Victory Conditions - Force Loss

[THH149]

Just played a scenario H2H, and the VC was for Blue Force 100 points for enemy casuatlies > 80% and for Red Force it was enemy casualties > 60%.

We did wonder what the % were based on: is it number of soldiers on each side (eg > 80 of 100 soldiers killed or wounded) or is it purchase points in QB or some other metric.

I checked the rule book and its unclear, though its implied to be the QB purchase points/combat value.

A realism question here too, if the Red Force causes anything remotely close to 60% casualties on Blue Force, why wouldnt Blue Force pull back and remove the 'feature'? Wouldnt 10% of start force killed or wounded have the Force pull back and get reinforcements? In this scenario, I think the casualties allowed are to high for Blue Force to tolerate.

Best

THH

[Combatintman]

Casualty parameters work on the number of casualties suffered by that side.  So in your instance above if Blue inflicted 80 casualties on a 100-strong Red force, the Blue player gets 100 VPs.  If Red inflicted 60 casualties on a 100-strong Red force, the Red side gets however many VPs are allocated to the parameter.  However, it is binary so if the casualty count is 79 and 59 respectively, neither side gets the VPs.  There are no relative combat value calculations in parameters - it is all about the numbers.

Realism we can debate all day - you are correct in that the levels of losses 'allowable' in many scenarios would likely cause a real commander to disengage.  However; casualty parameters may have been employed for other reasons by the scenario designer such as ensuring that one side or the other does not achieve a victory by hitting cease fire in the early stages of the game while using a combination of other VP tools to arrive at their intended VP scores for the end/later stages of the scenario.

Otherwise, scenarios and campaigns in the game are more often than not going to err towards producing something that a player is going to play through to the end.  If every Afghan scenario for instance just involved whistling up A-10s/AH-64s every time a callsign came into contact with half a dozen Taliban as was pretty common over there then people will quickly get bored of it.   While Battlefront comes closer than most designers in terms of modelling warfare, the scenarios and campaigns are entertainment products so compromise is necessary.  The number of threads that I have seen titled along the lines of 'The AI surrendered early just as I was teeing up my final assault' prove the point that there are many players who want to play a scenario through until the clock runs down or until they have completely eliminated the enemy and illustrates how some players perceive entertainment value.

Edited November 24, 2020 by Combatintman

[THH149]

OK thanks for that, casualties (killed/wounded) it is. Oddly it makes the vehicles important to kill because they hold bodies (as well as reduce enemy combat power).

Agree with you on the realism question, the game is entertainment afterall. But, that scenario could've set the Blue Force casualty limit much lower so the OP Blues have to work much harder for a Major Victory. 

Best

THH

 

[Combatintman]

56 minutes ago, THH149 said:

OK thanks for that, casualties (killed/wounded) it is. Oddly it makes the vehicles important to kill because they hold bodies (as well as reduce enemy combat power).

Agree with you on the realism question, the game is entertainment afterall. But, that scenario could've set the Blue Force casualty limit much lower so the OP Blues have to work much harder for a Major Victory. 

Best

THH

 

No worries mate - otherwise, seek and ye shall find  ... there are a bunch of Shock Force scenarios out there where Blue friendly force casualties are set at 10% or less.