Back in January I received a veritable wargamers` red cross parcel courtesy of Craig over in the States. One of the exciting contents was a black box with PIQUET emblazoned in red on the cover. The box rattled and when I foolishly opened it whilst standing up, a torrent of dice, markers, measuring sticks, cards and charts cascaded onto the carpet. My immediate reaction was "What on earth has Craig gotten me into ?". The answer is PIQUET. I`ve not looked back since.
PIQUET is a set of wargames rules devised by Bob Jones which are unlike anything you`ve ever played before with miniatures. Believe me you`ll either love them or hate them, there`s no in between. It takes the form of a master set of rules which can be applied to practically any wargames pertiod. I say a standard set of rules, well, there`s actually three in one. Utilising the same overall system there are for want of a better desription - divisional, battalion and skirmish levels, each with it`s own amendments. In addition you can purchase different supplements which take various histirical periods in greater detail with the necessary period specific rules, army lists etc. LES GROGNARDS is the supplement covering the Napoleonic Wars, CARTOUCHE the supplement for the Seven Years War, and ARCHON is the ancients supplement. These supplements can be purchased either separately or in sets together with the master rules and all the dice, markers etc which heaped at my feet.
PIQUET completely does away with the you move, I move system which has hung around wargaming rules like a bad smell for so many years. In PIQUET, game turns are split into phases of different lengths. You have to think on your feet, assess the changing situation and plug away with your best or most tactically sound units . No more "I`ll just fire these guys at super, extreme range at your tank in case I kill it with a treble six", there may not be an opportinity to move or fire all your units in a Game Turn. Yes, this is realism come to the tabletop at last.
Probably the best way to explain how PIQUET works is to take you through a Game Move, but there`s a bit of work required before we fire the first shot :
Before the game commences you will have to consult the Leader Quality Table and use a D20 to determine the quality of your army commander and his subordinate leaders. Next, determine the quality of each unit in your army by rolling on the Unit Battle Quality Table. In all cases the initial quality level (BDV) is one of four die types - D4, D6, D8, or D 1 0 - which will then be modified up or down by nationality, weaponry and, unit type.
To determine the results of a combat situation the die type used by a leader or unit will be further adjusted by the situation - enfilading fire, cavalry vs square, target in entrenchments etc and then rolled against an unmodified D6. Obviously the better the unit the higher the die and greater chance of giving your opponent a good grubbing.
Once quality had been assessed you will have to draw cards from the Army Characterization card deck in order to characterise your tabletop army. Obviously the French army of 1940 will have a completely different character to the Germans or British. No longer are the only differences on the tabletop down to the shade of khaki or tank specifications. A French force with better tanks is likely to have circles run around it by an equal or smaller sized German force.
Each army commander now takes one of the included decks of game cards - known as a Sequence Deck - and adds or subtracts certain cards, including specially cards, for this particular army, period, or battle. Morale chips are variable too and will have to be alloted at the outset. The use of these chips will allow you to modify several aspects of your army's behavior at key moments.
Obviously all this preparation can be done on an evening before the game itself and can be as entertaining in itself as creating role-playing characters used to be.
To commence the game turn, each commander rolls a D20 (Command Die), to determine which side will gain the initiative or "impetus" to act in the first phase of the current turn.
The high roller begins turning cards in his sequence deck and may perform the actions allowed by the card - with his Command Groups (group of units), commanders, or individual units. The player may turn as many cards, or performs as many actions, as the difference between his initiative roll and his opponent's. These are called Impetus Points. (e.g. you rolled 15, opponent rolled 11. You have 4 impetus points to spend by turning cards, movingor firing units.) When one commander exhausts his impetus points, a phase of a turn is said to have ended.
The two army commanders then roll again for the new initiative and a new set of impetus points. Another phase now begins. If one commander should exhaust the cards in his deck, the turn is said to have ended, and excess impetus points are lost.
To begin a new turn, both sides reshuffle their sequence decks and start the first phase by rolling the Command Die for initiative and establishing the new impetus points for the high roller.
Note that rather than having actions such as movement, firing, charging, changing formation, testing morale etc., take place in a rigid structured sequence, these activities now ebb and flow in a more unpredictable and realistic manner. The army's leadership and quality will affect the number and type of cards in a sequence deck, and as these cards come up, the better commander (i.e. player) should be able to take advantage of his opponent, regardless of difference in size of armies or types of armoured vehicles etc.
"As in poker, it's not the luck of the draw, but what you do with that luck"
- Bob Jones.
Details of the design philosophy of the rules, product availability and costs can be found on the Piquet Web site at http://www.piquet.org. Bob`s design notes ran into eight pages like this when I downloaded them, but I found his thoughts refreshing and very much after my own. To sum up PIQUET ? To my mind, 'war' has at last come to "Wargaming".
US Rangers in Korean War scenario for PIQUET`s WW2 supplement POINT OF ATTACK in Gauntlet no.12.
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© Copyright 1998 by Craig Martelle Publications
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