urban warfare rules?

[flashmobbob]

hi guys,
Im a fairly new MD, having only run a few "theatre of the mind" style, scripted one shots for some uni mates.
they've requested a ww2 setting and Im currently throwing together a battle of berlin assault on the Reichstag thing.
has anyone got any tips, house rules or general help for dealing with house-to-house and building clearance mechanics?

currently im going to use:
Roll 2d4, 1d6, 1d8, 1d10, 1d12 to randomly generate a house
on d10- 9+ donates an entirely civilian occupancy
on d12- 8+ donates a booby trapped door/entry point (if civilians inside, substituted for a barricade or being rushed by a panicking civilian)
number of rooms decided by d6+2 (not including stairwells)
number of civilians or enemies decided by 2d4
basement/attic space decided by d8- 1=empty basement, 2=basement with civ, 3=basement with enemy, 4-5=nothing, 6=attic with enemy
7=attic with civ, 8=empty attic

then rules for making them clear houses:
approach
-1 and 2 on the stack roll Al for threats externally
-1 and 2 roll Al for door checks (if they remember)
entry
-if they post a frag, occupants make Ag checks: full damage on a fail, half on a pass, quarter on a roll of <20
-unaware enemies/post frag= 1st and 2nd man in count as in cover for first CR of shooting
-aware enemy= 1st and 2nd count as in the open
-rest (3rd and 4th in stack) count as moving to cover in first CR, sandbagged by the first two guys
shooting
- 1st CR- all enemies in room can fire if still alive and the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th players can fire.
- rest of the PCs are able to move in in 2s every subsequent CR
Initiative will be dealt with in order of Ag, though might knock the enemy Ag down if they've just been fragged or are unaware

hows that sound? it feels a bit clunky but hopefully once I get the system down I can move on to other theaters like Tet offensive, Russians in Afghanistan, korea and Rhodesia.

sorry for the long post, there's just no one whos even heard of this system nearby and I'm having to MD with no experience playing myself. any help at all would be great.

thanks guys.

[slade the sniper]

Those are actually pretty good rules...
I would say that you should do some expectation management with your players as to how "fast" they think they are going to move in an urban combat environment under fire. Unless you are supporting/supported by armor, you are not going to move faster than a block an hour-ish, especially with multi-floor buildings and you have to keep pace with the units to your flanks. Also, you have to be aware of who is pulling rear security, sub-surface movement (via tunnels and sewers) is a real pain.

Clearing big swathes of residential area is manpower intensive and not too valuable in terms of manpower lost and objectives gained, especially unless you have to. Hospitals, schools, government buildings, police stations, warehouses, factories, etc are actual objectives and all those houses and stores and other stuff is just stuff to clear once you have your actual objectives. Granted, in WWII it wasn't like you could just roll in and take them, so it was a lot of room to room to room type stuff.

A lot of the time in WWII you kept off the streets if you could help it. T intersections almost always had a MG team on them to ruin your day. Consider going through walls from one house/apartment to another. In WWII, there wasn't a lot of "going back to base" so as far as you cleared was where you stopped when you took too many casualties or were out of ammo or just too tired and needed to be replaced. The sheer amount of energy/ammo used in high intensity urban combat is unreal. Every window/door/alley/shadow is/might be a threat. You are either still or sprinting. Tearing down walls with tools is hard work. You go through grenades at a very fast pace. Grenades in an enclosed space are good, two are better, three is great. Even if they are still alive, they can't do much but grope around blindly and make fish sounds. Grenades in an open area are pretty much trash. Artillery is not too great in urban areas depending on range, they need to do high angle, make sure your FO tells them just to be sure. Sometimes the red legs forget.
Use your mortars. Light mortars can be brought with you, and can be used at a range of a block or two. If you have a GOOD gunner in handheld, they can drop rounds right onto bad guys heads, but it isn't going to penetrate much beyond a house roof.
Smoke grenades are useful for concealment, use them. Fires, even those that make smoke are much less useful than you would think. Fire IS a great way to find out if a building is inhabited, however.
Some things that you really want to bring along for your squad are flashlights for everyone, a megaphone, a sledgehammer, a pickaxe, a crowbar, spraypaint or lots of chalk, a flag to dangle out windows to communicate with your flank units if you need to tell them exactly what room you are in, a grappling hook to pull tripwires (saves time to just blow the damn things instead of defusing them), and a nice light collapsible ladder...waaaay better than a grappling hook (OR you can use each other's bodies to make expedient ladders which is pretty sweet, but you have to actually know what you are doing) 4 grenades at least per person, 1 smoke per person, some explosives if you can get them and at least double the blasting caps/initiators that you think you will need (nothing makes you more stupid than a dud...cuz now you gotta go fix it) a pistol for everyone of the same caliber, primary weapons of the same caliber (carbines are nice, just remember to use three or four shots instead of one or two; full battle rifles are a plus for the range, but do suck for CQB, use a pistol if you can), a LIGHT machine gun (the ranges in urban combat are not long enough to bring GPMG and tripod and all the other goodies unless you are defending).

Finally, if you have a copy of Cyberspace, page 194 has a GREAT random urban encounter table filled with stuff for what type of building it is.

-STS

[flashmobbob]

Thanks mate, those are some brilliant points that I’ll try to work into encounters!
I’ll trial those with this upcoming soviet one, hopefully the high attrition rates that they’ll be able to deal with (literally cut down character sheets enough for a whole rifle company) will help to teach them some of those realities through practice rather than me just talking at them.
Was there much pushback for civilian casualties in intense situations such as ww2 or Tet/nam?(Dispatches seemed to write that command did a lot of turning a blind eye). I’m trying to build in the opportunity for a few morally grey encounters so players think a little before going condition red and fragging every building.
Also WP, useful in urban or nah?
Finally, would you deal with stuff like over penetration, both for caliber choice in firarms and grenade fragmentation through walls or would it be too clunky/should I just wing it a little or put it in just for flavour?
Thanks for the quick reply!

[slade the sniper]

Thanks mate, those are some brilliant points that I’ll try to work into encounters!
I’ll trial those with this upcoming soviet one, hopefully the high attrition rates that they’ll be able to deal with (literally cut down character sheets enough for a whole rifle company) will help to teach them some of those realities through practice rather than me just talking at them.
Was there much pushback for civilian casualties in intense situations such as ww2 or Tet/nam?(Dispatches seemed to write that command did a lot of turning a blind eye). I’m trying to build in the opportunity for a few morally grey encounters so players think a little before going condition red and fragging every building.
Also WP, useful in urban or nah?
Finally, would you deal with stuff like over penetration, both for caliber choice in firarms and grenade fragmentation through walls or would it be too clunky/should I just wing it a little or put it in just for flavour?
Thanks for the quick reply!

WP in urban environments....well if you are wanting to set fire to things, it is great. For "marking," targets in an urban environment, no. There are too many ways to exit the area in an urban environment for the marking to be effective, even if you have the objective on overwatch. However, to set things on fire, it is great. Much more effective than other flammable materials such as molotovs and flamethrowers (really only effective in enclosed areas). So, for a final answer, yes, WP in urban environments is a go

As for overpenetration...well, hmmm. Is it a thing to be aware of, yes. Large caliber rounds (.50 cal and above) are going to chop through exterior wall, and if you are using AP rounds they are going to shoot through a lot of "cover" (IIRC .30-06 AP rounds can penetrate 4" of concrete...) so that is something to be aware of, bullets from "nowhere" just arriving, then the sound of gunfire.

In my experience, however, once a battle has begun, "most" people have a tendency to hide and huddle together (except for crazy people...usually some old grandma that DGAF just walking through a gunfight with her eggs and milk). Civvies are really an issue in ambushes and raids. People on rooftops are not "hiding," which means they are also not innocent. Just because they are civilians does not mean they can not provide aid to the enemy (which is to be expected, you are generally invading their country...) Civvies TODAY are a battlefield obstacle and hindrance and need to be protected, blah blah blah. Not really...just don't kill them/rape them/rob them, and you are doing good enough (in a high intensity conflict). Back then, it was more "fluid," so to speak. From what I have heard about WWII, most military aged males were already fighting, so those that were left were dregs, criminals, deserters or unfit for service. Kids and women...that is up to your players, but, these situations are the ones that determine alignment.

As for mechanics...meh, just wing it.

-STS