Targeted for a 1990 release date, For Whom the Bell Tolls is currently in the playtesting stage. Over thirty draft "pre-playtest" kits have been distributed since the end of last November, with about half of the recipients responding in some manner. Their feedback has already generated a great deal of much appreciated errata, with more (I'm sure) on the way.

FWBT began rather innocently as a possible article I was writing on upgrading and revising the rules set for No Pasaran [They shall not pass!], published in The Grenadier #27. I had been fortunate enough to playtest NP with John Gee, and assist him with his design (most of this "assistance" being clerical in nature). John persuaded me that a more substantial revision would be desirable, including the integration of several order of battle modifications and additions he had come across since his earlier research. More importantly, he was able to convince Winston Hamilton to consider and support FWBT as a full-fledged Europa title. What follows is a brief overview of the current components of the draft.

ORDERS OF BATTLE

John Gee will be covering his work on the OBs in detail in a future issue of the Europa magazine. There will be several changes which should be apparent to veterans of NP, including revised units ratings (primarily manifested in the form of lower attack and movement factors) for many of the infantry and artillery formations on both sides (over half of all Loyalist infantry divisions are now rated as 2-3-5's and the Nationalists, who could formerly deploy as many as 41 divisions with 5(+) AFs in NP, now have only 16 of the beasties in FWBT.

Yet another political faction, the Falangists (Spanish fascists), has been broken out from the preexisting Nationalist units. A third paramilitary organization, the Guardia de Asaito (a creation of the young Republic, represented as police), has joined the Guardia Civil (security) and Carabineros (border). Several naval infantry and Interventionist Kondor Legion and CTV) support units have also been added as a result of further research on John's part. The Insurgent air force has been broken out into its constituent parts: the Nationalist air force proper, the Konclor Legion, and the Aviazione Legionaria. Several Anarchist brigades raised later in the war, and in "The Republic of Malaga", have been added to further augment the already embarrassingly large collection of marginally effective Loyalist units.

Perhaps most significantly, the order of appearance for many of the northern Gobernito (Asturian, Basque, Catalan, and Santandero) infantry formations has been tied to Insurgent activity, helping to address the problem of early collapse by these "little governments" when confronted with the earlier-than-historical campaign in the North inevitably chosen by Nationalist players in NP.

MAPS

When the project began, John and I assumed that we would have some flexibility in modifying the existing maps from Spain and Portugal (map 23) and Fall of France (western half of map 17), and that the result would be, like the game itself, a stand-alone item (i.e., not necessarily a component of Grand Europa).

John had come across a rather detailed railroad map of the Iberian peninsula which suggested the need for some minor revisions to the Spanish rail net. Additionally, we were interested in seeing the terrain in both the Basque country (the northeastern coastal region of Spain) and the southern/eastern (depending on which north you're using: true, magnetic, or Europa) end of the Ebro valley represented as rough rather than clear hexes. Finally, the addition of point cities and regional boundaries was desired, in order to facilitate the implementation of various rules mechanics we planned on including.

While laying out the regional boundaries was fairly straight forward, choosing some criteria for the inclusion of the point cities was not so obvious. Population seemed a good place to start, but after obtaining and studying the census figures for Spain it became apparent that even the existing stratification of Europa's major, dot, and reference cities didn't always fit into clean categories (Teruel, with no permanent airfield and a population only half that of any other Spanish reference city represented on the maps, was the most blatant example). A cut off figure of 25,000 persons was originally chosen as the level necessary for inclusion as one of the "newn point cities, with any provincial capitals not already included being thrown in as well.

Enter Europa's renaissance man, Arthur Goodwin. Arthur (unbeknownst to us) had already been working on maps, not only for Spain, but for Europa as a whole. His typically well- researched and thorough efforts have yielded maps which are far superior to anything that John and I could have produced ourselves. Ambiguous coastal hexsides have been eliminated; rail lines added, revised and reclassified as high or low capacity (with most of the former "roads" on the Spanish maps properly elevated to this latter category); port capacities differentiated; and the inclusion of point cities rationalized (with cities over 20,000 persons in 1940, provincial capitals, significant ports, and important rail junctions now incorporated).

Additionally, Arthur has added five reference cities, promoted Sevilla and Gijon to partial hex and dot city status respectively, and sent Teruel down to the minor leagues to join the other 81 point cities in Spain, Spanish Morocco, and the Balearic Islands (this last geographical entity yet another new "feature").

RULES

Despite the advantages of an already existing core system, and even a published game on the same subject, working on the rules set for FWBT has been a very humbling experience. Whenever and wherever possible, I have swiped John Astell's (and John Gee's) prose word for word. I've also borrowed liberally from the many fine submissions published in both ETO and TEN by those disciples of the system who have contributed so much to its growth and improvement over the last several years (though the selection process has been admittedly arbitrary up until now). Most important to me has been the support and assistance of the local wargaming grognards, the Bros, particularly David Bolt. While the Bros' reputation for irreverence is well earned and worn with much pride, they are very experienced with and knowledgeable of the Europa system, and their comments and suggestions have been uniformly constructive.

The most obvious changes to the system result from the upgrading of the basic rules set from one based on FitE to one based on SE, with a healthy dose of WitD thrown in (Bill Stone has already explored and covered much of this synthesis in his "Hitler Turns South" scenario, and General Stein articles in ETO). Wherever applicable, SE enhancements (such as the 1/7th AEC/ATEC proportion, partisan attacks, local drafting, etc.) have been adapted and included. Among the subsystems exported from the desert, the most crucial is the concept (and mechanic) of attack supply. This was an idea which had been considered as far back as NP and rejected as being an unnecessary complication. Besides, limiting the logistics for both sides would get in the way of "settling hash," a phrase used around these parts to describe seriously offensive behavior (i.e., a lot of combat).

One of the most endearing qualities of NP was the wild and crazy, non-stop, thrill-a- minute action, particularly during its opening turns. While this may have had little historical validity, it sure was fun, and I played out the first months again and again (and again), always rolling to see which way the peacetime, regular army would go. David Bolt aptly described this phenomena as want roller derby," and after a single playtest, he became an ardent (and convincing) advocate for the necessity of utilizing steps of attack supply (half as big as those in Western Deserit/Torch, i.e., each step allowing only 5 REs, rather than 10, to attack at full strength) to properly reflect the lack of ammunition on both sides. (German and Italian formations, lavishly supplied relative to the Spanish units, are considered to be in attack supply whenever able to trace a line to an Insurgent owned port.)

Other WitD concepts include discrete rail depots located at major and dot city hexes (which can attenuate as the war drags on and the depots themselves change sides) and the simpler air replacement system, used with the Interventionist air forces (both the Germans and Italians were able to maintain their air strengths at relatively stable levels, despite losses, throughout the conflict by drawing upon the pilots and aircraft of the Luftwaffe and Regia Aeronautica).

Fundamental to FWBT are many of the special rules relating to the Spanish Civil War originally used in NP. Militia unreliability (being unable to count on formations attacking or defending normally during the opening months of the campaign) is still here, although utilizing one die roll per combat rather than one per militia unit (another David Bolt suggestion) facilitates execution of the mechanic, and some Insurgent units (Falangist and Requete) are now afflicted as well.

Artillery points (whose less specific precursors in NP, equipment points, were borrowed from Their Finest Hour) are yet another reflection of the shortages endemic to the conflict. While perhaps unnecessary when dealing with the (by comparison) well equipped armies of WWII, supporting arms (or lack thereof) were a serious consideration in Spain. The advent of the civil war and the attendant level of mobilization of the unarmed populations on both sides brought with it a demand for armaments, particularly artillery, that far exceeded the capabilities of Spain's domestic industry to meet. While the Rebels (thanks to their Interventionist benefactors, particularly Italy) had less difficulty in this regard than the Loyalists, both sides relied heavily on foreign shipments right up through the end of the war.

The Insurgent naval blockade of Loyalist reinforcements arriving from overseas (c/m and artillery, steps of attack supply, artillery points, and armor RPs, most of these having been purchased from the Soviet Union) is still abstracted with a revised NP/ WitD naval blockade table.

The reinforcements and replacement rules (given the large and varied cast of characters on both sides) are still complex and detailed, reflecting the diverse ways in which units appeared, evolved, and (when necessary) were replaced. The ability of the Insurgents to use a limited number of Colonial, Falangist, and Requete infantry RPs when building (and rebuilding) Nationalist divisions, for instance, may seem like just another bit of confusing chrome (even, at times, to the designers themselves), but it reflects an important advantage which the centralized dictatorship of Franco held over the chronically fractious Loyalist coalition of semi-autonomous, separatist governments (the Gobernitos), far-left radical movements (the Anarchists and P.O.U.M., these latter anti- Stalinist Marxists), and the Republic itself (predominantly Socialist when the revolt broke out, by the end of 1937 it had evolved into a pro-Soviet, communist dominated government, a process largely facilitated by the refusal of any other European government, save the USSR, to support it.

Political rules in FWBT (like those for reinforcements and replacements) are necessarily detailed. The reluctance of the Gobernitos to commit their own forces in any endeavor not directly related to their own defense is handled with deployment restrictions, now implemented on a regional basis (thanks to Arthur's boundaries), rather than an artificial radius around their capital/supply sources.

The constantly changing attitude of France (Europe's other Popular Front government) towards supporting the Republic is still handled through the mechanic of a French Border Table, which from time to time allows overseas shipments to avoid the Insurgent naval blockade by off-loading in French ports and then moving into Loyalist controlled Spain via a friendly border hexside/rail line.

Pacification (an euphemism used to describe the oft-times brutal suppression and outright murder of "enemy" civilian populations by an occupying military force) is a crucial element of FWBT, and one which both sides (particularly the Insurgents, who were capturing most of the enemy-held territory) had to deal with. Captured cities are pacified by being garrisoned, with the number of REs and turns based on the type/size of the city itself. Once pacified, cities provide an intrinsic defense strength for the owning player (again, based on type).

Various "Bro Rules" (i.e., rules developed by David Berry and appearing in his Bro scenarios) have been borrowed. These include limited intelligence (organizing stacks and/or employing corps markers to limit the other player's knowledge of their contents), incremental ground CRT (rolling for the next odds level on a ten-sided die if the ratio is at least half way there, which partially offsets the defensive advantage gained with limited intelligence), battalion stacking (allowing two battalions of the same type and affiliation to stack together as a single non- divisional unit), and entrenchments (bestowing upon stacks containing divisions which remain in the same hex for several turns a -1 die mod to reflect the digging of trenches, laying of wire, registration of artillery, etc.).

Whether or not these (and other) rules will be included in the final game will depend largely on feedback from the playtesters and, most importantly, John Astell himself. His upcoming review/edit of the current rules set, further contributions to it (particularly those new Grand Europa mechanics appearing in Second Front), and decisions regarding whether rules are to be included as core, special, advanced, optional, or post-publication, ultra-optional, semi-subversive suggestions by the designers will be appreciated and welcomed.

Acknowledgements

I would like to take this opportunity to again thank the aforementioned David Bolt (who has played 181 turns of FWBT with me over the last year and a half, and contributed immeasurably to the evolution of the game), Arthur Goodwin (who not only provided the maps, but ably served as our quality control in reviewing the various drafts), Bill Stone (from whom I borrowed many rules relating to the supply and rail systems), Harald Hansen (a NP playtester and the only person who has played that game more than John Gee and me, he has already solitaired a complete FWBT campaign game and provided a great deal of valuable feedback), and all the other playtesters who have spent time on this game so far, especially Greg Bartels, David Berry, Bobby Bryant, Dennis Dubberley, Victor Hauser, Fred Helfferich, Roy Lane, Andrew Pollack, Gary Stagliano, Shelby Stanton, and Joseph Youst.