Would be nice to see in SBs

[Outlaw Josey Wales]

The ability to break a large squad down into fire teams or recombine fire teams into squads or remnants of a couple of squads recombine into larger squads.

Also, if a vehicle becomes immobile, you have the option of the crew being able to possible fix the vehicle or abandon it and become troops on the ground.

Also, if a vehicle gets destroyed, the possibility of all or some of the crew survive to become troops on the ground.

Thoughts anyone?

[Compass Rose]

I'm not sure bailed out crew members would be much help if they were armed with just pistols.

[Outlaw Josey Wales]

According to a lot of the books I have read, a lot of crews were armed with more than just pistols. Many of the German tank crews had submachine guns. Plus, one can always pick up another weapon somewhere. Alot of them had grenades as well.

When many crews found themselves without a vehicle, they worked their way to the rear to obtain another vehicle eventually. Maybe there could be something in the victory conditions for crew survivability if they can make it to the rear and be exited off the map.

[Compass Rose]

Of the books I've read, none of them talked about the subject. All I can base an answer off of is either WWII movies or real WWII footage.

In the movie Battle of the Bulge, a American tank gets knocked out and the crew escapes through the bottom floor escape hatch. They are shown only with pistols.

In the movie Sahara the crew of the M3 Lee had Thompson machine guns.

I don't off hand remember any other movies that showed such examples but I do know that just because it was in Hollywood, doesn't make it real.

As for real WWII footage, I remember watching a German and an American tank crew both bailing out of their tanks after they were hit. In both instances, they were trying like mad to get out of there tanks before they got shot at again. The American footage was a little startling because one of the crew members was trying to pull out their buddy who had one of his lower legs blow off! The German tank flamed up very quickly and the crew could be seen running away looking for cover as they were being fired at my machine gun fire. In both cases, none of the crew members had any weapons in their hands.

I agree, if crews found themselves without a vehicle, they would try and work their way to the rear or out of harms way.

As for the victory conditions for crew survivability suggestion, I'm not sure how that would play out of you were playing a battle that had alot of vehicles. It could present more headaches for the game player since he'd have more units to manage that wouldn't help support his current force.

I do think that maybe a calculation could be introduced that would allow some crew members to survive after their vehicle gets hit. As of right now, any time a vehicle gets wrecked, all crew members are shown as killed.

[Dog Soldier]

As of right now, any time a vehicle gets wrecked, all crew members are shown as killed.

I believe this is just a game mechanism to state that the VP for the crew are awarded to the other side since the crew are no longer "in this fight". I would not assume because of the lack of a crew counter that they are KIA.

As to the idea of crew counters from bailing out, would it be considered gamey to have these tank crews manning another crew serviceable weapons where the crew had been lost in a previous turn? Say manning a heavy MG or an artillery or AT piece. I think (from my brief brushes with the SB system) that this behavior would not be right.
It would then require some changes to the game system to differentiate tank crews which bail out from trained crews which are assigned weapons to be crewed at start. Sounds like too much trouble for too little gain, IMHO.

But I wanted to throw out the idea here for the SB community to chew on.

Dog Soldier

[TheBigRedOne]

My interpretation of the system is along the lines of DS's. If a tank gets whacked, that crew is pretty much out of the picture, either because they were killed, wounded, or taking their injured comrades back to an aid station. Either way, they are out of the action for the most part.

Casualties in SB are an abstract interpretation which can include WIA, KIA and surrenders. Not all casualties are considered to be killed, but they are, in some way, no longer combat capable.

[cazart!]

I have crew bailout on the list of things I'd like to see in SB. Especially a voluntary one where the crew could bail from an immobile to deny VP's. They may not be legit as ground troops, but still.... (I'd make them F quality - they are not really trained infantry.)

More importantly, I'd like to see the ability to combine squads. This would be very important for crew served weapons. It drives me nuts when you have a HMG that goes undercrewed early on. Your only option is to have a squad pick up the HMG (and thereby tying down 10+ men).

[Outlaw Josey Wales]

I agree. Should be able to detach any number of men from or to a squad. Drop one guy to help man the MG. Or reorganize by taking the remnants of two squads and combing them into one squad, two left here and 3 there combine to make a 5 man fire team. Maybe somebody wants to use one squad broken down into one and two man LP/OP to cover the front of their company. Get eyes on while falling back to join with the rest. Or you have a company in a village that requires a bn to cover everything, would have to breakdown squads in order to try and cover the whole village.

[Compass Rose]

I agree with you guys. It would be nice not to be stuck having under crewed MG, mortar, bazooka, etc. Being able to combine and/or detach squads would be a big plus to the game system.

[cazart!]

Probably would have to implement a drop in quality/morale to check players from breaking everything down into 2 man fire teams. Quality/fatigue/morale status of merged unit would also need to be based on lowest values....