AAR A/2-7 Joint FTX SpyMaster - Operation Buttered Baguette 29OCT23

[Komar.T]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
Name of Combat Mission: A.Co & C.Co Joint FTX SpyMaster - Operation Buttered Baguette
Game: Hell Let Loose
Server Hosted on: Training/Event
Date of Combat Mission: 29OCT23
Time of Combat Mission (Zulu): 2330Z​

Mission OIC: First Sergeant Komar.T & Captain Strider.R
Mission Controller: First Sergeant Komar.T & Captain Strider.R
Number of Attendees: 101
7th Cavalry Personnel Involved in Action:
Lieutenant Colonel Hayes.J
Major Rollins.R
Captain Strider.R
First Lieutenant Smith.V
Second Lieutenant Anderson.P
Sergeant Major West.B
First Sergeant Komar.T
First Sergeant Wayne.B
Master Sergeant Zimm.L
Sergeant First Class Becks.J
Staff Sergeant Hermes.S
Staff Sergeant Canuck.J
Staff Sergeant Avery.D
Staff Sergeant Phillips.B
Sergeant Webber.R
Sergeant Dietz.H
Sergeant Cantrell.J
Sergeant Balazova.S
Sergeant Ackelson.K
Sergeant Thrawn.N
Sergeant Coutu.M
Sergeant Wags.D
Sergeant Mueller.H
Sergeant Rhodes.R
Corporal Zulu.P
Corporal Slagg.J
Corporal Herber.R
Corporal Huber.B
Corporal Meyer.T
Corporal Owens.J
Corporal Raine.A
Corporal Moskal.C
Corporal Donato.E
Corporal Guillermo.C
Corporal Sotelo.R
Corporal Henderson.B
Corporal Berkowski.C
Corporal OCulien.M
Specialist Willis.B
Specialist Joshothy.J
Specialist Maca.D
Specialist Cris.C
Specialist Plum.L
Specialist Watson.J
Specialist Quake.B
Specialist Hall.S
Specialist Kiing.T
Specialist Karr.H
Specialist Jefferzon.Z
Specialist Silvis.B
Specialist Silvis.C
Specialist Sokol.Z
Specialist Swanson.B
Specialist Baldrick.D
Specialist Chay.S
Specialist Ching.H
Specialist Blade.B
Specialist Walker.S
Specialist Lucas.A
Specialist Carmine.J
Specialist Stenberg.P
Specialist McGee.C
Specialist Ashie.L
Specialist Bastogne.M
Specialist Martin.R
Specialist Massey.A
Specialist Lowther.B
Specialist Choi.S
Specialist Simonis.T
Specialist Rhodes.J
Specialist Lee.N
Specialist Tovarysh.U
Specialist Button.J
Specialist Argentini.E
Specialist Rivera.A
Specialist Scarselli.T
Specialist Rousseau.A
Specialist White.N
Private First Class Korfias.F
Private First Class Curran.J
Private First Class Dubose.C
Private First Class Wisniewski.A
Private First Class Felton.J
Private First Class Eller.J
Private First Class Jayaraman.V
Private First Class Campbell.G
Private First Class Rilian.M
Private First Class Leaf.J
Private First Class Mead.T
Private Bean.P
Private Evans.J
Private Cooper.E
Private Sudul.L
Private King.DJ
Private Hazen.D
Private Woody.W
Private Lawton.D
Recruit Ackerman.J
Recruit Baldwin.C
Corporal Smith.N (RET)
Corporal Reign.A (RET)

 

[Komar.T]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: Commander AXIS
Element Leader: First Sergeant Komar.T
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
First Sergeant Komar.T


Pros:

• First Ever 50 V 50 Match in 2-7 History!
• Great communication and movement from Defensive side
• Locked down the Center point even with limited spawn locations
• Lessons learned for next time, one being ensuring all member who sign up for leadership understand the plan to a T so that they can execute to their best ability.

Cons:

• OPORD had a clerical error, and command Comms instruction on change to ROE was not heard.
• Confusion early on during set up lead to some objectives not being fully set up/ lightly defended and easily taken off the start.
• Still need to get the balance right where the center point will actually be a back and fourth battle
• Had to turn away 5 members at Rally.

 

[Thrawn.N]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: Tank Lead 2 (S.A.D.)
Element Leader: Sergeant.Thrawn.N
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Sergeant.Thrawn.N
Sergeant.Wags.D
Specialist.Lowther.B


Pros:

• Great Turn out!
• Great Defensive work from Infantry
• Beautiful callouts for enemy movement and assets
• We won!

Cons:

• Didn't have many tanks to shoot at within Southern Sector (My area of cover)

 

[Hermes.S]

Element Callsign: Axis - Jig Squad
Element Leader: Staff Sergeant Hermes.S

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Lieutenant Colonel Hayes.J
Corporal Slagg.J
Specialist Quake.B
Specialist Hall.S
Specialist Karr.H

Pros:

• Lots of orders to absorb at the start from myself as SL that the team disseminated well.
• Good hold, maneuvering, and call-outs at the final objective last stand.
• Great work keeping up with consistently changing plans from the original.
• Stronghold South of the church. Charlie and Bravo worked well together adjusting as needed.
• Excellent return satchel work by Ret.Smith.
• Hall did amazing medical work
• LTC Hayes joined our squad!
• Airhead was perfect and a ton of fun to be chosen to partake in it.
• Axis Victory!

Cons:

• Poor start on our end in regards to structure building, defensive preparations, and getting the bunker up. (Over estimated time before go live and underestimated enemy starting point)
• Changing the bunker location at the last second moved it too far from the first set of supplies and caused it to take too long to build which simultaneously heavily slowed the building of any defenses on the point.
• Underestimated the enemy and being at the '2' line prior to start, which allowed a very very quick and uncontested climb on the hill which should've been a meat grinder for them.
• Two of the enemy's most hindering objectives went down far too quickly due to the above.
• The locations that both Bravo and Charlie Reapers were asked to hold for the Church initially failed immediately. The location was 300+ away from the spawnable garrison and by the time we got remotely close, the enemy had already swarmed it, causing an immediate fallback. Without OPs it was doomed from the start.
• I'm sad to hear the significant differences in the times that stated a 'full go live' 30-minute mark and 25-minute mark. That was big and I don't want to pin our victory on that but it played a large role.
• Karr had to leave early due to a relentless migraine
• More splitting of the full Bravo section than I would've liked.

 

[Wayne.B]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: ALLIES Tank 3
Element Leader: First Sergeant Wayne.B
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Tovarysh.U
Specialist Button.J

Pros:

• Good attendance.
• Lots of communication!
• Excellent prebrief strategy.

Cons:

• Ruleset was detrimental to an armored advance from the beach (bottleneck entry into entrenched defense).
• Slight scheduling conflict.

 

[Ackelson.K]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: Tank Lead 3
Element Leader:Sergeant Ackelson.K
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Sergeant Ackelson.K
Sergeant Coutu.M
Specialist Massey.A


Pros:

• Great Turn out
• Good coordination with infantry
• Good crew and lead TC comms

Cons:

• Command chat was very busy

 

[Slagg.J]

Element Callsign: - Axis Bravo 2 [item].
Element Leader: Corporal Slagg. J.
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Kiing.T
Private First Class Curran.J
Private First Class Wisniewski.A

Pros:

• Really good turnout.
• Good FTX plan, fun and challenging. Good scenario ideas.
• Solid callouts from squad, good comms overall.
• Troopers were effective both as directed, and in using initiative to best effect.
• Effective synergy with B1 providing flexible responses to tactical issues.

Cons:

• Initial timings/setup caused a surprise assault at very close ranges, despite this axis recovered.
• Command chat procedures need working on. Command chat was very busy and hard to follow at times.

 

[OCulien.M]

Element Callsign: King
Element Leader: Corporal OCulien.M
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Private First Class Mead.T
Recruit Baldwin.C
Private Lawton.D

Pros:

• Great concept for local comms
• Great Defensive from the Axis (credit where its due)

Cons:

• Difficulty in command chat

 

[Avery.D]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: Allies Infantry Platoon Lead
Element Leader: Staff Sergeant Avery.D
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Staff Sergeant Avery.D

Pros:

• Took the first 2 objectives really fast
• All squads know their roles and positions to move to and move to them very fast

Cons:

• Enemy MG's at the center point was very thick and hard to move through
• We did not place enough satchels to push the point
• Forgot the enemy can push to the end of the map and did not have any squads fall back to defend the point

 

[Cantrell.J]

Element Callsign: Allies Infantry FTL 5 Love Squad
Element Leader: Sergeant Cantrell.J
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Corporal Owens.J
Private Sudul.L
Corporal Meyer.T


Pros:
Good attendance.
My squad's executed well and comes was good

Cons:
Communication and clarification of the Opord
seemed like communication kind of fell apart at the end and lost cohesion

 

[Swanson.B]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: FTL 4 Allies Dog Squad
Element Leader: Specialist Swanson.B
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Private First Class Jayaraman.V
Specialist Ching.H
Specialist Chay.S
Specialist Baldrick.D
Private First Class Campbell.G

Pros:

• Phase 1 and 2 were fun. We did good push on both phases.
• Good squad gameplay and communication

Cons:

• Felt like a meat grinder a little bit on both phase as our squad was assigned frontal assault
• Offensive OP were often taken out by flankers. Made it hard to push on both phases.
• Nothing was planned to defend after 25 minutes mark. FTX should have been restricted to assault only with no back cap after 25 minutes.
• FTX was 2 hours but we played 1:10 or so. This was a long wait for some of us.
• Felt like when losing Dog Green, no body was defending except 2 squads
• Phase 1 : Once squads capture south and north bunkers, they kept pushing west for a while instead of converging on the middle remaining objective. This prevented quick capture of WN71 of a good 10 minutes.

 

[Carmine.J]

Element Callsign: Able
Element Leader: Specialist Carmine.J
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Bastogne.M
Private First Class Rilian.M
Corporal Moskal.C
Corporal Donato.E
Corporal Raine.A

Pros:

• A squad had an easy to do job. Despite the large setup.
• We held all the objectives despite them becoming meatgrinders, but that just means it was an even fight.

Cons:

• Completely forgot about the Phase where we had no OPs. We didn't necessarily need them though they would've been preferred. Maybe a reminder at the start of each phase. Also command comms were all over the place at times so it was hard to pick out bits of information. Im guilty of this too at times, but for the most part I just called out pings that I had made.

 

[Henderson.B]

Element Callsign: Tank Lead 1 (Bob)
Element Leader: Corporal Henderson.B
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Corporal Berkowski.C
Specialist.White.N

Pros:
-Great Crew Communication
-Great Gunnery Skills
-Great Infantry Support


Cons:
-My lack of communication to my fellow SL's for a period

 

[Hellious.T]

Element Callsign: Ally FTL 3
Element Leader: Sergeant Hellious.T
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Corporal Zulu.P
Specialist Willis.B
Specialist Joshothy.J
Specialist Maca.D
Specialist Cris.C


Pros:

• Squad pulled off objectives quickly and efficiently
• squad moved well off the start and moved well through the narrows to take ground and push up in concert
• multiple objectives for defenders to spread out and allow attackers to strategize and flex weak points is always nice to see
• tanks were tucked in for the axis seemed good

Cons:

• tankers flexed away from infantry a few times and were left in the dry - lost quickly
• the typo (25vs30 min) left troopers feeling naked on a back cap that likely would have worked but was not prepared for at 30 minutes, 5 minutes in HLL is a long time
• we had some daisy chaining due to our far south positioning and man power getting cut down along long lines

 

[Zimm.L]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: Allies FTL 6
Element Leader: Master Sergeant Zimm.L
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Major Rollins.R
Corporal Reign.A
Recruit Ackerman.J

Pros:

• fun for the first hour
• squad moved affectively
• good squad comms

Cons:

• tank at church was uncontested for to long
• last 30 min because we were working on an objective still and was a big moral hit when they just started back capping us and seemed like everyone lost all drive
• command comms was a little lacking
• allies team assets seemed deprived for having to attack a equal number when you normally want a 3 to 1 for attackers
• lost a back garrisons that was behind the line and behind buildings

 

[Silvis.B]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: AXIS FTL- Easy Squad
Element Leader: Specialist Silvis.B
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Jefferzon.Z
Specialist Silvis.C
Sergeant Major West.B

Pros:

• Great turn out!
• Great communication and squad flow

Cons:

• Would like more clarification on Op board and opening moments of match

 

[Canuck.J]

Element Callsign: Charlie Reapers
Element Leader: Staff Sergeant Canuck.J
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Private Bean.P
Private Evans.J
Staff Sergeant Phillips.B


Pros:

• Great Defensive work.
• The tankers did awesome on the defense, great work and great positioning.
• Troopers did a great defensive build on the church.

Cons:

• Command Comms to busy.
• Phase 0 (Build phase) was too short and lots of confusion.

 

[Warren.G]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: ALLIES Easy Squad

Element Leader: Sergeant Warren.G


7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Argentini.E
Private Hazen.D
Specialist White.C
Private First Class King.DJ
Private Woody.W

Pros:

• Good attendance
• Got to play with some newer troopers in an official setting
• Game didn't crash
• The team as a whole got comms back online quickly

Cons:

• Lack of Tank/Infantry Coordination - we were tasked to support a tank that 4th geared it past us which left both elements exposed unnecessarily.
• The fill in squads felt like we were just thrown into the plan without a ton of thought
• The plan was too micromanaged down to the detail. Keep each sections objective broad enough to allow for adjustment to the enemy
• It felt like the tanks got tunnel vision on one particular area and failed to adjust to help the infantry advance in the south or north.
• We were back capped and wasn't even aware that was possible and we failed to respond to it effectively
• for 50 v 50 any AO restrictions really should be lifted to prevent it from being a meat grinder. Having that many guns in a restricted zone makes attacking the point pretty pointless, especially on a point that was reinforced with buildables.

 

[Webber.R]

S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: Allies George Squad, "Delta" Reapers Fireteam 1
Element Leader: Sergeant.Webber.R
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist.Sokol.Z
Specialist.Watson.J
Private First Class Korfias.F


Pros:

• 2nd Battalion record 101 member operation!
• The op structure of multiple objectives for the first phase allowed for tactical strategic decisions for planning.
• Allies completed removing the radar jamming bunker along with the AT Bunker for tankers in extremely fast fashion.
• Excellent usage of smokes from the squad and team.
• Delta Squad made use of tactical pausing and reorganization between phases to iron out our plan and rearm. Real happy we're seeing excellent success of this strategy from SPs.

Cons:

• Squad was unable to get a successful AT gun built south of Vierville due to uneven terrain blocking our shots.
• As a squad leader, I was not flexible enough to abandon our AT gun plan and change strategy on the fly. After the second unsuccessful attempt, I should have maneuvered my squad with Hellious to flank from the West.
• Typo in our OPORD meant Axis took back WN71 with zero resistance as we were not prepared for a counteroffensive for another 5 minutes. Although the time change was relayed during the FTX, I don't believe anyone acknowledged it from Allies. In the future, at the very least we should make sure the team leader acknowledges a change like that because it definitely killed the mood for the remainder of the match.
• Although it did not affect this match due to how fast we destroyed it, there has been quite a bit of feedback from our Platoon that the "radar jamming" comms has become a tad overused and is becoming stale and unfun.

 

[Becks.J]

Element Callsign: German - Fire Team 7
Element Leader: Sergeant First Class Becks.J
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Stenberg.P
Specialist McGee.C
Specialist Ashie.L
Specialist Martin.R

Pros:

• Sections did a good job reacting to the various attacks coming at us defending the point on Vierville.
• My troopers did a good job passing up info on direction of incoming attacks.
• As the QRF fireteam they had great initiative plugging holes in the line before I might even have noticed. The 4 of them managed to almost single handedly hold off the north flank attacks buying time for us to be able to get the air head and turn the tide of the battle. They were rewarded by going on the attack and helped win the battle on the final point.

Cons:

• Command comms were crowded. I kind of miss the days we had fireteams in game, then FTLs would be in a discord channel with their SL and only SLs were to use Command chat with the Platoon Leader or Commander etc. (FTLs would mute command chat in-game). Having 8 or more FTLs passing up things in command chat is cluttered. No matter how disciplined we try to be with it, I believe with the more people able to talk, the more will. Everyone thinks their info is the most important at the time.
• Always try to get enemy numbers from your troopers (not just enemy on my ping). The more intel we have on how many enemy we are likely to have in a certain direction, the better we can divert manpower to reinforce those areas.
• While we knew the enemy was pushing in from the rear. Sufficient manpower was not sent to deal with it, or info was not passed up about the threat level. They had time to build up, organize and push in. Once that happened we lost our beach defence, being unable to spawn in and those who could were fighting surrounded (US pro: excellent fire support from US armor enabling the push from the rear).