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screamingeagle_101

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How many troops?
« on: 13 Apr 2003, 13:27:35 »
I'm just wondering how many troops would be appropriate to garrison the small towns and villiages in OFP?

I ask this because I think I station to many enemy troops in the towns and bases in my missions.

Judge856

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Re:How many troops?
« Reply #1 on: 14 Apr 2003, 04:45:39 »
I'd say about 30-50 but that kills the Pc lol, would make it about 20, and after a short time(you've killed a few) have a convoy approach and enter the garrison and get how, then waypoints etc etc

Offline Messiah

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Re:How many troops?
« Reply #2 on: 14 Apr 2003, 15:06:10 »
ermmm... well, what kind of town is this? if u are asking for realistic numbers, or gameplay number... then theres a difference...

off hand, i think 2 troops per building in the town is an accurate number... the smallest villages in ofp would only be garrisoned by a single squad - the large towns would be held by several squads and armour
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Phantom

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Re:How many troops?
« Reply #3 on: 17 Apr 2003, 15:29:51 »
it's all about proportion.
by that i mean that you need to know what sought of battle do you want? are you attacking the town or defending it?

How will the town be defended, what units will be defending and where will they be placed, those are the three most important questions in my opinion.

If your defending the town, just have a trigger that makes a chopper come in with reinforcments of 10 men at a time if numbers are too low, or your losing men to quickly.

If you want to prolong the battle, give the enemy only a rifle, with maybe a few rockets and a minimized amount of MG power, and make them dumb!

Just keep playing it until it feels right, not to easy, not unbeatable.

Hope that helped.

Offline macguba

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Re:How many troops?
« Reply #4 on: 24 Apr 2003, 14:07:39 »
Always think about the structure of a unit in cases like these.  

The smallest element is a squad of typically 6-9 men.   A squad does not have an officer, and conseqently never strays far from home.    

A Platoon normally has three squads plus a small HQ element and has 20-30, perhaps up to 40 with attachments like AA or AT.   A village that was garrisoned on an OFP island would probably have at least a platoon there.      A squad hardly counts as a garrison.    So a village that has troops in it is likely to have 20-40.

A platoon is part of a company, which normally has three platoons and a small HQ element.  It's normally 80-120 men and is the largest size unit you can really have in OFP.   You might use a company to guard a town.

A company is part of a battalion, which usually has 600-700 men.    About half the battalion are infantry (which is what I have been talking about up till now), about a quarter are fire support soldiers (mortars, AT, snipers, heavy MG, assault pioneers, recce) and the remaining quarter are supporting elements (medical, transport, mechanics, signals, clerks, cooks etc).    These are all organised in companies and platoons like the front line troops, but the companies are purely administrative - they never fight in companies - and the "platoons" vary enormously in size from about 10 (sniper section) to perhaps 50 (mortar platoon).   However you would never find the mortar platoon alone in a village.

You could imagine that the town in question is battalion HQ.   In which case there might be 150 soldiers there, but poorly armed.    There would be lots of tents and trucks.

50 is a bad number - in realism terms - to put in a place.   Of course its possible, but it would be made up of various groups - its not a coherent unit.     You would be better to have about 25-30 (a platoon) at the start, reinforced by another 30 later.      If you are going to have three lots of 30 then remember to included company HQ (about 10) as well.

Btw this is all based on my sketchy knowledge of British light role infantry.    Other armies have slightly different systems, but the basic idea is very widespread.  The Roman army used it for example.

In OFP of course, it's not the number of loons that's important.   It's how well placed they are and what waypoints they have that really matters.

You would never approach a village that you thought was occupied by the enemy with less than a platoon.   This is where OFP is unrealistic, you frequently approach with just a squad.   And of course special ops are an exception.    
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Offline Sui

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Re:How many troops?
« Reply #5 on: 24 Apr 2003, 17:09:04 »
I guess it's the old realism vs. gameplay arguement...

Since OFP is limited by CPU strength, I generally take what would be used in real life and downsize it one level.

As Macca said, you'd normally have more than a platoon guarding a town. So I downgrade that to maybe slightly more than a squad (or two).

If it's a major town, then have a platoon sized force guarding it (as realistically there would be a whole company in there).

At the end of the day it's up to the mission maker to find the balance between realism and gameplay (or CPU performance ;))

I see a lot of missions where the designer increases the difficulty simply by adding more bad guys. This isn't very good in my opinion, as you tend to get to the stage where the mission crawls along with your computer chugging.

Remember, it's not just the size of the enemy force, it's their reactions, tactics and position that make them difficult to kill ;)
Instead of increasing the numbers to increase the difficulty, make one of the squads flank the player, or make a squad do something else unexpected. It's all about thinking outside the box (and being a cunning sod ;))