Thought I would put up a quick post describing the USMC force that I’m constructing and has been the subject of most of this diary. The game is Hind Commander by Assault Publishing. Hind Commander focuses on helicopter actions, so the forces revolve around helicopters and air units. Ground vehicles and troops are present. However, they exist mostly as targets. However AA ground units and Artillery are options.
I won’t go into too much detail about how Hind Commander forces are constructed, save that you select a role and this then limits the different technology levels and classes of units that can be chosen. That said it is pretty open and is susceptible to power gaming. However, like many historical games, it’s not really intended for tournaments or power gamers. As such I’ve put together a relatively accurate USMC strike force. The ground forces are a little off (I’d like to add some MRAPs/Cougars) and I’ve also attached a couple of USAF assetts to provide recon (the E-8C and OH-58D). However, I’m reasonably happy it feels like a current day USMC force you might see in operation in Iraq or Afghanistan.
The force below is a half-sized Special Forces doctrine. We’ve found the half size game perfect for the 3-4 hours we have to play in an evening.
Strike Group | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Unit | Class | Tech | Crew | Cost | Qty. | Total Cost |
AH-1Y Viper | Light Attack | III | IV | 80 | 3 | 240 |
UH-1Z Venom | Light Transport | III | III | 45 | 1 | 45 |
OH-58D Kiowa Warrior | Light Recon | III | III | 60 | 1 | 60 |
F/A-18C Hornet | Airplane | III | — | 50 | 2 | 100 |
E-8C JSTARS | Modern Radar | III | — | 55 | 1 | 55 |
Total: | 8 | 500 | ||||
Ground Forces | ||||||
M1A2 Abrams | Modern MBT | III | — | 60 | 2 | 120 |
LAV-25 | Modern IFV | III | — | 50 | 1 | 50 |
LVTP-7 | APC | III | — | 25 | 4 | 100 |
LMTV | Military Truck | III | — | 20 | 5 | 100 |
Total: | 11 | 370 |
Note: corrected 7-SEP-2013 due to a couple of small errors. One of which was to use the E-8C as a regular radar rather than AWACs: AWACs cannot launch strike planes. Also the cost of the unit was wrong so I had to re-jig the training levels