Right, after 3 years of games and having been to pretty much every training day, plus others before WWII started, I can confidently state that we all have the best of intentions and try to make the drills we practice work, but immediately we get into contact it all goes out of the window.
Why?
Because we are trying to work in fire teams that are too big for airsoft.
Here is an example of a typical exercise we did at Op Impromptu last year. Two 6 - 8 man teams were tasked with attacking about 6 enemy. The modus operandi was the usual fire and move, Able suppressing while Baker moves up in bounds and so on. It all seems theoretically sound and should work, but consider the following points.
Our toy guns only have an effective range of about 35m (actual metres, not elite airsoft pro exaggerated range metres which are roughly equivalent to a foot).
Let's assume the engagement starts at extreme range, 40 to 50m when people start to feel "in danger".
Each soldier has a spacing of say 3m from the next man. That gives our 6 man team a frontage of about 15m.
Allow a bit of space between the teams and you have a total frontage of say 40m.
When Able are set to advance, Baker must attempt to suppress all the enemy.
The problem is, Baker team are unlikely to be able to engage the enemy on the extreme flank - they may well be completely out of range! Note also that most of our games occur in dense woodland - further reducing the chances of even spotting the enemies facing the other fire team.
See my attached diagram which illustrates this issue and hopefully makes it much clearer. For anyone interested it is at 1:250 when printed at A3.
I trust everyone will have to agree there's a serious hurdle here to using real world tactics. I'm all for the training days and the realistic drill etc - it's fun. However, I do believe that to make it work in a game, we need to divide our rifle section into smaller units of say 4 people maximum and fire and advance in pairs. That is, use the same tactics, but on a smaller scale.
Well, I'd agree Barrie - I've never really seen the squad thing work beyond the first 30 seconds of a game and its usually completely forgotten about by the end of the day (that's why CiA events have never had fixed squads & fire teams and been more fluid and ad-hoc). Nice to see some theorising though, good to rationalise these things!
In the real world everything works at a tenth of the speed and at ten times the range (to use the word 'tenth' loosely) - probably rarely even seeing the enemy clearly. (How much archive footage have you seen that includes both sides unless one has surrendered!)
I trust everyone will have to agree there's a serious hurdle here to using real world tactics. I'm all for the training days and the realistic drill etc - it's fun. However, I do believe that to make it work in a game, we need to divide our rifle section into smaller units of say 4 people maximum and fire and advance in pairs. That is, use the same tactics, but on a smaller scale.
Observe the Jed and SAS at the weekend teams to see if this works! 3 and 4 man teams respectively.
Or maybe real world tactics do work, but we're just not very good at doing them 
I'd have thought so.
I'm not from a military background, but isn't the 4 man "brick" the standard for close country/built up areas these days? (do correct me if I am wrong)
Apart from the range issue, we have a hell of a lot more automatic fire than any WW2 section would (well, not counting soviet SMG companies) and much larger capacity magazines, which I 'feel' would change the dynamics significantly (mainly due to a lack of skirmishable and affordable bolt action weapons).
Therefore, with the different capabilities of our tools at hand, we will have to adjust how we work to the capabilities of those tools rather than make the fit in with period tactics.
As a table top wargamer I default to the idea that with ranges compressed, unit scale should change. Say a 4 man team acting as a section, 2-4 sections acting as a platoon, more than one platoon acting as a company.
If you are not a tabletop wargamer used to this idea it can be a bit freaky to take in. But figure wargamers do it all the time. Usually a platoon size unit of about 48 figures with a few heavy weapons being an in game battalion for many WW2 systems (the legacy basis that 48 figures is what you get in one box of Airfix figures so 1 box = most of your battalion)
This will mean that our 20-40 a side games will 'in effect' company level actions. If your thinking gear struggles to cope, think of it as very understrength companies (official unit strengths always were the ideal than the actual anyway).
I could be interesting to see how this 'organisation shift' works with original WW2 tactics in airsoft. It is a compromise, but if it works...
To the tune of "Mademoiselle from Armentières"
Napoleons army ran away, As you do
The guard stood firm for Frances Pride, As you do
They said the guard will stand and die
But we heard what their Colonel cried
It wasn't pretty I tell you.
Resistance is fertile
Nice to talk through the theory and then work out what actually works in airsoft. I think B&A have basically got it spot on but here's another couple of ideas to add in:
1. Op Aerial was mainly rifles in woodland and that played at longer ranges and a bit slower (echo Chommers comment re the reality of range and speed). That was a really geat game!
2. Terrain has alot to do with it - I would say dense woodland suits jungle tactics - stealth, listen and ambush with lots of automatic fire - open land like Xsite seemed to work best with almost Napoleonic/ ww1 tactics of advancing line into fire - maximum aggression!
I think there is a lot of value in practising the methods employed by real soldiers at the time but modifying them to suit the weapons at hand and the terrain seems very sensible.
Our best weapon is surprise! (that said a well dsciplined mob acting on standing immediate action drills and being good at it will beat airsofters- as per the AI article where a load of Marines played airsoft for the first time against the site team and trounced them).
Peter Rabbit - Tank Killer
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hawk914/2159973655/
I wholeheartedly agree with your points Barrie (give that man a lollipop), 6 man sections are too 'unwieldy' in airsoft. There is great value (not to mention fun) in practising and operating period tactics but the 'tactical elements' to steal a tabletop term should be smaller. Here I also agree with you, four people is, I feel, the more ideal size.
not to mention that with a six or eight man section or squad is difficult to co-ordinate and lead, making it much harder for the person assigned to command said group, but a four man section can be more easily and effectively controlled reducing the need to find a cadre of l33t airsoft NCO types.
You've also got the "why should i listen to your orders, you're no more a soldier than I" factor.
Actually the point is that there is broader basis of people who would be able to effectively manage four people as opposed to six Webby, you should always listen to the orders of whoever the scenario/organisers has designated to be giving you the orders. No matter how crap they are.
Do you limit you ammunition loads to a realistic amount? To much ammunition tends to lock down situations.
you should always listen to the orders of whoever the scenario/organisers has designated to be giving you the orders. No matter how crap they are.
Absolutely. I've been following Chomley's orders for over 3 years now, and look where it's got me! 
Do you limit you ammunition loads to a realistic amount? To much ammunition tends to lock down situations.
Yep, every event I've been to (all 21 of them) have had ammo limits. To me, it is one of the most important rules there is for a more realistic event.
You've got nothing to ein, zwei, drei, vier
One question that has just occurred to me is to do with mechanisation. Eight man squads split into two fireteams came into use as you could only fit 8 passengers in the truck/ APC/ helicopter when armyies mechanised (I think), hence the 4 man brick we have today. It seems to work well in reality and in airsoft so the question it, did this apply in ww2 as motorized transport became more or less ubiquitous?
Peter Rabbit - Tank Killer
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hawk914/2159973655/
Perhaps part of the issue is that we are not fighting with realistic numbers of players ? You are unlikely ever to have three 10-man rifle squads on each side facing each other.
You've got nothing to ein, zwei, drei, vier
I'd personally disagree
Op Huskey was a classic example of hwo a good section attack rapidly rolled up a defended position, its looses cohesion after that but that becuase it was a regen battle not the tactics.
Similarly squads used properly worked at St Lo (and pretty much every other PBI battle tbh), on the flip side of the coin ground got taken at Caen when folk started using proper wwii style house clearing tacitcs rather than bimbling about in threes and fours and expecting results.
I remember on the hohenstaufen pbi traing day we'd have been stuffed if chommers and our bren gorup properly deployed on the flank hadnt had prevented the germans sneakily trying to roll round the line etc.
Thats not theory thats actually seeing it happen multiple times.
I dont think its that proper tactics dont work, i think they work as often as they dont to be honest, there are just too many variables as to why an attack may or may not succeed.
Using real world tactics equally fail to work in the real world as often as they fail to work in airsoft or there would never be a losing side in a conflict would they?
If we abandon period tactics to be more effective or to fit the style of the 'game' why not just play paintball? Surely authentic structures, tactics, chains of command and vocab are as much a part of our form of re-enacting and 'being there' as the scenario or the kit... other wise are you not just having a SIHK (skirmish in historical kit).
In reality adhoc flung together little groups only really occur when the situation is utterly desperate (lonsdale force, defence of berlin etc) so if we're trying to elevate airsoft away from 'games' then surely we should make them as historically accurate as possible?
"I think we are in rats' alley - Where the dead men lost their bones."
One question that has just occurred to me is to do with mechanisation. Eight man squads split into two fireteams came into use as you could only fit 8 passengers in the truck/ APC/ helicopter when armyies mechanised (I think), hence the 4 man brick we have today. It seems to work well in reality and in airsoft so the question it, did this apply in ww2 as motorized transport became more or less ubiquitous?
Its also partly because in reality the ten man section in combat in wwii woudl really be about 7 or 8 men.
Each platoon would select two or three men to be 'left out of battle' to provide and experience cadre should the worst happen and the section be wiped out.
Four man bricks are very much a northern ireland thing and the BAOR type forces used a gun group/rifle group setup until the LSW came in allowing both 'elements' to be manouvre and fire support at the same time, before that you had to weight the gun gorup with a gimpy or l4 against the reduced firepower of seven or so SLRs
and Steiner you're right, real world doctrine really insists on a minimum three to one superiority for an attack against troops in defence, the smallest really credible attack is the platoon attack against a section, then a company vs a platoon etc.
"I think we are in rats' alley - Where the dead men lost their bones."
One question that has just occurred to me is to do with mechanisation. Eight man squads split into two fireteams came into use as you could only fit 8 passengers in the truck/ APC/ helicopter when armyies mechanised (I think), hence the 4 man brick we have today. It seems to work well in reality and in airsoft so the question it, did this apply in ww2 as motorized transport became more or less ubiquitous?
The USMC developed something quite similar to their current squad organization already in WW2. They had three 4-man fireteams under corporals assembled under a sergeant giving a 13 man squad. There is a description of how this evolved om http://www.ww2gyrene.org/rifle_squad.htm . This also seems to be a part of the explanation for the AAV7 and the future EFV being significantly larger that other APCs/IFVs - they are designed to carry a larger USMC squad together.
When the 8-9 man squad of two fireteams developed I'm not sure, but as mentioned below the fireteam goes back to WW2.
When the 8-9 man squad of two fireteams developed I'm not sure, but as mentioned below the fireteam goes back to WW2.
I'd hazard a guess its to probably NATO standardisation to a degree as everyone else was working with two elements to fire and manouvre. If i recall correctly the 'able' part of the section was a scout group for the US.
Having said that i think in the 90s the US went back to 3 lots of 3 ('nam NVA style)
"I think we are in rats' alley - Where the dead men lost their bones."
If we abandon period tactics to be more effective or to fit the style of the 'game' why not just play paintball? Surely authentic structures, tactics, chains of command and vocab are as much a part of our form of re-enacting and 'being there' as the scenario or the kit... other wise are you not just having a SIHK (skirmish in historical kit).
Nah. WW2 airsoft, not matter how much we kid ourselves, has very little to do with the reality back then other than a passing resemblance in costume and weaponry and some historical background. We make massive pragmatic concessions to what is practicable or possible. Its largely a state of mind after all - that's why it's a rubbish spectator display. Everything we do is adapted to fit the time available, the fitnes of the participants, the potential of the weapons, the regard for H&S and so on.
What Barrie has carefully illustrated is that 'authentic' drill needs to be adapted, just like everything else we do, to make it 'work' in a useful way.
If we abandon period tactics to be more effective or to fit the style of the 'game' why not just play paintball? Surely authentic structures, tactics, chains of command and vocab are as much a part of our form of re-enacting and 'being there' as the scenario or the kit... other wise are you not just having a SIHK (skirmish in historical kit).
Nah. WW2 airsoft, not matter how much we kid ourselves, has very little to do with the reality back then other than a passing resemblance in costume and weaponry and some historical background.
Maybe to you Dave, I'd like to think PBI events try and make objectives, scenarios and engagements as realistic as we can, at the very least as 'realistic' as a traditional blank fire battle (albeit without the small arms bangs) - that of course depends on how realistic you consider blank fire battle re-enactment to be and if the answers 'not very' then what is accurate.
I dont think you *can* be in the 'mindset' if you throw squad structure, and accuracy to the wind... how can you feel what it was like for a landser in 44 if you're not struggling in the heat in the same kit, expected to do the same role in the squad of supporting the MG etc or acting as platoon runner between the main force and HQ?
I think with all the will in the world if its just about mind set lets sod buying expensive AEGs and revert back to making ratatat noises while carryig sticks....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EU9Bp1GtCo
"I think we are in rats' alley - Where the dead men lost their bones."
You are muddling all sorts together Gadge - Barrie is specifically talking about authentic by-the-book drills and squads and the reality of playing with toy guns.
And no, I don't rate blank-fire battles at all..., at least public ones anyway! WW2 airsoft beats that every which way in terms of realism, authentic squads or not!
