Hello everybody! Greetings from Romania!
My first post here,even though I've been playing Steel Panthers versions for years now, with WinSPMBT being the latest. And after enjoying some really well-designed scenarios and campaigns,some user,some developer, over the years, I felt like I can give something back to the community.
The thought of serious scenario editing passed my mind a couple of times but only now do I have the ideas,tools (and I'm mainly talking about GoogleEarth updating Romania here) and the experience,small as it may be, to get into actually creating stuff.
Ok, let's get down to business.
As the topic title suggests, this is just the first in what it is meant to be a scenario series.
I also mean to attach an ample backstory to the scenario(s) as well in order to enhance the experience.
The context sounds something like this :
It is 2009. It's been 20 years since the Revolution and the end of Communism.Its ghosts,however,still linger,dragging the country down.Former youth party members,Securitate Colonels and mid-level politruks rule Romania.They are senior party officials,top-50 bussinessmen,Romanian Intelligence officers,Generals,judges,local barons, they are everybody that is anybody in the country. Naturally, they neither know or care about democracy,accountability and the social contract. To be a politician,a member of the Government, is just a quick way to get rich,nothing more. Laws are either voted with built-in backdoors that the legislators themselves first take advantage of or are never enforced or have their teeth dulled through endless "negotiations" and "compromises". Everything from shady privatizations to conflict of interests to corruption investigations that lead nowhere are all part of this mockery of democracy. Amid all this spectacle organized crime of all shapes and sizes does nothing but thrive. And it is the average Romanian citizen that always foots the bill for the entire carnival...
(What I've described is actually the real Romania 1990-2008. EU/NATO accession is just for show,take it from somebody from the "inside".We're nowhere near Hungary/Poland let alone Belgium).
(And now we tumble down the rabbit hole...
)
It is in this context of frustration and powerlessness that a radical movement takes shape.The "Vlad the Impaler" Organization. With an age average of just over 30, they comprise students,university graduates of all kinds,professors,doctors,teachers and,last but not least,soldiers and junior officers. They are those fed up with the travesty of plurality that is the choice of electing who is it that their taxpayer money will enrich : X-ulescu or Y-ulescu and their cronies.
Their first move was also the most daring.The assassination of the Romanian President. What followed became known as the 2009 Revolution.20 years of humiliation and injustices finally exploded with a ferocity reminiscent of the French Revolution. Every high-ranking party or government member was either summarily executed while numerous senators and deputies also met the same fate. A stunned Europe watched live images of young militiamen storming the Parliament Palace,also known as the House of People,the 2nd largest building in the world,Ceausescu's final megalomaniacal dream, while YouTube and other such sites were swamped with videos of overweight local "barons" being dragged out of their bullet-ridden Bentleys or Hummers and finished of with a point-blank shot.In just 3 short weeks the government crumbled completely. The Second Republic (the first being the Socialist Republic of Communist times) was dead and the Third Republic declared.
The new government moved to secure the country and enact the vast overhaul needed after 20 years of near-stagnation with the same celerity and brutality while pursuing the remnants of the Old Government as it retreated towards the Black Sea city of Constanta. Political parties were banned, surviving lower-ranking members of the old regime fired with only a handful of exceptions. Every piece of legislation,every contract,every tax re-assessed,no stone was left unturned.
Though the revolutionaries had been exceedingly brutal in the elimination of the old government and any individual associated with it, its leadership refrained to widen its suppression even though voices advocated that the Revolution now owned a monopoly over "righteousness".
Thus,the new government retained unanimous support among the population.
However...
The events were watched with great concern by US President John McCain. Not only did the US corporations lose a "banana-republic"-like friendly business environment, the New Romanian Republic also advocated a total pullout of Romanian troops from Iraq and,more importantly,Afghanistan. It was feared that a domino effect would start among the NATO countries there,with their patience already wearing thin as it was. Finally,there were whispers of Russian involvement which,in the context of Georgia's humiliation in August 2008 and Yulia Timoshenko's recent victory in Ukraine along with growing unrest in the US-aligned Central Asian republics,was another sign that Russia reclaimed its superpower status, a state of facts absolutely unacceptable to the McCain administration, especially with the preparations for the attack on Iran finished. Something had to be done lest America's hegemony was contested...
=end context=
And so we arrive at the scenario.
The scenario will feature the New Republic's attempt to capture the western end of a bridge over the Danube from a hodge-podge force of Interior Ministry troops and some counter-terrorist forces still loyal to the old govt holed-up in Constanta. If anybody is curious,I will use the GoogleEarth imagery at coordonates :
44°45'16.80"N
27°52'22.10"E
and the surrounding area.
Since I'm a first timer on these boards I will post my partial progress and gladly accept any suggestions and criticism.
I'm thinking of a company-sized engagement between a New Republic infantry (BTR-mounted) force backed up by artillery against a light infantry force.
Romania - Third Republic , Volume I
Linear Mode
