Trench Warfare

[Mohoender]

Someone might object that it's not entirely relevant to Twilight but Jester reminded me that it might well be. Therefore I post an interesting site on the Italian Arditi of WWI.

http://www.worldwar1.com/itafront/arditi.htm

In a twilight setting such type of warfare might become useful again and I wouldn't be surprise to find again middle ages type weapons and armors as in WWI. If anyone has something on this, I'll be most interested.

As modern bodyarmor become rare, troops might rely on old types of body armor suits. Moreover, a mace or a battle axe is a scary weapon in close combat even when you are facing it with modern rifle. As Jester said, especially when you are taken by surprise.

[headquarters]

Originally Posted by Mohoender

Someone might object that it's not entirely relevant to Twilight but Jester reminded me that it might well be. Therefore I post an interesting site on the Italian Arditi of WWI.

http://www.worldwar1.com/itafront/arditi.htm

In a twilight setting such type of warfare might become useful again and I wouldn't be surprise to find again middle ages type weapons and armors as in WWI. If anyone has something on this, I'll be most interested.

As modern bodyarmor become rare, troops might rely on old types of body armor suits. Moreover, a mace or a battle axe is a scary weapon in close combat even when you are facing it with modern rifle. As Jester said, especially when you are taken by surprise.

The various militaries all reverted to old school trench warfare tactics of the 1400-1500s at some time during the "Great war".

You can find examples of industrially massproduced trench knives,maces,mortars,bodyarmour and grenades and so on that are based on or exact copies of centuries old gear .Saw a german trench club on some auction site some time back - it was based on a mace popular in Central Europe around 13-1400 .

Our site contains a few examples of WWI gear such as "Graben panzer",as well as melee weapons that could be easily made when other weapons cant be .As the world of T2K grinds on and units go into cantonments etc the occupation of trade routes,farmland etc becomes more vital to the individual commander.Entrenching and fortifying would be a natural thing to do considering the "old tactics" of fire and manouver are becoming obsolete-fuel and ammo is getting scarce and risking what little you have left in an assault could be too risky .There will be little or no resupply .

We played a great big scenario on trench warfare some time back in our group .Inspired by the book "The Somme" -excellent read btw ,I as GM had my players face trenches and bunker systems on a large scale .It was great fun considering the old school rpg feel of the mapped out "dungeon like trench systems " -on the map they do look like an old ADnD dungeon -and plenty of action to be had -after all the enemy lies in wait in droves just around the next bend or in the next section of the trench.

[jester]

I agree.

As units settle down into catonments they will dig in. First a fighting hole. Then a improved bunker, and then trenches connecting them, then full on WWI style trenches.

And with trenches comes trench warfare. Instead of the insane frontal attacks of WWI, it will be more like small teams of men sneaking through no mans land hoping to infiltrate the enemy trenches to accomplish whatever their mission may be.

And one thing about personel infiltrating into enemy positions. It helps if you are really really quiet. Thus, trench knives, crossbows, axes and hatches all are pretty effient in their dealyness and for the most part quiet. At least much quieter than a gunshot unless you have a working silencer for a pistol with subsonic ammo.

And then if it is full on trench warfare. Well, then things sometimes get to close that a rifle is useless! If you are body to body in a grapple with an enemy, you can not bring your rifle to bare. But, a trench knife, a hatchet or tomahawk or a mace well you can dispatch or at least get the enemys attention quite easily.

Further, weapons wear out. New troops will need some form of weapon, so I can see new civilians, peasants formed into a militia could be armed with some primative weapons. A few with single shot localy made shotguns maybe, since they are primative and simple weapons. Crossbows, again a simple easily made weapon, and pikes, axes and maces, since most of the primative firearms and bows would be a one shot weapon before the enemy would be upon you and it would then be a melee.

And then we also have the sieges early in the war. The siege of Warsaw for example. I could imagine it surrounded by trenches belonging to both sides. One side digging in as they were stuck in the city and needed protection. The other side digging in as they encircled the city, digging trench networks closer and closer as they choke the city and its defenders.

How hellacious would that be, have the PCs traverse a MILE WIDE trench network of the enemys before they hit no mans land and then back to freindly lines. That alone would be a campaign.

[headquarters]

not the regular ones you bury to have a tank drive over them -but old school trench warfare mines -were a trench position is so well defended that it would be inadvisable to attack they dug tunnels under it that could be miles long and employ thousands of diggers-then they filled it with explosives and blew the whole position up .

this of course was tried countered by the defenders digging their own counter tunnels to blow up the enemy or to break into their tunnel and fight them man to man etc

Again a very cool setting for gameplay imho.

[jester]

Originally Posted by headquarters

not the regular ones you bury to have a tank drive over them -but old school trench warfare mines -were a trench position is so well defended that it would be inadvisable to attack they dug tunnels under it that could be miles long and employ thousands of diggers-then they filled it with explosives and blew the whole position up .

this of course was tried countered by the defenders digging their own counter tunnels to blow up the enemy or to break into their tunnel and fight them man to man etc

Again a very cool setting for gameplay imho.

That is so evily cool. I recall reading about that durring WWI and the American Civil War. Turning T2K into D&D,

"As you are digging, the wall before you colapses."

"You see a stunned Russian in the dim light of your headlamp. He is holding a pick, and you hear other viioces in Russian behind you....What do you do!"

[Marc]

I remember to have seen some good examples of trench weapons in the Imperial War Museum, London

[Targan]

Originally Posted by Mohoender

Moreover, a mace or a battle axe is a scary weapon in close combat even when you are facing it with modern rifle. As Jester said, especially when you are taken by surprise.

My brother's PC in my current campaign is a 6'5", 230lb Samoan in the USMC Force Recon and he picked up a fireman's axe in the Armies of the Night segment of the campaign. In hand to hand he can easily weild it one handed and because the roots of Gunmaster lie in the mediaeval combat system Harnmaster the results of an axe strike are very, very ugly.

[jester]

There is a program on the history channel about Arms and Action where some Brit dude has amatuers using weapons of a specific period. And most of the time they deal with melee weapons sometimes firearms, what I have learned from that program is alot of such weapons are hard to control. The big axes and morning stars in particular.

I am thinking three weapons will come to prominance,

Maces

Hand Axes

Cutlasses would come into vogue, or similiar short swords, or long dirks

Since all are cheap to make, easily controlled and carried and effective even for those who are not overly skilled.

[headquarters]

Originally Posted by jester

There is a program on the history channel about Arms and Action where some Brit dude has amatuers using weapons of a specific period. And most of the time they deal with melee weapons sometimes firearms, what I have learned from that program is alot of such weapons are hard to control. The big axes and morning stars in particular.

I am thinking three weapons will come to prominance,

Maces

Hand Axes

Cutlasses would come into vogue, or similiar short swords, or long dirks

Since all are cheap to make, easily controlled and carried and effective even for those who are not overly skilled.

spears ?

easy to make ,and easy to learn people the basics .

otherwise I am totally onboard with your analyzis.

[Targan]

Originally Posted by headquarters

spears ?

Absolutely. Harnmaster/Gunmaster treats rifles with bayonets fixed as spears so all soldiers that have had bayonet training effectively have spear skill in my campaign.

It's been a long time since there has been a bayonet charge in any of my campaigns but there was an excellent instance of bayonet fighting in my awesome Gunmaster T2K one-off years ago. I had 10 players for this one 24 hour session and the PCs made up a French Foreign Legion long range foot patrol on the Iran-Iraq border. They ended up being chased by Hind-mobile Spetznaz and were wiped out to the last man in a heroic last stand at a rocky outcrop in a valley full of scrub. Really good game.

[Mohoender]

Originally Posted by Targan

Absolutely. Harnmaster/Gunmaster treats rifles with bayonets fixed as spears so all soldiers that have had bayonet training effectively have spear skill in my campaign.

It's been a long time since there has been a bayonet charge in any of my campaigns but there was an excellent instance of bayonet fighting in my awesome Gunmaster T2K one-off years ago. I had 10 players for this one 24 hour session and the PCs made up a French Foreign Legion long range foot patrol on the Iran-Iraq border. They ended up being chased by Hind-mobile Spetznaz and were wiped out to the last man in a heroic last stand at a rocky outcrop in a valley full of scrub. Really good game.

So your PCs had their own little Cameron (nice) .

[jester]

I was going to add spears, actualy pikes....but I was meaning for up close and personal hand to hand combat inside trenches., a spear is a bit long for use inside a narrow trench. I was also thinking of something to supliment a firearm or other primary weapon.