Shhhh . . . quiet(!) Another Ambush question . . .

[Gpig]

What would you do if;

You have a platoon of infantry hiding in a patch of woods. They have a ambush set up that covers a NASTY killing zone between BOCAGE rows.

"Infantry?" units can be seen approaching from a long ways off, over the course of 2-5 minutes. They appear to be SNEAKING in the open. Hugging the BOCAGE.

Your platoon is dug in with great concealment. The lead enemy infantry element appears to wait for half a minute for another unit to catch up. Then continues to approach.

It is now within 100m. But You're ambush marker is set @ 10m to avoid a premature tripping of the ambush.

It is now evident that the lead unit is most likely a scout. He is going to trip your ambush as he will have to come right through your position. In fact that is probably what the enemy commander intends.

Do you;

1) Bug out, leaving foxholes and question marks for your attacker? Resetting an ambush farther back?

2) eliminate the scouting party and hope some more enemy units come into view?

3) eliminate the scouting party and THEN bug out?

Looks like my nice ambush will only be getting the appetizer and not the main course.

Gpig

[Conscript Bagger]

As soon as you give a movement order, your troops (no longer Hiding) might very well blast him during the order delay, ambush target or not. Even if they don't, at 100m he'll see you when you bug out anyway.

To my way of thinking, shooting at 100m is better than 20 because he'll almost certainly be pinned by your first shot, and he won't be close enough for close combat. I'd shoot right now, and issue a move order toward the rear with as long a delay as you feel safe issuing (to give you more shots at him before leaving, but not staying so long that his following troops can draw a bead on you).

If you're lucky, you may wipe out his scout in one shot, before he can spot you. Wouldn't count on it, though...

[Sarge Saunders]

Gpig- Probably number 3. If your opponent has shown that he scouts ahead with teams, half-squads, etc. then he will trip any ambush such as you described later most likely.

A couple of things to consider. What squads are you? What are his? If, for example, you have 10 man motorized squads then I'd say let it rip at 100 meters against an enemy in the open (since he is gonna ruin your ambush anyway).

By doing number 3 you will hopefully accomplish the following (in order): Kill his scouting unit completely. What will he see after the scout is dead? Will his units further back have LOS? He might lose visual on your units or not get anything but a sound contact after the hopefully short melee with his scouts. Then pull back. The opponent won't know how far if the bocage breaks LOS. He will be forced to treat it as though you are there, wasting time and possibly arty. Meanwhile, he loses some men and you are safe and sound.

Just my $.02!

-Sarge

[ July 16, 2002, 09:46 PM: Message edited by: Sarge Saunders ]

[YankeeDog]

My take on this situation:

It seems pretty clear to me that you should engage the scout in some way - whether you should engage him at 100m, or set the ambush closer (to, say 50m or so) depends on details of cover and what kind of platoon you're ambushing with. Ideally, you want to wait to ambush until his scout (probably a half squad) can be rendered combat ineffective (i.e., all killed or panicked) in one 'shot' from your combined platoon. If all three of your squads can fire on the scout at 100m, this is probably a fine engagement distance for most squad types. For killing ambushes, 250 'firepower points' is the magic number I use - if I can get this much firepower on the unit at the ambush (assuming little cover), I can be pretty sure the unit will be substantially destroyed in the initial ambush.

You don't want the scout to come too close, either - it may see at least your foxholes (sometimes you can spot foxholes before you spot units), and then your enemy will have gained valuable information on your exact location. Basically, you want to ambush it as far out as possible but still be reasonably positive that you will destroy it.

Obviously, I think it all depends on situation, but most of the time I also think you have to bug out after you knock off the scout. To stay in place will allow your enemy to focus support assets on your ambush position and wipe you out. If you have a good covered route of withdrawal and other assets you can bring in to support your platoon and cover it's withdrawal, you might be able to stay in place for a turn or two - your biggest worry is an artillery barrage on your position, and that will take at least a turn to start coming down unless he's really smart/lucky and has already guessed your ambush position and plotted a barrage there. If you're really lucky, the scout will be killed so quickly that all he'll get is a bunch of "Sound Contact?"s from the shooting, and no hard sightings of your units, but I wouldn't plan on this.

Cheers,

YD