CC Skills Military

> *If you give the command "SECURE THE BUILDING", the different US services would approach it in their own signature way. The Marine Corps would assault the building, using overlapping fields of fire from all appropriate points on the perimeter. The Army would surround the building with defensive fortifications, tanks and concertina wire. The Navy would turn out the lights and lock the doors. The Air Force would take out a three-year lease with an option to buy...*
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> **- Old US Military Humor**
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## **The Military Skill Sets**

These are the martial necessities for a soldier to survive and thrive. Tactical level skills are predominantly confined to the field and those who are deployed there, while strategic level analysis and planning often go hand-in-hand with "administration" and "political science" skills.

Soldier templates are offered as a guideline to average personnel trained to operate at that particular level. Certain militaries have more time and resources, and may go well beyond what's offered in the template.

You can also build from scratch, and the path to do so is provided here. Soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen usually start with Recruit Training for the foundation of military skills, then will add skill set(s) specializations they are trained into. Unless you're recreating your own training path, follow the wiki links to determine a realistic contemporary path of assignment, training, education, indoctrination and field experience.

Note: every country is a little different, in both the details and the depth, and every country is (of course) the best. For sake of argument, we're standardizing based on consensus tiers.

### **Recruit Training**

This is the boot camp, the basic training for armed forces around the world. We're taking the Wiki approach and breaking this down into combat modes.

* Ground-based services, the Army and Marine recruits, are trained in:
	+ Military Science. 5 points for a militia, 15 points for a storied well-organized military. This is part of the indoctrination, learning the chain of command, recognition of ranks, and the structure of the bureaucracy.
	+ Marksmanship with individually assigned weapons, usually a rifle. 20 for the typical army, 30 for prestige units (such as the US Marine Corps).
	+ Physical fitness training
	+ First Aid
	+ Survival techniques, basic. 10 skill: *enough to find water, build shelter and look for food*.
* Maritime service, the Navy and Coast Guard recruits, training usually focuses on:
	+ Military Science. 10 points for most, 15 points for tradition-rich navies.
	+ Water survival training
	+ Physical fitness
	+ Basic seamanship
	+ Occupational Specialty. Pick a primary and a secondary:
		- basic engineering
		- shipboard firefighting
		- signals
* Recruits in the average Air force usually have training that includes:
	+ Military Science. 10 points for most, 15 points for tradition-rich navies.
	+ Physical fitness training
	+ Basic marksmanship, usually up to 15 points.
	+ First aid
	+ Occupational Specialty. Pick a primary and a secondary:
	+ basic engineering

### **Military Occupational Training**

This is the second stage of training, coming after inductees have successfully completed their recruit training (boot camp). This system averages western-world practices, and instructs on a primary, a secondary and tertiary skill that will be the primary mode soldier serves.

Infantry

Engineering

Technician

Logistics

### **Special Training**

Special duty, starting with training, is where characters pick up "a particular skill set." The special operations community has remarkable diversity yet unifying commonalities based on contemporary tactics and technology. These form the world's special operations units.

The tasks here are the high-speed/low-drag forms of operations that have become famously associated with any given military's elite units. This includes the "glamorous" roles of reconnaissance, airborne operations, counter-insurgency, counter-terrorism, foreign internal defense, covert ops, direct action, hostage rescue, high-value targets/manhunting, intelligence operations, mobility operations, and unconventional warfare.

Piloting at any level counts as special training, and combat pilots may have additional training in survival, language and escape skills.

## **The Military Skills**

### **Demolition**

* A little combination of chemistry, electrical and mechanical engineering.  This includes making the explosives, primer, detonator, and appropriate fusing.  Low level is simple fuses and kitchen-brew plastique.  Middle is mercury switches and semtex.  Upper is range-sensitive barometric detonators with anti-tampering devices and octol (and the defusing of such monstrosities).  Some civil engineering (usually 10) is a must to analyze proper size and placement of a charge.

### **Military Science**

* A general grasp of modern military customs, history, society, and hardware.  Knowledge of command and organization of various armies.  There are general theories, of course, and then there is specific history.  For each fifteen points of skill, the character can consider himself expert in one culture's history, including major battles, generals, hero lore, and favored weapons (both wielding and construction).

### **Martial Arts**

* This is the art and science of ***combat at personal distance***.
* Distinct forms of martial arts count for separate forms of the skill. Someone may be a master at Western Fencing without ever learning how to throw a punch.
* Hand-to-Hand (HTH) is the most basic form of unarmed martial arts.
	+ Specific types may specialize when declaring intent, such strikes versus sweeps, throws, grappling, etc. Western Boxing specializes in strikes, but may be vulnerable to throws. Wrestling or Judo may specialize in throws, sweeps and grappling but not do well in strikes.
	+ ***Note:** the Speculation COMSYS (Personal) compares relative skill levels, so knowing an art that covers every method isn't necessary to successfully defend one's self. If the fight is going to be extremely technical, then multiple arts may be useful (like the character is a Mixed Martial Artist).*
	+ Specific types will also and often require differentiation between *sport* and *combat*. Intent is a critical distinction, where a common street fight engages to subdue/incapacitate an opponent (demonstrate dominance while avoiding murder charges, etc.), while battlefield combat techniques are designed to incapacitate/kill an opponent (what martial arts often isolate into "self-defense techniques" as opposed to "fighting techniques").
* ***Each category of weapon martial arts*** count as a separate form of the skill.
	+ Learning an improvised flail (a.k.a. nunchucks) does *not* grant skill in swordsmanship.
	+ Likewise, learning [Sword, 1-hd, combo] does not grant skill in use of a shield. In this case, picking up a sword of familiarity *and a shield* (not familiar) is going to result in attacks at half-skill level because the character is wielding a second device simultaneously.
	+ Picking up a long sword *without a shield* (when one is used to using a shield), results in half skill as both the defense is lower but the range of attacks is greater.

### **Marksmanship**

* This is the base skill used in the ***Ranged Combat System***.
	+ *Specify:* one category from the ***Ranged Weapons***.
* Marksmanship skill includes basic ballistics and weapons operation/handling. For the artificialities of the game system, this skill also includes cleaning and basic maintenance. Beyond soldiers, this is the skill of most sport shooters (including some specialists), hunters, and security professionals.
	+ For contemporary campaigns, the skill system is not so granular as to require distinction between caliber classes of handgun or long gun. Rather, if they know one semi-auto pistols, they know *all* semi-auto pistols.
* **Genre Twist**: historical, fantasy or futuristic campaigns may also include alternate and additional forms of marksmanship. These different classes allow some level of crossover: 25% skill translation for different biomechanics (a rifle expert trying their hand at a bow and arrow), 75% for similar biomechanics (a rifle expert using a no-recoil DEW).
	+ Archery: skill at maintaining and using a bow & arrow. At level-15, archery skill may include compound. At 25, may include historical forms, such as longbows. At 35, may include the basics of making a bow (bowyer skill) and arrows (fletcher skill).
	+ Crossbow. At level-15, crossbow skill may include compound. At skill level-30, may cobble together a *rudimentary* crossbow and bolts.
	+ Historical projectile. Includes black powder handling, loading, and at a skill of 50+, knowledge of how to produce black powder explosives. For every 10 points above 10, the character may know the details of various powder-based weapons, such as matchlock, wheellock, snaplock, flintlocks and percussion cap ignition types.
	+ Directed Energy Weapons (DEWs). Normal actuation/trigger, no recoil.
	+ Specialized Weapons. Skill per weapon, will include any exotics, from rail guns to rocket guns, with or without recoil or other special considerations or hazards.

### **Stress shooting**

* Our niggly details of firearms combat are expressed here, and reflect the art and science of stress shooting.  This skill reflects training the kinesthetic nervous system to do its job even in the face of conscious indecision, or in simpler terms, to make the point-and-shoot process a reflexive one.  Technically, the skill is used to negate penalties that have been tacked on to the PPY.  There are elements which I am not including, but may be considered for games that are revolving around tactics.  These are: maximum natural levels, trained levels (getting the rust out), and minor experience levels.

### **Ranged combat**

* The art of reaching out farther than the eye can see. This has a number of subdivisions, but all of them are weapon system skills. The oldest in artillery, simply projectile combat on a much larger scale. Mortar is a subdivision of this. Beyond this is rocket attacks, scaling from emplaced ground-to-ground systems through mobile launchers. Finally, there is missile combat, from cruise missiles to ICBMs.

### **Reconnaissance/camoflauge**

* The art of observation and surveillance to notice the inobvious or specifically hidden and the analyzation of the information.  Also knows where and how opponents would likely attempt similar things back and allows countersurveillance techniques.
* Gives the ability to move with stealth at full movement rate in non-combat situations (right up to the point where a Recon artist would surprise his prey and attack, then moving into a combat situation).
* Gives the ability to use natural cover, environmental situations, and artificial techniques to blend in the surroundings.  Everything from weaving grass-mat sniper outfits, to knowing where one might be silhouetted, to proper application of cammo sticks.

### **Tactics**

* The art of movement, emplacement, and timing during combat operations. Tactics is necessary to move with stealth, the tool used to gain the advantage of surprise. When moving with stealth, the CMV is at half normal rate. *Specify:*
	+ **Hyperclaustic**: small tunnels and extremely close quarters.
	+ **Urban**: both heavy and light densities of structures.
	+ **Rural**: forested and open areas of country, marshlands, swamps.
	+ **Inhospitable**: very rough terrain and temperate conditions  (mountains, desert, forest)
	+ **Blitz**: Extreme execution speed for maximal suprise.
	+ **Covert**: Night and infiltration operations for maximum undetected penetration before aggressions. Surreptitious CMV is full value with Covert tactics.
	+ **0-G**:  Although artifical gravity is common, shipboard battles have it present only about half the time. Shipboard with grav uses regular tactics. Without grav uses Zero-gee versions of tactics. O-gee tactics have a prerequisite of 10 points 0-gee environs.
	+ **Vacuum**:  No atmosphere or a potentially hostile (poisonous) one, this helps compensate for the limitations of wearing a helmet/spacesuit.

## **And now, a word from our sponsor...**

Military skills are hard to come by in any world. Training in them indicates commitment to the willingness to inflict violence, even if in defense. That kind of training, then, usually comes with provisos: some oath and time spent in defense of the common good (becoming a soldier or police officer).

There is high-quality training available to those outside the usual systems, but there is usually a high cost and often some level of vetting before entry into the school. For those who haven't gone through military service, this is a way to gain martial skills if going into the "Private Military Contractor" (mercenary) career path.

There is plenty of low-quality training in the form of home-grown militias. Of course, one person's "militia" is another person's "terrorist training camp."