Wotan Allied Leadership stuff....

Thats post was suggested by a player actually.

Its only what was done with hohenstaufen and thats bonded players fantastically

it also worked very well at Arnhem.

It would appear that Kavster also wants that sort of thing.

To be honest though as long as we have 'inter allied' forces you're going to get it.

eventually we'll hopefully have a big enough player base to do more realistic single nation sides.

The Itlay game im drafting is commonwealth only.
(there is room for player sin us kit but they represent free french)

Thats post was suggested by a player actually.

Its only what was done with hohenstaufen and thats bonded players fantastically

it also worked very well at Arnhem.

I disagree with your perception . SH tried to create a 9thSS only team complete with TO&E , and it failed as an "exclusive" organisation . At CR, and also at Arnhem ,once players had regened, the German force was a polyglot of different units with players sticking together with their mates rather than their units.

We didn't try ot enforce any unit conherence at all , which I think works far better. IMHO if they all turned up doing generic German or generic UK Airborne impressions rather than unit specific ones it would help even more .

How you run the Allies is up to you and them , but the less concentration on units the better IMHO . People play with their mates at airsoft , not their units . The unit thing adds little other than some authenticity , but does not add ot the gameplay dynamics . We command them at their consent remember .

We've encouraged webby ot have a go at getting the US together , some form of generic division is the widest way to get buy in .

As stated folk dont have to do it, a few of us do, i don't see the problem with it.
in very big capital letters for the hard of thinking it says it entirely optional for those who *want* to do it.

I rpeat i found C&C much more efficient because of it at Arnhem, everyone knew who i was talking to if i said '2para will do this...' or 'Stafford retake the hotel'

Certainly helped me co-ordinate attacks.

I totally disagree with you guy i think Chris completely bonded the gemrans together by forming a distinct unit. But then we've had this argument adnausseum already.

I'm going to carry on doing what works and what a lot of players said they loved until it doenst if that ok with everyone...

Ahem, let's keep it civil fellas.

No worries, just that in my experience it didn't really work well at CR, maybe because of the size of the site and difficulty in comms. (And Yith going AWOL for an hour)

OY!

For what its worth:

1) it creates more atmosphere and feel to feel you're part of 'the 2 battalion south staffords ' than to be part of 'uk airborne'. folk are in this for wwii not 'blue team vs red team'

2) For team leaders it easier to quickly direct groups by squad at the start of the game before it disolves and give people clear ideas as to who is doing what. Saying '2 commando will look for secret weapons' is better than 'evo and his mates will look for secret weapons'

3) It fosters an interest in reading up on units and general independent research among players.

4) It gives the players who want more depth the option while still allowing those who just want a blat fest the opportunity to do just that.

OY!

Oh, NOW you show your face!

For what its worth:

1) it creates more atmosphere and feel to feel you're part of 'the 2 battalion south staffords ' than to be part of 'uk airborne'. folk are in this for wwii not 'blue team vs red team'

2) For team leaders it easier to quickly direct groups by squad at the start of the game before it disolves and give people clear ideas as to who is doing what. Saying '2 commando will look for secret weapons' is better than 'evo and his mates will look for secret weapons'

3) It fosters an interest in reading up on units and general independent research among players.

4) It gives the players who want more depth the option while still allowing those who just want a blat fest the opportunity to do just that.

I agree with you, just not sure so many others do.

Would it be worth running a little vote survey?

Yes -I'll just STFU then .

At any point were you streamed by unit at CR ?, no not really . Did the Germans have a good time , yes mostly .

TBH I think its easier for the Germans , all Heer with a few exceptions look the same , so do the SS apart from the cuff title which is frankly neither here nor there. NB chose H/Staufen first , and people did that at Arnhem coz it fitted in with the game , but I doubt any of them have any great allegiance ot the 9thss beyond that.

What irritates me is the insistance on doing it our way , why not ask the players what they prefer or even just try it another way . At the end of the day were are all just herding sheep around in the game .

As said once already, my post was at a player request and to be fair its something i want out of the game and nobodies making anyone do it.

I'm getting a bit tired of repeating that.

In no way is it going to detract form the game and in many way may (ney will) benefit it.

As you said Guy you're not fussed how we organise the aliies, so what are we arguing about.

We could leave it to players to organise themseves but doyou *really* think much will happen.

and this is for two real reason, im not being superior its because:

1 ) to quote a player they are worried about oversteppng the mark as they dont know what they are expected to do.

and to be fair when stubble hopper started being proactive we all got a bit edgy about it

2) most folk are not by their nature very good group organisers, thats why management is a skill. We all have it in spades, we are lucky in that.

the phrase 'herding cats' has been used when referring to orgnaising airsofters many times before for a good reason.

Im only recommending organising things like this from five years experience of running successful commercial gaming events...

Experience has shown me that most people like a bit of direction and even more prefer a solid structure and orgnisation to a game

As you said Guy you're not fussed how we organise the aliies, so what are we arguing about.

I'd like ot think we are debating this rather than arguing . I am fussed how both sides are organised and led if it has a major effect on the quality of our events . All the Allies fu.cking off at CR being my case in point.

I don't beleive that was neccessarily down ot squad structure , but we can't igone the possibilty that it was a contributory factor as well as the crap weather etc .

Some market research is required methinks .

Lack of cohesion IMO

You get cohesion from training together, common goals and common identity & traditions.

or maybe the British army have had it wrong for the last 500 years....

In all seriousness the major divide is always going to be us/uk players with regards to common identity.

Folk (in general( have an ingrianed liking for being in teams/packs/gangs/squads the more you can tap inot this with ritual, symbol, language the stronger the group.

The Heer/SS have a very strong common look, apart form camo differences most folk are in larlgey the same field grey and a smock wiht m35 helet or m43 ski cap.

On the allied side you have us airborne, rnagers, us inf, resistance, uk commando , uk airborne.

Psychologically regardless of the fact you are all on the same side a uk airborne player sees 5 uk and 30 germans.. he doens treally see it as 'allied' IMO.

classic exmaple is Yith at the wwii re-enacment event last week, only guy in uk line inf, felt (i got the feeling) somewhat isolated despite the fact lots of 'allies ' were there.

Edit: i just remembered the overall feeling of being outnumbered by uk lads at Arnhem depsite the fact they were not as they didnt really see the dutch as 'on their side'

Commonality counts.

That is the main reason I suspect.

I'll make the point again though that you will get this through social rather than military methods . The last TD was far more social than military & it's this we need ot foster. In the army I believe you fight first for your comrades ?

I agree the uniform choice for Allies is much wider than the Germans , perhaps we ought ot go more down the lines of US or UK to narrow it down , but then that will potentially isolate Yith or Stephen. Perhaps US airborne or US inf and UK line or UK airborne . Not sure on that one .

The germans do all look the same , but they also know each other far better I suspect.

Oh yeah and we don't have Gliderider or Oddball either

Aye, Germans all knew each other, all became mates and gelled as a force - simple-as. Bugger all to do with SS or Heer, Hohenstaufen or GD or indeed rank structure.

Plus we had a secret weapon - Helga. A strong girl who didn't give up - so how could the blokes?

When I asked Matt to get a group together I did make it clear that it's purpose is to get chaps to know each other - what badge you are wearing has little value 5 minutes into a game. As Guy says, you want to play with your mates at a game, if all your side are your mates then you are quids in.

Ah my secret method of getting any group together , get em all down the pub for a few pints. Works every time .

Plus we had a secret weapon - Helga. A strong girl who didn't give up - so how could the blokes?

Heheh. We had H3b who gave up before first contact!

Single faction sides is the way forwards.

i was speaking to rich about htis.

For five years i used to run GWs national campaign weekends.

Now for those at best i had 11 different armies with different motivations, allianance etc to shoehorn into one scenario.

Did this for two years or so and the scenarios were limp because of it, i had to manufacture a reason for every army being in that warzone at one.

Eventually i argued the point with uk group HQ that we would have better events and more spirited play if we restricted campaigns to a max of four factions.

this was unpopular with the old school managers who hadnt played a game in a decade but i looked through sales data and worked out that it was doable with the exsiitng player bases as long as one was always 'marines (read Germans for us)

So we did the Dmaocles Gulf campaign (only three armies as oppoesed to ten, we had eldar & tau versus imperials)

and..
we sold out in record time., everybody said it was the best event ever, the task forces gelled as they were eight layers of the same race ot five or six diffeent amries etc etc.

from experience its the detail and 'team' feel most game players want tbh

you know thats just from my personal experience of motivating people to play in factions and play game s and part with £60 for the privelige

its all very well saying 'you play with your mates' but not everybody is mates, team structure and insignia gives new players who *dont* know people common identity. mates grows over time a strong coheive idnetiy to start with isnt going to hurt and can only help

its an interesting point...

It certainly seemed to help with Arnhem... The allies were a much more cohesive side than they were at CR or BotB