The following is a description of an encounter using the rules just outlined. We did make one change: while the rules prescribe that the percentage chance for a second action for a brigade is the Brigadier's points times 10, i.e., (BFxlO), we halved this percentage to make it a "more risky" procedure. It becomes riskier in the sense that if the attempt to get a secono action fails, the entire brigade remains immobile for that turn. In the article on the ACW Hamilcar T. Valgus campaign (REVIEW, September '88), 1 mentioned that General Valgus had the effrontery to invade Territory Simon, confronting the Lion of the West, and that I, the Lion himself, was cogitating as to what my best response should be. My choice was to either move my southern- stationed troops north, or to take a unit or so from my Headquarters and march south to intercept the enemy. In this campaign, Hurst, Haub and Simon are battling against a "randomized enemy", in that Valgus' movement, and his strength, are governed by a series of tables. I chose to march south with two brigades of infantry, each of two regiments, and two guns. It turned out that Valgus's force, in its random movement maneuvers, not only entered my territory, but actually moved to intercept me, entering a field in which my boys were encamped. It also turned out, when the dice were thrown, that Valgus' force was composed of three brigades: two of infantry, and one of cavalry, plus two guns. Artillery aside, I was outnumbered, seven regiments to four. The tables governing the size of Valgus' troops indicate that his forces will range from one brigade of two regiments, to a small division of three infantry brigades plus cavalry plus artillery. One of the objectives in the campaign was to keep the battles fairly small and simple and quick. In battles we've fought so far, this has been accomplished... none have run over two hours. As mentioned in the earlier. article, since the size of a Valgus' detachment is not known until it is actually contacted, we also threw in the probability that i,, was a "dummy" of zero strength, i.e., no force at all. But here, however, the dice did me in, and I was committed to battle with 7:4 odds against Bob Hurst took the part of Valgus, assisted by a fella who had never played the rules before, and we set out our troops as shown on the accompanying map. All encounters in the campaign are considered as "Set piece" battles, in which both sides place their forces up to two feet from their baselines. Musketry ranges out to 20 inches, and the intent is get the troops into the fight as soon as possible. Being outnumbered, I took the defense, trying to run my 1st Brigade out to Nicholsville, and sheltering my guns, protected by the 2nd Brigade, in the rocky area known, for some strange reason, as the Rocks. Map The map is annotated in accordance with the following: Points A,B: Valgus' cavalry came on the field in the east just north of Nicholsville at Point A, and then, for some reason, the new fella, running Hurst's left flank, decided to reverse field and gallop his horsemen way to the west to Point B. This dash to the west took them out of the battle for over half of the game, and more importantly, left the defense of Nicholsville to a two- regiment brigade of Valgus' infantry. Point C My 1st Brigade went north up the Road, trying to get into Nicholsville before the oncoming Rebels. Unfortunately, Nicholsville was closer to the opposing baseline, and the other side took the town. Seeing this, I sent one regiment, the 6th North Dakota, into the Woods where they kept up a covering fire on the town. Point D The other regiment, the 2nd North Dakota Zouaves, went out to Point D, where they formed line facing the town and slowly advanced on Nicholsville. As an item of interest, the 1st Brigade's Commander stayed in the Woods with the 6th North Dakota. This meant that his Zouaves, out to the east of Nicholsville, were urescorted, and were some 25 inches from the Brigade Commander. I mention this because the rules mandate that this distance from the Brigade Commander is imposed as a negative modifier on a unit's morale level. Remember that in the morale phase, the opposing commander gets to choose which of Your units will check morale. When a Morale card was drawn in the sequence, therefore, indicating that my troops had to test morale, the opposition would point to the 2nd North Dakota Zouaves as one of the units chosen, to take advantage of the huge decrement to the 2nd's morale level. Morale level is BFxCF, and at the outset, with no losses, when the BFxCF product was 100%, the -25 decrement brought the 2nd's morale level down to 75%. As the battle continued, and the 2nd took losses and its CF factor decreased, its morale level sank even lower. I am happy to report that the 2nd North Dakota Zouaves did themselves proud... never once did they fail a morale test as they advanced on Nicholsville, closed with the defending Rebels and drove them out of the town. In fact, so wondrously effective were both regiments of my 1st Brigade that they annihilated the opposing brigade, i.e., both opposing enemy regiments disintegrated completely, all their circles being crossed off, and their CF factors being reduced to less than 5. This, in part, was due to two factors: 1. First, I somehow managed to throw high dice rolls during the firing routines, hence every time my boys blasted away, they knocked off the maximum number of circles from the target's CF tally. 2. Second, when the opposing commander saw he was being peppered at so effectively from the Woods by the 6th North Dakota, he tried to mass his brigade, and charge the Woods to clear it before the advancing Zouaves came in from the east of town at Point 0. In so doing, in his desire to get into contact with the 6th, he attempted to double-move several times, i.e., to get a second action for his brigade. His percentage chance of doing so was (1/2) (BFx10), which, when the BF was 9, equated to 45%. Unfortunately, he failed his dice throw several times in a row, and for those movement/fire phases, his brigade was immobile and remained a sitting target. And then, when his double action finally came through, his units refused to enter the Woods! The terrain rule is that there is a 70% chance that a unit passes through rough terrain unhindered on any given turn. The Rebel regiments, thanks to the dice, just couldn't see their way to entering the dank, dark woods where the 6th North Dakota lie in wait. Points E, F: My artillery was set up in the Rocks at E, while the Rebel guns were at Point F. Both did good work on the opposition but, I must admit, minedid better. Better, because Valgus infantry was trying to close with my units, continually shortening the range. I, on the other hand, on the defense, played back, forcing the opposing artillery to take relatively long shots at my own troops. Point G Here, alongside my batteries in the Rocks, was my 2nd Brigade, two regiments strong. Three regiments of the enemy advanced on them, and all three got pounded. My high dice rolling spree continued, and I crossed out lots of the opposition's circles. So many, in fact, that the three enemy regiments all crumbled to dust before my very eyes! The three regiments were annihilated because they took it upon themselves to advance, unsupported, on my defending troops. Consequently, while the opposition was advancing, I was firing. And all this time the enemy cavalry were in the background, not doing too much, except going "Tsk! Tsk! Tsk!", or sounds to that effect. At the end, General Valgus was left with a very beat-up cavalry brigade and two guns. A dice throw decided that his force would retreat four fields to the south, almost running them off the map. A good days work. For the most part, unlike the Lion's usual gambits of the past, I played a very conservative game ... it's got to be old age. Early on, I tried for a double action on the part of my 1st Brigade, trying to get to Nicholsville before the enemy, but after failing once (the percentage chance was 50%), I contented myself with single moves. I would institute two changes to the rules as played: First, return to the rules as outlined and the full percentage of (BFx10) as the chance of having a brigade obtain two actions. Halving it, which meant chances of 50% and less, just made it too risky for the players to attempt. The basic intent of the rule is to speed up the game, making the units more mobile, and decreasing the chance of success runs counter to this concept. Second, cavalry closed with infantry too easily. Another way of stating this is that the horsemen didn't get shot up enough when making a frontal charge on standing infantry. A solution we've used successfully in the past has been that if a cavalry unit moves into frontal contact with an opposing infantry line, then, when the Melee card is drawn, before the melee is resolved, the first procedure should be some sort of "stress morale" test for the cavalry at half their normal morale level. This makes it much more "chancy" that the cavalry will successfully close, without the need to increase the rate at which the horsemen take casualties from firepower. If the troopers fail their "stress morale" test, then back they go, losing a few circles. And, of course, if they do close for melee, the cavalry get a "plus 2" for an advantage in combat. The combination of the fixed and random sequences seemed to gell (coagulate?) with the card mix as described. There are six Morale cards and six Melee cards, and each turn, with four opportunities to draw there's just enough uncLrtainty to keep each side guessing. After a lot of experimentation, I've come to prefer this type of "open" sequence to the fixed type which mandates that "units that are hit will immediate test morale..." Here, one can take casualties and hope that, at least for the moment, the need for a morale test is bypassed. Back to PW Review October 1988 Table of Contents Back to PW Review List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1988 Wally Simon This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com