Which do you prefer in RB/RO Booby Traps Or High San?

Gunner Scott

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Howdy

So having played alot of RB, I find as the Russians keeping the Russian SAN up to be a suckers bet, instead I could use that 1 CPP to buy FPP's or bank it for maybe engineers down the road. With Booby traps on the other hand, once you get it to level a/b it will rarely go down and the benefits I think are that much more powerful, IE a kill stack gets hit with a PTC, now 7 units (6 HS + SMC) have to roll and the possibility of rolling an 11 or 12 is pretty darn good. Whereas a sniper is random and sometimes you might not even effect anything all game. Or if you do effect something, it lands on a stack of units and if does not take out the SMC, then expect sniper checks with the possibility your SAN being reduced, a wasted CPP in my opinion. So which do you Campaigners prefer: High SAN or Booby Traps?
 

commissarmatt

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You make a good point. I haven't played RB/RF/RO very much, but it seems reasonable that booby traps might be a more efficient expenditure.
 

Gunner Scott

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If a booby Trap hits a stack of units, it can do serious damage if multiple ties are attained, where as a sniper lands on a stack, it might break a unit, perhaps take out a leader but usually what happens is you break a squad and everybody else does a sniper check and 90% of the time reduces that SAN #. I played one game where the Germans had upped their SAN to six only to see it get reduced to 3 by SAN checks, thats 3 CPP's gone.So personally, buying SAN up is a suckers bet either way.

You make a good point. I haven't played RB/RF/RO very much, but it seems reasonable that booby traps might be a more efficient expenditure.
 

Eagle4ty

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Get the booby-traps up to "A" as fast as you can then concern yourself with the wisdom of increasing your sniper. As Scott pointed out the threat of Sniper Checks is high given the good chance of stacking in RB/RO terrain and also the RePh may take away the purchase anyway.
 

witchbottles

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SAN - make it higher, every time. If its a choice of CPPs and wher to spend them, spend them on SAN increases first.

Booby traps only occur on opponent's TC DRs and nothing else. SAN activation dr's occur on any opponent IFT/IIFT,TH,MC or TC DR. the capability for a SAN 1 or 2 dr effect is exponentially higher from increasing SAN # over increasing Booby Trap levels.
 

jrv

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Bobby traps? I'm not getting it.

8029

IEDs against a bicycle seem a little unfair.

JR
 
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Gunner Scott

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True a good SAN can be helpful, but I have played in games where my SAN activated maybe once or twice in an 8 turn game, then in the refit phase you get screwed even further by your SAN going down if the dr is high. With booby's when it does hit, it can be devastating plus it might not break a unit but even better, it CR's them or wounds the leader. Much better then SAN I think.

SAN - make it higher, every time. If its a choice of CPPs and wher to spend them, spend them on SAN increases first.

Booby traps only occur on opponent's TC DRs and nothing else. SAN activation dr's occur on any opponent IFT/IIFT,TH,MC or TC DR. the capability for a SAN 1 or 2 dr effect is exponentially higher from increasing SAN # over increasing Booby Trap levels.
 

Craig Benn

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Boobies definitely.

It's not just the TCs - it's an additional 1 in 6 chance everytime a search Dr is made. Useful synergy with set DCs. If he looks for them, risk of additional search casualties, if he doesn't boom.

Also you can swap 10ap mine factors for one level of booby traps in a geoboard scenario. Worth considering.
 

Eagle4ty

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Boobies definitely.

It's not just the TCs - it's an additional 1 in 6 chance everytime a search Dr is made. Useful synergy with set DCs. If he looks for them, risk of additional search casualties, if he doesn't boom.

Also you can swap 10ap mine factors for one level of booby traps in a geoboard scenario. Worth considering.
I just learned (or relearned:unsure:) a nice little tidbit!?
 

witchbottles

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True a good SAN can be helpful, but I have played in games where my SAN activated maybe once or twice in an 8 turn game, then in the refit phase you get screwed even further by your SAN going down if the dr is high. With booby's when it does hit, it can be devastating plus it might not break a unit but even better, it CR's them or wounds the leader. Much better then SAN I think.
a SAN can CR/ wound or kill a leader also. The fact is that Booby traps will ONLY work if an opponent Task Check DR is rolled ( or a search dr 1 in 6 chance I agree). The SAN fires whenever the opponent rolls a Morale Check, a Task Check, an IFT Attack DR, a To hit DR. Booby traps cut the exposure to casualties down to only 1/4th of the capability of a SAN, and the SAN has a much higher probability at 4 or 5 or even 6, than a Booby trap does on an 11 or a 12. at SAN levels 5 and 6, the probability is much higher than even Booby Trap "A" with 11 or 12 TC DRs triggering the Booby traps

I choose to play for the larger threat to the German forces, myself. a Higher SAN is always the larger threat probability. That only increases in a RB/ RF CG where 2 SAN counters are on map instead of one.
 

Robin Reeve

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If the Martinsofen is in play, with its special Russian snipers which may activate on a 3 dr, a good SAN could be an interesting option.
 

Sparafucil3

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boobies don't work if all you do is "assault move.... next .... assault move.... next..... assault move.... next.... ad infinitum." :D
It depends on how good your advancing fire phase is. My CC game is strong. -- jim (sadly, my CC rolls are bad for my "opponent" but it works for me)
 

Philippe D.

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At best, a SAN will activate on 1 DR out of 18 of the opponent's eligible DRs - that's with SAN 7 (1 out of 6). Half of that will be Pin results - not bad, but circumstantial, unless you hit a leader.

Booby Traps will only hit on opponent's TCs, but with the maximum rate, they will hit one TC out of 12 (DR 11-12), and with hard casualties - Casualty Reduction, or Wound on SMCs.

What proportion of a player's (Sniper eligible) DRs are TC? I suppose VASL could be hacked to provide a rough estimate... my guess would be something like one in 6, maybe one in 10, so that Booby Traps would hit roughly half or a third as much as "1" SAN attacks (assuming maximized SAN and BT, again).

But then, high BTs only have a 1 in 6 chance of decreasing during RePh, where high SAN, even withouth Sniper Checks, will decrease much more often (1 in 3 if SAN 5, 1 in 2 if SAN 6), so maintaining maximized Booby Traps wil have a much lower cost.

Oh, and Booby Traps will always hit in the Location where the Task Check occurred, where SAN can become stuck in rear areas of the battlefield where they are less useful - while Locations with TCs are almost often front line.

The other factor is that Snipers tend to strike when the opponent is doing good, while Booby Traps hit when he's doing badly. But on large CG fights, this should pretty much even out.

Me, I'd go with the Booby Traps. Actually, I'd probably go for both, though probably stopping at SAN 5.
 

Robin Reeve

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An argument in favour of the Booby Traps is that they hit units which are up front most of the time, where a Sniper can be attacking units in the rear (unless you spend one activation to reposition them next to units up front).
 
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