============ OGREverse list, June 30th (Last: June 26th) ============= ===== Forward Observers From: "Andrew Walters" From: "Pat O'Hara" ===== Ogres in Role-Playing Games From: "Andrew Walters" From: "Todd A. Zircher" ------------------------------ From: "Andrew Walters" Subject: Forward Observers So... you want to take out a major target, say a factory complex, with a cruise missle, but the jamming and air defense make that an impossiblity. So you send in a few platoons on GEV PCs with a couple of GEVs for support to take out the lasers and jamscreens, which are located in a lightly forrested area and defended by a HVY, a couple of LT TNKs, and some infantry. In this scenario the infantry is more of a Forward Demolition Team than a Forward Observer, but it has a certain drama: as each of the jamscreens and lasers goes down the chances of the cruise missle getting through go up, but the attacker only has a limited number and can only fire one per turn. See how long it takes to get the missle through, then switch sides and see if the other player can do better. I still haven't located the article. Andrew Walters andreww@farallon.com ----- From: "Pat O'Hara" Subject: Forward Observers A note about FOs since I played one in the Marine Corps :-). The modern military (that's today guys) is moving away from FOs in favor of other means of spotting. The reason is FOs are too easy to take out. Do not misinterpret this for concern for the individual, the reality is that the expense of the training (both basic and advanced), and the equipment (radio, optics, etc) do not justify the 45sec average operational time. This is because there are cheaper alternatives. Ground pounders (infantry) do not live long (8-12sec in combat), but there is no other way to take a building without destroying it. Infantry cannot be replaced, but an FO can be and for less money. ----- [In the latest MCG, the OpFor commander bemoans his lack of infantry to flush out all those pesky Hunter Warrior rifle squads. The differences between the Hunter Warrior squads and those of OGRE are that the Hunter Warrior teams were immobile, unarmored and the firepower they applied was essentially entirely on call from the air and sea. You either accept the OGRE preconditions that AI is expensive and remote sensors are unreliable or you don't build OGREs, you build Rivets. (Play the theme of The Charge of the Light Boppers here...) -HJC] ------------------------------ From: "Andrew Walters" Subject: Ogres in Role-Playing Games Here are a couple "adventure seeds" that have popped into and out of my head over the years for Ogres turning up in RPGs. They're more glorified combat situations than role playing adventures, but hey, build around them... #1 - The players accompany a weapons inspection team to a recently implicated site in a rogue nation. The rogue nation is protesting this inspection, so the group is heavily armed. The inspectors are two to four scared NBC experts with no combat skills, but they're VIPs and their safe return is vital. The site is a large, isolated warehouse, accompanied by a dormitory-like building, and a couple of tool sheds. No workers are on site, just a couple of sentries acting nervous, and these leave when the players enter the building. Think of it as an infantry vs. partially operational Mark I in a city environment. Then, to make it more than a shoot out, stir in your choice of the following: *The tank's AI was created from stolen source code to some kind of top secret heuristic project at a University in an advanced country, and the rogue nation doesn't completely understand it, so it has only partially figured out who it is and which side its on. In this case it will be protected by a few elite soldiers, and there will be a couple of computer scientists trying to convince it to fight the party... *The tank is really big and they've tried to hide it by piling scrap, crates, tarps, etc, all over it, so the party actually walks *under* it and is enticed to *enter* it through an access hatch on the bottom, and with some of the party in and some still waiting to enter, the thing powers up... *The tank's AI has figured out The Big Picture, that it will be used to create a breakthrough in a stalemated local groundwar. The tank is more or less expected to get destroyed in the process, so its current desire is to escape. There are guards in this case, and they have an anit-ship missle hidden somewhere (rafter of the dormitory?) pointed at the tank; they've told the tank that if it tries to escape, they'll kill it. So the tank and the guards have a delicately balanced mutually-assured-destruction thing going on, which the players will likely undoubtedly disrupt as they try to figure out what's going on. If the Ogre converses with the players, it will trick them into some action that will render the missle unusable, resulting in a firefight between the guards and the tank with the players trying to protect the weapons experts. In this case, either the tank *or* the guards would be willing to cooperate with the players, all three groups just want to get away safely. In any of these situations the referee will have to plan a lot of confusion to keep things from happening all at once when the firefight starts. There should be a lot of jamming to protect this site from electronic surveilance, plus obstacles, smoke, clutter, etc. This is a *very* low-tech Ogre, so it can't just kill everyone in the first 4/10ths of a second. #2 - A friendly (to the players) Mark V Ogre has attacked a small town and elminated the defending armor and scattered the infantry, but as a result of an extraordinarily lucky shot or shots it lost *all* its sensors,p and is stuck in a pond. The enemy doesn't know this, so they've left it alone in the town while they amass a force that can take it out with some degree of security. In the meantime the Ogre has communicated its situation to HQ, who has in turn sent the only available help around - the players: either jump-suited MI or just heroic millitia, they venture into the town, shoot/sneak past the few enemy infantry, and get to the Ogre. Once there they dump some expanding foam stuff or something into the pond to make it thick enough for the Ogre to get out, or something, then they get on top of it (and maybe a couple inside it) to guide it home. There will be armed oppostion, of course, but that's not a problem if they can act as forward observers for the Mark V's weapons, which is way to slow for moving targets like armor. Possible solutions are: 1) The Ogre heads for a nearby river and escapes underwater, the party has to sneak out own their own, 2) the element of surprise... 3) party gets inside Ogre and just tries to ram enemy armor. The best way to handle it would probably be to allow a simple plan to work, and then add the complexities in the human-Ogre cooperation aspect. Andrew Walters andreww@farallon.com ----- From: "Todd A. Zircher" Subject: Ogres in Role-Playing Games >> I always though a total conversion package for Quake would be good >> for that. Players could also work together or against each other >> in multi-player death matches. > > [Besides putting bitmaps of all the units on the screen, what's the > point? Would it really have the flavor of OGRE? -HJC] The flavor of Ogre? The board game, no. Playing the role of a fearless cyber tank pitted against an army of conventional forces, sure. You could even go as far as to set up the mission/scenarios from the game. The fog of war as you trudge through a marsh or run up a river would add a different feel to the OGREverse. I think OGRE would survive the conversion to first person 3D shooter just fine. (Look at Gunmetal or Battle Zone for 'proof' that SciFi tanks have a place on the gaming scene, again.) Because of the scale, you can try things that wouldn't work in the paper game like subterranean, undersea or urban combat zones. As a role playing experience, I can foresee missions that have moral implications and fuzzy objectives. TAZ ----- [OK, everybody who'd setoff a nuke while in a cave elevate your turrents. Let's have a count here. -HJC] Henry J. Cobb hcobb@io.com http://www.io.com/~hcobb All OGRE-related items Copyright (c) 1998, by Steve Jackson Games.