A friend claims to be toying with the idea of The Pcs being elected the leaders of A Democratically ran Mercenary Army and wants to know what rank should the Pc whose in overall command have when he or she commands 4.17 Regiments of Regular Soldiers, 1.13 Regiments of Elite Soldiers, 2 platoons of Psion's and 3 squads each of tanks, artillery and aircraft that in theory work for whoever pays the most but in truth have been happy to spend the last very close to 2 decades doing nothing more then being very well paid and eating, drinking, relaxing and sleeping fit for Barons and all they've had to do is simply stay on a remote but very rich planet and keep the entire population, both civilian and government, safe simply by their mere presence on the planet being more then sufficient deterrent to the rivals and enemies of the world and/or its government and/or its ruler
What rank should the commanding Pc have
- Thread starter JMISBEST
- Start date
A
Anonymous
Guest
Nothing authoriative, but I think today they prefer the title of "Colonel". Maybe General makes you sound like warlord, or maybe they retained their old rank before going independent?
It's a hard topic to research.
It's a hard topic to research.
Condottiere
Emperor Mongoose
It's either a large brigade or a small division, since it lacks adequate combat support of engineers and artillery, and depends on how you define a regiment, being anything from one to three organic battalions.
M J Dougherty
Mongoose
What constitutes a regiment? Typically the term is used for an administrative formation which has one or more battalions (in WWII, lots of battalions, today regiments are typically trying to retain one and avoid amalgamation). In that context the regiment will have a titular colonel-in-chief who is someone like HM the Queen. Battalions are commanded by a Lt Colonel.
If by 'regiment' you mean 'battalion' then you have a five-battalion formation with attached forces. if your 'regiments' are infantry then what you have is an overstength brigade with inadequate supports, to be commanded by a brigadier/brigadier-general/colonel holding the brevet rank of brigadier or similar.
So. You need to decide if these regiments are equivalent to a single battalion, and what their composition is to be. Is one an armoured battalion and another an artillery formation? If they lack armorued, artillery and aerospace defence capabiity how does this force secure a planet against more than a bunch of yahoos with rifles?
There is an article on the 4518th Lift Infantry (which at the time of writing had 6 battalions) in the new JTAS kickstarter. That might be a useful starting point for figuring out what this force consists of and who should be comamnding it.
Though let's not forget that this is a democratically organised force in a fictional setting. You can give the leader any title you like really.
If by 'regiment' you mean 'battalion' then you have a five-battalion formation with attached forces. if your 'regiments' are infantry then what you have is an overstength brigade with inadequate supports, to be commanded by a brigadier/brigadier-general/colonel holding the brevet rank of brigadier or similar.
So. You need to decide if these regiments are equivalent to a single battalion, and what their composition is to be. Is one an armoured battalion and another an artillery formation? If they lack armorued, artillery and aerospace defence capabiity how does this force secure a planet against more than a bunch of yahoos with rifles?
There is an article on the 4518th Lift Infantry (which at the time of writing had 6 battalions) in the new JTAS kickstarter. That might be a useful starting point for figuring out what this force consists of and who should be comamnding it.
Though let's not forget that this is a democratically organised force in a fictional setting. You can give the leader any title you like really.
JMISBEST said:
Yeah, that's not really answering the question. What you have is four regiments, plus some (unattached?) forces. A few squads running around on their own? A couple of platoons? Who are these guys, and where do they fit in the TO&E (Table of Organization and Equipment, basically the "blueprint" for a military force)?
Basically, all of this sounds like you're using terminology that you don't really understand.
A
Anonymous
Guest
M J Dougherty said:
Cool that helps to explain why all the real world merc unit commanders I hear about running around Africa use "colonel". Knew this was the sort of question that needed specialist expertise to answer. As I said, it's a "hard" topic to research as quick Google doesn't help and there's bound to be so many exceptions. Thanks for providing the specialist expertise.
