AAR AAR Easy Company 2-7 FTX - Operation Cold Freedom

[Cameron.J]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
Name of Combat Mission: Easy Company FTX - Operation Cold Freedom
Game: Hell Let Loose
Server Hosted on: Training Server 1
Date of Combat Mission: 02MAR25
Time of Combat Mission : 2000z

​

Mission OIC: Major Cameron.J
Mission Controller: Major Cameron.J
Number of Attendees: 86
Major Cameron.J
Captain Anderson.P
First Lieutenant Korfias.F
First Lieutenant Rhodes.R
Second Lieutenant Carmine.J
Second Lieutenant Leifried.R
Second Lieutenant Sotelo.R
Second Lieutenant Manser.N
First Sergeant Rasmus.M
First Sergeant Sven.S
First Sergeant Balazova.S
Master Sergeant Mueller.H
Master Sergeant Becks.J
Staff Sergeant Avery.D
Staff Sergeant Mulholland.J
Staff Sergeant Konn.G
Sergeant Bean.P
Sergeant Etoh.I
Sergeant Noriega.D
Sergeant Laui.M
Sergeant Martin.R
Sergeant Berkowski.C
Corporal Flanagan.L
Corporal Riley.D
Corporal Feathers.A
Corporal Guillermo.C
Corporal Warren.G
Corporal Rilian.M
Corporal Moreau.M
Corporal Willis.B
Corporal Baldrick.D
Corporal Slagg.J
Corporal Laroche.P
Corporal Scarselli.T
Corporal Owens.J
Specialist Mess.L
Specialist Blade.B
Specialist Mogensen.J
Specialist Angels.N
Specialist Beans.F
Specialist Narayanaswamy.A
Specialist Woody.W
Specialist Barrett.JH
Specialist Rowe.S
Specialist Yee.L
Specialist Jay.JH
Specialist Watters.W
Specialist Leaf.J
Specialist Barnes.D
Specialist Lemon.D
Specialist Eckert.B
Specialist Pippin.C
Specialist Pollock.R
Specialist Heinz.B
Specialist Schultz.M
Specialist Lewis.P
Specialist Moff.N
Specialist Suplee.B
Specialist Darko.M
Specialist Quake.B
Specialist Parton.D
Specialist Loup.N
Specialist Crozier.N
Specialist Lahti.R
Specialist Maikranz.J
Specialist Tawfik.Y
Private First Class Grayson.J
Private First Class Stanley.MF
Private First Class Koalafied.C
Private First Class Hooman.Z
Private First Class Faissal.A
Private First Class Kent.S
Private First Class Payne.J
Private Baktash.L
Private Becker.J
Private Crooks.A
Private John.C
Private Milkovic.D
Private Pick.S
Private Salvatore.J
Private Tilley.B

Second Lieutenant DAmico.J - Retired
Corporal Reign.A - Retired
Corporal Smith.N - Retired
Specialist Rousseau.A - Retired
Specialist Henson.K - Active NFA

 

[Cameron.J]

Element Callsign: Allied Command
Element Leader: Major Cameron.J
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Major Cameron.J

Pros:

• Numbers
• Balazova's placement tool continues to make things easy
• Pre-Planning

Cons:

• Massive Skill gap
• Weaknesses presented more often than Strengths

 

[Sotelo.R]

Element Callsign: Axis Armor - "Cheap and Easy"
Element Leader: Second Lieutenant Sotelo.R
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Second Lieutenant Sotelo.R
Sergeant Berkowski.C
Corporal Guillermo.C

Pros:

• Armor crews had a good time, both crews coordinated well together to support overall team objectives.
  • Managed to score a heavy 76 takedown using a medium P4
• Command comms were great. Clean, generally quick.
  • I swear Barnes is a great example of some QUALITY comm callouts.
• The mission was solid. Simple idea, decent challenge for both teams.
• Happy to be training cadre.
• Allies had good use of AT Guns, always good to see more

Cons:

• It felt like there was infantry/armor desync at times for the Allies.
  • Allied Infantry smoking us out while Allied armor was trying to engage us, actually allowing us to escape
  • Frontline Sherman 76's were getting snuck up on by 2 Tigers a couple times, so maybe trying to get more eyes on the road ahead for the tanks' approach?

 

[LaRoche.P]

Element Callsign: Allied recon squad
Element Leader: Corporal Laroche.P
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Barrett.JH

Pros:

• Etoh's slides and plan was excellent, really well put up

Cons:

• proved me again that if you kill more than you get killed, you win...
• T17 maps are pure dog shit, hate every single one of them, they're extrmemely unbalanced

 

[Rasmus.M]

Element Callsign: Axis Squad George - East side
Element Leader: First Sergeant Rasmus.M
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
First Sergeant Rasmus.M
Corporal Moreau.M
Specialist Narayanaswamy.A
Specialist Rousseau.A RET
Specialist Woody.W
Private Becker.J

Pros :

• We worked very well as a team, filling gaps, good flex ;
• Good callouts for AT guns and tanks ;
• Good Zone of control on defense ;
• Tried to assist our tanks as much we could ;
• Always a blast playing with these troopers.

Cons :

• AO changed versus what we had in OPORD, a bit confusing during Phase 2 and 3.
• Did not see a huge amount of defense structures on point for Phase 3 +
• I think we should have allowed Allies to setup themselves in the whole 7-8 Lines in Phase 1.

 

[Bean.P]

Element Callsign: Axis Infantry - Da Bean
Element Leader:Sgt.Bean
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
CPL.Feathers
CPL.Willis
SPC.Lewis
Pvt. John.C
SPC. Moff

Pros:

• Guys loved it loads of fun

Cons:
Server was a bit laggy.

 

[Angels.N]

Element Callsign: Axis "Dog" Infantry Squad
Element Leader: Specialist Nate Angels
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Corporal Jack Slagg
Specialist Milivojevic Darko
Specialist Benjamin Quake
Specialist Nicholas Crozier
Specialist Youssef Tawfik

Pros:

• Great communication inner squad and command chat.
• Great markups with pings
• Great movement inner squad and good flanking maneuvers.

Cons:

• Skill Gap was massive.
• Rules were not respected; happened in my squad but the rules need to be enforced from START to FINISH, rules weren't respected before the 1:13:00 start and nothing was said but when we were "bending" the rules on the line, my squad was getting scolded.
• The OPORDs were a challenge to understand and squad leaders (including myself) would always ask what the next phase line was to understand even if we were looking at the OPORD.

 

[Baldrick.D]

Element Callsign: Fox squad on Allies
Element Leader: Cpl.Baldrick.D
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Avery.D
CPL.Owens.J
SPC.Blade.B
Pros:
-none
-


Cons:

• Set up for a frontal assault just to be flanked in the C line where we were not allowed to go
• Communications went down after we lost the 2nd to last point. (SL's didn't know who to take orders from. everyone was kind of spread out.)
• SPC.Blade.B and CPL.Baldrick.D had lag issues all game

 

[Laui.M]

Element Callsign: Allied Tank 'Nassau'
Element Leader: Sergeant Laui.M
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Lemon.D
Specialist Heinz.B

Pros:

• Excellent presentation and planning by Etoh.I. Really cool and would like to see more of this.
• Really appreciated the amount of information about enemy tanks we got on such a poor-visibility map.
• We won a lot of (long-range) tank engagements and only died to enemy armor once — when we were facing two tanks at once versus our one, and after taking out one of the two.
• Excellent stuff from the crew, especially given us being a new crew.
• Enemy (Axis) infantry did wonderful when it comes to swarming and killing us in the tank from multiple sides. That AT presence was killer. Really big props to them — it messed us up big time.
• Had lots of fun.

Cons:

• Not sure what stopped our pre-planning from coming to fruition. AT guns are such a great idea and I hope we can really push their implementation to perfection.
• Combined arms needs work. Armor still struggles supporting infantry, and infantry still struggles supporting armor. The intent is there, and the motivation is there. I have no doubt we'll iron this out ASAP.
• We were getting redirected and our orders changed before we could even get to our previous ordered position, often. We were too slow in the heavy to be able to react in time, and the paths to orders were usually infested with enemy AT.
• Small infantry squads resulted in a split presence. We were getting swarmed by infantry all the time, and could not really move around anywhere to get in a position to support our infantry.

 

[Martin.R]

Element Callsign: Allies Mike Squad
Element Leader:] Sergeant Martin.R
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Master Sergeant Becks.J

Pros:

• Good defense at dug out
• Nice thought on the planning
• Love that we had dedicated supply truck drivers for setup

Cons:

• Lag was horrible for both myself and Becks
• Small squads hamper defense
• Lack of decent tankers (not the first time either) feels like we lack armor support at times

 

[Mueller.H]

Element Callsign: Allies Prep Squad
Element Leader:] Master Sergeant Mueller.H
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Henson.K
Specialist Schultz.M (mid game to end)


Pros:

• Good pre-planning for the preparation.
• Good defensive concept.
• Maybe my highest kill count in any non public OP.
• Mr. Henson was my human shield.

Cons:

• Small squads are bad for defense. A team mate that gets shot or a ping that is only seen by 1 or 2 is worse than having a full squad. Especially if the enemy squad is bigger. It would only be useful in some kind of counter attack on the flanks to take out the opponent's spawns.
• Pre-planning may be useful for preparation, but afterwards it is useless if the opponent does not do what was planned. In the end, almost all mines were still in the south on the battlefield but we haven't placed new ones.
• The server was weird. I briefly had over 200 ping, which never happened on the old server, even though the server wasn't even full. It's just 20 more than usual but something felt wrong. Sometimes the opponents didn't drop when I hit the body and sometimes they dropped when I missed.
• In this game there is a commander and squad leader. The commander determines how the game is played based on his spawns and his abilities. There is no need for an extra layer of administration for micromanagement, especially if they act in a contradictory manner. I don't know what caused this issue at end, but it didn't benefit us for the last 18 minutes.
• I've never seen a single game where attacking from one direction led to success. You could just run against 50% of your opponents and still lose, especially if they are equipped with MG42s.

 

[Cameron.J]

Element Callsign: Axis Infantry - Da Bean
Element Leader:Sgt.Bean
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
CPL.Feathers
CPL.Willis
SPC.Lewis
Pvt. John.C
SPC. Moff

Pros:

• Guys loved it loads of fun

Cons:
Server was a bit laggy.

Please link milpacs and spell out ranks

 

[Leifried.R]

Element Callsign: Axis Platoon Leader
Element Leader: Second Lieutenant Leifried.R
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:

Sergeant Bean.P
Second Lieutenant Manser.N
Private First Class Payne.J
First Sergeant Balazova.S
Specialist Watters.W
Private First Class Koalafied.C
Second Lieutenant Sotelo.R
Corporal Guillermo.C
Sergeant Berkowski.C
Corporal Smith.N
Specialist Parton.D
Private Pick.S
Corporal Warren.G
Corporal Feathers.A
Specialist Moff.N
Corporal Willis.B
Private John.C
Specialist Lewis.P
First Lieutenant Korfias.F
Private Salvatore.J
Second Lieutenant DAmico.J
Private Becker.J
Sergeant Noriega.D
Corporal Scarselli.T
Private Tilley.B
Specialist Mess.L
Private First Class Hooman.Z
Corporal Reign.A


Pros:

• Good format, keeping it straight up the middle - long live the RCON tool
• (For the most part) Allowing cadre to "not hold back"

Cons:

• Training 1 is now laggy? Increased ping across the board and was very prevalent for some troopers

 

[Mulholland.J]

Element Callsign: Allies
Element Leader: Staff Sergeant Mulholland.J
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Pollock.R
Specialist Yee.L
Private First Class Milkovic.D
Corporal Flanagan.L
Private First Class Grayson.J


Pros:

• My squad defended valiantly.
• Good initial defenses built.
• Great EU showing.
• The 3pm EST time slot works.
• Our platoon mostly played from 12 pm EST- 430 pm EST. This is a pro and con. I feel a little fatigued after 2 hours of play.

Cons:

• Comms. I could barely find time to speak to my section.
• Stacked teams. Again, and again and again. We are a new company, new platoon with lots of new troopers. We keep running FTX's and SP's like we are a veteran company/platoon but we are not that yet. We keep having to play the best the Cav has to offer which can be a good thing but not with the way we are balancing teams. Just because it is 50 vs 50 does NOT mean all players are equal, nor is the OP written to be equal. We all know this but yet we actively avoid that fact and act surprised every single time. It's getting old. You don't get better by playing uneven teams. You get better by playing your own skill level and play better and better opponents one after another. It's literally the way all sport teams and competitive multiplayer games are run. Skill levels are a thing!
• Gimmicks. This time it was the crazy OP board. More = less. I could not tell anything from anything without needing to study it like its an exam. Besides the people making it, we don't know what your trying to say so it needs to be clear and concise. We appreciate the effort but yea.
• Way to many to name here and not get people upset. My suggestion is to bring it back a notch and start at the starting line and take it slow and steady. Ramp up the challenge as we get better.

 

[Leaf.J]

Element Callsign: Allies Dog Squad
Element Leader: Specialist Leaf.J
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Leaf.J

Pros:

• Format and presentation was really cool. Enjoyed the central focus on the map.
• Noticed new additions to our platoon/squad did well in the prep phase despite it being a new and slightly strange concept to them.
• Once I adapted my role from a seventh man, I thought my personal performance was good considering I played as a completely solo SL. Despite never being used I set up my outpost as a back up for my other squad and would sweep behind enemy lines. I got a few outposts and tracked some enemy troop and vehicle movements.

Cons:

• I personally don't think 7-man tactics work when defending and this contributed to our loss. It causes huge gaps in communication which translates to huge physical gaps in our defense lines. We should have contested those points for much longer.
• Command comms were particularly crazy I started without them muted, as requested, but found it impossible to follow the battle without. Comms in general were poor, nobody really seemed to listen to the commander and I think splitting in discord was detrimental.
• Despite performing as best as I could, I did not enjoy playing solo. This is not why I joined the cav.
• Final third of the match was a grim meat grinder. There was no plan to deal with their MGs.
• Skill gap issues between the teams but our platoon has a lot of new and inexperienced troopers.
• Map choice not the greatest but that is a personal opinion.

 

[Jay.JH]

Element Callsign: Allied Item Squad (FTL)
Element Leader: Specialist Jay.JH
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Private First Class Shabz.A
Specialist Pippin.C

Pros:

• Impressive setup, brief, and slides from command
• The setup phase itself went well, heard positives from all troopers about having set roles, worked better than expected setting the defences up
• Overall was a fun FTX for my guys, there were some tough situations but they persisted and I feel we had good effectiveness throughout
• Held the points for as long as we could, despite the VERY tough situation, I am impressed with how well we managed to defend and hold our own against such an aggressive enemy
• From my perspective, out armour did phenomenal at taking out enemy armour, as soon as a tank
• The overall concept and execution of this FTX couldn't have been better from my perspective
• Cadre/Axis team did an impressive job, whatever they did worked!

Cons:

• 7-man tactics could have been utilised more, in the same way they were in the SP++/MiniFTX, although the situation wasn't really calling for it in the same way
• Being split into smaller squads didn't work as well as first thought, larger squads could have given a more sturdier defence - although this sacrificed agility to send people around and move squads around
• Comms issues from my end, having everyone in discord and muting in game command chat left us quite lost and helpless at the start, I remedied this by unmuting in game chat, but sorta kept us out the loop at the start.
• I also feel like at least one more person on my team would have made an impactful differnce, whether this be Specialist Leaf.J - this is so I don't also take away and cripple another squad

 

[Carmine.J]

Element Callsign: Allies (East A.T.)
Element Leader: Second Lieutenant Carmine.J
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Corporal Rilian.M
Private First Class Kent.S

Pros:

• An amazing amount of effort was put into the making of a detailed defensive setup OPORD by Sergeant Etoh.I. He put a lot of time into scouting out the terrain and the layout of the map during the week leading up to the FTX. While we were only working with 14/32 of our platoon (44%), he made sure everybody had a job during setup phase placing AT guns, minefields, and roadblocks in key locations that would ultimately buy us some stall time during the operation itself.
• I was only running a 3-man AT team, but we completed all of our setup and held our position for as long as possible destroying 2 tanks, a Luchs & a Panzer4, using the sightlines provided by the slides we were given.
• Our team was the Highest Combat Effective Infantry squad with only our 2 tank squads scoring higher. I managed to screenshot the entire scoreboard, my personal stats, and received both the screenshots of the personal stats from each of my squad members, gathering a lot of information on what my fireteam did during the operation.
• Effective markers were provided by some fireteams marking out enemy outposts and approaching armor that our anti-tank guns were able to follow up on.
• I'm actually glad I got to attend this FTX and had a good time. I prefer a challenge that forces me to think and approach my gunfights better causing me to adapt and switch loadouts to the situation. I just wasn't in the right headspace for this fight.

Cons: (Just because it's under Cons doesn't mean it's all negative, some points are just personal observations & constructive criticism. Losing only sucks when you refuse to learn from your losses.)

• Some of the squads butchered the setup phase putting AT guns in places we didn't need them directly on the hardpoint that didn't follow the defensive OPORD and gave up key sightlines we were going to watch. This is for every squad that didn't help build. We were given 17 minutes to setup, don't act like you don't know how to place barbed wire, mines, & help build. During Rally I asked specifically who was in charge of nodes and my 3 man and another team were supposed to group up & build a set of nodes in East HQ. That other squad never dropped supplies, so I had to temporarily jump out of the SL role to help build, it's not a problem for me, just don't get irritated when I have to jump comms for a minute to help with setup that was ignored. I also had to build one of the AT guns for our setup because out of my 3-man team only 2 of us had the gun crew unlocked. That isn't anyone's fault we just need to be more adaptive when it comes to handling hiccups in logistics.
• We had a solid defensive setup plan that was somewhat followed by some of the fireteams, but we didn't really have a plan to flex numbers if some areas got over pressured more than others. Dugout Tanks got hit hard from the East and my squad as East AT only had 3 guys and our East QRF squad was missing a bunch of people and running a 2 man, we were able to use our AT guns effectively up until we got outnumbered and overwhelmed by enemy infantry. Whoever was Southwest of Dugout Tanks got completely overran, I saw on a recon plane run half the enemy team rolling through that sector.
• I don't entirely agree with the idea that small squads are ineffective given that each squad had a specific role. In some APL matches they have as many squads as possible for multiple Outposts that can also function as a radar. It's pretty obvious our guys were just getting outplayed, not coordinating between squads, and losing their gunfights. I watched so many blueberries getting mowed down and running head down through fields with zero situational awareness. I can't say I did any better. I went 26-38 with 3 or 4 redeploys, but a lot of my deaths were just getting spawn killed at our garrisons and outposts and getting outnumbered in gunfights due to lack of support and coordination.
• My ping was 180 during the game and 130 when I screenshot all the scoreboards at the end and it seemed to be worse the more people were in the server, because as people started leaving my ping started dropping until it reached about 80. I don't think it can be considered an excuse as to why we lost because there were obviously several other mistakes made in game but being that a large chunk of our team is European which isn't there fault at all, I can only assume that our pings overall were worse than the team we were facing.
• One of our tanks that was helping guard our sector shelled a tree about 30m in front of them 4 times, injuring me in the process, my team thought we were taking incoming enemy tank fire at first. Basically, sums up how I feel about our armor support that game, I know they're capable of doing better but it just didn't feel like the support was there and not having those bodies in gunfights cost us. My 3-man was getting chewed up by a bigger fireteam pushing us while our tank sat about 50 m behind us on a hill. We marked an incoming tank and an enemy AT gun that was just out in an open field, our tank acknowledged and got too aggressive ignored the AT gun and pushed up and killed the tank but immediately got re-fragged by the most obviously placed AT gun.
• Effective pings were provided by some teams and ignored and not engaged or followed up on by a lot of teams.
• We had no plan for a counterattack and were pretty much just winging it after we lost Farahilde Farm. One of my troopers called it out, if we lose farm, we lose all our garrisons and from there we had to fight against really good infantry while trying to rebuild spawns. On the other end it felt like we provided very little resistance in tracking down & destroying enemy spawns almost like our team was tunnel visioned on just defending. My team knocked out a few over aggressively placed Outposts and almost destroyed a garrison that was being camped by a tiger when we managed to get an airhead in on one of the flanks but failed there.
• The premise of the operation was fine, it was pretty vanilla. Stall in some sectors while we build up in others. It's already been said, but when the attackers have all the initiative and you're just defending stationary, you're going to lose eventually. Call me crazy but I think this format would've been ran better on the Offensive game mode with a time limit to each sector so we can better gauge how long we held for.

 

[Balazova.S]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
​

Element Callsign: Axis 1st Tank
Element Leader: First Sergeant Balazova.S
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
First Sergeant Balazova.S
Specialist Watters.W
Private First Class Koalafied.C

Pros:

• Ruleset enabled formation of a frontline which allowed tanks to function well with infantry
• Points all being centrally located allowed versatility in assault tactics
• Phased combat led to fun gameplay
• Great communication from teammates with respect to location of armor threats

Cons

• Defenders were given superior armor despite equal numbers and having the defender's advantage

 

[Etoh.I]

Element Callsign: Allied Negat Squad - West AT Red
Element Leader: Sergeant Etoh.I
7th Cavalry Personnel within Element:
Specialist Suplee.B
Specialist Loup.N
Private First Class Stanley.MF

Resource: Operation Cold Freedom Defensive Briefing

Pros

• Really liked the concept of a rolling defense operation
• Enjoy that we have the tools to pick our hardpoints
• Astounded by the turnout we received given the timeslot
• Squads that followed their orders found great success within them
• Couldn't be happier with my individual squad in how they carried themselves and maintained flexibility
• Happy to see most of a plan carried out
• AT Guns in key locations crushed it
• Rolling barrage artillery work showed promise, would love to practice and implement it more

Cons

• I have a great dislike for asymmetric AO's along the X-axis. I understand Y-axis differences for flow
• I believe that giving the axis our flanks freely was too charitable
• The majority of people within my platoon couldn't attend due to timeslot
• Squads that didn't follow their assigned task not only failed to complete their own objective but hindered the completion of others
• Perhaps my briefing didn't go into enough detail or was too complicated at the individual squad level.
• Emotions ran high early, leading to a lack of cohesion before things started going wrong. Recurring theme in operations, very tired of this. It's over before it's over.
• When things went wrong morale was too low to reign free thinkers into a coordinated counteroffensive
• We flanked far East and West initially on the counterattack which spread defenders thin. When stalled in the far flanks for over 20 minutes we should have all formed a fast spear counterattack through the center but only half of the team bought into it with 5 minutes to spare.

 

[Sven.S]

Element Callsign: Allied How Squad
Element Leader: First Sergeant Sven.S
7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Beans.F

Pros:

• Numbers
• Good Planning
• Good Defence at some points

Cons:

• Flanks to Weak
• some comms problems
• Some Guys had Ping problems
• Blaance was not soo good