Reader's Reviews
"Piquet" Wargame Rules
review by Andy Finkel
 |
And Now for Something Completely Different..."Piquet" is a set of wargames rules designed for any period of history, with separate supplements for particular historical periods, including one called "Les Grognards" which covers the Napoleonic era. The figure scale for 15/25mm figures is 1/60. Units are battalions/cavalry regiments/artillery batteries. Each turn represents 30 minutes (40 for 15mm figures). However, the rules have options to enable you to cover other figure or ground scales. Although they are a set of rules, the designer's notes make clear that they are also a wargames designer's tool kit, which enables the players very easily to change various procedures and factors to reflect their personal perception of history. The designer, Bob Jones, rejects the move/countermove system traditionally applied in wargames. The Piquet sequence of play is based on the idea that everything is happening at the same time but usually at different speeds, and time is not necessarily equal for both armies The position of the figures on the table represent the commanders' perceptions of what is happening, whereas the reality may be very different, due to out of date or mistaken information. You are the C in C on the hill behind the action, not the regimental commander in the front line. Therefore your ability minutely to direct the actions of your troops is limited by time and distance. This concept takes getting used to, but after a few games, it should cease to be a credibility problem. This concept works in a clever way which avoids the need for written orders, prorating movement or "if you do this, I'll do that" rules. Each army has a sequence deck, containing cards enabling it to do certain things. The primary cards include separate Reload cards for artillery and small-arms, separate movement cards for each arm of service, Melee resolution, Officer check, Manouver and Deployment. Different armies get cards in different proportions, e.g the Brits get 3 Musket Reloads, most other nationalities get 2 and the poor old Spanish and Russians get 1. Not every card will be given to every nationality. The cards given to a nationality can change depending on the era, so an 1806 Prussian Army gets 10 Dress line [= stand about and do nothing] cards, whereas an 1813 Prussian Army only gets 4.. There are several additional optional cards, and players can adjust the deck to reflect particular forces or battles. My regular Piquet opponent will be fielding his 1806 Prussians in a reenactment of Eylau shortly, and based partly on Patrick Wilson's recent article on I'Estocq's lads in that battle, we will be upgrading the Prussians by reducing the no. of dress line cards. The sequence of play is based on winning the initiative by competitive die roll between the players, and the winner and gets a number of irnpulse points ("IP") equal to the difference, which he can use to draw cards from his deck and/or act on those cards or fire units with loaded weapons. When you draw a card, any eligible unit can act on it once at a cost of I IP/unit. When you are finished with that card, you can spend an IP to turn over the next card. Armies which can form Artillery Grand Batteries, i.e French and Russians, can fire all the units in a grand battery for a total of 1 IP whatever card is active. All units of a "command" (defined before the game start by reference to a unit roster, but typically a brigade or a division) who are in command can act on certain cards for a total of 1 IP. This encourages you to keep units in command where possible. There are various ways of getting out of command, such as a unit doing something different to the rest of its command, moving in rough terrain, moving into melee contact etc. To get a unit back in command, y on must wait for an officer check card, and pass a die roll check based on that officer's ability. Officer cheek cards fulfil other functions, including giving you an additional chance to rally routed or disordered units. French armies get 3 Officer Check cards pre-1813 thereafter,2. Therefore, if the Marie-Louises rout, you're less likely to stop them, due to the decline in quality of the French Officer corps after 1812, not because the troops themselves are any less brave than their predecessors in the Grand Armee. This procedure of competitive die rolls and using IPs continues until either player has used up all his cards, or both players roll the same die on the initiative die roll. This signifies the start of a new rum of 40 minutes (30 minutes for 25mm figures), and a reshuffling of the card decks. You must discard cards from your deck at the start of the turn, one per officer killed and one per unit routed or eliminated. Your army therefore progressively loses its ability to function as it takes losses. It is possible for one player to get several impulses before his opponent gets any. However, there is a game mechanism to lin-fit the number of 1Ps which can be used successively, which helps to reestablish an equilibrium between the players. The variable initiative and unpredictability of when a particular card will turn up leads to a very exciting game. It creates genuine fog of war, in that you do not know whether you can execute your plan before the enemy can react, and you can't work out whether the enemy will interfere with your plan simply by measuring how far away they are on the table. In a recent game, my French lancers manouvered onto the flank of a Russian hussar unit, and the next time I got a cavalry move card, I would have hit the hussars in the flank. In the meantime, the Russians got a manouver card, which enabled a unit of cossacks some distance away to wheel 90 degrees to face the lancers, and then 2 move cards to cross the valley and take my lancers in the flank, routing them. Whilst this was a real nuisance, I liked the fact that this could happen. In most rules, the division of time into structured units would have meant that the lancers would have had time to turn to face the cossacks, because the French player, as opposed to the colonel in charge of the lancers, can see the cossack threat approaching. Before the game starts, each army draws a no. of cards from the Army Characterisation deck. Average armies draw 1 card/4 units, British and 1802-1812 French draw 1/3 and Spanish and Mamelukes (and I presume, Neapolitans and others of that ilk) draw 1/5. Elite units count double, so that an army with 18 units, 6 of which are elite counts as 24 units for this purpose. These cards give you either additional (good ones) sequence cards, or morale chips. You must start with at least 1 morale chip per unit or else remove units from your starting forces until the number does not exceed your Morale Chips. You lose 1 morale chip every time your army takes a stand in casualties, loses a melee, disorders or routs, or compels the enemy to take a morale test. Your morale chips are your army's reservoir of courage and when the reservoir is dry, it's usually a good idea to call it a day and run away. The rules recommend you conceal the amount of your morale chips from your opponent. Not knowing how much more damage the enemy can take requires you to keep your nerve when you are running low on morale chips. At the start of the game, you roll a D20 for each unit, which is modified according to the unit's nationality, to determine its battle readiness, which will result in the unit having a BDV (basic die value) of 4, 6 8 or 10, with 6 being the average. The BDV is modified by the unit's weaponry (up 2 for muskets or rifles, up 1 for carbines, up 1 for lance or bayonet) and class ( militia/line/elite or guard) to obtain final ratings for fire, melee and morale and the final number for each rating is noted in the roster for each unit. Therefore, among units of the same class, you can have some units who are "up for it" and others who are having a bad shako day. It also means that militia may occasionally perform better than line or even guards on their day, and you don't know precisely how good your opponents are until it's too late. for carbines, up 1 for lance or bayonet) and class ( militia/line/elite or guard) to obtain final ratings for fire, melee and morale and the final number for each rating is noted in the roster for each unit. Therefore, among units of the same class, you can have some units who are "up for it" and others who are having a bad shako day. It also means that militia may occasionally perform better than line or even guards on their day, and you don't know precisely how good your opponents are until it's too late. The game comes with a plethora of dice, one each of 4,6,8,10,12 and 20 sided. (You need to buy a duplicate set for each player). Adjustments in unit quality or tactical situations are done in shifts of die type, not die roll modifiers. Fire, melee and morale tests require you to make competing die rolls against the enemy , and the raw number on the die is the final result. e.g if your unit normally fires on a D10, but is firing at point blank range with + 1 die type, you fire on a D12. Fire targets always roll a D6. You score 1 hit for each number by which you outscore the target , and you disregard hits unless you score enough to remove a stand (3 for infantry, 2 for cavalry). A full strength unit has 4 stands (2 for artillery). Melee works on a similar system, except both sides use their melee value modified by the tactical situation. If you move into the flank or rear of an enemy unit, you can melee them immediately without needing a melee resolution card, and the odds are stacked in your favour. There is no reaction phase so that if infantry are charged by cavalry in the flank and they are not in square, tough titty, they should have been. Infantry can often see off enemy cavalry frontal attacks with firepower, without forming square. Other things being equal, non-squared infantry are equal to light cavalry in a melee, but lancers, medium and heavy cavalry get positive die type shifts . The higher die roll wins the melee, inflicting hits equal to the die difference on the loser. If the loser loses I stand or more, they are disordered and must retreat, and will lose at least 3 morale chips; 1 for losing the melee, I for the disorder and 1 for the stand loss.lf the winning die roll is twice as high as the loser, the loser routs. Whenever you inflict a stand loss on the enemy, you can pay a morale chip to force the enemy unit to take a morale test, by rolling their modified morale no against your die based on the number of hits you caused; i.e if you inflicted 1-4 hits, you roll a D4, 5-6 hits, a D6 and so on. This acts as a policing mechanism to prevent petty morale checks, since you will only pay the morale chip if you have good reason to think your opponent will fail, or if the situation is critical. If you beat his roll, he is disordered. If you beat it by double, he's routed. If you win by treble, he's routed and can't be rallied. Although the sequence of play is highly unpredictable, you tend to win by good planning and tactics. The rules appear to reward the use of historical tactics, so far as I can tell after 6 games. In a recent game, my French army underestimated their Spanish opponents and attacked them frontally without adequate preparation. Result? Bloody nose for the French. Units are either in line, attack column, square or column of route for game purposes. Skirmish companies are disregarded (only specifically trained light infantry battalions can break down into skirmish order) and the doings of individual companies are ignored e.g you can't form a cavalry unit into echelon and attack a square with successive squadrons, and there is no functional difference between column of divisions, column of companies and battalionsmasse. The Les Grognards supplement indicates what formations are permitted or encouraged for a given nationality and era e.g pre 1808 Prussians don't feel happy in column. As with much of Piquet, if you don't like a particular rating for a unit/ nationality or a particular rule, you can change it [not, of course, in the middle of a battle without your opponent's agreement!] The rules are not available except by mail order. I discovered the rules by visiting the website on the internet. One major asset is the Piquet mailer group on the internet. This is funded by Bob Jones and connects you to a friendly, knowledgeable and enthusiastic bunch of wargamers (mostly American) who are happy to respond to your queries with helpful advice and debate. It's like a free online support desk. Through it, I have met a local Piquet player (hi, Ian) with whom I now play wargames frequently. A Napoleonic scenarios booklet is on its way to me by mail, and a set of Waterloo campaign scenarios is due to be published later in the year. Pro's
Con's
In summary, I really like these rules. They are simple to use (if a bit vague in places). They're a breath of fresh air. They are full of subtleties whose surface I'm sure I have hardly scratched, and I'm sure I will be playing with them for a long time to come, which is more than I can say for most other sets of rules which I've tried. To order Piquet by mail, write to: Piquet Inc, 165 Charles Street, Vestal, New York 13850 USA tel/fax: 001 607 785 5486 Piquet Website: http://users.aol.com/-IMAC100/piquet.htm Mailergroup: pkmailer@lntNet.Net More Reviews
1815 The Waterloo Campaign (reviewed by Neil Carey) Piquet: Wargame Rules Back to Table of Contents -- First Empire #41 Back to First Empire List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1998 by First Empire. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com |