There's been a map hanging on the wall of my rec room for almost 20 years. I drew it to help with some sort of campaign background, but nothing exciting ever occurred… the map ignored me and I ignored the map. And then about four weeks ago, I suddenly asked myself: "Why is this thing hanging on the wall? Use it or lose it!"
The map portrays an island with 41 areas drawn on it… sort of a hexagonal pattern. There's a road system, and a number of towns within each area.
Due to the existence of an island, at first, I considered an invasion-type scenario… lots of landing forces fighting their way inland, etc., etc. Nope, too much trouble. And so I settled for an island revolution… the forces of the Brotherhood Of Love (BOL) decided to bring peace, light and harmony to the island, and in keeping with most revolutions, the only way to do this is to massacre most of the civilian population. The Local Government (LG) can't be everywhere all the time, and they can only react to the BOL uprisings, trying to keep the peace as best they can.
Initially, an LG force is composed of 10 stands, 10 tokens, wherein a stand represents a company. In similar fashion, a BOL force consists of 9 stands, as follows:
| Unit | LG | BOL |
|---|---|---|
| Infantry | 5 coys | 6 coys |
| Tank | 3 coys | 2 coys |
| Anti-tank | 2 coys | 1 coy |
For the first battle, I tossed percentage dice& the result was a 31, and so the first battle would be fought in Sector 31.
Note that since there are only 41 sectors, there's a 59 percent chance the dice toss would give a number greater than 41... in such an instance, I took this to mean there would be no rebel attack because the BOL forces would be building up for their next strike.
Each time the dice exceeded 41, I'd add one stand to the next BOL force which appeared to give battle. A couple of sequential lucky dice tosses for the BOL, and their force size would increase greatly. Most of the time, due to the structure of the reinforcement table, the BOL would add an infantry unit to its tally.
In the battle in Sector 31, the BOL troops were divided equally between the regions surrounding the two towns, Taras and Bulba (see map). The BOL had no way of knowing where the LG force would appear... and, in fact, neither did I. The toss of a die and the government troops appeared on Nil Road, heading east into Sector 31, directly toward Bulba.
A maximum of 2 units were allowed within a town. Defending Bulba were an infantry company and one tank company. Both fired at the leading LG infantry unit, and both scored hits, giving the target unit 2 casualty markers.
The LG unit took a morale test, failed, fell back, and received yet another casualty marker. Not a good beginning for the force bent on retaking the sector from the BOL.
There were 9 key parts to each half-bound of the sequence.
- 1. The Active Side (AS) moves all its troops, infantry and vehicles, 10 inches. Note that in this phase, all units move the same distance.
2. The Non-Active Side (NAS) fires.
3. The NAS moves its vehicles 10 inches. This is the phase during which vehicles receive their additional movement. Note that it occurs on the opponent's half of the bound.
4. The AS has a reaction phase. Here, the AS uses its Reaction Points (RP) to perform a number of 'bonus' actions (move or fire)
5. The NAS now reacts with its own RP (move or fire)
6. Close assault is resolved.
7. The AS issues its 'field orders'. As explained below, there are a number of 'special actions' which the AS may undertake.
8. This is an 'additional damage' phase. All units that incurred casualties (received damage markers) on Phases 2, 4, 5, and 6 now see if they suffer additional losses.
9. Both the AS and NAS receive additional RP
Phase 2, when the NAS fires, is fairly standard. A 10-sided die is thrown, and a basic resultant toss of 1-to-7 is a hit. The basic toss is modified... deduct 1 if the target is in cover, add +1 if a heavy tank is firing on a lighter tank, and so on. If hit, the target marks the hit on its data sheet, receives a casualty marker, and takes a morale test. If it fails the test, it falls back and receives another marker.
One of the ploys used during the firing phase is called 'coordinative fire'. Each side has a limited number of 'Fire Coordination' (FC) points (less than 6). Expenditure of an FC permits 2 units to coordinate fire as follows:
- 1. Each unit must be within range of the target.
2. There must be an officer within 5 inches of both firing units.
3. If both units hit, giving the target 2 casualty markers, it now receives a third marker
It's on Phase 8 when the units that bear markers throughout the half-bound will test for additional damage. Each type of unit's data sheet records its damage, together with the hits required for its destruction:
- Infantry 6 hits
Tank 7 hits
Anti-tank gun 6 hits
When the 'additional damage' die is tossed, each casualty marker on the unit adds +1 to the die roll.
- A toss of 1,2,3 No additional losses
A toss of 4,5,6,7 1 hit incurred
A toss of 8,9,10 2 hits incurred
Over 10 3 hits incurred
With a total of 6 hits completely taking out an infantry unit, a bad toss of the die can fairly well put a unit out of the battle.
The entire advancing LG force essentially centered their fire on the 2 rebel units in Bulba. Lots of markers on the tank unit, which, after its morale test, wisely retreated. Lots of markers on the infantry unit, which did not retreat, but hung on until, in the third bound, it simply disappeared under the weight of fire.
Around this time, I noted that the BOL defensive forces seemed to be giving more than they got. The LG troops were suffering badly... and after a brief investigation, I found out why. Note in the order of battle for the BOL force given above, there are supposed to be only 9 units, and of these, 2 are tanks. For some unknown reason, I had placed a third tank with the rebels, and they had made good use of it.
It was time to make things right again... a quick toss of the die, and one of the rebel tanks rumbled off the field.
But, given their bad start, the LG troops couldn't catch up. For example, in Phase 7 of the sequence, the AS gets to issue a number of 'field orders'. there are five such orders, and they include such things as:
- a. Repair one unit (reduce its losses by one hit)
b. Remove one casualty marker (note that the 'additional damage' phase comes next in the sequence, and it's important to remove as many casualty markers as possible)
c. Receive 2 coordinative fire points
d. Bring on a reserve unit (not applicable to this battle)
e. Transfer a heavy weapons unit (which provides additional fire power) to another infantry company. A heavy weapons unit is ordinarily attached to an infantry company, and if the infantry receives 6 hits, it's destroyed and so is the attached heavy weapons unit. When the infantry receive about 4 hits, therefore, it's wise to transfer the heavy weapons out of danger.
A dice toss decides if the side can select 1 or 2 or 3 of these bonus options.
So hard hit were the LG units, that they couldn't take advantage of the field orders phase.
Several times, the LG issued field orders to obtain additional coordinative fire points. These are valuable in that, if the target is hit by both coordinating units, the target then receives a third hit, which counts against it in the 'additional damage' phase. Unfortunately, it was rare that 2 government units, firing at the same target, could both strike successfully,. and so the third casualty marker never materialized.
After 11 full bounds, the LG force called it quits and pulled back. Sector 31 remained in BOL hands. The government lost 2 of its 3 tanks, 2 anti-tank guns, and 2 infantry companies, some 60 percent of its force.
That night, to celebrate, the freedom-loving BOL units massacred another 200 Sector 31 civilians, and peace finally came to the wartorn sector.
With Battle #1 under my belt, another dice toss determined the next battle sector... Sector 5, which held 2 towns. Again, I set out the BOL forces and diced to see on which road the government units would enter.
I should note that in this second battle, I used a different set of rules from the first battle. To differentiate between the two sets, call the first one "R1" and the second "R2". My intention is to use the campaign background as a test bed for a host of what I call 'modern rules'... which, by my broadband definition, starts around 1940 and goes up to the present day. In theory, if the campaign lasts long enough, I might be up to R66.
There was no 'coordinative fire' procedure in R2, but I did have 'opportunity fire' phases for both sides. When a side fired, I tossed a 10-sided die, and noted the number. Each time a different unit fired, the die was tossed again. When the accumulated die total reached 12, that finished the 'opportunity fire' phase for that side.
Another different approach in R2 was the use of Efficiency Levels (EL) for the units, as recorded on a data sheet. Each time a unit was targeted, it lost either 5 or 10 or 20 Damage Points (DP), and when a total of 30 DP were recorded, one EL was crossed off.
Each type of unit had a different EL content... for example, when an infantry unit lost 4 ELs, it was termed destroyed and removed from the field. A heavy tank unit required 6 ELs to be crossed off before it was considered destroyed.
In the second battle in Sector 5, the LG force poured onto the field, and just wouldn't be stopped. By Bound #5, one of the two towns had been captured and the BOL had lost one A/T gun, one tank and one infantry unit, a third of its forces (3 out of 9 units). At this point in time, the government force had lost nothing... one company tank had suffered extensive damage (lost 5 out of 6 ELs).
By Bound #6, it looked even worse for the BOL... I diced to see if the rebel BOL units would hang around for Bound #7... and they did (so much the worse for them).
Bound #9 finished off the bad guys, and the survivors retreated off board. Sector 5 was back in government hands.
The next battle will be fought sometime next week. Since there are only about 20 units on the table (10 for the LG, 9 for the BOL), the game flows quickly, even with the required data taking procedures.
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© Copyright 2000 Wally Simon
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