but I didn't pay attention to my altitude.
Next thing I know, I have a speed of -30 and my altitude climbs rapidly. That's what happens when you don't hold down your helicopter properly. I tried making a quick hover landing afterwards, but it didn't work out. Afterwards I went down completely and thought I mashed him. Oh god the horror, I really thought I just killed him there. But apparently not, and we were off to Alpha's position. the initial plan here was to just land at LZ Paris and let him walk. But somehow, I managed to land right in front of Charlie Squad's line of fire and set Alpha Lead down there. Sorry for that Charlie
Afterwards it was really just hovering and at the end I got the idea to fly low above the enemy, switch to my rear gunner seat, blast away and die. But Arma wouldn't allow me to. So I just sorta hovered above enemy contacts until I somehow got shot in the head by an AI.

All in all it was a really enjoyable session and a huge turn up rate, first time I saw 44 players on Tactical Tuesday.

[dancemoox]

Bend - Charlie 2 AR
Dogface FTL
Ininja123 AAR
Pickers AT without RPG?

We found a place to hide and await death coming down the road, a nice place behind a big safe rock where we could sit and lean in amusing ways to keep our spirits up before the coming tidal wave of death. The plan was for us to wait until the explosions went off then come out from behind the big safe rock and kill anything on the other side. So we waited for explosions and waited a few seconds more before heading to the danger zone. I went prone on the right hand side of the big safe rock and had a nice view and decent cover against the massive assortment of armour that was zipping about. I started singing the songs of my peoples and got the first verse done when some of the armour took notice of my singing and ended me.

Wideola - Bluefor Charlie 2 FTL
Aido AR
Issus AAR
Rosswand AT

I was sitting over the emergency toilet hatch for the ride to the LZ and was sure I'd be either shot out or just randomly fall out, but my fears were unfounded it was a really nice and gentle landing, no broken legs / death for a change. After a quick jog to our staging point where we couldn't see anything I set Charlie 2 off to the east bounding in twos bwtween the trees in the hope that I wouldn't loose anyone going into the woods on the north side of town to enemy fire. As it turned out I didn't take any casualties to enemy fire but to a danger close A-10 gun run. By the time I'd patched up the rest of the fireteam I had to go patch up Dogface who'd been shot by sneaky infiltrators who managed to wound everyone else in Charlie 2. Once everyone was patched up minus Issus who bled out I think we moved to the outskirts of the town and Charlie 2 absorbed what remained of Charlie 1 and Mortars. We cleared the town without much of a fuss but had to go rescue DW who'd been shot in the same woods w'e had just been molested in.. On the sweep back from the town into the woods we lost Dabo the Charlie medic and took a few casualties, popping smoke I carried one of my guys back behind a wall for some healing hand action. With the town cleared and everyone living now patched up as best as we could we headed down to the barns, clearing the potential caches and liberating a Ural for transport. This is where communication broke down a little I had no idea where Dogface was taking us, we drove up to what I think was the remains of Alpha where a grenade exploded in front of our new Ural, Dogface took a bullet or two driving away from there making the front of the cab bloody and difficult to see where we were going. We drove south a little through some trees and into some EI that shot the front cab up killing Dogface and the guy to my left and wounding me badly. I managed to eject and shot enemy that was trying to run away. Once patched up by Nitram, the only surviving member of Mortars it took me a minute to work out where we were and what was happening. With the call going out for satchel charges to blow the nearby ammo dump me and Nitram started out towards the building some 30m away. Making it half way before someone called the A-10 in hot on the building.. We ran back to the Charlie death Ural and were shot by one of the puppiteers to the west. Worst thing was I didn't instantly die, I could hear the footsteps coming closer before I was murdered

Nutcracker - Opfor Charlie AT
Wires FTL
Ininja123 AR
Tad AAR

This mission didn't start out well for Charlie, Tad spawned on the roof of a building and had to leap to his death. Down to three men we went for a little drive in our UAZ and got into position to flank the town from the east. We moved into the town without being spotted and took up positions to take out the guys on the rocks firing RPGs into the tank. All I managed to do was wound some guy on a really steep slope and fire a few potshots at other dudes too far away. The tank blew up and the mission ended with me sitting next to a line of AT mines on the main road..

Lifting the seige - Bravo Medic

I was late in slotting this mission and went medic, when I've been medic in the past I've not had much to do either because I get blown up on insertion to the objective with the SL or because nobody get shot until the end of the mission.. It wasn't like that this time..

We moved nicely to just outside the construction site without a casualty but then we lost a FTL and I patched up a cuttlefish in the street. Making it into the building site I thought it would make a decent field hospital, and went about inspecting the various rooms before deciding on where to set up the triage area and where the visitor waiting room should go. In other words I kept my head down and waited for my services to be needed and it wasn't long. Bravo took another casualty moving up on the warlord tent, I got to him as one of his fireteam friends was touching him inappropriately and deftly fixed his broken body before rejoining Washington for the assault up the hill. It's probably a good thing I did rejoin Washington since he proceeded to get shot twice in probably 30 seconds. It did however allow me to get my jollies touching the SL in ways we dare not talk about... I was called over to Bravo 2 who were all bleeding somewhat and patched up as many as I could, sadly one was beyond my jolly touching skills and was dead upon my arrival. In exchange of the services provided I swiped a M9 off his corpse and headed back to Washington. I had to patch up MMG three times in a row and was also called over to provide healing hands to a guy that was very, very, very dead. I rejoined SL for the push towards the barn and fired my rifle for the first time towards a lone guy across the pond. In looking for another wounded guy to treat, from MAT this time I took a stray round to the back and sadly died. I did however see Washington getting his jollies looting my corpse..

After I died I saw a few guys freeze when someone in there fireteam was wounded, might it be worth doing a first aid workshop at some point? It's honestly got nothing to do with me wanting to touch you all when you are writing on the ground bleeding...

Uprising - Bravo 2 FTL
Greyeric
Rosswand

Armed with a useless makarov I let Rosswand pick people off from afar with the ever so nice Lee Enfield as myself and Greyeric moved into the town to loot the corpses for better weapons. I found an AI standing without a rifle and shot him in the head deciding that bullets may actually cause more damage than throwing the bloody makarov at him after all. Armed with an AKS that I quickly swapped with Rosswand for his Enfield we moved closer to town in a loose formation. I took position with B SL to pick off people from a hill, I managed to kill one guy and give another the 'what for' before the bullets hit me all over the place. Once patched up I moved further into the town patching up the wounded and the dying as I stumbled across them. Usually I would then be wounded and patched up by them and so we moved north through the town in a medic caterpillar fashion. I made a dash for B1 FTL who was crawling back to a safe building, grabbed him and was dragging him back when I got shot. When eventually patched up I found an RPG on a dead guy and grabbed that, and was wounded again, finally I saw Rosswand taken down by a lot of fire. Investigating I saw it was a MG nest at the T junction, I called out for everyone to stop but saw three guys go down as they ran into it's field of fire. I tried to get revenge with the RPG but died leaning out of the alleyway I was in...

[Dogface]

Haha, great writeup Moon. :3

Bend - C2(?) FTL

We holed up behind a rock and discovered we had no AT, so decided to wait a little while and roll around on the floor until it felt like a good time to pop out.

Unfortunately it wasn't actually a good time to pop out as we all got killed!

Wideola - Charlie SL

This turned into an epic mission that I really enjoyed. Playing against AI puppetmasters, we had to clear out a certain number of caches in a relatively well-populated part of rural Chernarus. Inserting to the north by helo, we slogged our way towards a wood overlooking the AO, got mortars set up somewhere safe, and went to the treeline to see what we could see.

It turned out we couldn't see a lot, and at the same time we got word that we were being sent to assault the cache in the relatively-large village of Sosnovka while the other squads handled the woods to the west. I split up the two Charlie fireteams, with C1 heading for a set of walls overlooking the village, while C2, me and the medic wandered into the eastern woods for a flanking attack.

This is when things started to get hairy. Hearing that C1 were getting torn up from the town, I had DW rain down some fire with the 81mm, and also called in an attack run from the A10. The whining growl of the approaching engines and the fizzing of rockets was welcome but the sudden OHGODEXPLOSIONSEVERYWHERE in the woods was less so, as we found ourselves floored by a slightly mis-aimed salvo. As we tried to patch ourselves up we started coming under stronger and stronger assault, so I had everyone gird their loins and pelt their way into the red circle that held the promise (but not the reality) of sweet, sweet cache.

After a little time spent recombobulating ourselves, we got orders to clear Sosnovka, so we ran a quick loop around the town which was indeed full only of dead bodies. At this point the mortar team had shot all their shells, so they were running down to us -- only to get bushwhacked in the same woods that had eaten half of us before. Well since DW had been responsible for so many exciting and useful explosions I decided there was no way we were leaving him behind. I had three of us stay among the buildings and cover us while the rest of us worked our way over to him, and the baddies in the woods shot at us with great fury. I managed to reach DW and start dragging him to safety, with the rest of Charlie throwing smoke, blasting away with great enthusiasm at the woods to suppress the naughty woodsmen, and even giving their lives and legs to get our man back into safety.

Eventually we managed to drag ourselves out of the chaos and behind a sturdy wooden fence, and patched ourselves up. Things seemed to be going badly for the rest of the team, so I decided it was time to get what glory we could, pulled the bedraggled remains of Charlie together, and start to hotfoot it down the rood towards cache O4, at a nearby barn. With a bit of sprinting we managed to find some ground that wasn't being shot at, and quickly cleared the barn - no cache. We did, however, find a rather tasty-looking truck.

At this point all sorts of people were calling out for help and describing some terrible-sounding stuff over CC, so I had everyone pile into the truck and head towards the CO element, who I noticed were coming down towards us from Sosnovka. (NB -- Apologies for not communicating what I was doing to the squad during this part -- it slipped my mind as things were getting so hectic on CC!). Once the CO had hopped in, Alpha and Bravo started clamouring for help and extraction. Bravo bravely waved us off after realising our canvas-topped truck would probably not be a match for all the men with guns they were surrounded by, so we headed up the hill and into the woods to see if we could find the two lone survivors of Alpha.

Feeling somewhat like a Pelican pilot in Halo, I pulled up to the spot marked on the map, but no Alpha was to be found, and they reported they were about 100m away. At the same time a GP exploded nearby and suddenly we were being shot to bits, so I slowly and laboriously turned the trucks tail and ran for it, laughing weeping at the sound of Alpha's plaintive cries as we abandoned them. Revving it pell-mell down the hill, I didn't notice we were headed into the thicket of badmen who had done for Bravo until one of them splattered over my windshield, and then the rest of them filled the truck cab with more holes than a bucket o' holes.

Flippin' great stuff! Despite the sudden encounter it seems like some of the truck occupants actually managed to survive and live on to drive the truck to all sorts of wondrous and magical places filled with bullets and explosions, and even blow up a cache or two, before eventually getting wiped out. Anyway, awesome!

Nutcracker - Nut driver (audiox gunning)

Ebass took on the challenge of trying to get our fragile T90 prototype (no maingun, engine breaks if you go faster than 30km/h) through Falar and to safety in 15 minutes while the other team attempted to stop us. Would they succeed? Oh yes.

Bravo and Charlie were sent hiking into the hills to clear out any ambushes and flank Falar from the cliffs, while Alpha, after a brief detour, moved along the road ahead of us. Driving the tank like a teenager stalling their parents car in the driveway, I managed to burn out the engine almost before getting out of the first village, though this did give the troops time to clear some distance ahead. Eventually we started rolling forward again, encountering a makeshift, bus-based roadblock. This was soon cleared, but as we started rolling past it we took a hit from a rocket (or something that went boom) and hared it backwards along the road, screaming all the way. At this point Audiox decided to catch a breath of fresh air by sticking his head out the hatch, but ended up catching a faceful of hot lead instead.

With time running out and little time left to complete the mission, we eventually had to grit our teeth and go for a head-on charge towards Falar. Unfortunately this went about as well as it always does and we almost immediately got blow up, dashing our hopes and dreams across the floor like the head of a particularly slippery and depressing baby.

Lifting the seige - B2(?) FTL

A shortlived (for me) but sweet test of a new Kale mission. After landing on the Chernarus shore by by boat (btw, did anyone else see the driverless mini-boats ghosting along next to the RHIBs?) we started working our way through Cherno (or Elektro?) to take out some mortars and fortified positions. I think Washington was doing the SLing, and there was some nice neat tactical stuff as we bounded from street to streeet covering eachother. Eventually we neared the construction site and my FT slowly edged around the corner. I saw some men in green uniforms, and wondered whether they were some of the friendly militia we'd been seeing for a second too long as they promptly shot me in my beautiful face. It was quite gratifying to hear, as I fell to the floor in slow motion, a furious burst of automatic fire as my FT performed a RRR (Rapid Reaction Revenge) maneuver and blasted them all to hell in about 0.5 seconds.

From there I got to idly watch on Cuddlefish taking over and accompanying the rest of the team on a largely well-coordinated and tactical, and then at the end briefly bloody and screaming assault on the enemy positions.

Great stuff all round!