How often has this happened in one of your games? The attack begins to bog down, your opponents huddle in a comer and in a whisper change their entire plan. Your opponents are implicit) assuming that they have the ability to talk without being overheard In reality, this was often not the case. The only secure means of tactical communications over a distance were telephones, messengers, and coded radio. The last two were slow and not suited to conversations. Telephones were good for immediate contact, but the lines were fixed and fragile. An attacker soon advanced beyond the phone lines; a defender had to deal with lines being cut by saboteurs or artillery. A rule that captures a little of the flavor of this dilemma is the following: Before a game starts, or anytime during it, the referee can declare that a side has insecure communications. Once a side has insecure communications, all talk between players must take place at the table in a normal tone, unless their senior command stands are in contact. Players may also send messages to each other via runner a jeep. This rule should probably not be used all the time but it makes for an interesting variation. The first time that it is in use, players are liablr to have fits as they seek an obscure way to say "Send the KV-1s over to my side." Back to Table of Contents -- Command Post Quarterly #2 To Command Post Quarterly List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1993 by Greg Novak. 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