Sturmgeschutz

The German Perspective - The Weltkrieg.

Name: Albin Drexel

Age: 39

Appearance: Albin in a shaggy looking individual, with his field-grey uniform often creased and appearing a size too big for him. He keeps his hair shaven, to lessen the effects of the Eastern Front's notorious lice. His jack boots and other equipment are well worn (most of it is second-hand), and the pale blue of his eyes are lifeless. He stands little of 5'8, and has the slim build of a pencil pusher.

Personality: Albin has no faith in Hitler, no faith in the idea of a Thousand Year Reich, and no fair in his ability to survive the Kursk offensive. He is terribly jaded by his experiences, though they have been brief, and speaks with a stutter. He drifts in and out of lucidity, but operates with inhuman efficiency when it comes to "killing or being killed".
Rank: Grenadier

Background: Albin is a lawyer by trade, and prior to Hitler's rise to power, he was very much a believer in human rights, and his work was often based around such things. Needless to say, when Germany's Jewish population started to face discrimination, he was one of the first, though one of the few, to voice his concern at the situation.

This landed him in prison, where he was given an indefinite sentence pending his "political re-education". Germany's need for manpower in 1943 however, earned him an early release from his purgatory. Given a rifle, a week or two of training, and dispatched with all haste to the Eastern Front along with a whole host of other minor undesirables, Albin is not pleased or enthused by his situation.

Prior to the opening days of the Kursk Offensive, Albin had never fired a rifle at a living person. Fast forward to August the 12th, and he is a broken man. War is not his thing, it is not his life. He was never supposed to die in a ditch, unloved and unknown, killed by an enemy who could not - would not - understand his situation. He is propelled now by basic human survival instinct. It is a matter of killing, or being killed. Of following orders, or being condemned for failing to rise to the impossible expectations given to him and his peers.

The romantic notions of chivalry, human rights, freedom, compassion, honour and love have no place in him now. Too many close calls, too many throttled throats and bayoneted rib cages have seen to that. He exists now, purely because he must, and he is driven by his basic animal natures to survive the war.

Equipment: Karabiner 98 Kurz, with a few pre-loaded clips. He's already used his grenades, and lost his bayonet inside some poor Russian girl he mistook for a soldier the previous week.

Other information: Inexperienced, shell shocked.

"We Shall Fight On The Landing Grounds"

ONL said
So am I allowed to go full World War 1 infantry charge, soldiers running across the field and storming the enemy? Preferably screaming out the Greek national anthem?

Of course, There's not much in the way of tanks on Crete, it was a mainly infantry-based battle. There were some, but none of them were suited to anti-infantry duties and suffered mechanical problems.

At the moment, I think has been stated, the Germans are just trying to get into cover so they can recover their gear. You'll meet some fumbling around with a knife, and others who have recovered their weapons (I think 40% of the armament were MP40's?) will be fighting you back with a "live or die" mentality. The Fallschirmjager were formidable troops, later serving as the Third Reich's praetorians alongside the Waffen SS, so they'd know what they were doing.

EDIT: 25% were armed with MP40s, after a quick wiki search. The Kar98 made up the rest, with MG34s scattered in-between.

"We Shall Fight On The Landing Grounds"

Well, it's down to you and ONL if the counter-attack goes south, and the Germans counter-counter-attack with some gathered strength and run us into the town. I think that's probably what happened at the time, but the ball is in your park with that one.

"We Shall Fight On The Landing Grounds"

ONL said
Uh, I like how Myles' playing on Alexios' patriotism. How can any proud Greek reject such suggestion?

He's trying to take Bailey's glory by sending Alexios and Scott into the cauldron. If it pays off, and the Germans are routed from their sector, then Myles is gonna be like "HEY LOOK WHAT I DID! :D", though if it goes wrong he might have hope that Bailey gets shot or something before he can file a report or have him arrested.

EDIT: Either way, he's not the one who is gonna be getting shot at, which is most of what he really cares about at present.

"We Shall Fight On The Landing Grounds"

For reference, Myles is referring to kingkonrad's character when saying "Australian".

"We Shall Fight On The Landing Grounds"

Myles happened upon his Greek sergeant, "I dare say you're quite the shot with that stone age weapon of yours."

Bailey's men hadn't moved from their positions, and Myles had noted this. Though he was not a particularly courageous man, to say the least, even he saw the illogic of allowing the Germans to flee and regroup. Then he had an idea.

"Sergeant Sta- ... Stathos is it?" Myles asked the Greek sergeant with a questioning glance, "well, whatever your name is, how would you like to become a hero of your entire country? It seems to me that old Bailey over there very much wants to avoid going after Fritz, where as I, a much more aggressive man of command, feel we should rout them entirely before they can come back at us."

Myles walked a few paces, hands behind his back, cane tucked under his armpit. "It seems as though that Australian buggar has already taken the initiative, it would be terribly wrong if the Greek of all people sat back and let his country get saved by others, wouldn't it? Lead your section on the attack, and link up with the Australian. Was he Australian? I can't remember. In any case, I want the two of you and your men to chase Jerry as far as you can. I'll hold back here with my section, to try and keep Bailey a happy boy."

"We Shall Fight On The Landing Grounds"

Myles stood unwavering at the edge of a sandbag wall, staring at the falling paratroopers with drunken glee. Tucking his cane neatly under his left armpit, he fumbled for his revolver with whiskey-laden fingers, and pulled it out. He pointed it to and throe at the dozens of Germans drifting slowly from the air above him and his men. The poor bastards had missed their drop zone, and with an apparant inability to steer their angle of approach, they were helpless.

Naturally, his platoon took aim and put to rest the helpless souls. Myles smiled in amusement as he saw their rag doll forms spasm with the impact of each bullet, before going limp. He raised his revolver and fired off a couple of shots at one of them, though he wasn't sure whether his target was already dead; everything was so blury!

"Bloody Fritz, they're... they're... oh, nevermind," he mumbled.

"Mr. Hedger!"

Myles turned and smiled stupidly at the crouching, panting form of Lieutenant Bailey. It appeared the man had run the stretch in the open from his own position, to Myles'. His chiselled, red face heaved with each intake of breath.

"Where the Hell are your men off to, Hedger?" Bailey demanded. "I told you to hold this God forsaken line, yet the moment I turn my back, your bloody men are running rampant in the midst of the enemy."

Myles raised an eye. Were they? He looked up and down his platoon's position, and noted his southern section had vanished. "Oh," he managed.

"Oh? fucking OH!? Get your shit together mate," Bailey shouted, thrusting a finger into Myles' chest. "If you fucking lose my flank, I'll shoot you, I swear to God."

Were Myles thinking clearly, and not clouded by drink and the euphoria of a perfect battle - a battle where the enemy weren't shooting back - he might have simply nodded. Instead, he smiled again, held up a finger and spoke in a forced sober tone, "My good Lieutenant Bailey, I am an Officer of Crown, and as such, I understand the workings of war."

"I swear to Go-" Bailey's face twisted in anger.

"Now, now," Myles chuckled. "You see, the true strength of an officer is in allowing himself to stand back, you see? To allow his men to think for themselves, and to react to a situation as it emerges. Micro-managing so many bodies, it's not only tiresome, it's bloody ineffective If I don't say so myself. Just because one of my sections is exploiting the enemy's weakness, doesn't mean we're forfeiting the battle, dear boy."

Bailey shook his head. "If we lose this line, you'd better hope you die in the fighting. And if I have to come back over here to watch this circus of yours slowly buggar CreForce's chances of survival, you would do well to hide."

Myles raised a hand in salute. "Yes s-si-HIC-sir. Understood."

Bailey departed in short order, muttering a stream of obscenities.

“Sir! Myself and Privates McKeon and Penfold are left, along with a few others and some of the Greeks. We’ll set ourselves up in a defensive position near the AA Gun. Do you want me to move the other men into any particular formation?”, came a thick Irish accent from behind.

Myles burped, and slowly turned. He looked the man up and down questioningly, and then recalled his earlier words to his men; this was part of his section.

"Gosh blimey," Myles laughed. "Irishmen, eh? What you boys lack in discipline, you make up for in courage, don't you now? How about you join me in this hilarious pigeon shoot of ours?" he stopped to point up at the massing shapes in the sky, mentally blocking out the more alarming sight of those of the enemy that were making it to the ground and dispersing, "you see them? I take it you do. Put holes in them, priva- er, corporal. Keep putting holes in them until there's no more left."

With that, Myles marched off further down the line to check on the his northerly section. Not that he particularly cared how they were doing, but he had to look the part if he didn't want Bailey chewing him up later on. "Jolly good lads," he called, passing by his nameless soldiers, "keep it up. You're doing God's work."

"We Shall Fight On The Landing Grounds"

ONL said
Seen as more people are having second characters, would you advise me to cook up a new one too?

It's a preference. Some people like having more than one character, some don't. As it stands, we still have room for second characters.

"We Shall Fight On The Landing Grounds"

Squrmy said
Thanks! :DAnd do we need to have any other Platoon/other character positions filled? I'll get round to writing up a second sheet at some point, and I'm happy to shape my character around a role we need filled.

The platoon has around 30-40 troops in it. That's to say the players + background NPCs. So there's space for secondary characters.

Alternatively, If things get stuffy, I could open a "second front" over at the other German landing zone. But let's just stick with our little small scenario for now, and branch out from there.

"We Shall Fight On The Landing Grounds"

Squrmy said
Alrighty, I'll start writing up a post for Sean, then. He'll have a pair of young Irish fellows along with him, both of whom are semi trained in how to be his "reloading guy", but one who'll just act as a regular ol' rifleman until the other one gets shot. They'll both be expendable, so I'm sure we can easily do away with them and have another player help him out if that's the way things end up going. I'll start working on an introductory post in a moment, and contact kingkonrad to see if he wants to work on a collab post. =)

Sounds good to me buddy, welcome aboard.