Please leave feed back, stories or videos about the event here.
Kinda frustrating from my pov in alpha 2, loved the terrain but I felt we didn’t plan it well, and took steep and unrealistic routes.
We remained too still at times when mortars were a danger, and often neglecting our safety. I felt Churizo didn’t delegate to his FTLs enough and made some questionable decisions concerning our formation and position in relation to enemy installations and known positions, but I can’t blame him entirely because i’ve been told platoon net was just nothing but talking all night.
So either the overall plan was badly coordinated, or squad lead was distracted or was caught like a rabbit in headlights sometimes, but it’s his second rodeo so I don’t blame him. I do think we all need practice with formations, so we can easier adapt into other ones in seconds, and squadleads should get used to them and not be afraid to change it up. They also gotta rely on their ftl’s autonomy a bit more. Really they shouldn’t get flustered by commanding every member of a squad but just by commanding two… The FTLs. You can imagine you’re a three man squad, but two of those men have 4 pairs of eyes and arms holding different weapons
What really irritated me was that we got pounded by mortars and didn’t move, and also that we did wreckless things like crest hills and abandon the defile, or remain stationary on the side of a hill in direct view of an enemy fortification. Not good! Caused extreme losses in the end, and so many injured that there weren’t enough people for security as we patched them all up. I even snapped a picture of FOUR numpties on the exposed side of a hill all with their binoculars out, only saved by the grace of GM and by the fact that the guys in installation that could have destroyed them were facing the wrong way.
Zeus:
[youtube]l7rmqWupSug[/youtube]
I’m going to partially agree with Price, the coordination or the movement plan itself went very bad considering the whole Alpha squad was walking on a ravine leading to bad formations (leading to bad security and sector covering) and ineffective fire response. Once retreating from the first peak we simply stayed on the side of the mountain with little to do other than taking mortar rounds, speaking of which I consider legit since we kept being bunched up for a good half an-hour.
As for squad leadership [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/3749902/avatar/small.1500023987.jpeg” name=“Churizo”]3749902[/user] I’d like to suggest to have your fireteams less tied together and more independent, telling FTLs what their task is, tonight I had the feeling of us suggesting what to do sometimes.
Anyways thanks Zcribe for the mission!
Thanks for the video Zcribe now I know about all the pltnet comms I missed. DMT proved how awesome they were with the hunt IR recon up the hill, best scouting ever. Also for some reason I kept thinking of a certain Kate Bush song during this mission.
[youtube]wp43OdtAAkM[/youtube]
I would disagree to an extent with Henrik and Price concerning the leadership (p.s. Price, you were Alpha 1, not 2). I kind of understand Churizo’s point of view, the terrain itself was extremely limiting to our maneuvers, Churizo did alright but I do agree that once the first tower was erased there was a bit too much standing around while being clumped up. But I think this was more of an issue at the Platoon level, people trying to figure out what’s next and where to send whom. The assault on the main compound should have been initiated the moment the T-55A patrolling it was destroyed. Also I agree with MAT regarding their use, they should have been ordered to strike several targets with Airburst shells to allow the teams to go forward.
Also I’m not sure but I think DMT member got killed when the first tower went down (correct me if I’m wrong), my team was in the tower when the mortar strikes started, I immediately ordered my fire team to run outside and we all survived. The rule of thumb in buildings should be: "It’s better to run outside and risk dying to a mortar, than staying inside and ensuring you will die when the building collapses."
The lack of aggression hit us badly, especially during the second mortar strike. I wanted us to hug the enemy compound, precluding mortar fire as then the enemy would risk friendly fire that way (Stalingrad style) we stayed back and suffered casualties. I was saved from the mortar fire by the fact that seconds earlier I had told yellow team to crest the plateau and get to the wall with me leading the way. Shails got killed while Tropical and Hadassa got badly mauled and we had to do life saving medical procedures, things got so bad I had to give Hadassa CPR (I KISSED A GIRL AND I LIKEEEED IIIIIT). The thing that pissed me off is that our squad medic was attached to DMT for some unknown reason, and that’s the biggest failure of the mission.
Then during the clearing of the compound we got separated by machinegun fire from the third compound so alpha ended up being mixed during the house clearing which I don’t mind since CQB was good and we ended up clearing it with no difficulty.
So to summarize. Churizo did a good job, but I do agree he didn’t allow for Fire-team autonomy to the degree that we’re all used to, and at times he lacked aggression. But both can be chalked up to this being his second time as SL. Aggression comes with confidence and experience. All in all, I think he led the team well.
Really liked the mission. It was straight forward with no gimmicks and pretty fun. The first 1-1½ hours were a bit boring but the rest had a good amount of action. I also loved the loadout. <3
The leadership seemed pretty good. Teddy did a really good job leading Bravo and Dulabu was an excellent FTL. I also loved the teamwork between Flo and Ryujin (AR and AAR) spotting and suppressing targets. For me that it just one of the nice things about only having 1x scopes.
The only thing I was dissapointed about was that we didn’t use MAT more. It seems like we’re always scared to use MAT for anything else than armor which is a shame. Either we need to just use them or mission makers have to be more specific about amount of armor to expect in a mission.
A point I would quickly like to make is that I don’t think we should use any DLC assets until we make it official that you need a specific DLC to play the mission. The use of a DLC helicopter at the end was pretty unnessecary when we have a mod helicopter that looks almost exactly the same. It just gives an annoying pop up thing for the guys who doesn’t have the DLC which isn’t very nice for potential recordings and as far as I know it prevents some for jumping in the pilot/gunner seat if nessecary.
Anyways very lovely mission, thanks Zcribe! :*
I enjoyed the mission too, the terrain was very interesting & it was good fun trying to use it to our advantage. I also really liked the loadouts, always nice to fire an FAL with a good 7.62 NATO round ; plus it gave a us a bit of a challenge on conserving ammo which almost never happens with 5.56.
Despite a few radio problems, the communication in Bravo squad was good. B1 & B2 supported each other well. I also liked the overall 360 security. We got attacked from the flank twice but were able to overcome the enemy & pull out the exposed element (B1 both times ahah) rapidly thanks to quick movement & supporting fire.
[user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/9240990/avatar/small.1579262273.jpeg” name=“Teddy”]9240990[/user] 's leadership was great & I had a good time being one of his FTLs. Thanks to [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/13750996/avatar/small.1434401605.png” name=“Shails”]13750996[/user] , [user avatar=“https://s3.amazonaws.com/files.enjin.com/821401/site_logo/small.png” name=“Mother”]18447842[/user] & [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/7849506/avatar/small.1590497467.png” name=“Seb”]7849506[/user] who did an awesome job in B1 !
Thanks a lot for the mission [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/16558368/avatar/small.1471276874.jpeg” name=“zcribe”]16558368[/user] !
First of all I would like to thank Zcribe for the mission and thank everyone in squad. As for the feedback let me clarify my thinking during the operation.
Starting from the beginning I do agree that the movement and formations could’ve been better. In my defense the terrain was very difficult to maneuver around in, If we would’ve taken a "realistic" route we would’ve been walking in the open or we would’ve been walking for 2 hours. In hindsight a squad column would’ve made more sense on the side of that hill.
Regardless I will refresh the squad formations if I intend to SL again.
Micro-managing FT’s is definitely something that wen’t wrong there (I guess I did get used to playing FTL so please give me some time to get used squad tactics). However when assaulting the compounds there really wasn’t a safe position where one of the fireteams could’ve provided support for the other one so I did what I thought was right and kept the squad together as we moved in.
After taking the first compound we started taking mortar fire and I immediately told you to get off of the crest and move around. The reason we sat still for such a long time afterwards didn’t really have anything to do with me. I asked Shakan multiple times what he wanted us to do next but he was preoccupied with the mess on PLT NET.
Just before we took the very accurate mortar fire we were moving to assault the main compound when we were asked to provide suppression on what I thought was the mortar position. That was my call earlier in spotting that bunker as a mortar position but obviously it wasn’t. So you can imagine that I was caught with my pants down when the mortars started landing right on us! I shouted over the radio for everyone to move up to the wall of the compound multiple times but either there was a glitch with ACRE or everyone was preoccupied with getting cover. It took us way too long to get out of that little forest and up to the wall. I think I even saw 2 guys doing medical stuff in the forest still.
Keep in mind that your feedback is very well grounded and I’m not trying to prove you wrong. This is just how I saw things, I noted everything down and will try to keep it in mind.
About the mortar strike to end all mortar strikes, I heard your order and charged towards the compound but as we did a mortar landed near the fireteam, and they were badly injured and couldn’t move. Henrik I think tried to apply some torniquets but a mortar landed right on his back. I myself nearly lost an arm, but was lucky to dive between two rocks when the next few shells landed… As the mortar landed almost right on top of me I was very lucky to have that cover… I ran back to get them but then another mortar landed on us. Presumably the one that turned Henrik into a fine mist.
I chanced it a final time trying to get the survivors to follow me and yelled at them to come quick to the wall, but another mortar landed directly on them, and only alex survived, extremely close to death. Eventually he dragged himself over but he had to apply some torniquets first as he was losing blood fast, I would have picked him up and carried him but I don’t like to do that while someone is concious in case they glitch out.
Mission was ok. Accurate mortar fire after 2 shots DMT shots are bs. DMT wasn’t used as a scouting element but rather as a supporting element and were not put on OW. Which was a mistake. We could have taken out mortars before any serious damage was dealt if we were acting as a scouting element.
I liked the terrain and the weather details. Fog was bad when we were lower. But higher up it was good 
Amount of enemies was a bit low unfortunately.
I suggest one training points for squad/FT leaders: If under artillery/mortar fire,or you suspect it is likely, then move in a spread out formation and move quickly. If you must bunch up for an attack prepare out of sight of enemy spotters and move very quickly to get close to the enemy.
A general point for training of everyone. If wounded and under fire keep moving until in good cover, good cover from artillery/mortars is not behind a tree next to where the last shell hit. Only stay in one place if you cannot move or have been wounded in the majority of your body and may die before reaching cover.
Thanks for the feedback guys. Descriptive feedback is what helps me improve the missions so thank you again for anyone who took the time to write out their thoughts. Just the debrief is hard to keep in memory for future missions. I hope the video is able to give some insights to players from the zeus side as well as just the high command level. Overall I hope most of you had fun and those who didn’t at least did not feel like you misspent your time of relaxation.
I would like to say that I hope more people would be willing to have a go at leadership roles. Being on the sidelines doesn’t disqualify opinions but does make one forget how hectic the situation actually is for leadership. Besides that [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/17713582/avatar/small.1552514282.jpeg” name=“Shakan”]17713582[/user] weirdo keeps playing PTL.
One thing I would like to ask is about the aggressiveness of mortar units. I stepped up the mortar ability a bit. What do you think is a good blend of threat vs fun gameplay? Was this mission too much, too little or just enough?
After viewing the video from your point Zcribe I would say that concerning mortar some of those rounds are really unfair. I think that Zues mortars should never be placed with players inside the orange ring. It just seems unfair to me as it’s basically just a random death that the player can’t avoid. Even if this is based on a "Well they’re not moving quick enough" idea. Therefore I would say that the mortar use was quite too much. I never felt it in the mission though as I think Alpha and DMT received all the mortars.
Remember that as a Zeus your sole purpose is to let the guys on ground have fun. It’s more fun to die if you get time to react to the threat. By that I of course don’t mean that Zues shouldn’t use mortars, but you can still get killed by mortars outside the orange ring from shrapnel. The difference is that shrapnel offers you ½ a second to get behind cover or on your belly. That means if you die from it you learn. You don’t learn much from catching a mortar round with your face though other than Zues didn’t like you that day 
To recap I think the mortar is allowed to be aggressive as long as it’s fair. Go ahead and rain down a ton of boom booms on us just as long as you don’t do it to kill.
B1 took a few mortar rounds after securing an enemy entrenched position & I thought that was logical. No one was hit but it was a fair warning & we moved away quickly. I even it could have been a bit more severe since we already knew there was an active mortar position in the area & so staying too long in an exposed spot was very dangerous. I can only speak for that single experience though.
On mortars again when the rounds kept coming I thought [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/16558368/avatar/small.1471276874.jpeg” name=“zcribe”]16558368[/user] wanted to teach us a lesson on "anti-bunching techniques" and it is legit in my opinion to force players to disperse and actually assume a tactic behaviour, the problem on this mission was that we had no cover at all to hide behind. I died because one round severely wounded me and I couldn’t move fast enough to avoid the round that killed me, I’m not mad because we were a bit static and it can be a nice memo to disperse.
I get you were trying to teach us a lesson. It may look bad on his video but if I was in his situation, I would want to punish players for bad decisions so they don’t make them again…
Besides mortars can be survived if you manage to put cover between you and it. If hard cover, trenches or sandbags are available, or a squad endures repeated bombardment and still has no sense of urgency, don’t be afraid to drop mortars next to people,
You can control the flow of the mission a bit more by adding cover to the map, which will cause their adaptive planning to incorparate the route, and allow them a bit more survivability and gusto in assaulting. If they don’t use the cover its their own fault. Crawling fire is a good method of getting them to wake up and move. That said I had trouble hearing the telltale sounds that give a way a mortar strike that mission… perhaps it has been changed.
As [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/9240990/avatar/small.1579262273.jpeg” name=“Teddy”]9240990[/user] and his friends can attest, I have dropped mortars within spitting distance of him and his team in a mission where they had no body armour and they took no casualties from them thanks to their trenches and their low profile. They may have got a little PTSD though.
I never try to kill people with any sort of arti if I am controlling it. The sound of mortars coming down is enough to disperse people if you want it solely for teaching them a lesson. When I died because of my controls being stuck by a mortar it made me salty for a minute because the mortar was dead on on me and I couldn’t move at all.
Sorry guys, but I’m gonna call bullshit on that, after seeing Zcribe’s video (I couldn’t attend the mission). The rounds should have been slower (spotting+calibrating+travel time = ~40-80sec, not 20sec), but that’s about it.
- Mortar accuracy in this mission
First, it’s very reasonable to expect any mortar team to pre-zero to specific landmarks; hills, valleys, any known "friendly" positions (towers), etc. [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/12591864/avatar/small.1526326563.jpeg” name=“Dachi”]12591864[/user] even taugh us, multiple times, that, when we take over a position, we should never linger for longer than we have to if mortars are suspected to be in the area exactly for this reason. Yet some of our troops returned to the top of the hill like nothing happened and didn’t take much hint from the landing shells.
Watching the entire thing from the opfor commander PoV while assuming an artillery observer present in the other tower, all of the mortar strikes make perfect sense. You could have been easily seen from the other tower (as DMT, as other units). Yet DMT was so incredibly stupid enough to return back to the same position that got mortar’d a minute prior with fairly accurate shells. Granted, you might have thought those were random rounds, but - again from the opfor commander PoV - you just returned to the same spot where he ordered a prior strike, so the followup strike was much quicker and more accurate.
The hard reality is that artillery is a really powerful force if used right and we, in this community, aren’t used to that. We treat mortar like minor inconvenience because:
- Usage of mortars in general
GMs are too afraid to use fire support "realistically". I never understood the "unfair" argument and why we historically "banned" them - you are just as likely to randomly die from suppressive fire, sniper fire, CAS gun run, or grenades / rifle grenades / RPGs. While in a vehicle, you can get HEATed from a hill while being a passenger, AA’d from the air, or simply run over a mine. So much, in fact, that it becomes impossible to define "unfair death" beyond disconnect.
How is a mortar shell any different than the things mentioned? In all of them, you can somehow reduce the chances of your death happening (by not being in a vehicle, being in hard cover, staying out of hot AO), including mortar strikes. Mortars are almost never random and can be fairly well predicted - just think of what you’d mortar if you were the mortar team … probably not the middle of a random forest.
One could argue that the problem is GM actually placing down mortars and deciding "these guys are going to die", but you have the same situation with GMs doing remote control and firing back at players, using sniper rifles and long-range RPGs or even just placing the suppression module on a particular FT. All of these increase the chances of players dying, none of them are guaranteed to kill.
In summary, I don’t think mortars should be treated as something sacred. I don’t want us to become even bigger pussies than we are. If I die to a random mortar because I was, by chance, at a wrong place at a wrong time, so be it - it will be like one of those times when I got hammered from 900m away by HMG. If I keep constantly dying from systematic mortar strikes, I probably suck and need a better strategy. That’s what’s in it for me - getting better, on the tactical level.
If random public server players can do it, as proven time and time on one youtuber’s zeus streams, why wouldn’t we?
And if it seems too much, if you didn’t bring any combined arms, didn’t request anything in the Planning thread, didn’t have another squad on another hill, didn’t have MAT to take down the tower, didn’t have mortars of your own, rifle grenades to pepper the base with, … have you ever considered aborting the mission, to take a different approach?
[user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/16558368/avatar/small.1471276874.jpeg” name=“zcribe”]16558368[/user]
- I think Artillery Fire didn’t work because the mortar units are LOP-specific ones … if you used vanilla mortars and put the faction units inside instead, the mortar classname would have remained vanilla and Ares would have found it
- Use the "Watch" action to ie. make the tank turret (or HMG) watch a specific location (hill), even when moving
- Suppress (bis) doesn’t work on ground anymore, only on units, use the suppresive target + order suppressive fire … or the ACE version
(I don’t know, I wonder if 2 missions per week isn’t too much, IMHO we don’t have the time to plan properly and just take the standard assets and standard approach and you know the saying about having a hammer and everything looking like a nail.)
This is my only problem with it. Maybe I shouldn’t have used the word unfair. From a realism point of view I totally agree with you. Then it’s totally fair.
Let me explain it in another way. When I play a mission I want it to be us against the AI. Not us against Zeus. Now that’s a really hard balance to achieve. That’s why I don’t like when Zeus listens in to coms, when Zeus exploits weak points in a formation on purpose, attacks a side that is not covered just to teach a lesson or decides that someone is going to die by putting a mortar round on him. Then we’re fighting Zeus and that’s not something I’m interested. Then if we take that from a realism point of view I’ll call the bullshit with you.
For me Zeus is there to sparkle some glitterdust onto an already made mission. Then other people might wish other things from Zeus. That is luckily why we have different people playing as Zeus. I’m just stating my view as Zcribe asked for it.