Hollywood Tactics: Difference between revisions

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQ3D4CqHbJM This Philips Carousel spot], which includes, among other things, police looking out the windows after a suspect while several other suspects are firing weapons ''right outside the door''. Don't even try and figure out a sequence of events where police have somehow penetrated ''past'' several of the criminals, and have had time to summon SWAT, but don't have a secure perimeter.

 

* Many of the Contractors in ''[[Darker than Black]]'' are bad about this, apparently buying into the [[Fantastic Racism|"you're just walking guns"]] view and throwing everything at their enemies without bothering to actually make plans about doing so. However, the [[Badass Abnormal|more competent]] ones tend to use better tactics; Wei, for instance, thought to aim for the support his opponent was perched on, and November 11 used his knowledge of his enemy's behavior to set a trap that Hei only barely managed to [[Stealth Hi Bye|ninja his way out of]].

** In fact, the survival lengths of the various contractors may be lampshading this. As a comparison, November 11 has relatively weak powers. Many contractors have one-hit kills, he only has ice powers. {{spoiler|He survives the greater part of a season, by sheer competence with his powers and [[Badass Abnormal]] skills.}} August 7 can {{spoiler|reality warp the area around his body. However, he behaves like a walking gun, and gets the [[Face Palm of Doom]].}}

** Somewhat justified in that a) It was always going to [[Authority Equals Asskicking|come down to the big name pirates and marines slugging it out]] and b) There's only so much you can do when you're knowingly sailing into a trap.

* The SEARRS troops in ''[[My-HiME]]'': Engaging targets on an open field without any attempt to use fire support, not even snipers. Knowing that the enemy has at least one air asset but not bringing your own air cover or even sufficient anti-air. No attempts made to locate and neutralise the enemy's headquarters to force a decisive victory. The list goes on.

 

== [[Comic Books]] ==

** Justified when you remember that Cap is also responsible for training most of the other Avengers. "Hit them hard and fast" more likely translates as "do exactly what we drilled, and remember your tactical tree so you can adapt on the fly depending on which predicted response the foes give." Remember, he was in the military; he knows the value of training.

** Cap is also consistently portrayed as one of the Marvel Universe's more talented strategists. Whenever there is a multi-team event, if Cap is present he will be the one coordinating the overall battle plan, and doing so very competently.

 

== [[Fan Works]] ==

* Played straight, averted, and inverted at the same time in ''[[Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality]]''. Draco's army is based on tight formation and classical wizadry warfare. Hermione's often goes into more basing her entire strategy off of one single action or plan that either wins or loses the battle. Harry goes a route of [[Confusion Fu|mass chaos and randomness to throw off the other two]]. However, each army is usually well run and have well thought out strategies.

* ''[[Tiberium Wars]]'' generally averts this, with characters using realistic tactics like bounding advance, engaging at long range, calling for air support or indirect fire, etc. There are sequences where Nod soldiers charge headlong into well-prepared GDI defensive positions, but they get mowed down frequently and only do this to tie up the GDI defenders, as they have the numbers and the fanatic dedication to make these attacks work, and they only launch these attacks while under supporting fire. Having [[Bottled Heroic Resolve|combat stims that make them berserk warriors who can't feel pain and can keep fighting despite lethal injuries]] helps too.

 

== [[Film]] ==

** The Battle of Hoth in ''[[The Empire Strikes Back]]'' is pretty good by ''Star Wars'' standards, considering the Imperials were denied aerial and orbital support by the shield generator and ion cannon while the Rebels were only stalling for time with the weather conditions (high winds, low visibility, heavy snow) plausibly denying use of heavy artillery by either side. It still has the Rebel pilots charging headfirst at vehicles that could only fire forward, and the Imperials having vehicles [[Fixed Forward-Facing Weapon|that could only fire forward]]. The ground rebels not only use cover, but also use it for supported firing positions, largely because the extras were played by Norwegian army soldiers.

*** Apparently, "[[Attack Pattern Alpha|Attack Pattern Delta]]" involves flying directly at the only guns the enemy has. Who exactly wrote with the Rebels' playbook?

*** Also, beyond that sortie by speeders, the rebels mostly just waited until Imperial armor with long range guns walks up to them and forms a firing line. After they had time to prepare and the enemy had to approach along the ridges. If they prepared good positions (this stone can't be too hard, there are natural caves) with at least few weapons capable of harming walkers, plus some surprises from engineers in the way (even hastily improvised, as long as someone is ready to do so once the enemy is detected), the place could be harder to advance into, up to "Afghanistan, but with poor visibility" grade. [https://angrystaffofficer.com/2017/07/10/warfighter-hoth/ There's more].

*** Also, the weird choice of vehicles, as "the Sith Lord himself expressed serious doubts about his soldiers' tactical choices" in ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20091127071227/http://www.collegehumor.com/article:1741255 Great Military Blunders of the Galactic Empire]''.

* Well, lets take ''[[Ultraviolet]]'' as the example, but ''every darn movie'' where the [[Big Bad]]'s minions capture the main character by surrounding them and pointing guns at them. '''Pointing guns at the center of the circle they're standing in'''. At least ''[[Ultraviolet]]'' shows what would actually happen if you tried this {{spoiler|Heroine ducks, minions kill each other, they do this for like three minutes, dumbasses}}.

** Same thing happens in ''[[Total Recall]]'' when Arnie is using the hologram watch thing to fool some Mooks into thinking they found him.

* In ''[[Kingdom of Heaven]]'' the only guy (at least on the crusader side) who even ''tries'' to use tactics is the main character. Everyone else does things like trying to march through miles of desert in full armor without any water to attack people who are threatening your fortified city.

** [[wikipedia:Battle of Hattin|The Battle of Hattin]] [[Reality Is Unrealistic|happened pretty much like in the movie.]] In fact ''Kingdom of Heaven'' is much more faithful to the actual history then the preceding ''[[Gladiator]]'' was. The biggest differences to actual history are the compression of the events of the movie which happened over at least a decade in history; the age of the main character, which in reality was about the same as his father in the movie, and the fact that he is actually a mash-up of the three, I think, Ibelin brothers, that actually existed and neither was born outside of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.

* In S. M. Stirling's ''[[Emberverse]]'' novels, gunpowder and electricity suddenly stop working, forcing the characters to painfully re-learn medieval military tactics. A more specific example: in ''A Meeting at Corvallis'', [[The Lord of the Rings|Sauron]]-wannabe Norman Arminger ignores pointed warnings from his subordinates and, instead of picking off the various factions opposing him one at a time, launches a massive three-pronged attack that instantly unites everyone against him and ends in general retreat.

* The achingly bad [[Novelization]] of ''[[Command & Conquer]]: Tiberium Wars'' has this in ''spades''. Among the most [[Egregious]] examples of tactics in the book is a scene where a [[Humongous Mecha|Juggernaut artillery walker]] attacks a Nod machinegun emplacement. Does it use its cannons to bombard it from a distance as artillery emplacements are ''supposed'' to? No. Does it blast the emplacement directly with its cannons? Nope. It ''charges'' the emplacement and ''steps on it.'' Aside from the obvious stupidity of doing that, what kind of idiotic commander ''puts his artillery close enough to the enemy that it can '''step''' on their gun emplacements?'' Especially when [[Did Not Do the Research|the Juggernaut only has legs because it is supposed to stay out of the line of fire in the first place?]] (We have a trope page for the [[Fix Fic]] ''[[Tiberium Wars]]'', by the way.)

* Averted and played straight in ''[[Codex Alera]]''. The Alerans, being the descendants of a displaced Roman Legion that ended up in another world, use classical Roman tactics, particularly the famous, highly-disciplined shieldwall. These tactics are, however, adapted to make greatest use of the Alerans' control over their furies, with specialist formations within the Legion made up of troops who are best at a particular discipline. [[Playing with Fire|Firecrafters]] are used as siegebreakers, [[Extra Ore Dinary|metalcrafters]] and [[Dishing Out Dirt|earthcrafters]] are used for shock attacks, [[Green Thumb|woodcrafters]] serve as scouts and snipers, etc. The biggest problem that the Alerans have is that their overreliance on furies, coupled with an extremely conservative mindset that breeds arrogance ensured that the Alerans forgot many mechanical principles and thus tended to discount enemy technology that doesn't rely on furies. When they encountered Canim troops with "balest" crossbows, they were utterly unprepared for how powerful they were, and the idea of using seige engines instead of furycraft to bring down walls or fight massed enemies never occurred to them {{spoiler|until Tavi and his mentor uncovered ancient catapult plans and sent them to Bernard, who did build them to fight the Vord}}.

* The battle tactics used in ''[[The Malazan Book of the Fallen]]'' series aren't necessarily bad; they'd probably work pretty well if used by [[Real Life]] generals during ancient times. However, in their world, magic exists, and it can be just as powerful, if not more powerful, than any modern weaponry, something which most generals seem completely unprepared for. Most of the time, marching their soldiers across the countryside in large formations just makes them sitting ducks for High Mages, who can kill hundreds with a single sorcerous blast.

** The real galling part of it is that somehow, the Straight Arrow manages to obviate the very real, pressing infantryman's need for heavy mobile support weaponry. The availability of potent anti-armor weaponry won't take away the fact that the troops on the ground are going to need firepower support when faced with strong, dug-in opposition. But the light infantry don't have any support weaponry beyond man-portable gear, despite the fact that flying, missile-armed drones are available in the setting. One would expect to see cheap, teleoperated, tracked or wheeled drones with support weapons, design to be compact and lightweight (and above all else disposable) to be used to support the infantry in response to the Straight Arrow, with armored vehicles serving as a mobile cavalry outside urbanized areas where they can use their extreme range to bombard targets from outside an Arrow's range.

* In the ''[[Chronicles of Thomas Covenant]]'', the character Hile Troy is hailed as a military genius by the people of the Land (and he was also a brilliant tactician on Earth), but his battle plan is terrible. He relied on only one scouting party to gather intelligence, and even if everything were to go according to plan, he would march his army hundreds of leagues to a canyon in the lower land to ambush the enemy army. Meanwhile his army would be tired and low on provisions, so the enemy would have to be vanquished in a only a matter of days. If the enemy chose not to take Hile Troy's bait in the canyon, then the land would be defenseless with Troy's army holed up at Doom's Retreat. And just like the real world, the best case scenario is not what happens, rather Lord Foul's army is too big and his scouts are delayed in delivering intelligence to Hile Troy.

** They don't bring enough ammo to deal with all the zombies that come, despite knowing the capital importance of that battle. This is Handwaved as the military being overconfident, but the handwaving is unconvincing as it goes directly against the normal US military doctrine which says that There Is No Kill Like Overkill, that is also used as a PR strategy ("Shock And Awe") as well as for serious warfighting.

*** In addition to the fact that mankind wasn't out of the Bronze Age before it became standard military practice to always leave a generous safety margin in your supplies whenever possible.

** While air support of at least some kind is present, it is both grossly inadequate in strength, composed of the wrong type of aircraft, carrying the wrong type of ordnance, and assigned to the wrong mission. They sent advanced high-performance multi-role fighters instead of dedicated ground-attack aircraft like A-10s or B-52s, they used long-range stand-off weapons intended for killing single tanks miles away instead of area munitions intended for killing large groups of infantry right beneath you, and what helicopters were available were apparently all tasked to the job of carrying news media as opposed to, y'know, ''shooting at the enemy.''

** Also, no close air support is even ''started'' until the zombies are already danger close, instead of the Air Force bombarding them the whole way in. Given that a good B-52 arclight strike could have destroyed most of the zombie horde before it even reached Yonkers, this is another one in the 'inexplicably idiotic errors that even Private Dumbjohn could have figured out was a bad idea, yet an entire room full of generals somehow failed to' category.

 

== [[Live Action TV]] ==

** A minor alien race called the Thyrus has this as their [[Planet of Hats|Hat]]. Their entire military strategy on any scale is based around what looks cool, and as a result they're impossible to predict on the battlefield - an impressive and dramatic defeat is as valued as a total victory, and huge casualties on both sides is their most-desired outcome.

 

* In ''[[Arms and the Man]]'' Captain Bluntschli explains to Raina why her husband to be, Sergius, was totally insane to take his entire division and charge straight into a nest of entrenched machine guns. It turns out that the attack ''worked'' and won the battle for Sergius's side but that was only because [[Rule of Funny|the machine guns]] [[Contrived Coincidence|were sent the wrong ammunition]].

 

== [[Video Games]] ==

'''Val:''' Why are the cute ones always insane? }}

* Here's how to conduct a battle if you're an Orc chieftain in ''[[Dominic Deegan]]'' [[Fantasy Counterpart Culture|who is also a Native American]]. Your warband occupies a hilltop overlooking your enemy's camp. Many of your warriors are master archers, while the enemy tribe has shown no ranged weapons and no defenses beyond teepees. You must carry the day, but you're not counting seconds. It follows that you should take your enemy by surprise by leading a charge down the hill. Keep your archers back, but have them hold fire until the ranks have mixed and the enemy is occupied with your fighters. Then pour arrows into the melee, where they only hit enemies. Fight nonlethally with your clubs, hammers, spears, and rain of arrows on a ballistic trajectory, since only the enemy chief is evil. Have all of this work until the chief overwhelms you with his magic, then give the order to kill by yelling it really loud in the middle of a battle. Get rescued by two different groups of allies that snuck up on everybody on what is largely a flat, featureless plain. Celebrate.

{{quote|Maxim 22: If you can see the whites of their eyes, somebody's done something wrong.

Maxim 42: "They'll never expect this" means "I want to try something stupid."

Maxim 43: If it's stupid and it works, it's still stupid and you're lucky.

 

* "[https://cavegirlgames.blogspot.com/2018/10/shit-games-dont-get-about-combat.html Shit games don't get about combat situations]" on ''Cavegirl's Game Stuff'': a LARP/paintball player gives a good list of, well, [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|the stuff many game developers are clueless about]]:

# [[Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me|Shields]]

# Big monsters, elites, vehicles etc. (support troops [[Bodyguarding a Badass|covering flanks of heavies/elites]] are vital)

* ''[https://angrystaffofficer.com/ The Angry Staff Officer]'' blog analyzes military fiction, including ''[[Star Wars]]''.

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

** The largest example of this is displayed in the first few minutes of the pilot film. Despite the clones having ample cover and artillery support to hold off the large amount of incoming droids, once Anakin springs his 'ambush' (a staggering ''5 soldiers''), the clones immediately jump out of cover and charge the enemy droids head-on. They predictably get slaughtered.

** However, the combat in ''[[Star Wars: The Clone Wars]]'' has been getting better. Newer episodes have featured armored units engaging artillery and flak cannons ahead of the main landing zones to ensure the gunships have safe places to deploy. Clones use carpet bombing tactics to uproot entrenched opposition. When sent against armored units without support by the resident [[General Failure]], the clones have been quick to adapt and begin using missile launchers and mortar teams, while two recon troops hijack enemy fighters and provide close air support.

 

== [[Real Life]] ==

* In the Battle of Leuthen (1757), Prinz Charles Alexander of Lorraine formed his troops into a single line about ''three miles'' long and concentrated his cavalry on one end of it. He was practically begging to be flanked. The funny thing is that he did it to ''avoid'' being flanked. [[Captain Obvious|It failed]].

** Also, technically speaking, the Austrian army was for the most part deployed in several lines (two of infantry plus cavalry). And the Prussian position was also very long, with fewer men, only Frederick the Great did a better job of massing forces against the Austrian left while keeping the left and centre busy with feints and holding actions using small forces.

* As mentioned in the ''[[Kingdom of Heaven]]'' example above, [[wikipedia:Battle of Hattin|Hattin]].

* The psychological attacks made by the Whites during the [[Red October|Russian Civil War]]. Involved soldiers marching straight to the enemy lines, without ducking, ignoring bullets. Some generals added twists to the basic tactic: the Volunteer Army men smoked cigarettes while marching, General Slaschev's men ate sunflower seeds. The aim was to intimidate the Reds with the Whites' fearlessness. Usually it didn't work, but sometimes it did.

***Partly justified because any hint that he had a chance to give battle would rightfully make Custer want to seize it. Irregulars usually can't take the stress of a pitched battle as well as regulars who have a [[Vast Bureaucracy]] that can reliably produce [[We Have Reserves|more or less fungible]] troops. The splitting up does sound odd though.

* Subversion. One common [[Acceptable Breaks From Reality|though often dramatic]] feature of Hollywood Strategy (as opposed to realistic tactics) is for the [[Evil Overlord]] to try to conquer people primarily [[We Have Reserves|with numbers]] and for the good guys to be exceptional badasses. It does not work that way in real life. A power that has little advantage but numbers is not going to trust to them to go conquering because it is expecting them to travel hundreds of miles under conditions that make unfit soldiers a liability. Meanwhile, the defender is close to a place to recruit reinforcements and will likely outnumber the attacker soon. Conversely a real [[Badass Army]] is likely to be commanded by a conqueror, simply for the obvious reason that the way to become a [[Badass Army]] is to stay alive while killing a lot of people. The easiest way to do that is to be an army that serves the sort of ruler that likes conquering people for the heck of it.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Military and Warfare Tropes]]

[[Category:Hollywood Style]]