Refugees

[cephalopagus]

I'd love to hear some feedback on this scenario

Refugees

When looking at the Nightfall counter sheet I saw a counter with a picture of a truck on it labeled “Refugees” and starting thinking how can I use that in a game. The following is what I came up with, full disclosure I have yet to actually play this scenario. I thought that this scenario could be overlaid on any other scenario that uses a map with town hexes. I was also thinking that this should be played by a third person.

The goal is to get as many refugees out of the conflict zone using three 5-ton tucks and into the refugee camp.

Counters:
1 refugee camp marker (I printed out a caduceus as a marker)
3 truck counters
1 note pad to track refugees and evacuated town hexes
Many radiation markers (bingo chips should work well)

Rules:
Refugee camp cannot be place on or near any CP hex or any other military target. Should be placed on edge of map farthest from the conflict zone. Near or on a road would work best. Truck have a four-person civilian team 1 driver 1 navigator 2 EMTs, each truck can hold twenty refugees total of 24 souls. Trucks start out at the camp with only the crewmembers on board. It will take one turn to load refugees onto a truck and one turn to unload. Trucks cannot drive in wooded, swamp or rubble.

If a truck is on a hex that is attacked automatic loss of all life (except AP weapons). If in a hex adjacent to an attack a roll 1,2 or 3 results in damage 4 or higher no damage. If damaged another roll to determine extent: 1= 4 lives lost, 2=8 lives lost, 3=12 lives lost up to a roll of a 6 all 24 lives lost. If cruse missile is used loss of life on attacked hex and any adjacent hex if two hexes away follow damage rules above.

Once a hex is attacked (other than with antipersonnel weapons) a truck can no longer drive through that hex too much radiation for an unshielded vehicle (for cruse missile attack that hex and all adjacent hexes).

Once a town hex is evacuated no more refugees are present in that hex.

Trucks can drive through “friendly” hexes with a cost of one hex movement. Ogres cannot fire upon trucks. Trucks can be detained or commandeered by either belligerent. Intentionally firing upon a truck is a war crime.

Movement:
Trucks coming out of camp (no refugees) can move 4 hexes on road, 3 hexes in towns and 2 hexes off road. With refuges on board 3 hexes on road, 2 hexes in towns and 1 hex off road. (so empty 4 3 2 full 3 2 1) Truck transitioning on to or off of a road all movement stops.

Turn sequence:
Offence, Defense, Refugees trucks.

[HeatDeath]

I did a set of rules for refugees a while ago. These might complement your scenario quite nicely:

14. Refugee Concentration.

The entire hex is choked with thousands and thousands of refugees. This represents a refugee camp, or, if a road runs through the hex, a fleeing population on foot or in civilian vehicles, choking the road. Refugee concentrations do not move during a scenario. Refugee concentrations may be placed in any terrain except water.

Refugee concentrations have two states: "Normal", and "Panicked". Represent them using a two-sided token, with one side for Normal and one side for Panicked. Refugee concentrations begin the scenario in Normal state.

Refugee concentrations may be, but are not required to be, affiliated with one of the combatant sides in the scenario. Their token's color should reflect this. Any combatant faction the refugee concentration is not affiliated with is considered its enemy for the purpose of determining state changes and defensive bonuses, as noted below.

Changing states: The following events immediately shift the refugees to the Panicked state:
Any Ogre entering a hex within a 2-hex radius of the refugees.
Any Cruise Missile entering a hex within a 5-hex radius of the refugees.
Any attack by either side against any hex or unit within a 2-hex radius of the refugees, whether it is successful or not.
Any non-Ogre enemy unit (see above) entering the refugee's hex shifts them to the panicked state on a roll of 5+ on 1D6.
Any "normal" refugee concentration that is adjacent to a panicked refugee concentration at the beginning of it's side's turn immediately becomes panicked on a roll of 5+ on 1D6.
Flip the refugee concentration counter over to show the Panicked side. Refugees remain in panicked state for the remainder of the scenario.

Effect on movement: "Normal" refugee concentrations cost 1 movement point to enter the hex, in addition to the hex's normal terrain cost for that unit. "Panicked" refugee concentrations cost 2 movement points (in addition to the hex's normal terrain cost), and 6 VP to move through (reflecting the inevitable casualties caused by trying to drive military vehicles or infantry powersuits through a panicking mob). Units are still affected by movement effects from the underlying terrain [e.g. chances to become stuck or disabled.

Rule 5.09 applies - any unit capable of moving may move one hex to enter a hex with a refugee concentration, as long as the hex is not forbidden terrain to that unit, even if the refugee concentration raises the movement cost to enter that hex above the unit's normal movement allowance.

Any roads through the refugee concentration hex are considered cut for movement purposes.

Effect on defense: Friendly units in a hex with a "Normal" [non-panicked] refugee concentration treat the lowest-numbered D result in the CRT column as NE. Additionally, friendly infantry defense is doubled in clear terrain. (Infantry defense is still doubled in Forest and Swamp and tripled in Town hexes - the refugee concentration provides no additional infantry defense bonuses there.) [Panicked refugee concentrations do not provide defense benefits to friendly units, though they are more of an obstacle to movement.]

War Crimes: Any attack of any strength against a hex containing a refugee concentration, whether directed at the hex, the refugees, or a unit in the hex, kills most of the refugees, and scatters the rest, at a cost to the attacker of 18 VP. Remove the refugee concentration counter.

If there is a War Correspondent within 4 hexes of the refugee concentration, double the VP costs for movement through or firing on the refugee concentration.

Scenario Suggestion:
Have a line of refugees affiliated with the attacking units form a wall across the map. The attackers have to pick their way through this wall to get to their objective, and pick their way back through to successfully withdraw. Both sides have to decide under what circumstances, if any, panicking the refugees or slaughtering them outright will create a tactical advantage.

[cephalopagus]

Cool thanks.

[Izzy_B]

Interesting idea.

We've been happily playing with combat in town/city hexes without thinking about the in game effect on the local population. Gotta figure that fights involving tac-nukes are gonna affect them.

Speaking of war crimes, how many of us have ever placed a howitzer or an armor unit deliberately in a town/city hex for the defensive value? While we're on the subject, can a cyber tank be held accountable for attacks on local population centers?

[cephalopagus]

Originally Posted by Izzy_B

Interesting idea.

We've been happily playing with combat in town/city hexes without thinking about the in game effect on the local population. Gotta figure that fights involving tac-nukes are gonna affect them.

Speaking of war crimes, how many of us have ever placed a howitzer or an armor unit deliberately in a town/city hex for the defensive value? While we're on the subject, can a cyber tank be held accountable for attacks on local population centers?

Thanks for the reply and yes I've put things in town hexes. As far as cyber tanks accountability...command and control theory states that the commander is ultimately responsible. So whoever sent that tank into action would hold responsibility.

As far as the moral or legal use of AI in war there are way too many articles, books and interviews to go into any detail here. If your interested I' d start with The U.S. Army War College Quarterly. There were many articles addressing this issue.

However, even after reading everything you want you can still draw your own conclusions. Just because the experts come to a conclusion doesn't mean a bunch of sci-fi tank nerds couldn't come up with something better. Remember chemical weapons were permissible in WWI but today that would be a war crime. Using cluster bombs were fine in WWII and today they are banned.

But my question is what did you think of the scenario? Any suggestions for improvement did I miss anything? Maybe deductions for war crimes on the VP?

Thanks

Paul

[Izzy_B]

Originally Posted by cephalopagus

Thanks for the reply and yes I've put things in town hexes. As far as cyber tanks accountability...command and control theory states that the commander is ultimately responsible. So whoever sent that tank into action would hold responsibility.

As far as the moral or legal use of AI in war there are way too many articles, books and interviews to go into any detail here. If your interested I' d start with The U.S. Army War College Quarterly. There were many articles addressing this issue.

However, even after reading everything you want you can still draw your own conclusions. Just because the experts come to a conclusion doesn't mean a bunch of sci-fi tank nerds couldn't come up with something better. Remember chemical weapons were permissible in WWI but today that would be a war crime. Using cluster bombs were fine in WWII and today they are banned.

But my question is what did you think of the scenario? Any suggestions for improvement did I miss anything? Maybe deductions for war crimes on the VP?

Thanks

Paul

I've been following the literature on thinking about military applications of AI from various cultural perspectives. Way too soon to draw any conclusions. Also as you say the legal concept of war crimes evolves as well.

As to the scenario itself I like it. For VPs I personally would not deduct from the attacking side if refugees are targeted since speculating on laws of war in Ogre could end up messy. At the most basic the scenario works like a train scenario or any other must complete Mission X scenario and I like those.

For more chaos, add a third player, a faction which wants to kill the refugees but both Combine & Paneuro consider as an enemy. The third faction has soft target goals but will have to fight off both C&P to accomplish them.

[cephalopagus]

Originally Posted by Izzy_B

I've been following the literature on thinking about military applications of AI from various cultural perspectives. Way too soon to draw any conclusions. Also as you say the legal concept of war crimes evolves as well.

As to the scenario itself I like it. For VPs I personally would not deduct from the attacking side if refugees are targeted since speculating on laws of war in Ogre could end up messy. At the most basic the scenario works like a train scenario or any other must complete Mission X scenario and I like those.

For more chaos, add a third player, a faction which wants to kill the refugees but both Combine & Paneuro consider as an enemy. The third faction has soft target goals but will have to fight off both C&P to accomplish them.

WOW holy crap I never thought of terrorist targeting refugees! So it would actually be a fourth faction because I see the refugee team as being played by a third person. I thought it would be too much for one player to defend and run the refugee too. I like the idea of the terrorist attacking refugees and they themselves being attacked my C&P maybe with orders to kill on site. But for now I think just keeping to the refugees and then add that one on after some play time to work out any bugs. Then again maybe we can throw in ARF to protect the refugees as a fifth faction but I think there wouldn't be enough room on the map for all of that, thank God. Thanks again for your help and patience.

[Izzy_B]

Originally Posted by cephalopagus

WOW holy crap I never thought of terrorist targeting refugees! So it would actually be a fourth faction because I see the refugee team as being played by a third person. I thought it would be too much for one player to defend and run the refugee too. I like the idea of the terrorist attacking refugees and they themselves being attacked my C&P maybe with orders to kill on site. But for now I think just keeping to the refugees and then add that one on after some play time to work out any bugs. Then again maybe we can throw in ARF to protect the refugees as a fifth faction but I think there wouldn't be enough room on the map for all of that, thank God. Thanks again for your help and patience.

Could be terrorists, could be an established non state actor like the Vatican Guard. So far we have not established that the town/city in question belongs to either major combatant after all. Could be a hold out city which has rejected any authority of the Church or perhaps the city is in some form of active conflict with the Vatican. Fighting between C&P may be just over the territory or just because they fight rather than the town/city being of any particular strategic interest.

I like a bit of back story, a bit of "why we fight".

[cephalopagus]

Originally Posted by Izzy_B

Could be terrorists, could be an established non state actor like the Vatican Guard. So far we have not established that the town/city in question belongs to either major combatant after all. Could be a hold out city which has rejected any authority of the Church or perhaps the city is in some form of active conflict with the Vatican. Fighting between C&P may be just over the territory or just because they fight rather than the town/city being of any particular strategic interest.

I like a bit of back story, a bit of "why we fight".

I think "Why we fight" should be required viewing and "On Killing" should be required reading along with "The Prince", "The Art of War" and "On War" but hey what the hell do I know? I just hope the scenario works well.

[Izzy_B]

Originally Posted by cephalopagus

I think "Why we fight" should be required viewing and "On Killing" should be required reading along with "The Prince", "The Art of War" and "On War" but hey what the hell do I know? I just hope the scenario works well.

A reader after my own heart!

Now if only Martin van Creveld would reply to my fan mail asking him to write up something on Ogre...