Ambusher's Trap
"Life is a suicide mission." ~Jane, Children of the Mind by Orson Scott Card
<<May 24, 1998>>
"Are you listening to me?" Startled out of your thoughts, you look up and your commander, who has a stern look on his face.
"Sorry, sir. Please continue."
He sighs. "All right, listen up. Our intelligence has shown a small enemy base just around that corner," he waves his hand, "which we have been assigned to raid. Our first troop was deployed in those bushes over there," he gestures again, this time to a small clump of bushes some distance off. "which is 90 degrees from your position with relation to the enemy base. You are to wait here while Jack," he glances at an enthusiastic soldier holding an XP 110, "moves 90 degrees further to your left," (which is away from the first soldier deployed) "and I move to a position directly across the enemy base from you.
"In this manner, we will attack the base from four opposite directions. We have made sure everyone has a synchronized watch. You are to move for attack at EXACTLY 1:27 P.M. Before that time, you are to stay right here. Our intelligence shows that the base is guarded only by two enemies, so this attack should succeed even if one of us is captured as long as we reveal nothing, or if one of us makes a catastrophic blunder--but that will not happen, will it SOLDIER!?"
"No, SIR!" you respond, careful not to raise your voice too high. He nods and, shouldering his XXP 175, turns and walks off. Shouldering your own weapon--an XP 250--you settle down into your cover for the wait.
Some time later, you are startled to notice a group of seven, heavily-armed soldiers, clearly displaying the colors of your enemy, walking toward the base you're about to attack. You glance at your watch. 1:24 P.M. You quickly look to either side and make a few estimates--in all liklihood, no one but you witnessed this troop movement.
You have no visual contact to any friendlies, nor do you have any communication device--and in three minutes, the rest of your lance is about to go on a suicide mission.
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Okay,
Because my weapon has enough basic power to get off one or 2 shots while I am waiting I
would emerge from the bushes and as quietly as I could I would start shooting and yelling
about the enemy soldiers.. This should alert my comrades that something is wrong and with
any luck they would remain still and out of the way. I would then shoot several shots off
of my 250 and run as far away from the base as possible but I would try to take as many
enemies as possible away from the base to follow me in a foot chase. At that point I would
depressurize my gun and remove the water to give me a better chance of escaping. This
should give my teammates the possible chance of escaping without too many casualities. In
this case the good of the many outweighs the good of the few or the one. Also I should
continue pumping my weapon so it seems like I have water in it.
~Thomas Warwick
Logic always dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, but sometimes the all can be saved. Your plan has the advantage of almost (depending on exact execution) definately not exposing your teammates to fire, but has the disadvantage that you're probably toast--there's a good chance they could get you even if you discarded your entire weapon, in which case they would get THAT whether you were caught or not.
Also, certain guns (I don't remember whether the XP 250 does this) will not depressurize except through firing actual water, and it can be damaging to the gun to leave it pressurized for a prolonged period. If you do this, make sure to perform some matainence on your gun afterward.
I would try and lead them away from the base, distracting them for as long as possible. I would move around to their side, and open fire. I'd keep in a position where I could get in front of them if they tried to run for the base for some reason. I'd keep hitting them until at least a few of them started to follow. I'd slowly lead as many of them as possible away from the base, even though it would be a certain drenching for me.
You're going to try and get between the seven, heavily-armed enemy soldiers and their nearby base? You got a death wish or something? Why do yo need to get between them and the base, its not like they're going to just march on to their destination while some opponent with an XP 250 is running up behind them and unloading . . . or at least, if they did, you could cause enough damage just with that to equal or exceed what you would have gained in the base raid.
Since that would only help to even the odds, I would try and make enough noise to alert the other members of my team that something was up. I wouldn't actually yell directly to them, as this would alert all of the enemies to their presence. I wouldn't want anyone to know about them, so they would still have the element of surprise. If I somehow managed to take care of all the guys that followed me, and there was still time before the attack, I'd drop in on the squad of new guys again and draw away some more of them. I'd keep it up until there was no more time left, even though there would probably only be time to pull it off once. If there wasn't any time left, I'd head back to the enemy base and give some support to the other members of my team. If all the members of my team turned out to not be there anymore, because they got their butts kicked, I'd just pull another suicide run on them, shooting everything that moved.
Definately a death wish . . .
Now, I know all that yelling would alert the two guys already at the base to my presence, but it could only do good at this point. They might think all of us were coming from the same direction, run the other way, and get caught by my commander. Or they might guess that we're on all sides, panic, and surrender.
~Matt Lindsay
That seems like an optimistic appraisal of their reactions to that information, its more likely that (if anything) they'd send reinforcements to the troops you're attacking . . . of course, if you could get them to stay over there for at least three minutes, that could only do good . . . and get you drenched . . .
I would jump up and run fast as hell yelling all the way reinforcements! Then I would turn around and to give friendlies time to run ( supposing one shot your dead0) blast the hell out of all the soldiers and to not give away info die!
~Sam Shaddox
Well, er, that would certainly get everyone attention, although you're more likely to draw all your teammates out into the open to get blasted than to give them time to retreat . . .
Well, this is obvious suicide, nine of them...four of us right? Well, as soon as I see this I'm gonna start bellycrawling like a madman to either the first soldier or Jack, whoever's closest to the commander.
Supposedly, they're both the same distance from you and the commander, 90 degree offset all around, remember?
Then, I'm gonna hiss at him the 411 in as quick a form as possible, telling him to get to the commander and inform him. Then, I'm gonna hightail it (well, lowtail it rather) back to the other guy (staying far enough from the enemy base of course) and tell him. If my commander's not a moron then we have a regrouping point somewhere a good ways off in case of a failed mission.
Hehe, but your persona doesn't know because he/she wasn't paying attention . . . hehehehe . . .
HOWEVER, I'm not exactly sure what kind of distance you're talking about, so in case we don't have time to do all that communications, I'm gonna hop up as quietly as possible and shoot the piss out of one of those seven guys. Then make sure all of em see me and I'm gonna start running...straight for woods. (Cuz I ALWAYS wear full camo and face camo). I'm gonna run my heiny off in the woods till I find a good cover...and get REAL still. This should (if time and space work the same way as usual) keep them busy till 1:27 when my three counterparts launch the attack without me. With the advantage of surpise the three of them should have no trouble. At least a lot less trouble then they'd have with nine. However it's always likely the two get lucky...but luck doesn't make for a good factor in quizzes like this.
~Fat Mike
It's not always LIKELY the two get lucky, its always POSSIBLE the two get lucky . . . which I bet is what you meant.
This second does have greater risk involved, but the advantages of it are probably better than the first plan . . . it depends how intelligent the enemy troops are; if they're dumb enough that they ALL follow you, you've got it made!
I would fill up a small water balloon. I would then toss the water balloon a few feet away from one of my teamates in the bush, to get their attention. I would then try to signal something to them telling them that the raid is off. If they are too far from throwing distance, i would then stay about 15-30 seconds after the time my commander told me to go(1:27). After 15-30 seconds, id run to the opponenys base and help in the retreat of my teamates. (If i did have water balloons, id fill them up quickly with the time i had to help in the retreat)
~Mike
Consider the Following:
With that in mind, consider your second plan: By not even showing up on time, you're increasing their disadvantage, and not using your knowledge to any good. In addition, there's probably not a whole lot you could do to help with the retreat, they could send three troops over to dispatch you while two stayed chasing each of your teammates; you're not even coming from the same direction as your teammates, so you couldn't hope to give much cover.
Assuming i have a water balloon (The commander would be an idiot not to supply each of his/her troops atleast one water balloon),
By no means! It's quite possible that there are no water balloons available, or that they were too precious to use on this assignment. It could be that your commander realizes you need both hands to effectively use your XP 250 and would therefore have to use your water balloon as the first attack, which means you'd have to risk getting pretty close (with a big heavy gun to boot) in order to get a good shot with it.
i would get up, throw the water ballon at them and slide in between them at full speed, i would then fire over my back while running like a bat out of h*** with them chasing me, and id then yell to my teammates, then id go to thier base, with a 250, id get off 2 shots at each gaurd, and wait for my team mates to catch up and nail the enemy from behind while i use any water balloons that could be in the base against the enemy.
~Christopher S. Biesele
All right, let me see if I understand: your plan is to throw a waterballoon at the passing troops, then run between them straight to their destination, the enemy base, and call your teammates to attack at the same time?
That's just plain arrogant, to think you could pull off something like that or that, even after that, you with help from your teammates could defeat that many enemy soldiers.
well first i would switch weapons with the solider because the xp110 can go about 37 feet. Then i would do everything as planned. but 1 minute before that i would fully pump my gun up and then i would let out a whistle with my fingers and then run right pass the enemys base assuming there is a path.and then disappear into the woods and hide in the tall grass. and if they started to follow me i would start firing from far range while my guys are heading back to the base to refill their guns and come save me.
~nathan harding
Uh, you've got a very limited timeframe to accomplish this in, your other teammates are almost undoubtedly unaware of your situation, and it could take considerable time to even reach the trooper with the XP 110, longer if you try to stay hidden, and doubled for round-trip.
By the way, usually people put capital letters at the beginnings on sentences and their names, and generally use a comma instead of a period when using "and" or "but".