Medal of Honor Scene

[massey]

But let's look at this from a different perspective.  Let's take away extreme rolls and think about how this might have happened otherwise.  I haven't seen the reenactment, but let's set it aside.  The video would have been made decades after the fact, based on old war stories and shown in a cinematic way.  All we really need to have is one soldier taking out six Germans.

 

So you've got Bertolo, and he's hunkered down somewhere.  And along come Hans, Fritz, Karl, Otto, Klaus, and Gunter.  They think everybody in the squad is dead, and so they let their guard down.  Bertolo has total cover, there is no line of sight between him and the Germans.  But he obviously knows what is going on, and he's working up the courage to attack the enemy and avenge his buddies (Ego roll).  He creeps forward and peeks over whatever object he's hiding behind.  This is what he sees:

 

Hans is the nearest to him, about 20 feet away, right in front of him.  He is looking down at the ground, kicking a body to make sure the guy is dead.

Fritz is 5 feet away from Hans, holding his weapon at the ready but his body is turned to the side and he is looking off into the distance.

Karl is off to Bertolo's right, maybe 40 feet away.  He is crouched down, his weapon on the ground, while he pokes at one of the bodies, looking for cigarettes or something.

Otto is next, with his back completely to Bertolo.  He is yelling something and waving his arm.

Klaus and Gunter are out of sight, having walked behind a small building.

 

Bertolo makes his Ego roll and combat begins. 

--Phase 12, the Germans are completely surprised.  They don't get to act.  Bertolo stands up and fires twice, once at Hans and once at Fritz.  Dex 11, his OCV is 4.  We'll say the Garand gives him a +1 OCV.  Both targets are within the first 4 hexes and so receive no range penalty.  Rapid firing, so he takes a -2 OCV penalty.  Both targets are at 1/2 DCV.  Betrolo needs a 12- on each one.

Bam!  11.  Hit

Bam!  9.  Hit.

 

The Germans hear gunshots and start to look around.  The GM lets them make Perception rolls to figure out where the shots came from and what is happening.  Because this is the "realistic war" genre, the fog of war is a real thing, and they don't get Perception bonuses (they hear the gunshots, but they don't know where they're coming from).

Klaus and Gunter make their rolls.  They know gunshots are coming from the area where their squad is.

Otto rolls a 12.  He hears shots, and he knows they're close by, but he has no idea where they came from.

Karl rolls a 13.  He is startled by the shots.  He swings his head around looking for something, but he's too surprised to process anything.

 

--Phase 4.  Bertolo is surprised to see the Germans haven't really reacted.  The two guys he can see are looking around, but haven't spotted him.

Bertolo aims at the guy holding the gun.  Otto is at 1/2 DCV, so a 2.  Bertolo has a 4 OCV + 1 for the weapon.  He needs a 14-.  Rolls a 12.  Hit.

Klaus and Gunter (on the other side of the building) take a half-phase to look at each other and make a decision, then they start moving towards the sound of the gunfire.  Half-move.

Karl tries to make another Perception check, this time with a bonus.  Rolls a 15.  This would fail, leaving him still clueless, but the GM rules that Karl can spend this entire phase figuring out what is happening.  Karl suddenly realizes he's in a lot of trouble.

 

-Phase 8.  Karl and Bertolo see each other and make Dex roll-offs to see who goes first.  The GM assigns Carl a -2 penalty because he's not actually holding his weapon right now.  Bertolo says he wants to make a Presense attack, and the GM rules that he can do that first since it is a zero phase action.  2D6 base Presence, -1D6 for being in combat, +1D6 for being at a combat advantage, +1D6 for displaying a power (pointing a gun), +3D6 for the incredibly violent action of killing 3 guys already.  Bertolo rolls 6D6 and gets 21 points, 11 points past Karl's 10 Presence.

Karl is already at 1/2 DCV because he was kneeling on the ground.  The GM rules he's basically at zero DCV right now due to the Presence attack, and Bertolo can act first.

Bertolo needs a 16- to shoot Karl.  He makes an easy shot and Karl goes down.

Klaus and Gunter come running around the corner of the building (half move).  Klaus fails his Perception roll to assess the situation.  He sees his dead friends but he doesn't see the American soldier.

Gunter makes his Perception check.  The first thing he sees is the Amerikaner standing there having just blown away Karl.  He raises his rifle and fires.  Bertolo makes his Perception roll and has his full DCV (of 4).  Klaus has a base 4 OCV, no bonus for the German gun.  He's in the -2 range penalty bracket, needing a 9 or less.  Gunter rolls a 10, and a bullet goes whizzing by Bertolo's ear.

 

-Phase 12.  Bertolo makes a Dex roll off with the Germans and wins.  He aims at Gunter and fires.  5 OCV vs 4 DCV, -2 range penalty.  The American needs a 10 and he makes it.  Bam!  Gunter goes down.

Klaus is now the last one left.  Klaus makes his Perception roll and finally sees the American just as the back of his buddy's head explodes.  Klaus has to make an Ego roll.  He rolls a 13, and decides that discretion is the better part of valor.  If the movie Rambo had been made yet, that's who Klaus would think he was facing.  He panics, turns and tries to make a full noncombat move away.

 

Phase 4.  Bertolo takes a full phase to aim and fire, getting a +1 OCV bonus.  OCV 6 vs fleeing German's 1/2 DCV of 2.  -4 range penalty at this point means it's an 11 or less.  Bertolo's good luck continues and he blasts Klaus in the back.  Fight over.

 

 

And there you go.  In real life, ambushes are extremely lethal, in part because the people being attacked don't know what's happening immediately.  Our hero here gets several surprise shots, and a scattered enemy enters the combat at different points.  Guys are having to run in and assess the situation immediately, and some of them just happen to be facing the wrong direction.  Bertolo meanwhile knows exactly where they are, and when new people enter they happen to be directly in his line of sight.  No amazing rolls required.

[massey]

54 minutes ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

 

Bertolo had a saved phase, because he was waiting behind the wall with cover when his buddies were suddenly and shockingly killed (they were trying to disarm and take the Germans prisoner and the Germans pretended to surrender then used sidearms to shoot them all). 

 

I hadn't noticed this part.  This makes things a lot easier.  Pistols are really inaccurate at longer ranges.  Beyond 50 feet or so, you have to be a really good shot.  If this guy has a rifle and the enemy is only equipped with pistols, that's a huge advantage right there.

 

In real life rifles would have reduced range penalties, and pistols would probably have increased range penalties.  So if Bertolo is 100 feet away from them and he crouches down behind cover, and they're out in the open?  They're all dead meat, man.  They're probably shooting at him needing 4s and 5s, and he's shooting back needing 11s and 12s.

 

There's also the possibility that some of the pistols were out of ammo after they shot up his squad.

[Christopher R Taylor]

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I hadn't noticed this part.  This makes things a lot easier.  Pistols are really inaccurate at longer ranges.  Beyond 50 feet or so, you have to be a really good shot.  If this guy has a rifle and the enemy is only equipped with pistols, that's a huge advantage right there.

 

Nah, he basically walked right up to them while firing, he was comfortably in effective range, at least in the reenactment (who knows how accurate it was, honestly).  For this particular event you only have Bertolo's word, I don't think it was confirmed by any Germans or other witnesses.  I don't mean he was lying, we just don't know exactly what took place and people's memories can be jarred pretty hard by traumatic and stressful events.

[massey]

Yeah but that’s the re-enactment.  You don’t have to be that far for pistols to be inaccurate.

 

We might be dealing with Star Trek distances, where ships fight each other super close onscreen, but are actually supposed to be farther apart.

[Killer Shrike]

5 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

And as an aside, one does not earn a Medal of Honor for doing the improbable, you get it for service actions which are above the call of duty, involving great courage, for the good of your fellow soldiers, in an action of great personal sacrifice which distinctly set you apart from other people.  Doing things which are unbelievable or surprising isn't a criteria; that guy who made a sniper shot at the longest distance on record (over 2 miles) didn't qualify.

 

As a former Marine, I am well aware of the nature of the MoH. We had to do readings of MoH recipients as part of the indoctrination process. I've met a couple of MoH recipients at Marine Corps Balls and functions and heard their anecdotes and shook their hands. 

 

The MoH is a very big deal of course and is subject to a certain level of rigor in its awarding, but here is how it really is with medals in general...people in the service do what they do, and sometimes it gets noticed and maybe somebody writes it up for a specific medal and maybe it gets approved. Maybe it gets upgraded or downgraded to some other medal by a committee. It is not uncommon for a recipient of a medal to wonder why the thing they got a medal for got noticed, when the other things they had done in the past that perhaps they personally felt were more worthy of recognition did not. Other times they feel like they don't deserve it at all. Some fit the ideal mold, a person did what they did, it was reported completely accurately and objectively, and was awarded exactly the right medal, and the recipient felt they earned it and not a higher award and were glad they got it and everyone involved felt that it was entirely warranted and well executed...but for the most part life is rarely so perfect.  And so on.

 

In the case of the MoH specifically, being an extreme award it is of course awarded for extreme circumstances but the line between a Distinguished Service Cross / Silver Star / Bronze Star vs the MoH is not a scientifically instrumented measurement of "gallantry"; being a human recognition administered by humans to humans there's room for interpretation and subjectivity. You can see the proof of this even by comparing a multitude of MoH citations to themselves...they are not all equivalently inspiring. Generally speaking, prior to the modern era, there was no video capture of events, there was little to no forensic investigation of events described in a citation...it's based on eye witness "testimony" from one or more witnesses. In later years the MoH also became politicized to some degree further muddying the mix. 

 

Basically, I would encourage you to leaven your idealistic perspective with just a pinch of humanistic reality. 

[BoloOfEarth]

On 1/19/2019 at 11:50 AM, Christopher R Taylor said:

I could buy that he was able to multiple attack.  But six guys?  That's -6 on every single shot for two phases straight.

 

6 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

On his saved phase, Bertolo fires his rifle three times in a multiple power attack at -6 OCV per attack...

 

Minor point, but you're consistently giving him too high a penalty.  If you're doing a Multiple Attack, it's a cumulative -2 OCV for every additional attack beyond the first.  So doing 3 attacks in a phase is -4 OCV, not -6.

[Christopher R Taylor]

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Minor point, but you're consistently giving him too high a penalty

 

Ah, you're right.  I ran it as a house rule that way, but I thought it was to all attacks. 

 

Actually I run it as a house rule of straight attack first shot, -2 for second shot, -4 for third shot, etc...

Still, an effective +2 OCV to my calculations does put it into the realm of at least plausibility in Hero terms, which is my main focus here.  If he had them at half DCV from surprise then presence attack, then the penalty isn't too brutal each phase.

 

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Basically, I would encourage you to leaven your idealistic perspective with just a pinch of humanistic reality.

 

Obviously with anything there is a level of politics and you only get awarded if you get noticed, that much goes without saying.  But I was listing the official requirements and standards for the medal, and none of them are "wow how did he pull that off?"

And thank you for your service.  Seriously.

[Sean Waters]

9 hours ago, Christopher said:

The problem is that 90% of all people in that situation tried the exact same thing and died, never to report of it.

And a  9/10 dead quote is not a chance most RPG players will take.

 

History remembers those who are both bold and fortunate.  Bertolo as a PC might feel he's going to be seen and shot dead if he does not do something, and he might consider that attacking is the safer option in the circumstances.  Anyway, RPG players rarely do the sensible thing, except when you least expect them to.

[Christopher]

10 hours ago, Sean Waters said:

Bertolo as a PC might feel he's going to be seen and shot dead if he does not do something, and he might consider that attacking is the safer option in the circumstances.

"Sometimes to only way to live, is to give up all hope of survival or escape." - Tzun Tsu.

It is a known effect. And Bertholo had most definitely hit that point.

 

 

[Christopher]

FYI, multiple attack might not be nessesary (to that degree) if we allow shoots that pass through to hit more then one Character.

Overpenetration is a well known thing:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stopping_power#Overpenetration

 

And a rifle on short range has the power nesseary, unless it hits bone.

[Sean Waters]

52 minutes ago, Christopher said:

FYI, multiple attack might not be nessesary (to that degree) if we allow shoots that pass through to hit more then one Character.

Overpenetration is a well known thing:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stopping_power#Overpenetration

 

And a rifle on short range has the power nesseary, unless it hits bone.

 

Indeed!

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

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FYI, multiple attack might not be nessesary (to that degree) if we allow shoots that pass through to hit more then one Character.

And its not impossible that might explain part of what happened, but in the Netflix dramatic reenactment they were not lined up at all, and it was one shot per target.