Three-man Hybrid Support Elements

[fer]

Way I see it, the DC slot is kind of a remnant from the times we didn't have squad leaders, and the leadership of some fireteams had to be delegated. Now, apart from very few particular missions maybe, it doesn't have any use. I'll regularly even, probably stupidly, remove him from the missions I make.

That's a shame, because it doesn't hurt to leave in such an element (unless you are doing something very special with transport); the ORBAT is standardised for a reason. What pubbie missions lock down with scripts, communities can accomplish by asking people not to use certain assets; that enables flexibility, and in turn, re-playability.

So why not go and change him to a Weapons Squad Leader? This would, maybe, act as an incentive to actually use him, even though it's actually just a change of name.

Since F2 v2-7-0 will allow you to create a weapons squad dynamically, the reverse argument is to keep the DC as a wildcard leader, to be re-purposed as the CO requires. Getting too hung up on labels can be limiting.

Regarding the weapons teams, those would also have as a main goal to act as an incentive for squad leaders to go a bit further than the good ol' 1 in the middle, 2 on the right, 3 on the left and we attack this village.

If you rely on the ORBAT to inform the tactics, you risk changes to it simply swapping one standard approach for another. What's healthier, in my view, is to encourage SLs to think more about how they employ their fireteams in concert depending on the situation. Perhaps the workshops will address this topic some day soon.

I'm also aware that, for once, what I'm proposing here is reducing the flexibility. Hence the idea of making it some kind of alternate Orbat, chosen by the mission maker, while most of the missions would retain the standard Orbat.

Mission makers are volunteers, so it would be hard to restrict missions using such an ORBAT to just 'a proportion' of those created. From the perspective of F2, it would also create yet another build to maintain, document and communicate - please don't underestimate the amount of work involved with those tasks (for devs, hosts and players).

Still, the ORBAT evolved in response to greater player numbers. It might evolve again - whether in concrete ways, or as a series of dynamic patterns that come into use organically post F2 v2-7-0. The fact that this conversation is happening is great!

[Ferrard Carson]

Awesome discussion to have spawned off of this! I hope no one's hopes (or fears) got raised too high - let me re-iterate that it's mostly just theory-crafting. To address some specific points:

1) Mamba's suggestion of a weapons fire-team and weapons squad is actually very much in line with what the author of "Rethinking the 'Rifle' Platoon" had in mind, but the real life reasons for that doctrinal shift don't present themselves in-game. The Marine Corps is evolving that way due to the reality of combat in the Afghani hills and mountains, where fire is generally laid by CSW's or snipers at ranges of 600m or more. In the typical FA mission, engagement ranges are within 300m, 400m at an extreme, a distance easily covered with a standard rifle, so there's really no reason for us to introduce more longer-ranged weapons to the mixture.

2) Kefirz's notion that what we have is good and there's no need to fix what ain't broke is really quite accurate. The F2 orbat is the way it is because it really does work. He also highlights that key item in my "Cons" list, which is that the three-man team's ammo-man / spotter is not as effective at his job as the ammo-man / spotter of a two-man team. As a side note: TK Army getting SPGs as an HAT option does make sense - the usual difference between MAT and HAT assets are whether it's mounted or not (Javelin and improvised Metis non-withstanding).

3) The thought experiment was not of adding to existing teams, but of collapsing two existing support teams by doubling up the ammo-man / spotter to serve the same role for both the MG and AT. When I say Crew-Served Weapon, I don't mean just tripod-mounted guns or launchers, but also MMG's, which are not as effective at their maximum range without a spotter, and shoulder-launched MAT / HAT, which really needs an ammo-mule to be effective beyond one or two shots.

4) Designated Marksmen simply aren't needed in the rifle-range environment that FA missions are almost always set in. Snipers are just really-ineffective overkill in most FA missions (Moonless is the only one where I've seen snipers used properly for recon and support), and if you can snipe well enough to make snipers effective in a typical FA combat situation, then you can definitely hit that same target with an aim-pointed -16 and two shots instead of one.

5) Fer has a very good point about the Platoon Sergeant being able to squad-lead a sub-section, and that's probably something I should have specifically planned for in Rebound once it was clear we had such a large support section that we could form an impromptu "Weapons Squad." The 2-7-0 group-switch is now something I eagerly await, and not just for the alarmingly common situation where I'm squad lead of a squad of 4 (including myself) none of whom have one another on STHud ^^;;;

~ Ferrard

[Black Mamba]

Points taken, Fer.

Ferrard, I'm well aware that what I developped as my idea was not at all the same thing you pointed out yourself.
I'm also well aware it doesn't apply to most of the existing missions (at least the weapons team part). It's more of a concept directed to mission makers in a case it would be actually applyable, if not even the core of the mission (and this has been done, see that Spetsnasz mission RedSnow, which displays a totally modified orbat and loadouts). The weapons squad, on the other hand, I'm pretty sure it applies everywhere, even though Fer appears to be right and the DC can handle that without any issues.
As a side note, please see the difference between an hypothetic DM, organic to the fireteam, whose sole aim is to direct fire and provide accurate suppression from mid-range, and a sniper team, which is a platoon asset and works independantly. Weapons, tactics, results, fun, are not even remotely the same. In my idea, it could even be replaced by a simple rifleman with binos and a backpack, and that wouldn't change much. The goal here is not to add in terms of range (granted, the Smaws does a little, but the Mk48, with the short barrel, won't do you much good), but in terms of punch and firepower for squad organic support.

Regarding our 'experience' from sunday. If it clearly worked out pretty well (well, at least until that rock ate our HMG) having that three men support team, I'm pretty sure It'd have been at least as good hadn't Rawrnix tragically died at the beginning. On the other hand, it does show that in case of non-sufficient player-count, merging two teams into one can actually work out.

[Kefirz]

2) Kefirz's notion that what we have is good and there's no need to fix what ain't broke is really quite accurate. The F2 orbat is the way it is because it really does work. He also highlights that key item in my "Cons" list, which is that the three-man team's ammo-man / spotter is not as effective at his job as the ammo-man / spotter of a two-man team. As a side note: TK Army getting SPGs as an HAT option does make sense - the usual difference between MAT and HAT assets are whether it's mounted or not (Javelin and improvised Metis non-withstanding).

Oh, I thought you meant this as a MAT, I can understand SPG's as HAT's sure, it's just you had stuff like RPG's and MAAWS for other factions and I got a bit confused (Looking back, the TOW is also an another odd one). It seems weird because some of those teams have MAT weapons and some of them HAT, not to mention the difference between a TOW against a RPG, heck even against a MAAWS and a SPG. And yet they ''count'' as the same type of a team.