Combat Roles (general info post)

One thing that is constantly misconstrued is the roles of characters, particularly infantry, in a battlefield situation. This post will help to categorize infantry better and help players understand what role they should fill.

Rifleman
The rifleman is the core of the infantry. He's a generalist who covers for other roles. The rifleman's main goal is to utilize the advantages gained by the rest of his team. If his team is heavy on marksmen or grenadiers, he should operate as a ghetto version of an automatic rifleman, providing suppressing fire so that his allies can do their job. If he is supported by an automatic rifleman, the rifleman becomes a marksman, taking down foes with accurate aimed fire. If his squad is thrust into a CQB situation, the rifleman can also quickly engage close-range targets much better than an automatic rifleman, marksman, or grenadier.

The rifleman should be armed with an accurate mid-range rifle with a burst or automatic fire capability. Automatic fire is essential; without it, he is a marksman and fills a different role in the team. Depending on the needs of his team, this weapon can be a 500 yard marksman rifle like the M16 or a 300 yard assault rifle like the M4. The assault weapon is better for CQB but limits his role as a marksman, while the longer, more accurate rifle is less effective in CQB.

Automatic Rifleman
In the USMC, the automatic rifleman is the center of the fireteam. This is because the USMC uses M16s, which are almost marksman weapons. The automatic rifleman is armed with a general-purpose machinegun or squad automatic weapon, and this allows him to lay down covering and suppressing fire for his squad. His role is to pin down enemy fighters so that the riflemen and grenadiers can get into better positions and destroy the enemy.

The automatic rifleman ranges from reasonable in CQB to terrible, depending on his weapon. A lighter squad automatic weapon can be fired from the shoulder, but is less accurate and more unwieldy to aim. A GPMG is basically useless in CQB as excessive recoil and weapon weight leads to lots of missed shots.

Designated Marksman
The DMR's role in combat is to get kills. He utilizes the tempo control from his teammates (armed with automatic rifles or light machineguns) to take any and all opportunity kills he can. With an accurized, semi-automatic rifle, he can deliver lethal critical shots to enemies at 300-500m and possibly up to 800m, depending on his weapon. The DMR is the center of the fireteam in the Army, as the assault rifles used help give him covering fire so he can take advantage of enemy movement and shoot to kill.

The DMR is useless in CQB. In most cases, he will need to use a sidearm to be effective at all, and sidearms are not very suitable weapons even in close quarters compared to a carbine or SMG. The DMR is also not a sniper, although in Rifts terms he would have the Sniper skill. A sniper is an assassin who shoots from a hiding spot and disengages before combat occurs at all. A DMR is a combatant who fights alongside allied troops with accurate and deadly fire.

Grenadier
The grenadier is a team member armed with a grenade launcher. He may use an underbarrel grenade launcher or a standalone, but his role remains the same; engage and destroy enemies who have taken cover. Enemies pinned down by suppressing fire are easy marks for the grenadier. An underbarrel grenade launcher is best for these situations, as he can use his rifle if the enemy is not pinned down. However, the grenadier is also excellent for breaking up enemy formations, and in this role a standalone grenade launcher is a much better weapon. Careful selection of weapon is important for the type of mission being undertaken.

Obviously, a grenadier with a standalone grenade launcher should not engage in CQB without his sidearm. Even with an underbarrel and a carbine, the grenadier's weapon is heavier and swings slower, making him much less effective in close quarters. On the plus side, a grenadier with a carbine is still more effective than a marksman or automatic rifleman in close combat.

Close Combat Specialist
Close combat is the least ideal situation for anyone to be in. At 300m, there is more margin for error and a lot more missed enemy shots, especially if they are not wielding good marksman weapons. In close quarters, getting shot is very likely to happen if you don't have the element of surprise.

A CQB specialist has to choose his weapon carefully. The ability to shoot through walls is both a help and a hindrance, as penetration can lead to civillian casualties. The best weapon choice is a good, accurate SMG like the MP5 that can be maneuvered easily and has a controllable full-auto function. Light carbine rifles like the M4 are also good, as they have a bit better penetration through doors and sacrifice little mobility. In Rifts, the best CQB weapons are those with very short range and penetration, as laser weapons rip through non-MDC walls making them very risky in urban environments. Melee weapons are also reasonable in Rifts, but it can still often mean giving up the first shot to the enemy in order to get close.

The CQB specialist's weapon is probably ineffective at longer ranges. The M4 is a great CQB weapon as it is also effective up to 300m when contacts are farther away. A MP5 or other submachinegun does not have that advantage.

Breacher
The breacher is the guy who shoots off locks and breaks down the door. He needs a shotgun, although in Rifts pretty much any MD weapon will do the job. An ideal breaching weapon is a carbine rifle with a Masterkey, as you have the CQB flexibility of the carbine and the breaching shell in the Masterkey. If you come to a new door, simply load another breaching round.

A tube-fed semi-auto shotgun with a pump is also a great breaching weapon. If you come to a new room, feed your breaching round, pump the action to eject your buckshot, then shoot in the lock. Your next round will be buckshot, which gives the breacher great CQB capability. The disadvantage of this is that you only have a few rounds before needing to reload, typically around 8 or so. If he is armed with a mag-fed shotgun, he must spend a lot of time feeding a breaching round and ejecting the old one, making it less than ideal.

Like the grenadier, the breacher can be very effective or ineffective outside his role. A breacher's weapon is reasonably good in CQB just by necessity but at battlefield ranges, he will be ineffective if he does not have a carbine.

Modern RPG Combat (not Rifts related)

I've been musing over this for a while. Most games do close combat (melee combat) pretty well, at least acceptably well. Most games don't really do ranged combat really well. In real world combat, a large portion of fights are slow -- combatants in close range often circle each other, looking for openings. At a distance, combatants hide behind cover before popping out, taking a shot, and returning to cover. This is especially true as characters become more skilled; they are less likely to leave openings and less likely to attack unless they have a very specific purpose -- either they can score a hit or they can pin the opponent, trap him, or disable his weapon. Aggression is valuable in combat, but only when it's controlled; blind rushing leads to getting gutted by a spear or gunned down by enemy fire out in the open. This is the theme I'm working with.

Combat in this engine is dirty and brutal, or at least it's intended to be. Weapons are deadly and wounds are serious. In order to prevent frequent player character death, PCs are granted some form of "luck" which allows them to avoid bad situations -- they're given a certain number of these per adventure and allow them to cancel the effects of a normally terrible situation. For GMs wanting a more realistic game, PCs could be given very few or none of these. I'll cover character statistics in another post; I want this to focus mainly on combat phases and actions. I'll cover dice mechanics elsewhere too, but I'm intending to use a 3d10 + modifiers system (essentially a d20-like system with 3d10 instead of 1d20). I'll go more into reasons for that later.

Generally this system assumes a few things that are not present in other combat systems:


1: Imperfect Information. Whenever possible, hide the exact position of things on the battlefield. This can be done pretty easily with MapTool or something similar. You show only the terrain, and not what is on the battlefield. Players then have to use their character skills to identify distances to a particular target, and so on. This is to simulate fog of war; it makes no sense that all characters know exactly which guy was shot by their buddy, or which zone has erupted into melee and so on.


2: Limited Communication. Players should only be allowed to communicate a small amount of information. In general, this means players should only be allowed to speak on their turns and only small phrases if they are taking other actions. Characters who want to convey lots of information should be forced to spend actual turns doing so; this is why in real life, there are radio operators and officers who are not in the main battle speaking with command units on the radio. If a character is in an emergency situation (eg. gets flanked, gets hit, needs assistance, there is a grenade nearby) it is totally reasonable for him or her to shout a very brief message such as "Help! Medic! Grenade!" and so on. Also, characters who are not within auditory range of other characters may be asked to leave the room temporarily so they do not know what is said. Because communication is so important in real life, it should be assumed that most player comms are over headset/walkie talkie or networked magic communication and that all players can hear what is being said, though.


Initiative

• Like any game, the first thing that needs to happen is the initiative roll. Like most games, characters or units (groups of characters typically used for mooks) act in initiative order.
• The duration of a combat round is 10 seconds.
  
• Initiative is determined by a roll-high method; highest numbers go first.
• If one side of a battle is expecting combat and the other is not, the attackers gain a significant bonus to initiative (+2 to +5).
• If one side of a battle is ambushing the other or otherwise takes the enemy by surprise, they gain a massive bonus to initiative (+5 or more).
• Even with ambush bonuses to initiative, extremely combat-aware characters may still be able to go before their attackers; the bonus is a bonus, not a guarantee. Additionally, an extremely lucky character may just be prepared for battle as the attackers are ambushing or spot them just as they come out.
  

Melee Combat

• Characters who have engaged in melee immediately begin brawling after initiative is rolled. Melee combat is exclusive; a character cannot participate in both the melee and ranged combat phases.
• Characters in melee have "melee actions," allowing them to take many (typically 3 or more) actions in a round. Skilled melee combatants generally have more melee actions than unskilled combatants.
  
• Characters in melee are considered to be in constant movement for characters outside of melee, which affects ranged combat rolls.
  Characters in melee are "deadlocked" to whoever was attacking them during the last combat round. If there are multiple attackers, the character may choose which foe to focus on.
• If a character is focused on one enemy, any other attackers gain a flanking bonus (+3 or more) against him. Some exceptionally skilled characters may be able to fight several attackers without granting any of them flanking.
• On each character's turn, he may attack his chosen target or use his melee actions to maneuver or defend. Once his turn has occurred, he may still act in the future if he has melee actions remaining.
• A character may spend melee actions to move a certain distance, according to his movement speed. In addition, each character can move up to 10 feet in a round without costing any movement. This can also be used to disengage from melee; however, a character attempting to disengage from melee must use at least one action for defense if he is not deadlocked.
• A character who exposes his rear to an attacker while moving immediately gives his attacker a free "flanking attack."
  
• Characters choosing to hold actions for defense gain a bonus based on their combat skill to dodge, block, or otherwise avoid a number of incoming melee attacks equal to the number of attacks held. It can also be held for the ranged combat phase to avoid close combat attacks (but not ranged weapons unless the attacker is at close range). Some characters may be able to gain dedicated defensive actions that are always available.
• Characters who have not acted yet are considered to have all of their actions held for defense when they are attacked. Any unspent actions on defense can then be used on their turns.
  
• Attackers roll against the active (held actions) or passive (no action) defenses of the enemy. Because characters in melee are always considered to be moving and on the defensive, the defender always gets some ability to avoid attacks. This may be waived if the enemy is grappled or otherwise unable to move or block.
• If a melee attacker scores a hit against a passive defense (no held actions), he may continue to make follow-up attacks that automatically hit until he has expended all his attacks. He does not have to make these attacks.

Ranged Combat (general combat?)

• Characters in ranged combat act much slower than characters in melee combat. Instead of having a number of melee actions, characters in ranged combat may take up to 2 actions. Some actions take both combat actions.
  
• A character may take an action to move up to half his base movement. This movement includes diving behind cover if desired. Slower amounts of movement may be performed in order to sneak through concealed areas.
• A character may attack an enemy. If this is a close combat attack, this attack generally forces a deadlock and the character will be considered in melee in the next combat round. The attacker may choose not to enter melee (although the defender may attack in kind). A defender with a significant weapon range advantage (eg. polearm vs. knife) can force the attacker to stay out of melee if his defense is successful. Missile weapons don't count as a range advantage, but a rifle with a bayonet counts against an unarmed enemy or one with a knife. Multiple close combat attackers always force a deadlock.
• Defense against close combat attacks in the ranged phase work like melee defenses, except one action spent defending counts as active defense against all attacks. Characters in melee defending against characters in the ranged combat phase attacking with close combat weapons do so with any held melee actions from the melee combat round.
• Ranged attackers must aim before firing their weapons; otherwise, any fire executed is wild and generally inaccurate. This does not apply to ranged weapons (guns or crossbows) in melee combat. Aiming takes up one ranged combat action; the character is considered partially exposed while aiming if he is doing so from cover.
• Wild shooting suffers a penalty based on the difficulty to hit the enemy. Partially exposed enemies aiming in are virtually impossible to hit; firing at enemies out in the open is still like shooting fish in a barrel. Enemies in melee are more difficult, but not impossible; however, wild shooting into melee has a very large chance of hitting other characters in the melee. Blind firing incurs additional penalties.
• Thrown weapons do not have to be aimed, although aiming may grant bonuses. Drawing and throwing a weapon is a single action.
• Reloading generally uses both actions. Some abilities may grant the ability to reload extremely quickly as a single or even free action once per round.
• Non-wild aimed shooting does not include the ability to return to cover after firing.

Clean-up

• Characters take wounding damage.
  Buffs and debuffs count down if applicable.
• Any other modifiers take place at this time.