Modern Spearhead

Rules

review by Bill Rutherford

Published by Wargames Inc., Modern Spearhead (MSH) is a division-level set of miniatures rules based on Arty Conliffe’s popular Spearhead (SH) WW II rules. Game components include two full-color card covers, 96 interior pages consisting of four introductory pages, 39 pages of rules, three pages containing four scenarios, four pages of designers’ notes and 41 pages containing 67 postwar divisional, brigade, and regimental tables of organization. Also included are nine equipment data cards detailing the major equipment used by the USA, the Warsaw Pact, France, the UK, Germany, Israel, and Iraq, two roster sheets, and a quick reference sheet that is generally the only rules reference required once the game’s learned… Production qualities are good; the rules are designed - and pre-punched - for insertion into a dime-store 3-ring binder.

Many of MSH’s basics are drawn directly from SH, which is good, because of the extensive playtesting the earlier game went through to develop the basic game mechanics. Game scales are 1” = 100 yds (for 6mm troops, convertible for larger scales), 1 turn = 15 - 30 minutes, and 1 model/stand = 1 platoon/battery. MSH is designed to allow a player control a brigade or division and play a game to conclusion in an evening. Though miniatures represent platoons (or, occasionally, half-companies), the battalion is the basic maneuver element and all game rules reflect this view. The play sequence is interactive-sequential, initiative governs who has the opportunity to go first each turn, sighting is deterministic, and combat is generally probabilistic but not ranged. That is, the likelihood of hitting a target doesn’t, other than in specific circumstances, vary with range.

In keeping with MSH’s focus on big battles, combat is strictly governed by target priority and proximity rules that dictate which potential targets combatants can fire at. This is good because it ensures that the divisional commander (i.e., the player) isn’t fighting the platoon leaders’ battles. Command control is re-aligned along eastern versus western command systems, in varying quality levels, as opposed to the old “Germans first, then the Western Allies, then the Soviets” method, and is an improvement, I think.

The new rules focus on equipment and weaponry peculiar to the modern era. All manner of missile weapons are provided for including ATGWs, SAMs, and modern artillery rocketry. Extensive helicopter rules include several types of ground-support missions and helicopter transport, allowing players to play out air-land battle engagements. The advanced rules address a variety of engineering options, as well as extensive electronic warfare rules, and of course (!) weapons of mass destruction including chemicals and tactical nukes. If I seem to skim over the details of the additional rules it’s because one phrase adequately describes them: Well integrated. They’re simple, to the point, of a detail level commensurate with MSH, and they work! The designers’ notes are especially valuable to MSH, as they give a LOT of insight into the changes to the basic SH system made to encompass the modern era.

The equipment tables seem to contain data for most currently-fielded weaponry; I’ve not done a weapon-by-weapon count, but the Soviet/Russian inventory seems fairly complete, as does the US, UK, French, German, and Israeli equipment lists (OK - there’re no ROK vehicles…). The organization charts include ten American, five British, two French, five German, four Israeli, 16 Soviet, and 18 Arab division and independent regiments of various types, and allow players to game out most European or Mid-East scenarios. Conspicuously missing are any USMC organizations. I enquired about this shortly after obtaining the rules and was advised that the authors had simply run out of space, which, considering the amount of data contained within MSH’s covers, is certainly plausible. More importantly, they immediately posted the USMC’s organization charts on the Spearhead mailing list, making them available to anybody who wanted them! Oh - there are four basic scenarios included, two from the 1973 October War and two from the hypothetical 1984 Soviet invasion of Western Europe, to get players started. They include the usual features - simple but clear maps, orders of battle, special rules, and victory conditions - and appear quite straightforward and playable.

All in all, I think MSH maintains the spirit of SH, allowing fast-playing, enjoyable BIG games involving the full gamut of modern weaponry. Modern Spearhead is available from your local game shop for $29.95. Well recommended!

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