Squad Leader Archive
Thread: Why isn't SL a MELEE Profession?
Melee SL is a nice poetic thought. Believe me, as a history major and a Civil War Reenactor, I sell into this idea all the time. Though I'll take a katana or even a Prussian cavalry saber over an American Civil War saber any day. They just look too flimsy. But.. ANYWAY..
Wrong era for that sort of thing, really. As they'd mentioned previously, since the gun REALLY took off as the master of battlefield, and cavalry charges were no longer viable (ask those that tried to charge the German panzers in WW2), we don't have too many melee-weilding leaders. Consider your lieutenants and captains, and on up to your colonels and generals, since WW1. Assault rifles for the lower ranks and pistols, at most, for the upper ranks. (General Patton's ivory-handled pistols come to mind. The Japanese samurai officers being the modern day exception, but that was still 70 years ago and long gone.) The most melee-ish thing is the bayonet on the assault rifle, used only occasionally in a bayonet form, or sometimes a knife-fight. But often used as a field knife.
I'll tell you why: you don't bring a knife to a gun fight.
I'm pretty sure that the sword wasn't standard combat issue for our officers in WW1. The Civil War was the lastmajor war thatlarge numbers of American officers carried swords into combat. The differences between the 2 wars explains much in the reason that the sword was dropped in favor or a rifle or pistol for the officers. (I do exempt from that statement trench warfare in WW1 as melee was common..but not related to officers specifically..as almost everyone had a big knife or club for that.) Heck, even in the Civil War, the officers were much more likely to pull their pistol in combat than draw a sword.
HzGuderian wrote:
Someone forgot to tell the majority of the American Civil War officers that.
And the WW1 officers..
!
Ellyria wrote:
If you look at it from a star wars stand point, you didnt see too much fighting that didnt involve guns/blasters. melee was pretty uncommon.
Totaly true if we dont take primintive cultures as Tuskens(tuskens got rifles but most seem to use gaffi sticks), Niktos(the niktos got a sect of killers with cortoisis polearms)and Gamoreans. The Gamoreans even prefere clubs and axes to blasters and is popular mercs for the hutts.Alot of jabbas henchmens in the movies that we see fighting is using melee weapon and they get there butt kicked.
Butthe Emperors elite gard the red emperors guard is melee fighters trainned in echani martial arts(some type of tkm) and pikes/polarms, with blaster pistols for special situation and i can't call them primintive. They can wipe out alot of ranged fighters before those fighters even know what hits them at least in the star wars comics.
Greivious bodyguards is also melee fighters and they seem to be hardest opponents the jedis have if we dont count other jedis.
When it comes to refering to real life historical events i say they arent relative in star wars because we dont have all those cultures and spieces as we got in star wars and it should be just out of our human culture view. By the way i did serve as a squad leader or more as a company leader in the swedish military and i was using an assault rifle and was trainned in sniper rifles, pistols, submachine guns, machineguns, anti armour rockets and grenade launchers so i say melee there was limited to basic hand to hand and some knife/bayonett use but it was just in extreme self defense when notihng else worked. But we got gangs in Somalia that took out mercenery units with machettes and clubs so in some parts of the world do melee still happen and can if ppl are prepered to sacrifice them self beat ranged fighters if they out number them.
Melee for squadleaders or not in swg i say i think ranged is good, but it may not hurt to open up for those who wants ot play melee squadleaders and not penalty to them if they chose to do that. After all this is a rollplaying game and if they want to play a primintive savage squadleader so should they be able to do it, but most sl abilities only buff ranged weapons so i would rather then see a melee squadleader type that buff melee parallell qith the squadleader i love as a ranged fighter. After all we are living in a big galaxy there we should have many option because it shall be big and that means room for diffrent cultures and civilization.
I am locking forward to see the changes you guys shall get and i hope i can hope you guys dont get handicapped with the new changes and they instead gives good bonuses so ppl will scream for your services.
Fein out
ShadowLightning wrote:
When was the last time you ever saw a battle scene when the leader/general/commander/king takes his men out to war with a Gun or a Bow?? Leaders grab their sword and go into battle!
ShadowLightning wrote:
When was the last time you ever saw a battle scene when the leader/general/commander/king takes his men out to war with a Gun or a Bow?? Leaders grab their sword and go into battle!
That's a valid view, but I think it's mostly applicable to outdated kinds of warfare, as has been mentioned by some others here. I know Star Wars isn't the same setting as our time, given the abilites of jedi and such, but I think it probably fits closer than most other eras. When I think about squad leaders I tend to think about more present day situations,Marines in Iraq or Vietnam for example. One leader commanding a small team of soldiers, each with specific roles and duties in that group. You could even say it's the model for how I'd like my squad to behave.
ShadowLightning wrote:
When was the last time you ever saw a battle scene when the leader/general/commander/king takes his men out to war with a Gun or a Bow?? Leaders grab their sword and go into battle!
There is a great line in the movie about Vietnam"WE WERE SOLDIERS". Mel Gibson is Lt. Col., Sam Elliot is his Sgt. Maj. They are about to go into battle for the first time with the new M16. Sam Elliot plays a war hardened officer who only carries a .45 colt. Mel Gibson asks him if he wants to carry an M16. He replies: "If there comes a time when I'll need a rifle there will be plenty of them laying on the ground."
Sasher Redo