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Solo Ranger


pmaidhof

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I received my long awaited Solo Ranger from Omega Games, updated and re-released for its 25th Anniversary. It is not a typical hex and counter, or even area movement wargame. It comes with laminated maps, a military-type protractor, dice, and a gazillion mission cards. There is a paragraph based Tactical Events book that guides you through your mission.

 

My first and only game so far was a squad reconnaissance patrol to scope out a enemy rocket site. You plan various aspects of the mission, how much ammo, what other ordnance or gee-whiz gear is carried and by who. Amongst personal weapons, we carried an AT-4, bino's, AN-PVS-7's, extra 5.56mm, extra 7.62mm, safety rope, a camera. We left behind a javelin launcher and its missiles, SPIE gear, claymores, and soe other things. You establish your route, (objective) rally points, etc. Movement is can be effected by how(over) loaded your people are.

 

As it turned out, only one UH-60 blackhawk showed up in the pick up zone, so I had to implement the bump plan, and the squad entered the AO in two deparate serials.

 

As it turned out, we snooped and pooped to the ORP, scoped out the rocket site undetected, and then egressed to the extract point. , crossing a linear danger area on the way out.

 

It's a pretty cool, and unigue kind of game. It does have some semblance to John Antal's programmed tactical decision novels like Armor Attacks, and Combat Team, although to be honest Ranger pre-dates both of those books.

 

 

From the site:

Ranger was compared to Special Forces by Fire and Movement Magazine:

 

Ranger is billed as the game of modern patrolling. You would expect it to capture these operations well. Actually it does. The emphasis is getting to the target and getting home again. Most of the actions are handled with an abstract combat system.

 

Ranger is not a traditional board game. It is a solitaire game that is played on a laminated map. There is no hexgrid, or counters. Play starts by selecting a mission. Then you have to plan and organize the mission. Factors under the player's control are the size of patrol (squad or platoon), the weapons carried, the composition of the squad, the infiltration and exfiltration routes, what areas of the planned mission will be rehearsed, and so on. Just about everything is under the player's control except the mission, the method of insertion, and availability of certain support...

 

Once the mission is planned and rehearsed, it...is resolved using a paragraph system. Since the situations are more generic and abstract, the system leads to more variability with replays. Many paragraphs can only be played once, and then you know the contents of the paragraphs and any replay is not very interesting...

 

The actions at the target are abstracted so it is difficult to investigate various tactics for actually accomplishing a mission. This action is resolved by a die roll. So if you are trying to destroy some target, it is simply a die roll, modified by your preparations. In this regard, Ranger is not very exciting. It is also why the game works best as a solitaire system. If you want the excitement of stalking through a building looking for the hostages, then you need another game.

 

Ranger was similar to Ambush! in that it was paragraph driven; however the latter game included counters and did have the "excitement of stalking through a building looking for the hostages" (in fact, quite literally, since one of the missions in Move Out, an Ambush! add-on module, was to track down and rescue half the player's squad, who started the mission captured.) Ranger had a much more serious approach to the subject, and Rooker felt the game could even be considered a training aid for actual military patrolling due to its realism.

 

Ranger

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AO Yankee #19 Comm Site Raid

 

 

Today’s action was a platoon sized raid of an enemy comm site in AO Yankee South. Looking at the insert point, objective and extract point, I saw that a number of linear danger areas would need to be crossed, to include the river. I would need to ensure that rehearsals include both inserts and one rope bridge procedures. The platoon was inserted by fast rope in the south-central part of the map, and off we went.

 

Other concerns were that to approach the objective, another linear would need to be crossed, and again after the site was hit. Not the preferred method.

 

Once we approached the river, it was determined to be deep, wide, and swift moving. Luckily we had our “combat swimmers” with us and the appropriate rehearsals completed. The location of the crossing site was a “tactical dilemma for me. Eastablish a crossing site within the swamp, or from a jungle point not far from the village in M(5) 29 (0). I’m not certain if any pre-mission intel told me if the town was deserted, or if not, hostile or friendly? Looking back on it, it was awefully close to the town, and most likely I would have swamped it if placed in a similar situation again, just some bad memories of moving through swamps in my rifle platoon days.

 

The rest of the movement was mostly uneventful. Enemy Contact number started at 1 but was quickly reduced to 0.

 

Once the ORP was checked out and then occupied, the objective was reconned. After security was established in both the northwest and southeast, the Support Element was put into place, followed by the Assault Element.

 

The enemy turned out to be a handful of comm bubbas playing grab-ass around an comm-relay site at dusk. The attack went off well. Fire Superiority was quickly established and 4-5 enemy soldiers were eliminated by primarily M203 and M249 fire, despite 3x M-4 attacks rolled first, when the Assault Element attacked across the OBJ. The site was successfully searched for intel items before we pulled off of the OBJ. Once the platoon backtracked to the ORP, collecting security teams along the way, we conducted a hasty crossing of the trail and punching about 1000m into the jungle before we conducted a security half and disseminated info to all members of the patrol. The remainder of the patrol was again uneventful. Since we arrived in the area of the PUP a couple of hours early, we set into defensive 360 and waited until 0500 before we approached the LZ for extract scheduled for 0800.

 

Questions and Comments:

 

1. I’m good to go with the “Readying of Equipment” concept. I still need to convince myself in the game that he who needs an AT-4, camera, claymore but did not carry it there, has it when he leaves the ORP.

 

2. If preparations and rehearsals are completed before the Insert Time, is it presumed that transportation is not waiting around to take us to the LZ early and that we spend more time on rehearsals, inspections, chow, etc. and cross the LOD on time.

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