THE LAST FULL MEASURE (LFM) is a set of unpublished rules generated by PW member, Ron Prillamen. Ron is extremely knowledgeable about the ACW...he’s a re-enactor, and runs around in the hot sun, sweating under his blue-serge uniform, and toting his 100 pound musket. He has an intimate knowledge about the weaponry, the formations, and the command structure of the ACW. He appeared in the movie GETTYSBURG, and proudly displays a photo of him and General Robert E Lee (Martin Sheen). About 15 years ago, Ron came up with his "Penny Rules"...25mm ACW figures mounted singly on pennies, and LFM is the current version.
From the start, I always avoided the Penny Rules for the simple reason that when a man was hit, they’d tip his figure over on the side and let it rest there, for the remainder of the battle, to indicate a casualty. Alas! LFM hasn’t changed a thing. You’d think that in 15 years, Ron would have discovered the existence of casualty figures. Several times during the game, I tried to remove the ‘dead’ men from the field, but Ron put ‘em back. This ploy, of course, instantly translates LFM into a Class AAA Abomination... the battlefield is littered with horrible looking tipped-over figures.
For our battle, Ron drew up three possible scenarios, and gave the Union and Confederate sides an order of battle. I was a Yankee commander, and I think we had some 28 infantry units to apportion amongst the three scenarios. We took our 28 units and assigned them to the scenarios. Ron then tossed a die to decide which scenario, which battle, we’d fight.
Amongst our units were some elite ones, some veteran ones, some regular, and some green. We indicated which would show up on which battlefield, and we Yankees lucked out. We had assigned all our rotten units, green ones, to the scenario which wasn’t chosen.
Each unit on the field had 30 figures in it, 30 men. I couldn’t tell if the unit represented a brigade (a la FIRE AND FURY)...or what? After the game, Ron stated he thought a unit was a single regiment, and the rules were oriented toward single-figure skirmishing. But there was a problem with this definition. For example, in melee, the system appeared to use unit-on-unit procedures (all 30 men involved), while if a unit entered a "house", only 2 figures could fire from a portal, a door or window...thus reverting to skirmish configuration.
The gaming table measured 6 feet across and 12 feet long. The Yanks baseline was the north one, that of the Confederates, the south. The scenario mandated that all Union forces entered from the very north-west corner of the field, while the Rebel forces entered directly opposite them, from the south-west corner. This made for a slow, slow buildup of forces.
The distance that a unit moved was governed by the toss of a 6-sided die, and with regiments moving at an average of around 8 or 9 inches, merely to reach the center of the field (a distance of 6 feet) took around 7 to 9 turns. The advance was held up even more by the wooded terrain...this reduced movement distance by another 4 inches.
And so, to my mind, we wasted a lot of time moving on. I thought the scenario could have been accelerated, and we could have gotten down sooner to the serious business of killing each other, by instituting a number of "strategic moves", wherein the forces could have moved up much longer distances, perhaps 20 or 30 inches.
Order Chitties
The heart of LFM lies in its order chitties. Years ago, Ron had made up a number of pennies, annotated with orders. All participants placed their penny-order-chitties next to their units, all revealed them at the same time, and then we went down the priority listing in which the various orders were to be carried out.
Ron knew what he wanted to do, and I tried to follow the sequence, but the rule sheets he gave out differed greatly from what was going on the table. For the first 5 or so turns, I was confused about the sequence...it didn’t seem to follow any of the listings I had. LFM definitely needs an update in the word processor.
The sequence, when it finally was revealed to me, was:
- (a) The first phase was a "routing phase". All units that had failed a morale test on the previous turn, were now moved back.
(b) All units that had chitties for "First Fire", immediately fired. Casualties of the target unit were removed, i.e., tipped over on their sides (yuch!). Note, also, that the targeted unit did not take a morale test...that came later in the sequence.
(c) Any unit that had taken casualties now tossed a "straggler" die...a 6-sided die that told of how many stragglers temporarily ran off from their unit and had to be rallied later in the bound.
- Note that anywhere from 1 to 6 men could run off, and during the battle there were, at times, as many functioning men in the units as stragglers. These stragglers continuously got in the way, and were pushed this way and that, and were, in general, a bother. Sometimes there were so many of them, they resembled full-size units. I suggested that we completely remove the stragglers from the table until they could be rallied...but no, Ron said they had to remain on the field. In fact, I can quote Ron, who said: "I gotta figure out a system to tell apart the guys still functioning from the stragglers!" Shades of the Simon Rally Zone! Now I fully appreciate the use of my off-board Rally Zone...it clears the field of a bunch of not-needed figures.
The straggler problem was exacerbated by another ploy. When a unit tossed its movement dice, if it tossed a 6, it moves its maximum distance, but stragglers took off. One of the participants didn’t take kindly to this. "That’s ridiculous!" was his comment.
(d) Now we return to the chitty list, and we look at those units that have had a "Charge Order" placed next to them. They take a morale test, and if they pass, in they go. The melee result is not adjudicated until later.
(e) Units that have "Change Formation" on their chitties do so.
(f) Now, all units with "Regular Move" chitties move on the field. They dice for movement distance and advance.
(g) The next chitty is "Fire". Here, too, as in Phases (b) and (c), the target unit knocks over its casualty figures (yuch!), and then tosses a "straggler" die (more people run off, littering the field with stragglers).
(h) Now we resolve melee, resulting from the contacts previously made.
(i) This is a morale-testing phase. All units that lost men due to fire in Phases (b) and (g) took a morale test.
- Each unit tossed a number of 6-sided dice, and the total had to be less than the number of men remaining in the unit. Around 5 dice were thrown (elite units tossed 4) and so with units starting out with 30 men, it was difficult, at first, to fail the test.
Initially, to fail, you had to toss a 6 on each of your dice. But I noted that as more and more men died, or ran off as stragglers, more and more units failed. I have no idea of why the morale test was delayed thusly in the sequence, instead of being instituted immediately in the firing phases.
(j) Here, I’m still not clear, but I think this last phase was a rally phase. On this phase, units that had a "Halt" order chitty could do one of two things. First, you could rally a unit that had previously failed a morale test by tossing its multiple dice. Second, if a unit hadn’t done anything during the bound, you could toss a 6-sided rally die for each unit with stragglers, and bring back the number of stragglers shown on the die.
The above indicates that there are 10 phases to the bound. It’s difficult to keep track of which phase is the current one. Some sort of "clock", listing the phases, with an arrow set to point to the current phase, would be a great help. Ron, acting as host and umpire, did admirably well in keeping us on track.
Ron’s boast was that LFM was a "faster" set of rules than other sets, i.e., the bounds took less time than other tactical rules sets. I didn’t notice any "fasterness"... in proceeding through the 10 phases, it seemed to play out like any other set I’ve tried.
As a tactical set of rules, LFM is pretty good. A unit can’t move and fire, since it can only be assigned one chitty. And so the participant has to choose between moving up or firing...if the enemy plays a fire chitty, the advancing unit takes casualties on its way forward. Once in position, the tendency is to simply always play a "First Fire" chitty, and do as much damage to the enemy as you can before your own units are blown away, both from actual casualties and from the straggler ploy.
When hit, certain units (skirmishers, artillery) had savings throws tossed in. I’m not a believer in savings throws...I think their effect could have been taken into account in the original probability-of-hit calculations.
Firing
When firing, LFM reverted to 12-sided dice. Why? I dunno. The basic hits occurred on tosses of 10, 11, or 12...causing a casualty rate of 25 percent. But the number of dice varied according to the range.
| At point blank range...up to 4 inches | 1 die per firing man |
| A range of 4 to 10 inches | 1 die per every 2 men |
| A range of 10 to 20 inches | 1 die per every 3 men |
| A range of 20 to 40 inches | 1 die per every 6 men |
Most firing occurred in the range of 10 to 20 inches. A 30-man regiment thus tossed 10 dice. Thus with a 25 percent casualty rate, each unit firing took out 2 to 3 figures. And don’t forget the stragglers.
In my command were several 30-man infantry units. And I arranged them in line, one in back of the other. My ploy was to give the first, most forward, unit a "First Fire" order chitty. The second unit in line had a regular "Fire " chitty and the third unit had a "Move" chitty.
The unit in the front fired on its "First Fire" chitty. But, so did the enemy...and the result was to cause great gaps in my front line, produced by both actual casualties and the stragglers taking off.
Then I waited until the regular fire phase, when the second line’s muskets fired right through the first line. The rule was that if you tossed a 1 on a firing die, the second rank would hit some poor soul in the first firing line...but I was banking on that not to happen.
After the regular firing phase comes movement, and my third line, with its "Move" chitty, now moves through both forward lines and becomes my new front line.
Is this clever, or is this clever? You can only do this for a couple of times, because the casualty rate is horrendous, and pretty soon, you’ve got nothing left in any of the three lines.
Because of the high casualty rate, there were few melees. Ron said he didn’t expect any.
I placed one of my elite units in my front line in skirmish order, and gave it a "Charge" chitty. I lucked out, since the enemy unit it was charging tossed rotten fire dice, and the unit took only 1 casualty. But later in the sequence, when my second line fired, one of its own fire dice produced a 1...hence it hit the charging unit in the back. Not good. But, again I lucked out, for the die I tossed for stragglers was low, and few men deserted.
Finally came the phase in which melee was to be resolved.
In truth, I don’t remember how the calculations went...but, as I mentioned before, it was a unit-on-unit affair. I think that each unit in the combat received a certain number of points. I got a point or so for being elite, and another couple of points for having my General charge with the unit, but I got a negative for being in skirmish order. I had previously placed the unit in a skirmish formation to reduce the effect of enemy fire...that had worked, but now I suffered in melee.
We each tossed a couple of dice...it was fairly close, but my elites lost and ran back.
Of interest to me was LFM’s listing of ACW artillery...there were 6 types of field pieces on the chart...6#, 12#, howitzer, 3 inch rifle, 10# Parrot, 12# Whitworth. All very historically accurate. But I pointed out to Ron that 4 of the guns had the same parameters...they fired the same. Why list them? Ron had no answer.
Another LFM ploy was to "pot-the-General". When a General helped a unit out (raised its morale level, added points in melee, etc.), he was subject to "sniper fire". Somewhere in the field, a sniper took aim at him, and the toss of a 12 on a 12-sided die said that the General had cashed in his chips.
LFM produced a good game. But Ron has got to get rid of his stragglers...get them off the field. And he’s got to go back to his word processor to turn out the rules as they’re played, not as they’re currently written out.
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© Copyright 2001 Wally Simon
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