The Battle for Alterac [RP-PvP][[1st of May]

• During preparation, Areyah Conover divides the army into four task groups: Frontline, Recon, Support, and Healing. Each group is placed under a subordinate commander: Gilran Steelfist for Frontline, Helmut Spoon for Recon, Lomenar Nightsinger for Support, and Irys Grimrock for Healing. Frontline holds the line, support flanks them, healers stay in the rear, and recon scouts the enemy and hits their support from behind.
  
• Each group leader is then additionally ordered to form A and B teams, in case portions need to split from the main group.
  
• Each group leader is given a Gnomish radio, in order to facilitate ranged coordination.
  
• Battle begins. The army moves down as one, but soon splits into separate divisions. Areyah takes the main division down towards Stonehearth Bunker, while a secondary division, comprised of Frontline and Range's B groups, move to take the mine and then hold position at Stonehearth Outpost. Recon group is ordered to scout out the enemy.
  
• Main Division sets up by Stonehearth Bunker. Frontline blockades the path, while Areyah moves atop the Bunker to watch the battlefield with her spyglass.
  
• Recon and Areyah spot the enemy, who has moved into the middle of the field of honor. After a short wait, the enemy attempts to flank Main Division by going around the Bunker's eastern edge. Areyah immediately orders Main Division to re-align to face east, putting Frontline into the enemy's path. The enemy engages Main Division, and is then hit from behind by Recon. Horde are outnumbered in this battle, and forced to withdraw.
  
• Secondary Division is ordered to move south towards Snowfall Graveyard. Meanwhile, Main Division moves south towards Iceblood Graveyard. However, Recon and spyglass show the enemy perched in the hills by Iceblood, making an approach from this angle heavily favor the Horde.
  
• To divert the enemy, Areyah orders additional troops from Frontline and Healing's B group to reinforce Secondary Division (this splits the numbers between Main and Secondary to about 17/16, with the remaining 7 in Recon). Secondary Division is then ordered to converge on the Horde from the direction of Iceblood Garrison. Though Secondary Division loses this battle, even with Recon's support, it opens the eastern cliffs for Main Division to push forward.
  
• Main Division faces down the enemy from the east. After a brief standoff, the order to charge is given. The Horde, now in a central position, is set upon by Main Division from the east, Recon from the west, and a regrouped Secondary from the south. They are quickly overrun and forced to withdraw to the bottleneck between Iceblood Tower and Iceblood Graveyard, but the chaos of the battle (namely, both Main and Secondary were NOT supposed to engage at the same time due to us outnumbering the Horde, and so we had to spent some time fixing things) enables them to prepare a strong defensive line.
  
• Secondary Division engages the Horde at the bottleneck, supported by Recon. They lose this battle, though it opens up the passage. Main Division attempts to exploit the opening by charging in, but open themselves up to being enveloped by surviving Horde from the rear and regrouping (rezzing) Horde from the front. Main Division is forced to pull back (gets slaughtered horribly).
  
• Not all of Main Division withdrew. A handful have taken cover in Tower Point, along with some of Recon. They hold out until reinforcements from both the rest of Main and Secondary arrive and push the Horde back.
  
• A moment of rest is taken to regroup and reorganize (so that we can start fixing the numbers problem). Main Division and Secondary Division are merged back into a single army. A small force of 14 is sent forward to engage the remaining Horde forces, who have prepared a defensive line. The attack fails.
  
• The army moves forward. One half, commanded by Bismack Bronze, is sent ahead to engage the enemy, while the other half remains behind to serve as a reinforcement wave. Bronze's attack fails, but is immediately followed up by the reinforcement wave. Even then, the attack only barely succeeds.
  
• The Horde withdraw to Frostwolf Base Camp, as the Alliance army assaults the outlying village. The Horde initially set up a blockade at the gate, forcing the Alliance to halt for a moment, but they eventually move into the general's fortress.
  
• The Alliance engages the Horde in the fortress. Several attempts are made, each are unsuccessful in routing the Horde. The general manages to escape (due to Horde going under minimum required numbers, a countdown was started).
  
• Ultimate outcome of the battle: Massive damage to Horde forces, but Horde leadership (the general) managed to escape to fight another day.
  

• Recon group. Easily the strongest force multiplier on the Alliance side, probably made our numbers look bigger than they were. Was the one group that we ensured took part in every battle. The one task group of the four that really functioned as cohesive unit (although, part of that is because numbers required us to split the other groups).
  
• Communication was good. Could use some work, but for the most part the addition of established commanders really helps with coordination, and usage of IC radios ensures that directions and reports of enemy movements over Raid chat are actually done IC instead of OOC. An improve that could be made here would be to put one or two of these established commanders in command of secondary divisions. Keeping all of the commanders in the main division sort of limited how much individual authority they could provide due to the overhead (me) issuing all the orders for the group. Delegation delegation delegation.
  
• Preparation and planning worked. Definitely can be improved and made more streamlined, but the basic strategies implemented mostly accomplished what they were supposed to accomplish.
  
• Spyglass. Spyglasses are awesome.
  

• OOC organization. I focused 100% on IC organization and planning, that I didn't even think about the OOC. I figured I would take the battle completely IC, and figured numbers would be equal and we'd just fight it out. Having to do so much OOC organization really threw me off-guard.
  
• Invites. Split off from OOC organization, the invitations were handled very messily. I misjudged how much of my mental resource time would be needed for my other jobs, that I didn't realize how stressful trying to also handle invitations would be. Though a few people were set as assistants, this was done in a very off-handed manner that didn't really require people to actively manage invitations. Lack of preparation here resulted in A) inviting low levels initially before realizing that war games can't have low levels, and B ) missing people like Greyford Company. The latter especially is very upsetting and something I feel very bad about. This area is something that definitely needs to be improved on. Recommending to myself to have a dedicated Invite Officer for any future events.
  
• Scheduling. Event was scheduled for 21:00, but no mention was made of preparation time. Next time, a firm time must be established for preparation, either one or two hours before the event. Additionally, try and get guilds to arrive at the location the day before. The guilds that had the most luck in getting into the 'queue' were those who had traveled there the day before. Guilds that only arrived 'according to schedule' (Natures Grasp and Greyford Company) received very few slots in the raid.
  
• Practice. Planning and leadership of Alliance forces went fine. Lack of practice however made it hectic, uncoordinated, and undisciplined. People were slow, unsure, and misunderstood some orders. Training needs to happen.
  
• Personal critique. I spent 1k gold and part of my morning getting a helmet made for my transmog set, and then forgot to wear it during the battle.
  

Ildranor / Odgan wrote:Was awesome, I enjoyed the RP around and during the battle a lot as well.
The actual WPvP battles got fun for me after the destruction of Iceblood Tower, as before that, the group (secondary group) I was part of got send in as suicide runs. But I understand that and don't blame anybody for that, as it's indeed quite hard to balance stuff in such situations.

Looking forward to more!

Drustai wrote:

Ildranor / Odgan wrote:Was awesome, I enjoyed the RP around and during the battle a lot as well.
The actual WPvP battles got fun for me after the destruction of Iceblood Tower, as before that, the group (secondary group) I was part of got send in as suicide runs. But I understand that and don't blame anybody for that, as it's indeed quite hard to balance stuff in such situations.

Looking forward to more!

I was just informed by Melnerag that when I sent reinforcements to join your group, they didn't actually... reinforce you during the battle. So I can see how you felt it was a suicide run. When Maelmoor/Disciples/some healers etc arrived with you guys at Snowfall, they were supposed to JOIN the battle with you. Not walk off elsewhere.

So here's another Improve I need to make: Assign better designations during the battle, since apparently it wasn't clear. Should have been calling them Main and Secondary during the actual battle.

Also, I need to assign more fluid groups next time. The four groups was based around even numbers between Alliance and Horde. Splitting into two divisions with those groups was very messy since they weren't planned to be split.

siegmund wrote:Instead of spliting healers-Frontline- etc. next time teams can be split with all included. Maybe a stealth team still together, but overall some teams that got someone in charge and more than just dps or just healers under their command. Would be a easier command chain. And the commanders (Hopefully got a clue about PvP or know how to flank at least) could do the job of IC moving forces. The main guy just tells where they may be needed or what tactics they could use. Seems easier to me.