Using Tactics with Elite Stormtroopers

[vanir]

when fighting dangerous opponents having initiative can really give you an edge, especially if it's consistent. Forcing them to declare first gives you the tactical advantage of knowing their offensive declarations and adjusting your declarations to suit, as well as placing them on the back leg in defense as their reaction skill uses sap their offensive dice beyond the first attack. When dealing with high skilled or powerful opponents which are using a lot of MAPs to clean up a Party, you just throw a spanner in their whole game and force them to act much more single-mindedly and conservatively, albeit at higher skill but against a Party it raises the ratio of counterattacks per attack if you make them act more conservatively because they don't know what you're going to do until after they declare first.

Alternatively when you have the combat power advantage you can limit wild card damage by minor bosses and henchmen by taking them down quickly and effectively at the start of the combat round by taking the initiative with an attack guaranteed to level them.

If you have those options in the bag every combat round, eg. by having an expert tactition in the group, over extended combat scenarios the Party really does make more adventure headway versus gametime, instead of still being stuck in the hangar fighting the one squad of elite stormtroopers after two hours of gameplay, they're through that in a few rounds and down the hall in two more, another melee at the turbolift banks and after a big combat session they wind up on the bridge for a big game session climax against a major boss with some parlay and roleplay to put icing on the hack and slash.


wrt the question of specialization, specialized beats general in its specific environment and can do extra things like affect passive difficulties,
eg. in an urban combat environment with craters and debris there might be a normal terrain difficulty of moderate to move freely, in addition a tactics roll of moderate might allow you to keep 1/4 cover doing so, a specialisation of tactics: squads might increase cover to 1/2 cover maintained through the terrain section. A tactics: ground assault specialization wouldn't help you here as it's for open field/trench warfare and not urban assault and house clearing like tactics:squads can do for you.


The dimension you get as GM with an NPC squad of elite stormtroopers under a veteran NCO or officer with tactics:squads means they maintain cover on the offensive, they consistently have a very good shot of winning combat initiative every round and depending on Party versus Stormtrooper equipment, can force initiative with feints, or take initiative when they have the advantage.
Mix in stormtrooper squad organisation like a five man 15D unit with an NCO that has no Dex penalty on his custom fitted armour, some melee skill and a vibroaxe/heavy blaster in each hand, two riflemen with grenades, one combat medic with medpacks, first aid and a pistol, and a troop support member with a repeater or concussive, anti-armour (particle) or antivehicle weapon, play them smartly, use tactics for benefit in both negotiating terrain and selecting firing positions with cover, as well as combat initiative, and it's a deadly combination that can stall a Party and make them re-evaluate the idea that Stormtroopers are just cannon fodder for anyone short of the Han Solos out there.

I mean Stormtroopers are seriously well equipped so they should be really easy to make very very dangerous.

[garhkal]

Ive often had imperial ST officers who had Vibro sword (and one officer's case vibro rapier) specialty under melee, and others who had brawl specialties of boxing (or martial arts-compnor)..
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[atgxtg]

[vanir]

[atgxtg]

[Kytross]

Random thought:

Tactics could reduce difficulty OR add to the bonus of combined action rolls, assuming everything goes according to plan.

[atgxtg]

[garhkal]

That's an interesting HR.. Sort of like a synergy bonus from tactics working on your command.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[atgxtg]

[atgxtg]

I had an idea. You know how there is a bit of a debate about Commanders passing on Command bonuses down the line to allow for a large group to coordinate? Well, what if Combined bonuses couldn't pass down, but Tactics Dice could?


For example, lets say we have a group of solders fighting in WWII. Their command orders come down from General Patton, who we can assume has a decent command skill, but after going through the chain of command the soldier really are getting their commands from the same Second Lieutenant who commands them 24/7. But...

...he is following General Patton's battle plan, so he can use Patton Tactics dice instead of his own. That's probably a good thing as the General almost certainly has a higher Tactics Die Code than some inexperienced 2nd Lt!

Commanders and the chain of command could use their Command dice to see how well they pass on the battle plan. If they make the roll they pass on all the tactics dice of the leader, while if they flub the roll they "lose" !D or more of the tactics dice. So if the command goes down through a bunch of bad commanders it can get all screwed up.

[Darth_Hilarious]

Sounds plausible to me, it makes more sense that by having the "Big Picture" that the tactical advantage would defer back to the commanding General rather that a first year Butter Bar.