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In firing up the Standalone scenario 'Duelists, 1989', I've remembered a general question I wanted to ask the community:

How closely do you follow the orders provided in a scenario's briefing/description, and any subsequent messages?

I'll explain how this specific scenario got me thinking along these lines:

For those not familiar with Duelists, this alternate history scenario has a different 1989 where the USSR has effectively been triumphant in the Cold War, having fractured the western alliance, with the US reverting to Isolationism, and most of Europe bickering amongst themselves, with only the British and West Germans left standing in the Anti-Soviet alliance.

While the scenario can be played as either the British or the Soviets, my general thinking has to do with this scenario from the British perspective.

The situation has the Soviets dispatch the Kiev with powerful escorts into the Norwegian Sea, ostensibly for another passage through the GIUK gap. The Royal Navy sends HMS Invincible group northward to shadow the Kiev group.

However, for the Soviets, this is actually a deployment to neutralize the Royal Navy threat in the North Atlantic by destroying HMS Invincible, calculating that such a decisive blow will dissuade the British from fighting further.

The British do not know this of course. The British Player's orders, per the Briefing are:

"Intercept the Kiev CVHG and show the British Flag. If attacked destroy this group with minimal loss to your own"

The second line goes without saying, but it's the first that got me thinking, as two things about this scenario actually contradict that first line of that mission order. Since sometimes similar contradictions have appeared in other scenarios, I feel this is a good example to go over the bigger question(s) I have.

First, the scenario starts with the British being Hostile to the Soviets, as shown with the Soviet airbases in the Kola Peninsula area being red. Although the player can freely change the posture toward the Soviets as Unfriendly, this default contradicts the briefing.

Second, as those who have played this scenario will agree, the key to winning as the British side is to not get detected until you are in an advantageous position to strike the Kiev. Therefore, you have to play stealthily.

Does this not go directly against the "show the British Flag" part of your orders?

Presumably if your mission is one of presence, you would want it to be known you are there.

I'm not necessarily criticizing the scenario for these, as I rather think it's a good example to illustrate my larger question, again:

How closely do you obey your orders in a scenario?

Some scenarios do include a penalty for going against certain orders (like not shooting civilians), but there's not always a penalty.

Presumably in full-blown war scenarios you would conceivably be a little more free in your actions, but in crisis/transition-to-war scenarios, would the situation not be more complicated?

The large period Command covers featured more tactical/operational control and influence by national leadership on overseas forces thanks to vastly improved technologies. The Blockade of Cuba in 1962 and the question over whether Conqueror should attack Belgrano in 1982 are instances where the national leadership, hundreds or thousands of miles away, had near-real time views/contact with their forces, and the fleets were direct instruments in Crisis management.

All this being considered, do you follow your orders to the T (as I often do), or do you often bend, or even break, your orders provided by a scenario?

The key to winning that scenario isn't remaining completely undetected, it's avoiding having your *carrier group* detected. Find the opposing fleet and send a harrier to go buzz the tower on the CVHG and wave the flag from the canopy. The carrier group will engage and boom, you've got justification to shoot back under your ROE. You're explicitly there to antagonize them.

More generally, I try to follow orders as much as possible. Some of the most interesting scenarios are ones that contain conflicting or illegal orders, but those are not common (and by that standard Duelists is pretty straightforward). I don't need the scenario to have scripted consequences for not following them, but it's cool if it does. And for what it's worth, I think Duelists is a pretty old scenario - and update would probably do well to set the Russian fleet to unfriendly instead of hostile to start.

I'll generally stick to what the scenario editor asks the first time I play. After that, I tend to tinker, so things change. My favorite scenarios are ones that allow me to tinker.

I designed Duelists, take no offense at anybody doing anything with it, and please do tinker. My perspective is that I'm your scenario editor, not your referee. That's on you to figure out what's fair and the larger picture, what you want to get out of playing.

Defensive programming and very strict ROEs are fine for your play, but if anybody wants to cheat they'll do it. It is probably a bit dorky to think players should follow the rules. People are people. They won't, so I spend more time elsewhere

Mike

I like to embed dilemmas into the orders, forcing the player to do some interpretation. Either enemy action or lack of resources might cause the player to make compromises and stray from the orders to achieve the overall intent. I attempt, and sometimes succeed, in making the dilemma subtle enough that the player may not catch it on first read, hopefully causing a bit of a re-think later on.

I also use the orders as part of the scenario story, which unfortunately makes them a bit long. This will hopefully cause the player to decide what is important and what is wallpaper.

Anyway, scenario orders and briefings are tricky things and tend to take me a while to write. A player, as the commander has one test; achieve the intent and the mission. Following orders too strictly has gotten commanders in trouble in the past, but on the other hand straying from them too far has the same result.

B

I wonder if IRL my ASW patrols would just murder any-and-all GOBLINs they find, regardless of ROE.

TBLackey wrote: Sat May 13, 2023 1:18 pm I wonder if IRL my ASW patrols would just murder any-and-all GOBLINs they find, regardless of ROE.

The British seemed OK with that in The Falklands.

One thing to keep in mind is the lack of use of self-protection and deconfliction zones by scenario designers and players. I play with air, surface, and sub warning zones relative to my ships and facilities. Any ROE in those zones are weapons free. Thats if actual combat is happening or expected.

The designer has to make sure that those zones are no-nav zones for all civilian and neutral traffic. And order/ROEs must be clearly defined around them as well. But its something designers miss a lot, especially when they set up civilian air and ship traffic.

Maybe a feature down the road is third type of zone that can be created by the player that is an exclusion zone for the player and a no-nav zone for the AI. They can be built dynamically and not in the scenario editor. That would make developing orders easier for the designer.