Applying METT-TC to Advanced Squad Leader

Sergeant Keller studied the village through his binoculars, weighing mission and risk. The crossroads had to be in his hands before the main body arrived, but the open wheat field leading to it was clearly covered by a machine gun in an upper window, while a shallow gully and stone walls off to the right promised a safer, if longer, path. Counting his squads, their few support weapons, and the precious minutes left on his watch, he decided: smoke to blind the road, a small force to pin the defenders, and the rest flanking unseen along the gully to hit the buildings from the flank before time ran out. Time to head out.

Sitrep

Most experienced ASL players already think about the essentials of a scenario before they set up by scanning the scenario card. It’s part of the process: what has to be done, what the enemy has, how the terrain works, what their own troops can do, and whether there is enough time to pull it all off. The military actually formalizes exactly that kind of thinking in a planning tool called METT-TC. With very little translation effort, it becomes a useful way to structure your ASL pre-game analysis instead of just eyeballing the scenario card and trusting your gut.

METT-TC is a real-world acronym from U.S. Army and Marine Corps doctrine. It stands for:

• Mission (M on scenario card)
• Enemy (E on scenario card)*
• Terrain (T1 on scenario card)
• Troops (T2 on scenario card)
• Time (T3 on scenario card)
• Civilians (usually na in ASL)

The last part (Civilians) rarely matters in ASL because it isn’t really accounted for in the ruleset, so I’m going to ignore it in this article.

Most veteran players already touch all of these pieces in some way, either purposefully or without even knowing they’re doing it. The real value of METT-TC is that it makes you think them through consciously and in order, so your plan is coherent and deliberate from the start rather than reactive after the fact.

*Assuming you’re evaluating the scenario card playing the German side. If playing the American side, swap T2 and E.

Mission – Victory Conditions

“The Squad Leader considers his mission … and derives the essential tasks his units must perform in order to accomplish the mission.”

In military terms, the mission is the essential task that absolutely must be accomplished from the “line of departure” (setup/entry area). In ASL, that is your victory conditions plus any special scenario rules that significantly affect how those conditions can be met.

This sounds obvious until you lose a scenario because of one word or term you might gloss over: “at game end” versus instant victory, “no good order enemy units” versus “control,” control of Locations versus hexes, deny control versus attain control, or some little SSR clause that changes how entry or VPs works. Even something so subtle as the use of “or” versus “and” (and vice versa) can change how a rule can be interpreted. Proper mission analysis starts with a slow, deliberate reading of the victory conditions section. It’s the single most important part of every scenario card, because if you don’t fully understand it and dissect it, you could very well lose the game before you even start.

Here’s your Victory Condition checklist:

Understand the VC from all angles, both yours and your opponent’s
VCs often have multiple components that can be interconnected
Understand how VC components might compliment or contradict one another
Prioritize these VC components to form your plan
Understand the SSRs and how they impact the “mission”

Starter Kit’s Retaking Vierville (S1) is a good example (see Figure 1). The Victory Conditions are:

“The Americans win at game end if there are no Good Order German units in buildings N5, N6, M4, and L3.”

If you read that at a high level, you might think “the Americans need to take those buildings.” If you dissect it, several details appear. First, “at game end” means the Germans can potentially retake the buildings; this isn’t an instant-win situation. Second, the condition is phrased in terms of “Good Order” Germans. The Americans aren’t actually required to be in the buildings per the VC. The Americans aren’t even required to vacate the buildings of German units. A broken German squad in a victory building doesn’t block an American win. A German unit locked in melee is not Good Order either. That means that on the final turn, simply getting into melee and surviving in a VC building hex can be as good as completely clearing it. But the conditions must be met in all the buildings because of the use of the word “and.”

You can see how this plays out. Suppose the Americans have already taken N5 and N6, and it’s the last American turn. The Germans won’t get another movement phase. Even if American units in those buildings break and are forced to rout, the Germans won’t be able to re-enter them before the game ends. There will be no good order Germans in N5 and N6, and those buildings are effectively secured by the Americans. Up around M4 and L3, the Americans might need to break the German defenders and force them to rout, or advance in and hope to create melees, forcing the German units into a non-Good Order state. The victory condition would be satisfied. If the Germans were to win those Close Combats, the Americans lose.

Mission can also include the SSRs that interact with the Victory Conditions. Hidden units, Molotov capability, special terrain provisions, weird entry restrictions, night or weather effects … they all fall into this category. It’s very easy to read those once and forget them. In a three-player scenario I played, I completely forgot that my side (Italian mutineers) had Molotov cocktail capability granted by SSR. I mentally filed the SSR but later forgot, and no MOLs were used all game, even though they would have been very useful in the close-quarters village fight.

If something appears in the SSR, assume the designer put it there for a reason as part of the “Mission.” It either needs to be utilized or understood. Don’t just gloss over SSRs.

Enemy – Know What You’re Up Against

“The Squad Leader considers the type, size, organization, tactics, and equipment of the enemy he expects to encounter. He identifies their greatest threat to his mission, and finds their greatest vulnerability.”

ASL gives you an advantage that real commanders don’t have: both sides’ orders of battle are on the scenario card. It’s tempting to glance at the enemy OB once and move on. Proper enemy analysis means deliberately reading through the opposing OB as if it were your own and thinking about their capabilities and your opponent’s likely courses of action.

Here’s your Know Thy Enemy checklist:

Go over your opponent’s Order of Battle: unit quality, SWs, leader quality, leader to squad ratio …
Understand enemy composition, disposition, strength, capabilities, and probable courses of action
Understand their weaknesses and attack them, understand their strengths and marginalize them
If vehicles/guns are involved, read their Chapter H entries and applicable MAVN (Multi-Applicable Vehicle Notes; A, B, C, etc, depending on vehicle/gun).

That includes morale levels and broken morale, ELR, smoke exponents, and the quality of enemy leadership. It includes what support weapons they have, their firepower, range, rate of fire, and breakdown numbers. For guns and vehicles, it should include reading the Chapter H entries for both sides’ pieces. That’s where you learn which guns have special ammo, which vehicles have smoke, how likely one tank is to penetrate another at common engagement ranges, and what weird special capabilities might be lurking. You should also pay attention to how many concealment counters and HIP options the enemy has.

Failure to Communicate (233, a fun scenario) is a good example. The French defending OB includes elite and first line squads, a superb 10-2 leader and an 8-1, MMGs, a mortar, a powerful 25LL AT gun with a rate of fire of three, and ten concealment counters. On top of that, the French player chooses one of three reinforcement bundles: an extra tank with an armor leader, a second 25LL AT gun and crew, or an ATR with twelve mine factors and a crew. As the German attacker, knowing that menu alone should push you to think through three separate enemy game plans. If he picks the second AT gun, you should assume both bridges (Terrain!) and the most obvious tank routes are covered by ROF 3 guns with excellent fields of fire. If he picks the extra tank and armor leader, you should think about likely tank duel locations and whether your own Panzers can win or whether you should use them mainly for smoke and infantry support. If he picks the mines, you should assume that roads, bridge exits, or obvious infantry corridors may be mined.

The trick is to ask yourself: if I were playing the other side, how would I use this OB and these options? Once you have an answer, assume your opponent will use something like that line of play. That assumption will affect how you move your armor, how cautiously you approach likely minefields or AT kill zones, and where you expect the enemy to be strongest.

Terrain/Weather – OCOKA

“The Squad Leader considers the effect of terrain and weather on enemy and friendly forces using the guidelines below (OCOKA).”

The third element, Terrain and weather, is where METT-TC plugs into the physical map. In doctrine, terrain is analyzed using another acronym, OCOKA: Observation and Fields of Fire, Cover and Concealment, Obstacles, Key Terrain, and Avenues of Approach. Weather usually (but not always) doesn’t come into play in most scenarios, but in ASL it can be viewed as another layer on top of terrain.

• Observation and Fields of Fire
  • Understand Lines of Sight for defense/approach
• Cover and Concealment
  • Cover = protection from fire
  • Concealment = protection from observation (and fire)
  • Take advantage of the best TEM/Hindrances
  • Don’t forget to Grow Concealment!
• Obstacles
  • Attacker: Leverage terrain that blocks LOS
  • Defense: Minimize how obstacles block your LOS
• Key Terrain
  • Look for ways to bolster (or seize) strong points and/or take advantage of rout paths
  • Tree lines/high ground/stone buildings/layers of hindrance/etc
• Avenues of Approach
  • Similar to Fields of Fire
• (Weather: visibility, wind, precipitation, cloud cover, temp, humidity)
  • NEVER underestimate the effect of (changing) weather/wind and ECs

In game terms, terrain is the combination of the board layout, the location of terrain features relevant to the victory conditions, the SSRs that tweak terrain or visibility, and the weather rules (usually SSRs) that apply. Before you set up, you should walk the board setup using the OCOKA framework.

Observation and Fields of Fire mean finding every meaningful line of sight. Look for long streets, potential Fire Lanes, open ground corridors, hilltops that can see far, and gaps between woods or buildings. These are natural sites for heavy machine guns, AT guns, and other long-range weapons. You also identify blind zones and reverse slopes where units can move without being seen until they are very close. Those often become your approach routes if you are attacking.

Cover and Concealment involves both TEM and actual concealment counters. TEM from stone buildings, wooden buildings, woods, orchards, walls, and hedges all determine how lethal an area will be under fire. Hindrances from grain, orchards, Smoke, and similar things also matter. Concealment counters and HIP add the fog of war, keeping your opponent guessing. When you plan, think not just about where you can get good TEM, but also where you can grow concealment, where you want “?” stacks to sit to bluff strength or hide it, and how the enemy will have to expose himself to attack you.

Obstacles are the things that block or distort movement and LOS. Buildings, woods, cliffs, streams, marshes, and gullies all fall into this category. As an attacker, you want to use obstacles to stay out of line of sight as long as possible, flanking them until you’re ready to fire or assault. As a defender, you want to position your units so that those same obstacles force the enemy to cross certain hexes in the open that you can cover with fire.

Key Terrain is anything that gives a disproportionate advantage. Level 2 hills that can see much of the board, stone multi-hex building strong points in the center of town, crucial bridges, and rout-safe woods clumps all qualify. You want to identify the hexes that, if the enemy holds them, make your plan nearly impossible, and the hexes that, if you hold them, give you dominant fire or safe rout paths. Because ASL is so much about morale and routing, key terrain is often defined as much by rout destinations as by firing positions. When you set up, try to place your units so that when they break, their legal rout destinations are places you want them to go, not where they are only required to go.

Avenues of Approach are the paths the attacker can use to reach the victory area. For each avenue, the attacker should think about how exposed it is and how long it is. The defender should be looking at the same routes and making sure that every plausible path crosses at least one decent Fire Lane or zone covered by AT weapons or OBA.

Weather overlays all of this. Mist or rain can reduce visibility. Dusk and night can radically shorten effective LOS and make concealment easier. Ground conditions such as mud or deep snow can slow vehicles and infantry dramatically. Wind can change how smoke behaves and how fires spread. These things are often specified in SSR, and it is easy to skim past them. When the SSR says “mild breeze,” for example, that is not just scenario bling; it can be a subtle hint about the tools the designer expects you to use.

This is exactly what happens again in “Failure to Communicate.” The SSR specified a mild breeze. If you then read the Chapter H entries for the German Panzers, you notice that all of them have Smoke dischargers (and some had Smoke ammo). Put those two facts together and it is clear that drifting AFV smoke is meant to play a central role. The ground between the German entry area and the French-held stone village is fairly open. Without smoke, an advance across that ground is murder. But if every tank that moves or even sits still can attempt to place smoke and then let the breeze drift it, you can quickly fill the board with temporary hindrances. That allows German infantry and armor to cross bridges and open spaces far more safely than the printed terrain alone would suggest.

Troops – Know Thyself

“The Squad Leader considers the strength of subordinate units, the characteristics of his weapon systems, and the Capabilities of attached elements as he assigns tasks to subordinate units.”

Troops, in doctrine, refer to friendly forces: their strength, organization, and capabilities. In ASL, that means your own order of battle and national characteristics, and it should be examined at least as seriously as the enemy’s.

Go over your Order of Battle
Understand your capability and nationality strengths/weaknesses
Take advantage of differences (morale levels, firing ranges, FP combinations for FGs, Assault Fire capability if you’re playing the attacker, etc)
Utilize a platoon organization structure (depending on scenario)
Have a plan for reinforcements!
If vehicles are involved, read their Chapter H entries, understand the chance of any vehicle penetrating the armor of any enemy unit

You need to know what your nationality does well and what it does poorly. German units tend to be well-rounded, with solid leaders and good support weapons. Americans (not including Marines) often have relatively low morale but excellent rally abilities and heavy firepower, as well as plentiful smoke. Japanese are a completely different: they are incredibly strong while attacking (not so much defending), deadly in close combat, do not break until reduced several steps, and reward aggressive, sometimes sacrificial tactics. Russians often rely on numbers, with somewhat weaker early war leaders, poor quality SW, and boat anchor MMG/HMG. Finns, SS, Gurkhas, and other special nationalities all have their own tricks and advantages written into their rules sections.

Organization matters a lot. The game may be called Advanced Squad Leader, but the OBs are structured like a platoon-level game. Each leader plus several squads essentially functions as a platoon. Before the game, it is useful to divide your OB into such groups and assign roles. One group might be your base-of-fire element, given your HMGs and best leader and set up in a place with excellent LOS. Another might be your assault group, stacked with elite squads, low Portage Point SWs focused on taking key objectives. A third group might be a reserve or flank guard element, hanging back to plug gaps or counterattack.

Your support weapons and vehicles are part of this Troops analysis. Mortars need good LOS. HMGs want to intersect enemy avenues of approach. Vehicles need defined missions: maybe they hunt enemy tanks, maybe they provide infantry fire support, maybe their main job is to throw smoke and overrun. Chapter H should be read for your own vehicles as carefully as for the enemy’s so you understand what your tools can actually do.

It is particularly important to understand vehicle matchups. You should know, at least roughly, which enemy AFVs your guns can reasonably penetrate. Players sometimes waste crucial fire opportunities shooting at targets that, even on a hit, have almost no chance of being killed, or don’t realize this face until they’re deep into a game. Those shots are usually better spent at softer or more vulnerable targets, or not taken at all in favor of movement.

Time – Distance Divided by Turns

“The Squad Leader refines his allocation of time based on the tentative plan and any changes to the situation.”

Time is the last major element in METT-TC. In the real world, that’s measured in hours, days, and how long you have to prepare before a mission or how long you have to execute it. In ASL, the main currency of time is game turns, and the practical question is whether you can get from where you start to where you need to be in the number of turns you are given, traversing the terrain of the scenario.

Understand the scale of the map setup versus the VCs (mission) versus the terrain versus the number of turns
“ABM” – “Always Be Moving” as the attacker. You should determine an average number of hexes to move each turn based on bullet #1 above. “Prep Fire and die!” as the saying goes.
“ABB” – “Always Be Breaking” as the defender. ASL is more a game of morale management than killing units. Breaking attacking units is almost as good as a kill in many scenarios, and much easier to do. Pinned/broken units can’t move toward objectives. DM units take an entire extra player turn to rally in most cases, assuming they aren’t DM’d again. So DM … and DM often.

The simplest way to look at it as an attacker is to literally count hexes from your “Line of Departure” to the furthest objective hex/Location and figure out how many turns it takes if you just run your units as far as possible each turn. Count the hexes assuming every hex is Open Ground. Then convert that to how many hexes (average) you should be moving every turn.

Time to Objective = [Distance (hexes) / Turns]  FRU

For example:

Time to Objective = [15 hexes / 6 turns] = 2.5 = 3 hexes/turn on average

Assuming a unit needs to move 15 hexes in 6 turns to capture/exit/engage/etc, you should be moving approximately 3 hexes per turn on average. But you will be slowed down by Prep Firing, by non-Open Ground terrain, by breaking, etc … so keep that in mind, and try to move faster!

Now compare that to the scenario’s turn limit. If the game is 6 turns and you need four of them just to arrive under perfect conditions, you can’t afford to spend three or four turns standing still and trading Prep Fire with the defender. That is how players end up in situations on turn five where they suddenly realize there’s literally no way to reach the objective(s), even if the path were completely clear. This is the root of the old saying, “Prep Fire and die.” As the attacker, you can win the firefight and still lose the scenario if you don’t invest enough turns into movement.

The above image shows the British movement targets for each campaign date in Decision at Elst. While not based on turns, it still demonstrates the importance of setting progress targets toward objectives. Without even a quick appraisal, it’s easy to get halfway into a game and realize … oh crap, I’m out of time.

The defender’s view of time is almost the opposite. The defender’s real job often isn’t to eliminate the attacker but to waste the time given to them. You do not need to kill every enemy squad; you only need to force them to move slowly and inefficiently. ASL is more about morale management than direct casualties. Broken units, units under DM, Disrupted and pinned units are not moving toward the objectives. As a defender, you should be happy to take shots that keep units under DM and stalled, even if the chance of an outright kill is modest. From the attacker’s perspective, a stack that is broken and DM in turn three may as well be dead for several turns while it struggles to rally and get back into position. Sometimes a broken unit is better than a KIA unit, as it strips away their time and ties up (and slows down) important leadership resources held back trying to rally them.

“The Drive for Taierzhuang (146)” provides a nice illustration of time and distance. In that scenario, Japanese forces must exit a certain number of EVP off one edge of the board. They have armored trucks that possess high MPs but are vulnerable and move very slow in open ground. The obvious road route is extremely dangerous, likely covered by Chinese AT guns and roadblocks. Running down the road might seem obvious and look fast, but is probably suicidal. Instead, you consider taking the trucks across open ground; the movement cost per hex for a truck is high (4 MP vs 1 MP for a fully tracked AFV).

When you actually sit and do the math, you see that you can barely get the trucks off the board in time, even if they move every single turn and never stop. Once you realize that, you know that any turn spent stationary or turning around is fatal. This leads to two tactics. 1) take the roads, move quicker but have the ability to occasionally stop and fire, or 2) go off-road and never stop, but avoid a lot of enemy fire. I chose the latter and managed to squeak out a win by exiting many of the armored trucks. That realization only emerges if you actually do the time calculation.

Debriefing

METT-TC is not just military jargon; it’s a practical framework for thinking about every ASL scenario before you make the first roll. Mission pushes you to read the Victory Conditions and SSR carefully enough that you know exactly what has to happen to win. Enemy forces you to study the opposing order of battle, imagine how you would use it, and prepare for your opponent’s most dangerous options rather than just what you hope they will (or won’t) do. Terrain/Weather, via OCOKA, guides you to walk the map, find fields of fire, safe approaches, key terrain, rout paths, and to notice when wind, visibility, or ground conditions might morph the battlefield. Troops remind you to understand your own OB and nationality characteristics, to organize your leaders and squads into functional “platoons,” and to know your vehicles and guns well enough to employ them efficiently. Time makes you count hexes, compare that to turn limits, and decide how aggressively you must move or how you should slow the attacker down.

Most experienced players already do fragments of this without naming it … or knowing it. Turning it into a pre-game routine can sharpen your planning, highlight flaws, and make your play more deliberate. The doctrine was designed for real infantry leaders facing life-and-death missions. There’s no reason why it can’t work for “simple” cardboard and dice game.

Academy Out!

GET TO THE CHOPPA…!!!

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