Guts ‘N Glory

WWII Rules

Review By Bill Rutherford

This set of WW II rules is pre-punched for a loose-leaf binder and includes 48 pages of rules, eight pages of American, Soviet, German, and British equipment charts, a photocopiable record sheet, and five scenarios spread over 10 pages.

These rules were designed with 12mm (1/160th scale) figures in mind, though other scales will work equally well, space permitting. Squads are broken into three fire-teams (regardless of historical organization) that each have two or more figures in them. I haven’t tried to play these rules using squads with only a pair of fire-teams in them but there’s scope here to increase or decrease the flexibility of one’s forces by varying the number of fire-teams (e.g., bad command control might predicate a single fire-team squad, that sort of thing). Considerable effort is gone to, to describe a simple method of magnetically attaching individual figures to the fire-team bases because during game play figures may need to be removed… In the larger scales I’d eliminate the magnetic bases and simply move the troops individually. Time and distance scales are unspecified, though both are likely pretty short, given the scope of the game.

Basic platoon organization in game-terms is discussed, as are multiple-platoon combined arms teams. Radios are important and comm is probabilistic. No comm limits leaders’ ability to give orders. There are several troop quality/morale levels that govern how quickly they can act, how long they’ll stick around, etc. Leaders, from the squad-leader on up, are critical to game play, as they issue the orders that allow their units to move and fight. Orders are plotted for units by their commanders, down to the fire-team (by its squad-leader). This sounds like more effort than it is; orders are simple and control a side’s “plan” more than they do specific units’ actions during a turn… Morale checks can be triggered by bad things or may take place simply because of bad situations, and are tested for in the same general way as all other dice rolls in GNG, by rolling a required score or less on one of a number of types of dice. Leaders may try to rally troops in bad morale in a similar manner.

Dice roll modifiers are minimized in GNG, the die-types themselves changing, instead. Game provides a use for all of those old 4, 8, 12, and 20-sided dice (in addition to the D6s and D10s) you have laying around… Typically one is trying to roll a number or less on the dice, so the worse the condition, the lower quality the unit, etc., the larger the die they roll.

Movement “standard”, that is, troops move fixed distances, modified by terrain. Though orders are plotted, movement and combat are generally sequential, depending upon the various troops’ initiatives and orders. Spotting is probabilistic and is very situational, both of which are good things.

Fire combat is unit-to-unit and is executed troop-by-troop with hits randomly applied to the target unit. The normal range of die modifiers (that, now, alter the type of die being rolled) apply, summarized on a single chart. The rules recommend having a lot of dice on-hand as a largish firefight can result in a veritable dice-fest. Vehicular combat is quite simplified in the interests of speed of play and in recognition of the fact that most combat will take place at short (or shorter) range but works pretty well - and fast… It elegantly and simply takes into account basic armor and gun classes, and gives (from my admittedly limited experience) convincing results. Vehicle data covers mainly the latter stages of the war and the lists are pretty basic. On the plus side, the lists give the gamer all of the ground-rules necessary to quickly come up with game statistics for anything not on the lists.

Each of the five scenarios lays out the forces involved, with one or two variant OOBs, and includes clear deployment instructions and victory conditions, as well as a basic but completely functional map. There’re historical notes for each scenario but they’re somewhat generic (e.g., you’re commanding a platoon from Patton’s 3rd Army…) Scenario sizes range from a squad per side up to two platoons per side and all look quite playable.

The authors did a pretty good job of coming up with a single, simple mechanic with which to handle most (all?) game situations and they addressed all of my hot-button game issues (e.g., spotting, morale, command control) in a consistent manner that allows the players to focus on playing the game and destroying the enemy… Recommended!

Available from your local game shop for $19.95 or, failing that, directly from the GTB Entertainment Group at 22924 Lyons Ave. #209, Newhall, CA 91321. Visit their website at http://www.marccanu.com/gng.htm for rules add-ons, errata, scenarios, product announcements, etc.

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