The following are some house rules for Scorched Earth we've been playing with here in Moorhead, Minnesota.

Rule 9.F.1, Retreats. Change retreat priority 3 to 4 and insert a new priority: "3) to a hex closer to a supply line/source; if unable to decrease the distance, the unit must not increase the distance unless no other legal route exists; German c/m units may ignore this priority."

The new retreat priority is designed to keep defeated forces from retreating forward, an obnoxious abuse. German c/m units are permitted this ability reflecting their purported mastery of a fluid environment.

Rule 9.F.1, Retreats. Add at the end: "Units attacking from cities, forts or fortresses may ignore retreats."

The ability to ignore AR results when attacking from a city or fort/ fortress has two inspirations: first, why would a defeated attacker flee out of a defensive strongpoint due to any action it initiated? Even if badly beaten, such a force would surely only return to the safety of its startline, not retreat to possibly open ground behind such favorable and familiar terrain. Second, this rule allows a badly-pressed force in a city or fort to counterattack one of the hexes of its enemies without fear of being driven from its strongpoint due to its own initiative. An extreme example of this rule's applicability is a siege of Odessa or Tobruk: no defender in such a siege dares risk an AR--annihilating his force-- so he instead resists by dumbly sitting out each of his own turns. The proposed change allows a fighting defense in such a situation.

Rule 13--Overruns. Replace "The overrunning units must have a total attack strength sufficient to achieve 10:1 odds ... defensive air support" with "All overruns are resolved on the CRT. A penalty of a two column shift is applied to the attack, in addition to all other modifiers. An overrun may be attempted at any odds. If a DE result is rolled, the attacker may continue moving the overrunning force. Any other result is treated as a HX for the attacker and the force ends its movement immediately. The defending force suffers any negative result rolled by the attacker. If all defenders are forced to vacate the attacked hex, surviving attackers may occupy the emptied hex even if the overrun failed. The attacker may always attack normally in the combat phase."

Also, "German c/m units spend 1 MP to attempt an overrun. All other units spend 2 MPs."

This overrun rule is a simplification of Bill Stone's "Hot Rod Europa" rule printed in ETO #6, with later suggestions from that estimable 'zine. The advantage of the rule is that it makes an overrun-proof line impossible. While low odds overruns are now possible, danger exists to the attacker in casualties incurred by failing to get the DE result. A possible danger to Europa inherent in this rule is that some standard defensive positions no longer can be held with certainty. The first turn of FitE could become even more one-sided towards the Germans, something that probably isn't desirable. But in general, greater uncertainty is desirable. A defender cannot be certain of halting an advance cold, until the exploitation phase, as is now possible. And the attacker is now faced with the decision to attempt an overrun at the risk of wholly unnecessary losses at odds between 3:1 and 9:1. It's always preferable from a gaming point of view to confront the players with additional uncertainty and necessity to make these difficult choices.

Rule 14.A.1, Construction Engineers. Change the first paragraph to: "A construction unit may build a minor fort or regular fort in any hex, except one already containing a regular fort, fortress, or fortified area; two forts may not occupy the same hex. A regular fort may be constructed from a minor fort. The unit begins building a fort during its initial phase and must be in supply. It takes one game turn to build a minor fort in clear or rough terrain and two game turns to build a minor fort in any other terrain. It costs one RP to build a minor fort. A minor fort provides a defender with a -1 die modifier in combat. (Use a fort counter with a hit marker to represent a minor fort.) A minor fort may be upgraded into a regular fort after one additional turn of construction and the expenditure of one additional RP. A regular fort provides a defender with a -1 die modifier and negates AECA and AECD effects. If the construction unit leaves the hex at any time before the minor fort is built or is upgraded into a regular fort, the fort counter is removed or the hit marker remains in place. Quick construction (14.A.1.b) may be used to build regular forts, but without reducing the two RPs cost."

This "minor fort" rule is also adopted from a suggestion in ETO, Ken Kettering's "A Modest Proposal" (ETO #31/32). The ability to deny AECA is sometimes wildly abused, especially in FF and WD. The additional cost and additional time to accomplish this defensive tour de force is entirely warranted I think. This rule is just an expounding of Kettering's original ideas.

14.G, NKVD Political Troops. Change this section's heading to "Fanatical Troop Types." Add: "German SS units (except SS-Polizei) gain abilities similar to Soviet NKVD political troops units:

"Hold at All Costs: This is identical to the NKVD political troops rule except that the effect cannot be extended to non-SS in the hex and may only be used in defense.

"Conquer or Die (Siegen oder Untergehen): This order is issued only when attacking. It can only be issued to an attacking force half of whose REs are SS. If the CRT result is NE, this is changed to HX; all Axis losses must first be satisfied by SS units in the attack. AR results in all attacking SS suffering an EX based upon the defending force's strength, the defenders are unaffected, and surviving attackers retreat.

"Both orders may be issued at any time before the die resolving the attack is rolled, but not after. The decision to issue either order is made separately for every attack."

We haven't playtested this rule yet; I hope some of you will give it a try and report your experiences. Obviously it's inspired by Hitler's use of the SS as a tire brigade and their fantastic willingness to follow his most bloodyminded orders.

25.C, Airborne Ground Operations, and 14.H.2, Commandos--Surprise Attack. Add: "A paratroop drop constitutes a kind of surprise attack. Paratroops add a +1 die modifier to any attack in which at least one RE of airborne units drop successfully without disruption. Smaller airborne forces provide the +1 bonus if a favorable roll on the Success Table is made. Attacks consisting entirely of dropped airborne units gain a +2 bonus

Europa gamers have been struggling to simulate the advantages paratroopers ought to have in combat for some time now. Currently, Malta cannot be seriously threatened by airborne invasion; many historical successes of the airborne arm are suicidal enterprises if per-formed in Europa. Airborne forces are definitely underrated I feel. Surely the value of paratroops when used in conjunction with a ground attack was greater than the mere addition of their combat strength. A paratroop drop is the epitome of a surprise attack; the expansion of the surprise attack rule to airborne ops is appropriate. Airborne units usually operated as part of important attacks-- the German assault in the Low Countries, the Russian crossing of the Dnepr, the British Sicilian campaign, and Overlord and Market-Garden. The +1 bonus to the attack will encourage the historical use of paratroops as extra spice in such major attacks. The +2 bonus for all-para ops enables a recreation of the Merkur operation. WitD's paratroop withdrawal rule should be used in conjunction with this rule, to avoid abuse. In comparison, commandos-who never suffer withdrawal (no pun intended) and require no planning to be used in combat--are more liable to abuse than my expanded paratroopers. It's been suggested that airborne units be considered supported when dropping- -again, to boost their combat effectiveness to something like their historical value. I've always thought "support" should mean just that--artillery support or support by some similarly complementary arm, and not a mere bonus when we feel some elite unit is undervalued versus conventional enemies. I think the surprise attack bonus is a more elegant treatment for airborne's undereffectiveness.

Let me add that my local circle of friends have been using David Berry's two-dice Ground CRT (from ETO #30) and incremental odds figuring (using calculator and percentile dice). [But see John Astell's more recent 2D6 CRT in ETO #40.] The overrun and airborne surprise attack rules have worked well in conjunction with these variants. I see no reason why they shouldn't elsewhere.