After the general historical background is covered it is time to think about actualy getting things done. Okay, just kidding - we are still at the very start of our early draft phase. What we do is think about the general scenario setup. Our guiding question will be: "What is the scenario about?" or rather "What sotry does it tell?"
There is one great thing that you men will all be able to say after this war is over and you are home once again.
You may be thankful that twenty years from now when you are sitting by the fireplace with your grandson on your
knee and he asks you what you did in the great World War II, you WON'T have to cough, shift him to the other knee
and say, Well, your Granddaddy shoveled shit in Louisiana. No, Sir, you can look him straight in the eye and say,
Son, your Granddaddy rode with the Great Third Army and a Son-of-a-Goddamned-Bitch named Georgie Patton!
- General George S. Patton, Jr (addressing to his troops before Operation Overlord, June 5, 1944)
Is it the desperate attempt of a platoon left behind to reach friendly lines while the enemy is closing in (the German retreat from France comes to mind)?
Or is it an overall chaotic situation with both sites struggling for control and trying to establish some kind of stability (think of the airborne landings on D-Day)?
Perhaps we have an attacker in superior numbers against a determined defender in favourable terrain (Normandy again, this time the allied advance through the Bocage terrain on the Cotentin)?
Or Maybe it is a surprised defender overrun by an unexpected attack (consider the opening moves of the German offensive in the Ardennes)?
There may be many aspects to whatever we have chosen to be the background for our scenario. Our goal will be to determine those which characterize the situation and focus on two or three of them. Once we have found these characteritzing elements we can start to weave our scenario around it and, yes, actually get something done.