Red Factories miscellaneous stuff

[jrv]

The 10-3 is a powerful game piece, just like a Tiger tank. As with everything else in ASL, they have to be used carefully. In a balanced scenario having the 10-3 on your side does not mean you win, nor does your opponent having a 10-3 mean he wins. That's what it means for a scenario to be balanced. In Suicide Creek, for example, the marines often have multiple -2 and -3 leaders. The Japanese defense has to take that into account, and if it does, the Japanese will not be overwhelmed by them.

JR

 

[Joelist]

I agree that the -2 and -3 leaders can be problematic in these scenarios, and the reason why is they have the necessary small arms FP available to them to create Death Stars. And this is where the ASL FP model does break down a bit - when you get enough FP the defender TEM stops really mattering. And this runs contrary to history where stone structures (especially fortified ones) either required ordinance to reduce or covering fire for other units to move up and breach with explosives.

Alas in ASL all that happens is your Death Star has 30 FP of small arms which breaks or kills the defenders.

This is where the concept of making all non ordinance/DC/FT fire against fortified buildings area fire comes from - it defuses the Death Stars.

 

[jrv]

I agree that the -2 and -3 leaders can be problematic in these scenarios, and the reason why is they have the necessary small arms FP available to them to create Death Stars. And this is where the ASL FP model does break down a bit - when you get enough FP the defender TEM stops really mattering. And this runs contrary to history where stone structures (especially fortified ones) either required ordinance to reduce or covering fire for other units to move up and breach with explosives.

Alas in ASL all that happens is your Death Star has 30 FP of small arms which breaks or kills the defenders.

This is where the concept of making all non ordinance/DC/FT fire against fortified buildings area fire comes from - it defuses the Death Stars.

Why do you want to "defuse" (an odd metaphor) Death Stars? Roll with the punches. Rope-a-dope. Cost your opponent time when he uses 36 FP down one to obliterate your halfsquad.

JR

 

[Joelist]

Except in these scenarios such punch rolling is impossible. The second you do not have good order units in even one exterior hex of the building the building can be easily entered - circumventing the whole point of fortified buildings.

ASL prides itself on realism. Well this is possibly the single most UN-realistic element in the game system - small arms fire at more than very short ranges is way overpowered.

 

[xenovin]

If you do the conveyor belt of advancing rear concealed units to the front they are subject to area fire while your unconcealed guys fall back behind them to gain concealment and repeat. Also, defending one hex back from the front of a factory building prevents German Death Star prep fire forcing them to either advance into the factory during MPh or APh and subject to doubled Russian FP at 0 or +1 TEM. Or launch a human wave at them from one hex your next turn.

After trying the new RB10 and seeing the Russians being vaporized by German small arms firepower again even with a fortified building I am getting convinced the fortified building rules need to be redone. Ultimately I think the issue is the Germans have two -2 leaders and their fire directions neuters the defensive terrain.

So, in the next playing of RB10 it is time for an experiment. There are currently two candidates which will need to be tried one at a time:

a) Instead of the extra +1 DRM, fortified buildings are still +3 but all fire that is not ordinance, FT or DC is treated as Area Fire.

b) On the RB maps leadership DRMs only affect IFT rolls versus targets where the TEM is 0 or +1.

 

[jrv]

Except in these scenarios such punch rolling is impossible. The second you do not have good order units in even one exterior hex of the building the building can be easily entered - circumventing the whole point of fortified buildings.

If you and 10-3s have a problem, perhaps it's not the 10-3s which are the problem. The 10-3s are just game pieces, numbers printed on cardboard. Just as the queen is not "too powerful" nor "not powerful enough" in chess, the 10-3 is not too powerful nor not powerful enough in ASL. It is a game piece. Use them when you have them. Mitigate their effects when your opponent has them.

ASL prides itself on realism. Well this is possibly the single most UN-realistic element in the game system - small arms fire at more than very short ranges is way overpowered.

ASL prides itself on movie realism. Don't ask what Desmond Doss would do; ask what John Wayne would do.

JR

 

[Joelist]

If you do the conveyor belt of advancing rear concealed units to the front they are subject to area fire while your unconcealed guys fall back behind them to gain concealment and repeat. Also, defending one hex back from the front of a factory building prevents German Death Star prep fire forcing them to either advance into the factory during MPh or APh and subject to doubled Russian FP at 0 or +1 TEM. Or launch a human wave at them from one hex your next turn.

I understand the concept and in some scenarios it can kind of work for a short time. In RB10 there is no time for a conveyor and failing to occupy every hex in the Red House is pointless as there are no blind hexes for the units to go to. Every hex of the building is able to be Death Starred right out of the gate. Even Concealment is insufficient when you're being hit with 32.

I guess the question is "what is the desired representation of fortified stone buildings"? And to me the correct representation is the defender being able to stand toe to toe in the building and trade fire with the attacker either needing PBF, Ordinance, FT or a Breach to gain entrance.

 

[jrv]

I guess the question is "what is the desired representation of fortified stone buildings"? And to me the correct representation is the defender being able to stand toe to toe in the building and trade fire with the attacker either needing PBF, Ordinance, FT or a Breach to gain entrance.

The desired representation is not for fortified buildings, but for SMC. The thesis of ASL is that there are a very few men on the battlefield that have a disproportionate effect on the battle. Exceptional leaders can make exceptional things happen on the battlefield, including against fortified buildings. A 10-3 is an exceptional exceptional leader. Rommel would not have a problem with a fortified building. Patton would not have a problem with a fortified building. A 10-3 will not either.

JR

 

[Brad M-V]

I’ve always thought that a cap on leadership DRM of -1 to IFT DR results should be implemented...but, that’s just me.

I remember you stating that years ago on Consimworld and I agree with your thinking. It bothered me that a leader could strip away even the best of cover with his -3 rating, so I took your suggestion one notch further by never lowering the initial roll below a hard base of 2. (before adding the other modifiers, as normal.) The leader rating keeps the firegroups performance closer to perfection then they'd be otherwise, but a hard base of 2 is the best result any firing unit can achieve (with or without leadership) before all other game modifications.

In short, cover is always cover.

 

[Joelist]

So how exactly would Rommel deal with a fortified building? He would either use ordinance / FT or have his troops breach with explosives. He wouldn't look at the building and somehow guide his riflemen to all fire at one spot that somehow penetrates the stonework (a la Picard directing the fire of the Federation fleet in Star Trek First Contact).

 

[jrv]

So how exactly would Rommel deal with a fortified building? He would either use ordinance / FT or have his troops breach with explosives. He wouldn't look at the building and somehow guide his riflemen to all fire at one spot that somehow penetrates the stonework (a la Picard directing the fire of the Federation fleet in Star Trek First Contact).

That's below the level of abstraction of the game. Patton comes by and says, "make those poor bastards die for their country," and by God it happens. How many seconds per burst does the MG operator use? I don't know that either. Play the game piece as given. If you stop fighting it and work the system, it's fun. If all the units are 4-4-7s and 7-0 leaders, it's not so much fun. You might as well get rid of the leaders and give each side, I don't know, four self-rallies per turn. Or, Risk anyone?

JR

 

[Joelist]

Um....that doesn't even make sense. This is a squad level tactical game that is all about the details - and these are the EXACT type of details it needs to excel in. To be honest it ISN'T fun to be the defender in this situation.

No one is proposing that all the units be homogenized - merely that covering terrain and especially fortified covering terrain be beefed up so it really is cover.

 

[Honza]

Fortified stone buildings have a TEM of +4. There could be another level of fortified building above that which would give them a TEM of +5; perhaps they could be called double fortified and could be placed by using two normal fortified building counters per location.

 

[skarper]

ASL has fossilised as a core system. You are stuck with it for very good reasons. If it kept evolving it would continually shrink its customer base, which is not actually huge anyway.

If restarting with a blank sheet of paper many things could be improved.

IMO no cowering and the morale bonuses of leaders is enough. The IFT drm is too much when it is more than a -1. Close combat drm, ambush drm etc are all reasonable. I think the Japanese leaders are a better model to follow, they raise morale and have smaller DRMs.

Next point....troops who keep their heads down in cover [or even lying prone in open ground] are nearly invulnerable to enemy fire. There should be a mode for troops to 'take cover' at the expense of being able to fire.

A while ago I made my own ASL style game on VASSAL and 'fixed' these and other issues. But I don't expect others to embrace my ideas.

 

[Honza]

I tried the rubble rule a few years ago an found it bothersome,the Russkies essentially die more easily because of the fact that they can't
get back quick enough. If you can't set fire to the factories there are of course other ways...

Singing " On a dry day you can't see very farrr"....

I think that is what Scott found as well. He mentioned it about a week ago.

 

[CTKnudsen]

It's a game that uses design for effect, folks. If you know your opponent has a 9-2 or 10-3 and the ability to form a death star, deal with it! Don't fight from where that stack can see! Use the tools in your toolbox to smoke it in, or OBA it, or shoot it with a tank that is invulnerable to it's massed HMG fire, or just defend from the interior of factories, where you can build fortified interior locations that will enjoy a +2 TEM vs the opponents measly +1. Cover the approaches to all buildings with MGs firing from positions in defilade from the death star's likely locations, so that to get into that factory he's got to get under your wire while moving through a fire lane and some massed small arms fire, and then advance into where you happen to have a HIP set DC anyways.

And the issue with limiting the IFT is that the game then becomes either a shootout, with troops blasting away at each other turn after turn until someone rolls a 2, or noone fires (because effect will be lessened) and everything is decided by CC, during which turn after turn in spent in melee until someone rolls a 2. The greatest thing about ASL is the balance, the fact that the IFT is dangerous enough that moving is risky, but there are mechanisms in place to reward moving, ie the failure to rout rules, encirclement, and so on. It doesn't devolve into nothing but blasting, but moving isn't so easy that it devolves into a total CC-fest.

And there is a mode in which troops take cover at the expense of being able to fire. It's called being pinned or broken.

 

['Ol Fezziwig]

It's a game that uses design for effect, folks. If you know your opponent has a 9-2 or 10-3 and the ability to form a death star, deal with it! Don't fight from where that stack can see! Use the tools in your toolbox to smoke it in, or OBA it, or shoot it with a tank that is invulnerable to it's massed HMG fire, or just defend from the interior of factories, where you can build fortified interior locations that will enjoy a +2 TEM vs the opponents measly +1. Cover the approaches to all buildings with MGs firing from positions in defilade from the death star's likely locations, so that to get into that factory he's got to get under your wire while moving through a fire lane and some massed small arms fire, and then advance into where you happen to have a HIP set DC anyways.

And the issue with limiting the IFT is that the game then becomes either a shootout, with troops blasting away at each other turn after turn until someone rolls a 2, or noone fires (because effect will be lessened) and everything is decided by CC, during which turn after turn in spent in melee until someone rolls a 2. The greatest thing about ASL is the balance, the fact that the IFT is dangerous enough that moving is risky, but there are mechanisms in place to reward moving, ie the failure to rout rules, encirclement, and so on. It doesn't devolve into nothing but blasting, but moving isn't so easy that it devolves into a total CC-fest.

And there is a mode in which troops take cover at the expense of being able to fire. It's called being pinned or broken.

Please. Stop talking sense.

 

['Ol Fezziwig]

Going back to Mark Nixon's earliest articles, one truism in ASL has always been is that nothing is neither insurmountable nor unable to be countered.
I get the apparent frustration but I think the better approach is to look within to improve rather than without. Obsessing over 'realism' or 'details' that don't fit ones' view of what that should be, energies are most productive when channeled into how to mitigate the perceived 'flaw'. Back in the day, before the flood of product and scenarios, there was time-and willingness-for multiple playings of single scenarios. Now, there is also a glut, a glut of pronunciations based on single playings usually followed by dismissals of value, balance.
Honestly, when I was more ASL-active and I'd see a conversation like this, that scenario LEAPT to the top of my must play list...but, then again, I've always been a contrarian.

 

[skarper]

I think the bottom line for me is that ASL is a lousy simulation of WW2 combat at the level portrayed but - for some at least - a very enjoyable game with a large community of people.

Any attempt to 'fix' ASL or even discuss fixing it is doomed. People are mostly happy with what they have.

I am still interested in ASL. I like to see what new modules are being produced and so forth, but I don't play it any more. I think I am not alone in this.

However in no way do I want to spoil the fun others get from their ASL hobby.

 

[Gordon]

It's a problem of infrastructure. Roads, bridges, tunnels, etc. are very expensive and/or time consuming to fix or upgrade because they are entrenched (+2 DRM). Is there no level of terrain that renders invulnerability to small arms fire a la an AFV? Could such an SSR/rule be added to the game like the IIFT heresy which became an official heresy such that players on both sides of the schism no longer kill each other (much)? Could a "super-fortification" (possibly per hexside like hull down or crest status) be designed that grants immunity to small arms (EXC: PBF/TPBF) and penalizes the occupants with area fire penalties and possibly stacking limitations like a breach?

It might be a cool exercise to have the community of developers create/modify some scenarios that test various ways of achieving such a design for effect. Then we'd have more stuff to argue over.

And for the love of god, why are walls indestructible?!?