Rival Company 101: DarkNight sniper teams

These notes are taken from a two lesson Rival Company course from Meny University.

Okay, today's lesson is about expelling the myth of 'Lone Gunman' snipers. The media, especially KillZone, like to show video clips of lone DarkNight snipers, trapped in bell towers shooting down at civilians. And you then see a squad of Operatives rushing in to take them down, followed by a short clip of all of the shell casings the sniper has fired. Another lonely DarkNight sniper trying to damage progress and kill innocents. Well there is a reason that all those video clips look the same, because they are.

The real DarkNight snipers aren't that stupid and few Operatives will ever be able to take them out so easily. Now as you are likely to end up the resident gun-head in the group, if your squad ends up confronting a sniper, they'll all be looking at you to get them out of the situation. And if you think all it will take is running up the inside of a bell tower you are mistaken.

Rule number one: DarkNight Snipers work in teams. One acts as a sniper, one as a spotter. I'll come to their individual roles later on.

Rule number two: Sniper teams are trained to find good places to hide and shoot. They know that the first place anyone will look at is the obvious place, so they'll try somewhere new and unique. Somewhere that they can't easily be found.

Rule number three: Sniper teams have specific targets. If indiscriminate targets have been shot, start looking at the top of a bell tower for a lone gunman loony. If specific targets are being eliminated, start worrying.

Rule number four: The first warning you'll get of a sniper is when they take out their main target. Chances are by the time you are trying to find them, they are all packed up and moving off.

Sniper Teams

So sniper teams. A standard DarkNight sniper team consists of two people, one who is the Sniper and is nominally the team leader. It is the sniper that uses the sniper rifle and is the most threat. This is an individual who has been trained in and excels at taking out people who are currently being no threat to him at all. It does take a certain type of emotional strength to be able to do that and it also means that if he is placed in a situation where he has to defend himself, he will do so without any delays. Most DarkNight snipers use the Fen 30-30 with HEAP or Hollow Point rounds, although there is a growing number using Standard ammo as if to prove that they really are that good. Their rifle is always equipped with a silencer and flash suppressor. Contrary to popular believe, Bipods and Tripods are not used by professional snipers, they tend to hinder the shot more than help. If a sideways motion is required by the rifle, a bipod or tripod will resists this, with its feet pushing into the ground. If they are kept still and used as pivot point, the sniper has to move himself, causing him to not be in his preferred position. Instead the best solution is that the rifle is rested on an object that the gun can gently slide over if required.

As a back up weapon the sniper will have a DN74 pistol, with optional painter, silencer and suppressor. The sniper will probably never have used this gun as it is only if he is disturbed. He'll also be carrying smoke grenades, riot gas grenades and fragmentation/anti-personnel grenades. Under his clothing he'll have a DN bodysuit armour and his top layer will have built in ECM capabilities. Camouflage clothing we'll come to later.

The Spotter is his team mate and is used to get the wider picture on the situation. Contrary to some of your ideas in last weeks quiz, Spotters don't mingle around with crowds, or sit on different buildings to identify targets. Instead as the Sniper is in the best position to see what is happening, they tend to be next to him on his gun side, so that they get the best view of the bullet hitting the target and of what else is happening in the target zone. The Spotter will have a set of optics that allow him to see what the Sniper is seeing, but from a little distance back. He can easily identify second targets such as those likely to cause problems to the team after the initial shot. He will also be able to trace the path of the bullet. Trace is the visible trail of a bullet and is created by the shockwave of a supersonic bullet. To an observer behind the bullet this appears as a V shaped vortex in the air following the bullet. This allows the Spotter to assist in the Snipers aim.

DarkNight spotters tend to be armed with DN100 Assault Rifles with underslung grenade launchers. This combination of weapons is useful for the sniper team to gain fire superiority if they are pinned down by an attacker. He will also have a DN74 as back up and a choice of grenades, both for the launcher and for throwing. Again he will have a DN bodysuit and clothing with ECM capabilities.

Camouflage

Okay, on to camouflage. Most DarkNight Sniper teams you will come across will be in an urban environment. This means there are three types of clothing they could be wearing. The clothing that offers the most camouflage in an urban location is coloured in different shades of grey. This helps to break up the outline of the sniper and imply that you are actually just looking at shadows. The second common outfit is normal civilian clothes, normally an armoured bodysuit and an ECM trenchcoat. This allows them to easily blend in when travelling through civilian areas. It also means they can carry their weapons under their coats without detection. The third option is that of an ECM 'Ghost' suit, which are extremely rare and would cause them to be almost invisible. If that's the suspected case, call Cloak Division, they have their own ways of tracking them down.

The actual firing position will be one that doesn't give the snipers position away. This means that they won't choose an obvious position that a Lone Gunman Loony would. I've known of Snipers who fired from sewer drains before - they probably laughed themselves silly as everyone started searching the skyline for them. If the sniper is attacking from above, which is the normal, they will have checked that any changes they do to a firing position can't be seen from outside. If they've smashed a window to fire through, they'll smash other windows nearby so as not to give their true location away. Also don't expect to see any gun barrels sticking out, a sensible sniper will fire at least a foot away from the window, so that any muzzle flash remains inside of the building and doesn't give the position away. DownTown is an absolute nightmare for detecting snipers. Your best bet there is just to leave and forget about it.

Potential Targets

Specific Targets is the next topic. Snipers very rarely shoot civilians. Not that they have anything against doing it, only that there is normally a more sensible target in sight. A sniper team is normally sent out by DarkNight for two reasons. The first is assassination. In which case there is only one target. If there was more, they'd use a bomb, or a hit and run squad. The second reason is to slow down enemy units so that an allied unit can escape.

If say a hit and run squad have taken out a target and are being pursued by a squad of Operatives, the sniper team will be used to slow down or stop the Operatives. This can be done a number of ways, either through injuring one of the squad, or by shooting something that will cause the squad to stop rather than continuing the chase. In the first case, an injured Operative is more trouble to the squad than a dead Operative, especially as they'll start panicking when they realise that it is due to a sniper. In the second situation shooting a civilian driver, could cause a crash which the Operatives would have to attend to, or perhaps a flammable object that might block the Operatives approach.

Skills and Training

The next thing I'm going to discuss is the skills and training that DarkNight Sniper teams have. DarkNight trains these individuals as well as they train their Interceptors only with a bit more specialisation. They are always trained in Rifle(8) and Marksman(8) as well as Detect(7), Hide(7), Sneak(6), Tactics(6), Evaluate Opponent(5), and Disguise(5). They also have further combat skills of Pistol, Auto/Support, Indirect Fire training for their grenade launcher, and close combat skills. Physically and mentally they are amongst the best of the best, and psychologically they tend to be slightly introverted, with maybe just a touch of sociopathy. The team will have trained extensively together and will likely be a formidable threat when faced.

So how do you detect them I hear you ask? Well, due to their training this isn't an easy task. The most important method of detecting them is to have someone in your squad who is trained as a Marksman. He will have the knowledge and experience to detect likely places for a sniper team to be hiding (roll average of Detect and Marksman on 2d10 against the sniper teams Hide skill). This common sense approach is normally the best bet. Failing that a forensics expert with military training maybe able to detect the angle of the shot (roll average of Forensics and Tactics on 2d10 against the sniper teams Hide skill, but will only give general direction of the shot). If you fail in this hopefully your general tactics knowledge will be good enough to identify a safe place to hide whilst you call for back up (roll tactics on 2d10, a success means the sniper team may have to reposition themselves to target you again).

There are several technological approaches that can be used to try and detect a sniper, using either heat detection or acoustic devices. I've included them in a handout below as they are all easily overcome by an experienced sniper team.

Dealing with Snipers

Once you've located or think you've located the sniper there are several ways to deal with them. The easiest approach is to call in the Shivers. Preferably SCAFs should be asked for, as they will easily be able to deter a sniper team in any given position. Additionally in DownTown they are allowed more latitude in damaging property, for example firing through windows to get suspects. As long as they are guided in to their destination, it should be easy for them to avoid the sniper until the last minute. If the snipers location is generally known across an open terrain for example in wasteland areas of DownTown, a Shiver DAC team is probably best to ask for. Several teams will be dropped off and the DACs should be able to flush out the snipers from their hiding position, as long as the general position of them is known. Always remember to ask for more than one DAC team as a standard sniper response will be to shot the DAC Handler. If he goes the DACs will be very ineffective in finding them.

If Shivers are unavailable, the best option is to wait until whatever the Snipers likely objective was has gone. If you were chasing a DN team and came under fire from a sniper, it is likely that he was just covering the team. Forget about chasing the team, wait an hour and then leave. Hopefully by then the team will have gone. If you find yourself with no place to hide, the best approach is run, moving in random directions to make it harder to be hit. You should be aiming to get close to the sniper, hoping that with a limited angle of fire, you will be able to get underneath this amount, causing him to either reveal himself properly to shot you, or to give up attacking you. Continuous firing in the Snipers general direction may be enough to keep his head down if you can afford the cost of the rounds.

If you have a reality folding Ebb user with you, get them to get everyone to safety and then try taking out the sniper team if wanted. It is more than likely that the sniper team will expect Ebb users of being able to fold (and therefore be the greatest threat to the sniper, bar another sniper) and take actions accordingly.

One final point to consider with Snipers is the effective range they are working at. Now ignoring what your best friend's brother's cousin who knows someone who works in Cloak says, the effective sniper range is between 200 meters and 600 meters, maybe extending to 800 meters using custom made sniper rifles, expensive scopes and a lot of training. There are several reasons for this, it doesn't matter if you have a scope that can see all the way from Mort Central to Meny, bullets don't work that way. First they are affected by gravity and on longer distances they'll just start hitting the ground early. Second drag has to be taken into consideration. Drag is caused by temperature, wind speed, humidity, altitude and bullet characteristics. All of these factors will cause a round to miss and even taken into consideration nothing could accurately determine the effect of all of them. That's the reason Snipers have Spotters, so that they can see how the bullets path is affected with the first shot and help with corrections on the second shot. Thirdly movement of target. Even at a walking pace a sniper won't be able to guarantee hitting the target before they have moved away from a distance of more than 800 meters. I know there are some Wraiths out there that can consistently hit targets on a range at a kilometre, but they won't be doing that in the field too often.

Anyway if you remember the above you might actually survive an encounter with a DarkNight Sniper team and the rest of the squad will thank you.

Technological ways of detecting Snipers.

If you are actively looking for a sniper there are several approaches you can try. The first is to look for obvious signs such as muzzle flash or the bullets shockwave through the air. Muzzle flash shows up easily on IR systems, although a simple flash suppressor can eliminate this method. Additionally a well trained team will fire from inside a location through a small hole, ensuring that the muzzle flash will be contained inside the location. The shockwave will be a mini-sonic boom that can be detected by acoustic systems. This can give an estimation of the angle of attack relative to the acoustic system. Unfortunately such an approach requires microphones placed at set distances apart from each other and give no clues as to the distance of the sniper. Again through use of a suppressor, the bullet is harder to detect, as the round is slowed down to below sonic speeds and therefore doesn't create the mini-sonic boom in the first place.

There are several new technological approaches to detecting snipers. These are defined as passive and active approaches. I'll start with the active approaches. A laser scan device can be used which will scan a laser beam quickly throughout a suspected area. The purpose of this is to try and reflect the laser beam back to the site via the snipers scope. Of course this approach only has a limited success in an Urban area, but can be quite effective throughout DownTown. Unfortunately, all it needs is the Spotter to be monitoring likely frequencies through a visual device, or a prism in front of the scope to reflect certain frequencies of light at an obscure angle unlikely to be picked up by the device.

Another active device is to try and capture the path of the bullet through the air. As the bullet travels it creates vortices, which in turn create pressure differences in the air. These differences although only small can be detected by a scanning laser which monitors the change in refractive index. Unfortunately this requires a fast computer system and a power supply for the laser. These would occupy the size of two briefcases, and so would only be practical in certain situations and definitely wouldn't be a standard piece of equipment. Also a Spotter monitoring the likely frequencies for such a device would render it useless.

A third approach is to monitor the temperature change in the air as the bullet passes through it. Again IR devices could detect this, although they would need an amplification device by a computer as the heat trail is quickly dissipated. The device would have to show a false decay of the heat trail as determined by the computer, otherwise the human eye would not be able to detect it. The device would also only work accurately if side on to the path of the bullet, to allow for the best determination of direction. If instead it was near to the destination point of the bullet it would be unable to detect the path. Again the trail can be defeated by using a suppressor, which will slow the bullet down and therefore cause less of a heat trail.

Passive approaches to sniper detection include the use of multiple acoustic devices to triangulate a possible position and passive IR detection. As mentioned previously these can be negated with ease by an experienced team.

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