Joking aside, I don't see the real advantage of a ten man squad, but five is arguable. If you have ten, and the leader sod's the only heavy body, then you can't really split it into two five man fireteams that are equal. If you have two heavy sods, then is there really any difference from two five man teams, aside from only having one DM/Grenadier/whatever?
You don't need two identical fireteams. The basic unit for deciding ratios is the 10 man squad, a fireteam is just an extremely efficient thing to use in the field, which is why they use it as well in RL. Also, it might be a good idea (if it's 10 men teams) to have two identical leaders, with one being subordinate to the other (though not necessarily as armored) just in case. But, for intents of deciding gear (do we even need to do that in detail?) the 10 man squad would be the basic unit.
I don't think elites would work well in teams. Relative to a battlesuit, they're quite squishy, so they could all be taken out by a single nuke. Considering the value we were gonna put in each one, spending a megaton nuke just to kill one is great for the UWM, let alone a whole team. Beyond that, they're not even all that extra effective in combat, compared to the survivability of a battlesuit.
Well, yeah, that's kinda what I meant: they're more for specific mission objectives than 'general' deployment. Battlesuits work better for the latter. And honestly, even a team wouldn't be more than 3-4 or so, and we shouldn't be sending them into situations where it could happen that they get TPK'd (it can always happen though). Consider it like this: in real life, the special forces are used in coherent teams, getting in, do what needs doing, and getting out again, leaving the brunt of the fighting itself to regular infantry. When you need more punch on the field, you send in the tanks, air support and the like. In a squad of them you could make it so each one has a specialisation that complements each other nicely, thereby (ideally) getting some force multiplication going.
The role I imagined for them is more insurance- that small base that we deployed two ARMies to attack? Turns out it's hiding an extremely advanced research base, and would actually need ten ARMies if we wanted to fully take it. The two elites that are there can't fully take the place, but they might be able to sneak in and sabotage something important while the rest of the troops are attacking, hindering the function of the base somewhat. Since they're away from the action, elites also give us the insurance that they can probably get away if something destroys an ARMy, and hopefully inform us.
A little problem: say that indeed happens, then they have a use. But out of (random numbers) 1000 bases, that may only happen once; So in the other 999 cases, you're wasting potential by letting an elite sit around 'babysitting' the unit.
Another way to put it: I'd rather lose an elite after he's done some missions, than keep one forever that never gets to really do anything he's made for. I think we can get the best return on investment if we keep shuffling those (teams of) elites around, trying to get maximum leverage out of them.
Would an even number like ten really be better?
I'm the kinda guy who likes to put the volume on his tv on an even number, or at least a multiple of 5. Is it silly? Yes, but I find beauty in harmony.
A.Having the minimum amount we can throw around being 250 (or worse, 1000) limits us from really having wide coverage. I don't know how much we're really gonna do, but a minimum of a thousand per planet, in a galactic war, when we're only going to have ten or so thousand a year, seems very... limiting. We might only be fighting on ten or so planets at a time though, which would make that much more practical. Dunno.
A thousand peeps really isn't all that big. It's a scale thing. for reference: on D day the Allied deployed about 150.000 people, and lost 10.000. And that's just for a single continent! Sure, sods are better than the regular human trooper, but still. A thousand dudes for a planet is peanuts. Unless you adhere to the common sci fi trope that an invading army only needs to take and hold the capital city/a single building in order to take over a planet.
Oh, and I'll say it again: on the scale of a universe, we're producing laughably small amount of sods (we really needs to get those instructional vids going). And even if we switched everything to robot sods, it'd still be lacking by a long margin. I mean, how many are we producing per month right now? Let's assume we could produce 50.000 a month . That's 600.000 a year RL.
Right now China, a single nation on a single continent, has about 2,285,000 people in active service. Not a 1-on-1 comparison, I know that, but you get the point.
B.It makes things more complicated. Unless the special groups are like emergency kits, where you can use them three times for any types of wound, but they're useless afterward, we'd want to keep track of what's been destroyed, whether this regiment is without heavy armor, or if this one had most of the infantry taken out, or if this one had the MK.III troops hamstrung... If we do something like using the 50 troop model, then PW can more easily just handwave it away as saying we lost X number of ARMies. Of course, if people(me!) are willing to keep track of those platoons/companies/regiments, you're actually allowed to use them tactically to their full extent, and PW is understanding of how the troops battles work, then it would be good.
I don't think pw would ask us to detail everything, and
certainly not to keep track of everything. It would just ensure that if we deploy one, we could ask for armored regiments or whatever to be deployed, and as long as it's reasonable, I think he'd be ok with it. Remember that the majority of the war will be behind the scenes, especially after what pw learned from Hep defense mission.
Do note that the "leader" isn't really a leader, because sods don't have the depth and variance that a leader implies. So, having the leader in a dangerous position isn't as bad as it sounds. Anyway, that's probably the safest sod, even if it is advancing at the front and taking the brunt of the fire, because it's under two layers of battlesuit plate. Most infantry weapons, which is what it should be facing for the most part, have barely any effect on BS plate.
Then we should hold for a second and decide who will be leading these sods. With leader I thought you meant a special sod that was independent enough to lead a team. Oh, and I'm not sure if we can continue to bank on battlesuit plate being as good and protective as the war progresses and the UWM ups its game.
Also, you used the word "agreeable" in there. That implies you don't merely want my opinion, but my approval. That's silly, you're the boss, and I'm not gonna get angry and sabotage something if you don't like my idea. You should go with what you like and think is effective, and not something that makes the weapon researchers happy.
Yes, I do have the power IC to force my vision on matters like this. But I try
not to. It's more fun that way for everyone (as you said, you're enjoying the discussion, no?). I only try to be dictator if it seems there's an impasse or things are grinding to a halt. Or to deflect blame and frustration to me so other people don't have to squabble (see: money dividing), but shh, don't tell anyone!
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Topic: Hephaestus No Longer Exists: Crater thread. (Read 190890 times)