The Persian Predicament Q&A (Patreon)

Here we are: your questions about the Persian Predicament answered! A big thank you to Luka again for playing and taking the time to answer some of these.

A video would have been probably a better format but finding the time to fit it in has been difficult, so we're here with text. In the actual document, this was all colour-coded and much easier to read... Patreon doesn't appear to have the functionality to write in anything except black so it's not as clear, but should be entirely readable. (Still better than Youtube, that just rendered it as a huge wall of text when I pasted it in there).

But enough of that: away with the Q&A!

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• Nicholas Shaler: How do you think things would have gone if either 1) 2nd Plt had not tried to contest the far objective at all or 2) if you had tried to retreat survivors to the middle objective. A dozen extra men in there might have made CM count it as a victory for you.

Hapless: 1) Without 2nd Platoon acting as a speed-bump and getting their “don’t tread on me” damage in Luka would have been able to easily pressure the other two platoons from the runway as well as the highway. We got a little bit of that in the closing stages of the battle when a BTR and a couple of Urals made a move and they did force me to react. If the whole BTR platoon had been there, plus half the BRDMs (which would have been able to push up earlier) then I would have had to really start splitting my AT assets and that would have been a problem.

2) If I’d have tried to retreat with 2nd Platoon after it was clear they were doomed then I think I would have just accelerated their destruction. I really don’t think any of them would have made it back anyway it that kind of open terrain, plus, by exposing them like that I would have been making Luka’s job a lot easier. By hanging on and dying in place, they lasted a lot longer and burnt more time.

• Eldar 1944: Question for the USSR, why go in for the flanking attack down the road and into the rear objective as it seemed to me that loosing that force was the point at which you ran out of options. Why not sit on the hill or attack the front objective out of the two by the road.

Luka: The attack was not made head-on due to my knowledge that the Americans had plenty of dragons, elevated positions, and buildings at their disposal. A frontal assault seemed too risky, so I opted to try a flank attack. The top of the hill was a highly contested objective, and it was clear that any artillery or infantry counterattack would be directed at the hill.

• Andrew Offen: Where is my medal?

Hapless: Under a pile of paperwork somewhere I think.

• Ray L: Question for Luka: why were the 120mm mortars tasked with neutralizing by smoke or fire the American supporting fires from the high ground. Even without spotting any enemy the terrain alone suggested the threat.

Luka: Time was short, and I adopted a more aggressive approach, with concentrated fire aimed at destroying morale while still conveying a sense of superiority, attempting to provoke movements in the American defensive positions.

• GLG: (Broadly interpreted): “What happens next in the narrative?”

Hapless: TF Ridgeway secures Bandar Abbas thanks to decisive US advantage in the air and the overextended Soviet vanguard pulls back into the mountains while the Soviet Air Force struggles to gain air superiority. The US launches a major B52 raid to neutralise the Soviet airbase at Kerman. The Soviets respond with a nuclear-tipped air defence missile. Things… go downhill from there.

There’s a movie about it! It’s called ‘Threads’ and it’s depressing.

• Ben Kerry: Why not have the 82nd take the Bandar Abbas international airport? That one is far larger. And with the Soviet recon battalion coming down is task force ridgeway really ready to deal with a Soviet motor rifle regiment? What would the defense area be for the first phase of operation?

Hapless: The real reason for choosing Havadarya AFB over Bandar Abbas International is that Havadarya has a less diagonal runway, making it easier to translate into CM.

But, there are still some operational/tactical reasons for going for it. The Soviets can attack Bandar Abbas International from three sides pretty much at their leisure. Havardarya is on the other side of the city though, and it has mountains to the north. So the Soviets would first be slowed down going through the streets, then be forced to attack from one direction. That not only makes defence easier, but forces them to bunch up in the streets or outside the city where the F4s can get at them.

• Ben Kerry: What would you do differently to the scenario if you were to do it again?

Luka: Learn more about the best ways to order artillery, use more smoke, and don't be overconfident, aggressive, or careless with your troops.

Hapless: I think I’d have a better plan for what the two platoons in the rear were supposed to be doing. 3rd Platoon held (and died) in place, but I spent a lot of time flip-flopping about what to do with 1st Platoon- whether to push them forward or keep them back to defend the rear objective. Part of the problem there was Luka being really aggressive and forcing me to worry about BRDMs and BTRs coming in deep from the highway and I don’t really have a good answer.

• Ben Kerry: Where do you think the “decisive point” lies in this game?

Luka: on the central airfield area base, where tanks, ifvs and apcs conducted the assault on the main urban area.

Hapless: For the Americans, the decisive point was definitely getting the TOWs into action. Without a reliable, longer ranged AT capability (looking at you, Dragon!) the battle becomes an exercise in whether the Soviets can mop up in time. They can just stand off with the tanks and BMPs and pulverise the buildings at will. The arrival of the TOWs and clearing room for them to operate at the western end of the map neutralised that option and put the pressure on them instead.

• Suity Boi: What would you have done with the forward observer and significantly more of your infantry force if your AT assets had killed all the enemy vehicles in the mortar area fight?

Hapless: The BRDM-BTR fight in the rear? If the FO had survived, I would have had two units capable of calling the F4s in in time so I’d have a better ability to spread them about a bit. Not sure if that would have changed anything, but the option is always nice. In some respects the fight actually did me a favour by pulling some of 1st Platoon to the rear where they were in a better position to repel Luka’s flankers later in the battle so, actually, greater success in that fight might not have been beneficial.

• Suity Boi: Have you read Sword Point by Harold Coyle?

Hapless: I have not. But I probably should.

• Spankee99: For Hapless: I would like to hear your thoughts on American infantry in CW. Despite the Dragon’s issues your guys seemed quite good at blunting Soviet pushes.

Hapless: They are pretty good. It’s easy to underestimate them on the mechanised battlefield, but the fact is that a small group of men with assault rifles and LAWs can put up a good fight against almost anything, providing they’re in a good position.

• For Luka: I have 2 questions: 1: What do you feel was the biggest threat on the battlefield? 2: Was there a reason you didn’t make a serious effort to contest the hill? Bonus Question: Any chances on a sequel to Persian Predicament?

Luka:

1-      M47-Dragons well placed in the buildings and TOWS; some small law teams scattered around were a potential threat too.

2-      For me it was harder to maintain and push, after dealing with big losses in the initial recon assault, I knew it would be harder to take it back because of how close it was from US spawn

3-      Totally in!

• Lemon6171: For Hapless- You might’ve mentioned it at some point(s) in the series, but did you have a contingency plan in the event that Luka either contested your control of the hill, or outright took control of it? Also, do you think airpower would have been decisive enough if you were an infantry only force and had no access to TOW Jeeps?

Hapless: My contingency plan for Soviets sitting on the hill is pretty much what I actually did: use the TOWs to suppress or destroy the enemy up there and take it back, if possible. If not, then it would just be an exercise in sucking up the pain and holding out in the buildings. In game terms, the time constraints on the Soviets meant they would have to come down and start trying to clear the objectives. In more narrative terms, a Soviet force on that hill would be a serious problem for TF Ridgway… probably right up to the point it became the Air Force’s primary target.

That said, in Combat Mission terms, close air support is slow to call in and not always reliable, so without the TOW jeeps the battle would be significantly harder for Blue.

• For Luka- I recall as I watched one of the first videos in the series, I predicted the mortars would be a key component in contesting the hill, but this ended up not being the case. How did the mortars play into your plans and their executions?

Luka: So there were 3 plans for mortars, an well-coordinated smoke barrage on the frontal part of the airfield in order to make an regular soviet assault, and more precise small barrage on know areas of importance that the enemy would be holding, the third one was and general artillery barrage in order to maintain pressure on the enemy and bring some casualties, I choose the third one because I wasn’t believing on myself to conduct an soviet assault with smoke or didn’t believe that I would have time for precision strikes with mortars.

• Rf8640: Hapless, regarding the setup, were the forces roughly equal in points value? It became clear very quickly that the Blue force were going to be defending the complex of buildings as it was close to the setup zone and that the Reds would be attacking across open terrain. Did the Reds have an attacker bonus?

Hapless: I didn’t intentionally balance the forces in points terms (swapping back and forth between Scenario Editor and QB Force Selectors is a pain), I just eyeballed it, but going back afterwards they work out pretty similar. Blue has 5590 points and Red has 5065. That’s not really the kind of points balance we want for an attack-defend scenario, but the F4s were really expensive and if we take them out, Blue only has 3034. That’s a bit more like it, and how relevant to balance the points values of the F4s are when they might not even do anything is an open question.

• Ongjunhung: For Luka: At game end I noticed you still had not an insignificant amount of 120mm mortar rounds left. Was there a spotting or call-in time issue, or was the rate of fire too low and 82mm mortars been more suitable? IMO they could've screened the attacking BMPs and tanks for either the swing you did from the highway or a hypothetical one across the runway, breaking LoS for his TOW MUTTs. They could also have been used to harass his units on top of the hill as well as inflicting the odd kill on the pixeltruppen in the two airbase capture zones.         

Luka:  Actually there a lot of remaining rounds, artillery took a lot of time to really put some pressure, and when it started, you can see by the videos that wasn’t something significant, I must say I didn’t like the way I performed my artillery calls, and plus I had to readjust because in midgame I was changing plans, so yeah, call in time issue was the major problem and spotting an very small one. And I totally agree that I could use artillery in a smarter way.