Tactics for adversary near-future soldiers

[PTTG]

My PCs are a group of low-powered supers defending their homeworld (a human colony world) from an invasion of highly regimented space nazis. The invaders know that Powers exist, but they don't specifically know about the PCs until they encounter them or are given intel on them.

The TL is roughly 9^, with fairly fast FTL and several other superscience devices.

The PCs will have a couple of powerful force multipliers, making it possible for them to win despite being the underdogs. My question is, how can I run the adversaries? Does anyone have a good sourcebook or something like that that describes tactics that future soldiers would likely use?

[Kelly Pedersen]

I don't know of any GURPS sourcebooks that give near-future ultra-tech tactics suggestions, I'm afraid. Also, I'm not sure one definitive set of tactics could really be produced. Even if you limit yourself to only TL 9, no superscience, there's still a pretty wide variety of tactical options available, and the choice between them will be both situational and cultural.

Take, for example, using nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons. In our current culture, these are heavily discouraged, since the most powerful actors in our current geopolitical situation have a strong cultural taboo against using them, and pragmatic reasons as well (NBC weapons have a nasty habit of spreading out beyond their initial target, with long term consequences for the user as well as the intended victims). But a culture from another world or timeline might not have the cultural taboo against using NBC weapons, and they might be able to arrange it so that the fallout/infection/long term pollution didn't hurt them as much (if they had some kind of nerve gas equivalent that penetrated TL 8 protective gear, for instance, but not their own, and that safely broke down after doing its work). Such a military might deploy NBC weapons on a large scale.

The point of all this is, I would say that, rather than try to work out the tactics from first principles, you should pick some tactics that you think will be interesting, and then choose the technology that justifies those.

[tshiggins]

Okay, the decision about what WMDs to create, and under what circumstances to use them, are strategic decisions, and not tactical decisions.

The term, "tactics" implies rules of engagement and doctrines that define how operations take place on the field of battle. It also covers what combatants actually decide to do when faced with active hostiles in a given situation.

What sort of suggestions do you need?

[PTTG]

I'm thinking round-by round tactics on the individual level.

We're talking the individual combatant's actions, and the decisons of their fireteam and squad commanders. Maybe going up to what sort of response their command structure would have to them requesting backup or support.

[Varyon]

I’d normally expect TL8 tactics, but with caveats for additional options opened by having TL9 tech, like gyrocs that don’t need LoS, HUDs for improved situational awareness, robotic autonomous attack drones of various flavors, etc.

Depending on how you’ve flavored them, however, your Space Nazis may prefer to just steamroll everything in their way, regardless of the number of Nazi casualties.

[thrash]

Two concepts to start:

maneuver warfare

swarming

Against supers, conventional troops should focus on their vulnerabilities (Do they need to breath? Use flame to rob their oxygen, even if it doesn't hurt them otherwise.) and not try to fight them head-to-head. Hit and run should be the order of the day, and take out Hawkeye first. Note that a few hundred conventionals should be able to overwhelm a handful of supers just by hitting them constantly and from every direction at once -- give them too many targets and too much information to process. Edit to add: this is very difficult for a solo GM to simulate against a group of PC's, so don't be afraid to cheat.

This might also be relevant: Tucker's Kobolds.

[Rhino]

Full auto to the face was the favorite tactic of my players in a near future game. The DR was usually the least. Also, get AP bullets.

[Anthony]

It's heavily dependent on the details of their available tech, and given your description, you might want to run it fairly cinematic anyway.

The defining features of the real world TL 9 battlefield will likely be drones and networked communication.

[AlexanderHowl]

In general, I think that soldiers facing supers will end up being equipped with a minimum of Powered Combat Armor and ETC Heavy Chainguns firing APEP Viper rounds. A ten-person squad would have an Armored Hovercraft for transportation and heavy weapon support, with the squad leader flying the vehicle and the assistant squad leader acting as gunner. The remaining eight soldiers would deploy in two four-person fire squads that would attempt to kill the supers as quickly as possible.

The problem with that set up though is that most supers die against that type of firepower. Since every round would deal 22d+2 (3) pi damage, a super with DR 50 and Hardened 2 would still suffer 27 points of damage per round that hit. With viper rounds, a high percentage of long distance rounds with hit their targets and, with a 1/2D range of 6,000 yards, most flying supers are dead long before they get to the soldiers. Stealthy supers are the ones who survive.

[Michael Thayne]

Originally Posted by PTTG

I'm thinking round-by round tactics on the individual level.

We're talking the individual combatant's actions, and the decisons of their fireteam and squad commanders. Maybe going up to what sort of response their command structure would have to them requesting backup or support.

Tactical Shooting is great for this. It shows how to translate things like "handling doors and corners cautiously" and "advance (or retreat) while using suppression fire" into a series of one-second GURPS maneuvers. Pyramid #3/55: Military Sci-Fi may also be very useful to you here.