10/23/59
The Rangers received an emergency order to insert immediately into an AO of what would be a toxic lake surrounded by hilled woods. The objective protect possible museum pieces with modernization potential that may or may not actually belong to the planetary militia.
Drac forces would for whatever reason choose to interdict "civilians" and not only did they know where they were they had enough time to swing around from behind to block them at the lake. Rangers would arrive intent on initiating the inferno doctrine the caustic planet would now have some napalm to boot. Knowing the possible results toward the contract the choice was made to drop directly onto the opfor.
Expecting and planning can only last as far as contact. Everything else becomes probability and doctrine. Drac forces occupied the closest adjacent hill after the lake with the heaviest forces and then positioned more heavy forces to occupy the northern hills. Lighter elements would deploy in front of the lake directly in the path of the civilians and then also the southern woods.
Fire would deploy north with norbotten to gain control of the northern hills for direct fire support as well as secure the north corridor. Foil and Ehreschuld would deploy on the lake north to help smash any resistance to the north in the woods adjacent the lake.
The opfor however chose to split the forces instead of a direct battle line meaning Foil and Ehreschuld would have a much heavier fight than anticipated. The northern opfor would hold longer than expected but do did Foil and Ehreschuld.
Initial pushes put Foil and Ehreschuld directly into a massive brawl in which they heavily were outgunned in most regards. Initial pushes would be rebuffed they would reform and push again with success. Both in the process would take heavy damage. Both Avatar and Quickdraw would lose a leg, Axeman would lose both arms, Ostwar being extensively damaged if not crippled. They would give as good as they got and more however pushing back over the hill. Opfor units would be fairly pinned in place with nothing to do but take the tenacity and crippling destruction. Although there would be plenty of salvage from that area it was severely crippled in most regards. Limb from limb to smoking hulks they became.
Lighter elements broke off to engage the civilians some of which simply were not expected to survive given the situation. Civilians pushed on with tenacity and a bit of luck. Splitting to allow as many units as possible to avoid damage seemed the best alternative to pushing down the middle with all. The tenacity would pay off managing to down or deter drac forces enough to have above a 50% survival rate surprising all involved. They would come with gifts and manpower, a welcome bonus.
Fire and Norbotten would drop on practically the mirror counterpart to the assault group the southern group would see. Not of machine but of weight and firepower. Unexpectedly a c3 net was dropped practically in c3 net. Expected further center it was a surprise when two lances turned and in Combine fashion pushed forward to short ranges. Seeing this Norbotten would pull for position and firing pocket but in doing so allowed the opfor focus fire for little return. Seeing this and the expected push to isolate each lance Fire ordered Norbotten forward while pushing into the group. This fight would last longer than expected and rotating armor became a necessity following the first initially volleys seeing Fire lances Spartan take considerable accurate fire close enough to near down the unit. Both lances would be able to regroup, push and brake running toward their counterparts. Few would be able to run far and in their regroup it wouldn't last long. Attempted but falling short eventually all lines would break.
The southern flank still would be under seige and fighting to about even. On the brink they would give themselves much needed room as Norbotten and Fire advanced south to complete the concave. Not long after they would gain ground, intiate partial envelopment would start mop up operations.
There were opfor elements attempting to pursue and flank posing risk to exfil. Dracs would pull south or have sporadic single units overtake the line. Drawing the ire of the full Ranger force several went up in sudden fireballs or were left crippled breaking the opfor signaling the end of the engagement.
Of the roughly 25 drac units they would see over 50% losses to Ranger units seeing damage in which no mech would have been even combat killed although several were close or forced to shutdown.
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Topic: FUSILIER Mission 4 - 10/23/3059 (Read 3554 times)