ChalkLine's Desiderata

[ChalkLine]

"Wow, we've got a lot of stuff!"

Players are acquisitive.

They start out fairly normally, and if you use the usual rules and say a five man group they get a load of equipment just starting out. However, after a few weeks of game time they can have a caravan of gear they can't bear to leave behind.
I've seen players happy to start out on foot with just a backpack soon end up with an MBT towing a trailer of junk, plus more. It's in their nature.

It makes a lot of sense. Everything about the setting states that all this stuff will get rarer and rarer. The constant struggle for food especially makes hoarding a natural response. Also, the game tends to throw up friendly NPCs, even the much-loved UK stragglers with their sterling SMGs, and soon they have a little train of camp followers traipsing along behind them.

Now, the first thing many GMs think is "how do I trim this train of stuff down to a lean, mean crew?"
Well, that's not hard and I'm not going to talk about that. Instead I thought we might discuss embracing the little society the PCs create and some ways it can be teased into good story-moments for players.

The first concern is of course working out how they move all this junk. Road trains are the usual method but there's also trains and watercraft as well. Now, from a tactical point of view you don't want your camp followers subject to a meeting engagement. It's going to be upsetting for the PCs if they have a heavy firefight complete with IEDs against a marauder ambush to find out that their NPCs are scattered across the road in bloody heaps and their stuff is on fire. So sensibly they should have two groups; the caravan and the scouts.
This works well with road, rail and river travel. The scout team(s) has or have a small, fast and nimble vehicle or two and they move ahead of the slow caravan looking for threats and either dealing with them or ensuring the caravan avoids them. T2K has many scouting vehicles in the list and these can often be used for rail and rivercraft as well although both these methods of travel can have specialist vehicles/vessels that travel on those mediums as well. 'Bogghammer'-style 'technical-boats' are great for river scouting and there's an enormous amount of specialist small rail vehicles in use by railways that range from the size of a jeep up to that of a railway car.
These scouting groups don't brew fuel or haul heavy loads, they are combat groups and only haul combat loads. If they need to rearm and resupply they go back to the caravan.
The caravan can haul everything else including specialist assault equipment that can toughen up the scouts. If the players need to penetrate some serious blocking situation that T-55 on a railcar or barge then comes into play without it having to be guzzling fuel every game day. Similarly the NPCs or wounded and recuperating PCs can be useful for providing supporting fires as well as just tending stills, scrounging/scavenging and standing guard. This means those mortars they've never been able to leave behind become useful and they may even be able to get a few shots off with that huge D-30 they've been lugging about to overawe any opposition. After all, the OPFOR don't know how many tubes or how much ammunition they have.

Of course the main group, the caravan, will not move fast but this in most games is a definite plus. Slow and steady exploration means that the GM can spend some time to detail the terrain they travel through.

Of course this is going to need some careful keeping track of. Players range from the bookkeeping-avoidant to those who revel in the minutiae. I find an hour or so with a cup of coffee and some paper spent with the players can organise shifts for the NPCs, how far each caravan vehicle goes on a fuel load and how much fuel the whole circus needs. You also can work out how fast the NPCs go through food and other supplies. Those NPCs permitted armaments (quite often the odd POW gets dragged along) need access to resupply as well and some NPCs will be tasked as hunters, although the large size of the caravan will tend to scare off game and it's more likely the scouts will do the bulk of the hunting.
While the card system for working out NPC motivations is a good start there's also many other systems for fleshing out NPCs and I really recommend the GM take the time to use these. The old AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide had a great set of tables (admit it, we all loved those tables) on page 101 to 102, Cyberpunk 2020 has some stuff on page 36 to 39 and I'm sure other games I don't know about have some good stuff you might want to look into, as well as your imaginations. These NPCs then become real, rounded individuals with wants, needs and desires and it becomes very easy to craft adventures and side adventures around, and the best thing is the players take them where ever they go!

How they do their scouting is of course going to vary wildly. Crossing flat farmland will be quick but traversing a ruined city might take weeks. In fact much of the time might simply be taken up finding a route the heavier vehicles in the convoy can use. While heavy trucks dragging big trailers might just need a good bridge every now and then a deep draught vessel or a heavy train might need both a special route as well as some careful engineering occasionally. GMs can use this to pause movement for a while to get the players to properly explore an area, deal with some sort of threat or even if the GM needs to take a breath to detail the upcoming route.
Some scouting groups might well be comprised entirely of NPCs and this is both a boon and a bane for the GM. It's good in that they might get into sticky situations the players have to get them out of and the GM can just feed info via them to the players, but it also means the GM has to sit down and work out their movements, consumables cost and what they discover. Also, as the players will be the commanders in most cases this will not be something you can just do all in one hit as the players will reroute them fairly often. I'd be interested in trying it out but it might not be for the fainthearted.

A caravan such as this is of course going to be an entirely different kettle of fish for settlements and groups they meet on the way. A bunch of nobodies in a hummer might not be a big problem; they won't impact the local foraging and hunting too much and the settlement would probably outnumber them so they'd feel a bit more confident but an entire convoy with heavy equipment is a different matter. As mentioned there will be concern about their impact on the local resources and also the presence of heavily equipped individuals in large numbers might be off-putting.

[ChalkLine]

Wisla Kralowa - Using Bunker Fuel

As many of you may know the use of coal/wood for the Vistula Queen has never sat well with me. I grew up among merchant seamen and when I chatted about that vessel's conversion system the general consensus of the engineers and shipwrights I talked to was "it would be easier to build a new vessel".

However, many soviet-era ships used what we call here in Australia "bunker fuel". Bunker fuel is a heavy very low grade oil from the very bottom of the fuel distillation process. It's of no use to vehicles smaller than a locomotive, you can't run a tank or truck on it. It needs to be heated up to 65–120 °C (149–248 °F) to be used and at cold temperatures it congeals into a kludgey, tarry goo. It was used in may places, primarily heavy industry and power generation. It's also extremely polluting which is why it's been largely phased out in many places but it still soldiers on in Russia for instance. It's notoriously horrid stuff to deal with and gets everywhere when being handled, which of course adds to the notorious "Post Apocalyptic Suck".

Now, rather than just brewing up fuel or cutting down trees having a heavy fuel oil used for the Vistula Queen actually adds to the game rather than takes away from it. Limiting options isn't such a bad thing as long as the GM let's the players have multiple choices. So rather than just blithely sailing down the Wisla the players now have to seek out sources of fuel for the tug giving the GM ready-made hooks for scenarios. Looting deserted towns is fun and crawling through abandoned factories or power plants (coal power plants use bunker fuel to get the combustion going) lets the players meet different situations than the usual 'settlement-with-a-problem' or armed mooks.

First off the players are going to need intel. Either the NPCs can have prior knowledge of the area or the PCs can interact with NPCs while scouting. Having one or two Boghammars/gunboats snooping along the river lets the PCs do this. Then they find out if the fuel is either on the river or inland. If on the river the PCs can simply clear the location, secure the resource and then bring the tug up to pump the fuel aboard after heating it.
If it's inland this then requires a dedicated tanker, and I'd be inclined to have them search out a tanker-trailer before leaving. A work truck towing this trailer would be a useful utility vehicle for the game and the truck could come in handy if the players also need to do any other repair, rebuilding or construction jobs in the game (and they should!)
Remember this stuff needs heating before it can be pumped out and recovered and the area it is found in may need repair or rebuilding before it can be heated up. This not only allows more encounters while this noisy process is undertaken but also allows the PCs to interact a bit with the environment such as scrounging.

This fuel gives the GM a little bit more narrative control. The PCs can have a hard limit put on their mobility, the GM can add a little tension as fuel stocks run low and it also forces the PCs to get out and look around more. A whole micro-campaign can be built just finding a good amount of fuel that opens up movement.

Here's some ideas to finish up with:
- Some NPC group has recognised the fuel's worth and has already recovered it when the PCs arrive to secure it. They can trade, negotiate or secure the fuel via violence/stealth.
- The facility storing the fuel has suffered an airstrike and is dangerous because of contamination, hazardous ruins, unexploded ordnance or a combination of these things. The PCs must deal with the dangers using their skills.
- A fuel source is now being used by a community of civilians and their militia and they are planning to use the fuel to kickstart a bit of light industry and at the very least for heating during the upcoming bitter winter. Who's need is greater?
- The PCs find some fuel but it is contaminated and requires a specialist chemist, an engineer and specialist distilling gear to clean.
- An NPC group is also running a ship and needs the same fuel, they might be in a race with the players to secure stocks. When the PCs negotiate somewhere this group might attack or try and outbid the PCs, if the PCs are too strong they might tip off nearby OPFOR units to the PC's presence. This group can be fleshed out and be great recurring rivals. Maybe some times they come to the player's aid if the player's are outmatched in exchange for sharing?

[ChalkLine]

Hmm . . did you say there's a sniper up there?
A water tower in Lubne, Poland. South near the Slovakian-Ukrainian border. These are very common structures in this area.

[ChalkLine]

Steam Tug

This is the "William C. Daldy". While she's a New Zealand vessel she was built in Glasgow in 1935 and is fairly representative of a vessel built right across Europe at that time. She's a proper steam vessel so she can actually do her rated 13 knots (24km/ph) and has a crew of ten. I've fixed up the plans a bit for clarity for you.

My only problem with her is that she's a harbour tug and thus has a deeper draught than a river tug. She's actually too deep for the upper Vistula as rated in the scenario which is given as 4.0 metres. Maybe she lurks downriver and you have to take her.
Here's her stats.

Specifications
Built: 1935 by Lobnitz & Co., Renfrew, Glasgow, Scotland. Yard number 986.
Launched: 1st October 1935. Left U.K. 7th November 1935 Arrived Auckland 30th January 1936
Total Price: £30,499 Sterling including delivery to Auckland
Registered tonnage: 348 gross
Speed: 13.4 knots on trials
Bollard Pull: 17 tons (at approximately 1,300 I.H.P.)
Registered Length: 127 feet (38.7 metres)
Beam: 34 feet 6 inches (10.5 metres)
Draft: 15 feet (4.5 metres)
Boilers: Two coal fired Scotch boilers, with 3 furnaces in each
Engines: Two triple expansion steam engines, surface condensing. 980 Indicated Horse Power each. 110 - 115 revolutions per minute.
Propellers: Two 11 feet (3.4 metres) diameter
Bunker capacity: 130 tons
Coal consumption: Long tow 1 ton/hour. Harbour work 3 - 3.5 a day
Crew): 10 - Master, Mate, 2 deckhands, 3 engineers and 3 firemen.

[ChalkLine]

Police Forces in T2K Poland

The police in Poland are a vital game playing element because they would be a major element in player interactions. When a disaster occurs, surviving police generally take charge and organise other survivors. As the only government representatives available in the atomised environment of Poland they lend an important element of solidity to traumatised civilians as well as projecting what they see as the government's will and trying to enforce laws when applicable and practical.
Of course they're not going to be everywhere. Police tend to be rounded up or otherwise de-powered when an invading force overruns an area. Due to their protective nature many might well die in the fighting and others simply die in the general destruction or the after-effects of warfare.
Historically many former-regime police are active in insurgencies for many reasons.

In the Twilight Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa (PRL), the Polish People's Republic, the police force is known as the MO, Milicja Obywatelska, Citizens' Militia,

These guys aren't called up for military service because they are a gendarmerie, or paramilitary police force of the style that is common in Europe.

They wear light grey uniforms and in wartime would be outfitted with equipment similar to the army (Polish People's Army Ludowe Wojsko Polskie LWP) although they would be very lightly armed. They wore the Wz. 67 helmet in light grey in combat situations, a grey peaked hat, a grey ushanka-style fur hat or a blue beret (for some units). Normally they would be only armed, if at all, with the FB P-83 Wanad pistol (in 9x18mmM). I think you'd probably see them with AKMs rather than the Kbk wz. 88 Tantal if in action though.

The elite of the MO was the ZOMO, Zmotoryzowane Odwody Milicji Obywatelskiej, Motorized Reserves of the Citizens' Militia. These guys were a sort of vast SWAT/Riot Troops/Disaster Reaction group who had stringent enlistment requirements (180 cm/90 kg) and even more political reliability. It was these characters that did much of the mass repression. They were armed as light infantry (including the BTR-60 in the special platoons). These guys make really nifty "bad guys" but once again I think they should be handled carefully like all NPCs.

For role playing I generally have the MO depicted as good communists, prone to corruption (like all soviet-style governments) but otherwise fairly normal. I let them have a wide ranging personalities and in fact in my canon the Warsaw Milicja make a famous last stand against NATO forces at the Warszawa Główna railway station during The Siege of Warsaw, the pivotal battle in my campaign's history. They make both good helpers and adversaries. If you don't stereotype them the players will never know what to expect and this adds a lot to the game.

The ZOMO however were used to keep the population in line and their brutality suppressing protests is legendary. They will be active in rear areas hunting down stragglers - ie: player characters. Worse, they will probably hand prisoners over to their bosses - the feared Ministry of Public Security, Ministerstwo Bezpieczeństwa Publicznego, the SB. The SB was not noted for their humanity.

[ChalkLine]

More Polish Places

The Chełm Chalk Tunnels
50km east of Lublin, home of the Sov 127th CD [(2000 men): Glogow, Nowa Sol], these tunnels were medieval and were only recently fully explored after the events in the game. Several galleries were walled off and difficult to find , let alone access. These tunnels are unique in the world and cover in total about 15km. Their vast extents may provide cover for a partisan scenario in the region of the main supply line from the USSR to the front lines that runs through Lublin. Check it out.

Bochnia Salt Mine
Halfway between Kraków and Tarnów lies the little town of Bochnia and its ancient salt mines, very similar but smaller than the Wieliczka Salt Mine. This one has a little trainway running through it, in fact right through the chapel that these mines often have, and this no doubt works in the scenario because, well, why not. It's time for tunnel-train fighting.
I can see a subterranean hospital being down here for some reason, and also perhaps something more sinister. One side or the other, maybe even both, has stashed some biological weapons done there and two or more teams arrive simultaneously to do something about it. Cue "Call of Duty - Modern Warfare" style desperate penetration of a facility while trying not to bring down the mine on the nearby hospital.

[ChalkLine]

The PT-76 amphibious gun vehicle
Use in combat in the Twilight 2000 setting

You'll note that I have not referred to this vehicle as either a Light Tank or a Reconnaissance Vehicle. This is although it has often been used in these roles where it predictably performed extremely badly it was not envisioned for these roles when it was designed. The USSR experimented with it for these and rather unscrupulously marketed it as them but it's not either. In fact what its actual role is for is quite different.
Let me explain. The PT-76 gets a bad rap in T2K and Cold War gaming because it's huge, thin-skinned, under-powered and has a very bad turret/crewing design choice. The usual assumption is that the soviet union screwed up with it but kept it on because the chassis was useful.

What it's actual role is for is extremely narrow. It's a boat that can climb over sandbars and provide fire support to troops assaulting rivers and beaches, places where the soviets took extreme casualties in The Great Patriotic War. When you examine the following aspects it starts to make sense;
Actual zero gun depression.
Very large hull but a tiny turret.
A gun with a medium calibre but ammunition the soviet union had already discontinued using.
Very thin armour, so thin it can only stop rifle ammunition and shell fragments.
All systems placed below the turret ring.
Limited vision blocks. Less rather than more than their MBTs, an odd choice for a scout vehicle.
Very large, strange, two man hatch with a superimposed commander's hatch.
Looking at these things you start to see why the soviets made their trade-offs in design.
The gun has -0º depression because it's meant to shoot from the water level upwards. [Edit: The hull was modified in 1957 to allow the gun to get a -4º gun depression. I suspect that the buyers were unimpressed] The D-56T tank gun (it's actually a unique gun, not a conversion as some sources say) uses a comparatively large calibre round because they contain more HE filler. If it was to use a 'tankerised' S-60 57mm autocannon it couldn't store the amount of ammo it would need to put down the same amount of HE and the 85mm D-44 gun would have meant a vast 20 tonne amphibious hull. The hull is meant to be submerged where it's safer (HEAT rounds of the time detonated when they hit the water and no light tank armour would stop the 90mm guns then in use) so the turret is tiny to limit its target profile - and thus the hull size is less important. A large hull is vital for a swimming tank and this also mandates thin armour because weight has to be kept down. The radio and so on was placed low, below the waterline where they were safe. As it was in effect a self-propelled gun it didn't need much vision equipment, far less than even much earlier reconnaissance tanks and even less that the contemporaneous T-55. The big hatch was designed so that the turret crew could escape wearing breathing gear or life vests.

So, the PT-76 wasn't a light tank/reconnaissance vehicle and when used in these roles it failed abysmally. It couldn't fight other tanks and it couldn't see anything to be any use. The BMP, BRDM and similar vehicles filled that role instead where they perform(ed) well. When the PT-76 fought actual light tanks such as the M41 Walker Bulldog it generally was destroyed before it could get a shot off or was even aware of the enemy. In fact the soviets only put stabilisation on the gun when it was shown that it had trouble hitting beach targets in any sort of swell.

Right, enough of the essay on what it is.
Where would you see this thing?
Well, unless it's pressed into service as a gun tank like so many specialist vehicles often are with "mixed results" (ie: a death trap) it is strictly a fire support vehicle. It's best function is if you imagine it as a direct fire artillery piece with the pathetic armour and vision that entails. By the time the Twilight War starts it's strictly used by naval infantry and only they have stockpiles of its rare ammunition so it's only where they are. Each vehicle should have a section/squad of troops that accompany it as it's relatively blind and they keep infantry and their nasty RPGs away from it. If any sort of armour is in the vicinity these things immediately retire, they have no business even fighting M2 Bradleys or even lighter reconnaissance vehicles. It can be considered to have no effective armour.

Is it any use?
Well, yes and no.
For the fighting that goes on in the Twilight War it is very good in that it can get across the demolished infrastructure. It doesn't need a bridge and this should not be underestimated as to how important that is. A good example is WW2 IJA tanks that were light to the point of uselessness in opposition to anything with a gun but they could get places where anything with a gun couldn't, meaning they were often very handy indeed. The PT-76 can appear in a lakes district or riverine area and rain down HE from outside of HMG or RPG distance. A careful enemy can utilise one to manouevre into a spot to whack a strongpoint with an HE round or two and then get it out before it's wrecked.
Otherwise it's only good for carting stuff around.
Consider this when considering it for an AFV; the commander's sight is not slaved to the gunsight. This means the commander/gunner has to use two sights, one to acquire a target and then one to engage it. As these sights might be pointing in different directions and the gunner's sight is of a narrow focus there might be a lot of hunting around to engage a moving vehicle that will likely result in the vehicle's destruction. The crews know this all too well.