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I just picked up Overlord, which has the rules for Britain and the US invasion of France. There's a lot of US forces in the book that have Paratroopers, but I can't find the rules on how paratroopers work. They aren't in the main rulebook, and Overlord simply says the follow all the rules found in the main book plus a few extra rules but it doesn't say anything about parachuting into the battlefield.

Where do I find the rules for that?

Thanks!

Paratroopers dont tend to drop into combat... In fact they avoid it at all costs!

Here you go.

Most Paradrops were done away from the enemy if they could help it. And then they would be an infantry company in the enemy's backyard.

So Para units are really just another flavor of infantry company, usually with lighter support elements like man packed artillery backing up well equipped and motivated infantry.

You aren't actually going to be dropping onto the battlefield, nor would you want to.

Unless you are playing a campaign where you have a hot LZ you don't usually deploy with drop rules.

The rules for that aren't usually used, simply because dropping onto a battlefield is a really stupid idea. Not only are you fully exposed slowly falling to the ground, but once you actually hit the ground you are still hung up before you can actually fight. Dropping into a Hot LZ only became a thing when we invented the helicopter and thus a fast way to get Air Assault troops in and out under fire. And even that is avoided unless absolutely needed.

Plus, good luck getting the whole company to land cohesively by platoon where you want them in the size table that FOW represents hahaha

Basically, Paratroopers are gonna be deployed and played like any other normal infantry. Only advantage is their skill/morale, and some of the other units and assets that Airborne Companies can bring.

There are rules it in the 'Normandy battles' book

As other have said they operate as a normal infantry company. Paratroopers normally ‘drop’ away from the enemy so they can organise themselves after the chaos of the drop. If they end up engaging the enemy as soon as they hit the group then there has been a massive cock up.

There is a special scenario for a hot drop, but these never happened intentionally.

Well they did happen - It happened to the Fallschirmjager on Crete who dropped onto the prepared defensive positions held by Commonwealth forces.

At Maleme airfield one battalion lost over 400 men, with one company losing 112 men out of 126.

The whole operation was much the same, one British officer described shooting the falling paratroopers as like snipe shooting.

The losses they took in an opposed landing was horrific... Ample proof that its something you want to avoid!

The rules i posted for download are the ones BF uses and are current.It is from there site.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 col. krazy kenny wrote:
The rules i posted for download are the ones BF uses and are current.It is from there site.

hey P didnt the Americans on d day also had a bad drop and got massacred?(to early not enough coffee yet. Brain farting)

Not really... But the Americans and Canadians, and also the British to a lesser degree, got spread to the four winds in the drop.

Combination of inexperienced crews, poor drop zone recognition and flooded areas meant the US particuarly went everywhere over the Cotentin Peninsula.

This scattering, while seemingly disasterous, actually helped to further confuse the Germans as to the size and objective of the landings. Their command had reports of enemy paratroopers everywhere... Added to which was the deception drops near Calais of dummy paratroopers and small SAS groups. Was a nightmare for both sides, but the Allied Airborne troops reacted superbly all round. But many were lost in the flooded areas, drowned by their equipment.

I think the furthest 'group' drop was a glider from Deadstick. Instead of landing by Horsa Bridge, it landed on a different river some 11 miles away. The troops on board promptly fought their way back to British lines, arriving some seven days late to the 6th Airborne sector... However some individuals were reported up to 30 miles off target.

 col. krazy kenny wrote:
hey P didnt the Americans on d day also had a bad drop and got massacred?(to early not enough coffee yet. Brain farting)

Are you thinking of Sainte-Mère-Église as seen in The Longest Day film?

http://www.army.mil/article/22006/

Thanks for the link to the rules, after reading them I can see why you wouldn't want to use them. The platoon can scatter 24" away from where you want them to land and they won't have any special weapons until they recover the supply crate.

Might be fun to try playing sometime, but I can definitely see it being a risky move.

one of theese days me and friend of mine are going to do a para battle were all of the men and equipment must be drop in by chute or glider. but for this game we may have to make a exception for American Gliders.He will play 101st. and i will fallschirmjager 6th.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 George Spiggott wrote:

 col. krazy kenny wrote:
hey P didnt the Americans on d day also had a bad drop and got massacred?(to early not enough coffee yet. Brain farting)

Are you thinking of Sainte-Mère-Église as seen in The Longest Day film?

http://www.army.mil/article/22006/

yeah, i believe that was it.