SOAR 2025 Update!

Recon Company,

Thank you all so much for your patience over the last week. Several core members of our team were away in Las Vegas to attend The Special Operations Association Reunion (SOAR) 2025.

As it is every year, the experience was incredible. It was a rare opportunity for us to connect with each other in person, but more importantly, it was an honor to spend time with so many veterans from Special Forces and SOG.

The Honor and the Urgency

Being at SOAR is always a powerful mix of emotions. It’s a joyous reunion, but there's also serious elements of melancholy. With every year that passes, we lose more of these living legends. This reality underlines the intensity and profound importance of our mission: to capture the history of the Vietnam War and ensure these critical stories are told.

This year, that feeling was especially poignant for me. Among many other faces, it was good to catch up with Gerald Baron, the passionate author worked with many vets to write about CW3 Terry Crump's experiences flying for the 361st AWC "Pink Panthers" It Was My Turn.

We talked about the passing of our dear friend, Woody Woodard (PANTHER 27), this past spring, which was tough. It feels like only yesterday we were at last year's SOAR, hanging out with him and his son, Michael.

Losing heroes like Woody is heartbreaking, but we always do our best to allow these moments to inspire us. It steels our resolve to continue our mission, to work even harder to preserve these stories, and to do justice to the history these men lived. To all of them: we won't forget you!

Woody's service photo, courtesy of his son Andy

While we were there, Rob put together a series of posts that I want to share with you all, as they fantastically sum up some of the core experiences we had.

It's always a busy week full of a variety of experiences, but we are so incredibly honored to be a part of this community and to have such a close, personal relationship with the Special Operations Association (SOA). I hope you'll join me in exploring our world over the last week. Over to Rob!

~Sam

SOAR 2025

Arriving with our team mate Jeff, who took the photo - you never know what awaits at the top of that escalator each day - but it’s always inspiring and wholesome and occasionally even life-changing. Thank you to my SOA friends and team brothers for always supporting our mission and putting your trust in us.

One of the special highlights of my life is the work we have done with the Special Operations Association and in particular our special team advisers who are enthusiastic members of that “behind enemy lines / black ops” organisation.

John Stryker Meyer spent two tours with MACV SOG and works tirelessly to promote the STORIES OF HIS FELLOW SOLDIERS - in the SOGCAST series on all good platforms (youtube and spotify etc). These stories are a fascinating and unique insight into the rapid evolution of irregular warfare during the 1960s, which laid the foundations for everything we see in use today.

His 3 books are outstanding - and this year he signed my treasured copy of Across The Fence - which I’ll share in a later post. Our game Arma 3 SOG Prairie Fire was made with Johns constant input and encouragement.

We will be friends and team mates 'til this mission is completed. Thank you John for supporting us and always being there with energy and wit and good ideas!

De Oppresso Liber!

Where the rubber hits the road in good game design is in the connection between narrative (core lore, backstory and character arcs) and mechanics (progression, combat, tactics, strategy, exploration). In SOG Out Of Shadow we aim to write a MACV SOG TV show in parallel with the game - so having movie screenwriter/playwright/NY Times bestselling writer Ralph Pezzullo (Jawbreaker/Thomas Crocker SEAL Team Six novels) on board makes complete sense. Here he is meeting our design director Phil O Connor (Rainbow Six Siege/Dying Light expansion) to discuss the junction of mechanics and narrative. Figuring out how to gamify art and artify games is key to the foundations of a successful transmedia game/TV crossover - like Fallout or The Last Of Us - it starts with the writer, but it relies on fun playable mechanics to grow the brand…

Guest speaker COL Scott White, USASOC To set it in context - Scott’s excellent speech followed previous years speeches from:

• Major General Ken Bowra

• General Bryan Fenton

• Colonel Brent Lindeman

So you’re in excellent company there Scott.

"Wild Carrot" MSG Jim Shorten-Jones and "Wild Carrot 2" COL Scott White

What makes the SOA so special is it was founded by MACV SOG recon team leader Jim Butler back in the early 1970s when SOG still had another 2 decades of being classified. Over the years new guys discovered their old friends had a secret reunion and joined up to reunite with men they presumed were dead or lost in time.

It was so good to see COL Paris Davis there, whose service is legendary for all generations of Special Operators.

Frequent past attendees include John Plaster, Eldon Bargewell, Billy Waugh, Roger Donlon, Bob Howard, Doug Miller, Jack Singlaub, John Meyer, and a host of other historic warriors.

As the younger guys connect up with their spiritual predecessors, all kinds of positive things happen - mutual respect and support, coordinated projects, memorials and a lot of war stories.

Thanks for being part of it.

COL White with SOG Vets Jim Day and John St. Martin.

COL Scott White, MG Ken Bowra "El Cid," and Rob Graham

We do our bit in the corner every year and host an exclusive gamer group which brings SOG and GWOT vets (and their family members) together each Sunday to team up and go across the fence in our game built by General Bowra and Tilt Meyer.

It is an immense honour to work with, and be a member of the SOA. Long may it continue.

DOL
- Rob Graham - Savage Game Design