The first rule of Politics of Pressure is: use common sense and be good sports.
Weapon classes
We employ the standard VSAF rules about weapon classes:
Combat rules
Hits
Any hit is to be counted. If you are unsure about a hit, please take the hit. When hit, scream “HIT” (or “TRÄFF”). Feel free to roleplay the injury by screaming, clawing the ground, calling out for mommy or whatever.
If hit, you’re out cold for at least a minute. If possible, remove yourself from the line of fire, and then wear a deathrag (a brightly colored red/orange piece of cloth) on your head. Please stay put and don’t mill around.
When hit, you have a ten minute bleedout time, meaning you have to get medical assistance inside of ten minutes, or you’re dead (see respawn). Anyone can extend your bleedout by another five minutes by applying first aid (ie giving you 15 minutes in which to get medical assistance). Any uninjured person can assist in moving casualties to a safer location.
Death
Unless you receive medical assistance before your bleedout time is over, you are dead. Wear a deathrag and go to your designated respawn locations, where you can once again enter the game after a while (different respawn times will be used for different factions, check your faction forums).
Remember the following: Your character is dead, and you enter the game again as a newly arrived replacement that just happens to look and behave just like your old one. That doesn’t mean you can impart information that your old character knew. If you were ambushed by a group of civilians and your entire unit was wiped out, your “new” characters don’t know about that and you can’t act on that information.
Medical assistance
Only medics and field surgeons can revive and save injured people on the battle field. Once a medic reaches an injured, he/she can revive them and restore them to fighting status by actively focusing on an injured (or group of injured at the same place) for ten minutes. After this period, the injured can enter the game again. You can only receive medical assistance once per “life”. If you have been hit, and taken care of by a medic, your next hit immediately kills you, and you have to go to the respawn immediately.
Respawn
There are designated respawn spots on your maps. This is where you go when you’ve been killed. Wait at the respawn until your respawn time is over (this can vary between factions), then enter the game again.
Triage cards – Only applies to peacekeepers
The peacekeepers (ie NATO and Russian forces) have slightly different rules for injuries and medical assistance. All NATO and Russian medics will be issued a finite number of Triage cards. When a medic attends an injured person, the medic draws a triage card from his deck to check the severity of the damage. The effect of the damage is modified by wearing body armor and helmets (the cards will clearly state what modifications are made). A Triage card comes in four variants: Minor, Delayed, Immediate and Morgue.
A minor wound is easily taken care of by the medic, just taking a few minutes. A delyed card means a somewhat more serious injury, taking more time to fix. Immediate cards mean serious injury, and requires evacuation to a field hospital for treatment. Unless the casualty is brought to a field hospital in time (will be stated on card), that person will die.
A Morgue card represents an untreatable injury, and the casualty has to go to respawn immediately. However, remember that all these cards have modifiers for body armor and helmets. I really pays off to wear BA and helmets.
Vehicles and combat
All vehicles in play have to fly a red flag (ie a red piece of cloth tied to the antenna) to signify that the vehicle is in play. All vehicles with red flags are valid targets during the game. All other vehicles are not to be considered in play.
All vehicles must have their windows open/down so that you can fire into them. A vehicle under fire must stop and its passangers disembark. Only when the threat has been eliminated or the firing stopped can the vehicle move again. Anyone inside a vehicle hit is to be treated as a normal casualty. Remember: A normal car is *not* an APC, and is not bulletproof.
A vehicle is destroyed (and out of the game for 4 hours) if someone manages to get right up to the vehicle to fire a long burst into the engine block, or if there is an explosion (eg IEDs, handgrenades) right up close to the car.
DO NOT USE BB MAX! Those BBs crack glass and cause all kinds of damage to cars.
The maximum speed for all vehicles is 30 km/h. Drive safely.
Grenades, smoke & pyrotechnics
Exploding grenades (mostly Enola Gay-grenades) will be used at the larp. If you are close to a grenade (use common sense) going off, take a hit. Vehicles can be taken out by grenades (see rules for Vehicles).
Smoke will be used, and has no other effect than the obvious ones.
There will also be some pyrotechnics used, mainly satchel charges, demolitions etc. These are for the special effects mostly, and will be handed out by the organizers.
All pyrotechnics/grenades/smokes brought to the game have to be cleared with the organizers at checkin.
Other rules
Safe zones and non-firing areas
There are essentially no safezones on the game area, which means: goggles on at all times. There is however one exception: The bar (note it on the map, it’s where the checkin is). There is to be absolutely no shooting in/at the bar what so ever. The goggle rule still applies, but we do not want any firefights inside the bar or just outside it, since there will be very sensitive intruments and other delicate things there.
The border
The Transnistrian/Moldovan border is an absolute no-crossover for the Peacekeeping forces. Unless strictly ordered to cross the border by your commanding officer, the border is your absolute limit, no matter what occurs on the other side. Please respect this!
LARPing
Remember we have quite a few larpers portraying different characters at this larp. If you are uneasy larping yourself, please respect that others might be in character, and keep a low profile. Please try roleplaying a bit extra, as this really gives milsims a new depth.
Also, the civilian larpers are not there to fight. You can’t “kill” the civilians, as this would make the rest of their game pretty boring. Feel free to interact with them, or even be nasty and brutal, but please avoid pointless killings just for the sake of it.
Languages
This is very important: The local language (a mashup of Russian and Moldavian dialects) is represented during the game by Swedish. NATO people talk English. Unless your character for some reason understand Moldavian or Russian, you can’t speak or understand the local language. If you for some reason hear a conversation in Swedish, remember that it’s actually Russian being spoken.
The Russian peacekeepers, the Transnistrian locals, and Obnovleniye/Respublika all understand the language, while NATO troops generally don’t. The same applies the other way ’round: Not all Transnistrian or Russians understand English, or have a very rudimentary skill in English. Please play this out.
NATO troops usually have one or two translators along to help them translate. Your commander will designate these translators before game on.