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| Back to Problems of the Years | posted 12/17/99 |
"Anything and Everything"
"Fourth Skye Rangers, Warof `39. Twenty-seven
missions, four field commendations."
~ Zachary "Hawk" Hawkins, 1st Somerset Strikers, July 3050
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the yellow dot indicates position
Lieutenant Tont crouches low in the bushes, trying very hard not to be seen by the swarms of enemy troops still streaming through the woods where his unit used to have an adamant defense. One of the few remaining friendly troops approaches him.
"There's another 10 of us left," he says quietly. "Counting you and me, that makes a dozen. None of them have recovered any equipment other than their weapons."
Lieutenant Tont nods. "So that means we have no radio. What are the weapons?"
"Besides your 1000, we've got a couple of 250s, two 150s, five 110s, and four 40s. None are more than half full."
Tont nods once more. "Are the men doing OK?"
"Sure. They're the most experienced troops we've got, they'll handle it."
"All right, I want you to choose the fastest runner and send him back to HQ with our status report. Have him take one of the 40s, and shift the water around a bit to make sure he's got a full one," Tont decides.
"Aye, sir."
the yellow dot indicates position
"Commander Bremmon!" Lieutenant Thorby, Bremmon's second in command, calls loudly. "The enemy's still coming!"
"I know that!" he shouts over the hubub. "Why don't you do something useful, Thorby, like raising HQ on the radio!"
Latching onto this new idea, Thorby crouches over the communications officer just in time to block a shot aimed at the radio. He raises his head again with a frown.
It was very comical. Normally, Bremmon would laugh.
Unfortunately for his sense of humor, his brain was currently busy evaluating his situation. Overwhelming hordes of enemies, armed with all sorts of weapons and apparently disorganized, were rushing at his troops' position from both the woods to the southeast and the bridge over the river to the southwest. Glancing around, he notices that the southernmost hill is now almost devoid of soldiers, and that placing the 2'-high sandbags at only the front side of his fortifications on the four hills was clearly a mistake.
He tells himself to count his assets instead of his enemies, and looks around, not sure where to start. Originally, each hill had 25 men on it, and each group's armory included a 3000, 2500, two 1500s, five 275s, two 90s (for the sake of appeasing his troops' sentiments), and several other medium-sized weapons. It looks as if two-thirds of his forces have been eliminated, but he can't quite bring himself to believe that his situation was quite that bad. He reminds himself that his estimates tended to be pessimistic, but his fears ignore him.
"Well," he begins, earnestly, "any word from HQ?"
the yellow dot indicates position
Captain Kiltor is in charge of guarding the Wall, which is really a short, wide plateau which looks out over the land. The cliffs facing forward, though not nearly so high as he would like, are still a formidable seven feet high. He had a well-disciplined squad of 72 soldiers with excellent marksmanship spread out along the wall, wielding an evenly-distributed 10 CPS 3000s, 6 CPS 25000s, 15 CPS 1500s, 15 XXP 275s, 15 XP 250s, and 12 XP 175s.
Unfortunately, the word "had" is in the past-tense. At last count, 18 of his troops had been shot down, and more are falling all the time. He shoulders his own 150 and touches the 25 at his belt for reassurance. "Keep to your lines, men!" he orders sharply.
Enemies of all descriptions, fortunately quite disorganized, swarm about the Wall. The largest bodies avoid the wall completely, which in retrospect makes sense, because there's not really anything critical on the wall and there's plenty of space to both sides. The Captain makes a mental note to suggest a redistribution of forces . . . if he survives.
Still, the enemies clearly consider the wall to be of some importance, because they keep making desperate efforts to climb up the front cliff edges, which Kiltor cannot puzzle out. Surely it would be a more efficient use of manpower to defeat the force from the ground and then to climb up?
Suddenly a sickening sensation strikes Kiltor's stomach as he realizes that their tactics make perfect sense if the enemy is making efficient use of time instead of manpower.
He quickly bends down over his 2-way radio and hails HQ.
the yellow dot indicates position
One of his subordinates passes Lieutenant Commander Jackson the only pair of binoculars, and he looks sourly through the trees at the chaos that is besieging his army's fortifications.
"They're attacking from everywhere else!" one of his men moans irritably. "Why aren't they attacking on this side of the Wall?"
"Perhaps they don't have enough men," Jackson suggests.
His soldier laughs bitterly. "If you actually believe that, why don't we go and help out with the defense instead of waiting here? The Marshall deposited 45 troops with CPS 1000s here so we could follow any enemies in who attacked and mow them down from the rear, right?"
"Only if they come up this passage. We're the only guardians between here and HQ, though we'd like them to believe we've got those hills guarded." He nods toward the hills to the north. "If we abandon our post, they're be nothing to stop them from getting through."
"If they're waiting for us to desert those hills, they'll think that their plan still hasn't worked!" the soldier protests. "If they were going to attack, they would've done so already! We're wasting our time!"
Jackson grunts in complete apathy to his subordinate's complaints.
"At least let me contact HQ and ask if we can leave our post!" he begs.
There is a long pause, during which Jackson considers this. "Very well," he says finally. "Check in and ask for orders."
the yellow dot indicates position
The prosecutor paces back in forth in front of the stand. Sitting behind the stand is a recently famous individual by the name of Rithben, who is the entire reason Sergeant Hanson had to pull his troops away from the real fight in order to protect this stupid little mock-courthouse. At least all of the troops were green, so they could probably be spared. He stands by the entrance with a two-way radio next to his classic 25 on his belt, only paying divided attention to the proceedings.
". . . and is it not correct," the prosecutor continues, "that your commander gave strict orders that you were to guard the pass?"
"Certainly," Rithben says, clearly unconcerned.
"And so when you left your post, that was a violation of a direct order, was it not?"
"Not exactly, SIR. The commander ordered my unit to guard the pass. In my judgment the rest of my unit was capable of carrying out that assignment without my assistance, and it was clear that if I didn't leave, those other defenders at the woods would have been outflanked and--"
"But you ceased to guard the pass, correct?"
"Look, I surprised an enemy platoon and took out all ten of `em, which I would think was worthy of a promotion -- especially because if I hadn't, they would have ambushed our defenders at Point Four and--"
The judge speaks up (a rare occurrence), saying "just answer the question."
Rithben lowers his head slightly. "Correct."
Sergeant Hanson tunes out again, since the prosecutor wasn't telling the court anything they didn't already know. He looked out the wide door at his defending units . . . more to keep prisoners in than enemies out. The courtroom was surrounded by low hills, so you couldn't get 20 feet away from it before you had to start running uphill, and he had a pair of troops with XP 105s at each of the eight compass points, so no one stood much chance of getting out.
Suddenly Hanson's radio erupts in a burst of static. "--anson, this is Patrol Five. Do you copy?"
His hand flies down to his belt. "Hanson here. What's the matter?"
" **ergenc****mbus**d ther*****en of the**** swarmin' up th*****ackup, no** " his radio crackles.
Hanson rushes to one of the courtroom's three paneless windows and looks up towards his southwest patrol to see, instead of friendly colors raised high, several black-clad figures lurking through the trees that speckled the top of the slope.
Hanson turns to the courtroom scribe quickly. "Raise me HQ on the LR radio, NOW!"
the yellow dot indicates position
Scout Dilth walks along the slope casually, his XP 35 held loosely in one hand. He loves scout duty, because all you have to do is say "nothing to report" every so often and no one would ask you where you were. Right now, of course he didn't see anyone, because he was at the very back of friendly territory walking along the river towards the waterfall.
Dilth smiles as the roar of falling water grows louder with every footstep. One of these days he was going to have to bring someone along the scenic scout route.
"I TOLD you to stay back from the waterfall! Now look what you've done! You think that thing'll work NOW?" a voice suddenly cries out.
Startled, Dilth looks around cautiously. He can't be sure, but it sounds like it's coming from behind the waterfall. Warily, he creeps closer.
When he's finally right up next to the waterfall, he gasps. In a small enclosure behind the waterfall, a dozen enemy troops decked out in camouflage with an enormous supply horde are sitting around chatting. He takes quick stock -- hundreds of water balloons, three giant slingshots, dozens of CPS weapons, a 25 for every one of them, and several other weapons of minor note.
He takes his radio from his belt and presses the button. "Uhh, sir . . ." he begins.
"HEY!!!" one of the troops shouts as he sees Dilth. "Who're you?"
the yellow dot indicates position
General Esthrat whittles on a short stick, which was something he's doing every day now. He can see the logic of keeping your best forces in reserve in case of emergency, but in practice, it was BORING!
50 of the best troops in the army -- 15 snipers, 30 combatants, and 5 spies -- all under his command, and sitting in this forest doing NOTHING -- and with them, 5 3000s, 10 2500s, 5 275s, 5 250s, 5 175s, 5 150s, 10 110s, 10 90s, 250 water balloons and five giant slingshots! There simply HASto be something more interesting to do!
He throws his stick away in disgust and turns to his communications officer. "Call HQ and see if you can talk them into letting us do something, will ya?"
His subordinate activates the radio half-heartedly.
You sit in headquarters reading a good book. On the advice of your numerous advisors, you're defending your territory for the next month while you perform a membership drive to try to acquire more soldiers and equipment. It makes sense, given the most recent reports on enemy activity, but it doesn't require much concentration. Most of your troops are on the front lines, but you have three dozen greens and training under half a dozen veterans at the base with a virtually unlimited number of 105s, 65s, and 35s -- you let the active units get all of the newer weapons, of course. Fortunately, someone was wise enough to put running water in the command building, so you don't have to send runners to the river every time you need more water for the drills.
"MARSHALL, sir!" someone says loudly, bursting into the room. "Urgent reports from the front lines require your attention immediately!"
You sigh, and allow yourself to be lead into the next room to hear the reports.
Solutions
| Tactician: "Mind Ring" | Solution |
Evaluation |
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